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Friday 25 January, 2008
SUPER SMASH BROTHERS
LOG#2
GAMEPLAY: Although the 1P mode of Smash Bros gets stale somewhat quickly, the versus mode gives Smash Brothers 64 infinite replay value, as playing against other people (and even playing against bots) gives the player the ability to create a large variety of different scenarios. Smash Bros has been about the multi-player battles, and playing against another person never gets old. Versus mode comes in many modes. In Time Mode, the character who kills the most wins. In stock mode, each character gets a given amount of lives, and whoever is left living wins. Items, when are various weapons/recovery items/bombs, can be set to spawn from none to very high, and you can even customize which items can be turned on and off.
The best thing about versus mode is that it can be pure, utter, chaos. With 4 players and items turned on, you have no idea who is going to come out on top. With bombs, pokeballs, koopa shells, guns, recovery hearts, and weapons spawning in random places around the map, if a player who is behind gets the right weapons, they can turn the game around and win. If the infamous giant hammer spawns, whoever picks it up first goes into a giant hammer frenzy. The music changes into circus music, and every player left tries to desperately get away from this overpowered giant hammer that deals massive damage and knockback. As one can imagine, the downside to items is that victory is not necesarrily determined by skill. The upside is that players of different skill levels all have the opportunity to win if the items go their way.
While playing with other people is the most fun, you can also fight against bots to improve your skill. The AI ranges from 1-9, and is a very good fight until you find and exploit its weaknesses. Nevertheless, I was content playing against the bots so that I would become good enough to beat my friends.
DESIGN: Smash Bros. succeeds where other fighters fail in its brilliant design. The problem with Tekken, Virtua Fighter, Soul Caliber, etc is that it requires players to memorize complex button inputs and combos. It expects the player to spend countless hours memorizing difficult special attacks, and these games like to boast their complicated fighting and blocking maneuvers. The complexity is bad because it turns off most new players, and even those like me spend hours learning the mechanics get frustrated with useless combos and unbalanced characters.
Smash bros's fighting system is so simple I can explain it right now. A = normal attack, B = special attack, yellow buttons = jump, L/R = sheild, and trigger = grab. There are no confusing combos to memorize and no advanced dodging/countering systems to learn. The attacks are designed in a very intuitive way, because they are based on how hard you hit the control stick. Tilting the control stick while hitting A will produce a weak yet fast attack. Smashing the control stick while hitting A will produce a powerful smash attack, useful for finishing off opponents. The air and on the ground, you can attack in any direction just by using the control stick. B attacks are special attacks, such as projectiles, which are especially unique to each character. Although the system is simple, it takes much practice to master Smash Bros. Shields Block Attacks, Grabs beat Shields, and Attacks beat Grabs. Knowing when to do what is key.
Furthermore, the fighters in Smash Bros are surprisingly balanced. The powerful Donkey Kong is hampered by slow movement and a giant hitbox, while the small fox has weaker attacks but greater speed. Link has great range and a plethora of projectiles, but has a horrible recovery. No characters are overpowered (not even Kirby!), some are simply harder to master. Spamming projectiles doesn't work due to the layout of the stages, and also using projectiles leaves one vulnerable to attack. Overall, compared to most fighting games, Smash Bros provides fair, balanced gameplay with any character. Although SSB might not have as much content as other fighters, its revolutionary gameplay lead it and its sequel to become instant Nintendo classics.
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