MTKO
is holding an ORB

I'm glad we've reached a middle ground. I kind of thought you'd put down quite a few of my points, but it's good to see that you understand where I'm coming from. And I'm glad you don't hate Brawl. I'm so tired of people online proclaiming it as the worst game ever and saying Sakurai is intentionally killing the Smash Bros. series when so much time and fan-input was put into the game. SSB64's competitive scene must've changed quite a bit since I last kept track of it. I heard about online tournaments picking up and the latest tier list ending in Link, Luigi, and Samus (Samus being bottom), but that's about it. As for SSB4 being competitive, it sounds like Sakurai is going to try to appeal to both competitive and casual Smashers based on him saying his staff will be more involved with balancing and him wanting to implement more co-op in the console version. Let's hope SSB4 has a good balance that'll satisfy the competitive players without leaving the casuals unable to keep up.

Sakurai and his staff tried so hard to make the game a dream come true for as many people as possible, yet so many people overlook all of the added characters, stages, modes, and hate on the changes that were made to make the free for all mode more enjoyable to a wider fanbase. I'm not angry about your personal dislike for Brawl (since you're quite civilized in explaining it to me, especially compared to people at GameFAQs), but it's kind of unfair to exclude it in a Smash Bros. thread just because people don't think it's as competitive.

Sure, the gameplay of Brawl may have deteriorated to you, but many of those changes were implemented to give everyone a more balanced playing field, rather than favouring the highly skilled ones while leaving the less skilled in the dust. Also, SSB64 technically never had a competitive scene, which is why its tier lists are solely based on the SBR's staffs opinions without tournament results (if they do have any, there's not many tournaments to base them off of). People can play Smash Bros. competitively if they want, but they should really keep in mind that it wasn't designed for that kind of play in the first place. That's why I find all the Brawl hate annoying, since many people hate it for not being as competitive when Smash Bros. wasn't meant to be competitive in the first place.

Also, Smash Bros was always supposed to be a simple and easy fighting game for everyone to be able to learn easily, hence why all regular moves are done with one button rather than having two kick and punch buttons and special moves are done from one button rather than having inputs like down forward punch or back forward kick. I know what you're talking about with the changes made in Brawl, especially the highly reduced hitstun making combos harder to do. But in a game series where most people will be doing free for alls and not one on ones, reduced hitstun is pretty much necessary to make sure that someone doesn't get constantly juggled and comboed by other players, and that they have a fair chance of getting out of combos.

I figured you weren't fond of Brawl, especially with all the talk about the competitive scene. Smash Bros. was never meant to be a competitive fighter, and to hate on Brawl because it isn't competitive and it's too simplified is quite unfair. Given elements like all stages having hazards in the original 64 versions (yeah, Dreamland's wind wasn't too bad, but that doesn't make it a completely neutral stage), items always showing up in most single player modes with no option to turn them off, and random factors in attacks like Luigi's Green Missile and Mr. Game & Watch's Judge, it shows that the randomness in Smash Bros is supposed to be a defining feature of the games.

So... any specific reason why you omitted Brawl from your Smash Bros. thread?

Your move