DLC 5 tournament

[Yoshiken]

My emotional reaction to Brawl + is strongly against with a touch of anger, though I don't know how much of that springs from the hack itself, and how much from the smug superiority I found on the forums when I was looking up info on it.  If it is available, I will likely give it a try.  But...  yeah.  Just can't like the thing right now.

Says it all for me, really. Sure, I hate that Brawl was slowed down, but... I hate the SSB community 'sometimes'. >.> Brawl is still a fun game normally, although I'd be happy with anything that isn't SSB. I can't go back to an SSB without smashes.
I'd love to see an SF game in there in some form, although no idea which. SC is always a good choice. Never been a huge Tekken/KoF fan and never played a GG/BB, although I didn't like the look of BB.

[OblivionKnight]

Marvel vs. Capcom 2. 

Take us for a ride, goddamnit!

(Note: Have not read anything else)

[Dark Holy Elf]

And of course, I loathe BlazBlue with a passion even before considering it was way too long for a fighting tournament. We finished two other games while it was going on!

(If you haven't figured out what Elfboy likes in his fighting games yet, you haven't been paying attention.)

[Meeplelard]

I'm honestly not a fan of Brawl+; having played it a bunch of times in school, the general consensus was that eventually everyone just went "Brawl is better" and we went back to playing that; the other agreement was "If we wanted faster gameplay, play Melee."

Excal and Yoshiken also summed up what I don't like about it in general.  There's also the fact that, as we just spoke about in chat the other day, apparently one of the thing about Brawl is people were jumping too quick to how things actually are, and not actually bothering to figure out true mechanics, assuming too many similarities to Melee.  This was brought in how much the Tier Lists have changed recently cause suddenly there are character traits that people totally overlooked that apparently help a lot.

Faster Matches, admittedly, are better for tournaments, but from my perspective, that's the only advantage Brawl+ has over Brawl.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I don't really see how a community's arrogance or its failure to pick things up for tier purposes has any effect on how fun a game is, but whatever. If it's not worth having a Smash game because people will bring up INTERNET DRAMA then so be it.

Also for Marvel vs. Capcom 2 since I think it's a pretty widely-played/known fighter we haven't touched yet.

[Excal]

Well, as you may recall, we were asked for our feelings.  And yes, actually, the way the guys who made the thing act do matter somewhat, because if thinking of something angers, or just wills you with antipathy out of simply connecting the two, then it weakens the product.  I mean, if the guys behind LFT were a couple of jackasses who thought that anyone still liking the old FFT were ass-backwards retarded, I'd be far less favourable towards the whole thing.

Then again, I also don't value speed quite as much in a fighter, so I suspect I'm not really in the Brawl + target audience anyways.

[Luther Lansfeld]

If I am running it I basically will not use Blazblue; I wasn't really enamored with it and t's loooong which I feel like is a serious concern. I spent all my time pacing around hoping it would end soon.

[metroid composite]

My emotional reaction to Brawl + is strongly against with a touch of anger, though I don't know how much of that springs from the hack itself, and how much from the smug superiority I found on the forums when I was looking up info on it.  If it is available, I will likely give it a try.  But...  yeah.  Just can't like the thing right now.

Well...that was my reaction before trying it and looking at what the changes really were.  Actually I should probably explain the entire family of major Brawl hacks:

vB = "Vanilla Brawl"
Melee 2.0 = "Melee 2.0": Let's make Brawl exactly like Melee, by adding Wavedashing and L-Cancelling!!1!1
BB = "Balanced Brawl": Keep everything from Brawl including the slow speed and the infinite combos, just make characters balanced.
B+ = "Brawl Plus": Let's just make a fun game, and don't try to reproduce any past game.
PSA = "Project Smash Attacks": Let's create completely new characters (note: every single one of them that I know of is overpowered >_>)

The really stupid elitists actually tend to rally for Melee 2.0, and when they realize nobody cares about their project anymore, rally for making Brawl+ into Melee 2.0.  They get shunned by the B+ community generally (which makes me happy).  A similar sort of thing happens when the Balanced Brawl people try and tell B+ people that Brawl was perfect, and they shouldn't be messing with the formula.

So...eh, B+ really doesn't strike me as the elitist hack.  There's lots of opportunities they had to be elitist (they could have inserted manual L-Cancelling) where they opted to not be elitist.  They aren't wearing blinders of "Game X was perfect we should make it exactly like that."  Granted, there are elitists who play Brawl+, but the design actually seems fairly grounded in good logic.

[Tide]

Marvel vs. Capcom 2. 

Take us for a ride, goddamnit!

(Note: Have not read anything else)

Possibly best idea in this topic! >_> <_< We can even Hatbot teams for great YESZness

On topic: My two cents for Brawl+

Okay, I should probably explain what B+ is.  By and large LFT for Brawl.

Eh...I really don't think this is an appropriate comparison between the two. LFT was a complete rebalance hack. Brawl+...from what I heard started off as a rebalance mod. Then I read some of the changes which made me go, "How is this different from melee" only to realize it isn't. It's more Melee on the Wii instead of Brawl itself. With the biggest comments coming from people, "I want to play with brawl characters using the melee engine" when asked why they even play Brawl+. Turn off 1. Then another thing that made me raise an eyebrow early on was how the rebalance changes were made identical to Melee even though there's really no reason to (speeding up C. Falcon's jump is one example. Also, I read that his sweet spot for the ledge got reduced even more than other characters getting their sweet spots for ledge reduced). This was a while back though, so who knows - it mgiht have change, reasons for changing might be different...etc.

The fact that no one else would have gotten a copy for it (and hence any practice) before hand is another thing that irks me against it. It'll be difficult for regular brawl players to quickly adapt when some of the things they changed would become different and diffuclt to adapt to on the fly. So yeah, I really dislike the idea and probably wouldn't play Brawl+ at all. As Meeple put it, just play Melee if you want a faster Brawl.

Addressing some other concerns:
- Dissidia. The biggest problem that Meeple brings up is regarding viewership. Now, I do know of a solution. It's not a *good* solution, but its there. The problem lies in having enough TVs. Newer models of the PSP apparently have the ability to connect directly and play on console. I checked here in Hong Kong since I wanted to play XF and Power Stone on the big TV, and yeah, they sell cables for it. How much? No clue in the states. It's 100 bucks here in Hong Kong, which is roughly 13 Canadian or so. Basically take 2 PSPs, connect them to separate TVs, start Lan matches. Voila. Players still play on the PSP. If people seriously persist, they can consider doing this.

Personally, I would be looking forward to playing MBAC since its the version of MB I play ( ). I would've thought people bringing PCs or laptops would allow a tourney to run using AC >.> Oh wells.

[Excal]

Like I said, I'll give it a try at the con.  But I'm not about to mod my Wii, and I can't see the Elf doing so for Brawl, so I suspect I won't really have any impetus to change that reaction until then.

Tide: It's about $20 Canadian for those cables.

[Meeplelard]

For the PSP thing, this is more curiosity rather than "OH! DISSIDIA IS NOW LEGIT!" statement, is ti a direct to TV, or do you hook it up to a console and then play from there (obviously, a PS3 would work if the latter, but question is would a PS2?  Then again, its possible we'd have PS3's there but again, this is more a curiosity thing rather than an actual "lets play Dissidia at the tourney!

Just cause I bring it up, might as well say it:

Dissidia matches vary widely on length.  They can range from about a minute long to something much longer.  It depends on a number of factors; a match where Emperor wins usually takes forever, where as a match where Squall wins can end pretty damn quickly.

The fact that Dissidia has only a few players, and the system is *NOT* intuitive "Pick up and play immediately" ala a lot of fighters, it lends itself to being a poor tourney game; the varying match size is probably more a hindrance than a plus.

At least English Dissidia does rule out the Competitive Pokemon problem of "You must raise characters!", as we can just rule that everyone play Arcade Mode variants  (preset levels, equips, and skillsets...basically, it sets the game up more like a general fighter rather than a Fighter RPG Hybrid), but yeah, that alone isn't enough.


OH, Tide's thing does bring up a different problem:
You'd need 2 TVs for every game, unless everyone wanted to see the game from only one person's perspective.  So either spectators miss out on half hte match (though if people don't care about this, this can be ignored), or we have half the fights going on at once.  And if we get two people unfamiliar with the system fighting each other, the match could take forever, due to the Brave/HP Attack system (where as Vet vs. Rookie would end really damned fast, while Vet vs. Vet really comes down to the point I mentioned above about it depending on a number of factors.)

...yeah, I don't think Dissidia in the Tourney is a good idea.

I also agree with Ciato that Blazblue isn't a good idea on grounds that the tourney took forever.  I was watching the game being played recently at school, and just sitting in line that was basically 2 people in front of me, it took forever to finally sit down and play.  Brawl matches were about as long, and they involved 4 People, so up to 3 new players at once (we do the usual "Winner stays on, loser(s) trade places when applicable.")  It says something that SOul Calibur matches, with their 3/5 standards (vs. 2/3) seemed to take less time too.

[Tide]

Meeple: It's a direct port to the TV AFAIK. I didn't check though since my PSP can't use the cable, which basically means I have to buy another PSP if I wanted to play on the big TV. And that's just lol.

And yeah, that's the main weakness - matches are basically going to go twice as slow because now you need *2* TVs for every match. Unless people want to carrying more TVs, its basically going to be slow. This seems to be MC (and the tourney in general)'s big concern, so it has problems. My point is just that if for whatever reason people *INSIST* here's how you do it.

EDIT: Almost forgot. You can also consider POWER STONE 1 or 2. Although I am a) pretty sure there is low playership b) requires a Dreamcast and most of those things are dead by now. On the up side? It's a very newbie friendly game and not overly complicated (ie: Skill peak is pretty low). Matches should also be fairly fast since you can adjust Power Stones/Items/Damage levels which can greatly speed up matches.

[metroid composite]

although I'd be happy with anything that isn't SSB. I can't go back to an SSB without smashes.

SSB has smashes.  ...Are you talking about the C-Stick controls for smashes?

Marvel vs. Capcom 2.  

Take us for a ride, goddamnit!

Hmm...I have some time concerns...let's see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFXTB0Sq3Wk
Character select starts at 1:00, and it's 50 seconds before we even get into a match.  Match itself isn't that long--about 1:30 (time out).  Next match starts at 4:00, character select is done at about 4:45.  Match itself was about 1:30 (time out).

Okay, well I guess it might depends on whether or not people want to turn off that match timer.  Long character select but short matches (thanks to the timer) probably make that about equivalent to a 2:00 match.  If we put time on infinite, though...among other things you do a lot less damage in MvC2 if you don't know what you're doing.

"If we wanted faster gameplay, play Melee."

That's another option.  Supposing we are aiming for a faster smash game, would people prefer Melee? B+? SSB64?  Match length for all of these games is pretty similar, so it really just comes down to what people would like more.

Then another thing that made me raise an eyebrow early on was how the rebalance changes were made identical to Melee even though there's really no reason to.... This was a while back though, so who knows - it mgiht have change, reasons for changing might be different...etc.

I...think the direction has changed to some degree, yeah.  I didn't see the game early, but looking at the physics numbers now the changes are actually more in the direction of SSB64 than anything else.  Like the hitstun constant is 4.0 for melee, 4.0 for Brawl, something like 5.0 for SSB64, and 4.8 for B+.  (And I don't think there was a single person who was intentionally trying to make a game like SSB64, it's more that gradual tuning ended up drifting it in that direction).

[Yoshiken]

although I'd be happy with anything that isn't SSB. I can't go back to an SSB without smashes.

SSB has smashes.  ...Are you talking about the C-Stick controls for smashes?

...Gah. Not sure why I said Smashes. I meant the tap attacks. (IIRC, it doesn't have those? Has been a long time since I played it, admittedly.)

[Grefter]

That's another option.  Supposing we are aiming for a faster smash game, would people prefer Melee? B+? SSB64?  Match length for all of these games is pretty similar, so it really just comes down to what people would like more.

Or just not play Smash anything because that shit is tired and played out into infinity and the games suck big fat donkey dicks in tournaments (and in general of course).

[metroid composite]

although I'd be happy with anything that isn't SSB. I can't go back to an SSB without smashes.

SSB has smashes.  ...Are you talking about the C-Stick controls for smashes?

...Gah. Not sure why I said Smashes. I meant the tap attacks. (IIRC, it doesn't have those? Has been a long time since I played it, admittedly.)

SSB original has...

4 B-Moves (doesn't have the fifth B-while-holding-still move, but does have up-B moves being different on ground/air)
Neutral A Jab
3 tilt A moves
3 smash A moves
5 areal moves (up down left right neutral)
2 ledge attacks (depending on percentage)
1 Dash attack +2 options out of a dash (Granted, much like SSBM you have to jump-cancel if you want to upsmash or ground up-B; Brawl and its hacks are more sensible about this)
1 grab (rather than two.  if you are dashing and grab, you will just stop in place and do a standing grab, instead of a separate running grab animation.  If you try to grab in the air, you'll just kick, unlike Brawl where some people still Hookshot, etc).
No way to grab items while you jump (Melee had that on R, Brawl and its hacks have that on A)
2 throws (down from 4.  only left and right instead of left, right, up, down).
0 pummels (down from 1. can't beat people when you've grabbed them).
0 Ground Dodge (down from 1).
0 Air Dodge (down from 1).

So...really, it's not missing much attack-wise.  (Missing lots character-wise, defence-maneuver wise, and has some absurd mechanics like 100% reduction L-Cancels).

That's another option.  Supposing we are aiming for a faster smash game, would people prefer Melee? B+? SSB64?  Match length for all of these games is pretty similar, so it really just comes down to what people would like more.

Or just not play Smash anything because that shit is tired and played out into infinity and the games suck big fat donkey dicks in tournaments (and in general of course).

Well...DLC2 had some really exciting Smash matches, so it worked well in tournaments two years ago....

Though sure, "give smash a rest this year" is an option I am definitely open to.  (If there's other games we really want to make time for, and are more excited about than we are about playing Smash in a tournament for the third time straight, then...sure).

[Cotigo]

I don't really see how a community's arrogance or its failure to pick things up for tier purposes has any effect on how fun a game is, but whatever.

Well, do you think LFT would be a good hack if Laggy wasn't totally familiar with the game's mechanics?  The fact that they altered characters' moves without knowing full well how it alters the character balance (IE, they may take out a really good move that got overlooked and replacing it with a more obviously good but ultimately less useful attack) is enough for me to write off the hack, really.  If you don't fully know how the game works then you shouldn't be making arbitrary, sweeping changes to the gameplay.

On that note, I really don't get the big deal about Brawl being slowed down.  It is, sure, but it's not even that bloody noticeable unless you played Melee immediately beforehand.  It's still a damn fast paced game most of the time.

[Taishyr]

I'd approve of giving Smash a rest in the tourney, from the "perennial spectator" position - it's a fun party game but I found myself not interested in watching the one on one matches.

[metroid composite]

Well, do you think LFT would be a good hack if Laggy wasn't totally familiar with the game's mechanics?  The fact that they altered characters' moves without knowing full well how it alters the character balance (IE, they may take out a really good move that got overlooked and replacing it with a more obviously good but ultimately less useful attack) is enough for me to write off the hack, really.  If you don't fully know how the game works then you shouldn't be making arbitrary, sweeping changes to the gameplay.

For starters, I would say we actually don't have a 100% perfect understanding of everything in FFT.  This is how we, for example, horribly broke Last Dance for a while there (and nobody caught on because they're just as used to the old metagame as we are).

Anyhow, so as I understand this objection, the Brawl tier list has changed recently, as people learned more about the game.  *glances at most recent Brawl tier list*.  Okay, a few comments:

1. There...hasn't been a Brawl tier list update in like...six months, and the past tier list change wasn't that extreme--mostly mid-tier characters moving down as people realized just how few options they have against good characters.
2. Melee's tier list has updated within the past year.  SSB64's tier list has updated more recently than Brawl.  In Starcraft, Protoss went from being the worst race to best race not all that long ago (either 2008 or 2009).  Metagames change.  This isn't unique to Brawl.
3. The Alpha build of Brawl+ was like...three months ago, long after the most recent Brawl tier list and with more than enough time to account for any new mechanics discoveries.

I dunno, changing metagames and newly discovered glitches seems like a terrible reason to argue against rebalancing a game.  Starcraft went through several rebalancing modifications for the first several years of its life.  Magic the Gathering regularly bans cards, or unbans them when the players point out that the card is no longer as useful due to newly discovered strategies.  More to the point: who in the DL actually uses these exploits?  I mean, I know I was the only person who even wavedashed in melee, and most of the brawl exploits are a hell of a lot more technical than wavedashing.



That said, you're speaking very generally, so I'm really just guessing as to what you're actually talking about.  If you want to give me an example of something that the B+ team did not take into account and very clearly should have, I'd definitely be interested.

[Meeplelard]

I wouldn't be adverse to No Smash for once, but at the same time, feels like the game is generally a staple in these kinds of things *shrugs*

We could just go and do SSB64, since we didn't play that at either con, but then, that game feels so dated compared to Melee/Brawl, so I dunno; feels like one of Melee or Brawl should be in.  I'd rather play Melee than Brawl+, mostly cause people are familiar with Melee, and Brawl+ didn't exactly enhance Brawl for me, so if we wanted "Faster gameplay", I'd just prefer going with Melee rather than an altered Brawl.

With regards to Dissidia...
If people don't mind seeing only half of the match (or rather, the fight from one person's perspective, cause you can see a good deal of the match from one perspective), then we wouldn't need twice the TVs.  That doesn't rule out the factors I mentioned above, the big one being 2 people unfamiliar with the game can make matches take forever.  Again, Dissidia is not a "Pick up and play" friendly game; you need actual experience with it to find it enjoyable, and its system takes time to learn.  This is fine for casual purposes, but for a tourney, it'll probably have the reaction Ciato had, even if the game is stylish as hell.

Also, I do want to say this:
I am against both MvC2 and TvC being in the same tourney.  Now, what I mean is, having one or the other is fine; having both? Not so much.  Its the same basic fighting game style, so yeah.  I'd prefer variety in the Tournaments.

Which we choose, I'm pretty benign too; thinking MvC2 might be better on grounds of familiarity, both with the character recognizability (Marvel Characters vs. Random Anime Characters that made people think the game might not be localized, gee, I wonder!), which matters for novelty mainly, and just for familiarity with the game itself; I'm sure more people know how MvC2 functions and how characters play contrast to TvC.

That, and MvC2 has the REAL Mega Man, not the MML version that only a select few DLers care about <.<  Then again, TvC has a lack of Resident Evil Jill <_< >_>

Edit: Oh yeah, one more thing...

We need not be entirely Fighting games.  I'm sure having some form of Mario Kart in the mix, even doing it 4 player style if only to speed ti up (how we determine who moves on, whether its "Winner only" or do a round robin point allocation, hard to say) might not be a bad idea, if only for varieties sake.

That reminds me, an alternative way to handle Smash:
Do 4 player matches in earlier rounds.  It'd make for a new take on the same game, rather than the same old 1v1.  At least this way, people can have the aspect of Politics and general insanity applied in some manner.  You don't have to play based on STANDARD TOURNEY RULE PLAY after all.  Depending on style of Moving on, be it single elim, double elim, point style, etc, this could take longer, shorter, or same amount of time but just be more psychotic and amusing to watch <.<

[Xeroma]

TvC has Zero you silly. We could get X4 quotes!

[metroid composite]

Also, I do want to say this:
I am against both MvC2 and TvC being in the same tourney.  Now, what I mean is, having one or the other is fine; having both? Not so much.  Its the same basic fighting game style, so yeah.  I'd prefer variety in the Tournaments.

Which we choose, I'm pretty benign too; thinking MvC2 might be better on grounds of familiarity, both with the character recognizability (Marvel Characters vs. Random Anime Characters that made people think the game might not be localized, gee, I wonder!), which matters for novelty mainly, and just for familiarity with the game itself; I'm sure more people know how MvC2 functions and how characters play contrast to TvC.

That, and MvC2 has the REAL Mega Man, not the MML version that only a select few DLers care about <.<  Then again, TvC has a lack of Resident Evil Jill <_< >_>

Yeah, I'm definitely in agreement about not having both MvC2 and TvC--actually I should probably go edit the first page to add "no two games of the same series have been in the same tournament."--forgot about that one somehow.

And yes, MvC2 seems like a better choice than TvC.  Lots of enthusiasm (whereas I've seen almost none for TvC).  Big popular game from the past.  Matches look like they're faster (assuming we're leaving the match timer on).

[Meeplelard]

TvC has Zero you silly. We could get X4 quotes!

I see your Zero and raise you a Dan.

[Cotigo]

That said, you're speaking very generally, so I'm really just guessing as to what you're actually talking about.  If you want to give me an example of something that the B+ team did not take into account and very clearly should have, I'd definitely be interested.

I'm speaking generally because I honestly have no clue what the B+ team changed exactly.  However, I am sick an tired of whiny shitheads on the internet bitching that Brawl isn't Melee.  It isn't, fucking get over it.  The characters changed, the glitches are different, and for a damn good reason--had they just released Melee 2 there would be a lot of other people bitching about dropping the 60 bucks when they could have just stuck to playing Melee in the first place.  Altering the game, changing characters' movesets, etc., in the name of making it more like Melee is fucking stupid and a waste of time.

It sounds like the B+ crew is at least aware of how much turning the game into a carbon copy of Melee is a bad idea, but I can't imagine that the alterations weren't at some level designed to make the game resemble its prequel.  And that is enough to write the hack off as trash as far as I'm concerned.

[Dhyerwolf]

The fact that Dissidia has only a few players, and the system is *NOT* intuitive "Pick up and play immediately" ala a lot of fighters, it lends itself to being a poor tourney game; the varying match size is probably more a hindrance than a plus.

Some version of Smash has been in every tourney though! But I like the idea of 4 player Smash if we have to have it.