The Dual layered nature of Super Smash Bros.

The dual layered nature of Super Smash Bros.

A comical, but amusingly accurate representation of dual-layered design in Smash Bros.

When observed at face value, Super Smash Bros. is most often described as a party game. The general consumer sees it as an opportunity to pick up their favourite Nintendo character and duke it out in a chaotic environment. Random elements such as items and stage hazards contribute to making battles unpredictable. Adding to that unpredictability is the possibility of 4 player free for all matches, where pretty much anything can happen. It can cater to a style of fun that I like to refer as “On the couch fun”. It is less engaging, but it is very much a laid-back social experience. The game is not taken seriously, but it is enjoyed as a nice distraction. The average new smasher will generally get to know and experience this style of play first because this is the game’s default setting.

However, a subset of players that was very passionate about the game decided to take the gameplay a step further. One element of Super Smash Bros. that many seem to forget to mention is competition. Even at its default chaotic settings, matches end with a clear winner. Someone is standing triumphantly in the foreground of the victory screen while the rest clap for the winner in the background even at non-competitive levels; you still strive to be victorious.

More competitively-oriented players, out of desire to have a more definite clash of skill have decided to reduce the chaos in favour of a more leveled playing field. Thanks to in-game options, they were able to adapt the games to their needs and play without random interference from items and match-changing stage-hazards.

Why reduce randomness?:

It took a long time for the community to agree on what was considered fair, and just for Melee alone, we even used to have debates on whether items should be permitted in tournaments or not. We have chosen to remove their use due to how they are randomly-generated on the playing field, and on how polarizing of an effect they can have on a match. When a bob-omb is set to appear right in front of your character while you are in the middle of an attack, no amount of skill or probability-calculation can save you. It will blow up on you, and you will gain a disadvantage, sometimes, a very major one. While playing with items can be very fun, it has no place in a tournament setting.

 

Random tripping, a mechanic that is infamous in both competitive and party play. This reduces Brawl's ability to be a legitimate a competitive game.

In terms of stage-selection, the current rulesets we use for Smash in general has players begin on a “neutral stage”. These are a group of stages that confer less polarizing advantages to specific characters. There are several to choose from, and both playing parties go through a stage-striking process. That allows one side to ban a stage that is to their disadvantage, then the other side to do the same, and go back and forth until they reach a commonly agreed-upon stage. It allows both players to get rid of stages that they feel would put them at too much of a disadvantage, reaching an acceptable middle ground between players. After the first match, the loser chooses the next arena. In a set of 3, if Player A beats Player B, Player B chooses the next stage. If Player B wins, then Player A chooses next. If Player A wins, he won 2 out of three matches and is declared the victor.

This is balanced because even if one player wins due to stage advantage, the other player can retaliate with a stage advantage of his own.

Competitive smashers have chosen to reduce random occurrences because when playing to figure out who is the best player around, it would be a shame for the outcome of a close match to be influenced by unforeseeable factors.

Why compete?

In my case, I started off as a party smasher. I played many free for all matches with items on. I was very passionate about this series and played it quite a bit. I eventually gained some degree of skill which made me noticeably better than my friends at the time. This was merely a result of my playing the game much more than they did and being more passionate about it than they were. I reached a point where the gap in skill and interest between my friends and I had become quite wide. I wanted to play more, but they wanted to play other games as well, and that was quite understandable. They also did not have the drive to improve at it, while I had figured out very basic things like short-hopping and fast-falling, but I had never gone to smashboards, so techniques like L-cancelling that would have allowed me to truly capitalize on that knowledge were beyond my knowledge at that point.

Nevertheless, I wanted to keep playing it, and at some point, I went to a Smash event at a convention and I learned how little I actually knew about that game. I would see players move in innovative ways. I asked someone there how he managed to move that way, and he explained L-canceling to me. He then guided me to Smashboards and told me to start reading up on advanced techniques guides; stressing on how it really helped him get better. I listened to the young man’s advice and I was enlightened by just how much deeper this game was. It had revitalized Super Smash Bros. for me.

When I thought that I had reached my challenge ceiling, I was given an infinite source of new challenges and new play styles to clash against. I was given an opportunity to meet people with similar interests and get more mileage out of my favourite game of the time, until Project M replaced it a decade later.

Love for the game:

Picture taken from a Super Smash Bros. Melee tournament.

Smashers all have different origin stories, but my story is very typical. Competitive smashers often began to play the way they do because they loved the game so much that they felt compelled to take it to the next level. There is a strange misconception that competitive smashers take the game seriously to the point of losing sight of the fun. However, it would be more true to state that competitions are their means of keeping the fun alive.

Human beings avoid pain and seek pleasure. It’s a generally accepted rule of science, and we share this trait with most of the animal kingdom. When pain is not avoided, it is because the perceived reward is greater. Competitive smashers are not miserable. They are having fun in their own way. While it is completely legitimate to take a laid back approach to playing Super Smash Bros., there is something to be said about the exhilarating rush of a very close match between two evenly-matched players. Playing while feeling that one mistake could cost you the game, and that you are always on the ropes adds a level of excitement that one would never get from playing Smash as a party game. The rush could be compared to a runner’s high.

While competitive combat is taxing both mentally and even physically due to the heavy pressure game and high levels of concentration and reflexes that this game demands at high levels, it is stimulating. People keep coming back to tournaments because they have a lot of fun. Often, when they are not playing bracket matches, tournament players will take that time to seek out players they want to play with, or even seek out random players they don’t know and play friendly matches together. Players who were eliminated will often stay the entire time just to be spectators for the finals.

Competitive smashers seek out new challengers because each human player has his or her own unique play style. Each match is a fresh new puzzle to solve. Fighting one person’s Marth is completely different than fighting another person’s Marth. For example, if you know a players and you watch a video with just their gameplay, you should be able to tell if it is them from the gameplay style alone. This ties to the next topic.

 

Expressing oneself:

Super Smash Bros. is unique, not only due to its platformer influences, but also because it gives the players an incredibly extensive amount of control on their character’s mobility. You can run, jump dodge, shield, roll, wavedash, jump a second time, fall faster, short hop, dash dance, DI (Directional influence), etc... This game lends itself incredibly well to self-expression. A Smash character becomes an extension of yourself, and in more responsive games like Melee and Project M, it truly feels as if your character moves on command.

A really technical player can input around seven separate commands in a second, which allows for incredibly elaborate combo setups. However, some players are more mindgame-oriented, and use their mobility to ensnare opponents into moving into their setups. Some are innovators who create new ways to approach combat. Other players are naturals that play solely on instinct. Some also have a mixture of some or all of these elements. The key point here is that there is more than one way to play this game effectively. Watching someone play and comparing that gameplay to their baseline level of play tells you a lot about their psychology. One with enough knowledge can tell how confident the other player is, their level of stress, how aggressive they are, their reticence, if they are distracted, etc... mindgames players use these cues with great efficiency.

Players will often claim some level of “ownership” to their characters and identify with them. You often hear things like “My character”, very often at events. Players often don’t notice, but their characters become an extension of their self. “Roy main” is now part of my identity as a smasher. 

Let us also not forget that many of us are also Nintendo fans and pick up characters based on the affection we have for them. 

 I would main this guy.

Intrinsic motivation:

Sometimes, the act of engaging in something can be its own motivator. For instances, if you play a game and you are having fun, the fact that it is fun is motivating by itself and it encourages you to engage in that activity some more. Intrinsic motivation has much to do with continuous party smashing, but when we bring it competitive smash, there are several aspects in which we utilize this concept.

That guy was motivated to learn and thus learned more effectively.

The first aspect is the same as party smashers. Competitive smash is engaging, and that is a good motivator by itself. However, the second reason is most prominent in the competitive environment: Mastery. The process of improving at a task can be a motivator on its own. For instances, just the concept of learning a new technique, seeing it in action and realizing that you are a better player because of that can be a great motivating force. It fosters a great deal of pride in the individual who is sharpening his skills. When competing, you also have a whole catalogue of other players to compare your performance to. For instances, let us say that Player A is not as good as Player B and he knows it. However, he meets Player B again later in a tournament and barely manages to snatch victory away from him. Through the use of comparison, Player A reasons that he has improved, and he is proud of his achievement. This model would even work if Player A had narrowly lost to Player B. While he did still lose, the match was much closer that time around and he feels good about himself because he can see that he has improved. In a sense, you could say that for these people, just playing the game and getting progressively better over time is rewarding.

Community:

It is common knowledge that human beings have a need to belong. Smashboards can be seen as a sort of hub where passionate Super Smash Bros. players can discuss about that said passion. People also use that communication platform to organize tournaments and other events such as smashfests. These are our opportunities to meet these people that we have been talking to for a while. However, it is also a good opportunity to meet people you’ve never even spoken to directly. For instances, when I went to the latest Polybash, I met Sprawlers, a very nice person who traveled all the way from Boston to participate in the Project M tournament over here in Montreal. We hung out, played a few Roy dittos and kept in touch. This happens to me all of the time. I meet individuals that I would never have met otherwise and build connections with them.

Picture taken from my trip to Virginia with fellow Project M developers and playtesters.

The Smash community is special in that it is very open, unusually so. As I walk around venues, I observe experienced smashers helping newer contestants hone their skills. I see random people walk up to each other and ask “Can I play with you?”, sit down, and have a good time. I’ve even seen smashers support each others on a very deep, personal level. For many, this community has served as a confidence booster, or even a second family. The truth is that at events such as these, we are brought together by a common trait: Our love for Super Smash Bros.

If you ever went to a convention, you know what I am talking about. People are friendlier, more open for dialogue. It’s a festive environment. For all of the serious thought that goes into playing this game competitively, there is a clear celebration of this part of our identity going on. We are smashers, and we are proud of it, together.

Challenge:

Human beings tend to be motivated with challenge, but that challenge has to be moderately difficult and the player must believe in his chances of success. The reason games like Dark Souls have achieved success is because it understood that while a game can be challenging, it must always give you the impression that you are progressing bit by bit. For instances, through your repeated failures, you gather souls, which you can use to strengthen your character. You also gain more knowledge of the terrain and enemies you encounter, and thus you end up progressing farther each time until you succeed. However, games that simply offer no real challenge or goal like Wii Music are bound to fail.

 

Sun bros at the best.

The Player is not engaged because he or she knows that they don’t have to provide any kind of effort. Games like Kirby’s Epic Yarn have a clear goal, but they are mind-numbingly easy to achieve and provide sub-optimal challenge that keeps you from achieving the level of engagement that a challenging game would. Then again, a game that is punishing as opposed to challenging, like Battletoads makes the player eventually lose their hopes of improving to a point where they can see the possibility of some progress, and they will simply give up. For most games, difficulty settings help alleviate some of those issues, but for fighting games, it can be a hard issue to tackle. Traditional fighters often have an unusually high skill floor to even play the game semi-effectively. Exceptions exist like Persona 4 Arena, which anyone first getting into traditional fighting games should try, but as a general rule, it is very difficult to approach competitive fighters as a newcomer. Only the most motivated will keep on playing.

Super Smash Bros. has a very low skill floor for party play. It is easy to approach, and the basic commands are easy to understand. This makes the transition between party to competitive gameplay much easier, as simply having good mastery over the basics facilitates the learning of advanced techniques. Furthermore, Super Smash Bros. has a high skill ceiling, meaning that one can grow as a player for a very long time. One could argue that no one has ever truly reached the peak of competitive Smash Bros yet. After all, Melee keeps evolving even after more than a decade and Project M has just begun to blossom into a new scene, waiting to be explored further. The key thing to remember here is that with an infinite amount of possible growth, players have incentives to continue improving further and further. The challenge level is not static. Rather, the player has new and exciting challenges every time they meet new players. They can also challenge themselves to improve. They will never run out of challenges because they can infinitely learn and improve. Some will grow faster than others, but it is the possibility of growth alone that acts as the motivator to keep on playing.

Excellent Roy player and esteemed Project M co-worker Sethlon has made this comment when we were discussing why he chose to play competitively:

.

 He has the ph1re.

“I've always had a competitive drive. I grew up playing Tekken with my older brother, and I took smash fairly seriously from the get go. I hadn't really tried to get into any truly competitive game at that point in time, so it didn't really matter to me that Smash was "outside of the norm" as far as competitive fighters go. Once I stumbled on to the combo video Shined Blind and saw the technical stuff that you could do in the game, all the different movement and combos and edgeguarding, I immediately knew that I wanted to explore the game to its depths and be able to do that sort of stuff.”

His inherent need for a compelling competitive experience was very clear. He wanted to challenge himself simply because he enjoyed doing so. The challenge motivates him, and being famous for his impressive Roy skills demonstrates that winning was never his prime objective. After all, Roy was not a very viable character in Melee. Nevertheless, he took him farther than many even thought was possible. While he played to win, winning would lose all of its significance if it was at the expense of fun.

Justifying the dual nature of Smash Bros.

The right way to play and accessible depth:

 It's all about the glory.

When I discuss Super Smash Bros. with others who are less competitively-inclined, I get mixed responses. I have individuals who deeply respect my mediocre competitive skills, while others approach my gameplay style with borderline vitriol. As a curious individual, I like to ask the reason for that vitriol, and the response I hear most often is “You are not playing the game right”, or “This is not how this game was meant to be played”. I’ve asked these same people some time later how they felt about Zelda Ocarina of Time speedruns using glitches, and they responded favourably, some stating that is was silly, but really fun to do. I asked again about their feelings on competitive smash, and they responded the same as they did months ago. This shocked me as both speedruns and competitive smash use exploits to their ends. One could also argue that one is not supposed to skip important flags in Ocarina of Time, and thus, they are not playing it the way it was meant to be played. Why did they consider it right for Zelda, but not for Smash Bros.? I pondered on that idea for a while and expanded my line of questioning to other fighting games, and I could never get the same response. Then, as I played The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword and commented on IGN about my dislike of the motion controls model, I was met with a similar kind of vitriol. Some comments alluded to the idea that Nintendo knew best how we should enjoy their games and that my opinion was “wrong” because it didn’t agree with Nintendo’s design sensibilities. I’ve read comments on articles on Nintendo-centric websites as well as Miiverse to verify my claims, and realized what was truly going on: There is a rampant “Nintendo knows best” attitude among less critical Nintendo fans.

Just like how competitive smash has become a part of our identity, being a Nintendo fan has become a part of some people’s identities. Just like how we feel that we must defend what we do and enjoy when our community is under attack, Nintendo’s less critical fans feel attacks to Nintendo as personal attacks. The idea that Smashers might play the game differently than what they believe to be the right way (default settings) to play Super Smash Bros. feels almost like desecrating a masterpiece. This behaviour is toxic to our community by nature, and one might feel the need to go to them and call them fanboys, but aggressive defensiveness has never fixed problems.

There is also the issue of competition-hate. There is a subset of vocal individuals that could be described as casual-elitists. They are the opposing end of hardcore-elitist players, in a negative way. Their unbridled hatred for competitive gaming has them making sweeping, often misinformed statements about competitive communities. In the case of Super Smash Bros., they often rally under the chant “No items, Fox only, Final destination”. While it is true that we have opted for a no items approach, the fact that we play on a multitude of stages and use a wide selection of viable characters, especially in Project M where the cast is extremely well-balanced, they managed to get two out of three affirmations wrong. This behaviour misinforms third parties who have never really paid attention to the scenes.

There is also the assumption that competitive smashers are of the elitist kind that will look down on new or non-competitive players. The truth is that while there are a few out there who may qualify as elitists, most of us come from a party smashing origin. We understand why people are playing it that way because we have done so before. In general, we are also very welcoming of new players. When a new face comes in, we offer support and tips whenever they ask for it. For instances, when Topher played as Pichu at Melee singles at various events, he was approached by good players and told that he was very good with this unviable character. They even told him what they were able to anticipate in his gameplay so that he can use that information to better himself. I have done this as well, telling a new player at Polybash that he had great instincts, and then I explained to him that I was using a technique called crouch cancelling and that he could punish my attempt by grabbing me instead. He was thankful for the tip and even though he had lost, he lost with a smile. He told me he’d kick my butt next time and I told him to bring it on. We enjoy sharing our passion with as many people as possible.

Casual elitism is misinformed and basically engages in the very behaviour that it condemns. It accuses competitive gamers of attempting to force a gameplay style, while attempting to force their own gameplay style on the competitive gamers. One could say that this is very hypocritical, but I think that misinformation has a lot more to do with this. I firmly believe that people’s minds can change, and that they can grow to better understand and respect differences in taste.

Farfromsubtle, a fairly popular Let’s play channel has shown that this is a possibility. Fraser Agar, the host of Video Games Awesome has made many erroneous statements about the nature of competitive Super Smash Bros., but after reading his comments section, and actually choosing to get informed on the topic through watching the well-made Smash Bros documentary and listening to what the scene had to say, he made a response video where he demonstrated that he grew to understand our community and respect it. He did not become a competitive smasher, but he understands how important this is for us, and has shown an openness that I believe deserves to be mentioned and respected.

Persecution of the smashers

His statements were not meant to be mean-spirited; those were the words of someone who was not following the scene closely and had heard it being described by individuals who did not know what they were talking about. The fact that he was willing to go through a nine parts documentary shows that there are people who will listen and actually try to understand when given the chance to do so.


Deep but approachable:

The most important feature of Super Smash Bros. is how it is a deep but approachable game. Many game designers fail to grasp the importance of that duality. They at times either make games that require high levels of involvement and mastery to play, or they make games that require no involvement and mastery to learn. Games get branded as hardcore or casual, black and white. 

However, when I try to explain the concept of approachable games that also have a lot of depth, my mind keeps going back to Super Smash Bros. Melee. This game’s basic mechanics are easy to learn. One can enjoy the game without learning about the intricacies of advanced techniques. However, if one is so inclined, he or she can choose to learn advanced gameplay mechanics but does not need to do that to play it. One could say that this game is truly a game for “everyone”. Players get to choose how they want to experience the game. They get to choose if they want a social couch play experience, or if they want a competitive high octane challenge. Sometimes, players will play a mixture of both, using advanced techniques but adding in the random elements. At other times, people will play both, experiencing all facets of Super Smash Bros.

As a member of the Project M development team, I coined the sentence: “There is no right way to play a game, only a way that is right for you” during an interview for Nintendo Force magazine. I’ve seen other members of our team use it, so I believe that we generally agree on that. Gamers have different needs, are looking for different levels of engagement, have different tastes, etc... If one really means to create a game that as many people as possible can enjoy, they must reject black and white interpretations of game design and see video games for what they truly are: interactive experiences. A player’s perception and subjective experience contributes to the general experience of a game. If you simply watch let’s play videos, you will quickly realize that players put emphasis and pay attention to different elements of the game than you would. In fact, playing through one game several times has often allowed me pay attention to other things, allowing me to notice details and easter eggs that I had missed in a previous play session. For example, the Youtube channel Game theory has made a very compelling argument about the theme of The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, which forever changed my interpretation of the game’s narrative. It gave me a new perspective, and it made experiencing the game again a very fresh experience.

 

The article in question. I own a print copy!

Tying accessible depth to player control:

In terms of gameplay, games like Fire Emblem Awakening have understood the concept of accessible depth. It gave players different difficulty settings to choose from, but it also even allowed players to choose whether perma-death should be left on or be disabled. It lowered the bar of entry into the Fire Emblem series, but removed none of the features that those looking for a more difficult challenge desired. That is good game design that takes into account different player needs.

Knights in the Nightmare however is a game that failed to understand this concept. It is a DS RPG with an extremely steep learning curve. Those who have had the patience to sit through an hour of tutorials and study the very complicated game mechanics have found it very fun and engaging. However, most gamers simply do not wish to spend hours learning how to play a game, and spend additional hours revisiting that said tutorial in order because so much information was thrown at their face and they had forgotten earlier mechanics. In that case, the game was deep, but not very accessible.

On the other end of the spectrum, Wii Music is fairly easy to play. It’s a waggle game that has no inherent goal. Anyone can jump in and play. However, it is devoid of depth as there is really not much to it. You waggle to make noise and there is no goal in sight; not even a high score to beat. One might want to argue "but Minecraft has no goals!", which is true. However, it allowed the player to create their own goals, which ties into the idea of player influence, which we will explore further down the article. Both extremes of the spectrum limit the reach your game can have. They are locked into very specific categories of players; those that want a strictly deep experience and those that want a strictly accessible game.

Whenever a game combines both of these elements, they can grasp at a variety of fanbases, and even capture those in between. The player gets to decide what type of gameplay appeals to them most and thus everybody gets what they want.

Competitive Smashing is part of that interactive nature of video games. Players have taken a game that they loved, and they created a new way to play it. This happened with Street Fighter, where players discovered combos in a game that was not designed around them. The difference here is that Capcom embraced that feature whereas Nintendo tried to stifle its competitive scene. Instead of protecting that perfect balanced between party and competitive play, they decided to excise a portion of their fan base, which is rather unfortunate.

Rather than letting players choose how to play their game, they decided to try and dictate how players ought to play their games, control the experience. They did so at the expense of everyone. The infamous random tripping mechanic in Super Smash Bros. Brawl was a mechanic that had the sole purpose of discouraging dash-dancing. Players assume that this was the intent as every previously-established advanced technique was carefully removed from the game or reduced in effectiveness. Static air dodging was added to prevent wavedashing, L-canceling had been completely removed, Directional influence was changed to make escaping combos much easier, and the general feel of the game was much slower and clunkier. There was a deliberate attempt at removing all traces of competitive gameplay. It was a difficult pill to swallow within the competitively Smash community, and it has made them feel unloved by the very company that they supported.

The fact is that competitive players have never demanded a fully competitive game. They have however demanded a competitive-friendly game. They wish for the option to play a high speed, technical game, whilst keeping the party game elements alive and well-tended to. Competitive gamers enjoy the fact that this game is accessible. After all, this is part of the reason why the scene has grown to what it is today.

Conclusion:

I would like to end this by stressing that no matter how we play Smash, we are all smashers. While we may all enjoy this game differently, the important point is not how we enjoy the game, but that we are in fact enjoying it. Smash fans would have much more to gain by supporting each other as opposed to antagonizing each other. Working together for a game that is more fun for everyone feels like a more optimal option than striving to hurt the other party’s enjoyment of the game. I believe in a Smash Bros. for everyone. I have played Project M with Melee players, Smash 64 players, Brawl players, exclusively Project M players, non-smash players, etc... I have played it in both competitive and party environments, and have been amused through it all.

Project M has taught me a lot about game design, but also about keeping an open mind. It taught me that one does not need to sacrifice depth for accessibility or the other around. The balance is difficult to achieve, but it has already been done. Player choice is essential for a game’s reach to cross several fan bases at once, and that even translates into character design. Some players prefer fast fallers, while others prefer floaty characters. Some players like speed, while others prefer power-oriented characters. Some like to rush aggressively, while some are more defensive. Player choice should be prevalent in all spheres of gameplay design. While I am not advocating for a sandbox smash game, I strongly believe that players ought to be able to play the game in the way they feel is best for them.

Now since we have mentioned Fire Emblem Awakening, let us end of a lighter note: