Super Smash Bros Brawl

Review from Jae - Friday, 27 June 2008 @ 12:55am

The very first multiplayer game, of more than 2 players, that comes to mind was Golden Eye on the N64. Engaging a group of four 13 year olds in one game was unheard of but the phenomenon quickly caught on. Many have attempted and failed in recent years, do you remember Dream Mix TV World Fighters? Answer: Exactly. There’s been something about Super Smash Brothers that has kept the series strong. I bet its something to do with that pesky electric rodent.

Brawl is technically the third iteration with its predecessor claiming the title for highest selling GameCube game. With the stellar line up currently on the Wii I have my doubts as to whether Brawl will be a top of the pops this time round. There’s been some great additions in Brawl, including more characters, a lengthy single player experience and online play.

What you’ll come to appreciate though, on a subtle level, are the little improvements. Things like the assist trophies, a solid frame rate and remixed soundtracks. More on that later. With the Wii completing its three pillars of success earlier this year, Zelda + Galaxy + Prime 3, Brawl was the last of the big Nintendo franchises to make it out the gate. When we first heard of the almighty Revolution at E3 2005 Nintendo announced the newest Smash Brothers game as a launch title. Fast forward 18 months after the launch and you have a title that has been tweaked as close as possible to the developer’s idea of perfection. Not only was it late to the party but it was inexcusably released more than 3 months after the US (well 109 days after the US or 147 days after Japan but who’s counting). Excuses about localisation timeframes are no longer acceptable Ninty. Smarten up your act guys, otherwise Play Asia is going to steal your thunder.

Majority of you reading this would’ve tuned in to Yahtzee’s not-so-glamorous portrayal of Brawl. I’m not sure how much of the game he played but I’m not here to rebuttal or even side with him on his opinions. I’ve given this game over 50 hours of my life so I might as well give it a few more by writing about it. Now if you’ve never played a Smash Brothers game before let me give you a quick run down. The game pits 2 – 4 fighters against each other in an arena. The rules of the fight are customisable but the default gives everyone the objective of getting the most knock outs. The way to obtain a KO is to knock another player off the screen, indefinitely, by either making them fall to their doom or hitting them so hard they go flying in any direction off the screen. Your chances of succeeding in a “Smash” KO is based on a probability percentage for each character. This percentage increases as the player is hit more which puts a bit of a spin from the traditional fighters where everyone has a health bar to deplete. As a player you have to be mindful if you percentage exceeds 100%. Once you get past that point a simple attack can send you flying into the ether. Every time you succeed in knocking someone out you gain a point however every time you’re knocked out you lose a point. Scores in a typical 3 minute match are not much different from that of soccer. It’s not even surprising to see the winner score 0, as dying can set your score into the negatives.

Customisable rules can increase the replayability here. Having a set number of lives to battle it out to the finish is popular and there is always the coin battle where you try to bash the coins out of each opponent for the highest coin count. One of my favourite parts is where you have sudden death between two or more winners. Each person’s KO probability starts at 300% which means almost any hit will send them sky high. When you get to a sudden death your chances of winning are only as good as how quick you can hit your opponents. The parts that make brawl interesting are all the toppings it includes. Firstly there are items that can randomly drop into the arena. These items range from simple Donkey Kong barrels to a gigantic legendary Pokemon who’s come to wreak havoc. Again items are customisable, but if you’re just starting out in this game, I’d encourage you to open up all the items so that you can learn each one’s benefit. All your traditional items are back, like the Red mushroom, which either turns you big or small, with some new items that spark a bit of interest. For example there is an item called Dragoon Parts that originates from the Kirby universe. It basically comes in three parts, if you collect all three you get a targeting reticule on the screen in which you can aim at the opponents and swoop in on your Dragoon with a high percentage of knocking out the targeted players.



There are two new items that you can collect in battle that can really tip the scales in your favour. The first one is assist trophies, which are like game-themed summons that come and attack any opponents within their grasp. Their attacks are fairly tough and can result in a knock out, depending on how much damage someone has already taken. I won’t spoil the trophies for you but look out for some traditional and not so traditional gaming characters especially from the 8-bit era. Some of the good trophies require unlocking but the way to unlock them will come with progress in the game, such as playing 100 rounds. Sounds like a lot but if you have friends over for a weekend you could pretty much unlock most of them. Those of you with no friends can customise 1 minute battles and play with yourselves whilst playing with yourselves. Go figure that one out.

The other item is the Final Smash which is one of Brawl’s big trump cards. The Final Smash is a multi coloured ball, like the one that girl gave me on Saturday night after I told her she looked fat, that floats around the battle field. In order to obtain it players must hit the ball, much like that girl did to me on Saturday night, till they absorb the ball and all its multi colour goodness. What you will notice is that players that have the advantage, in terms of KO’s and damage, will have to repeatedly hit the Final Smash whereas those that are down on their luck can hit the ball one or two times and claim it. Some simple fighter balancing mechanics but it does make a difference. So once the Final Smash is yours you simply need to press and hold the special move button and you’ll perform your character’s unique move. This is one part of the game I found to be rather unbalanced. Some characters seem to have awesome Final Smashes whereas some seem to have ones that hardly do damage. Take for instance the comparison of Link versus Wario. Link’s Final Smash is the Triforce which grabs your nearby opponent and slashes them to KO land, almost every time. Wario’s special ability is eating garlic... Alright there is more to it than that, Wario changes into Wario-man which means all regular attacks become stronger. Even though Link’s Triforce takes precision to attack opponents it is still the easier and stronger move to pull off. I’ve never once, in my hundreds of battles, seen a Wario-man KO as many players as Link can. Things like this can make for unbalanced game play.


Onward to the controls. I’m always a fan of variety and the option to choose from four different control schemes is something only the Wii can offer in this generation. First of all you have the default setting of Wii remote and nunchuk. This is not the worst option but some buttons on the Wii remote are too awkward to pull off moves. The smash attacks, which are the strongest form of basic attacks, is a combination of the analogue stick and the A button. This sounds all well and good but smash attacks are meant to be used sparingly in battle as their damage effect depletes through repeated usage. Somehow hitting the analogue stick and A at the same times seems to be a frequent reflex. You’re basically screwed in the event where you accidentally waste the smash attack. Now the second option to use the Wii remote as a stand alone control fixes this issue by assigning the smash attack to a combination of pressing the 1 & 2 buttons together. However, since you’re holding the Wii remote like a NES controller, the B button or trigger for shield is one that is hard to hit in the heat of battle. I would’ve thought if Nintendo were running out of buttons for this control scheme they should’ve used the motion sensing to turn the shield move into a tiny tricep exercise.

The next two controllers require extra moolah to purchase, so consider your choices wisely. The Classic Controller, used mainly for play on the Virtual Console titles, sports an improvement over the earlier choices. The smash attack is now designated to the right analogue and the shield move can be easily done by pressing either shoulder button. The only thing that is missing from this option is rumble. Now if you’re like me, and you take any good vibrations you can, this may matter to you. I also find the classic controller was made for the hands of a 10 year old. Reaching for the analogue sticks is hand cramp candy and limits the amount of play time you can healthily have in one sitting. That is why the best option for controllers takes you back to the last generation: GameCube goodness. Out of all the controllers I’ve ever handled the GameCube one was always most fitting. The buttons were well shaped and placed, the handles were far part enough and the analogue sticks were in a suitable spot. Except for that Z trigger – what the hell was with that? Anyway the controls for Brawl are almost identical to that of Melee (the previous Smash Brothers title for the GameCube). If you were fortunate enough to keep GameCube controllers from the previous generation you will find controlling this game a lot better. If you were a depraved child and have never touched a GameCube controller it’s time to pop that cherry and invest in one of the best controls in the twenty first century. Third party ones are abundant in your local games stores but I recommend importing the newly produced white controllers from Nintendo. Not only do they look fantastic but they’ll match all your other Wii related products.



The character selection in this game is the largest it’s ever been. The starting line up gives you access to 21 fan favourites with over 10 more to unlock throughout the game. Unlocking these characters can be done one of three ways, which was a great idea, either by completing the solo Sub Space Emissary mode, Classic mode or by playing countless battles. Each method will steal around 8 hours of your youth which I felt was worth it just to get some of the characters. If you’ve managed to avoid all spoilers for the character listings up till now, be prepared to get royally spoiled! One of the stand out characters from the initial 21 is the Pokemon Trainer. Using Squirtle, Ivysaur and Charizard provides a good strategy point at any given time during battle. Changing between them is as easy at pressing down and B which can also prove to be a smart way of dodging an attack.

Sonic and Snake have starring roles amongst the unlockable characters. The effort gone into unlocking Snake is not too intense but his move sets and abilities make him a tournament favourite. Sonic on the other hand will take a lot longer to unlock, which compared to his special moves, is an unjustified achievement. Lucario makes it’s debut into the smash scene with the Pokemon baring a resemblance to the moves of Mew Two in Melee. Alright I’ll stop with the name calling now. Another surprising set of characters you may encounter are some boss fights. These bosses span the Nintendo universe from the likes of the Metroid, Pokemon, Earthbound and more. Again, another moment of nostalgia or fanboyism for those in the know.

Speaking of the Sub Space Emissary, there are various modes added to Brawl to keep you coming back for more. Classic mode is just like playing arcade mode of any versus fighting game except they jumble it up a little with a Giant Yoshi or Metal Link or some variations that are similar. Event mode is like a mission based form where you are given a different objective on each level. One might be to knock out 50 Marios as they drop in from the sky or one might be to knock all the clouds out off the platform of the battle field. The mode that seems to count towards the game the most is the Sub Space Emissary. This mode is Brawl’s only major flaw. It is as if Nintendo has taken a chapter out of a videogame from the 1990’s and shoved it into Brawl. SSE is a mode which can be played by one person and is platform based. You will see the occasional koopa or goomba enemy in which you can stomp on but the rest of the enemies look like a bunch of rejects out of a Kingdom Hearts game. The platform game play gets fairly repetitive after the first 30 minutes with the saving grace being the cut scenes that tell the story of how the characters in each universe meet up. Look forward to the unstoppable amount of back tracking you’ll have to do towards the end of this mode and try not to fall asleep.

Six months ago it was still speculated that online play won’t make it into the final game. Nintendo were keeping mum about this and it’s not hard to see why. Online play is very bare bones. If you’ve played Mario Kart Wii online you’d probably know exactly what I mean here. First of all I could never ever connect to a random game online. It may have something to do with me being so far away from the majority of players, in the US, but I had heard many reports of people in America that had the same problem. That’s okay, that is what friend codes and MSN are for. Playing against local Australian gamers online proved to be an easier feat. Games were virtually lag free and easy to set up. All the other features of online play that are considered the norm now a days were omitted. Things like voice chat, keyboard support, leadersboards and a lobby were just overlooked. There is no way, inbuilt into the game, to communicate with a friend to ask them to join you in a match. You just have to take the hit and miss approach and hope for the best. Either that or grab your phone, call your mate and tell them to join your game. There is also a spectator mode online, which is where you can view a previously played battle and learn what techniques other characters had used in order to win. You can customise not one, not two, not three but a whole four pre-determined text speech bubbles. Insert more sarcasm. Censorship of your captions is not applicable so feel free to put as many ill mannered words into there as possible. You can then use these text bubbles during battle to taunt your opponents. Wow Nintendo, you’ve finally inputted something Sega put into their Phantasy Star Online title 7 years ago!



I could go on and on about Brawl but I can already see your eyes getting droopy. There is so much more I could fill you in on, like the classic Nintendo music, the collectable power-up stickers, the stage builder, the coin launcher the list is almost endless. There are many little flaws I can pick at about this game too but I think I will leave that for you to discover. My only gripe apart from the SSE mode is the way in which you choose your character. Why must I drag my coin selector from my previously used character across to my newly selected one? Like I said little flaw but one that annoys me to no end. Brawl is jam packed with Nintendo goodness. Everything from the obscure games like Electroplankton all the way to the traditional games of yesteryear like Wind Waker. For this reason alone the game is a worthwhile purchase. As a party game it doesn’t quite hit the nail, especially with your average Wii player who wants more motion with their mojo.

Summary

If you have friends that will have this game too you will get the most out of it. If you got no friends, that’s because you’re wearing them damn skinny jeans. A masterpiece on all things Nintendo and then some. Get it while it’s hot.

Pros

Great for fans, some very nice looking Final Smashes and blasts from the past. Solid core online play that has minimal lag. Plentiful unlockables to keep you coming back for more.

Cons

It’s got that damn rodent that shoots electricity from its bottom again. Better controlled with an additional accessory, a GameCube controller if you don’t already have one. Sub Space Emissary is as much fun as cleaning a toilet with a butter knife.