Super Smash Bros Brawl

[Thalzon]

If there's gonna be any announcements on the smash bros website from now on, they'll probably be Nintendo-sponsored tournaments or something to that effect.

[Aninymouse]

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Hello everyone, it's me, Masahiro Sakurai.

I hope you're all enjoying Super Smash Bros. Brawl to the fullest! As for me, work sure has been slow these days.

I had a really great lunch today: torikatsu on fired rice with a spicy sauce! I sure do like salty food, don't you?

It sure is lonely around here.

...

The Dojo updates sure were fun to do. I wonder if they were a bit too curt at times, though. I know I already wrote all those updates, but I wanted to explain them again.

Cue 11 months of the same updates with different commentary

EDIT: BUT did anyone else think this was the greatest thing on the Dojo ever?!

■Brawl’s director, Masahiro Sakurai, provided the voice for King Dedede.

[Ninja-san]

How much power did they give Zelda? It's not even fun anymore playing against my room mate with all the damn fireballs or magic attacks being impossible for me to counter and tired of dodging all the time. I don't know if thats just me or what....

Anyway anyone have any strategies when fighting a Zelda?

[Steben]

How much power did they give Zelda? It's not even fun anymore playing against my room mate with all the damn fireballs or magic attacks being impossible for me to counter and tired of dodging all the time. I don't know if thats just me or what....

Anyway anyone have any strategies when fighting a Zelda?

Play Lucas and then no one will spam Din's Fire against you.

[Arek the Absolute]

air dodge fools

air dodge

so easy

[Chickenwarlord]

Anyway anyone have any strategies when fighting a Zelda?

Game and watch's bucket works wonders against Din's fire. Air dodging a fair amount is also a good guard.

Try not to let her multiple hit stuff break your shield and you should be fine. Her smashes are slow and easy to punish if she misses. Try to let aerials be as much of a non-factor as possible. Her grabs can be quite brutal at high damage, so be on the lookout once you hit 70% or so.

[Garde]

Like Arek said, air dodging is important. If you don't air dodge, you'll get rocked by any decent player just because you'll become pretty much the ball in pong (except moving even slower). What does that mean? That means that all your opponent needs to do is do some simple intuitive calculations to see where you're moving and how they can attack you out of your movement (or dodge your attacks and then hit you).

Air dodging is really powerful because you get the most invulnerability out of it, and will usually keep you safe from successive attacks (provided you're actually timing them, not spamming the button).

The same goes for rolling and sidesteps, though I see a lot of people rolling across entire stages, which is just retarded. You use rolls as a tactical maneuver to get away/around people when they attack (provided the invul frames allow you to, this is very dependent upon both your own character and your opponent's attacks), not as a mode of transportation.

And as for Zelda, she's not very powerful, imho. Her range is quite lacking and her KO moves are pretty poor. Also, she is very easy to approach since her Din's Fire is her only projectile and while it's much better than before, it's still not great. Since it moves fast, she has very little time to actually hit a moving opponent with it (basically, she has to release the button at a specific time otherwise the move will miss), meaning it's very easy to air dodge to completely avoid the damage. You can also jump over the attack if you save your midair jump, since it can only be directed so much up or down it's easy to time your jumps properly to avoid it.

Her tilts, dash attack and jab are the only things you really need to worry about (since her aerials are pretty much crap aside from n-air and up-air), and most characters have easy times getting in on her as she's pretty freakin' slow. Just bait a tilt by jump near her and jumping away or something. Try and get her into the air above you, she's pretty helpless up there. Also, small characters are a nightmare for her since her aerials have sweet spots aside from n-air and up-air, meaning it's REALLY hard to hit smaller characters with the sweet spots. Big characters are super easy to sweet spot, so unless you massively outrange her like with Dedede (who she should never be able to beat if you spam f-tilt), you should probably stick to a smaller character (also one that is probably faster than her). Another thing about her side-air moves are that if you air dodge close to her, even if she waits to hit you, she will almost never sweet spot because she is so heavily dependent upon spacing those moves that if you do ANYTHING to mess up that spacing, she won't be able to get a good hit (and since those sweet spots are way harder to land now, it's much easier to screw with her spacing than it was before).

So basically, you need to worry about up-tilt, f-tilt, jab A, dash attack, n-air, and up-air (and only if your entire moveset is crap, each character will beat out some of these moves, you just need to figure out which ones your character can beat out). Din's Fire is a nuisance but nothing dangerous (unless she's edge guarding with it) and all her other moves are pretty much jokes since they're so slow.

Her smashes are dangerous but slow, and she can be hit out of them or they can be shielded/dodged and then she can punished for them. Nothing of hers really sets up into her smashes, so if you get hit by one, it's because you did something that left yourself open (like rolling as transportation about the stage or missing a laggy move).

[Global-Trance]

You guys are funny.

[The Derrit]

Like Arek said, air dodging is important.

And as for Zelda, she's not very powerful, imho.

Her range is quite lacking and her KO moves are pretty poor. Also, she is very easy to approach since her Din's Fire is her only projectile and while it's much better than before, it's still not great. Since it moves fast, she has very little time to actually hit a moving opponent with it (basically, she has to release the button at a specific time otherwise the move will miss), meaning it's very easy to air dodge to completely avoid the damage. You can also jump over the attack if you save your midair jump, since it can only be directed so much up or down it's easy to time your jumps properly to avoid it.

Her tilts, dash attack and jab are the only things you really need to worry about (since her aerials are pretty much crap aside from n-air and up-air), and most characters have easy times getting in on her as she's pretty freakin' slow. Just bait a tilt by jump near her and jumping away or something. Try and get her into the air above you, she's pretty helpless up there. Also, small characters are a nightmare for her since her aerials have sweet spots aside from n-air and up-air, meaning it's REALLY hard to hit smaller characters with the sweet spots. Big characters are super easy to sweet spot, so unless you massively outrange her like with Dedede (who she should never be able to beat if you spam f-tilt), you should probably stick to a smaller character (also one that is probably faster than her). Another thing about her side-air moves are that if you air dodge close to her, even if she waits to hit you, she will almost never sweet spot because she is so heavily dependent upon spacing those moves that if you do ANYTHING to mess up that spacing, she won't be able to get a good hit (and since those sweet spots are way harder to land now, it's much easier to screw with her spacing than it was before).

So basically, you need to worry about up-tilt, f-tilt, jab A, dash attack, n-air, and up-air (and only if your entire moveset is crap, each character will beat out some of these moves, you just need to figure out which ones your character can beat out). Din's Fire is a nuisance but nothing dangerous (unless she's edge guarding with it) and all her other moves are pretty much jokes since they're so slow.

Her smashes are dangerous but slow, and she can be hit out of them or they can be shielded/dodged and then she can punished for them. Nothing of hers really sets up into her smashes, so if you get hit by one, it's because you did something that left yourself open (like rolling as transportation about the stage or missing a laggy move).

wut to all of the above/bolds especially

[Zombie]

I've been playing with Zelda tons lately.

I love her.

[Garde]

Zelda's range is pretty poor. It's not the worst, but I would never, EVER say she has good range. She can KO at decent %, but they're not easy to land against a skilled player being careful (and they will probably be careful if they're at KO %).

Din's Fire is fast, but it's not powerful enough to KO at reasonable % (aside from edgeguarding), it often times doesn't set up into other attacks, and it still counts as a recovery move, meaning using it while in the air is very dangerous aside from SH retreats. It's a useful move for hitting people out of approaches that they've commited to, or forcing someone to move, but it's honestly not a dangerous move. The fact that it can only be directed so much up or down (and that it's dangerous to use in the air) make it a fairly easy move to deal with. Obviously, the times you can't do anything about this move is when you're in hit stun, and since it comes out fast, you can use it as a final hit in some combos (which, when they work, there's nothing you can do to avoid it anyway), but that's about it.

Link is one of the hardest projectile whores to approach (when played properly), and I can close the distance on him fairly easily with any character. Zelda has a single projectile that is still laggy in comparison to most other characters (considering you need to control it, preventing you from using a second one). If you think she's hard to approach, I pity you.

If you think Zelda's attacks set up into smashes (at least in the % where they can KO, which is the only point where they are really important), then the people that are victims to those moves do not know how to DI, escape the tumbling animation, or tech, which is very sad. Every Zelda player I've played and watched vids of gets their smash attack KOs from people making mistakes/doing something stupid, not setups.

The larger a character, the larger their hitbox (the one that attack hitboxes collide with to do damage). The sweet spot of an attack has a much greater chance of hitting a large hitbox than a small hitbox. The only reason Dedede is difficult to beat is because he can effectively (and easily) prevent Zelda from attacking him due to his tilt range, attack speed, and priority. His tilts are irritating since they beat out a ton of attacks and hit super far away and rack up damage relatively fast. Zelda lacks speed and GOOD range (she has medium range and medium priority), so she will get beat out by them. Her maneuverability on ground and air is pretty damn poor, and she cannot even be close to considered a fast character. She'll have trouble approaching him, and he can easily avoid her only long range attack while slowly getting in range for tilts. It basically turns into a game of cat and mouse because Zelda's ground game is entirely worthless against his tilts, and her air game is not what I'd consider strong (there are plenty of characters with much better air movesets or even one move in their air game which makes them better in the air than her). If you get hit by a sweetspot f-air/b-air, you probably deserved it.

None of Zelda's moves set up into her smash attacks at KO %, and that's the only time her smash attacks are really useful (since they are technically KO moves). Her dash attack pops people up, her f-tilt pops people up (both good to use an up-air afterward at KO % since the opponents can escape before they get close enough to up-smash). Her d-tilt is garbage until higher % and even then I don't know if it can set up into anything. Jab A can be followed up by a second Jab A, f-tilt, dash attack or Din's Fire. N-air is good to use when people are too close as it has fairly good priority (not much reach) and it comes out fast and is multi hit and knocks away enough to put an enemy back into her desired range. D-smash is probably her fastest smash and is good for getting people away, but not that great of a KO move unless you're at the side of a stage (in comparison to a lot of other d-smashes, this one is child's play).

[Jaybell]

So for some reason I'm good with Dedede. He showed up a couple times when I chose random and I always went "aw dangit" but then I won a whole lot. What is the deal?

[Global-Trance]

So for some reason I'm good with Dedede. He showed up a couple times when I chose random and I always went "aw dangit" but then I won a whole lot. What is the deal?

Because the bastard is good? He's a beast when played right.

[JCvgluvr]

You're a man of many words, aren't you Garde? That's what your back-to-back walls-o-text seem to indicate, lol.

[Global-Trance]

So Garde, when can I school you again?

[Imagist]

My only issue with Dedede is really an issue in general with my ability to accurately control my tilts and smashes. I f-smash with him when I mean to f-tilt far too often, and f-smashing with Dedede in the wrong situations is a terrible, terrible thing to do.

[Scufo]

@ Garde:

Of course Din's Fire is easy to dodge. No one ever said it isn't. But actually hitting people with it isn't always the priority. The value of Din's is to keep the pressure on the opponent which, thanks to its amazing range, can be pulled off constantly. Zelda, in this way, MAKES you approach her, which I think is an asset in a game as defensively oriented as Brawl. One thing I've noticed is that, because of Din's strange hitbox (hits outside of the actual explosion if it travels a fair distance) is that people will very often airdodge when you set it off near them. If you use Din's on an opponent returning to the stage from above (which happens a lot, thanks to floatiness), you can set it off early, hopefully causing them to air dodge right into your waiting usmash. Given, skilled players will know exactly how large Din's hitbox is at a given moment, but this is just one example of how Zelda's pressure game can be used.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say, as a Zelda main, that all of her moves are useful. You're the first person I've heard say she has bad aerials. Yes, fair and bair are harder to sweetspot now, but skilled Zeldas can and do still do it.You might whiff five of them and then hit one, but that one would be worth it since it's just such a powerful move, even more so than in Melee. Her uair has a disjointed hitbox and is absurdly powerful. Dair is a very powerful spike. Again, sweetspot, but you really just have to learn the timing. I have spiked successfully with this move, though admittedly, not very many times. Still though, combined with Din's this move gives her a very powerful edgeguard.

So basically, you need to worry about up-tilt, f-tilt, jab A, dash attack, n-air, and up-air. . .and all her other moves are pretty much jokes since they're so slow.

Whoa whoa whoa whoa WHOA. What? First off, since when is a move instantly branded useless just because it's slow? I guess the vast majority of Ike's moves are jokes, then? Regardless, Zelda's moves are NOT slow. You saying her smashes are slow lead me to question whether you've actually played a Zelda of any decent skill. Dsmash, Usmash, and Nayru's Love all come out almost instantly, and can be used anytime an opponent gets too close for comfort (thus the mentality that she's hard to approach). Not only will these moves get the opponent away from you, but usmash and dsmash are good KO moves too. Usmash KOs off the top at around 120% and unlike her fsmash, cannot be DI'd out of easily. The knockback of her dsmash is almost entirely horizontal, leading to mid-percentage kills with edgehogging. So not only does Zelda have great and many finishers, but they come out fast too.

None of Zelda's moves set up into her smash attacks at KO %, and that's the only time her smash attacks are really useful (since they are technically KO moves). Her dash attack pops people up, her f-tilt pops people up (both good to use an up-air afterward at KO % since the opponents can escape before they get close enough to up-smash). Her d-tilt is garbage until higher % and even then I don't know if it can set up into anything.

Dtilt. At high percentages it pops them up above you and sets up into usmash or utilt, both great KO moves. At low percentages, it VERY often causes the opponent to trip, allowing you basically a free ftilt or fsmash. At middle percentages it pops them in front of you, which also leads into ftilt or fsmash. Dtilt can shield stab, too.

In spite of all this, I don't expect to see Zelda on the top tier (nor do I really want to). She still retains the same basic weaknesses she had in Melee (lightweight, limited mobility, escapable fsmash, even if it's harder now), but she's been buffed so much in just about every other aspect that her weaknesses are diminished. She's really a contender this time around.

[Jaybell]

Because the bastard is good? He's a beast when played right.

But that is the thing; I do not do that. My strategy is throw waddle dees and hope for the best. Also mechanical hammer. This has been working out okay for me.

But someone reeaaaally needs to explain to me how the dang his up+B works. PLEASE MOVE HORIZONTALLY DEDEDE AT ALL THAT WOULD BE NICE oh okay, you did. Well that's cool, let's do that again wait no THAT IS GOING STRAIGHT UP AND DOWN INTO THE ABYSS THIS IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF RECOVERY RAAAAAAAAAAAA

Also! Game and Watch is currently my main and Rob and Olimar are my secondary character guys. I have been experimenting also however with Ice Climbers, Dedede, Zero Suit Samus and also Wario and Lucas. And Snake and Sonic as well I am liking. I'm also pretty good with Meta Knight but saying you are best with Meta Knight is like saying you are a chef because you can microwave popcorn.

[Eten]

I love dtilt, maybe two dtilt, then an utilt KO. It feels so sneaky. Usually I can turn around in the split second before the utilt, which times/lands it much better. Utilt, Uair, Fair, Bair are all extremely good killers, Zelda is one of the few characters who can consistently KO below 100%. Actually, I think she fights for some of the best KO power in the game. Fsmash, Usmash, Dsmash would all kill too, if it wasn't for DI on fsmash and diminishing knockback on the frequency of which you use Usmash and Dsmash. Ftilt, too, can KO, just at slightly higher % than the rest. The dair spike can spike targets without a sweetspot, just because a spike is a spike and spikes send people traveling in the worst direction possible, but the dair on water maps is the best place to safely set up and exploit the insane spiking power of the dair. Sending people through the water on delfino to their death at 35% is evil.

Zelda's weakness is that she has little to no solid approach options(consists mostly of mindgames and the slow basic approach options), and that she's easy to KO, and has few combos. Technically, she isn't "floaty". She's lightweight, but has in-the-middle fall speed. Of course, there is just one little advantage to Zelda's weight- she's the first of the characters who are "too light" to be chain grabbed by Dedede. It makes her a nice Dedede counter(Dedede is very easy to fair/bair sweetspot too). She also has a decent short-hop, you can shorthop bair out of shield and with perfect timing just barely manage to sweetspot the top of Olimar... it's better to not risk it and go for that only on larger targets, of course. Or if you don't sweetspot on a rising bair/fair shorthop, go into Nayru's as you land! Anyway, she's an EXTREMELY powerful character, without a doubt, and actually quite easy to pick up. Just play defensive, spam the Din's Fire and force them to approach, then brutally punish people with your defensive options.

If things get sticky, like, say, you're against a patient and careful Lucas/Ness or G&W who will just down-B absorb your Din's Fire and punish you with sufficient approaches, fall back to sheik who actually CAN play the approach game. =P

[atmuh]

you guys write too much

play more type less

[friendlyHunter]

you guys write too much

play more type less

Suddenly I feel the urge to post this again:

[atmuh]

thats how i win as olimar

i hit people

[AarowSwift]

thats how i win as olimar

i hit people

Yeah, that's how I play. I have no defensive game, I just get in there and thrash away. I figure sooner or later I'll hit something.

[Tables]

Defend? What a silly notion.

Unless I'm someone who has to set up their moves like Dedede or whatnot, I'm always on the attack, for better or worse.

In other news no one cares about: I'm losing my R.O.B skills, but I'm getting pretty awesome with G&W. Dedede, I'm not too bad with, but I have to adjust. Almost any other character I'm at least decent with, which is great.

And Olimar, oh boy. He isn't my best, or even my favorite character. But still, if it makes sense despite that, he's probably the most fun character in the game.

On a final note, I love to go on "With Anyone", play a match, then pick the character that gets 4th place. Then, I beat everyone with that character, and after a few rounds of doing this at least one person leaves. Oh joy.

[Imagist]

But that is the thing; I do not do that. My strategy is throw waddle dees and hope for the best. Also mechanical hammer. This has been working out okay for me.

But someone reeaaaally needs to explain to me how the dang his up+B works. PLEASE MOVE HORIZONTALLY DEDEDE AT ALL THAT WOULD BE NICE oh okay, you did. Well that's cool, let's do that again wait no THAT IS GOING STRAIGHT UP AND DOWN INTO THE ABYSS THIS IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF RECOVERY RAAAAAAAAAAAA

Mechanical hammer is kind of a terrible move IMO. At least, not nearly so useful as his other moves. But I may be missing its usefulness.

As for up-B, you have to kind of roll the control stick to either side once you've initiated the move in order to make him do any horizontal motion. Also, you know you have to cancel it (press down) in order to grab ledges, right?