Poll Review #3

What format do you prefer the most?
singles (1v1) - 20 votes
doubles (2v2) - 8 votes
crew battles (various) - 3 votes

Hmmm... I think the results speak for themselves. Singles is clearly the most popular event amongst my readers. I plan on doing an article in the near future on how doubles offers a unique experience. Many players prefer singles as a result of how hard it is to maintain a loyal teammate (myself included). Doubles requires that two people practice together so that they learn how to play off each other. Crew battles, on the other hand, are not too popular yet. Two other people besides me voted for it. XD

The War Rages On

Earlier in the month, I described the interesting conflict taking place between competitive and casual smashers. Well, the discussion marches forward as members from both sides take their defensive stances. Competitive smashers continue to be weary of the casual smashers' accusations against them regarding items, "true skill", and advanced techniques. Casual smashers feel insulted by generalizations regarding how most any competitive smasher would defeat them (by a fair margin, too).

Signs indicate that this will not end until after Brawl is released. First off, the discussion is taking place in the Brawl discussion area despite many of the arguments being drawn from experience with Melee. The moderators seem tolerant of this as a similar thread in the Melee forums would not receive much (if any) attention. All focus is on Brawl at this point. More and more new members are joining the fray. Many people are registering accounts just to participate in these discussions.

Another Glimpse Into Tournament Lore

AlphaZealot was in another interview at Smashes my Bros. I highly recommend checking it out. AlphaZealot discusses many of the philosophies involved in the banning of stages, the role of tiers, and a couple other interesting topics.

The wavedash is STILL not a glitch.

Apparently, the logic from my first attempt still confused several readers, so I will reiterate the logic here in a hopefully more understandable manner.

I have been doing software development for a long time. So, despite what many may think a glitch is, I will explain it here. Before software is released, it is tested to its greatest extent. Numbers and scenarios are fed through the system to ensure that it behaves correctly. Let us imagine a basic calculator as an example. Before releasing any kind of calculator software, we must make sure that it reacts appropriately to any given input. So, we test 1 + 1 and get 2. 3 + 5 = 8. 13 + 7 = 20. No matter how many times we run these tests, the results are identical. The software has structured limits on the results based on the input.

So now, the calculator is out in the wild. Like most non-graphing calculators, this one has a solar panel for power. In poorly lighted environments, my calculator starts to operate slowly. Eventually, it goes insane and stops cooperating (despite having power). The display works fun, but I punch in 1 + 1 and get 413 (I really have before). Despite the many tests done by the creators of this calculator, the math operation experienced a glitch. Something happened (most likely the low light conditions) to cause the software to behave irrationally but still believe it was operating correctly (hence the instant result displayed). By giving the calculator more light and restarting it, 1 + 1 once again yielded the expected result of 2.

In the world of Melee, the designers obviously knew about air dodging (since, well, they put it in there), so it probably did not take long for someone to ask the question: What happens when an air dodge comes in contact with a solid surface? Well, if it is anything besides a floor, it simply blocks the momentum. They could have left it that way and had the floor simply stop movement but allow the air dodge animation to continue. They chose instead to have the character slide along the ground (and sliding still exists in Brawl).

Now, there is another big controversy about the definitions of glitch and exploit. Some believe the two are identical. They both relate to intent, but they relate to entirely different intents. An exploit takes advantage of physics in a way the game creator never intended. A glitch violates the physics in a way the software never intended. In other words, while the creator's intent is mostly reflected in the software, a glitch happens when the system reacts contrary to the many tests run before release. Air dodge + contact with floor = slide. That is a natural occurrence in the game. Wavedashing is clearly an exploit because it is doubtful that the creators ever thought players would jump and air dodge so fast that the jump animations were essentially invisible to the point where characters appear to just slide along the ground. However, the software itself behaves 100% as it should.

Now, let us return to the Ice Climbers Freeze Glitch. Something happens in this process that leaves the victim in a grabbed state despite being released (and despite the Ice Climber losing his or her grip but not also freezing). Under all other circumstances, the victim simply breaks loose and is free to move afterward. Somehow, when the Ice Climbers get together, the circumstances become just right to where this system fault is made known.

I have seen Captain Falcon fall through the center of Corneria. I have also seen Fox fall through the center of Pokemon Stadium. The floors are supposed to be solid surfaces. Somewhere in the object collision algorithms, the system suddenly decides that the character ought to be relocated to below the stage. These are software glitches.

Competitive Rant

There was an excellent post on SWF on how many competitive players feel about anti-competitive casual smashers. I felt it was worth noting here.

The crux of this debate is that some people do not want other people to play a certain game competitively. That's it. No one is asking the inverse, demanding that casual gamers play by their arbitrary set of rules. It is simply the anti-competitive crowd going out of their way to spite those who are better than them. Their "arguments" normally focus on some abstract "way the game was meant to be played", which we all know actually means "way I want to play the game". To this I can only say, who killed Sakurai and made YOU king?

For the misinformed, which includes most of the anti-competitive crowd, here are the standardized rules for Super Smash Bros. tournament play:
-4 Stock, 8 Minutes, Team Damage, No Items
-Both players choose one stage to ban for the set
-Both players pick characters at same time and go randomly to one of the six "neutral" stages.
-The loser determines the next stage to go to, from almost all of them. The loser also picks character second.
-Best out of three wins

Obviously, we have to talk about items. Items add luck to the game, period. If a good item appears next to you, you very well could instantly win. If a bomb or exploding container appears in front of your attack, you very well could instantly lose. Players don't like having their skill nullified by luck in a competition. Players enter tournaments to pit their skill against their opponent's, not to gamble. Items benefit top-tier characters more, period. It only widens the gap between characters. Most the high tier characters are fast and/or very aerial, giving them a massive advantage in obtaining items on the stage. Some people say that items were meant to balance the game, claiming that characters like Mewtwo and Pikachu were designed as item gods, and their low tier positions are due to items being banned. This is bull****. If an item spawns directly between Pikachu and Shiek, who will get to it first? Fox and Falco, two of the top characters, even have their reflectors to give them the upper hand even when their opponent has the items! Are you saying they need MORE advantages?

If you want to play competitively with items, go ahead. Make your own tournament. Tournaments are organized by players, not people who own stores. Just don't be surprised when no one shows up, because virtually no one wants to play competitively with items. Tourneys do not play with items because the people attending them don't want to, not because some evil tourney director is making them.

Next stages. Hyrule Temple sucks, ok? Let's get that out of the way first. The bottom zone makes it almost pure luck as to who kills who first, giving certain characters huge advantages and leading to REALLY long matches. If you want to organize a Hyrule Temple tourney, go ahead, no one will show up. The only other stages that are banned are ridiculous ones like Super Flat Zone that no one ever likes anyway.

Now then... The six "neutral stages." People act like tournaments only play on Final Destination, which is ridiculous, since it's only one of the six default stages even, and it's typically banned by a player if their opponent has a good Falco. Some tournaments even play with something called "Dave's stupid rule", which states that no stage can be played twice in a set of matches. Yoshi's Story, Fountain of Dreams, Pokemon Stadium, Battlefield, and Dream Land all receive just as much play as Final Destination, if not more. And those are only the initial stages! The other counter-pick stages just aren't included on Random so you don't get some ridiculous random match-up like fighting Peach or Jigglypuff on Mute City.

So why are there so many people who think tournaments are the scourge of Smash? It's simple really. Every fighting game suffers from this to some degree, but it has hit the Smash community particularly hard due to its "easy to learn, impossible to master" nature: Everyone and their dog thinks they are great at Smash, some are, but most suck. People seem to get the idea that just because they've unlocked all the stages and characters, that they are true masters of the game. Then one day, they come up against someone using advanced techniques with tournament rules, get destroyed, then become angry and bitter towards tournament rules and techniques like wave dashing.

So next time you get beaten by an advanced player ask for some advice rather than the usual, "Bawwwwww! Wave dashing and L-canceleing are such cheep glitches (PROTIP: they're not glitches). The game is supposed to be played on Hyrule Temple with full items." It's not like advanced players are in some secret club, and are determined to keep these techniques hidden from you just to maintain an advantage. With the exception of a few rare douche bags the whole notion of elitism is false, most advanced players would be more than happy to explain advanced techniques to you. Furthermore, it's not even that hard to learn them. In only a couple hours you can learn to wave dash, a couple more and you can learn to L-cancel. From there it's just a matter of practice until you can incorporate them into your game.

So what do casual players have to complain about? Nothing, the anti-competitive crowd just doesn't like the fact that some people are better than them at the game, and they don't want to put forth the effort to become better themselves. That's it. The can claim otherwise all day, but that's it.

Is Competitive Smash a Sport?

A sport (according to Dictionary.com's definition) is "an athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess and often of a competitive nature, as racing, baseball, tennis, golf, bowling, wrestling, boxing, hunting, fishing, etc." So, technically speaking, smash is not a sport, but oftentimes this argument is carried too far to say that smash is forbidden from being considered competitive. The reasons revolve around two primary ideas: smash is "just a video game" (I wonder what Halo is, then), and smash is "not supposed to be competitive" (on account of being wild and wacky and having newb-friendly mechanics). But my goodness, fishing is a sport? I would venture to say that Mario Strikers Charged has more physical exertion than that!

Regardless, the argument that smash cannot be competitive (for whatever reason) is absurd. Any activity is made competitive by those interested in taking it to the next level. I totally missed when cup-stacking became competitive. Chess is one of the more popular competitive brain games. The Rubik's Cube is the source of many new competitive speed solves. Smash is something with a concrete set of rules that clearly yields a winner and a loser. Serious smashers win consecutively suggesting that there is a level of skill involved in determining the winner. If smash is too cheesy to take seriously, then why are experts at putting dishes away allowed to win money and awards?

Another attack on the competitive smash community is that extreme gaming skills are a waste of talent and time. Taking the game too seriously is somehow unhealthy or pathetic. What most casual onlookers do not realize is that top-level play requires major cunning and lightning reflexes. I have great respect for players who can best me 4-stock to none. They demonstrate their ability to read my attacks and intellectualize at a higher level than me. That is not wasted talent; that is a sharpened tool. Gamers are some of the best problem-solvers I have ever met. When I work with gamers on any programming project, solutions come easily since we are so used to challenging odds. "Proper" programmers see only one way to solve a problem and refuse to do anything other than the "correct" way.

If the competitive environment is not for you, that is AOK. There is no shame in playing a game for party-type fun (as that is what games are for), but competitive players do not deserve this form of mockery.

Women Can Smash

And I have proof. This is a clip from a recent match I had with my wife "sugarpoultry". I am "Buzz" in the video, obviously. I had such a great start. >_>

This land is your land, this land is my land -- unless your name is Fox

I'd like to talk a moment about the validity of banning stages as opposed to banning characters. On more than one occasion I've overheard talk of banning characters rather than stages in tournament play. The supporting logic of the character ban is this: most banned stages are such because Fox can abuse the layout; just ban Fox and open up more stages. Why not ban Falco while we're at it?

Let's look at this objectively: Often Fox and Falco are not the only characters capable of abusing the stage in the manner offered as the reason for the ban. Using my personal favorite banned stage, Hyrule Temple, as an example, the reason for the ban is (largely) the circular shape it makes. Pichu is just as able to abuse this as is Fox.

Second, eliciting a ban on any character sets a precedent for banning subsequent characters and opens a whole can of worms. You know what happens when you open a can of worms? You've got to eat them. Nobody likes eating worms. Once any character gets banned, it'd be a small step to ban another character. And another?

Also, how many smashers sit down and practice a stage looking to improve their play on that stage? When a stage is banned, players move on with no problem. Their practice time and invested effort isn't attached to a stage; it's attached to a character.

The game isn't about the stage; it's about the player's mastery of the character and the techniques of the game in general. Dropping stages weeds out environments that draw the focus of the game away from that.

Candy Land - The True Test of Skill

Recently, I participated in an extremely interesting debate on how skill is defined. While the true definition is somewhat subjective in terms of video games, I learned what true skill is not. The title of today's article is a direct result of that particular discussion.

Essentially, the entire discussion boiled down skill being one's ability to emerge victorious given exactly equal circumstances to the opponent. While this sounds correct upon first hearing it, the definition of "equal circumstances" was certainly a skewed one in this particular instance. The people in the discussion went on to state that it is unfair how certain players have more time to practice advanced techniques than more casual players, so advanced techniques are forms of cheating in that they grant an unfair advantage against those who have not practiced them. In other words, when two people sit down to play a game, the chances of a newbie winning and a five year veteran winning have to be equal.

Now, correct me if I am wrong, but that sounds like a coin toss. Is it not? If the chances of a player who never practices needs to equal that of a polished veteran, only a coin toss will satisfy that. Any other system would steer clear of the needed 50/50 odds. These debaters attempted to clarify that skill implies an ability to adapt and play a new game without experience. So, this changed the argument from a coin toss to a direct measure of God-given talent. Practice is not allowed to alter results; skill simply measures the player's natural ability. Are you confused yet? So am I.

I have checked the world over, and I cannot find one instance of serious competition where this was the measure of skill involved. Last I checked, basketball players were allowed to practice dribbles and shots before competing. Last I checked, skill resulted from hard work and personal refinement as opposed to gaging the amount of dumb luck a person has. However, if these expressions of skill are incorrect, then I suppose Candy Land is the only way we can see how much natural talent a person has. After all, it would be unfair if the game promoted practice or gave anyone an unfair advantage.

Poll Review #1 - Items in Brawl Tournaments

Should items be permitted in competitive Brawl?
Always! (8 votes)
Only in special events. (18 votes)
Never! (19 votes)

This does not speak for the entire smash community (obviously), but the results are fairly expected. There is a minority who want items in all tournaments with no questions asked. The bulk of the competitive community is split between even allowing them for special events (on top of having item-free events) and disallowing them entirely. The reality of the situation will be interesting to see as Brawl tournaments are finally organized starting in February. With the advent of online tournaments, there may actually be item tournament followers this time around. While online tournaments will never become the accepted mainstream tournament standard (I reference Halo 2 at MLG), the community will grow as a result of online participation.

Brawl Update Patches

I have given this topic a ton of thought. However unlikely to be implemented by Nintendo, I believe the concept is feasible.

For the sake of background, I will use Blizzard as an example. Blizzard maintains their sacred triad of franchises: Warcraft, Starcraft, and Diablo. In all those games, players discover imbalances in the core engine. Upon revealing those issues, Blizzard releases a patch required for online play. The patch makes certain characters stronger and others weaker to make the game more competitive. In the case of Diablo, the patches tweak individual spells and skills to prevent instances of the "one-trick pony" (one who abuses a single skill in dealing with all opponents because that skill does the job). In Starcraft, units have their damage and speed modified based on group dynamics. For instance, since marines usually travel in groups, it is only necessary to modify their weapon damage by a small amount. The large numbers amplify the effect of such a change.

The feasibility of Brawl update patches depends upon the structure of the combat engine. In an ideal situation, every move's speed, damage, hit-box radius, etc. would have a number assigned to them as opposed to being hard-coded into the game. Under these circumstances, patches from Nintendo would be only a few kilobytes. This would make the whole system quite comfortable in the Wii's limited storage space. 512 MB is not much, but a patch of this size would occupy less than a thousandth of the space.

Update patches would solve a whole bunch of problems. In Melee, Nintendo saw the delayed PAL release as an opportunity to clean up their "mistakes". Several of the high tier characters were weakened in hopes of balancing the game. Today, almost six years after Melee's release, I am sure both Nintendo and the smash community have thoughts on which characters need to be modified, but it is far too late for that. Brawl offers a unique opportunity with WiiConnect24. Today's DOJO update suggests that the game creators could more closely monitor the way players handle their characters. By collecting statistics on wins and losses sorted by character, Nintendo has the ability to better watch out for broken tactics. The tier list would slowly rotate as bottom tier characters improved. Every character would have his or her chance in the spotlight of competition because no one would be neglected.

Sadly, update patches would also introduce a whole bunch of problems. First and foremost, Nintendo and the competitive community would disagree on what moves or characters need improvements or handicaps. For instance, the PAL version of Melee destroyed the semi-spike ability of Link's spin attack, but even the NTSC Link poses no serious threat in a tournament environment. This change likely resulted from new players spamming the move and winning against other casual players. Second, releasing patches too often would prevent the game from evolving as Melee did. That also asks the question, how often is "too often"? Every six months? Once every two years? One way to answer that is to ask, when did Melee stagnate? When did Melee start needing patches? Those questions are equally difficult to answer. Third, patch johns would run rampant all over the world. Anyone playing on another person's Wii would excuse their losses by explaining how a patch's update threw them off.

Both sides present serious issues. Not patching the game leads to issues Melee experienced. Fortunately, Brawl is receiving much more attention and care than Melee did. I am fairly optimistic in hoping that Brawl features more than four characters winning tournaments everywhere.

Inconsistent Experience

Investing time into the learning process is important, but certain processes yield more knowledge and experience than others. To put it bluntly, not all experiences are created equal.

I lived in South Korea for two years as a missionary. Before flying to the country itself, I spent eleven weeks in Provo, Utah at the Missionary Training Center to study the Korean language. When I first arrived at the MTC, there were two other districts learning Korean. One district was five weeks ahead, and the other district was ten weeks ahead. In my district's first week of lessons, we practiced our personal introductions to the ten week district. Our Korean was choppy, slow, and all around bad. On top of that, they were memorized routines. The ten week district, on the other hand, spouted off whole paragraphs of detailed information without a moment's hesitation. At that moment, I wanted more than anything to reach the ten week level. One week into the training, the leading district flew out to their respective missions.

Ten weeks later, I became what I wanted to become at week #1. Not only did I speak comfortably and fluently, there were two districts under me, so suddenly I was the expert. I was the one being asked all the questions. It was an extremely exciting week. My district finally received its batch of flight itineraries, and the nights became sleepless ones. After a few days, we finally stepped into the plane and flew to the city of Incheon. From Incheon, we rode a bus to Seoul.

In Seoul, my district given the opportunity to interact with hundreds of native Koreans. We were excited for this opportunity, but excitement turned to horror as realized we could not understand a single word. We suffered blows to our ego as other missionaries who had been in the country for just a few weeks longer seemed to converse with little difficulty. It suddenly dawned upon us that we judged our own abilities based on each other.

In contrast to my district's disappointment, there was indeed a light at the end of the tunnel. We discovered that our Korean skills had more than doubled in the first few weeks in the country. The circumstances were substantially different. Rather than practicing the language with other ignorant non-Asians, we were in a place where the language really mattered. Our survival depended upon our ability to speak.

To be continued...

Violation of Kindergarten Principles?

Never trust strangers... unless smash is involved. That seems to be the philosophy of anyone who has ever traveled to a far off place for a smash tournament. Competitors are willing to fly to a state or country they have never been to, be picked up by someone they have never met before, and stay overnight (sometimes multiple nights) at that someone's home. This requires an unbelievable amount of trust on both sides. The one traveling has no idea if the host is planning on trapping him and mugging him with the help of his buddies. The host has no idea if the one traveling is planning on pulling a knife and robbing the place on his way out. These are obviously quite radical takes on the situation (and if any parents are reading, know that I completely made them up), but honestly, how are traveling smashers able to trust one another so faithfully despite all we were taught in our youth?

I remember my kindergarten teacher explicitly using Nintendo as an example. She said, "Never get into a car with a stranger, even if he offers a Nintendo!" Ironically, last year, I flew to Colorado and rode with a stranger because he promised to play Nintendo with me (big tournament in Broomfield). My kindergarten teacher would be so disappointed in me, but seriously, what drove me to do this? Reputation plays a big part in this. This "stranger" is now my good friend InterimOfZeal. He was an active member of the Colorado smash community, so I knew I could trust him.

The second best thing to traveling out of state for a tournament is hosting traveling smashers because it is a fresh experience for both parties involved. For the host, it is like "traveling without having to travel" since the 'foreigners' came to them. The only loss here is that the host cannot experience the foreign environment. Personally, I always look forward to doing a 360 in a new place and absorbing my surroundings. Seeing the smash venue is always a treat as well. This all adds to the implied trust since the host is equally excited to the travelers.

Traveling alone is uncommon in the smash community, anyway. It is safer and more fun to travel as a group. This is particularly beneficial when driving a car since riders can all pitch in for fuel costs.

What effect will Brawl's WiFi have upon the traveling smashers? I suspect that tournaments will remain relatively unaffected (if you do not believe me, check Halo 2 at MLG). However, smashfests will most likely take a downward spiral. My neighbor and I both have Mario Strikers Charged. Even we were too lazy to physically walk over and play each other since online play was available and relatively lag-free. If Brawl's online play is feasible, it will most certainly impact the way practice sessions are run. I definitely will have more people to play with than are currently available in the abyss of eastern Idaho.

TO READERS: What are your thoughts on traveling to smash with strangers? Is it exciting or scary? Share your thoughts by posting a comment!

The Fate of Items in Smash - Part 2

Today is a continuation of yesterday's article. Be sure to read that first to catch up on the story.

So, what will become of items in the Brawl era of competition? Well, that question can be answered with an absolutely indisputable... depends. In other words, items did not behave so well when Melee competition was developing. As noted in AlphaZealot's response, the competitive community actually did use items for a long time. However, being unable to disable exploding capsules, boxes, and party balls was items' undoing. With unfair explosions occurring within a fraction of a second, items became intolerable in the competitive environment. There were too many upsets during the final matches of tournaments.

As competitive play has evolved over the years, other more blatant issues began to present themselves regarding items. For instance, even without random explosions, the randomness of items gives one player an advantage that cannot be matched by the opponent. A capsule appearing near one character gives him or her unearned added leverage. Consider Falco knocking Fox off the stage. In the time from when Fox starts his fire fox to when he actually starts moving, Falco can watch a capsule spawn at his feet, pick it up, and KO Fox with no effort since Fox is immobile. (A member of SWF witnessed this very event in competition, so it is not unheard of.) These kinds of events pull emphasis away from character control and place more on luck of the draw. That leads me to my next point.

Many argue that smash is supposed to be a game of chance just like Poker and Blackjack. Despite luck being a common factor in all gambling games, there are professionals out there who win consistently because they know how to best handle the elements of randomness. Why can't the same be applied to smash? Well, technically it can be, but the current competition simply chooses not to. Competitive smashers today view the game more along the lines of a sport. They believe there should be no coin tosses or outside interference. Victory should come as a result of hard work and discipline while playing the game. Losses should be traceable to a single mistake (or series of mistakes). Allowing items is like allowing spectators to throw junk onto the field during a football game.

So, we have two strongly opposing perspectives on the same game. Why have item-free tournaments blossomed while item-filled tournaments become nearly extinct? My theory is that is has to due with the very mentality behind both sides. Competitive smashers take the game very seriously and thus are adamant about making sure competition happens. They tend to look for opportunities to compete, even if it means hosting their own event because winning matters. Items tend to cater more to the casual smashers who do not take the game as seriously and are tolerant of random elements in the game. However, since item supporters are generally more casual, discovering who is best is not of utmost importance to them. Therefore, not many item tournaments take place because just smashing at home with friends is usually sufficient for this type of smasher, even if they do strive to increase their ability and win more.

The future of items seems bleak in Brawl. Many tournament hosts have agreed to at least allow items in tournaments for the first while. Disabling random explosives will be a step in the right direction, if it is even an option. There are still two major barricades to overcome. First, many smashers have become so comfortable with item-free environments that hosts may ban items from the get go just out of habit. This will only hinder adoption of items in competitive play. Second, even without the explosions, players may slowly become frustrated with the unfair advantages that items throw around. While a coin flip's odds remain at a constant "fair" 50/50, there is nothing to stop it from landing on tails eight times in a row.

TO READERS: What is your take on the items situation? Post your response in the comments!

The Fate of Items in Smash

No items. Fox only. Final Destination... The only way to play! OK, not really, but many would have you believe that that is how the competitive smash community likes their Melee. The big question on many smasher's minds is this: Why were items banned? What happened? Did a smasher wake up, decide he did not like items, and ban them from his matches that day forth? Why are items banned so universally in tournaments now? I recently attended a tournament hosted by Play N Trade. The hosts had no connection to Smash World Forums or Major League Gaming whatsoever, but they still banned items (despite permitting all stages).

I sent an inquiry to AlphaZealot about the history of items, and he was kind enough to provide a detailed reply:

The east coast has been functioning with itemless tournaments since 2003, the west coast since 2004-2005. For a long time there were two camps of smash thought, one that argued for items and one that argued against them. The pro-item argument usually centered on the idea that items spawns were not random; they were on a timer and rotated between spawn points. Therefore, the location of these spawn points could be controlled and added a risk/reward type idea. The only problem left then were the exploding capsules/crates, something that could not be predicted in any way. In the end, the east coast won the argument, and Matt Deezie finally changed his rules to no items for TG6, which signaled the end of the debate.

The east coast for many years played with 5 stock. This went on until sometime in 2005 when MLG rules became the way to go. The west coast was using 3 stock until around this time. Again, MLG rules and 4 stock sorta took over in the late 2004 early 2005 era.

[...] There were really only a few tournaments that set the standards we use today, and they occured back in 2004. If you looked at it, the most influential tournaments would be FC in the midwest (and maybe JV's Michigan tournaments), Gauntlet, BOMB, H2YL's tournament series (game over/live or die), and TG on the west coast. MLG modeled their rules (with M3D being the person who did so) after these tournaments but particularly over the tournaments around DC because that is where he first began playing smash competitively. Once MLG functioned, their rules became a consistent force for tournaments; the rest of the community began adopting their rules as almost a standard (the idea being something like this: when we hold tournaments, do it with MLG rules, so when we go to MLG tournaments and large sums of money will be on the line, we will be ready).

Article is continued in the following update.

Blood, Sweat, and Tiers

This is a very hot topic and has been for years since its conception. Brawl's upcoming release only adds fuel to the fire. The concept of "tiers" is a very sensitive topic for many smashers. Even I never had a very warm welcoming from the tier-worshiping community.

I purchased Melee in the summer of 2002. My favorite characters for years were Young Link, Roy, and Kirby (you can see where I am headed with this). One day, I stumbled across the almighty official tier list of Smashboards. How are my favorite characters ranked? Low, low, and bottom. (Actually, the list was different back then, but the positions were essentially the same.) Needless to say, I was quite skeptical of the character rankings. How could characters I use and win with be considered so bad? Well, it took a year or two of tournament attendance to discover my answer, but I did finally accept the tier list for what it was.

There is one key thing that everyone needs to understand: the tier list does not dictate the winner of any given match. The winner of multiple matches dictates the tier list. However much people don't like it, Fox is #1 right now. Is it all just a big popularity contest? Sort of. The more people that use Fox, the more likely he is to win, no? This is one unfortunate side effect of the tier list, but it stems much deeper than this. Players take great offense at seeing their favorite characters so low on the tier list, but they do nothing to rectify the problem outside of debating the issue in forums. The tier list was only partially determined through discussion. The vast majority of tier list decisions arise in the Smash Back Room from observations of tournament results.

It is also important to understand that the tier list does not always apply on a personal level. I win far more matches with Young Link than Marth, but that is not some testament that Young Link is "better" than Marth. It just goes to prove that hard work offsets the implication that higher tier characters will absolutely, positively always defeat a lower tier character. As noted in my recent SmashTV article, there are players out there who demonstrate amazing feats with extremely "bad" characters. While lone legends are not enough to push characters up the tier list, they are important examples of hard work (hence the "blood" and "sweat"). ChuDat is one of the best players in the world, but Ice Climbers are still #7 on the current tier list (though, they probably would be lower without his influence).

The tier list is nothing more than a tool. It is not there to mock players who prefer low tier characters. There are several members in the community who use the tier list as ammunition for insults against anyone who dare supports low tier characters. Everyone should play with whom they want to play. If winning tournaments is important, the higher tier characters provide some good options. The tier list is not a source for excuses when losing a match. Players choose their characters fully aware of the consequences.

So, what does this mean for Brawl? Well, this is a rare opportunity to play smash without a tier list breathing down everyone's neck. Play to win, but also play to develop a favorite character. If everyone plays only Meta Knight, then naturally he will be top tier. Branch out and discover hidden talent amongst the other characters!

Competitive versus Casual - The Unnecessary War

As the release of Brawl draws closer day by day, the worst seems to come out of all sides of the smash community. Wishful hopes transform into adamant expectations as light-hearted discussion causes members of the smash community to blindly call one another's ideas stupid. Rather than ignore such immature behavior, members proceed to defend their ideas as if it it were their religion that suffered an attack.

This scenario is most evident in the recent outbreak between the "competitive community" and "casual community". Recently, the competitive community made a concerted effort to verify the presence (or absence) of certain advanced techniques in Brawl (namely wavedashing), whose demo was available for several days to the public at E4All. Upon discovery of the apparent loss of wavedashing as a result of a new air dodging system, the casual community interpreted this to mean that wavedashing (among other advanced tactics) were unintentional abuses of the physics engine and thus constituted cheating in the world of Melee. The competitive side retaliated with its own logic and reasoning as to why such physics exploits are completely harmless and only benefit competition.

The tragedy of this whole situation is that the arguments are completely unnecessary. The casual community attempts to define "fun", the "intent of the creator", and "cheap". The competitive community retaliates with insults such as "noob", "scrub", and "idiots". Why is it impossible for both sides to accept the other's style of play?

Casual smashers are seeking genuine entertainment but tend to downplay the competitive smashers' definition of "skill". The common argument is that true skill includes the ability to deal with the random element involved with items and tournament banned stages. Some casual players take it all a step further and refer to advanced techniques as crutches for competitive players to deceive themselves into thinking they have real skill. It is sad to see such a short-sighted perspective. The problem with banning advanced techniques on account of being "cheap" is that it is impossible to draw the line. Every anti-competitive casual smasher has a varying set of rules on what constitutes honorable combat.

On the other side of the spectrum lies the competitive community. What started as simple defense of advanced techniques evolved into vengeful mockery of the casual community. Advanced players throw around terms such as "noob" and "scrub" despite some members of the casual community being fully capable of using advanced techniques. This led to several discrepancies as numerous competitive players defended the casual community, and several casual players defended the competitive community.

The war will most likely rage on until Brawl is actually released. When that day comes, both communities will go their separate ways. Members of the competitive community will collaborate to unveil as many techniques as possible. Casual smashers will mostly withdraw from the forums to focus on just having fun with the game. The forums give them something to do and provide a way to build hype leading up to Brawl's release, which is what led to this clash of cultures in the first place.

The wavedash is not a glitch.

In response to the overwhelming number of smashers who believe that wavedashing is glitch, I have taken it upon myself to clarify this otherwise touchy subject. Whether glitches/exploits should be allowed in competitive smash is another discussion for another day. For now, I will explain the wavedash.

If any character air dodges into the ground, he or she will slide along the ground a set distance based on both the angle of contact (steeper angles lead to shorter slides) and individual character friction (Luigi has virtually no friction [more distance] while Zelda has extremely high friction [less distance]). Players take advantage of this part of the physics in order to better maneuver their characters. It can be used to better space attacks, launch a moving smash attack, or quickly slide off the stage into an edge-hog.

The wavedash is a particular variation of this slide. It is used from a standing position (as opposed to wavelanding where a character air dodges into the ground after having fallen from the air). It consists of three parts: jumping, air dodging, and sliding. If you examine each component individually, it should be quite apparent that all three were clearly intended physics of the game. Using all three in quick succession results in a seemingly unique move since the jump animations are completely invisible. However, no part of the wavedash pushes the game outside of its normal boundaries. Everything happens exactly as it should. So, if jumping, air dodging, and sliding are not glitches, how is the resulting maneuver a glitch as so many people believe?

For the sake of argument, let us examine a blatant game glitch: the Ice Climbers freeze glitch ("glitch" is even in the title). This trick also consists of non-glitch components. The simplest way to trigger this glitch is to have one Ice Climber grab while the other breaks the target loose with the hammer spin (forward-B). The target, for whatever reason, suddenly freezes in time and space. The target cannot move (but still can take damage) until grabbed and thrown. This result is clearly a glitch (or the game creators had a twisted sense of humor) as it essentially grants the Ice Climbers a free kill. According to the physics engine, the victim should either take the beatings or be broken loose. The result is clearly a system accident.

The wavedash grants no such advantage. It is not a glitch that guarantees victory; it is one of many tools available to skilled players to enhance their game. To ban wavedashing is to ban forms of creativity in the game. Under such circumstances, it would be only a matter of time before the most basic of combos are deemed dishonorable. At worst, the wavedash is considered an exploit.