Super Smash Bros. 4: What Did You Think Of It, Really?

We are now months out from the release of Super Smash Bros. for 3DS and Wii U (depending on which version you decide to go with), so enough time has passed that the 'honeymoon period' has ended, and we can have a fair assessment of the game.

My question to all of you is- what do you think of the game? What were your thoughts? What were your impressions?

Here is what I thought:

• Holistically, this game is better than Brawl
• Holistically, this game is better than the original Super Smash Bros.
• Mechanically, this game is, in my opinion, better than Melee. I don't care if you think I am casual trash for thinking so, this is my opinion, and I stand by it. There is more mechanical nuance to Smash 4 than there was to Melee.
• Smash 3DS was content starved. However, it had the better stages of the two versions of Smash 4
• Smash Wii U is in a lot of ways disappointing- the stages are worse than Smash 3DS, the Wii U exclusive mode, Smash Tour, is worse than Smash Run, and so on- but 8 Man Smash almost single handedly justifies its existence. 8 Man Smash is so far the only instance where I have felt this was true next gen gaming- here, we had eight local players all going at it in the same room, with a variety of controllers all synching up to my console while the game continued to run at 1080p/60FPS. No other game or console can offer this experience.
• Smash 4 is, without a doubt, one of the best experiences of last year (though I still maintain I like Mario Kart 8 more).
• The soundtrack in Smash 4 is amazing. I like the Smash 4 main theme the most out of all the Smash main themes.
• Amiibo support in Smash Wii U is great.
• I don't care what you think, I really like the 3DS controls. The 3DS is actually my preferred controller for Smash 4 as of now, and I am fairly bummed I cannot use it online.
• The character selection in Smash 4 is great.
• Really, would it have killed Nintendo to have some form of a story mode or central campaign in this game? That is, really, my only complaint with the game.

That's what I think, though. How about you?

You copy pasted my opinions, dick head

I don't have too many gamer friends anymore, actually none really, just one that is cool with playing games but doesn't really care about game himself, so I haven't really had much fun with it but I intend to play more of it sometime.

blog it

• at its core, it's the best, most balanced smash game to date.
• 8 man smash is way, way too cluttered and chaotic. it's borderline unplayable. me and my friends have pretty much given up on it. maybe if it had split screen, it could work on that kirby stage...
• speaking of 8 man smash, classic mode sucks on wii u because half the matches are 6-8 man smashes in tiny stages (who thought kongo jungle 64 and castle siege were good stages for 8 players?). as such it lacks encounter variety. smash 3DS' classic is efficient and better than in the wii u, but nothing game breaking.
• not sure if i got way better since the melee days, but i breezed through all events in a few days, with the rewards/flags. some were more troublesome than others, some were interesting and creative (i like the one where you must keep the mr. game and watches from landing on the stage), but it felt short.
• smash tour is sh!t. smash run is the best mode in either game and justifies buying the 3DS version, on top of smash on the go.
• still can't set custom values for stamina smash, or set coin smash to "first to X coins wins" instead of time.
• someone fire their stage design team and hire a new one. i'm tired of all stages being either a variation of battlefield, a scrolling stage, or a "tour" stage, where a main platform takes you through several spots in a large environment (like the mario sunshine stage). this problem started in brawl and it still annoys me.
• for the love of god, remember who's playing the game now. having to set my name every single time i play every single game mode and every single time i swap game modes just because i use custom controls is the most obnoxious thing i've seen in any fighting game. imagine having to set up your buttons before every match in any other fighting game.
• i really, really miss having long term specific goals that rewarded me characters and stages. on one hand, i like having access to everything in the "base" game fast, on the other, i feel like i run out of interesting content too quick if i don't have a clear goal to work towards (this really, really hurt how much i played mario kart 8). no, doing challenges for trophies doesn't count.
• this might tie into the previous paragraph: RNG for custom moves, hats and costumes is hell. at least costumes go by quickly.
• i like the more cartoonish style on the 3DS, and the more gamey music. while the wii u smash's visuals are far better than the "gritty reboot" style from brawl, i still prefer cartoonish visuals for this game.
• custom fighters are a really cool idea... if they didn't have to come with stupid RPG-lite stats. i can't play fairly with custom characters because the CPU filler characters will all be buffed to hell and back because of a broken system. i really want an option to turn on only the custom moves, not the stats.
• overall, i prefer the 3DS version, unless it's to play with others. in fact, i was ready to skip the wii u version until someone gifted it to me. it's a really solid game either way though.

PS: pet peeve: who looked at the wii u gamepad and thought "L + R + A + start" was a good input to exit the match? why can't it be something that i can do without taking my hand off my controller first? and why don't events have a "quick retry" button like home run and target blast do? i don't even mind the lack of an actual pause menu, but make the damn thing intuitive and complete then.

I haven't really touched it in a while.

Then again I've been playing a lot more PC games.

@BrunoBRS: Really well said man.

And yeah, wtf. I use my nose to exit matches. Thanks Sakurai

It was a video game.

It was a video game.

I live with a bunch of dudes

and one guy loves N64 for Golden eye its all he plays he even does the single player a lot

and the other guy loves Smash bro N64 and does the 1v1 or free for all and loves kirby in that game

other dude semi likes 360 for stuff like halo and hitman an stuff

NONE of em like wiiU actually zero of them

they love smash n64 i see them playing it all the time listening to music an stuff playin that game an having a great time

i HAVE not once seen them play wiiU or smash wiiu

and ive seent hem play wii smash brawl a lot too and everyone is laughin having fun with n64 (more competitive 1v1) wii smash brawl (fun with 4 people switchin in an out)

wiiU was never needed and trust me when i say college kids aren't into it and many people are mocking the wiiU still

To put it short and simple, I loved it and it's probably my favorite Smash to date.

@ProtossRushX:

Your posts are always practically unreadable. Are you seriously a college student?

Wouldn't this thread be better suited for the Nintendo Discussion or Games Discussion boards?

• I love 8-Player Smash.
• Most balanced game to date.
• Online improved a lot.
• Best roster.
• Superior Classic Mode to its predecessors.
• Hard as balls All-Star Mode.
• Event Mode is more challenging.
• Incredible soundtrack.
• I love to browse trophies and read their descriptions.
• Each hard challenge gives me a sense of fulfillment.

You guys should get the 3rd party GC adapter if you don't want to wait anymore for the Nintendo one. It works perfectly.

Meh. Another Smash. I try to get into it every time and every time I fail. Just not my thing, but sometimes I play it with my kid sisters on the weekend, so at least I do have a use for it.

i haven't played it but i dont get why people freak out and hype the shit out of smash bros games.

Haven't bought it yet. Does it have the sidescrolling stuff like the N64 one?

This is me to a "t" as well. I love the game but with no gamer friends it's hard to get into Smash, single player story driven games are what I tend to play now.

I still think melee is best. It was the most hardcore of them all.

The most balanced smash as of yet. The Wii U version has more content, but the quality of the 3DS version is generally higher.

Smash Run>>>Smash Tour
3DS Classic>Wii U Classic
3DS Exclusive Maps>Wii Exclusive maps

That said, the sheer variety offered by the Wii U ultimately trumps the 3DS.

Yeah, what the hell were they thinking?

Looks like a lot of fun

But I'm still waiting for the bundle that includes the 3DS and WiiU version.

I really love it. But my main problem with it is...No matter which way you cut it, it's always the same characters fighting on the same stages. An adventure mode or story mode would of differentiated the gameplay.

Other than that...It may be the best Smash ever.

Cool story

It's really awesome and fun. And it will get better when tournament mode/mewtwo/miiverse stage etc etc arrives (I guess all of those in march)

that's why i like smash run so much. it has enough moment-to-moment gameplay and variables to keep it varied, and it doesn't play like regular smash, but like adventure mode in the previous games.

The best Smash in terms of gameplay and characters.

In terms of content, I'd say it's a grade below Brawl, since Brawl's story mode was fun in my opinion, All Star didn't seem as easy and compacted, and getting trophies was fun and not a total pain in the ass.
I like the Wii U version better for its controls and content, but the 3DS version handled quality more with Smash Run (basically Adventure mode) and the stages (despite a third being classics).

Overall, I'd say it's the best in the series for multiplayer, but if I were to go single player on a console, I'd still go with Brawl, because single player on the Wii U version gets boring fast for some reason.

My opinion to sum it up goes.

It basically took all the best elements out of all the previous games and expanded upon it. Plus kept to the same formula which made the others so entertaining. Beautiful to look at and runs flawlessly and the music is the best out of any game i've played.

My only negatives with the game is that it should of had some form of campaign like brawl. Online needs more freedom, the games has all the modes but online suffers by keeping it very basic. I want to play stock with randomers!

But im very pleased with the game and will come back to it for years and years to come just like melee.

I can't say I like it very much at all. The default controls are horrid with the gamepad and they keep changing your settings back to the fucking default causing you to constantly get into games with controls that are ass backwards, it drives me insane. The fighting is passable but if it weren't for the nintendo mascots I would have stopped playing this game after the first day.

I never played the original SB games so I have little to compare it with, but I'm not a fan of what I've seen. This game has mostly sat in its case since I picked it up.

-smash tour is lame and is doo doo tier compared to smash run

-8 player smash, while maybe okay for multiplayer stuff (never really got to try it with actual people), it completely ruins classic mode. Smash 3DS's classic, while not devoid of BS itself, was still better than Wii U's

-stage builder was meh tier yet again. Don't see why they decided to remove stuff from what Brawl's stage editor offered, and I'm not the most artistic person there is, so the whole drawing thing doesn't really do much for me.

-lolmasterpieces

-special orders is okay. I actually think Crazy orders is kind of neat. of course the only worthwhile single player mode actually costs coins to play (unless you have a ticket). and like other single player modes, can be unfair when the game is like HERE CPU ENEMY HAVE THESE OP ITEMS.

-some events and challenges are just pure unfair, cheap, horseshit. the challenges in the 3DS version were overall less obnoxious, and I liked how they seperated challenges between 3 seperate boards.

-any mode that both versions of Smash 4 shared (aka trophy rush, target smash, etc.) became tiresome in the Wii U version since it came out after the 3DS version.

Overall I would actually say smash 3DS was actually better than the Wii U. I could understand why people may prefer the Wii U version, since its multiplayer is technically better, but the thing is Smash 3DS's multiplayer really wasn't bad at all IMO. I didn't really find it that hard to get used to its controls and had no problem improving my game with the 3DS version. and there's the fact that the 3DS, while it had less modes overall, it had more GOOD modes.

As for my overall feelings for the smash 4 experince overall, it was alright. the games are mechanically better than Brawl, so I could apprecaite Smash 4 for that, but it still doesn't compare to Melee. Smash 4 does clearly have the best roster of characters. OST is nice, outside of the fact that nintendo basically went out of their way to give DK awful music representation.

Only other thing I'll say is that I wish Nintendo did a better job of differentiating both versions of smash. maybe the Wii U version should of had an adventure mode instead of a classic mode. maybe the should have replaced target smash with a target mode more similar to previous smash games (preferrable 64's and melee's). Maybe give the Wii U version a different trophy game other than trophy rush. Or better yet maybe Nintendo should have just focused on making one amazing smash experience, as opposed to one pretty good one (3DS) and one decent but redundant one (Wii U). The whole "two different smash versions" idea sounded good on paper, though the execution left alot to be desired.

I haven't played Smash Run yet. I only have the Wii U version. The Wii U version doesn't have anything like that.

Other than 3 questionable cuts and clone inclusions easily the best Smash to date.

You're welcome to have an opinion, but prefacing this statement with "in my opinion" is like saying "in my opinion, water isn't wet, gravity doesn't exist, and the sky isn't blue." I'd be 100% okay with you saying Smash 4 is more fun than Melee because that's completely subjective, but saying something like this hints at being uninformed.

Factually, Melee is more mechanically nuanced than Smash 4 or any other official SSB game.

OT: Obviously, I don't like Smash 4.

@princeofshapeir: Actually, I am curious, what was your stance on Smash 4, then? I remember you seemed to be liking it after the release of the 3DS version.

The game suffers from not having this stage

And yeah, I wish it had an awesome campaign like Brawl had, and I wish Gamecube controller adapters were easy to find (since I do not like the Wii U controllers for this game)

@papatrop: That stage is in there, it's in the 3DS version though.

Didn't read but

if this is true, then I probably disagree.

The more I played the less I liked it. It feels like a slightly sped up Brawl. It takes too long to KO anyone. Everyone's recoveries are really good and there are less offstage options compared to Melee or 64. IMO the final roster doesn't feel as impactful as Brawl's final roster. Even on Wii U the online is really laggy. People are catching on to characters like Diddy Kong who are really easy to play yet really good and dominating with them, and then Sakurai said something to the effect of "I won't be doing any more balance patches," which is weird.

Overall I have more fun playing it with friends than I did with Brawl, I guess.

Also: it really grinds my gears how Nintendo patches the game, but doesn't release patch notes. The community literally has to figure out what changed on their own, and that's an exhausting process.

• Adjustments have also been made to balance the game and make for a more pleasant gaming experience.

TC knows how I feel: my critical pick for GOTY. It strikes a great balance between being a twitch game while punishing overagression. And the amount of polish is phenomenal, in a year when many other games couldn't stand on their own two feet.

Albeit I say all that in light of the fact I missed out on some top-tier games: South Park, Far Cry 4, Talos Principle, Bayonetta 2, Shovel Knight, among others

A disappointment. No characters with an appealing moveset. That's all it takes to kill a fighting game.

3DS version?

• 8 player Smash is awesome especially on Temple
• Smash Run > Smash Tour
• I feel the game has great balance compare to the others
• Wii U stages are meh for the most part. The 3DS stages are ok but neither have a stage that wows me (then again I still haven't unlocked every stage on both games yet).
• Smash Wii U is overall a lot better then Brawl and Smash 64
• Playing Smash on the 3DS is playable but it doesn't feel right. Hence why it's the main reason why the Wii U version kills it.
• I like both classic modes and all star modes
• I miss the Melee target practice
• For the most part I love the new characters

B-but Mewtwo

I love the WiiU version. I don't care for the 3DS version, although perhaps playing it on the New 3DS XL will improve it.

@papatrop: Yep. No Corneria on the Wii U version was heartbreak.

I said this a few times WELL BEFORE SSB released on both systems, but I'll say it again because people around here don't think about the developer struggles:

I'm sure it would have been better if the developer (Masahiro Sakurai, Sora, Hal, Namco, etc) could have focused on making ONE Ultimate version of SSB instead of rushing two complete two versions of SSB in the same year. That's what they used to do. I wonder about the idea of what could have been. I think both products (3DS SSB and Wii U SSB) suffered by existing within months of each other.

Personally, I already stopped playing my Wii U version. It seemed easier. The family don't bug me to play it anymore once we unlocked characters and did challenges. I haven't gotten better at games, I was playing fighting games at tourney levels winning 1st place before SSB N64 ever released. If anything, I've gotten worse, but it's just an easier game. *Shrugs*

All that said, I still am glad I own it. I'm sure it will be used again at the next party/BBQ/family get together. I love fighting games for decades but this game is a disappointment to me, then again, I always liked the pick up and play aspect and SP modes in the previous entries. The games are designed to be easy to jump in for all which was always nice for kids.

The game is a lot of fun, but it's still one of those games you play in small doses if playing alone as it wears on you towards boredom after a while, at least for me. Just gets a bit boring after you've played and unlocked all the characters and stages, but the challenges keep it interesting.

Smash Tour is all right, inferior to Smash Run, but it's good for what it is and is a good way to get a lot of collectibles.

Other than a few occurrences, the online is buttery smooth and a blast to play unless you suck like I do most of the time.

An adventure or story mode would've been nice, but it doesn't kill the game in any real way. I recall hearing that it was supposed to have it, but it got spoiled by leakers and Sakurai a bit irrationally and immaturely got rid of it. If it had variety each time, it would have been a great edition.

Other than that, the game looks beautiful, awesome soundtracks, is a blast to play on and offline, and has tons of challenges and modes to keep you playing for hours. An amazing game if you love fighting games.

It's definitely the most fun-to-play Smash game since the N64 one.

I couldn't care less about the competitive crap people bring up all the time. If that's what you like, great, go play Melee and leave the rest of us to enjoy what Nintendo thinks the majority likes in peace.

That and Bowser is finally a reasonably good character to play as. Which is a nice change.

I got bored of it pretty instantly; I just don't find these games much fun to play anymore. My bro on the other hand, is super competitive and is always wiping the floor against anyone and anything. He always wants me to practice, but I don't have any motivation to. Too boring.

I had fun playing the game despite not trying the online mode once.

It's okay but really disappointing compared to Project M. I would encourage anyone to try that game out as soon as possible.