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Settle It In Smash

  • Addit
  • 10/03/2014 09:56 AM
  • 11332 views


A Game Made By: Felipe_9595
Created Using: Game Maker
It's A: PLATFORMER Game
That Roughly Takes Around: 5 - 10 Minutes To Complete
And It's A...
DEMO VERSION!!!

(As of September 23rd, 2014)


What a smashing coincidence! (Yeah, I know, bad pun… Shut up!) With the impending arrival of the next highly anticipated installment in the “Super Smash Bros.” series (you know…that Nintendo fighting crossover game thingy…good for throwing at parties and when you’re drunk) now arriving in North America as of…*checks calendar* right now, and with the Wii U version of the game (the one that I’m getting, personally) sailing on over here via illegal cargo ship sometime soon - the girlish screams of the many fanboys and fangirls are running high. And how could you not get excited!? It’s freakin’ Smash! I don’t care who you are or what console you like over the other, you have the admit that it’s still pretty fun and satisfying beating the ever-loving shit out of your least favourite Nintendo characters with your most cherished Nintendo characters. Either way, it’s a good time to be a Smash Bros. fan.

I’ve been Smashing with locals, friends, family, former drug dealers and addicts since 1999 – and I even entered a Melee tournament back in 2002 in downtown Vancouver where I was eventually ousted in the quarter-finals by a guy who mained a killer Fox. I had no chance against him… Well…maybe I would have if I just “believed in myself” a bit more, whatever. Also, the stench of sitting on that stupid couch for every single match for almost four hours long started to get to me a little bit, especially with everybody sweating up a storm and rubbing it all over all those Gamecube controllers and passing it to you afterwards, urgh.

(Nerdsweat. The worst kind of sweat.)

…What was I talking about again? Oh yeah, Smash. Either way, Smash fans got a little “extra excited” during these past couple of days before the release of the real Smash because Felipe_9595 and his intelligent team of buddies managed to crop up a brand new spankin’ demo of their fan variation “Super Smash Bros. Crusade”. Not a bad present.

I find it quite funny that I remember Felipe_9595 more for the whole #shump falling out thing back then where we all just acted like jackasses more so than this game, which has been around in development for a couple of years now. I actually remember this game a little bit back then but thought it was too good to be true. No offence – I kinda thought that these guys would have given up by now and packed their bags and set off straight towards Tahiti… But, once again, I am proven wrong by the incredible power of teamwork…and donuts.

So why not dust off the old USB controller that I’ve had lying around in my drawer somewhere and get some practicin’ for some Smashin’! I could use the practice, considering my skills have all been but a bit rusty lately due to, you know, old age and stuff.

The Story


Alright – alright – who was the wise guy here that was the one who invited Goku to the party!?


- It’s the biggest fighting tournament of the century, where many countless Nintendo all-stars both famous – and not so famous – have all gathered together here in one single game for only one thing and one thing only (and no, it’s not for charity or raising money to build an orphanage or something like that in Africa, although that would probably help a lot) – it’s to beat the ever-living hell out of each other and prove that they still have what it takes even today…even Sonic, who’s technically been dead for years!

Even some new faces have decided to sign up and join the ranks for this year, like Geno from Super Mario RPG: The Legend Of The Seven Stars; Mewtwo, a former Smash veteran from the good ol’ cheap ass, broken washdashing days of Melee who’s been absent for the past couple of years now; Bomberman (who finally got the blasted memo); and even Ridley’s managed to shed a couple of extra pounds and finally be medically cleared to participate in Smash. You know, I think the only reason why he hasn’t been in a real Smash Bros. game yet is that they’re extremely worried about his weight and the problems that it could cause. Any more additional weight on him could break the entire platforms and send everybody plummeting towards their doom. And with all the legal and licensing fees and all that other stuff involved into this, considering you have such gaming icons like Pac-Man, Mega Man and Solid Snake in there and they’re just not the same like they used to be physically and mentally wise (especially Snake), they just wanna protect their asses for it just in case. But Ridley’s finally managed to make his playing weight, so he’s in…for now.

And, well…as for Goku being in this game from the ever-so-popular “Dragonball Z,” I…don’t know why he’s even here to begin with, and I can’t really blame all of these guys for telling him to go away. I mean, he IS the strongest being in the whole known universe. I mean, you try telling that to f**k off. Either way, he’s in there, whatever.

So…yeah, beat the shit out of each other; that’s the name of the game and that’s the way it’s played. If you want a better love story, try checking out “Super Smash Bros. Brawl”.


The Gameplay


Pfft, and they say Ridley’s too big…


Super Smash Bros. Crusade pretty much spiritually and “mostly” mechanically plays and feels like most of the previous Super Smash Bros. games, where it’s a fast paced, actioned packed dogfight to the very bitter end to knock off your foes and foes-alike off the platforms and into the abyss and, in the meantime, trying to keep your ass alive. Just like in Melee and Brawl, you can select between Stock Battles, Time Matches, Coin Matches, and even Death Matches, where the object is to deliver as many KO’s as you can and get up to a certain amount before your opponents can, which is a new mode addition for this game and I like it. There’s no setting for that stupid other mode, which I can’t even remember the name of it anymore, frankly, where the match is based off fighting style and points, but I never really played that much of it back then, so nobody really cares. Either way, everything there’s, even team battles and even six player matches. That’s right, “6 player matches”. Whew…that’s a lot of beef.

Items are once again present here as well, even though they’re quite limited for the demo. There’s the usual staples like the fan, homerun bat, the hammer, the invisibly star, and even some brand new ones from the newer games like the special flag from the new Super Smash Bros. game for 3DS and Wii U and the smoke bomb from Brawl even make an appearance. There are no assist trophies this time around, so that’s kind of a shame, but I’m hoping that they make an appearance sometime down the road in the full version when this game manages to get fully finished. It’s actually not much of a big deal, as since I’ve been playing with the original and Melee more than the other games throughout my time, so I could deal without the assist trophies. Of course, you can turn on or off the frequency of items and whether which ones pop out or not.

As for the stages you’ll be fighting on, there’s quite a variety of them in this demo, 24 to be exact. There’s a few of them from the past games, like the Temple stage from Melee, Kongo Jungle, Saffron City from the N64 version, and they all pretty much play similar to their original counterparts, which is a nice nostalgic touch. The new stages that really stood out to me were the Tetris stage, where it sounds exactly what you would think of for a Tetris themed stage, falling blocks and all. (I’m actually surprised that they haven’t made a stage like this in the actual Smash Bros. games yet.) Q’Bert was another good one, and the Pilotwings one was pretty cool too, especially with the Mode 7 effect going on in the background. Not all the new stages were particular great, but it’s nice to see even a Bowser’s Castle themed stage – FINALLY - and even the infamous Casino Nights Zone from Sonic The Hedgehog 2 managed to get in there. Hopefully in the future they’ll add even more classic stages from the other games and a boatload of new ones for the new characters, such as Klonoa, Crash Bandicoot and even Geno.

Speaking of those characters, let’s talk about the roster, shall we? Ah, yes… Whenever anything Smash related is usually brought up, especially with every new game that manages to get released, it’s always about the roster and what should have been, could have been, and what the hell happened here. I’m pretty sure you know what I’m talking about here if you’ve been following and playing the Smash series as long as I have. I’m usually a realist when it comes to these sort of things, and I don’t really mind so much (well, it still stings and what not) whenever a character I really want doesn’t get in for some reason. I won’t cry, or slice my wrist if said character doesn’t get it, nor boycott the game just because that one character is in or not. So, at the end of the day, I don’t really mind who gets in as long as it makes sense or if that particular character is unique and is just overall fun to play.

This roster…is good, I guess, but it’s also a bit conflicting with some of the choices made. First off, the cuts, everybody’s favourite thing to bi*ch about besides the new characters: First off, right off the bat, I noticed that Diddy Kong, Zelda and Shiek, King DeDeDe, Wolf, Pit, and even all the Fire Emblem characters, like Roy and Ike, are completely absent from this game, yet Sonic, a third party character, has 4 characters in there, and there’s even two street fighter characters in there, 4 Capcom characters, if you also count Mega Man and Phoenix Wright (who apparently is just too awesome and extremely bodacious to load, because everytime I decide to play or fight against Phoenix Wright the game decides to crash. Damn.)

I mean, in the real world of things, Capcom wouldn’t get 4 characters in there let alone Sega also getting 4. I mean, yeah, I could see Megaman and maybe Ryu from Street Fighter be in there together, same thing with Sega getting Sonic and Tails in there – but 4 characters each!? No way is that going to happen in this lifetime. Also, Crash Bandicoot - really!? Um…I know he’s been on a Nintendo console before in the past when they tried to bring him back a few years ago…but he’s more of a Playstation character more than anything. Same with Goku being in the game, just…no… I just don’t understand the whole appeal behind Goku being in Smash Bros.; he’s from a T.V. show! He’s a cartoon character! He’s not a video game character in the slightest. What part of that don’t people get? Plus, his neutral special in this game is just so god damn cheap and incredibly broken that, when I facing a group of level 10 CPU’s and was down to my last stock with all of them, still having two or three left themselves, I just spammed his neutral special and was able to asswhomp everybody and win the match quite easily. Wait a minute *flashback*, didn’t Dudesoft, who reviewed this game a little while back ago with one of the other demo versions said something about that? Hmmm…


Cheap Ass Characters
Goku: Kamehameha is one button press. Almost no charge time, and it is a beam attack that cuts clean across most stages. Can we understand how this quickly becomes the worst possible character? You can't get back on the stage! Kamehameha...


Yeah…if that move was toned down a bit or, I dunno, required a charge-up in order to perform it correctly or make it do what it does, than Goku would be just fine in my opinion. (Well, I’d still prefer him to go as far away as he can, because he doesn’t belong in something like this.) He may able to stay stationary in the air for an indefinite amount of time, but he can’t just simply fly back up there and have unlimited recovery time, so there’s some balance to him. Either way, I’d probably just get rid of him, along with Petey the Piranha (why?), Gooey, Shadow The Hedgehog (really, Sonic, Tails and Knuckles are fine enough if you wanted to go the extra mile), Ristar, Crash Bandicoot and Phoenix Wright. Everybody else in this game is just fine. Just get rid of those guys and replace them with Diddy Kong, Pit, King Dedede, Roy or Ike, Wolf, Zelda…and maybe even add in Dixie Kong in there and make me happy. (Seriously, why can’t Dixie be in Smash?) Lloyd Irving, Master Higgins and Sora from Kingdom Hearts would also be other good future options as well. Either way, the roster isn’t perfect, but it’s still pretty good. Props for finally putting in Bomberman, Ridley and even Waluigi in there, finally.

Anyway, enough about that – what about the fighting mechanics? Well…everything plays and feels like Smash, especially in regards to the controls and even techniques like edge-guarding and wall-jumping, but there are two main key differences that I noticed while fighting that Crusade seems to do different other than the other Smash Bros. games and that’s in its air-dodging game and how it handles its Final Smashes.

You see, in the other Smash Bros. games, to activate a Final Smash, or your character’s “ultimate attack,” you just need to crack open a Smash Ball by hitting it enough times and then pressing the specials button in order to activate it. Simple, huh? Well, in this game, there are no Smash Balls to be found. What you have instead is a meter at the bottom in the player’s H.U.D. that slowly fills up when you attack or get attacked by the other players. Once this gets to maximum, you can press the specials button and perform your final smash. Amazingly, this mechanic isn’t a bad way of incorporating this, as, although it’s quite different, it’s kind of a nice way of changing things up and rewarding you for your fighting skills instead of just chasing something down like a moron. My only problem with this is that the meter doesn’t flash or change colors, or your character doesn’t even illuminate when it reaches max to let you know that it’s full…you know, like some kind of an indicator to know that it’s full. So, since I’m concentrating mostly on the fight, I hardly even noticed that it was even at maximum at all, so often times I would just simply whiff on the attack. I don’t mind this setup, but there needs to a better indication that you’re ready to pull it off. Personally, I would just stick with the Smash Balls and use that meter as a “rage mechanic” where you’re granted temporary double strength and less knockback from opponent’s attacks.

As for air-dodging, this is probably one of the coolest, and sweetest features that this game has over the commercial ones. You see, air-dodging in the previous Smash games would just let you avoid mid-air attacks and, if you’re really, really good at all, can even catch items from being thrown at you, like in Melee. But in this game, the air-dodging not only lets you avoid attacks mid-air but it’s also allows you to zip around the stage really, really quickly in eight different directions. That may not sound like anything impressive, but you really ought to try it. I can’t express how much fun and how much of a great mechanic that this is to just quickly zoom around the stage; it’s quite exhilarating. Not only can use this as an air-dodge and also even a recovery technique, but it’s also a quick get-around the stages at blinding speed. And, even if you don’t happen to like it, you even have the option to go the Melee or Brawl route.

Speaking of options and modes, this game has quite a lot of them in regards to the options department. You can optimize your controls to whatever you wish. Although, for USB controllers, you’ll still need something to download an additional program, like Joy2Key, and match the keys up in the README file in order to change it. I know that these guys are planning on fixing this in future updates, so that’s a good thing. I’m also hoping that you can adjust the controls for two or six players manually as well and even take on your friends locally. Because as of right now, this game is mostly a single player game unless you decide to take the fight online.

Yeah, this game even has an online mode where, once you put down your IP address, you can take on other Smashers from across the world. I tried doing this a few times but couldn’t find a match, so I eventually opted out and just played this game locally, but I would imagine in the future that this is going to have more players online and the connection speed will probably be even better than Brawl and the 3DS and the Wii U combined! So I’m pretty stoked for that.

As of right now, the only real mode is just the Crusade mode and the Training mode to get you accustomed to the game’s rules and mechanics a little bit. Unfortunately, there is no classic mode, or break the targets, or anything like that in this version, so your options are a bit limited. But, hey, the main mode is allllll you need, as I literally probably played around thirty matches or so before even doing this review. After playing for a while, you can kind of forgive its short comings in that department. However, in the future, I would love to see more single player modes, if only to serve the purpose of unlocking certain characters and stages, and even adding things like trophies and a sound test option would be nice.

The Soundtrack


- Stay away from me, Q’Bert! I got an arm cannon for a hand with unlimited ammo and a squeaky, girlish voice and I’m not afraid to use it!


Speaking of those sound test options, if there’s one thing that the Smash Bros. series is also known for, especially in regards to Brawl and the newer games and their massive amount of tracks, it’s definitely the music. Just hearing those classic, iconic Nintendo tunes, either original or remixed, definitely puts you in the mood for some ass-kicking. And, although each stage in this game only uses around one or two songs each, which, thinking about it just now after playing something like Brawl, I feel a little bit spoiled now, the songs used do, do the job quite well, even the custom tracks arranged for this game.

First off, the main menu theme, especially the first variation, the one done by Afilion, this is a great pump-up, getting ready to fight song that’s, honestly, I feel is on par with the ones done for Melee, Brawl and even the ones for the 3DS and the Wii U. I actually think this is my favorite arrangement of the main menu theme - ever, I’m not kidding. The other arrangements are alright, but they just don’t have the same “epicness” like the first theme does. The results screen theme is also wonderfully done, and it sounds more like something that Motoi Sakuraba would probably do. It may sound a bit off-putting for something like Smash at first, but it’s definitely grows on you after a while.

My other favourite custom tracks created for this game are “Asteroids,” “Casino Nights Zone,” “Bomberman Battle Medley,” and “Pilotwings - Light Plane,” all also done by Afilion. (Man, seriously, this guy does some goooooood music.) There’s even some old favorites returning without any arrangements, like the Temple theme from Melee, so there’s even some nostalgic love thrown in there for good measure. I like this soundtrack, and I’m hoping that in the future that these guys will put in more songs, do some more arrangements, and even have the option to select what songs play in each particular stage, similar to Brawl and the 3DS and Wii U version. I guess the only real complaint I have is that the Final Destination theme, which is always something to look forward to listening to, is just not as impressive - but, hey, it’s a demo, things can change.

As for the sound effects, they’re pretty typical for something like Smash Bros., so they generally work well. As for the voice overs, well…most of them are fine and are ripped straight from their respected games, such as Mario, Luigi, Marth and the like, and they’re fine the way they are; it’s just in regards to some of the sound overs for the newer characters like Mega Man or even Pac-Man.

Mega Man’s voice overs in this game are ripped straight out of the original Marvel V.S. Capcom and Mega Man: The Power Battles / Fighters, which were arcade games where you took on the various robot masters from the series. I actually got to play Mega Man: The Power Battles in an actual arcade close to my house several years ago, so I recognize some of these voice overs. The thing is, it’s all done in Japanese, and Mega Man still sounds like a twelve year old little girl, similar to his Mega Man 8 incarnation for the PlayStation and the Sega Saturn. Now I don’t mind this for a little bit, but almost every one of his attacks have him shrieking with that girly voice and it definitely starts to degrade on you. Pac-Man also has a similar annoying voice over also ripped straight out of Pac-Man 2: The New Adventures for the SNES, which is another game that I actually like that everybody else seems to hate. It’s similar to Mega Man where it can definitely get to you after a little while. An option to turn down some of these voice overs would be great in the future, as for now you can only just turn just the sound effects off.


The Aesthetics


Waka-Waka, mutherf*kers!


I know I don’t have the best image quality here with these screenshots, and it doesn’t really truly do this game justice, but the graphical presentation for this game is actually quite impressive, especially in regards to the animated backgrounds being used, like the main menu or even this Pilotwings stage up above with its Mode 7 effect. Everything looks quite nice. Even the H.U.D. below has gotten a drastic facelift since the old versions of this game have been released – and it really has come a long way. The characters models still seem like a mismatch with some of them being ripped from some commercial games and some of them being customly made (like Pikachu’s custom sprite looks TERRIBLE in this game), but it does work and you’ll be too busy pounding the hell out of Crash Bandicoot to even notice. It’s not entirely perfect, but it works alright. I’m not a big fan of the main menu portraits done for this game, as some of them, like DK’s and Fox’s, don’t look the most presentable, but, like I said, you’ll be too busy pounding the hell out of Crash Bandicoot to even care.

The End Result


Hey, I’m getting pretty good at this.


I’d be lying if I told you that I didn’t enjoy this game, because I DID enjoy it, too much actually. (I’d must have played it around two hours and over thirty matches before I decided to call it a day.) This game pretty much captures the Super Smash Bros. spirit to a tee, and even adds some exciting new mechanics, especially in regards to air-dodging and even how Final Smashes are performed. And come on – it even has Bomberman and Ridley in it, along with some of the newer characters being added in Super Smash Bros. for 3DS and Wii U, like Little Mac, Mega Man and Pac-Man as well – how can you not beat that!? Okay, yeah, the roster isn’t entirely perfect or even humanly plausible (I’m looking at you, four Sonic and Capcom characters – AND GOKU! Don’t you think you can just slink away without me noticing you), but I’m guessing that this roster was designed more in mind to keep the overall fans happy more than just going with what seems right. Because at the end of a day, this is a fan variation, something that we wish or dreamed of could be possible that the actual commercialized version would never, ever do or just take a long time f**king doing it. I mean, come on, Bomberman and Ridley should BE in an actual Smash Bros. game by now! It makes no to little sense that they’re not in yet. And, what the hell – am I going to be a toothless old man, sitting in my rusted rocking chair by the time that Dixie – freakin’ – Kong gets in this game in some playable form. Jesus, man…

Roster griping aside, this is a great fan iteration of Super Smash Bros. that I think any fan of the series should definitely check out. Yeah, sure, this game has a few problems in regards to the A.I. being as stupid as all hell at times and constantly walking into obvious traps, not picking up health items when it’s right next to it, and falling off the stage for some strange reason (even at a semi-high level difficulty), some balancing issues, and the game having no other real single player modes in this version to speak of, but it’s still surprisingly a good bowl of fun, perfect for any Smasher, and I can’t wait to see what the entire full version has in store when it eventually gets completed sometime in the future.

Also, you haven’t truly experienced life until you do a six player, all Ridley, Final Destination only, no items except Mushrooms on, five minute coin battle. It’s truly the craziness thing I have ever experienced in a video game.




- Happy smashing!


OVERALL GRADE:
4 / 5 - B ~ Pretty Darn Good!!!

Posts

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Oh god, the #shump stuff hahahahaha so old, i still have a related profile pic just for nostalgia hahaha

Glad you liked the game ^^
nhubi
Liberté, égalité, fraternité
11099
I don't play these game, sorry I just don't, but oh this was a fun review to read (like always), thanks for the laughs.

Oh and nerd-sweat, yep that's the worst.
The least they could have done for us was just given us a small towel (like the one you get in one of those bowling allies) to wipe off all the sweat off the controllers after each match or - at least - allow us to bring in our own Gamecube controllers along for the tournament. *sigh* Oh well…

Also, really, nhubi, you’ve never played a single Super Smash Bros. game, ever!? Man, you are sure missing out. You oughta go pick up one of them one of these days and just give it a go.

Oh, and I forgot to mention in the review that I really like what you guys did to finally differentiate some of the clone characters, like Link and Toon Link, and actually give them a bit of a different moveset that fits and makes them feel almost completely different from one another, like with their down and up specials, and what not. That was pretty cool.

And speaking of #shump, I do admit that I kinda miss some of those good ol' days… Maybe not so much with some of the drama that was going on, but definitely with some of the people that were involved, like Magi, Strangeluv and TFT. Yeah, they pop in here once and a while, but it’s just not the same like it used to be…
author=Addit
The least they could have done for us was just given us a small towel (like the one you get in one of those bowling allies) to wipe off all the sweat off the controllers after each match or - at least - allow us to bring in our own Gamecube controllers along for the tournament. *sigh* Oh well…

Also, really, nhubi, you’ve never played a single Super Smash Bros. game, ever!? Man, you are sure missing out. You oughta go pick up one of them one of these days and just give it a go.

Oh, and I forgot to mention in the review that I really like what you guys did to finally differentiate some of the clone characters, like Link and Toon Link, and actually give them a bit of a different moveset that fits and makes them feel almost completely different from one another, like with their down and up specials, and what not. That was pretty cool.

And speaking of #shump, I do admit that I kinda miss some of those good ol' days… Maybe not so much with some of the drama that was going on, but definitely with some of the people that were involved, like Magi, Strangeluv and TFT. Yeah, they pop in here once and a while, but it’s just not the same like it used to be…


Hahaha yeah, i really liked what the bosses did, it makes the game pretty cool. I used to be more involved with the game development but for now i am just doing publicity and extra works (CSS and Music related stuff https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ol-IJYr6RL8)

Oh, about the They had their own forum, i can't even remember the name, it had a weird name, 2 words(Maybe involving rainbows?) , hahahaha how long it has been, 4-5 years? Back then i was still a kiddo that had a lot of problems speaking coherent english ("He with custom CSS", laughed my ass off when i came back and saw that as my user title XD)
Meridian Dance

Btw, the CSS is screwing up the tabs.

I played this game a long time ago, and I tried it again a few days ago. It looks much better but some characters and moves are just so awful I want to rage about it. But I won't. Things like, doing a up attack but having your attack animation go left/right from your body. Who is designing this stuff? They did a horrible job balancing the characters, and the whole roster. Obviously there are solid characters, but too many crap ones.

I main Luigi in Melee and here he plays a lot like Melee Luigi. That was fun. But his up throw is the stupidest thing ever. He picks up the other guy and just runs in the air, barely lifting him, never launching him, and before the animation is finished the other guy is free and can hit you before you can move again.

I don't like the run mechanic, either. But without the precision analog sticks any way you code it going to be worse off.
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