Super Smash Bros.: A Retrospective Part II: Get Ready for a Brawl!

Go here for the first part of the Retrospective. Go here to see my website and buy my books.

Shameless plug aside, we return to the Retrospective of Super Smash Bros.. 

Super Smash Bros. 3 was announced and the internet was in anticipation for what was to come. Me, I was still playing Melee and had yet to unlock every character. Smash really wasn't that big in my life, even when the game released and I was in the center of the hype storm, but hyped nonetheless. So let's fast forward to E3 2006.

The game's title, Super Smash Bros. Brawl was decided at long last. I had a dial-up connection so I could only watch maybe three seconds of an uninterrupted scene before the video buffered. But when 0:06 occurred, holy shit did I lose it. That had to be the biggest graphical overhaul I ever saw since...Melee. Again, I mention that I couldn't really watch the video due to my connection but I did hear the details and saw the screenshots.

The first new characters shown were Metaknight, Pit, Zero Suit Samus and to my joy, Wario. A lot of people were puzzled by certain characters absent from Melee and Wario was one of them alongside Diddy Kong who wasn't even a trophy and I never noticed until someone mentioned it. But this Wario was from WarioWare, which I wasn't too fond of and at the end of the trailer, the dude made an atomic fart...yeah. One thing at a time. But the end of the trailer baffled the hell out of everyone and to me now was the point of no return of Smash.

Showtime!

This asshole here opened a box that should have remained opened until at LEAST the fourth game. With Solid Snake in the game, everyone was requesting 3rd parties left and right. Suddenly the dream for Nintendo characters coming together was drowned in demands for Sora, Simon, Alucard, Mega Man X and other characters who have no place In Smash Bros. But in general, everyone was hyping characters in general. The rules for 3rd parties was that they must have appeared on a Nintendo console and Snake appeared in Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes for the Gamecube, but Metal Gear on the NES counts too. Snake's inclusion was due to a friendship between Hideo Kojima and Masahiro Sakurai. One particular post on the Donkey Kong Universe summed up how I felt about that in retrospect.

But after that trailer and the website that launched, there was a blackout of information as the game was still early in development, though around October or November, Fox popped up in another short trailer. Around that time, I spent almost every other day browsing Gamefaqs for general games and browsing Brawl's message board. If you really wanna know how huge this game's hype was, you had to have been there to know. Every gaming site was bustling with topics on Brawl, wondering how Melee's successor would fare up. And with Snake opening the door for 3rd parties, every other video game fandom was hoping to get a piece of the Smash pie. It was insane. I'll share some pics with you on my very old folder from high school.

Just silly shit. Everyone had a mockup or a silly ass image they made for the the hell of it. Fake rosters were a thing too, mainly a wishlist of stuff. Sometimes it got insane like that second pic. This game was so big that characters like Earthworm Jim and Crash were requested, though at that time there was still somewhat of a fandom for the former at least. One character I wanted was Sonic the Hedgehog. Who didn't want Sonic in Smash? You'd think he'd be the first pick but nope. Going to another pic:

No, I didn't believe it.

That was the biggest hoax posted at Melee's release, Sonic and Tails. I personally want Tails in just for that hoax to become a reality. But going back to Sonic, he was the most overall character requested for the game, and it baffled me that people didn't like him. The first stance of me getting a taste of opinions outside my own. But in 2007, this popped up:

This was unbelievable. The two biggest gaming icons appeared at long last in a game together...and it was a sports title. I don't care for sports titles too much and around this time, SEGA's reputation started to fall with the disaster that was Sonic the Hedgehog (2006). Ouch. 'Nuff said. People thought that this game meant that Sonic wasn't going to be in Brawl. It would make sense to have Sonic debut in Smash first, but okay. Around a month or two later I think, the Smash Bros. website got a rehaul and was dubbed Japan Time during the countdown. And then...

The DOJO!! appeared. A new site to showcase daily updates for Brawl. At long last, we would get new information after a very dry spell of no news. The original site can still be found here.

The site showcased characters, items, music and ways to play. The site updated every day where I'm at now at around 3AM, so I would stay up until...4:30AM bullshitting and waiting for shit like this:

I never recovered from my insomnia...

And yes, most of the updates were like this. But what made the DOJO!! stand out was the creator, Masahiro Sakurai's overall quirkyness and flare to describing the features and updates. Once in a while, we got characters, mainly characters from the first two trailers but we'd get a new character or a returning veteran with a new look.

This was a big deal, believe it or not. Sakurai also mentioned that not every character would return from Melee, adding more suspense to the days ahead. I had no qualms on who was getting cut, but I admit when Lucas from Mother 3 was shown as a newcomer, I wasn't worried.

But I heard Lucas was gonna show up in Melee and replace Ness. If Sakurai did this, I'd be pissed. I loved Ness in Melee coming off Earthbound and didn't want to lost a valued character. But what I admit caused some real damage to Smash Bros. in the long run was the introduction of Assist Trophies. Assist Trophies are an item you can use in the game to summon a character from another series to fight for a bit. This item was included to add characters that couldn't be playable, such as the Hammer Bro. from Super Mario Bros. and the Nintendog from the first trailer. Neat, right?

Hmm. Samurai Goroh was a requested addition due to him being Captain Falcon's rival in the F-Zero games and Stafy (Or Starfy, whichever you prefer) having his own series, Densetsu no Stafi standing out at the time and Isaac, a requested pick from this same period was mentioned as well. Being Japan-only didn't mean shit if Marth and Roy was anything to go by, so Stafy being deconfirmed stung a bit. At the time, I didn't consider assists to be a bad thing, and if anything you could say that this was the team's way of saying "Sorry, we couldn't add these guys in but take this cameo as a consolation prize". At the time, that was fine. Disappointing, but okay all things considered. In retrospect, another post from the DKVine summed up everything that was wrong with this item from Day 1.

(Site's down at the moment, so I'll sum it up like this: The poster mentions that making Goroh a summon character was a dangerous precedent as his role in F-Zero was notable. When I saw Stafy and Isaac years later coming back to that topic, I realized what he meant. Another poster mentioned it best: Smash Bros. isn't about the Nintendo characters anymore, it's about the personal projects and sword-rubbing IE Hideo and Masahiro with Snake.)

And how right they were. But we'll get to that later. Back to Brawl, the game was nearing release and I was still on the edge of my seat with Sonic the Hedgehog's inclusion. I didn't think the Olympic Games affected his chances, but I started to get worried in the back of my mind. Then, came October 10th.

Hot damn. I came home from school and was hyped the fuck up. That day, I even met an old friend from elementary school from back in 2nd grade. I hope he's doing okay. So that day has more sentimental value for me aside from Sonic's confirmation. The reveal was for the press conference at the time. With that put aside, I was all set for Brawl. Nothing could keep my hype from dying. At this point, my hype levels were off the charts. It was THAT big. And a little earlier, the Subspace Emissary was shown, a beefed-up version of the Adventure Mode in Melee, with cutscenes and a dark epic tale. Yeah, Brawl was going the extra mile to stand up to Melee, and it wasn't hard to do. But one thing I did have an issue with was Wario.

Wario was notably smaller in this game compared to his past appearances with Mario. Wario in the Wario Land series and Wario World was shown to be a very competent fighter with a lot of power to his moves and boasts masculinity and strength.

More or less the character in a nutshell. In Smash, almost none of that is present, Brawl being the notable offender for his representation. He moves like Mr. Game & Watch with choppy movements and I wonder if this was meant to be due to time constraints but he was one of the first characters shown. I remember that Sakurai mentioned that Wario got some negative press and possibly because of WarioWare and his overall bastardization altogether. Years later I found out that his Smash appearance was based on the Japanese adverts that featured him with a crude side dealing with toilet humor. Not to say the Manuals for Wario Land 4 and Wario World didn't have their grossout moments but in-game you didn't see Roachie or deal with an overflowing toilet bowl. Kinda funny how Sakurai slowly goes for being accurate to the source material...when he deems it necessary. Even the Mario party games and spin-offs get him right, but Smash continued to use this bizarre take on Wario, even by Wario standards.

I'm going on a tangent, but here you go. I gradually stopped using Wario in Brawl, sticking with Diddy and Donkey Kong. We'll get into that one next time. With Sonic finally confirmed and despite my overall nitpicks, I was still hyped for Super Smash Bros. Brawl. And I am indeed hyped for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, releasing tomorrow worldwide. But we'll still touch on the other Smash titles. Don't you worry.