Super Smash Bros. Melee
With many Nintendo franchises, when Nintendo comes out with a new system, they make a new game to update the franchise. With the worldwide success with Super Smash Bros., Nintendo of course had to come out with a new Super Smash Bros. The game for the Game Cube they called: Super Smash Bros. Melee., called just "Melee" or SSBM for short. While not fully improved to the best it can be, Melee was a big step up for its predecessor. Since for the most part the game play has stayed the same, I'm not going to go too much into that. If you want to, see my review on the first game. What I will focus on this review is the improvements.
The first improvement is there number of extra characters. It went from 14 to 26. 12 more is a huge jump up, taking fully ahold of the GameCube's memory capacity. For the most part, the character additions are good. They add new characters, like the Ice Climbers and Game & Watch, sidekicks, like Falco and Roy, and even enemies, like Bowser and Ganondorf. The bad news is a lot of these characters a virtually repeats of other characters, with the exception of stat changes. Marth and Roy are virtually the same. Pikachu and Pichu are virtually the same. Mario and Dr. Mario are virtually the same. Link and Young Link are virtually the same. Fox and Falco are virtually the same. But this isn't limited to see characters within the same game. Ganondorf and Captain Falcon are pretty much the same, except Captain Falcon is faster and Ganondorf is stronger. Mewtwo is like a cross between Samus and Ness. I'm not sure what's worse: the repeats within the same game franchises or with characters from two different franchises being the same. And I'm not sure I'm a big fan of having characters from Japan only games. Sure the Japanese audience relates, but not the American Audience. And some of these characters can be a pain to unlock. For example, Mewtwo is so hard some gamers just left their systems on for 24 hours instead of try to earn him the other way.
Stages are also improved. There are now 29 stages, much more than the last game, another sign Nintendo is using the full power of the GameCube. Some stages take a while to earn, but once you get them, they are so worth it. With so many stages, it's hard to get tired of them. They give a whole new experience. And once again, they continue to bring back good nostalgic memories to fanboys as they remember these locations from franchise games.
But probably the best addition is adding more to the single player mode. Of course, they kept classic SSB solo mode: 10 stages leading up to Master Hand. But on top of that, they added "Adventure Mode." Adventure Mode is when a player chooses a character, brings them through a level made up from a familiar setting from a well-known Nintendo franchise. While there is still no story to this, it's fun because it allows you to have Nintendo characters go through a world from another Nintendo character. It's more than the typical multiplayer play, while still involving a bit of it. But wait, there's still more. Another mode can be unlocked called "All-Star Mode." All-star Mode is when the player has to beat every character on one life, with only 3 times to replenish health. While this is similar to Classic mode in the sense it's just the regular fighting, it at least gives the challenge to endure. In ordering which solo mode I like, it would be first Adventure mode, second All-star Mode, and third Classic Mode.
Multiplayer also has some improvements. Along with more characters and more stages, more items are added to game play, making it new every time. On top of 3 B moves from SSB, a 4th B move is added with a side B. A new game play is added to multiplayer. In "Coin play" coins come out of a character depending on how hard he is hit. The other player can collect these coins, and the richest one at the end wins. While it's not really popular, it at least makes things news if the gamers need a change up.
Under Training, there are more improvements. On top of the previous training, there is now "Home Run Context," where you have a few seconds to beat up on a sand bag, and then send it launching with a homerun bat to see how far it goes. There is also "Special Melee", which consist as such things as beat 10 wire frame enemies and beat 100 wire frame enemies. Also, there is "Events," which has the player perform a certain task against certain enemies on a certain stage. More events unlock as previous ones are defeated. Simply put, there's more to do in this game, for both the multiplayer and single player.
Even unlocking things is an improvement. Not only do you continue to unlock characters and stages, you also unlock trophies for doing certain things, like getting through a classic mode, adventure mode or all-star mode with a character. More trophies can be unlocked with vending machine in the shape of a gumball machine, using the tokens earned in gameplay. The only problem with trophies is with so many of them, it can take a long while to earn him, almost too long. For example, each character has 3 trophies: one for classic mode, one for adventure mode, one for all-star mode. Do the math: 26 characters x 3 gameplays = 76. A collector would go crazy playing this game so much for these simple trophies.
Heck, even the graphics are improved. No longer are there the 64-bit graphics of the N64, but the Nintendo takes full hold of the graphical power of the GameCube. Characters look more like they game they came from. Even the blank characters have improved. They've gone from Polygons to Wire Frames.
In conclusion, Super Smash Bros. Melee made many improvements from its predecessor Super Smash Bros. I've been trying hard this review not to think about its successor, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, but I can't help it. And it shows Melee is still lacking some things. More characters could be introduced, and characters could be much different. Stages could be way different, too. While Adventure was a better solo mode, it still lacked a story. Hello! Super Smash Bros. is the most epic Nintendo crossover! Fanboys have been writing crossover stories for years! Surely professional writers could do it. So while Super Smash Bros. Melee is better than Super Smash Bros., it is still not the best it could be.
The first improvement is there number of extra characters. It went from 14 to 26. 12 more is a huge jump up, taking fully ahold of the GameCube's memory capacity. For the most part, the character additions are good. They add new characters, like the Ice Climbers and Game & Watch, sidekicks, like Falco and Roy, and even enemies, like Bowser and Ganondorf. The bad news is a lot of these characters a virtually repeats of other characters, with the exception of stat changes. Marth and Roy are virtually the same. Pikachu and Pichu are virtually the same. Mario and Dr. Mario are virtually the same. Link and Young Link are virtually the same. Fox and Falco are virtually the same. But this isn't limited to see characters within the same game. Ganondorf and Captain Falcon are pretty much the same, except Captain Falcon is faster and Ganondorf is stronger. Mewtwo is like a cross between Samus and Ness. I'm not sure what's worse: the repeats within the same game franchises or with characters from two different franchises being the same. And I'm not sure I'm a big fan of having characters from Japan only games. Sure the Japanese audience relates, but not the American Audience. And some of these characters can be a pain to unlock. For example, Mewtwo is so hard some gamers just left their systems on for 24 hours instead of try to earn him the other way.
Stages are also improved. There are now 29 stages, much more than the last game, another sign Nintendo is using the full power of the GameCube. Some stages take a while to earn, but once you get them, they are so worth it. With so many stages, it's hard to get tired of them. They give a whole new experience. And once again, they continue to bring back good nostalgic memories to fanboys as they remember these locations from franchise games.
But probably the best addition is adding more to the single player mode. Of course, they kept classic SSB solo mode: 10 stages leading up to Master Hand. But on top of that, they added "Adventure Mode." Adventure Mode is when a player chooses a character, brings them through a level made up from a familiar setting from a well-known Nintendo franchise. While there is still no story to this, it's fun because it allows you to have Nintendo characters go through a world from another Nintendo character. It's more than the typical multiplayer play, while still involving a bit of it. But wait, there's still more. Another mode can be unlocked called "All-Star Mode." All-star Mode is when the player has to beat every character on one life, with only 3 times to replenish health. While this is similar to Classic mode in the sense it's just the regular fighting, it at least gives the challenge to endure. In ordering which solo mode I like, it would be first Adventure mode, second All-star Mode, and third Classic Mode.
Multiplayer also has some improvements. Along with more characters and more stages, more items are added to game play, making it new every time. On top of 3 B moves from SSB, a 4th B move is added with a side B. A new game play is added to multiplayer. In "Coin play" coins come out of a character depending on how hard he is hit. The other player can collect these coins, and the richest one at the end wins. While it's not really popular, it at least makes things news if the gamers need a change up.
Under Training, there are more improvements. On top of the previous training, there is now "Home Run Context," where you have a few seconds to beat up on a sand bag, and then send it launching with a homerun bat to see how far it goes. There is also "Special Melee", which consist as such things as beat 10 wire frame enemies and beat 100 wire frame enemies. Also, there is "Events," which has the player perform a certain task against certain enemies on a certain stage. More events unlock as previous ones are defeated. Simply put, there's more to do in this game, for both the multiplayer and single player.
Even unlocking things is an improvement. Not only do you continue to unlock characters and stages, you also unlock trophies for doing certain things, like getting through a classic mode, adventure mode or all-star mode with a character. More trophies can be unlocked with vending machine in the shape of a gumball machine, using the tokens earned in gameplay. The only problem with trophies is with so many of them, it can take a long while to earn him, almost too long. For example, each character has 3 trophies: one for classic mode, one for adventure mode, one for all-star mode. Do the math: 26 characters x 3 gameplays = 76. A collector would go crazy playing this game so much for these simple trophies.
Heck, even the graphics are improved. No longer are there the 64-bit graphics of the N64, but the Nintendo takes full hold of the graphical power of the GameCube. Characters look more like they game they came from. Even the blank characters have improved. They've gone from Polygons to Wire Frames.
In conclusion, Super Smash Bros. Melee made many improvements from its predecessor Super Smash Bros. I've been trying hard this review not to think about its successor, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, but I can't help it. And it shows Melee is still lacking some things. More characters could be introduced, and characters could be much different. Stages could be way different, too. While Adventure was a better solo mode, it still lacked a story. Hello! Super Smash Bros. is the most epic Nintendo crossover! Fanboys have been writing crossover stories for years! Surely professional writers could do it. So while Super Smash Bros. Melee is better than Super Smash Bros., it is still not the best it could be.
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