Why Smash Ultimate Sucks in 2023
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- Опубліковано 2 чер 2024
- Coney explains why the common viewer is sick and tired of watching Super Smash Bros. Ultimate tournaments in current year and surprisingly, it is NOT because of the characters in the game.
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What ultimate is missing is a man in his mid 30s going to 10 year old birthday parties and beating them with DeDeDe for $200
More CONEY Storytime!
A Coney classic for everyone to enjoy!
This is the correct answer
Nah bruh never send a smash player to a 10 year old birthday party
@@ToadtheGreat1fuuuuuucckkkkk 😂😂
My brother in Christ, you NEED to run a tournament or invitational with this format. Call it Coney's Controversy. I'd watch the fuck out of it
This format would be great for an Alpharad invitational
@@dyllnye1239 The "How did we get here podcast" invitational
That'd be sick
If you want even more alliteration you could call it Coney’s Controversial Clash
Conetroversy #1
"Why have a stage there if someone's just gonna ban it?"
During my Smash 4 Smashladder era, I stopped banning Lylat:
No one ever wanted to play there. Most people banned it.
So, I had an idea; why ban Lylat if most people aren't selecting it?
I could ban other stages and leave someone 2nd guessing if they wanted to play a stage that was bad for them, or deal with Lylat
I usually won that coin toss, and if / when I didn't, I was one of those people who didn't mind Lylat.
It was win-win.
smart but now there arent really any legal stages people HATE playing on, so it doesnt really work
You also get weirdos like me that love Lialat because my character is busted on it (Smash 4 Sonic). True MU knowledge check.
@@Squiferz fd
That's why I left Lylat legal in all my Ultimate tournaments. I had players who didn't "waste" a ban on it, only to get taken there and despair at their own hubris.
Good 4 Wii U I Play In All
As someone who's been around since Brawl, this has been a slow gradual slip from the end of Brawl into Smash 4 into Ultimate. Everything has grown more and more samey in every respect and its the newest generation that's the worst about it. Not to sound like a boomer cuz I'm in my 20s but like, we used to play on RAINBOW CRUISE IN TOURNAMENT. Now people freak out because there's a stage where you can wall jump a little bit. Absolutely insane
I know Mario Kart isn’t seriously competitive but you can see the same kinda crap there. More balanced but homogenous and boring. Mkwii is peak
Yeah, I remember the only reason Delfino Plaza, and I THINK Halberd were banned was because of Meta Knight sharking hardcore on those stages.
But yeah, back in Brawl, there were a lot more dubious stages.... And that was better for viewers, I feel.
(Also, why don't they use Omega and Battlefield stages? Just count them as Battlefield and Final Destination picks.)
@DataDrain02 most of the out there stages were eventually banned because of MK unfortunately
@@mitchellsmith2628 Yeah.... But, that still proves a bit of a point. If Meta Knight didn't exist in Brawl. Those stages likely would have remained legal.
@DataDrain02 oh yeah of course. No argument there. I'm just saying that's when it started and following games adopted stricter and stricter stage lists (even though they truly never needed to)
Biggest problem for me is the stage list. Tired of seeing wall-to-wall PS2. I don't CARE if it's the most "neutral" stage they should CHANGE it for MY viewing pleasure
So fucking based
The funny thing is it’s not the most neutral though lol.
We’ve been seeing Ike ladder since the start of the game, Mario ladders, sonic camping, Steve’s best materials etc
It’s just the comfort zone
The longest stage being the “most neutral” is a lie forged by Big Smash
Yeah the stages are part of the fun but seeing the samw stype over and over again gets boring real fast. Your character and playstyle should take the stage into accocount
wouldnt give a shit if it was only ps2 if i didnt have to watch characters that double the match length on ps2
tl: dw: no warioware
TRUEEEE GIVE US THE 4-PLAT
So true bestie
Unabashedly true.
WarioWare Inc is a stage
Game 5 WarioWare would go CRAZY
I mentioned this on twitter. Smash is a fighting game that has near unlimited customization options for stages, rules, etc. The reason why we waste all of the potential this game has is beyond me.
People need to learn to enjoy to game and its mechanics for what it is.
It's because there are no dumb metagaming mechanics or exploits for them to cheese the game. That's literally it.
It's not a fighting game
@@vandagylon2885 yea sure.
@@vandagylon2885You must not know what a fighting game is, to say ssbu is not a fighting game.
Every current legal stage in this game can pretty much be chosen as a starter. There are NO real counter-pick stages in this game. Everyone always complains about having to ban stages. Like, YEAH, that's the point of a counter-pick, it's supposed to give one person an advantage. And then you get to do the same thing right back to them when you lose that game.
Yeah the current meta is just "Maybe I ban battlefield or FD if it's gnw or kazuya."
FD is the counterpick-est stage rn LOL
@@hunbi1875 literally. Just ban those two stages and then whatever character they pull out, doesn't even matter since the stage will be mostly neutral.
Fd is not as polarizing as it was in melee
@@GabrielHodge Okay? Good for Melee? This is Ultimate, compared to the rest of the legal stages FD is definitely the most polarizing.
Fully agree with the stagelist. These new stages aren't even un-competitive, they are just different. I would LOVE AN invitational that FORCES these new stages to be played on
Exactly.
Yea I want those stages added and many of the similar stages removed like Small Battlefield/PS2, FD/Town, or Smashville/Hollow Bastion.
As someone who tapped out of Ultimate pretty early, I was shocked when he got to that section.
Why would a game with dozens of uncontroversial stages and a hazard toggle ever end up with this fate? Doomed to have a stage list that is 3 totally-not-battlefield clones featuring big box FD for starter options, and then only allowing two stages with tight boxes as counterpicks only?
UFA at least did slightly better by only giving three bans and then supporting 4x tight box stages (too many to get rid of every single one, forcing a decision between an actual counterpick or a close-quarters stage at best).
For a very limited stage list (in classic starter/counterpick style): Battlefield, FD, Smashville, Yoshi's Island, counterpicks: WarioWare, Fountain of Dreams, Lylat, Yoshi's Story. If you want to babysit players so they don't have to learn any stage variety, then at least do us all the favor of copycatting Pound 2019's pre-DLC list with PS1 shenanigans lying in wait and Lylat as a starter.
I recommend the ssbwiki page on stage legality, it goes into detail across the series, has detailed information on why stages are legal or banned.
The majority of stages tend to be banned for pervasive walk offs/blast lines[29], caves of life (Ala smash dome in temple) or allow infinites[27], are too large, promote circle camping/stalling[26], have disruptive geometry [17], and randomized layouts[6], keep in mind, many stages have more than one reason.
I was honestly agreeing with you, even as a melee fan, but man those are not bad reasons to not use stages, the lesser common ones I didn't include are less egregious usually but make sense, things that are minor gripes, but because very similar stages exist, are redundant.
I guess it's just a shame smash ultimate had to have so many stages, many being outdated and simple. Of course it's awesome, and I'm glad. But there are so so so many ideas for completely different, unique, interesting, gameplan changing stages that are competitive.( see melee competitive stages mod and it doesn't even try anything too crazy, partially bc it's a lot of work, partially bc limitations.)
A Floating wall in the upper middle of a otherwise normal ps type
Or a stage with two offstage plats on each side that act as a teeter totter, (imagine this on doubles!!) Or a stage with toggles in the background that you hit and it changes the layout of the platforms.
It's such a shame stages like yoshis story and fountain are limited in legality or straight banned, these are the wackiest stages in MELEE, we play with unfrozen retro jank Pokemon stadium too.
Big reason for the difference is the amount of options, the lack of diversity, and
theory but modern smash players being punished by samurai throughout brawl, and 4, I don't blame them, both games has a legal stage count of 6.
Halberd was legal for a decent period of smash 4s life?? It has a giant cannon that tracks you down and insta kills you??? WHAT thats one of the more competitive stages??? (shout-out to 64 with 1 legal stage)
@@Bingo_Bango_
@@Bingo_Bango_Biggest red flag to me, and was part of the reason for a decent number of your list, was "horizontal blast zones too close" which honestly??? If you don't want to die extremely early, don't stay at the edges of the stage the whole game, you shouldn't be at the same risk of dying until 70+ percent center stage vs in the corner.
The stage thing is annoying. It gets so tiresome when all the players just go to PS2 all the time. It's so common they have that stupid "run it back" motion they do with their hand. Other fighting game communities don't do that. You're not supposed to just win and be like, "Hey bro, wanna skip doing bans and you counter picking a stage?" But they do it anyway. Yet STILL the sets go for up to 50 minutes. Wild.
Other fighting game players actually get confused looking at competitive Smashers.
Sets never go up to 50 minutes...35 minutes is the absolute highest, average is more like 20 minutes. Including the time between games.
@@legrandliseurtri7495 You're right. That 51 minute video was when they had a reset so that was actually two sets. But still they feel very lengthy and stage variety is very low.
@@hughmungus227Probably because the majority of ult games rn is two players camping for like 20 minutes until one of them run into the 70% up tilt combo
@@tba6604 In other fighting games, the stage typically doesn't matter because it's just the background changing. In platform fighters the stage matters greatly.
I saw a comment that brought this up and I never hear people mention this, but the lack of personality and engaging stories in the Smash Ultimate scene is a major contributing factor.
To put it like this, I can describe several Melee players' personalities and the personal stories and struggles they went through. Hbox was one of the villains of smash bros, with a campy playstyle with puff. He acted arrogant, cocky, and intentionally riled up the crowd and got them to hate him. Amsa was the nice, sweet guy who played a low tier character. He fought his way to the top and ended up winning a major after a decade of struggles. Even during these struggles, he was always smiling and positive during these times.
His motto was "I play to win". Leffen was a villain.
Hateable, cocky as hell, childish, yet insane. He was not only memorable, but also insanely good with Fox.
These are examples of Melee pros that have distinct personalities, playstyles, and stories that kept people engaged with Melee even after all these years.
Meanwhile with Ultimate, as good as Leo, Spargo, Sonix, Acola, etc. are, I can’t describe anything about them. I don’t know anything about them or their personalities aside from “they’re good at smash”. They don’t maintain the same interest or have the same distinct personalities that Melee pros have. I think that’s one reason the scene for Ultimate is dying while Melee continues to thrive to this day. You can literally find hour long documentaries on Hungrybox and Amsa and Leffen and MangO. I haven't seen a single documentary on any smash ultimate pro.
Going off Coney's point about Ultimate sets being so long, I'm coming from the FGC and I was ASTOUNDED at how long sets take. I was at a tournament that had both SF6 and Ultimate, I was there for SF6. At one point, the TO told me my next match was against someone who had to play a Smash match first. I went over to the person and saw their set was just starting, so I watched a bit of it here and there while talking to friends. It was Palutena vs. Pikachu, every match was on the same stage, and the Palutena just kept running away every single match. I waited for FOURTY-FIVE minutes to play my set with this person. For any other game, I've never had to wait longer than 10 minutes. Absolutely insane how long Smash sets are.
Palutena do be running away every match
45 minutes seems very unlikely if it was a best of five. Even the worst sonic sets don't go above 35 minutes, including the time between games.
he is not saying the set took 45 minutes. He is saying he waited for his own set to start for 45 minutes.
@@legrandliseurtri7495maybe they also took a long time to ban stages or choose counterpick characters. Some players take a long ass time doing that from my experience.
Love this idea. You should run a tournament with these rules to see how it would play out. Folks would watch, I would.
I swear you need to ban gentlemen because otherwise we are gonna get another Gimvitational
It would be cool to add spirits to the mix......I just want to see more tourneys with spirits, cause when I saw spirits at ultimate launch, I thought "oh this could be cool as shit for competitive" when I saw all the effects which would be dope, and more spirits kept gettin added and smash ultimate could be different then the rest by adding customization to ur loadout .......but for some reason, they got overlooked for some reason, ......the only "problem" that I could see with is that u can't transfer the spirits from console to console.....and the easy solution to that is just have the switch the tourney is at have all spirits, and have the players just make there team before hand and in the char select screen, just mark the saved team as the Competitors name, easy switch......I would like that in a comey tourney and wish it was apart of smash in general
Wait, I missed this. How did gentlemen's ruin gimvitational? I was super syoled for it until I saw 2 kazuyas and 3 steves, and I skipped it
stoked*
@@treasure9342I love the idea of spicing things up with spirits, but it has a couple of massive problems. For larger tournaments, you don’t have only one switch, it’s usually hundreds. Getting all those set up would be impractical. And the other issue is that spirits are VERY imbalanced, and top players won’t be willing to commit the time and energy required to play with them at a high level. For a side event, it would be quite fun though.
I honestly agree with Coney on all of this, which is something I would have not said about a year ago. WarioWare makes things more fair for UNFAIR bullshit to happen, because it would happen to everyone. And jesus fucking christ if I have to see the same black and green background on PS2 one more time I'm going to lose it. And Coney is once again right for saying that we are in no position for making the players have a more disadvantaged state for our own entertainment when they are the ones playing. Honestly shocked by how right Coney was in this video
But then you get to 24:50 and see someone in the chat calling Coney a cunt and because one random viewer disagrees then the entire video is thrown out the window
Edit: The fact people can’t tell the most obvious sounding sarcasm in the world in this post concerns me
He has a different oppinion than me therefore he is wrong
all of these problems would be negated if the games were interesting. they arent interesting because of the characters being played. dance around it all you would like, boring characters make boring games make boring make a boring watch. simple as.
We obviously can't tell the players what stages to pick. But we also don't have to watch them either.
@@judekaraki1650But those boring characters would not be able to execute their boring gameplans on stages like Warioware or Yoshi's. The stages matter a ton.
the last bit of this comment is so funny because the most meaningless thing included in this video "ruined the whole video".
Homie I din't think you should let a twitch chat message hold that much weight lmao
My favorite thing about coney is that the worst mistake he can ever make on stream is make any kind of genuine/heartfelt point
I miss storylines and rivalries that Sm4sh had. Having circuits and tournament series over a year or 2 span, with high stakes and actually reasons for people to be playing made it so exciting to watch every tournament and see how people did and are going to do. To me, tournaments have very little reason nowadays besides just being a tournament.
I really liked early ultimate, especially when Leo was #1 by far, for this reason exactly. It felt like everyone wanted to beat him, but he was just near-untouchable
@@mcmann2243 Yeah, it's basically the wild west rn, so many people have shots at winning (not that that's a bad thing), and just so many different tournaments that it just lacks the cohesiveness of previous smash games. It's starting to come together tho, kinda.
One of the reasons I miss sm4sh
We could have that but most people are either too afraid or lack the skill to trash talk. Smash 4 imo was the last of that era of tournaments imo. It felt like more was on the line because we had some strong personalities playing who have history.
I wish tournaments were more like Pro Wrestling, not that matches are fixed but people play a character. Players lack personalities, they already go by tags why not play a character? Just imagine if MK Leo was a heel? Just talked mad shit but you had to respect him because he has the skills to back it up? You'd feel more inclined to watch just in case someone humbles him. I know money is on the line and playing character might not be the best if you're trying to be put on teams but just imagine it.
This is what came to mind seeing the title. Ever since I started following Smash with Melee's place at MLG way back in the day, there have always been storylines, personalities, and people to follow. Ultimate has nothing. The entire professional scene is comprised of players about as interesting as a saltine.
I think what you're saying is 100% right. I come from Melee, but some of the most exciting sets are sometimes the unexpected short ones. I was there for Jmook vs IBDW at Genesis 8. The entire Top 8 set was only 10 minutes. And this was in a Bo5 without bans AND Jmook won on the worst stage in the matchup (Final Destination) twice. The length of time and the lack of stage variety seems like it's good on paper for balance and helps the players, but it hurts viewership.
IMDB 😂
Coming from melee yet saying IMBD is crazy
@@jonathanc3001 had to use the old tag in case some people wanted to look up the set.
@@yankees2864 tagging you too so you see my reason.
@@drstclair no, IMDB is a movie info website. His tag was IBDW lol
I know this is more of a lighthearted video, but beyond never having been bored with Ultimate I especially have a desire to get more invested in it because this weekend one of my oldest friends and my "Smash rival" sadly passed away from a long battle from complications brought on by Crohn's. He was the best player I ever knew, seriously his Yoshi was such a demon that he could have made a serious run at pro, & he'd never forgive me if I didn't keep my skill sharp. I owe him that much. RIP, Johannes.
Salute my man
Salute
My condolences for your loss, amice. May the Ike philosophy serve you well.
Oh man, sorry for your "rivals" loss.
Rest In Peace ❤
Beat ppl only with Yoshi on his birthday every year
@@treythomas7193 As a Snake main who pockets Sephiroth & Ness, that sounds brutal but I also really like that idea and I’m willing to try that. Thanks for the suggestion, friend!
Hey, former SoCal PR Bowser player here - I totally agree! I mostly quit ult in ~ March of this year due to a mix of school responsibilities and what you’ve mentioned in this video here. It really sucked to see the character that I’d invested so much time and energy into labbing and figuring out drop from arguable top 20 in the pre-COVID era, to niche mid tier that could beat good players if the player piloting him had an immense upper hand in defensive fundamentals and punish game when I was at my peak, to low tier who gets absolutely blasted by characters he can’t keep up with on the massive stages that time him out or characters who take advantage of the stagelist to keep him in disadvantage hell for entire stocks. My performance at tournaments went from being directly correlated with how much time I’d spent on VOD review, writing matchup notes, improving my subconscious flowchart, labbing, etc to being directly correlated with whether or not I’d run into Steve, Kazuya, or Sonic at some point, and I think this vid does a great job of conveying why we’ve gotten to this point with the meta.
You can certainly still win a large event with bowser given the right player but that's how yoshi was in melee so never give up hope there's always meta game developments
Coney: Explains why the game isnt fun anymore and gives things that could fix it.
Also Coney: Do nothing because it's too far in the meta.
Seriously though, great video that explained quite a bit.
He only said to not change the ruleset (aka stock count and game timer). He still suggested the addition of more stages.
UFA having Lylat was such a breath of fresh air. People are so scared of that stage whose biggest problem post-pandemic is that Kirby sometimes doesn't have a good time on the ledges. Every problem got patched out but people want the stage gone anyway because of Smash 4 PTSD.
Lylat makes hype games.
Lylat is a really good stage for Kirby too, so it's not even that big of an issue. People just have Smash 4 PTSD and/or hate slants
Lylat is innocent! People will blame any weird situation on the stage even when it has nothing to do with the stage.
Add that Lylat's awful for Steve and Kazuya, but:
" B-b-b-b-b-ut *MY* character's bad on Lylat cuz *SLANTS* ! I don't wanna give someone an advantage ! "
... then BAN it, numbnuts.
If your sole argument is "my character struggles on this stage" as the primary reason why that stage shouldn't be legal, that doesn't warrant a whole ass stage getting banned from a stagelist.
Get better.
Lylat is rhe dumbest legal stage ever... why is it legal like it has slopes and moves ew
@@splaturials9156 It doesn't move anymore
I think another major issue with Ultimate's stage ruleset is that it's been conservative since the launch of the game. Melee had gone through an era of stage removals for a decade and a half and technically is still going on with the use of modifications. We have seen what those stages do for the meta (Yoshi Island heavily favors Fox, Mute City for Peach) that the community had enough evidence and reason to ban it. Same went with Brawl, especially with a more meta centralized character that had heavy advantages on stages with a lot of aerial camping options (Rainbow Cruise) or sharking platforms (Halberd, Delfino). The sacrifice to these stages in order to bring Meta Knight down however led to the rise of other game-breaking meta characters that had a part in weakening the meta over time to end up supporting more strict rules outside of stage bans or god forbid character bans. Despite that however, Brawl had a fairly liberal stage list up until Apex 2012, it never had forced a set standard of stages from the beginning even though Meta Knight was already a top contender character even after a year of the game's released. Outside of the very first regionals and locals, Ultimate has always had the same stage list throughout it's entire competitive lifespan. This in turn not only leads to the same stages being seen across different sets and tournaments, but being like that for a grand total of five whole years with barely any changes outside like 2 additions and 3 removals (Yoshi, Kalos, and Lylat, which funnily enough, weren't even that bad of counterpick stages, I mean at least compared to what there was in Melee-Sm4sh, hell even Yoshi was a starter in Brawl). This longevity (along with the aformentioned top meta characters and all singles BO5) has led to the Ultimate meta not being able to develop a gradually healthy meta compared to that of Melee and to a lesser extent Brawl (not so much since MK mains were just getting better every month, but it at least gave spawn to a myriad of "solutions" to try and slow done a growing cancer in the meta before thinking about stage or *gasp* character bans), and I feel that once the next smash game comes out, people will be less reluctant to keep Smash Ultimate up any longer, despite being the most balanced (will likely change as top character meta's keep evolving and most of the others have already hit there potential) and housing the most content given out of any Smash games before and likely after, and that's really just a damn shame. Unless they want to define the meta of the next smash game and keep it interesting for years to come, it would be in there best interest to NOT set an extremely conservative stage list at the very beginning, maybe over time as the meta progresses into what is valued by the community, but at the very start is how you can lose interests very quickly afterwards.
this is def an essay not many people will read, but I def agree. It always confused me how ultimate got a competition player’s wet dream in the stage hazard toggle, and then we used basically the same 6 or 7 stages since the game’s release with NOBODY trying to vouch for new stages (except that one meme account that wanted wuhu island)
@@the0therethanI think the reason hazard toggle fell through was because even in the present day, you still need to select entirely different rulesets if you want hazards on or off
@@grunkleg.3110 that’s true but not exactly what I’m getting at. There are so many hazards off stages that could’ve been at least tested but nobody ever seriously tried
I feel like ultimate having a conservative stagelist is kinda just the natural progression of the game especially in the more "esports" era.
When ult dropped we had 4 previous smash games + PM worth of stage knowledge. We saw castle siege suck in brawl, we saw it be absolutely terrible in sm4sh, it makes sense to cut it early when it sucks again in ultimate.
I also think what end up being controversial stages are less fun as a player. As a personal anecdote I remember my first set on anthers ladder on smash Wii u I got circle camped by a sonic on the duck hunt stage. I did not have fun.
Bro I am not reading this until you learn to fucking SEPARATE YOUR PARAGRAPHS
I just hosted a tournament where we played on Warioware and players were living far longer than I expected. A pichu lived until 130 on that stage! The side blast zones are really close but the top blast zones are pretty normal. We also played on a bunch of other weird stages such as King of Fighters stadium, Dreamland, and Skyloft. The players of the tournament had a great time and said it was very refreshing compared to our usual stagelist.
26:40 I love how Coney has to clarify that he's not being wholesome
The whole stage thing reminds me of the fighting game one where every tournament set was set on training room and it eventually got to the point where people got really sick of it.
I'm assuming you mean Street Fighter 5. Where it got to the point of people complaining, that Capcom banned the training stage in an official tournament.
It’s a bunch of them. UMVC3 only plays on Bonnie Wonderland because it’s the brightest stage and it’s hard to see on the darker stages. KOF 15 is only played on Training stage. For years everyone always played on Colosseum silent across multiple versions of Blazblue because it caused the least lag online. To date I think Strive still only plays on like 3 stages because they’re the least laggy. The list of fighting games that don’t have the issue of top players only playing on one or a handful of the available stages is at this point far shorter than the ones that do.
@@Joltman11 a bunch of stages lag in marvel 3, boon doesn't.
@@Joltman11Back when Soul Calibur VI was played. I think there were only a few banned stages at launch. And then the devs fixed those stages.
So.... Yeah, it was a game that actually had a lot of stages played on.
The problem with training stages goes much deeper than that. Max dood did a entire video diving into it
I was so mad when they started taking kalos, warioware, and lylat out of rulesets, I really wish they would allow them again
Kalos is okay and allowed at every event I play wario ware is a absolute no andthats for the better
@@splaturials9156From what I gather... Kalos eventually got replaced with that one which came with sephiroth
The thing that’s unfortunate about this idea is that competitors just simply won’t embrace it even if implemented. Even though It would give players new stages and scenarios to lab, encourage more characters counter-picking, and just a general reason to grind the game other than “i’ve invested so much time into this game that i’m trapped and have to keep playing” (which lets be honest, is the only reason why competitive ultimate is still somewhat strong). I don’t believe for a second that people will actually bother to make use of any of it. We couldn’t even figure out hazards on.
The entire meta is centered around how well a character can edge guard while simultaneously how well they can recover after being thrown off a stage. Only a handful of characters can do both of these well.
I think playing of a flatter stage will open up the meta for more characters to shine
LITTLE MAC SUPREMACY GO
Untrue kazuya just kills you at o on stage
No? Ultimate is notorious for being the smash game where edgeguarding matters the least.
@@legrandliseurtri7495eh not the least that's still tr4sh
Lol wat, edge guarding is barely relevant on this game
What this game really needs is million dollar prize pools but ONLY if there is also Warioware with stage hazards on. The arrow dodge meta has some serious potential
.... or jusy pick RNGesus hero
Spectator perspective should be taken a little serious if ad revenue and viewership is serious. Not to call it a spectator sport but the broadcast is for spectators and the broadcast's health depends on viewership retention. An anti-spectator perspective would definitely encourage great brokeness. I think we should hear this out. If changing the meta wouldn't flip the tables on on the players I would say let's do it now or for BO5s under a certain brackets to try it out (TOs can still try it out whatever they want). But broadening the available stage counterpicks and the strategies that will need cooked up for those stages is exciting. It's a layer of depth to the game that's just sitting there. But I respect how we got to the stage list we have. It's what I would have pushed for if I was competing. I get salty when I lose on banned stages in elite.
This is absolutely true, I think a stagelist with more variety would make the game infinitely more interesting. I am so tired of watch the entirety of top 8 be played on PS2
I really enjoyed watching ultimate early on, especially when mkleo was on top. These days though ive just been more into melee. Its easier to follow with the smaller cast, better storylines, and a better defined community and history. The complicated melee things are just more fun to watch and it feels like it has an essence that continues that ultimate has lost.
Melee is dead as shit too right now lol. And Im somebody who believes its a way better game than ult.
@@dingo9696what fk are you saying lol
The big house stream had like 400k spectators
@@Ellesenzacognome you stupid? Big house 11 didnt even hit 50k peak viewers. The average was 15k.
I think it’s the people who make it their whole life that says it sucks, I still play and watch tournaments and enjoy it.
I think your timer idea and stage ideas are awesome, I don’t like wario ware but man I miss brawl with the crazy stages because it makes it even more fun honestly your right!
Yeah. I still play the game regularly and I still love it just a much. 😅
I can also definitely see that many people who play only a couple games regularly at some point start to develop the kind of “I have to do this” feeling that people get when they work at a job for a long time. That feeling where the passion goes away and it starts to become a chore y’know?
Idk PS2 is really the culprit, it's too common
Thank God Jay Eazy Is Performing At The Biggest Smash Tournament In NYC Today ❤
big up jay Eazy. bro was never book smart !!
The reason it's boring is because of the high level gameplay that has emerged.
-it's slow to look at. You don't get punished for not being aggressive, so why try?
-this non commital neutral with pokes is tedious. Not great for spectators.
-not a lot of surprise stocks taken. Most characters can make it back from pretty high knockback so this big swing in stocks rarely happens.
-combos are too short, or not impressive to pull off.
I went back to watching Melee this year, where very exciting new things seem to happen all the time, and watching Ultimate now is just so uneventful.
I'm not really playing much these days so these are just observations from a spectator.
Unpopular opinion: People are over it, because players are missing personality and we're no longer watching the best players, playing at their best. Sadly, the players that got banned, were the best of the best and they were fun to watch. Not saying they shouldn't have been banned. Just saying the current pros are boring.
Stage list definitely fucking sucks, things are way too conservative. We need variance, and you'd think people would like Lylat considering it's Steve's worst stage and generally want smaller stages to combat zoners and Sonic. WarioWare would be a legitimate counterpick option, slants aren't bad, and I've always wanted legal Frigate again.
Smash players when they see ramps (slanted):
Doesn't lylat give steve iron? I don't understand how that's bad for steve
@@sageofsong Of the building blocks it gives him iron, but it gives him *only* iron. It is slower to mine and he can't build with with dirt, stone, or wood. TNT uses iron, crafting tables use iron, walls use iron. Compared to other stages, it hampers how much he can mine and how much he can build, and the stage is also pretty small so its easier to chase him around.
Contrast that with PS2 which everyone gentlemans to and is a *great* stage for Steve. It's large, has a useful platform setup for him to build under/behind, and he gets stone as a minimum.
There's nothing scarier to an Ultimate player than a diagonal angle
@@grunkleg.3110 it's funny cause slants also mess with Steve's walls, usually to the point where you can walk right through blocks cause they're not aligned properly.
Spectators have been BEGGING for a new stagelist since 2019. TOs don't care, because getting the best players to show up is the #1 factor in drawing attention and if you throw weird shit at them they simply will not go. Every time I see a big-ish tournament try to actually make the game fun they get punished for it. It's such an unfortunate feedback loop but I don't see the solution.
Casuals: Leaving Smash Ultimate because most of the things they loved from previous Smashes (Items, Stages, Character Specials/FinalSmashes, Modes) were toned down to be more fair and balanced for competitive. Less randomness, less chaos, less fun at parties.
Competitives: Leaving Smash Ultimate because even with all of the new balances, they still threw out most of it and stuck with the same Modes, Rules, Stages, Ban Lists and it's getting real boring.
Congratulations, no one won.
Him talking about the stage list and how milquetoast it is has gotten me thinking of making a stage list of my own…
I think a huge problem for viewership is that most of the old goats of the game just don’t perform as well as they used to. At this point It’s hard to root for someone who doesn’t play an extremely meta character because for them maintaining consistently is so hard.
Also, Steve’s, kazuyas, sonics, make the game hard to watch from a competitive standpoint, especially when they are beating your favorite players. Just not the storyline most of us want.
One thing I think we could use is a variety of tournament styles. The unique parts of the game are shafted off as “side events”, that being Doubles, Squad Strike, Items/Hazards on, illegal stages, FFAs, etc.
We need tournaments that could mainly focus on different elements that make the game unique in order to encourage people to master all elements of the game. I’m so sick of seeing players that are really good at singles, but flop in every other mode.
Singles can obviously be played as main events for the largest Super Majors and invitationals, but I think it would be incredible to see B or A tier events mainly focus on things such as squad strike in order to encourage character diversity. Because yeah, like you said: the current meta favors characters that are only good for the systems we’re using. I follow competitive Splatoon as well, and one thing that makes the game more interesting are the unique modes, and that different weapons thrive in each one. Most players will still stick close to their main weapons, but will play them differently to adjust to their corresponding modes. It allows you to think of new ways to view your characters and gain a newfound wisdom that can even be applied to the main mode.
At my University, we had unique tournaments such as 8-player smash tournaments where the top half of the players would stay in the game, and last one standing would move up in bracket. All others would be sent to a 4 player FFA for elimination, where the games worked similarly to the 8-player games. Grand Finals would be a 4 player first-to-two.
It was a blast to say the least, and it made me realize that no one will ever do that because we’re too damn conservative despite the complaining. And I’m no TO, nor do I have the desire to continue because the singles community genuinely disgusted me while I was still playing.
TL;DR : We need to make our “side events” into main events that count towards PGR in order to encourage full mastery of the game. We also need more creative tournament ideas.
CONEY SPITTING FACTS!
I've played in and hosted for this game since launch. I hate seeing the green on PS2 so much and I hate how all smash players dont ever want to change anything. I legit go to some venues to play friendlies and pick FD form of a 'non legal' stage like momentoes only for them to complain. I have played at locals that had tried a five min rule set and it was alot no different, I would rarely see a time out at 5 mins let alone 7. I think time outs CAN BE HYPE given the situation.
I main Ganon so nothing scares me anymore. I’ve already accepted that I’ll never have the advantage.
ive been saying that reason why Ult is boring now is because the game mechanics favors boring slow characters who can control the pace of the match. I never considered that the stages also help that fact. Now this might because I'm Pika-pilled but fuck it, I'm down for Lylat, Warioware, or anything.
nvm, a minute later Coney said my opinion doesn't matter 😔
Honestly... Panda's death was by far the biggest part of why my love of competitive Smash dropped so drastically. Thankfully I'm getting more and more excited about LG as time goes on. I don't know if they'll be able to fill that vacant hole but, I really hope they do
I watched every day of their videos but Smash isnt dying at all pepole said it for 5 years now its getting stupid
@@splaturials9156 I didn’t say Smash was dying, nor is that something I believe. Please read the comment you’re replying to before replying.
I can fill that vacant hole
This video came out at a crazy coincidental time for me because I'm running my new local with a larger hazards on stage list and full DSR for more variance (and no PS2 so people can't go to it every game.) Smash has so many options and it's insane we just end up running the same ruleset at every event when there's so many great options honestly. I've been so much more excited to play ever since I started playing with moving platforms again.
you know, I always did know you commentated here and there (loosely knew) but after watching the worst video game songs I just really realized how much I enjoy the vibe you give off. the humor, the chat that plays along with roasting you, and just the overall thought and setup you put into things isn't overbearing and feels right. I don't really get entertained by people much, but ig that commentating really helped too, you speak very clearly even when dying of laughter
One of the best tournaments I watched was the Why do's "anything goes". Any game this old needs some kind of breath of fresh air. It may not be the best for the pros but honestly, viewer engagement going away isnt good for pros either. Especially since a lot of the pros try to go the route of content creation anyway
Sorry little bro but stream numbers dont lie stop saying games dyint bs when its just not true
@@splaturials9156 and now we observe one of the last remaining few people that tune in to watch an entire top 32
@@splaturials9156 you're part of the problem
It's so interesting now that I've gotten into fighting games these past couple years, seeing the difference in culture. Smash is soooooooooo top-player-centric that it's crazy. I don't follow SF or MK that much, from the outside it feels like maybe they are a bit closer to Smash in that regard (also Tekken, maybe?).
But still, it's nothing compared to Smash. The TOs in fighting games are all trying to appease the developer and get their event on the pro circuit. In Smash there is no developer, so everyone has put that same energy into the top players, it feels like. Maybe I'm wrong, that's just what it feels like.
yeah, that's pretty spot on. it's hard to even remember or think about one happened in a game when it's indistinguishable from the other games for being on the same stages with such drawn out matches.
very curious, however, to compare it with the efforts of the new plat fighters coming out. NASB2 (and 1, for that matter) has a sidebar for a competitive stagelist. Rivals had stage counterpicks built into its ranked system, all built of very competitive-friendly stage layouts. crucially, the stages in both of these games have incredibly varied, if not always vibrant, backgrounds. much easier to distinguish.
Something he didn’t bring up really was half the reason the games take so long is because every player just camps the ever living hell out of you every game. The game super defensive a lot because in a game where you mash the A button and take 90% there’s just no reason to approach most of the time. It’s not even the characters, it’s the game itself. Aggression is just not as good as playing lame because shielding and grabbing is ass and good luck getting past Clouds wall of fun bair spam.
The game is built to incentivize Sonic running the clock and Steve making walls, because first and foremost the game is built for 5 year old johnny who will drop this game and return to Fortnite because he can’t figure out how to recover. Sakurai wanted little Johnny to feel like he can win so he made movement and hitstun bad (thank you Brawl for introducing hitstun cancelling!) so he can mash the A button and do cool shit. However little did he know it didn’t make 4 player smash more fun it makes 1v1 worse. They have a different damage percents for 4 player smash so I don’t see why they don’t do the same for hitstun and other things. Ironic Sakurai hates combos so much when he keeps making characters like Smash 4 Bayo, Steve and Kazuya, you can’t do cool shit unless you pay money and the expense of your opponents enjoyment. It’s like his vision failed at the very thing it set out to do. No matter how hard you try to minimize the difference in skill between players the better player is going to win most of the time.
I don’t know why he designed his game like this. When I played Melee as a child I picked Bowser and Kirby and spammed down b, or picked Mario and spammed specials. Naturally I got my butt kicked by my neighbor who try harded with his Sheik and completely obliterated me. Was I mad? Yes, but I wanted to get better and play like him, because it was so impressive to me. Competitive mechanics doesn’t make casual Melee worse, it makes the game itself better, and the “target audience” is largely unaffected. Or for people like me, it made me want to be that good.
Fr, Sakurai is always trying to close the skill gap even though the vast majority of people aren't going to notice
the stage banning process / counter picking would be so much more meaningful in a bigger stage list
I think the one issue is the increased variety stage list hurts low tiers and bottom tiers a lot. There are some characters that are forced to ban things like Battlefield or FDs, which really lets characters that can abuse the weird stages get way better
Do you have any specific examples of this?
@@thattubaguy217 like say someone like the Belmonts who have bad disadvantage. Stages like Battlefield are a must ban or else some matchups become more difficult, so that’s one less “mandatory” ban for a controversial stage that could be equally as bad
@@thattubaguy217 lucario pretty much always wants to ban smashville, for instance
I called it back in 2018 that this game would suck competitively
Please do a tournament with these rules. We need it. This sounds so fun
I thought for SURE this was going to be an episode of facts and opinions
But it was 🤔
I was in drastic disagreement with "it's not a character issue" until you brought up Warioware I'm on board
I think there’s also something to be said for how interesting characters are on an individual level.
Like, sure, there’s 100 characters, but because of how this is, at the end of the day, a party fighting game meant to the LCD gamer, it can be hard, as a viewer, to distinguish different players outside of sheer skill.
What I don't understand is how CONEY's entire position around stage change in this video revolves around dealing with certain characters, and yet he says it's not the characters. 5-7 character bans in this game, even revolving ones, would change the meta a crazy amount and make the game 1000% more interesting to watch.
His point is that the current characters are a consequence of the stage list, which is the root problem.
when the pandemic hit that just killed almost all of my motivation to watch smash tourneys, i watch the occasional tourney/top 8 here and there but i havent been able to re-create that spark i had with playing & watching as the first year of ultimate
fun times glad i was there when i was
I still love ultimate but that doesn't change the fact that Coney is spitting. The game is old as shit. This is just how it is. Nintendo isn't going to let Smash die, Sakurai or otherwise, so we just wait for what's next and take what we got. We're still way better off than the end of 4's lifecycle.
Songs: Mario Party 10 Songs: Smash 4 Wii U Songs: Brawl Subspace
I can relate to the stage issue even from a player position, the last monthly I went to had 3 bans no DSR, meaning I was forced to play against Mario on platforms every game since he'd auto ban FD Kalos and Town which just led every match going to small battlefield or PS2.
It’s just the same people making it to the top over and over in every tournament that’s boring. No one new and exciting ever comes along or if they do it’s very rare.
I agree with a lot of your points but I think you’re underestimating player pull, you can look at viewership data and see numbers LITERALLY QUADRUPLE when Mkleo, Kola, or Marss is on the screen
Gotta agree hardcore on stage list. One of the most fun parts about Melee is that different stages (both collision and blast zones) force you to adjust your playstyle. Playing on triplat battlefield is different from triplat Yoshi’s is different from triplat dreamland is different from triplat FoD. They’re all triplat, but they’re so different in other ways that they make people approach the match differently.
Although I do agree that a big stage shakeup has a decently large chance at attracting more viewers to the game, I really don’t think this is gonna be too well received by actual competitors due to the higher amounts of variance and frustration that stages like YIb, Warioware, Halberd, and Frigate may cause. if a tournament ran a controversial ruleset, I can’t see that many top players opting to attend due to this. I also think that part of why casual viewers are more inclined to see a big stage shakeup than competitors is because a lot of the strong decision making and execution goes over their head when they watch so there may not be as much to enjoy if they aren’t seeing obvious sources of variation from game to game (even if there are plenty of variations in how players are adapting based on previous decisions). I don’t think that a stage such as halberd will make ppl want to watch a character that they dislike after the novelty bias wears off.
Great points, and I agree with everything. A new stagelist is what this game needs, and there's so much more to be explored besides..
the occasional Lylat
SHOUTOUT EDITOR FOR THE POKEMON MASTERS MUSIC
Adding more variable stages would allow the meta to continue to grow in nuanced ways as well. I once had a blueprint of stage bans where stages were grouped based on platforms so you had: Tri plats, dual plats, solo plats, no plats and the oddballs which would be stages like Wario Ware, Castle Siege and Frigate. This allowed for draft rules such as: Losers ban a group and winner would choose from remaining groups. Never got to run the tourney but the idea was well received in community polls.
From a player perspective I like best of 5 to provide a chance of coming back when you're down. But I get that it makes tournaments take significantly longer.
In regards to the stage list. I'd be fine with a trial run of Wario Ware and Yoshi's Island.
Frigate is a no from me because of the wall, and Halberd is a no because it further benefits characters with ridiculous recoveries like Sora, Bayo, Pikachu, Game & Watch, Sonic (and others I'm sure) others by giving them more options for recovering and pretty much removes ledge trapping from many MUs.
I'd maybe be down for Lylat to come back (I think the unique platform layout heavily outweighs most of the cons) the only reason I'd be a bit heasitant is because Steve would get hella Iron from it so it'd probably be an instant ban for pretty much anyone fighting Steve
My 3 Reasons Why Smash Ultimate Sucks in 2023
1. No extra content. Hell, I replayed Smash Run on the 3DS version because it was the closest thing I could get to Kirby Air Ride and it was actually fun with friends.
2. Hype Train died with Etika. If you thought you brought more excitement than him, you're just wrong. Sit down. Didn't even ask.
3. It's just mid. "Balance" means everyone is mid and nobody is special anymore. I preferred the days when Pichu was OP and hoped they did more characters this way to have their own gimmicks, but no. Community whines loud enough and sucks the fun out of everything when they don't know shit.
So I’ve only played smash seriously for a little over 2 years now and I’m nowhere near tired of Ultimate. So seeing my teammates (play for my high school esports team) drop out bc they’re burnt out makes me sad
In my playgroup we have Castle Siege on and a few others like yoshis usw. We mostly play on random stages and just wanted a couple smaller stages in. because there are so many big ones, so I kinda understand it.
What I suggest is a very large stage list with 4 or 5 bans where you can use 2 bans to ban "Groups" of stages. Grouped stages could be: 2Plat, Mid Plat, tri plat, open Middle, Large, Small or others.
My stage take is even more radical. Turn hazards on on some stages. Have two near-identical rulesets, one with hazards off, the other with hazards on, and then the players decide what stage to go to before selecting the game mode. There are several hazards on options that re interesting and balanced. (And yes, I think hazards off WarioWare should be legal)
We need to mod the UI of the entire game. I think characters should be selected first before the stage. Stage hazards needs to be a toggle on stage selection.
Alot of the points made in here are actually pretty valid from spectators POV, and not against more stage varierity in the future with the next Smash game. The last message made is very true, we have forged the game in how it is and we gotta just hold that change until the next smash game appear
No schmoovement in Namco's overbalanced vision of Smash results in stiff gameplay, and slow-progressing rounds. Ultimate is definitely the slowest platform fighter out right now
I actually really agree with these points and would like to see what you think a ruleset should be.
I was thinking to match other games, 3/4 minutes and 2 stocks. But for stages I’m not sure just yet
I have 0 competitive experience and all my knowledge of the pro scene comes from this channel and other UA-cam movies but one thing I’ve thought is that there doesn’t seem to be much variety in smash when it comes to people strategies and i think a change to the stage system would improve that, it seems like the old days of melee and brawl (and pm) had a lot of people who found success by using a creative strategy, like a character and stage combo, with all the stages being so balanced in ultimate it feels like stages dont effect people play styles as much so both players are trying to do the same thing better then the other guy. Maybe its just a result of people being better after the game and the scene being more competitive but it feels like everyone plays the same in ultimate
It would be hilarious were it not so depressing how the Smash community can't make up its mind whether to ban characters or not, no matter how powerful they are, yet they have consistently trended to make the stage list more and more bland over time.
Can't figure out whether Steve is worth banning, but slants? Oh baby, get that out of my Smash Bros.
Smash Ultimate is the most milk toast competitive smash game imo. I love that Rainbow Cruise was legal in brawl. And Mute City in Melee is epic.
And that's another great point. None of the top characters are broken, they just fit the meta the best rn. Why do we even hate sharking? Get good and start jumping
Melee had the best controls and most importantly had the most fun. Been like 2 decades and they've never made the franchise better than that.
Counterpoint- tap jump is MANDATORY in melee so every game past melee is better
From a competitive standpoint, bo5 is understandably preferred as it gets you less uncertainty- better player is more likely to win the more games you play. But you already have a kind of safety net with double elimination. And while I think single elimination is a valid ruleset for a lot of games, double elimination is far too engrained in smash culture to ever see that changing. So I think he’s on the ball here.
I think the same idea can be applied for the stage choices. Competitors will always try to snuff out variation.
I think smash should have a seasonal map pool, and perhaps even ruleset. Some space for experimentation and refreshing the meta a little bit. That always gives room for new people to find footing in the meta too which helps to keep newcomers motivated and veterans on their toes
I've made my custom stagelist years ago, and nobody listened to my suggestions. Pictochat would go crazy. Flat stage, solid blast zones, walls on the bottom, tiny slantes that force recovery mixups
Why would top players listen to you
@splaturials9156 well, locally, I was okay. Nobody wanted to actually change since we go so used to the stagnate ruleset. But you're right. I'm a nobody, so why WOULD anybody listen to or even consider suggestions 🤔
New legal stages would breathe so much life into this game at pretty much every level. For me personally, it might even feel like a whole new game, which is a good thing.
One thing I've heard top players say is that most player, especially top players, don't want to learn new things. The current stage list means that all you have to learn is don't be on platform vs Mario or up throw kills 5 percent earlier. The game plan only really varies around platforms. The same way we saw some people fly up through rankings by having a new character released could happen if more stages with varied strats came in. People talk as if the current stage list is neutral but like coney said, it isn't. A neutral stage list would have stages that favor all characters play styles.
Man I wanna blame FP2 SO bad
fp2 was definitely not a healthy addition to the game
@@gbx4858 but at the same time it would be kinda funny to see steve sharking under halberd
Even if they weren’t there, players would just blame something else. People love to complain and always will
@@competitively3315 true, I remember when they were complaining about olimar and inkling back when the game first came out (and they even complained about k Rool despite him being trash)
@@kiwifluorite no. 💀
1. No patches
2. Bad netcode
As a competitor I highly agree with what you're saying about stages I wish there were more stages added in tournament
I agree, it needs more actual counter picking or strategy/match up stages. In melee you can pick yoshis if you want smaller, more combos, and kill early gamble. You can pick FD for chain grabs or neutral based match ups. Battlefield to lessen recovery options but have platforms for combos & movement. Dreamland for bigger stage, good for floaties, harder to combo in. FoD If you like walls, a mini FD, and weird platform combo angles, etc. PS (frozen) suprising prolly the most neutral stage in melee now I think of it.
‘Who the f are you [the viewer]?!’ is a valid question, but ‘Part of the income for the tourney’ is the answer
I wasn't a great player (usually top 1/2 at locals/monthlies) but I quit ultimate 6 months in because almost every game felt same-y. I loved hype moments where you outplay someone with stage knowledge. Now it's more like a traditional fighting game where spacing and footsies are everything with less stage quirks. And ever since "The World vs. Steve" arc in 2022 there haven't been any interesting story lines to make me want to watch tournaments. Hopefully something happens to add hype to the game, even if its a new top player or random beef.
Ok I know it was just supposed to be a little throwaway joke at the end but for me the lack of quality commentary has been a big part of my waning interest in Ultimate these days. I can't remember the last time I bothered to watch an Ult tourney that wasn't being restreamed by Coney or Plup
I agree with everything ecxept the end. Change it! Better players will still usually win, but adding some stages thy allow knowledge checks and cheese is so much better to spectate, I love when games need up on Lylat and such. Here’s a bit so hot take, the players are better at exploiting cheese and avoiding cheese anyhow. But I love a world where little Mack dash attack kills on some stages at like 80. I think a more robust stage list wouldn’t change to tier list, but it would lessen some of the gaps.
So we're not going to talk about problem characters, but we're going to cite a 50 minute Sonic vs G&W grand finals as a "stage" issue?
Smash 4 unironically the better competitive game.
I know there was a Sakurai Says bracket that was in a tournament that evades me. It had items on and random stages all legal, I can’t even remember if it was at a Summit, but I think that kind of side bracket made for a really fun watch. Even if it’s a quick, bo1, or seeing some squad strike screen time. I love KOF and it’s 3 character lineup for standard games, so I wish that things that incentivized more chaotic games would be around! Ultimately, seeing some silly ass stages would make the game be much more entertaining to me, a viewer who doesn’t even play
As a person who's played competitive Smash since Brawl - S.Ult, the samey-samey definitely is real. Your video's so real for that. That's why playing "samey" sometimes is too much, and I kick back and play Frigate, Yoshi's Island(Brawl), and my most controversial "legal" stage--Prism Tower on the down time. Delfino Plaza got some hate for being a legal traveling stage back in the day, but we rocked it. The one point I'd make before trying to praise Prism Tower, will be that it's definitely the healthiest traveling stage with the most legal tournament potential. As balanced and non-jank as the other traveling stages are today in Ultimate compared to their past inclusions and flaws.. Delfino Plaza, Halberd, Frigate, Castle Siege, and Skyloft... they all are still quite radically meta shifting stages. Prism Tower is healthier than them all in my opinion. But Halberd and Frigate are fairly acceptable out them all.
Frigate Orpheon is only a two-part transition, and Town & City is a three-part transition. Frigate has become tame in Ultimate too.
Prism Tower is cool though. Gotta love that dangerous 10 seconds of walk-off start of the match. Once the traveling stage rotations finishes its cycle of six stage changes in a spam of ~1 minute and 55 seconds, you come back to the walk-off that's effectively lasting for 15 dangerous seconds in technical battle terms. Then it repeats all over again.
You have multiple stage transitions, but they're all healthy for the most part. Nothing is going to kill you, and it's hard to ignore the causes of death because the stage gives you clear warning that the stage is going to travel and slightly change. The main floor is a semi-soft platform, so it can be prone to sharking like Halberd's first traveling stage floor. And yet despite of the traveling stage aspect, the stage transitions are simple, small or "big", and easy.
Been around awhile too. I was really involved in Ult development but ive been mostly tuned out the past year or two. I actually happened watched that sonix/miya game after not seeing any sets outside my specific character for a good year and holy shit was it long. I kept tabbing out and coming back thinking "i cant believe its STILL going". The characters were obviously a bit silly but the raw timer itself was def the issue, 100% agree.
Agree on every point here, especially the stages.