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Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U review


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Well, until this site gets a board for reviews, I'll post this one here.  I hope you guys enjoy it, and I promise to do more later.

 

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Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U
 
Developed by Sora Ltd. and Bandai Namco
 
Published by Nintendo
 
This is going to be my first double review, and there's no better couple of games to do this for than Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U.  Ever since it was announced by Iwata at E3 2011 that Sakurai was going to do Super Smash Bros. for the both the 3DS and Wii U, the minds of many a Nintendo fan raced with excitement and possibilities over what these two games would have in them to make them feel like true upgrades over Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the Wii to the point it got so many people speculating on the roster, stages, music, moves, what have you.  And when the trailer for the games was unveiled at E3 2013 with a surprise reveal for Mega Man, the hype train was in full throttle as we got several trailers of newcomers, a Direct talking about the games in full detail, the reveal that Miis would be playable, production of amiibo figures, a 50-Fact Extravaganza for the Wii U game, a free soundtrack for anyone that bought both games, and loads of DLC with several bits of information covering all of it.  A version for the Wii U would have been more than enough, but getting one on the 3DS just took the Smash Bros. franchise to new levels never thought possible, and the hype for these games was very real.  In fact, there's been so much hype for both of these games that Capcom feels they need to up the ante with the amount of hype they've put out for Street Fighter V.  Anyway, I could be on this paragraph all day long, but rather than do that, let's get to talking about the games and what makes them so legendary.  Here's my double review for Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U:
 
The Look: 5 out of 5 (for 3DS version)/5 out of 5 (for Wii U version)
 
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And meanwhile, Dr. Light is having an aneurism.
 
There have been several games on 3DS and Wii U that push the graphical boundaries of those systems when it comes to visuals, animation, details and frames per second, but these two particular games really do that to the extreme with the 3DS version having stellar graphics that certainly push Nintendo handhelds to their limit, and the Wii U version boasting crisp and clear HD visuals at a native 1080p resolution.  Both games have incredible stages, both old and new.  For old stages, several have returned from Brawl while a few have returned from Melee and the first Smash Bros. game (most of the stages from the first game came as DLC for both games), with Sakurai choosing only the best ones for these games. As for the new stages, no detail has been left out of each game, from the 100 Coin collecting that gives you a gold fighter in the Golden Plains stage to the Game Boy throwback in the Dream Land stage on the 3DS version, and the overall gorgeousness of Mario Galaxy to the dual-plane battling on Jungle Hijinxs on the Wii U game.  Even the stages that both games share also have their own various details, with Battlefield and Final Destination having different backgrounds in each version to having Metal Face appear in the Wii U version of Gaur Plain.  As for the new stages that appeared as DLC on both versions, Suzaku Castle is quite cool with the beautiful background and actually managing to add Street Fighter flare to the world of Super Smash Bros., Midgar is incredible with the various summons that change up the environment, and Super Mario Maker is amazing with the four changing themes and a random level generator that ALMOST puts Cloudberry Kingdom to shame.  Even the new Wii U-exclusive DLC stage, Miiverse is spectacular with the various Miiverse posts that appear on the stage depending on who's currently on it (of course, I could do without the various troll posts that appear, but hey, it's the internet).  And if you're a more hardcore gamer, just turn on the Final Destination form for each stage to give you enough visual variety without having to play on the same stage all of the time.  Even the character designs are all incredible with tons of detail and fluid animation, and exuding huge amounts of personality to pay respect to the games each character came from.  Some characters even have completely different outfits, with Shulk in his swimsuit, Zero Suit Samus in her crop top and shorts from the GBA Metroid games, or even the various Koopalings as Bowser Jr.'s alternate colors.  The trophies and alternate outfits for the Mii Fighters look especially amazing.  Pretty much everything in this game looks great.
 
The Sound: 5 out of 5 (for 3DS version)/5 out of 5 (for Wii U version)
 
Main Menu theme for Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U
 
Like Brawl before it, Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U features an incredible and eclectic collection of various soundtracks from several Nintendo games and other titles, both remixed and original.  One of the biggest differences between the two games is how stage music is done, with the 3DS game being like that of Melee as each stage has two tracks of music tied to it (just like how some stages in Melee had such a feature), and the Wii U game being like that of Brawl with just about every stage having a huge collection of music that you can adjust the play frequency for in the My Music option.  Also, the other big difference is that, while the 3DS version has a lot of music in it, the Wii U version has a BOATLOAD of music, with a good bit not in the 3DS version (though to be fair, there are some tracks of music that only the 3DS game has, such as the classic Kirby's Dream Land music that you can hear on the Dream Land stage).  You will never find this much music in any other fighting game out there.  As for sound effects and voice work, it's all done to great precision, with meaty hit effects and sounds for each hit and attack the characters give and take, and some voice actors reprising their roles from other games to do the characters they played in those, such as David Vincent returning to do the voice for male Robin, just like he did in Fire Emblem: Awakening.  My only real gripe with the voice work is that Fox sounds incredibly whiny, especially when compared to how awesome Falco sounds.  You have to admit, Fox sounded much cooler in Brawl.  Of course, I have to admit that it does sound like a lot of the voices and victory jingles from Brawl were reused for these two games.  But in a way, that's not really a bad thing as those from Brawl were all done incredibly well.  Overall, I can't really complain about the sound design for either game as they're both done extremely well, and will have me cranking up my volume every time I play just to enjoy all of it.
 
The Feel: 5 out of 5 (for 3DS version)/5 out of 5 (for Wii U version)
 
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I see this ending badly....
 
The core gameplay of these two games remains fundamentally the same as Smash Bros. has always been, in that to win, you must damage your opponents high enough to send them off of the stage.  While some fighting games like Virtua Fighter and Soul Calibur have featured ring outs before Smash Bros. came out, those games never did such a thing to this level of insanity.  But how do these two new games compare to the ones of the past in terms of content and gameplay?  Let's discuss that right now.
 
Both the 3DS and Wii U games have a lot of the same modes as each other, such as Smash, Classic, All-Star, Training, Stadium with all of the same minigames (as well as each version of Multi-Man Smash), the Vault, Custom, amiibo (which the 3DS game got through an update) and Online.  However, there are modes that are only in one game or another and even certain modes both games share are completely different.  For modes only the 3DS version has, there's the big one that was mentioned in the Direct back in April 2014, which is Smash Run, which is a very creative mode that has four fighters trekking through a vast labyrinth defeating enemies and collecting boosts to increase certain stats within five minutes, eventually leading up to a random, final two-minute battle that has the enhanced fighters duking it out for supremacy.  As for the other mode, that would be StreetPass where people you've streetpassed will have their character tokens facing off against yours in a game of StreetSmash in a chance for you to win prizes.
 
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Huh, I wonder if it's Gay Pride Week in the Mushroom Kingdom?
 
As for modes only on the Wii U version, good god almighty, did Sakurai go all out with it!  First off, you have the party-style board game, Smash Tour where four players control Miis, and go around collecting boosts, fighters and trophy-like items to gain the advantage in random battles.  And once all turns are used up, the four players will go to a four-minute stock battle where every fighter the player collected will act as the stock, thus making these battles feel similar to a game of The King of Fighters.  Second, you have Special Orders, which is divided into two games, being Master Orders and Crazy Orders.  Master Orders has you using gold to purchase tickets to take on different challenges only once, regardless if you win or lose (higher difficulties of challenges will cost you more gold), and Crazy Orders has you entering by spending 5000 gold or a Crazy Orders Pass.  After that, you have ten minutes to take on challenges to earn rewards, which you only get to keep by defeating Crazy Hand.  Lose or run out of time, and the bulk of your rewards is lost.
 
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I'll let you draw your own conclusion here.
 
Another mode only in the Wii U game that returns from previous games is the Events, but this time, it plays out much differently as you now navigate a map of events, advancing to new ones as you beat each one, and sometimes picking up rewards as you advance.  There's even a Co-Op version with an entirely different map to cross.  Honestly, the concept behind this I find to be pretty cool and much more unique than how the Events were done in both Melee and Brawl.  Stage Builder also returns to the Wii U version from Brawl, but this time, it's even better as the themes are very well done and the ability to draw in terrain, controlling movement paths for moving platforms, directions of barrel cannons and painting in lava allows for anyone with a truly creative streak to make some awesome stages.  Of course, it's not without its shortcomings as deleting sections of the stage can be a chore since you can only delete them in the reverse order you created them in.  While a level editor in a game like Smash Bros. is a good idea, it will still pale in comparison to level editing software for your PC.  Still, it's a bigger improvement over the one from Brawl.
 
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Looking at Bowser's expression, I wouldn't be standing there if I were Pikachu!
 
Another mode from Brawl that returns in the Wii U game is the Special Smash, but this time, it's been enhanced with more options for crazier battles.  Masterpieces also returns from Brawl, this time having an even greater number of game demos to try out, and even a few third party ones like Mega Man 2 and Pac-Man.  Coin battles also return in the Wii U version.  Brawl's Diorama Mode returns as the Photo Studio that gives a load of editing options to create cool snapshots of your trophies.  I haven't fooled around with this mode that much, so give me some time.  Another big mode that was sold heavily for the Wii U version was the 8-Player Smash, which is quite a big deal as this is the first time you've been able to do such a thing not only in Smash Bros., but just about any fighting game as it allows for a lot of friends to gather around a Wii U, or just have some crazier battles altogether.  Of course, since 8-Player Smash is a special mode, there are only a select number of stages you can battle it out on (though that selection grows more when you activate the Final Destination form for each stage) and you can't play that way online, which is very understandable because having the many fighters would most likely cause a lot of server crashes.  Finally, the other feature in the Wii U game includes the ability to paint on your snapshots, and once again, just like with Stage Builder, if you have a creative streak, you can make some incredible-looking art.  Another mode that got added as an update was being able to upload replays to YouTube.  Of course, the replays have to be a certain length in order to upload them.  This does suck, but it's not entirely a big deal to me as this is the first time you could ever do something like this in a Nintendo game.  The other are the Trophy Boxes to display your trophies in, which ought to please the completionists.
 
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I'd do the "seeing double" crack, but honestly... it's been done to death.
 
As for modes the two games share, but differ in greatly, the biggest one is Classic mode.  In the 3DS game, Classic mode has you traversing a path that you can create by deciding which battle you want to take on, with the blue path being the easiest, red being the hardest and green being right in the middle.  As for the Wii U game, you're in an arena, having the ability to choose which opponents to fight.  You also have rival battles, team battles (which let you team up with the fighters you defeated) and intruders that can either be giant or metal.  At the end of both versions, you fight Master Hand, though depending on the intensity, the battle will be different where you'll take on both him and Crazy Hand, and sometimes even fighting the creative new boss, Master Core (in the Wii U game, you'll take on Master Fortress on even higher intensities).  Honestly, how Classic was done in these two games reminds me of how you could choose your opponents in each round in the Arcade mode of Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike, though it is obviously different here.  Still, kudos to Nintendo for this one.  The All-Star modes, while being rather similar to each other in some ways, are also different in others.  For example, while the 3DS game's All-Star mode has you taking on the characters in chronological order, the Wii U game has you taking them on in reverse chronological order, which does change the formula quite nicely.  Also, in the 3DS game, beating All-Star mode earns you the character's alternate trophy while beating the All-Star mode in the Wii U game nets you their Final Smash trophy.  And though it's not a big deal, the rest area for each version is also quite different.
 
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Bar none, the coolest Final Smash ever!
 
While there are different modes between the two games, and similar modes that are quite different from one another, the roster of characters is the same, giving us 58 characters (with 21 of them as newcomers, and four of those newcomers came as DLC).  Along with classic Nintendo staples and other characters returning, such as Mario, Donkey Kong, Link, Kirby, Bowser, Marth, Pit, Sonic and others, Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U brings a whole cast of newcomers to the fray, and probably the best choices yet, with characters like Mega Man, Palutena, Robin, Little Mac, Pac-Man and Shulk.  Future DLC gave us old favorites like Mewtwo and Roy, and even newcomers like Ryu, Corrin and Bayonetta.  While some characters have been unchanged though improved in the gameplay areas, others have gone through significant changes to make them play even better.  Most notable of these changes would have to be both Bowser and Pit.  Just about everything on Bowser was changed to make him a more effective fighter, and Pit got some new attacks, special attacks and a new Final Smash.  Others like Zero Suit Samus and Olimar went through their own changes to make them more effective at fighting and recovering.  As for the newcomers, they're all amazing to play as, from Little Mac having his KO meter that fills up and allows him to do a super-powerful uppercut when full, Robin's Levin Sword and tomes being limited in uses and needing to restore with time, and Shulk having his Monado Arts that increase certain abilities while lowering others.  Even the DLC characters are incredible with their own unique gimmicks such as Ryu having the Street Fighter commands to perform his special attacks (also powering them up), and Bayonetta being able to pull off fancy combos like she could in her games.
 
For the controls for these two games, they're pretty much unchanged from the previous outings, but in a very sublime way.  One would think playing Smash Bros. on a 3DS would be a very daunting task.  But once you get up to speed and learn all of the control layouts, it pretty much becomes second nature.  There has been word that people have broke the Circle Pad on their 3DS while playing Smash Bros., but honestly, I think that's mainly because they end up playing it so hard that they end up doing that.  Honestly, I think some people really need to take a chill pill when it comes to playing these types of games.  For the Wii U game, the number of controller options is staggering, giving you so many options to play the game the way you like.  All of the supported controller types include the Wii Remote on its side, the Wii Remote + Nunchuk, the Classic Controller, the Classic Controller Pro, the Wii U Game Pad, the Wii U Pro Controller, the Gamecube Controller (via the Gamecube Controller Adapter) and even the Nintendo 3DS family of systems (more on this one later).  This gives the game a huge amount of variety, which is always good when it comes to video games.  And like Brawl, you can customize the controls to your own liking in both of these games, so feel free to do this to your heart's content.
 
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What the hell kind of house party is this?
 
For the custom section of each game, you can create your own Mii Fighters or customize existing characters.  Both Mii Fighters and existing characters can be decked out with equipment that changes what they do best in and different special moves, though only the Mii Fighters can be equipped with new types of headgears and outfits to completely change up their looks.  For Equipment, you get three types, with orange equipment boosting attack, blue equipment boosting defense and green equipment boosting speed.  Of course, equipment can drop other stats as a result, so choose wisely.  And for Smash Run, you can also customize your characters with a few powers to use during your battle in the labyrinth.  How equipping powers works is that each character has a certain amount of carrying capacity for powers, with heavier characters able to equip more than lighter characters.  However, the carrying capacity reduces as you equip your character with equipment that increases his or her speed, so do keep this in mind.  In the amiibo section, you can scan amiibo figures to create Figure Players that you can customize with different moves, and can even feed them equipment to make them stronger (and equip with different headgear and outfits in the case of the Mii Fighter amiibo figures).  Mind you now that you're FEEDING equipment to the Figure Players, not EQUIPPING them with them, which means whatever you feed them is lost forever.  Figure Players start out very weak at Level 1, but will get stronger as they increase their levels, eventually maxing out at Level 50.  And even then, they can still learn new tactics by fighting tougher opponents.  Overall, a very fun extra for these games.
Challenges also return from Brawl for both of these games, though they're quite different in each one, with the 3DS game having three panels of challenges for a total of 105 individual ones with the first one containing the easiest ones, the second panel containing the normal ones and the third having the hardest.  As for the Wii U game, all 140 challenges are on one panel.  Just like in Brawl, completing a challenge earns you a reward in each game, be it stages, trophies, custom parts, Smash Run powers, music, Masterpieces, Pokémon or gold.
 
As for the 3DS and Wii U connectivity, if you own both games, you can connect the systems together to either trade custom characters and Mii Fighters between the two games, or to use the 3DS as a controller for the Wii U game.  Both functions work quite well.  Of course, the only downsides to the controller functionality is that you can only play in Smash mode and you can't play on the Miiverse stage, so the limitations are pretty big, but otherwise, it is quite cool.  If you've played the 3DS game enough, you'll be able to control the Wii U game with the 3DS with relative ease.  To connect the two games, just select Wii U on the 3DS game's main menu, then select 3DS on the Wii U game's Main Menu.  Have the 3DS game search for a Wii U and if it finds one, just connect them up.  It's that simple.
 
Finally, there's the Online mode.  I haven't got to try out this mode a whole lot, but I will do my best to talk about it.  The section is divided into many sections, such as With Friends (which lets you have full customizability, and use both custom characters and Mii Fighters), With Anyone (separated into two modes, being For Fun and For Glory), Conquest (which has special events with three teams of players battling for victory), Share (which lets players share their Mii Fighters, custom characters, snapshots and replays, as well as stages in the case of the Wii U game) and Spectate (which lets people bet on matches and view all who are playing the game online).  The Wii U game is the only one that got Tourney mode in an update, which let's people participate in 64 player tournaments, or have the ability to create their own unique tourneys.
 
Of course, before I end this section, I will say that both of these games keep up with both Fighter Records and Stats very well as they cover all of the bases, which is something a lot of fighting games don't do.  Heck, fighting games these days don't keep up with high scores like they use to.  Overall, Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U are a couple of games that will keep people busy for many years to come.
 
Overall Rating: 5 out of 5 (for 3DS version)/5 out of 5 (for Wii U version)
 
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Fan art by hybridmink

With how much content and features got packed into these two outings in the Smash Bros. franchise, it's really hard to imagine how the Switch outing will surpass them, but rather than speculate right now, I'm going to continue enjoying these two games to their utmost fervor.  And while the 3DS game is pretty much an appetizer compared to the Wii U game, both games are completely worth playing for their own reasons, as well as putting them together.  In fact, while owning one game is enough, owning both versions together creates for an even greater experience as each one is two halves of a greater whole.  That said, if you have both a 3DS and Wii U, you owe it to yourself to pick up these two games posthaste.  I guarantee you'll have so much fun that you'll be thanking Nintendo and Sakurai for years to come.
Edited by Albedo238
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Probably one of the best iterations of Smash considering depth of characters, arenas, 3rd party fighters, and what not.  Also, Smash being able to go portable this generation was smart move.

 

I think the one thing that is a draw back to some is so many clone fighters and not enough unique fighters....but still, its hard to complain about what got offered on the whole.

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4 minutes ago, purple_beard said:

Probably one of the best iterations of Smash considering depth of characters, arenas, 3rd party fighters, and what not.  Also, Smash being able to go portable this generation was smart move.

 

I think the one thing that is a draw back to some is so many clone fighters and not enough unique fighters....but still, its hard to complain about what got offered on the whole.

Yeah, this is pretty much my favorite version of Smash Bros. until Sakurai unveils what he does for the Switch version (if there is to be one).

 

Check out my Ultra Street Fighter IV review on the General Gaming section.

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This was a really nice in depth review which is a lot considering how much content Smash games in general tend to have let alone Smash 4.  Haven't had as much time to play it lately but when I was heavily into it the game was almost overwhelming with the amount of stuff you can do but it's still so good.  The soundtrack is as good as ever and I think I was most impressed that they included a track from Baten Kaitos Origins.  When it first started I didn't think much of it at first and then it started to dawn on me and I was like... is this what I think it is!?  I wish they had more tracks from that series because it does have an amazing soundtrack, both games in the series do.

 

Anyway if they do a Smash 4 port for Switch which seems to be a common rumor I hope it combines the best of both the Wii U and 3DS versions.

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Just now, Kezay said:

This was a really nice in depth review which is a lot considering how much content Smash games in general tend to have let alone Smash 4.  Haven't had as much time to play it lately but when I was heavily into it the game was almost overwhelming with the amount of stuff you can do but it's still so good.  The soundtrack is as good as ever and I think I was most impressed that they included a track from Baten Kaitos Origins.  When it first started I didn't think much of it at first and then it started to dawn on me and I was like... is this what I think it is!?  I wish they had more tracks from that series because it does have an amazing soundtrack, both games in the series do.

 

Anyway if they do a Smash 4 port for Switch which seems to be a common rumor I hope it combines the best of both the Wii U and 3DS versions.

Knowing Sakurai, it'll probably be a completely new game.  I don't think he likes to do rehashes like Capcom does.

 

Speaking of Rehashes, check out my Ultra Street Fighter IV review.

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True, I know Sakurai personally wouldn't want to but I could see it being a request to bring a popular last gen game over to the new platform especially since it isn't backwards compatible.  After all, Iwata was planning on a new Smash for Wii at one point to simply be an enhanced version of Melee with online. Whether that was intended to be how a new Smash would appear on the system without Sakurai is something I don't think was elaborated upon though.

 

Anyway, I'll check out your Street Fighter review too.

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9 minutes ago, Kezay said:

True, I know Sakurai personally wouldn't want to but I could see it being a request to bring a popular last gen game over to the new platform especially since it isn't backwards compatible.  After all, Iwata was planning on a new Smash for Wii at one point to simply be an enhanced version of Melee with online. Whether that was intended to be how a new Smash would appear on the system without Sakurai is something I don't think was elaborated upon though.

 

Anyway, I'll check out your Street Fighter review too.

True, but such an action would have been un-Nintendo.  I mean, yeah, they did port certain Super Nintendo games to the Game Boy Advance, but they also had extra features to make them incredibly enhanced, not to mention the system could handle it.  Overall, I'm glad the Wii game was brand new.

 

Thanks, and I hope you like it.

Edited by Albedo238
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