Tag Archives: Mario

Smash 4 is hard to play

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This past Saturday I entered a Super Smash Bros. Wii U (Smash 4) tournament. Being primarily a Project M player and being part of the competitive Smash scene in general, there’s a lot of hate against Smash 4 for its “easy” play in terms of technical ability.

But dammit Smash 4 is hard! I play Mario, one of the more aggressive characters in the game, and it’s painful sometimes how hard it is to get in on another good player. In Project M I can rush down someone with Meta Knight’s great pressure tools and feel relatively safe near someone’s shield. I don’t feel safe at all when I’m near someone’s shield in Smash 4, and it’s so stressful when you’re trying to space around it!

Really, I think it’s harder than the technical barrier Melee/Project M have for new players. Sure, you can pick up and play Smash 4 easily, but to be able to get in on someone good, especially a more defensive player/character? That’s not gonna happen for a while. At least in Melee you can Nair someone’s shield with Fox and be almost completely safe as long v as you L-Cancel and Shine. That kind of input skill can be committed to muscle memory and performed without even a second thought after like two weeks of practice. Obviously it gets a little harder during an intense, heart-pounding match, but I think that can apply to really any game that has even a tiny amount of technical skill involved.

Maybe it’s just harder for me to play Smash 4 than it is Project M. Maybe it’s just more stressful because during a combo in Melee/Project M you can relax yourself for a moment (at least, I do). I dunno. All I know is that Smash 4 is hard to play.

Just sayin’.

Training Amiibos

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Before I begin, a quick shout-out to this thread, which is what I used to train my amiibos.

So, when the new Super Smash Bros. was announced, Nintendo also announced Amiibo, a figurine that could interact with games on the Wii U through an NFC touch point built-in on the game pad. In Super Smash Bros. Wii U, this scanning translated to a fighter that you could then fight with/against. I saw it as an opportunity to train these fighters and pit them against other amiibos because that sounded really fun to me (as a competitive Smash player it’s at the heart of what I find the most fun about training an amiibo).

So, I quickly bought a Kirby amiibo, named him H U P BOYZ, and got to work training him. I played with my brother in amiibo + player teams until he got to 50 (the max level for an amiibo), and then I realized that H U P BOYZ used Inhale too much (Neutral B move for those who don’t know). He also used a lot of grounded Rock (Down + B special) and Up Smash, but not too many aerials. He used some, but I wanted him to play like I did with Kirby.

So I started doing some research, and found a couple articles with some training tips. A few of them were very similar. CPU mirrors 1-10, you vs them mirrors 10-20, 20-30 playstyle chars, 30-50 your main + CPU mirrors to see how they’re progressing. It sounded pretty good, so I gave it a shot. I reset H U P BOYZ and started training him.

Spoiler alert – H U P BOYZ still sucked.

He still used too much Inhale and grounded Rock. he also spammed jab a lot this time. So I went back to researching when I came upon that thread I linked in the beginning of this post. It was pretty much eye-opening for me.

Let me break this down for you:

Amiibos basically have a hit % variable stored inside of it for every move in its arsenal (probably not including pummel, which is guaranteed out of a throw). From what I’m theorizing, whenever they hit with a move, the % for that move goes up. If they use a move and it whiffs, is blocked, or is outright beaten or punished, the % goes down. No one has truly found out everything about amiibos, but this sounds the most logical to me given that thread confirmed data tables. Anyway, amiibos will use moves with a higher hit % more often. However, they won’t use it all the time, just more than a normal level 9 CPU would. And this data table updates even after they’ve hit 50.

So what does this mean? Basically, the amiibos will use moves more based on what opponents they fight. That means that if you let a Kirby amiibo get off Inhale or Rock against you, it’ll think it’s better than against a player that never lets a Kirby amiibo get away with it. Amiibo do have slightly different styles, it’s just based off of hit %, and the placebo effect takes it from there because of that subtle difference between amiibos.

So, I did my second reset on H U P BOYZ and trained him from 1 – 50 against just me, except this time I literally air camped so that H U P BOYZ would be forced to take to the air and use aerials against me. Every time he tried to use Rock, or Hammer (Side + B special), or Inhale, I would punish him. And to top it off, I would literally let him hit me with aerials and tilts so that he thought they were better moves.

And it actually worked (a little).

See, amiibos still have that core AI ingrained in them. They’re going to do some stuff no matter what, but you can influence them. H U P BOYZ does the standard Power Shield and then a grab or smash attack, but sometimes he’ll throw out three Forward Airs in a row or use Up Tilt twice in a row or even do Up Tilt to Back Air instead of Up Tilt to Forward Air (which is a level 9 Kirby combo implemented into their base AI).

So that’s how I train amiibos. I let them hit me with the moves I want them to use and try to punish them for using moves I don’t want them to use. H U P BOYZ barely uses Hammer or Rock, although now that he’s fought other amiibos and CPU’s he uses Inhale a fair amount (although not nearly as much as the first two times), but overall, training him was a success.

I think this is the best way to train them right now. Let me go over how I do it in terms of levels.

Levels 1 – 20: Beat them down. Amiibo aren’t very smart here. Sure, they’ll throw out attacks, but it’s best to just beat them down so that they don’t throw out anything bad that’ll hit you. Even if you let them hit you, they won’t be borrowing from the data table too much because their base AI at this point is, well…dumb.

Levels 20 – 30: This is where I make them start learning. At this point they should be borrowing from level 4 or 5 AI, so they’ll be throwing out attacks, but they won’t be utilizing the hit % table a lot unless you let them hit you a ton in the earlier levels. You won’t see certain attacks because the 4 or 5 base AI just doesn’t choose it. If you see them throwing out any moves you’d like them to learn, let them hit you. This can be tricky with aerials and tilts (especially if you don’t want them using smash attacks); my advice is to jump around a LOT for aerials. Tilts are much harder and I have no safe way to get hit by them without being hit by a smash attack. It takes a lot of patience.

Also, don’t forget to beat them. They level up faster losing.

Levels 30 – 40: This is where most of the learning happens. At this point, they’re borrowing from level 6 or 7 AI and so will most likely be using every move. They’ll also be borrowing from the data table so you’ll find them using certain moves less and certain moves more. Just keep letting them hit you and maintain victory over them so that they level up faster. This is probably the longest phase for me because I take a lot of time making sure they learn what moves are better than others.

Levels 40-50: This is where the amiibos’ inherent buffs (yeah, they’re stronger than normal fighters even without equipment) start to become noticeable. You’ll also see a noticeable change in how they fight compared to level 8 and 9 CPU’s. If you’ve done your training correctly, you’ll notice them using moves you let them hit you with more often. That means it’s time for some crazy positive reinforcement. Let them hit you A LOT. Sure, you still need to win or else leveling them up takes longer, but make them extra close. Let them take you down to that last stock (if you’re using time, make sure you maintain a point lead).

This is a good time to pit them against any level 50 amiibos you have, also.

Level 50: You’ve done it. Your amiibo is now max level! A couple things to note here:

– While you’ve been training them, don’t fret if they use a move you’ve been punishing a lot or never let them hit you with. They are, in theory, at Level 10 if there was a Level 10 AI in the game, and so have hard-coded scripts that they simply can’t ignore.

– They will start rolling, spot-dodging, air dodging, and perfect shielding a LOT, and usually right when you use a move. They will punish you with a smash or grab after perfect shielding a LOT, even if you trained them to think smash attacks are bad. It’s part of their script. Don’t let it bother you.

– You should notice that they’re very rarely using moves you’ve punished them for using and using moves you let them hit you with more frequently. However, there will be no drastic change in their move selection unless you let them hit you with the same move over and over from 1 to 50. Then they’ll spam a move way more than a level 9 CPU would.

– Amiibo buffs are pretty apparent here. H U P BOYZ does over 20% with one Back Air. That’s as much as a normal smash attack with an aerial!

And that’s how I train my amiibos. So far I have 3 trained amiibos (H U P BOYZ the Kirby, a Mario that likes Up B, and a Pikachu that doesn’t use Thunder a lot). They’ve all been trained using this method and they’ve all shown good results, so I think this is a really solid training method. Give it a try next time you want to train an amiibo. I’ll end this with a few more notes:

– Because amiibos learn after 50, it’s impossible to stop them from landing a certain move. If you let them fight another amiibo, a CPU, or a person, they might land that move and increase the hit % of it. The nice thing is that that hit % has to contend with the other ones you’ve trained, meaning they’re not suddenly going to start spamming that move, but you will see them try and use it more. If you see them using a move too much, just play them and punish it whenever they do. My Pikachu spammed Thunder between levels 30-40 and I literally sat there for two games and punished Thunder. After those, he never spammed Thunder again because of how low I made the hit % after that and from levels 40-50. He still uses it, but he hasn’t used it twice in a row since.

– Amiibos only update their hit % after a match is completed. This is really important. If you don’t like how a match is going, just quit out of it. I can’t tell you how many times I had to do this because H U P BOYZ landed Inhale on me.

– Amiibos level up insanely fast on a different Wii U. Not really important, just thought I’d let you know. They also level up faster fighting CPU’s and other amiibos than they do against humans.

Have fun with your amiibos! I can’t wait to enter these guys in amiibo-only tournaments!

Just Sayin’

Thoughts on Smash 4 (3DS Demo version)

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Last Friday, the Nintendo 3DS demo of Super Smash Bros. 3DS was released to the public. Luckily, I was able to obtain it earlier thanks to a special giveaway for Platinum members. Now that it’s been about a week since I’ve played it, I thought I’d write about my first impressions.

The Ledge System is GREAT

As someone who hates every ledge mechanic in the previous iterations of the series, I love how the ledges work in this game. You can’t grab the edge to stop someone else from grabbing it, and you can’t regain invincibility unless you touch the ground and then re-grab the ledge (I actually don’t know if you regain it after being attacked). I really like this system. It forces more off-stage play if you want early KO’s, otherwise you’re stuck fishing for KO’s on-stage.

Pivot Canceling

If you push the other direction while dashing, you do a little slide animation before starting to dash in the other direction. During that slide animation, you can cancel that into an Forward Smash, Up Smash, or Forward Tilt. Forward Tilt and Forward Smash are the most useful applications of this mechanic, and it’s a great way to space your opponent while ground. It gives characters like Mario and Pikachu some neat ways to keep space, especially with how fast their Forward Tilts are.

Combos are (kind of) real

Some characters have good combos (coughMariocough), others have a couple strings. However, combos do exist due to hit stun being longer and unable to be canceled like in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, despite how small they may be.

Air Dodging sucks (YES!!)

Air Dodging produces some serious landing lag when you hit the ground with it. +1 for offense.

It’s fast

Since Super Smash Bros. Brawl was quite slow, this game feels much faster. You feel like you have greater control over your character and you feel more rewarded for performing high-execution techniques quickly (not that there are many…). I think the speed is perfect. It felt much better than the Best Buy demo.

It looks good

This is, without a doubt, the best-looking Smash game I’ve ever played, even on the 3DS. It looks fluid, feels fluid, and the effects are awesome. The animations are also great.

Villager can pocket everything

And it’s godlike!

If you haven’t yet, download this demo and start playing! The game comes out in less than two weeks – better practice up!!

Just Sayin’.

Coins in Mario Kart 8

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After 1 month, I’m finally done with summer camp! And while it was an awesome month, I’m glad to be back home, sitting at my computer and typing this blog post up. I was originally going to just do a little update, but I’ve been wanting to write about this since I left for camp: coins in Mario Kart 8.

I’ve enjoyed almost every game in the Mario Kart series since its inception, and Mario Kart 8 is the first one that I don’t really enjoy playing. I’ve only really played it once. There are a number of reasons why I don’t like this game (all gameplay related – the visuals and music are phenomenal, I think the biggest reason is the re-inclusion of coins from Super Mario Kart.

For those of you who don’t know, in Mario Kart 8 you can have up to 10 coins. These coins increase your maximum top speed as well as your boost speed. If you are hit or you fall off the map, you lose 3 coins. This opens up a couple problems right off the bat:

Speedier Karts/Bikes/Characters are better:

I love Toad. He’s one of my favorite Mario characters. However, he’s a light character, so he’s pretty slow. Normally, this is offset by having better acceleration and off road speed. With coins in play, having less coins than a speedier character/kart almost always results in me trailing farther and farther behind. Without coins at least I can try and get some items or do some skillful drifting to catch up, but that’s more difficult when you have 4 coins and they have 7 and are cruising on ahead considerably faster than you.

Rubber Banding (or same place syndrome):

Because of how significant the speed boost is from coins, the rubber banding from items is diminished in its effectiveness. Given two characters of same character and vehicle, one with 10 coins can go about the same speed as one with 0 coins and a Star/Mushroom. That’s absolutely ridiculous, and can sometimes lead to what I call Same Place Syndrome. Let’s say you’re in 2nd place, and you get hit with a red shell and a green shell at 10 coins. You now have 4, and people speed on by you with more coins. If this happens, you may find yourself in 6th/7th/8th place for the rest of the race. This has happened to me and a bunch of people I’ve observed playing a lot, and it’s incredibly frustrating when you feel like the items can’t help propel you forward just because you’ve got less coins.

Conversely, if you’re in first with 10 coins, sometimes you can rocket so far ahead of the pack (assuming they’re not collecting coins like you are) that being hit with two blue shells won’t even come close to putting you in 2nd, especially since one of the items you get commonly in first place are a coin item that gives you two coins.

The first lap becomes a coin collecting contest:

The first lap, I think, is pretty crucial. The players that collect more coins will stay at the top (unless combo’d hard by items), and those that don’t will find themselves struggling until they collect more for the whole race.

It’s disappointing that a game I was really looking forward to has, in my opinion, an awful mechanic for what the series stands for. It looks great, plays great (controls are amazing), and has a memorable soundtrack, but coins really take a lot of fun out of the game for me. I will say that I think coins are an amazing addition to Time Trials, as I think strategic collection of coins leads to increased depth in that area, but otherwise, coins need to go.

Just Sayin’.

REVIEW: Super Mario 3D World

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Apologies for last week; school has just started and so I was a little preoccupied with transitioning into school mode. But, enough of that, it’s time to review Super Mario 3D World!

I won’t bore you with the plot or characters. It’s standard Mario fare, except Peach is a character you play and the victims are a group of fairies. What’s really important is the gameplay.

Gameplay:

If I were to sum up the gameplay of Super Mario 3D World, it’d be “wow”. With this addition each character (Mario, Luigi, Peach, Toad) has different properties – Mario is the most balanced, Luigi jumps the highest (but is a little slippery), Peach can float (but is the slowest), and Toad is the fastest (but jumps the lowest). This allows for some pretty interesting gameplay choices within each level, as some characters have a vastly easier time with certain platforming elements depending on the level.

Speaking of levels, the level design is fantastic, and you can see the thought put into the 4-player co-op with each level. While the worlds are pretty standard (Grassy, water, desert, lava, etc…), I loved most of the designs, some of them proving to be quite challenging.

Because each level doesn’t brutally murder you for having 4 players (like New Super Mario. Bros), playing with friends is very fun. The twist to playing with multiple players is that, instead of everyone having their own lives, the players are share them. That means that playing with friends, while more fun, is also much more dangerous. Expect game overs, even if you’re experienced with Mario games. My brother and I probably accumulated 3 or 4 game overs throughout the main portion of the game due to us sharing lives.

Thankfully, unlike in New Super Mario Bros., you cannot bubble in the air. This is great because it means you can’t just haphazardly attempt to make a jump and just bubble to safety. I always hated that feature because it decreased the game’s difficulty while playing multiplayer. I like how punishing it is now, because it forces cooperation. The ONLY problem with bubbling is that you can get out yourself, and sometimes, the bubble will hover above an abyss and you’ll pop out yourself and die again (I can’t tell you how many times this happened to me). Even near land, the bubble would literally hover just off the ledge and so you had to wait until you popped out. I would rather get back to the action as fast as possible, not wait 10 seconds for the bubble to be over land so I don’t die again.

Oh, and let’s not forget the new power up, the Cat Bell, which transforms Mario and co. into a cat that can dive and climb walls. This is, without a doubt, the best power up Mario has ever used. Platforming is a breeze once you master how to use the cat suit. It’s an awesome power up, and the little “meow!” that Mario and co. say after beating a level is absolutely priceless.

Atmosphere:

There’s not a lot to say, unfortunately. Pretty standard Mario fare, although I liked a lot of the level designs and the art. Nothing really captured me, but I can’t say I didn’t enjoy it.

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All in all, Super Mario 3D World is a fantastic game, especially for co-op. If you’re a Mario fan that still loves the series or even someone who’s been a little bored with the series, I recommend it. It’s a breath of fresh air to the Mario franchise co-op wise, and that’s something, I think, a lot of Mario fans have been yearning for since New Super Mario Bros. Wii.

Gameplay: 10/10
Atmosphere: 7/10
Final Score: 9/10

Just Sayin’

REVIEW: Mario Party Island Tour

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I apologize for this being late, I was busy Friday and Saturday. Onto the review!

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I haven’t really played any of the recent Mario Party games. Mario Party DS I played a bit, but not too much. The newest installment into the series, Mario Party Island Tour, however, is shaping up to be a Mario Party I will play quite often.

Mario Party Island Tour, like Mario Party 9, completely offs the classic gather stars and circle a game board. Instead, they’re replaced with “race” boards, as I call them, where the first player to reach the finish line wins. However, unlike Mario party 9, where everyone rides that dumb vehicle together, it hearkens back to the classic style of moving, where everyone takes their own turn and uses dice…or cards on certain boards. Because of this style, there are no blue and red spaces that give out coins, instead having item spaces, move back spaces, and other various spaces that switch places with opponents, summon Bowser, etc… It’s actually pretty refreshing, and I find myself not missing the old style because, really, I can play the old ones on the virtual console.

So that’s all great, but what really makes this game awesome are the mini games, which are surprisingly great. I didn’t think the mini-games would be spectacular, but they’ve all been really fun and I haven’t been disappointed by one yet, and I’ve played through almost every board.

That’s really it. The music has some cool throwbacks to old games, and the graphics are pretty good (the Mario Galaxy board is awesome!), but there’s really nothing else to write about.

If you’re looking for a Mario Party experience not quite the classics, but refreshing and new with some awesome mini games, consider picking up Mario Party Island Tour. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.

Final Score: 7/10

Just Sayin’.