Smash Bros. Online Mode Confirmed

FiringSquad confirms the best news a Wii owner could hope for: online play is a go for Smash Bros. Brawl . This is the news from the official website for the game, and the site discusses the various modes the game will support. You can (of course) play with friends, and you'll be able to use cute little pre-entered taunts on each other. You can also play with strangers, but the game has some serious restrictions on that kind of play: "You can also battle with people you don't know who are looking for brawls. The most important point here is that you will not know each other's names. Your opponent will not know your name or any information about you, and neither of you can send short messages. There will also be no battle records kept for this mode, so whether you win or lose, it doesn't matter. Just sit back and play."

I hope...

I hope that for random online play with strangers they at least include some sort of skill matchup like Tetris DS did. It was fantastic, depending on your score, 1-1000, you'd be matched up against someone with that same score - and it worked well, my matchups were regularly against people who were just as good as I was. Totally random play would get frustrating for newbies and boring for the more hardcore players if bad matchups occur frequently.

Re:I hope...

Totally random play would get frustrating for newbies and boring for the more hardcore players if bad matchups occur frequently.

Are all your friends equally skilled at Smash'? No, but you play anyway because it's fun. Win or lose.

Wonder if this works better on a LAN

I can only hope such a game works better on LAN

Seems reasonable to me

The Wii is a family platform, and parents aren't going to want to have their kids exposed to online predators through it. If the player still wants to meet people, they obviously have internet access. The only drawback is that online play with strangers may be random; you fight against somebody great then you get some real stinkers. Since they don't keep score of the stranger fights, they probably won't have any form of ranking you can use as a yardstick.

About the "Limitations"...

I foresee some whining about the fact that it won't build up ranking data from anonymous battles, but after playing several DS games online, this setup actually sounds like a good thing to me. Hear me out. :^)

In Mario Kart, random, non-friend battles are ranked. So, when some lamer is losing, he quits. Wouldn't want to blemish his record. Game over, no getting to finish, no closure. In Planet Puzzle League, the Smash Bros approach is taken, and random battles are "free". Not ONCE has somebody dropped out mid-game on me, no matter how badly I was pounding them. And no matter how badly I was being pounded, the little devil on my right shoulder never even suggested dropping out.

Take away the stats in anonymous mode, and suddenly the incentive to be a prick for the sake of some arbitrary numbers, dissolves. If you still want the bragging rights, play within a known circle of friends, which should also reduce the prick incentive. This way we can concentrate on having fun playing a kickass game, instead of worrying about the metadata. That might seem wussy to the frat boy Halo crowd, but to me, it's what gaming has always been about.

Re:About the "Limitations"...

Makes sense.

Just a thought on top of that though...why wouldn't they track quit games as a stat? That would really fix those 'perfect record' lamers when their stats show up as win:11, loss:0, quit:999.

They have my attention now

I'm really quite thrilled about this. Considering Nintendo's track record with online gaming however, I really hope they know to allocate enough server power and broadband such that it prevents any sort of lag. If you have any kind of lag in a fast-paced game like this, it can really mean the difference between in-game life or death. Since nobody would dare consider direct IP-to-IP functionality for console gaming, playing within a LAN will likely not make a difference. So while Smash Bros. online sounds awesome, don't be surprised if it suffers from lag (at least, starting out) or if it suffers from limitations (only certain levels, characters, items, etc.). I have no problem with remaining completely anonymous from strangers. I could give two craps less about statistics; I'll just want to play the game.

Waiting for 7 years for this

Whenever the Gamecube first came out, a lot of people were talking about internet readiness and online mode capabilities, which is one of the reasons that I really wanted SSBM, because I figured that it would be the first game anyone would make online-capable. So yeah, I was pretty sad the day I found out that it didn't have support for anonymous international whuppage.

I've been waiting for this feature since around 2000, so this totally just made my day. Hopefully they make it an easy connection process rather than a PITA to get it set up, etc. Thanks, "The Studio"!

I'm just surprised..

That with newer games that online play has to be confirmed. I mean, this game is follows in the footsteps of a great game to play with other friends. What happens when your friends move? You can't just drive over, you need online play if you want to play with them.

So, no mix of friends and strangers?

Say you know 2 people beside yourself that owns a Wii. Are you then stuck with only 3 players match at most with your friends?

Avoiding complexity

It's a good idea to make online battles non-ranked. A huge reason is that Smash battles are so customizeable. Item frequency (if any), the items available for the match, the number of lives per player (or maybe HP, or maybe coins collected? etc), the levels allowed via random select, team attack on/off, handicap on/off, etc.

There is so much to bother with that it would be nigh-impossible to implement a reliable ranking system that actually reflects any sort of skill. If all you want to be ranked in is no-item 4-stock 10-minute-timer 1v1 on a subset of stages (typical of SSBM singles tourneys), you'd have seek out opponents willing to play that particular setup. Across what setups would they by chance be ranked, and would some care?

It's basically a pointless and overly complicated system as a result.

If rankings were to matter, they'd have to be on some common terms (e.g. MLG rules), and in Smash coming up with those common terms is far from easy, nor is it reasonable to expect everyone who wants to play a ranked match online to want to observe them in the first place. Considering that even MLG Smash tournament rules evolve over time, this system would have to be updated semi-regularly.

With all this in mind, given that there IS no standard "setup" for online matches, a matchmaking system based on wins-losses would be very unreliable (and possibly fragment the online playerbase).

Friends IRL

If everyone is so worried about the non-ranked anonymous brawls why don't they just call some friends over? To me thats the ultimate Smashbros experience. I hardly have a tough time finding three other people to play Smashbros with. If you're a loner and a fan of Smashbros how did you get by in the first place? I won't plan on playing too much online with this game, but i do welcome the addition. It'll be nice to play some humans instead of AI for practice games.

There's prolly a reason you're missing...

I agree fully that unranked random online play will reduce lamers dropping out to raise their score, its one of the things that made me stop playing Mario Kart DS online after awhile. But more than that, I think customer service and satisfaction issues might be weighing in to the decision to not rank and rank match...

Because of the possibility of lag, its very likely that occasionally people will lose or die due to a lag glitch. They see the screen pause, the other charater "teleports" across the screen, and suddenly you're dead before you can react. Smash can be rediculously fast-paced, but if the online play introduces enough lag (depending on how they program the game to handle it), heavier slower characters like Bowser or... I guess Wario might have advantages over the traditional cheap fast reaction characters like Fox (I hope they get rid wave-dashing) and Sheik. If it doesn't affect their "score," people are going to be much, much less likely to call up the 800-number and bitch about it, they'll just play it out and request a friendly rematch. ...I hope they keep Peach's down-smash and turnip-tossing...

Honest comparison to Xbox Live

1) In this system, there is no way to affect your opponent's "reputation." The low-down dirtiest exploiter could join in and ruin any game. You can weed these people out in Xbox Live.

2) There is no reason to stay in a game if you are losing. In Xbox Live, you are counted down severely for leaving a game early (DNF). You can add filters in Xbox Live to only play players with low DNF %.

3) Little replay factor. Moving up in rankings gives players a completely new and fun way to play.

4) Competitiveness. You will find many players just goofing off since the game has no impact on anything. If you are a competitive player, it is no fun to play someone who isn't. The opposite is also true.

5) Fair play. In Xbox Live, you are matched up with people on a similar level as you. Trust me, Fight Night 3 online is terribly boring playing people who simply wipe the floor with you.


This is a significant dissapointment.

Re:Honest comparison to Xbox Live

3) Little replay factor. Moving up in rankings gives players a completely new and fun way to play.

Depends on the player if rankings is a plus or a minus (though at Slashdot plus is probably in the majority). Just as an example, amoungst a group of friends I used to play GC games with was one player who despite gaming as much as we did was never very good at any games. In games that either didn't keep detailed ongoing stats, or at least didn't make them highly visible during game play(like SSBM), he could go all night without winning a match without a care in the world; in games that constantly reminded you of who has won the most (like MK Double Dash), he would start getting really depressed after about an hour.

4) Competitiveness. You will find many players just goofing off since the game has no impact on anything. If you are a competitive player, it is no fun to play someone who isn't. The opposite is also true.

I totally agree with you, its just that I happen to see this as a plus for SSBB, not a minus. If the ultra-competitive players are going to go off and play Halo 3, rather than matching up against me, I won't shed a tear.

Possible issues

Like many Smash Brothers fans, I had to change my pants after reading the announcement yesterday. Even so, I can't help but see a lot of potential problems. I'm trying not to lay them in too much, as we only have preliminary information, and some of my concerns may be addressed in future updates.

• Random Play Matching
  I love the idea that random play isn't about stats or ranking. This makes it easier to get into a game just for fun. However, one large problem I see with it right now is uneven matches. Without a ranking system, you could walk into a match and either have your ass handed to you very quickly, or get a complete newbie and have no challenge what so ever (some will delight in this, I don't find it that useful).
  
  I hope that there is a ranking system, but that's it's invisible, and used merely to have good match ups between users. The ranking would likely work the same that it did in Multiplayer for Melee- everyone starts with five stars or so (out of 10), and as you win or lose your star level goes up or down, respectively. Then you only fight with people within one star level of yourself (so someone with eight stars won't be matched to someone with two).
  
  
• Lack of Communication in Random
  The lack of communication means I won't have to deal with some 12 year old calling me a "fag" when I toss them off a cliff. While being free of annoying idiots during play is great, I'd really love some way to meet up with people after a match, if only to tell them congratulations. Perhaps a system where one person says "I want to contact this player, and these two can contact me", and if two people request/give contact permission the system can hook them up.
  
  
• Small Friend Roster
  Take a look at one of the screenshots that lists "you" and three of your friends. Note the "3/64" in the screenshot. While we can't be sure, some discussion has lead to the idea that you are limited to only 64 friend codes for the game, out of the 250 or so allowed in the Wii system itself.
  
  Another concern that springs to mind is the Law of Kevin Bacon- if your friend invites you and two of his friends, who are not on your machine as friends, to a battle, will the system disallow the match because you are not their "friends" too? That is, can you only battle with people who you have one degree of separation with, regardless of who sets up the match? This seems crazy, but Nintendo can be overzealous about online stuff. ("Think of the children", etc.)
  
  
• Lack of random communication
  As I said, I like the idea of silent battles, but there are times when it's fun to just bullshit with people. I would think that the ability to "hear" other people could be a user or system preference. Perhaps tie it in with the Wii's Parental Controls.

As I said, we only have preliminary information, so hopefully these will be taken care of before the game's release (though, with but three months to go, I doubt these would make it into the game if they're not already, even if there was a large outcry).

I've definitly been waiting for this...

...announcement, and it definitely hasn't disappointed me.

The Super Smash Bros. series is probably the only game(s) I've ever been crazy about buying, so I've been following the website somewhat diligently. Even though a friend of mine who follows the website more diligently said that they [Nintendo] have already announced this before, I decided to be stubborn and wait for an official announcement.

I gave a shout of joy and a little dance when I read the title "Wi-Fi Play".

Since I know almost nothing about online play, I came to think that SSBB's [Super Smash Bros. Brawl] approach to it was genuinely good. Two types of play, customization, the little messages, and the entertainment in-between matches; all appealed to me as good and original ideas. Except the fact that distance can affect the amount of lag there may be; that was the only problem I saw.

When I get a Wii, I know I'll have a good time with the Wi-Fi play.