Have we lost our way?

[TaFoKiNtS]

We've moved forward quite a bit from the old days of DC++, basement tournaments, and shoddy commentary/recording setups. Both Evo and MLG are including Melee again in their respective tournaments. Big E-Sports teams such as Team Liquid and Curse are sponsoring top players. It seems that the smash community is starting to receive some momentum in regards to "hitting it big."

So why the title, "Have we lost our way?"

After all, much of what Melee has gained in the past year seems golden. Who wouldn't want larger prize pools, player sponsorships, or higher production tournaments? Don't get me wrong, these are all very great things for our community, but there is a greater concern of the underlying trade-offs that come with the glamour.

Recently, Wife wrote an article that proposed abolishing Doubles from tournaments. One of his reasons was that "doubles" is chaotic, making it messy to commentate and spectate for the average viewer. Wife does make some sound points. Online viewership does tend to drop when doubles is played on some of the more popular Smash-related streams. However, dropping "doubles" completely for the sole purpose of appealing to the "outsiders" of the community would be a travesty. It's also raised many questions about the direction of the community. One of which:

"Have we lost our way?"

Let me elaborate.

Smash started as a grassroots community. There were no sponsors or corporate support from Nintendo for the Smash Community. Tournaments were ran in rag-tag venues (and still are to a certain degree) and people's houses. Smashers didn't really sleep at hotels; they crammed 20-30 deep into someone's apartment. Before the days of Tio and Challonge, tournaments ran on paper brackets. Results would come in the form of rumors on the mIRC chat or by rapidly refreshing a tournament thread on Smashboards. Yet, people played and participated in spite of the lack of professionalism. It was the love of the game and the community that kept players coming back.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying professionalism is evil at all.
Aside from the things mentioned in the introduction, the limelight has helped the community mature in many aspects. We, as a community, have moved on from the use of words such as "****", "homo" and "f******" to become more professional. GIMR from VGBootCamp removed a commentator from the stream a Xanadu weekly event for his unprofessional, vulgar language. In this regard, the viewer feedback has helped the Smash community grow.

Hype moments will exist, regardless of the size of a stream​

There comes a point in which catering to the average viewer or audience becomes cumbersome. By audience, I refer to people who are probably not active in the competitive community but would follow the scene via YouTube or Twitch.tv. Go to any Smash video on YouTube and you'll see that it's riddled with comments, most likely about the commentary or quality of the video.

"These guys are annoying"
"These guys need to get the f**** off the mic"
"These guys are boring"
"These guys are too analytical"
"These guys aren't hype enough"

In essence, there is no way to satisfy the needs of people who provide very little to the community while demanding so much. One of the highlights of the community was the "Wombo Combo" (Warning: NSFW). Despite its vulgar nature, the video highlights, in my opinion, the beauty of Smash and the community surrounding it. It had an amazing combo with candid responses that encapsulate the "hype" that's in the game. In 2014, we may never see another video like it. There was a similar moment at "The Next Episode" in which the player "Lord" pulled a crazy maneuver to steal the game from "s2j" to win the set. Instead of capturing the natural excitement of the moment, we're left with the commentator, lost for words, awkwardly saying "What the crap" to remain professional.

I'm not advocating for fake "hype" in the sense of yelling or screaming into a microphone for the sake of being loud.

Though, I do worry that in becoming an "e-sport" that the Smash community may lose its core roots and identity that made it so special. There may be a point in which events have to cater to the viewer more so than the actual players. At this point, I may have to wrap up my controller and call it quits to a community that I've spent an entire decade with. Hopefully, the magic isn't ever lost.

-Tafokints

 

[Plum]

It's very possible to keep both the professional and grassroots elements of Smash together, even at the same event.
For instance, bringing the Salty Suite to the professional tournaments for after hours, raw, non-censored Smash goodness.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

I think there is a certain amount of incompatibility between the Smash scene's culture as it is now and our desire to be acknowledged and supported by Nintendo, a family-friendly company. It's a choice we have to make, frankly. Do we want Nintendo, MLG, and Evo, or do we want "We're all a little bit hard?"

 

[Jaedrik]

Sure, great, but it wasn't awkward in the slightest that Toph said "what the crap", in my opinion. It's a matter of perspective. The whole reason 'bad' words are used is because of their significance, the incredible amount of emphasis or power given into it.
This is why I think 'destruction' was one of the most perfect words to replace '****', it has an incredibly powerful connotation of absolute wreckage without being 'bad'. It's also, sadly, the reason why foul language is often used in the hypest commentaries. Gimp has not been changed because there is no good alternative, and by good I mean powerful enough to reflect the level of emphasis most people want. Also, we haven't "progressed" enough to start calling minor "offenses" like that into question sufficiently to prompt change.
And the game should always cater to the player, but that doesn't mean we can't cater to the spectator too.

But, I'm reminded of competitive FPS games. It is difficult to cast or show the action period, no matter how good the UI stuff is, and without the spectators having in-knowledge it becomes even more difficult if we want to use specific terminology like location callouts.
But doubles makes sense to me in some intuitive form. Though I can't analyze it anywhere near as easily, it can make the hypest of hypes.

Aside from that, perhaps we have lost our way with the considerations of the PC crowd being forced upon us. I'd much rather we cast that yoke away and laugh at them to scorn, so removing foul language should not, in my opinion be done for sake of making us more 'presentable', then, nor any change to the core of Smash, but it should be done for higher motives, such as time or money or organizational difficulty in the case of doubles, or a real and substantial change not affecting the superficial aspects of the game.

In the realm of language, we only ought to change if there is sufficiently a good alternative that nothing important in inflection or meaning or connotation is sacrificed for the sake of 'professionalism' and being 'PC'.

 

[-ShadowPhoenix-]

I have argued with many on the MIOM and melee social facebook groups about this. I just don't understand how people view us as "selling out" just because we can't say ****/gay/etc on stream. Do people watch/go to tournaments to hear commentators going crazy or do they go to watch melee at it's greatest? We've been given a second chance to grow as a community and it shouldn't be wasted by refusing to let go of childish "stream cultures."

 

[rikochet]

I'm right there with you Tafokints

In essence, there is no way to satisfy the needs of people who provide very little to the community while demanding so much. Hopefully, the magic isn't ever lost.

 

[Battlecow]

This article is mad unfocused lol

Tafo you need to stick to your thesis statement dawg, what are you even saying? It goes from acting like it'll make a point about grassroots tourneys to just talking about how mean people are to commentators to being mean to commentators. Wut?

 

[Pazzo.]

I do admit I'm a bit turned away from watching live streams because of the lackluster commentators. Hopefully Nintendo will get a good commentator for the E3 tournament they can show us how it's done.

 

[NH Cody]

Cody (me) wrote at 1:50 PM on May 2, 2014 :
I was literally about to make a rage blog about the predictable bs opinion "articles" that I see on swf. bunch of brain dead idiots who would even consider changing the brawl ruleset and doing other hair brained schemes to cater to the noob spectators who don't know what they're watching at all to begin with

Cody wrote at 1:51 PM on May 2, 2014 :
catering to spectators and catering to esports/mlg is beyond moronic

basically I agree with some of this article not all

 

[NH Cody]

This article is mad unfocused lol

Tafo you need to stick to your thesis statement dawg, what are you even saying? It goes from acting like it'll make a point about grassroots tourneys to just talking about how mean people are to commentators to being mean to commentators. Wut?

> implying that this is the first article to be completely incoherent and have bad English
have you even read the other ones?? 99% of the "writers" on swf don't even know an independent clause from a dependent clause, let alone bigger structures and organizations of essays

Whenever I see "it's" instead of "its" like in this article I just facepalm and smh. I gave up on these kids years ago.

 

[Jaedrik]

This article is mad unfocused lol

Aye, this writing isn't that good.

> implying that this is the first article to be completely incoherent and have bad English

While I might agree, you forgot to capitalize and use punctuation in a few cases, hehe.

 

[NH Cody]

no, I didn't - I don't use all correct punctuation or caps unless I'm the one writing the article (this is a forum post so I always use abbreviations and shorthand)

 

[Plum]

Cody (me) wrote at 1:50 PM on May 2, 2014 :
I was literally about to make a rage blog about the predictable bs opinion "articles" that I see on swf. bunch of brain dead idiots who would even consider changing the brawl ruleset and doing other hair brained schemes to cater to the noob spectators who don't know what they're watching at all to begin with

Cody wrote at 1:51 PM on May 2, 2014 :
catering to spectators and catering to esports/mlg is beyond moronic

basically I agree with some of this article not all

Is it really idiotic to at least try to make something good for spectators?
You what a lot of spectators are? Future players.

I got into competitive Smash because I saw it in 2006-7 MLG. I was just a spectator once, and if it wasn't for the competitive gameplay being really fun to watch from a spectator standpoint I wouldn't have gotten into competitive Smash.

The attitude that (basically) says "**** the spectators" is the attitude that lets a game die because there isn't enough new players coming in.
Obviously there is a point at which you cross the line and are sacrificing the players for the sake of the spectator... but if you actually think we are anywhere close to that point then I don't know what I could possibly say to change your mind.

Trying to improve ourselves as a community (doing things like taking out the ****, gay, and excessive swearing) when under the spotlight is also among the best things Smash has ever done for itself. It's not catering to the MLG's of the world; it's improving who we are for the sake of improving who we are with the upside of also making us look good for the professional side of things.
And let's not kid ourselves into thinking both the professional and grassroots sides of things can't coexist.
They have in the past just fine, and they will continue to do so now.
And as I already mentioned in my earlier comment, something like the Salty Suite allows us to still be rowdy and loud when it's appropriate and can even be held at these professional events thanks to guys like GIMR.

 

[Jaedrik]

no, I didn't - I don't use all correct punctuation or caps unless I'm the one writing the article (this is a forum post so I always use abbreviations and shorthand)

Of course, but I found it ironic regardless.

 

[rawrimamonster]

That's what happens when you appeal to peoples feelings over what's fun to listen to/watch, there's no real stopping it since the smash community is so diverse, it's just what's going to happen. As a community, us getting sponsored means Melee is going corporate sterile, we're not gonna be able to act like wild dudebros types forever, at least at major events. We're growing up, and since we're such a open community, we have to grow up as a playerbase.

Even still though, and to the point I think Tafo was trying to make... I fear the day when the smash community is ruled by the likes of hypersensitives like tumblr SJW feminists or other people with extreme ideals. Having respect for someone or a group of people doesn't have to rule how you act or speak, just make sure they're not in ear shot to get hurt, and if they are dont say it, if that's not fair then yknow...maybe you shouldn't be around groups of exciteable guys that love the game they play. It comes down to people needing thicker skin.

 

[SoniCraft]

I fail to see why we should look down on professional actions(not saying certain words, etc.) in order to keep the "spirit of Smash". I didn't join this community because it had a bunch of crazy commentators letting loose profanity when the match got exciting. I joined it because I love competition and I love Smash, so when I saw that there was a thriving competitive scene with an interesting story to it, I was happy to join. I myself never say such foul language, and I'm certainly not going to start using it just so we don't "lose our way".

 

[Coolwhip]

Good read. I'm glad the commentators are speaking more professionally during matches nowadays.

 

[CloneHat]

Smash seems to have this inferiority complex, which has really shown itself since the EVO fundraiser. Many (not all) desperately want approval from the FGC: we try to use their terms in place of Smash vocabulary, and start putting letters in front of our tags. EG AE 2012 ODST|CloneHat really rolls off the tongue. I remember when Megabus|Mango was being said as a parody, a joke. Nowadays I wouldn't be surprised to see it in reality.

The next step was for Smash to hit livestream, which of course means we need to suck up to League of Legends and StarCraft. Careful attention must now be given to the "casters", who determine whether a video of gameplay is watchable or unwatchable. Colour commentary is phased out, with a focus on the "nerds in suits" political correctness found on Mountain Dew-funded MOBA streams. Leffen has said that he turns off commentary when he watches tournaments. The game is what's left.

Of course, I've only been mentioning the negatives of Smash's recent ascent. With increased publicity comes an amazing amount of exposure. We've become more inviting to new players than ever. We have become much better at letting new players in but the community's direction does not have to be subservient to what's current. We have a long history, and we should embrace it.

On a lighter note: http://youtu.be/vyGFM5CGnoo?t=1m3s

 

[sneakytako]

Why is half the article in italics?

 

[NH Cody]

No, plum, spectators have nothing to do with future players. most of the time spectators are intimidated by real national tourneys and less likely to get into competitive smash after seeing a stream ("Where's IKE??? I WANT TO SEE MARIO!!!"). New players are ones who go to tourneys and haven't before. changing ANYTHING that makes the game less competitive for the PLAYERS in order to make some bs "hype" or "excitement" is catering to the spectators (who are casuals and don't understand it anyway)

Trying to improve ourselves as a community (doing things like taking out the ****, gay, and excessive swearing) when under the spotlight is also among the best things Smash has ever done for itself.

this sentence makes no sense at all and your entire post is just as ridiculous. what the heck does "under the spotlight" mean and how does being under a spotlight relate to reducing swearing or improving the "smash community"?? and what do either of these things have to do with my post

 

[rikochet]

@ N NH Cody what are you talking about man. i have like 8 friends as well as myself who found out about competitive smash and play in tournament because we found a stream and we weren't intimidated at all we loved it and wanted to play aswell. Lol not every stream watcher is a easily impressionable child who would be intimidated by smash bros.

 

[Doctor X]

I'm not sure if I understand what Tafo's post is trying to say.

Is this:

"These guys are annoying"
"These guys need to get the f**** off the mic"
"These guys are boring"
"These guys are too analytical"
"These guys aren't hype enough"

Supposed to be an example of the outsiders he mentioned, or of smashers?

Is:

In essence, there is no way to satisfy the needs of people who provide very little to the community while demanding so much.

referring to the outsiders, or to smashers?

Based the rest of the last paragraph, it seems that the former is an example of smashers being unhappy, and the latter refers to outsiders-- who we are attempting to satisfy with analysis and professionalism, but of course, this isn't even remotely clear until you finish reading that last paragraph.

I mean, what was the point of all that if the only real point to to be made was "I'm sad about people not yelling, 'my **** hurts!' on stream anymore." Aside from that appeal to personal emotion, this whole post is a garbled mess. Like the FGC's resistance to professionalism it really just amounts to emotion over logic.

The community is great, but what really makes smash special is the game itself-- it's rhythm, its flow, and its incredibly high skill ceiling. There's a reason why a community like ours doesn't exist for just every game. We yearn to see it played at the highest possible level, and to be amazed by the things that level of play reveals.

MLG's first circuit with Melee pushed the level of competition like crazy. E-sports is the only real step forward, and should not be held back because people somehow can't just say their own curse words while watching.

 

[comboking]

This not swearing has nothing to do with PC it has to do with swearing not being mature.

 

[Moon Monkey]

I don't mind the vulgar language at all, But I guess I'm just a minority.

I don't really care on whether or not commentators are well mannered and politically correct. As long as I feel the hype and see the commentators enjoying themselves that's what really adds to the experience. That's what makes Womb Combo so classic.

GET YO ASS WHOOPED!

 

[NH Cody]

@ N NH Cody what are you talking about man. i have like 8 friends as well as myself who found out about competitive smash and play in tournament because we found a stream and we weren't intimidated at all we loved it and wanted to play aswell. Lol not every stream watcher is a easily impressionable child who would be intimidated by smash bros.

surely you found hours and hours of meta knight vs snake, meta knight dittos, meta knight vs diddy kong, and meta knight vs ICs to be INSPIRATIONAL, and it made u want to join the scene?? I find this hard to believe

I think other factors convinced u to play smash competitively

 

[artofskjet]

f*** the people who didn't like the commentators. commentators work hard and they deserve praise. some take their breaks in between sets to commentate only to hear the whining and complaining from people who like the way themselves commentate or want tings to be perfect. there will never be the perfect commentator people need to accept that

 

[Snug]

I'm pretty new to the idea of a Smash competitive scene (I am heavily invested in Team Liquid and BW/SC2 and have been for some time) and I only learned about competitive Smash through Liquid signing players. HOWEVER as a new viewer I don't think it is the job of the community already present to make room for me, as much as it is my job to find my own place in that community. I love Smash I immediately jumped into following the pro scene. If you are a new viewer of Game of Thrones, you don't tell HBO "Hey tone down the nudity and foul language for me". You either watch it and enjoy it as it is, or you decide it isn't for you.

I dunno if there is much point to what I am saying here but what I am trying to convey is that at least some new viewers (at least me) feel that Smash is what it is and it is up to the viewers to decide whether or not they like it, rather than the responsibility of the community already present to cater their broadcasts/tournaments/game to these new viewers. If the commentators of the game like to curse and get hype when the game is being played, let them. I'm all for professionalism, and I don't like the excessive use of words like ****, gay (and other derogatory words for homosexuals), etc. But if someone pulls off a sick play, I don't see a problem with a caster shouting "HOLY ****".

I don't know. Maybe there are other new viewers that wanna see casters in suits at these big tournaments and want a strict code on what you can and can't say. I just want to say that some of the new guys around here recognize that there is an established Smash community (which through my short tenure here I have come to recognize as awesome) and we want the Smash community to continue however it damn well pleases.

 

[rikochet]

@ N NH Cody Lol yeah it was we were brawl players.

 

[SSBM_HypnoToad]

Everybody needs to stop looking at the documentary as their only source of competitive information. For example, for several months, Mew2King has had a winning record over Mango, since the documentary said that M2K can't beat Mango, people still think that Mango is WAY better than M2K. Just saying.

 

[SpiderMad]

As the Smash community turns into League, I just want you all to know that I love you.

 

[Wasp]

f*** the people who didn't like the commentators. commentators work hard and they deserve praise. some take their breaks in between sets to commentate only to hear the whining and complaining from people who like the way themselves commentate or want tings to be perfect. there will never be the perfect commentator people need to accept that

well-said, though i must admit that some commentators really suck, but these two in the example from this article do a pretty good job imo.

 

[p4nd4p4nd4p4nd4p4nd4]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyGFM5CGnoo&hd=1

 

[KayB]

No, plum, spectators have nothing to do with future players. most of the time spectators are intimidated by real national tourneys and less likely to get into competitive smash after seeing a stream ("Where's IKE??? I WANT TO SEE MARIO!!!").

Surely you jest. You should be able to tell the difference between normal viewers vs stream monsters/youtube comments. I would say a healthy if not more than 50% of this community originally started out as spectators. You think I'm wrong? Start a poll in the Brawl/Melee boards about how they joined the Smash community. Even if many players didn't start off as spectators, many MANY players have been inspired to play better and progress as a competitive Smash player after continuing to spectate. Many players, including top players like PewPewU, took inspiration from Ken's Marth. Players and people who are now influential members of the community now were inspired after spectating Match 4, M2K vs Shiz, like Prog. Watch the Smash documentary if you think I'm wrong.
Being a spectator is a huge deal within the community and you'd be deluded if you think otherwise.

I mean obviously there should be a line drawn between what the spectators demand and the players should do, but never in the history of Smash have I seen an example where players have let spectators abuse their power. Any change that has been made for the sake of appeasing viewers (ex. not being offensive, having professional commentary that focuses on the matches instead of calling people out) have been very reasonable. If you disagree, that's fine, but it's an incredibly subjective topic that have reasonable arguments on both sides and you have no right to call either side moronic or ********.

 

[Mansta]

*Ahem*
♫DON'T LOSE YOUR WAY!~♫

Besides that, Smash becoming an e-sport shouldn't ruin anything in the community at all really.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyGFM5CGnoo&hd=1

I was writing this post at the same time you posted that.

 

[NH Cody]

I'm a brawl player so I was thinking of BRAWL and how diddy vs ICs/diddy vs snake/meta knight vs ICs grandfinals that we've been seeing for years aren't particularly exciting to casuals. melee in general is of course more spectator friendly to start with because of the game physics, but also more spectator friendly because of the diversity

 

[raymundoTheGod]

We've moved forward quite a bit from the old days of DC++, basement tournaments, and shoddy commentary/recording setups. Both Evo and MLG are including Melee again in their respective tournaments. Big E-Sports teams such as Team Liquid and Curse are sponsoring top players. It seems that the smash community is starting to receive some momentum in regards to "hitting it big"

So why the title, "Have we lost our way?"

After all, much of what Melee has gained in the past year seems golden. Who wouldn't want larger prize pools, player sponsorships, or higher production tournaments? Don't get me wrong, these are all very great things for our community, but there is a greater concern of the underlying trade-offs that come with the glamour.

Recently, Wife wrote an article, suggesting to abolish Doubles from tournaments. One of his reasons was that "doubles" is chaotic, making it messy to commentate and spectate for the average viewer. Wife does make some sounds points as online viewership tends to drop when doubles is played on some of the more popular Smash-related streams. However, dropping "doubles" completely for the sole purpose of appealing to the "outsiders" of the community would be a travesty. It's also raised many questions about the direction of the community. One of which:

"Have we lost our way?"

Let me elaborate.

Smash started as a grassroots community. There were no sponsors or corporate support from Nintendo for the Smash Community. Tournaments were ran in rag-tag venues (and still are to a certain degree) and people's houses. Smashers didn't really sleep at hotels; they crammed 20-30 deep into someone's apartment. Before the days of Tio and challonge, tournaments ran on paper brackets. Results would come in the form of rumors on the mIRC chat or by rapidly refreshing a tournament thread on Smashboards. Yet, people played and participated in spite of the lack of professionalism. It was the love of the game and the community that kept players coming back.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying professionalism is evil at all.
Aside from the things mentioned in the introduction, the limelight has helped the community mature in many aspects. We, as a community, have moved on from the use of words such as "****", "homo" and "f******" to become more professional. GIMR from VGBootCamp removed a commentator from the stream a Xanadu weekly event for his unprofessional, vulgar language. In this regard, the viewer feedback has helped the Smash community grow.

There comes a point in which catering to the average viewer or audience becomes cumbersome. By audience, I refer to people who are probably not active in the competitive community but would follow the scene via YouTube or Twitch.tv. Go to any Smash video on YouTube and you'll see that it's riddled with comments, most likely about the commentary or quality of the video.

"These guys are annoying"
"These guys need to get the f**** off the mic"
"These guys are boring"
"These guys are too analytical"
"These guys aren't hype enough"

In essence, there is no way to satisfy the needs of people who provide very little to the community while demanding so much. One of the highlights of the community was the "Wombo Combo" (Warning: NSFW). Despite it's vulgar nature, the video highlights, in my opinion, the beauties of Smash and the community surrounding it. It had an amazing combo with candid responses that encapsulate the "hype" that's in the game. In 2014, we may never see another video like it. There was a similar moment at "The Next Episode" in which the player "Lord" pulls a crazy maneuver to steal the game from "s2j" to win the set. Instead of capturing the natural excitement of the moment, we're left with the commentator, lost for words, awkwardly saying "What the crap" to remain professional.

I'm not advocating for fake "hype" in the sense of yelling or screaming into a microphone for the sake of being loud.

Though, I do worry that in becoming an "e-sport" that the Smash community may lose its core roots and identity that made it so special. There may be a point in which events have to cater to the viewer more so than the actual players. At this point, I may have to wrap up my controller and call it quits to a community that I've spent an entire decade with. Hopefully, the magic isn't ever lost.

-Tafokints

Sometimes I fear Smash becoming mainstream for these reasons too. At the same time, what makes it special is how rare it is to come across players, especially good ones. I feel like a smaller community is better, for the other fear of Smash players becoming COD players.

 

[QWA]

GIMR from VGBootCamp removed a commentator from the stream a Xanadu weekly event for his unprofessional, vulgar language.

#FREEBOSS

 

[Gatoray]

"Wombo Combo" (Warning: NSFW).

You tag the Wombo Combo video as NSFW as if you actually assume some people on smashboards haven't seen this video already...

Watching this video is, like, mandatory to play smash bros competitively at all.

 

[ImaClubYou]

My detailed response to this news feed in video format.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uc7EcuqVhPE

 

[Comet7]

I have mixed feelings on doubles. On one hand, it's one of the great things that makes smash unique, and not just some tekken two thousand and who cares what number. On the other hand, I'm sure it's difficult to manage them and some people want other alternatives like crews. I don't think they should be abolished, just that they should be ran if they don't get in the way of singles, or if possible without too much trouble.