Why smash 4 can't match melee competitively

Hi my name tag is noboruplaysgames. With Smash 4 growing ever more popular, there have been many debates to whether smash 4 has the capabilities to be equal or close to melee in terms of the competitive scene. Although nobody knows who I am, I feel like I can give a long and fact based oppinion on this subject.

So to start this off, my opinion on the matter is that Smash 4 will not be able to match melee. So first lets talk about what smash 4 has that melee does not. After all, there must be good traits for there to be any need to debate in the first place. So let's start off with a quote from my favorite and the top smash 4 player Zero. "@ZeRoSSB: I feel like EVO shows that Smash 4 can be an amazing competitive title if just the community got their stuff together." This is a quote from Zero's Twitter. So let's look at what smash 4 has to offer in terms of a competitive scene. First of all it's easy to get ahold of and pick up. Due to the fact that smash 4 is the newest title in the franchise, it is of course still sold everywhere and for the price of 60 dollars. That means that anybody who is interested can go and get a copy and start practicing right away. Melee is unfortunately no longer sold and getting a copy can cost a whopping 80-120 dollars on the Internet. Also in terms of playing the game it is easier to play as well. While there are cool things that are possible such as the zero suit samus glitch when fighting robin, gredninja taunt combo, little macs footstool combo, foward airs to bouncing fish with sheik, ect, it can in no way compare to wave dashing, l canceling, dash dancing, ect along with the character specific tech in Melee. The fast-paced gameplay in melee allowed many very technical actions to help you improve your gameplay and get an advantage over a player who could not perform these techs. Because of this, melee can be very time consuming and will have you practicing for hours and hours before you can get to a competitive level. There are many people who do not have the time to get into the scene.

Smash 4 also has a much bigger character roster and in turn, more characters are seen in competitive. In Melee you see mainly (and there are exceptions) S tier characters in competitive play such as fox, falco, sheik,
Marth, jigglypuff, peach, caption falcon, and ice climbers. In smash 4 you see much wider of a variety. I won't list them since its composed of most of the cast. The wider character variety leads to many more people playing competitive and allows for many new matchups and discoveries.

So now I will talk about Melee and why I believe that Smash 4 will not be able to match up to it for competitive. The qualities that melee possess makes it much more suitable for long term competitive. So to touch on the main point, I will talk about tech in melee. Tech is short for technology and refers to advanced techniques that players can do. For the smash 4 players who are not aware of tech in melee search for it on google or anywhere else and there are many helpfull guides. The tech in melee serve to speed up gameplay and in turn makes the game require much more skill. There is many more things about melee that makes it competitive and praised so please look into it if you don't know much about it. People may argue that smash 4 takes a lot of skill as well. But between the slow and less skillful gameplay, it suffers for much of the same reasons brawl did. There are many people who may argue that brawl is just as capable as a competitive game, but that's an argument for another day.

Now let's look at what it would take to be able to compete with melee at a similar level. The only official other smash that has come close to matching melee's longevity is smash 64. Today there is still a small competitive scene by very dedicated players. Even though 64 does not have as much as melee does, it is still the closest. And that makes a statement that is very clear. The smash game that has the most skillful and effective tech will last the longest and be the most respected and played at the highest level.

Of course, when it comes down to it I'm a smash fan at heart, and love all the titles. But regarding competitive, none can stand close to melee. And unfortunately, smash 4 falls to the bottom only standing above brawl in competitive. Brawl failed on a competitive level and is regarded as a very poor competitive game. They took out everything that made Melee great. And I am not a hater just to hate, because I would love to see smash as a whole progress and have a rightful successor to melee. But unfortunately, smash 4 like brawl was purposefully designed to harm competitive. And when the creator himself makes an effort to remove any competitive aspects, there is not much we can do about it. Because of that, smash 4, once it is no longer new, will most likely be doomed to the same unfortunate fate as brawl.