Balanced Brawl

Who's heard of this?

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=239604

It's an attempt at balancing Super Smash Brothers Brawl. Some people here may have heard of Brawl+, but this is sort of a parallel project, and not the same thing.

(Brawl+ is sort of a way of making Brawl faster and more competitive similar to Melee)

Basically, Balanced Brawl is a hack about keeping the general feel and core elements of Brawl, while trying to rebalance it. The physics remain the same, the character movement remains the same, most of it is still the same. So, Meta Knight is still a gimp character, he just doesn't get as many amazingly early kills as before. Snake is less powerful, but still has his myriad projectiles, Wario is still the aerial king but is not as strong, and so forth. The project's "target" was making everyone as good as Diddy Kong.

What the project DOES do is remove infinites and inescapables. The only infinite that remains, though, is the Ice Climber's infinite, but that's only because they can't change it yet.

The link has a summary of changes, as well as more in-depth changes.

Really interesting changes

Ike begins to play a bit like Luigi; his Quick Draw can be used as many times as one wants in the air, while Aether is the move that makes him helpless at the end.

Link's arrows knocks enemies back far while they're still on the ground. So, this means that they don't go into the air, and then they can aerial dodge Link's other attacks. They stay on the ground, and Link can get in some follow ups.

Ganondorf got some awesome changes. He's now more of a ground, tech chasing character. His Ganon Kick forces enemies into the ground like DK's Headbutt and is a SPIKE in the air, and it kills. His Ganon Dive doesn't send enemies 2 inches away from him, so now they can't just smack him after they get hit by it. And the uppercut on the Dark Dive has HUGE killing potential. Of all the changes, his down tilt TRIPS PEOPLE. So now it gets paired with his Flame Choke for tech chasing!

Lucas gets a faster spot dodge. His PK Freeze is better, and his PK Fire does more damage, so he can spot dodge many attacks and counter with a PK Fire now. His back air is stronger, so it's a good "deterrent" and encourages enemies to stay on the ground, where Lucas is king.

Samus in general does more damage and more knockback, which is nice.

I used Brawl+ on my Wii before and I wasn't really fond of it, and the only reason I downloaded it was to get the textures that were included with it, because I had no other way of getting them at the time.

But I like Balanced brawl because it's not making alot of major changes like Brawl+ did.

And although I like the idea of these balancing packages, I don't think any of them will ever popularly be accepted as a substitute in the competitive community.

EDIT: I haven't tried it yet mostly because I find the lack of chain-grabs unnerving

I played this for about an hour on my friends Wii. Didn't really see much difference in it from regular brawl other than damage and stage interactions (also no tripping). Still, I think I'd rather keep playing this than regular Brawl.

Also I like how Sonic's spring spikes now

Originally Posted by CaptainTMS

Also I like how Sonic's spring spikes now

*GASP*

Epic win.

Originally Posted by MrBaconsock

I used Brawl+ on my Wii before and I wasn't really fond of it, and the only reason I downloaded it was to get the textures that were included with it, because I had no other way of getting them at the time.

But I like Balanced brawl because it's not making alot of major changes like Brawl+ did.

[QUOTE[And although I like the idea of these balancing packages, I don't think any of them will ever popularly be accepted as a substitute in the competitive community.[/QUOTE]

Of course not. There are too many logistical problems. And part of why the Smash community is successful is because uncompetitive players show up to tournaments, add to the pot, and then they learn how to be good. If they play a different game than the one packaged in the box, it won't work out.

If only Nintendo had put more storage in the Wii (an 8 GB memory card was like $20 at the Wii's launch, would that have been so bad to have out of the box? 512 MB? Come on Nintendo), and if only they were of the patch mindset. Patches are very necessary for games; some developers look towards it as "Oh, we didn't give you the best game we could immediately," but it's better to correct mistakes than to leave them there. Oh well.

Originally Posted by CaptainTMS

I played this for about an hour on my friends Wii. Didn't really see much difference in it from regular brawl other than damage and stage interactions (also no tripping).

Maybe you should play with one of the characters who were more heavily changed? Actually, you know, if you can't absolutely tell the difference, maybe that's a good thing because that's sort of what the hackers want. :-P

Still, I think I'd rather keep playing this than regular Brawl.

Yeah, I think that this game is basically BETTER than Brawl. Brawl+ turned some people off, because it messed with the engine and plays almost like a new installment of Smash Brothers. But Balanced Brawl still plays like regular Brawl, except less unbalanced.

Also I like how Sonic's spring spikes now

I KNOW! It's hilarigood!

Originally Posted by TheBattler

Ike begins to play a bit like Luigi; his Quick Draw can be used as many times as one wants in the air, while Aether is the move that makes him helpless at the end.

Ike playing like Luigi? That would be really awesome since I main both. :3

They just better not **** up Ike's power, meteor smashes, or godly jab. Or Luigi's recovery, traction, and Fire Jump Punch.

EDIT: I just noticed in the thread linked that they won't be getting anymore changes. Silly me. xP

Originally Posted by Crystal

Ike playing like Luigi? That would be really awesome since I main both. :3

I mean, the hackers made it so Ike's recovery is like Luigi's. In fact, it's almost exactly like Luigi's, except Ike can hold his forward special in as long as he wants, and Luigi has a slower fall speed and Ike gets better vertical recovery.

They just better not **** up Ike's power, meteor smashes, or godly jab.

Oh no no. A quick read of the Ike section in the link will show that the change on the Quick Draw was the only change they made.

Or Luigi's recovery, traction, and Fire Jump Punch.

They didn't change anything about Luigi except his fireballs come out faster (which is great because now Luigi's fireballs are uniquely good instead of uniquely bad), and his dash attack makes the enemy trip, which really seems like the most hilarious thing ever, next to Sonic's spring being a meteor smash.