User blog:Element Knight 375/My Thoughts on the Smash Bros. 3DS Demo!

Greetings and salutations, my public! As some of you may know,  Super Smash Bros. 4 for 3DS  was just released in North America, and although I'm personally waiting for the Wii U version coming out during the holidays, I decided to download the free eShop demo on 3DS, just to get a feel for how it plays. I can now say without doubt that even though I only got to play around with one stage and five characters, the gameplay in '' Smash Bros. 4 '' is the best I've experienced in the series so far. It strikes a fantastic balance between the weight of  Brawl's  gameplay and the speed of  Melee 's, and the controls are extremely responsive, even though I found the default control layout to be awkward at first.

The thing I love most about the gameplay and physics is that they don't waste your time as much, the way they did in Brawl. Recovery is faster, and characters don't fly as far when hit by a powerful attack. It stresses actual contact between opponents over controlling the stage, which makes it much more intense and engaging to play. More than that, dodges, jumps, and attacks are all marginally quicker, which drives home this game's priority of expediency and fun action. This is something that I found lacking in Brawl, and yet SSB4 also manages to revive the great pick-up-and-play aspect of Brawl that its fans love about it.

This is what makes me think that this iteration of Smash will be the new pinnacle of the series. It does exactly what a good sequel should do: it expands on its source material, but keeps in the good stuff. It brings back some of the realism of Brawl and mixes it with the graceful chaos of Melee about as well as it could. Plus, even though the roster has taken its own direction, it seems (at least from what I've seen) to have achieved the monumental feat of having each newcomer be unique in style, rather than inferior to another existing character.

Another gameplay change I found myself impressed by were the special effects. Everything is more colorful and bright, from the trails left behind by flying characters to the columns of light that erupt when they get KO'd, and the sound cues are perfectly suited to everything happening on screen. It may not sound like much, but this combination of effects along with the snappy gameplay makes everything about this game INCREDIBLY satisfying. I literally find that I can't settle for one short match at a time because playing them just feels so good.

Those are my major praises for the game so far, since I don't have access to the full game yet, but I should also say that the art assets in this game are fantastic. It has my new favorite music in the series, and all the stages are beautifully redesigned. I'm also quite a fan of the new Omega stage mode that creates a single, flat stage with no items. Although, I'm hoping that in the full game, items are still customizable for any mode, because it just wouldn't be the same without them for me.

That's all I can really say for the moment. On the whole, I'm super-pleased with this game so far. Once I get my hands on the full game, and unlock all the characters, stages, and features, I actually have no doubt that it will surpass Brawl as my favorite in the series. So, expect to see a change in my Top 10 Favorite Games list sometime soon.

And heck, if you have a 3DS and are interested in the new Smash Bros, I absolutely recommend you try this demo. SSB4 has definitely set itself apart from its predecessors, and I'd say it's totally worth all the waiting.

Can't wait for the full Wii U version, and I hope to hook up with you guys for some PvP when it comes out!

Thanks for reading, and let me know what you thought of this little demo review of mine. I might do more if you enjoyed it!

Peace!

<p style="margin:0in0in0.0001pt;line-height:16.5pt;">EK (or Gavin)