Month: September 2017

The leap from Pokkén Tournament on the Wii U to Pokkén Tournament DX on the Nintendo Switch includes two versions worth of balance changes. While American players probably don’t want (or need) to dwell on the fact they missed the Arcade exclusive version 1.05, it is where many of the biggest changes in Pokkén Tournament DX originate from.

This is especially true of of the Fire Fox, Braixen. Once considered the best character in the game (an opinion boosted by a series of major wins by Evo champion Tonosama, no doubt), this powerful zoner received both heavy nerfs and interesting buffs. Double_FGC (arguably the U.S.’s best tournament Braixen pro) has made a great video demonstrating each of these changes for the meta-defining Pokémon, with footage from both the Wii U and DX versions for comparison’s sake.

Source: Double_FGC

The leap from Pokkén Tournament on the Wii U to Pokkén Tournament DX on the Nintendo Switch includes two versions worth of balance changes. While American players probably don’t want (or need) to dwell on the fact they missed the Arcade exclusive version 1.05, it is where many of the biggest changes in Pokkén Tournament DX originate from.

This is especially true of of the Fire Fox, Braixen. Once considered the best character in the game (an opinion boosted by a series of major wins by Evo champion Tonosama, no doubt), this powerful zoner received both heavy nerfs and interesting buffs. Double_FGC (arguably the U.S.’s best tournament Braixen pro) has made a great video demonstrating each of these changes for the meta-defining Pokémon, with footage from both the Wii U and DX versions for comparison’s sake.

Source: Double_FGC

If you’ve played a lot of fighting games or RPGs, you will have come across the idea of character archetypes. Used by both players and designers, they act as a form of short-hand when you are describing the attributes of a certain character. The glass cannon is probably the most cited character archetype — someone who can deal massive amounts of damage, but is super fragile.

To give players tangible examples, MySmashCorner has made a helpful video which attempts to map common character archetypes onto fighters from across the Super Smash Bros. series. MySmashCorner is keen to point out that characters will often fit multiple archetypes at once, in order to make them more appealing to play. Smash also has its own archetypes along with these generic ones, like the space animal and the fastfaller.

Having multiple archetypes makes a game’s roster interesting, and it’s fun to see when designers deliberately play with an archetype to create something new. Hopefully, future Smash games will continue to experiment and make new twists on old formulae.

Source: MySmashCorner