Super Smash Bros. For Wii U (Nintendo Wii U)
Official GBAtemp Review
Product Information:
- Release Date (NA): November 21, 2014
- Release Date (EU): November 28, 2014
- Release Date (JP): December 6, 2014
- Publisher: Nintendo
- Developer: Sora LTD, Namco Bandai
- Genres: Action
Game Features:
Single player
Local Multiplayer
Online Multiplayer
Co-operative
Review Approach:
First off, I'd like to apologize for the lack of proper formatting in this review. I have no idea how that works. I also apologize for the low quality of the images, as these kinds of things aren't really my strongest point. I'd much rather play my games! This is also my first review ever, so it might not be that good!
Super Smash Bros. is a beloved series by many, and for good reason! They've always been good brawlers and they're always sure to cause a melee between friends. (See what I did there?)
The title that brings many nintendo characters together for one thing only: Smash!
But how does it stack up? Does it differentiate itself from the 3DS version enough to warrant a buy?
So, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U. Definitely the most anticipated game for the Wii U this year, and it shows. Everywhere I go, everything smash is now sold out! Quite impressive, considering this is the Wii U we're talking about. All the characters from the 3DS version are all present, and if you have no idea about those, I strongly urge you to either find out for yourself or look somewhere else; I won't be writing down the full character list. I do note however, that there are some clone characters present. Lucina is Marth, although the attack properties are a little different. Dark Pit and Pit attack the same, but they have some differences in character properties. Mario and Doctor Mario are also there, where Doctor Mario is the more powerful but less agile one and vice versa. The cast is obviously very varied, and surprisingly balanced to boot. But let's not repeat the 3DS review here, and jump into game modes, shall we?
oh, uh, there's quite some options here...
So to break it down:- Smash - The bread and butter of this game. Most of your local multiplayer playtime will be spent here, if not all!
- Smash (again) - For your local smashes, just go straight here. No BS, no problems, just fight!
- 8-Player Smash - For the first time ever, you can play with 8 people at once! Or, with 7 CPUs. It just depends on how many friends you have! Not all stages are available, though. More on that later.
- Special Smash - The "Special" gamemodes return! Here you can tweak your game with a variety of... interesting options. Anyone care to play "300% Mega Bunny Metal Curry Heavy Fast Angled Smash"?
- Rules - Not a very important option to have here, as you can access this menu in the other modes too. Here you can change your game settings to stock, like everyone else
- Online - You don't even need friends to play with other people!
- With Friends - Okay, you do need friends for this one. You can play with your friends in your friends list here. You can also bring one local friend online!
- With Anyone - Screw friends, right? Here you can choose even more different modes and play with literally ANYONE.
- For Fun - Items on, all stages. Sadly lacks a 1v1 option, though. Free for All 4 players or team battles! You can bring a local friend in team battles! in For Fun, no records are held.
- For Glory - Ever heard "Fox Only, Final Destination"? well, half of that is true in this mode. You can only play on the Final Destination-styled omega levels in this mode. Records are kept, and you either play Free for All 4 players, 1v1 or in a team smash. You can, however, bring a local friend online in a team smash! Represent your team skills online!
- Smash Tour - Party game setup, local only and up to 4 players. I'll go a little bit into this later, but for now, it's just there.
- Games & More - All your favourites are here! Except for an adventure mode. There is no adventure here. Too bad, huh?
- Vault - Here you can look at, listen to, and even play some of your unlocked content. There isn't much to review here, though.
- Solo / Group - Here you can find some singleplayer things to do! And unlike the 3DS version, most of these can be done together with a friend!
- Classic - Similar, but different to the 3DS version of Classic. Now with a board. huzzah.
- Events - Here you can play scenario-like matches. The missions are different for singleplayer and 2-player co-op for this one, so find a friend and play them all!
- All-star - Fight all the fighters in the game! There's not much else to say.
- Stadium - Here you can find the various minigames: Target Blast, Multi-Man Smash and Home-run Contest
- Target Blast can only be done in singleplayer or versus, which is essentially just multiple players taking singleplayer turns and comparing scores. It's the same as the 3DS version, in which you have a bomb and launch it in an Angry Birds fashion. then it explodes and hits targets. Honestly, I didn't find this very fun. There are 3 stages in this version, though.
- Multi-man Smash - Take on hordes of miis! Can be done co-op with a friend. Not much else to say!
- Home-Run Contest - The beloved minigame of "hit the sandbag and launch it" returns! As with Brawl, you can do this together with a friend! The Versus mode is also the same as target blast, so there's that.
- Exclusive to singleplayer is "Special Orders". Also very scenario-like battles, but with a bit twisted. In Crazy Orders, it's also a survival game! I won't go into this too much either, because it's not that different from other gamemodes in my honest opinion.
- Amiibo - More on this later!
- Challenges - Clear a board of achievements! That's all. You mostly unlock these through just playing the game!
- 3DS - Connect your 3DS to use it as a controller for the normal smash modes, and transfer your customized characters from the 3DS version!
- The book with a question mark - this is the manual. Yep.
It's smash. I have no idea what's going on here.
The graphics are all very nice, and very polished as to be expected. It looks very good on the Wii U in HD, and it always, ALWAYS runs at a consistent 60 FPS. Not once have I seen it dip below, which is very amazing for how much goes on in an 8-player smash. All the stages have the style of their own games, and it all feels very alive. The models are very impressive and animated very well, as with the 3DS version. I'm still not a fan of the faces; they can't seem to get it right! This was especially noticable in the 3DS version, and the Wii U version fixes these a lot... but I still laugh everytime Ganondorf wins. I can't take that face seriously, and I am very sorry. And again, no lag! It's amazing!
I love Final Destination even more thanks to this!
The music is once again, absolutely amazing. Most of the tracks on the 3DS are also present, if not all. Forgive me, as I haven't had the time to go through all the songs in the game! One of the better features to the music, though, is that you can turn off songs you don't like. I don't think that's necessary for a lot of the tracks in the game, but I found myself turning off about 4 tracks I didn't like. I don't have more to say about this. The music is great!
As for controls, earlier I mentioned being able to use your 3DS. In this game, you can use any control option from melee onwards! Unless you didn't get a really-limited-supply gamecube controller adapter. Which I couldn't get. Oops! I did get the chance to use one, though, and it feels just like playing an earlier smash with the gamecube controller. except for the different mechanics. You can also completely customize the controls to your liking; not just switch buttons around! I tried setting all the buttons to jump, and it worked, and I can no longer use wiimote+nunchuck on my name. Not that I care, I use my Pro controller mostly, and it feels great for smash. The wiimote option is, like with brawl, very limited. I played with this in brawl and it's definitely possible to be good with it, but I highly recommend not trying this.
And playing with an actual stick as opposed to the circle pad is the best thing. You can't remap the movement controls, but it's still a huge improvement over the 3DS version. (Most used word while playing in 3DS version: CIRCLE PAAAAAAAD)
Having so many controller options is very important, because...
Featuring your favourite Monado-boy!
8-player Smash. Oh god. The chaos!
It's actually surprisingly fun, though! I feel like this is the real party option for this game, as you can still play the way you want. No items, 4-stock, but with 8 players! It's a bit limited in stage selection, and that's somewhat saddening, but the stage selection still has a surprisingly large variety. Because of the sheer size of some stages, it also introduces a new element in the stage "The Great Cave Offensive" called "Danger Zones". Hit them with more than 100%, and you lose a stock. This can turn into a really strategic match because of it. Should you try and KO that one player? or should you try and stay safe? This feature really shines in the 8-player smash mode. 8 players is only limited to this mode, but to be fair, you really don't need more. just fight, fight fight! In 8-player smash, you can actually pair a grand total of seven wiimotes or Pro controllers, or use a mix of wiimotes, gamecube controllers, 3DS systems... anything goes! You do need the 3DS game to connect a 3DS, however.
Smash Tour... is somewhat chaotic, and leads to being slightly underwhelming. You basically have a board, and have your miis travel on it in a mario party-esque style. Sometimes when characters overlap, they'll battle, other times they won't? You can use items and your goal is to collect fighters and powerups but honestly... I had no idea what was going on the whole time! Leave it up to smash to baffle even players who've played smash for years. Due to the absolute chaos that is smash, I found it to be rather boring. A win doesn't feel deserved unless in the final fight you absolutely destroy everyone. after a set amount of turns, all the fighters you've collected on the board become your stock, and losing one means switching over to the next character. the match isn't a survival match, however. Rather, it's a time match: most KOs wins. I was, once again, baffled by this.
Online worked significantly better for me in the Wii U version. It's still slightly laggy, but nothing will ever beat local multiplayer in smash! I did have a few laggy matches, but most likely due to the other players and the presence of items. Anyone who complains about the lag is most likely playing itemless, anyway, so I don't see too many huge problems there.
As for the final thing I'll talk about before shutting up, Amiibos! Oh how I love the little things. I won't talk about the amiibo designs themselves too much, but they're rather nice.
Gameplay-wise, though, they're very fun to play around with. I found most of my time going into teaching the little things how to play and afterwards, holding "amiibo Colosseum". Although that was rather unimpressive, considering I only own two right now.
Most of what I'll say here will be opinions coming straight from experience, so here goes.
First off, I had a Link, who I named "Linx". Me and my brother mostly made him play Free for All with just us as human players. He mostly seemed to learn from Aidan's moves, possibly due to Linx not understanding my play nature, which they seem to suffer from. They don't seem to want to be highly aggresive, atleast not for me. Linx therefore started to excessively grab characters whenever possible, like my brother. It was very neat to see, and seeing him pull moves that combine my plays with my brother's really made me happy.
The next day, I went and found a store that still had one amiibo left, as all other stores I went to had none left. It was Yoshi, exactly the one I wanted! I mostly made him fight me as a Yoshi, and then later set him up with some level 9 AI to freshen up his character knowledge.
He became somewhat of an aggresive Yoshi, trying to mimic me. Mostly fighting in the air, running all about. I was very amazed when he almost beat me once after picking up my moves. fighting myself is tough!
Then I set them up against each other. I found that Linx was constantly trying to keep a distance while Yoshuke, the Yoshi, would constantly run after him. This created some funny moments as I watched them run all around stages.
In the end, they both helped each other get rid of some bad habits they picked up.
Amiibo's for me are very fun to play around with. They don't detract from the overall experience if you don't use them. rather, they create a whole new experience within an already great game, and a refreshing one at that!
They do the thing they're advertised to do, and that's great. They also grant you extra items and unlocks so if you'd rather play smash! mode only and not do any other things like classic, having an amiibo is great to still collect equipment and trophies!
Verdict
What We Liked ...
- The graphics are amazing, and very flashy. "Too flashy" doesn't exist!
- The music is top-notch, and there is so much of it! And being able to turn off tracks you don't like is always welcome.
- The fighter line-up is great and varied.
- The game definitely feels like a step up from Brawl
- Customize all controls to your liking!
What We Didn't Like ...
- Customization feels rather limited, and yet very broken.
- Smash Tour is actually TOO chaotic, and the questionable design of its final match leaves a lot to be desired.
- Still no adventure mode!
8
Gameplay
The gameplay is very obviously smash. Being able to customize controls to be exactly what you want is a great thing to have.
The online performance is definitely more consistent this time around, and while not absolutely perfect, it works out for the most part. 8 player smash works surprisingly well and for the collectors, there are both physical and in-game trophies to collect this time around. Amiibos! Smash Tour is disappointing, however.
9
Presentation
Great visuals and music. The menus may seem chaotic at first, but the way they're designed make it easy to find anything you need in the blink of an eye. I'm not one to talk about graphics, but there is no denying that the game is beautiful, and the consistent 60 FPS is really a must if you're into any form of competitive play.
9
Lasting Appeal
If you're into smash at all, you'll find you can put hours and hours of play into this game. with both local multiplayer and online working very well, you never have to play alone. the AI works better than the 3DS version, but is still rather easy if you know what you're doing. Amiibos are fun to mess around with, and is sure to keep you busy for atleast a little while if you do get one. or two. or all of them!
8.2
out of 10
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