Smash Bros & Blazblue: a look into the fighting game genre

As my close friends know, I'm a huge fan of the Super Smash Bros. series. Melee & Brawl are some of my favorite games of all time, for a number of reasons. However, to many people they seem to be a completely different breed of fighting game as compared to Street Fighter, King of Fighters, etc. I'm not too well-versed in other fighting games, but I'm curious how the games stand out to each other. There are only two "normal" fighting games I've spent a good amount of time playing. One is Soul Calibur II, a great game that mostly managed to lure me in because I could play as Link, and the other is Blazblue: Calamity Trigger, produced by Arc System Works, creators of the Guilty Gear series.

I've spent enough time playing Blazblue to know the basic ins and outs of the game mechanics; I'm probably not going to win any tournaments, but I have a grasp of the complexity of the game. But despite how this game is supposedly a completely different kind of game than Super Smash Bros., I see several significant similarities between the two. I figured I'd have some fun deconstructing the important details.

The most significant difference between Smash Bros and a standard fighting game is the environment. Most fighting games take place in closed arenas. The only thing in the players' way is each other. Sure, there are different stages with different backgrounds and music, but functionally, it's all the same. Smash Bros, on the other hand, places a huge emphasis on the arena. The layout is different, edges are different, and many stages have obstacles that the player must avoid. Stages can be large or small, flat or vertical, and overall, stage selection is an important part of the game. Though, if you pick Final Destination every single time, that kind of defeats the purpose, doesn't it?

Another important distinction between Smash Bros and other fighting games is environment control. There's a difference between this and the arena. Basically, characters can manipulate the environment to their advantage. This is more prevalent in Brawl than in Melee, but both games still utilize it. For example, more beginner-leveled players might view Peach's turnips as a simple projectile attack. However, they can be utilized in order to control where Peach's opponent will move on the field, creating an extra dimension to her character. Brawl takes this a step futher; characters like Snake and Rob are all about placing obstacles for the player to avoid. Even King Dedede's Waddle Dee minions are capable of harming the opponent long after they've been thrown.

However, it's clear that Blazblue also subscribes to this bit of game design. Arakune's main strategy involves "cursing" the opponent in order to trap him in a loop of projectiles. V-13 may be weak, but her projectiles can hit almost anywhere on the screen, so her opponent must carefully dodge and block in order to fight her. Even the slow, but strong Tager can magnetize his enemy in order to manipulate their movement. Environment control, and "zoning" if you will, is becoming a larger part of the genre.

Of course, all this talk about the environment and evasion links nicely to my next point about Smash Bros as opposed to most fighting games: Mobility. With all these traps and obstacles, Smash Bros places a large emphasis on being able to get around quickly. Characters can double-jump, and use a special move as a triple jump. Some characters can go even further with this, utilizing regular attacks as a means of movement and recovery. They can roll in front of and behind each other, sidestep, and even dodge in the air. By comparison, most fighting games are rather stiff and grounded in comparison. Since the environment is less of a concern, traditional fighting games prefer to focus on the precise details of the bout; punches high and low, blocking in specific ways rather than a generic "overshield" that blocks everything. Additionally, in Blazblue characters are given specific "weak, medium, strong" buttons, each having a specific use. In Smash Bros, those actions are instead called "standard, tilt, smash" by the fanbase. Even then, those actions aren't set in stone, and may not have the appropriate speed or strength for the input.

Of course, talking about attacking mechanics brings us to another important part of Smash Bros: throws. In most fighting games, throws are usually shied away from; used only to get past a block, and typically end any combo. Smash Bros sees things differently; when the opponent is grabbed, you can throw them in four ways, each way potentially setting up a different combo or attack. Some characters may have a specialty in grabbing an opponent, throwing him, only to grab him again (and there are more instances than just Dedede and Falco's chain grabs in Brawl). While most fighting games tend to view grabs as just a "free hit", Blazblue interests me in that it works throws into combos very well. Like SSB, throws in Blazblue often set up the opponent for another, stronger attack, and can occasionally be chained together. Though, the creators of the game wisely realized the potential for abuse of this system, so they put in a grab escape. Still, I feel like the system they put in offers a lot of potential.

Finally, my last point may be the deal breaker for Smash Bros as opposed to a more traditional fighting game. Lots of jokes have been made about what constitutes a "combo" in a fighting game, but I feel like combos are the most intimidating part of the game for some. In Soul Calibur 2, there was a huge list in the game's menu for potential combos. The problem? They required pressing a specific sequence of buttons in a specific order. You weren't so much learning the character as you were memorizing a list of command inputs. And really, why should the player bother to learn those in-game combos? Why not just stick with the basic, but reliable attacks they have figured out and work from there? Attempting to do the combos is probably how the "button mashing" trope got started.

That question might be why Smash Bros has gained such a fanbase. Rather than the developers giving you a preset sequence of buttons to press, they just gave you a lot of moves. Press this command, you get this move, press this one and you get another. Instead of the traditional fighting game methods, SSB gives the player various attacks and encourages to use them however they please. And that is where the fun of the game comes in; you aren't memorizing a sequence of buttons; you're trying to figure out how to properly apply the moves you know. It's very successful, and is also why I like Blazblue so much; Blazblue's game mechanics are similar to Smash Bros than a regular fighting game in this regard. There's still a huge list of moves to learn, but the player will learn new techniques as they play naturally. They become faced with a tough situation, and find a new use for a move they previously thought useless. It's a fantastic system, and one I wish was more common.

The point of this article is not to say "x is better designed than x", merely to talk about differences in game design and how they are applied within their respective franchises. I love both the Smash Bros. series and Blazblue despite their differences. The biggest problem I have with Brawl lies not within its core gameplay, but the developer's attitude towards the fanbase. Nintendo has shown no interest in expanding Brawl past its current iteration, which has plenty of problems, the largest being a bare-bones online system, and a general imbalance of its characters. Blazblue's developers, on the other hand, actively study what works and what doesn't, and plans to fix many complaints about the game in its next iteration, due out next year. It's a great way to build a community with the fanbase, and as a whole, communities are what fighting games are all about.