March 16, 2008
Super Smash Bros. Brawl is the kind of game that I have not played since the Nintendo 64 days. Games have taken a big fall recently, but this game has changed that. Even those classic 64 BIT games lost their touch after a while. The goal of the game is simply to smash your opponents off the screen. You do this through attacks that weaken their defenses and send them further each time.
What makes the new Smash Bros. game so great is that it takes everything good about Nintendo games and stores it in a single disc. All of your favorite first party characters are there in some form. Captain Olimar, Toon Link, even R.O.B. the robot is playable. That of course wouldn't be naming all 35. You can probably guess most of them if you've played Super Smash Bros. Melee, but the newcomers are very welcome indeed.
Not every character is controllable. The Pokeballs return along with their equivalent, Assist Trophies. Both of these items summon characters that help you.
First party Nintendo characters aren't the only ones present. Sonic the Hedgehog and Solid Snake are excellent additions to the roster. Snake brings his large inventory to the brawl, and Sonic takes his speed.
Many of your favorite features from previous iterations are here as well. The only ones removed are Race to the Finish and Board the Platforms. I didn't care that much for those anyway. You might as well sell that old copy of the previous installment. It will just collect dust otherwise.
These things are all well and good. However, there are two new additions to this game that really make the experience. The new Smash Ball item changes the mechanics of fighting just enough to be interesting. Almost every character has a unique Final Smash that they can only use when you burst the ball. Just press the special attack button when you are ready. Other characters just share somebody else's.
The other welcome addition is online play. Sure, you need to exchange friend codes to play with whoever you like, but fights with random people are always fun. The only problem is that you might experience lag and errors because Nintendo is having server trouble. These will of course be fixed in good time.
There are way too many good things about this game. Well done retro and modern video game music, gorgeous computer generated cutscenes in the extended single player mode, and more make this piece of software my favorite in a long while.