Melee's Terrible Stages (And How We Banned Them)

How many games were played on Kongo Jungle?
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Clip Attributions:
Unsure’s Slippi Replays
Ambisinister
I Dair You!
PGH Carroll
Bekvin
Evo2kvids
Diaphone
Posby95
Frankier21
Wimbledon
U.S. Open
oopsmagazine
MaximuMGameplay
itsbmeGaming
getyourtournament
Michigan Melee
MikeHaggarSSBMDevilmayfart
New England Melee
PhantomTyrantGRsmash
EastPointPictures
Amazing Shadow
OptimusLime
Mew2King
Juggleguy
Mr. Rolo
Chris Solis
Sidefx28
Dashdancedan
harriettheguy
Omnigamer
VGBootCamp
Sephirothken
MLG
Last Stock Legends
David Cao
Simna ibn Sind
ChuDat
Pakman
R0ks0x
BrickNGamez
Meleeboy0
Mang0
Big Blue Esports
VGBootCamp
TheWaffle77
Azen Zagenite
Yttuty
SSBM Tonberry
Spiralflame88
Whatwhatwhatwhatwhat
Smashboards
Elias Orz
Formula Zero
The Gaming Otter
Hadster
curiousenver
DVCrecRoom
SSBWiki
Polarity
8wayrun
Junebug
Melee It On Me
Beyond the Summit - Smash
Savestate
Fourside Fights
Tourney Locator
Songs used:
Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy - Tchaikovsky
Crystal Caves | LoFi | Donkey Kong 64 Remix - Tingle's Jingles
Trophy Tussle Lofi Remix (Prod. Jaii)
Tidus Theme Lofi Remix - Lzls
Anitra’s Dance - Grieg
Gymnopedie No. 1
Rock You (80s Rock Instrumental)
Earthbound OK DESU KA (An0va Remix)
Morning Mood by Grieg
Steam Gardens Remix
Schubert
Illusion - Lzls
Ride of the Valkryies - Wagner
The Marriage of Figaro - Mozart
Rainbow Cruise (SSBM)
Moonlight Sonata - Beethoven
D E S E R T - Lzls
In the Hall of the Mountain King - Grieg (Kevin MacLeod)
Game Over Remix - GameChops

[@DoritoTime]

The fact that Ken's list from 2005 ended up being the final stage list shows how ahead of his time he was

[@kamjamrox]

yes

[@coolguy02536]

Cpt. -Obvi- Falcon over here

[@MyPlaylistWillSaveAmerica]

There’s a way to know the nature of the world where you just know what the rules are.

[@tempatchtheveryweird3665]

Ahead of his time to a boring stage list

[@moeski17]

@@tempatchtheveryweird3665 Do people really want the other stages? I'm not that deep into the melee scene to know.

[@Wither1224]

This is a very roundabout way to say that you want Poke Floats unbanned

[@Greendogblue]

pls unban it

[@duderino6171]

Best stage in the game.

[@Oldschoolgamer13]

Best casual stage ever made.

[@uponeric36]

Poke floats and Fzero would unironically be so hype. It's that right mix of chaos without pure randomness that I think actually would bring out more skill expression from players.

[@nickq8093]

​@@uponeric36...or it'd destroy mid tier relevancy because of circle camping. The stage is simply too big and difficult to maneuver around for a lot of the cast.

[@random1234da]

Ken really had the vision. Crazy he had the first mention of the modern stagelist.

[@dddmemaybe]

He prolly cared more than others for the rules.

[@spencercox9317]

That's one way to put it 🤷‍♂️

[@Flip-a-dip-dip]

King of Smash

[@dn22pkkdd476]

A vision of boredom and no creativity.

[@bungusmcchungus]

@@dn22pkkdd476 Camping and wall infinites are widely known to be the most creative way to play Melee

[@DerkDurski]

The absolute whiplash of emotions I went through from 29:19 thinking "oh it's funny that it's such a small number" to "wait why is it panning over? 30 GAMES?" to "why is it still panning? THREE HUNDRED?" to instantly back to "oh just 3 games" again was insane

[@BusGoesRound]

Literally did the exact same thing

[@MajoradeMayhem]

"Are we supposed to be playing best of 3 or best of 5?" "I dunno, more Melee is better." "True dat." I love that they are having so much fun they can't keep score and just blindly keep going.

[@ivolopez-felix5270]

Seriously though!

[@kylekiske_]

I don't get it. Why play 10 matches of Mario Party when you could just play like 5 Kinda wasting the TOs time

[@carolj7191]

@@kylekiske_ one thing is for sure, the tournament organizers set up these events because they absolutely HATE melee. more than that, the advertisers want to make sure people watch the event for as little as possible. i heard a few guys ended up homeless they were so ruined by those occasional best-of-fives

[@FritzyBeat]

It's fitting that at The Big House 11 when Juggleguy brought back Kongo 64 for doubles people thought it was gonna be a big deal and that it would compromise the integrity of the tournament, only for no one to pick it. It seems to this day the only thing keeping it out of our rulesets, is the fact that no one wants to play on it, heh.

[@rannynihilius8481]

You me Ganondorf Peach on Kongo if you want the reason it's gone lol :)

[@isaacargesmith8217]

In reality they FEAR the power of the crystal coconut

[@insertcolorherehawk3761]

Kongo 64 for Doubles was counterpick legal for the longest time because Fountain couldn't be used in doubles due to performance issues

[@insertcolorherehawk3761]

@@rannynihilius8481 in Doubles? nah, that's irrelevant, it was legal even into the late 2010s, if not the the early 2020s

[@KetsubanSolo]

​@@insertcolorherehawk3761 they don't want DK to shower them in coconut cream pies

[@trueblueryu5713]

Nice that we got the segment about ChuDat and his methods during the old ages of Melee. The documentary only featured a lot of behind the scenes details with him, or some of the instances where he lost to the other pros back then, so it made his presence feel minimal. This was a nice way to fill in some of the gaps with his time in the scene.

[@AutumnReel4444]

He has always been my favorite player. An absolute clown, who knew how to buckle down and play like his life depends on it.

[@Splozy]

2nd best player in the world, forever

[@jeremiahbaugh8195]

Right behind hanky panky

[@RobertJW]

​@@AutumnReel4444 It sounds like Ken's gimmick was "Better than everybody" and ChuDat's was "Better than you".

[@gamemaster2819]

Although a lot of fans want Poké Floats back, I get the feeling Sakurai and the Smash team aren't a big fan of the stage, which is why it never returned It was actually quickly scrapped together using models from Pokémon Stadium into a nonsensical stage. In Japan, it was called Pokémon Subspace, so it was just a wierd concept. Theming it into a parade themed stage was actually just a really good localization change. The original intended second Pokémon stage was actually going to be Sprout Tower from Gold and Silver, but this is what ended up happening.

[@RobertJW]

The fact that the stage uses Stadium models explains why it looks less polished than it feels like it should.

[@uponeric36]

Sakurai still remembers the time he didn't make the screen shake at the end of a kirby game. I like to imagine for every frustration players have felt, Sakurai has felt it 20 times over.

[@gamemaster2819]

​@@uponeric36I agree with your belief on Sakurai. We're always our own worst critics

[@gamemaster2819]

​​@@RobertJW​​The Poké Ball Pokémon also use models from the stadium games. Fortunately, they blend in well enough because they were very detailed in those games (due to not having to build big worlds and have a lot of enemies, they coukd spend more processing power on more polygons), as well as the NPC mons using limited moves requiring less animation.

[@RobertJW]

@@gamemaster2819 But where did the 2D sprites from the first game's Pokeballs and Silph Co tower come from?

[@metamayto]

"Attendees were more likely to fall off a cliff than play on Kongo Jungle" Adding this to my daily vocab

[@x3ln0ng1d7]

The sheer vitriol that he has for Brinstar is hilarious. Very well placed, but hilarious nonetheless

[@SoraDonaldGoofy99]

Still think it looks cool and occasionally play on it myself, but yeah, even as a non-tournament player, not good for serious fights like in a pro setting.

[@tortle1055]

It was not fair but it was balanced

[@nahor88]

I would personally be in favor of allowing those stages depending on how far apart characters are on the tier list, and the seeding of the respective players. Link is one of my mains, and I used to take high tiers to Brinstar as a counter-pick, often with good results. The combination of the acid and high ceiling were amazing in helping Link survive longer against Fox, Falco and Marth, and you can use the acid to help combo with projectiles.

[@eightcoins4401]

@@SoraDonaldGoofy99 Its kinda the fallacy of trying to play a *PARTY GAME*e as a competitive fighting game to begin with. Its like trying to make mario kart a realistic simulation driving game.

[@leaffinite2001]

​@@eightcoins4401 ok man we get its a party game big whup

[@joeflaherty1909]

That bit with the giant 3 dropping into the screen absolutely killed me holy shit

[@teacookieYT]

Same here 🤣 I don’t know how to explain it precisely, but stuff like that is one of my favorite types of humor.

[@pokeperson1000]

When it started slowly shifting to the left, at first I thought is was going to become a double or triple digit number. XD

[@hiimemily]

​@@pokeperson1000 "Wait, thirty? WAIT THREE HUNDRoh."

[@lemonlime8949]

Ugly pfp

[@linkkicksu]

The year is 20XX Every stage but one has been 'Loganned' out of existence because the random element of players picking stages is unfair, so we only play FD now. The final Logan picks Fox, his opponent picks Marth, and Logan unplugs his controller. "The players being able to pick any character they want is unfair and adds randomness to the game. We should all play fox." **The year is 20XX**

[@leaffinite2001]

The melee fan reads the comment and laughs, "haha what a silly joke." The melee hater reads this comment and laughs, "haha thats exactly what competitive players want!"

[@MrDevilRays]

I know this is kind-of a copypasta, but there's no way spacies would ever let FD be the last legal stage

[@cheddyh4032]

@@MrDevilRays ban fd it's already 60 40

[@henryreturns1397]

So pretty much Ken is beyond GOATED. Did not just dominated early , but also have a vision on competitive and was not okay on winning base on cheese and gimmicks. He wanted to win fair and square with the most neutral stages , 0 gimmicks , 0 cheese , just pure skills ! Also Ken won tournies over PC Chris and others competitors by counter picking Mute City lmao

[@saratoga6663]

you do what you have to to win, if its allowed then go for the cheese

[@henryreturns1397]

@@saratoga6663 A lot of players went for the cheese so that stage gets banned. - Armada went all his counter picks to Mute City cuz he was like "These americans are stupid looooool" - PPMD on rainbow cruise "I am gonna camp the camp master lmao" - Pink Shinobi : "I am gonna camp your ass for the whole game to proof this stage is stupid" - And much more examples lol.

[@skalty9868]

@@saratoga6663….which is why he wanted it disallowed

[@grdfhrghrggrtwqqu]

Ken is not a GOAT. Pushing to ban stages because it hurts your main is nothing short of short-sighted bias. There's a reason he was known for fun-cancelling, because he was too afraid to be cancelled and take an L.

[@RedRemover5000]

Adapting and overcoming is a skill.

[@SSB_Seal]

18:33 Melee players don't want to play important matches with who? 😢 Anyway WOOOO NEW MELEE STATS MAIN CHANNEL VIDEO WE'RE SO BACK!!!

[@emmbeesea]

Hey hey hey, they didn't include the "SSB" at the beginning, so you're all good. 😁

[@SSB_Seal]

@@emmbeesea Phew 😅

[@JohnSmith-fe3di]

As someone who played competitively for about 7 years from late 2003-2010 or so it was a lot of fun watching the game evolve. A lot of people were clueless when I would counterpick rainbow cruise sometimes. I also remember having to play brinstar in pools and absolutely hating it… it got to the point where I eventually started hating FD too because of all the chain grabbing and battlefield because of the stupid edges. Just stadium, yoshis, fountain and dreamland were the ones I preferred.

[@nahor88]

Stadium is just as annoying with the transformations and weird edges. I only put up with going there in Slippi where it's frozen.

[@JohnSmith-fe3di]

Just the mountain transformation was kinda annoying but I guess I can see your point.

[@Shiradrenaline]

The Kongo Jungle games out of 635 had me belly laughing, thank you so much. Crazy that two of the three games were with biggest ticket names! And a tremendous blast to the past with ChuDat and Ken. Ken truly was a visionary. Melee Moments just did a great vid about Mute City specifically, too, what with Off Season. Kongo 64 still my favorite stage for party play btw. So it'll never die for me. Great video, thank you.

[@eneada2618]

my favorite one is PPMD getting Rainbow Cruised banned lmao

[@FrostburnICS]

as an unbiased fox main i think it's so sad that pokefloats got banned 😢

[@jameshalldorsson9695]

This was a fantastic short film, it had humor, sensuality, historical accuracy, the whole spectrum of emotions tied up with a nice little bow on top. What a gift to the community.

[@Dave_Chrome]

Sensuality? When

[@misfire33]

​@@Dave_Chrome IDK bout you but I was bricked up the whole way through brother

[@elemangell2981]

This was way funnier than a competitive stage mini doc had any right to be. Fantastic editing on this too! Always a treat to see high-quality platform fighter content.

[@KRDsonic]

Brawl had a similarish thing going on at the same time as melee when it came to stage bans. A lot of stages that were legal initially were legal because melee had similar ones. Stages slowly got chopped off either because people didn't want to play on them or they just weren't good competitively. But then there was the issue that people had to deal with that the only thing that was holding ice climbers back from being top tier was that they were so easy to counterpick. Brinstar and Rainbow Cruise were both legal which meant you could always take them to at least one of the two. But then on the other side, those stages were stupidly good for Meta Knight, who was already the best character in the game. So it was basically a case of TOs having to decide between allowing meta knight to be even stronger, or making ice climbers stronger when most people hated them.

[@SmashCentralOfficial]

The Arwing Rest is still one of the coolest moments ever

[@bizboy6036]

I miss the days kongo 64 was allowed for teams. That is until until those "objectors" would start air camping with peach/puff in protest instead of forfeiting

[@nathanelwood5312]

Funny you say this, but it was legal at Big House 11 and my doubles partner and I took our first opponents exactly there. We were MERCILESSLY camped by a Captain Falcon hopping between the top platforms. Never again.

[@thoparchive6154]

😅

[@Appletank8]

Bring Rishi's Jungle Jam back

[@KeithCarterEOG]

As a viewer, I'd looooove to see more maps in these battles. The more chaotic, the better!

[@jrodd13]

God these videos are so well made. Chefs kiss honestly editing was god tier and that cliff joke at the end was funny as shit

[@GDRhythmic]

I kind of love how people just ran with the goofy stages and had a good time with them never taking it too seriously. I guess it makes sense why people don't do that as much anymore though since there is money on the line.

[@lollol9598]

Anitra’s dance (Grieg) is called Beethoven sonata no.23 in the description

[@burgerminus9390]

21:01 “PPMD has accomplished the unthinkable: being even lamer than Mew2King.” Best part of the video by far

[@IdkImNotCreative-mh4uo]

Can’t believe I spent half an hour watching a video on the competitive scene of a game I’ve never even played

[@Noxxa]

18:39 can't believe you guys would do Seal like this

[@GlitchanBlack]

Can't believe you would misspell Seel.

[@MilkJugA_]

Honestly I can see some of these Donkey Kong stages to be legal if pokemon stadium is legal

[@ryrin6091]

You're a great storyteller. The editing, writing, and way you tell the story are all really well done. Way too good for only having 29k subs.

[@ISuckAtMelee]

This is some of the funniest melee content I've seen in a while

[@x9x9x9x9x9]

I hope someday nintendo will just back the hell up and we can use custom stages from the stage expansion pack. Fourside, onnet, green greens, etc... these are all great stages in the expansion. Awesome video as always BTW. Also thank you patrons you guys are what make content like this possible and get some players to majors for our entertainment.

[@Bikrant50]

When the world needed them most Melee Stats came back with a banger

[@krubbington]

Very interesting video!! I guess I never really thought about the process of how the current stagelist came to be and just assumed that it was always these 6 stages. I never would have thought that people would be upset at the prospect of stages like Mute City being banned; the fact that the gimmicky stages were even given a chance to begin with just show how much Melee has changed over time. While I'm not a huge follower of Melee's scene, I can appreciate videos like these.

[@kitty207038]

This was so well done. Outstanding content, I'm excited to see what else you come out with 💕

[@jman2050]

Don’t let this wonderful, well produced documentary distract you from the fact that we must LEGALIZE POKE FLOATS

[@zRunes]

It's a good day when a new melee doc drops

[@lkjkhfggd]

Are you saying that if Fox was unable to shine combo characters off the stage or infinitely against a wall, then a bunch of stages may not have been banned? Or would they have been banned anyways? I know a few other characters can also infinite against a wall, like Pikachu and Link, but couldn't we have just made a rule where you can't do that? We made it a rule where you can't wobble, so I don't see why you can't do that here as well. I feel like with such a rule, there's a handful of stages that could be fine (Peach's castle, Corneria, Onett, Venom, Fourside). As a viewer, I find it super hype when a match is on a stage that isn't the currently unbanned ones. Any way to add more variety is a win imo.

[@btf_flotsam478]

Many of those stages probably would have gotten banned anyway. Unless you banned all combos that reliably dragged you to the side, someone would do it. It is worth noting that most of the stage bans focused on one character, however. I guess it's worth noting how similar it is to Brawl: one of the games has a character so braindead that everyone has a decent version in their pocket and has had that character's main technique ban stages seemingly singlehandedly, while the other one had Meta Knights that didn't shark all the time.

[@nickq8093]

Nah walled stages would be banned regardless because approaching over a wall is a really shit position to be in (is why you see people waiting out stadium transformations) and the characters who can exploit it the best are already some of the best chars in the game. It's actually a bigger reason for their ban than fox infinite, people just tend to over-emphasise the latter.

[@john-ym5he]

you’re a great story teller! shout out to the editor!

[@austinwilcox9290]

I wish there was more tournaments played with an expanded stage list, very fun to watch

[@OcaOca]

Man this was beautiful story telling of a beautiful history of a beautiful game

[@PookeTard]

Loved the little kongo jungle montage very beautifully edited.

[@godly74]

Wow great vid! It reminded me a lot of Jon Bois' old videos. Good stuff

[@ThePika78]

People who compare speeding cars with raising and dropping platforms, share some of that good stuff you smokin' 🚬

[@alastairchong4824]

beautiful vid, can't wait for the naysh to watch it!

[@WBRI_Brianless]

Been wanting this video made for a while, excellent

[@cullenlatham2366]

ok, the entire segment on genesi2 was masterfully edited. Even without knowing the punchline i couldnt help but laugh throughout it just from the over-dramatization of the math leading to an obvious subversion.

[@palatonian9618]

This was honestly so good. It was riveting and beautiful

[@YourLocalNobody420]

Miss this channel man, so high quality

[@RagingKarma2]

But the real question is. Did 2 players from genesis 2 fall off a cliff?

[@MrSoup1]

I still think kongo jungle should be at the weird kids table

[@stevenbahena5956]

Good video. Love the music you put in it.

[@wiliamarmstrong1294]

Love the conclusion so much. It’s so simple and sweet idk it makes me happy.

[@selfbane99]

This must be one of the best videos ive ever seen.

[@deplorabledegenerate2630]

I've always wanted to infiltrate a smash tournament and turn items on.

[@quantumsessays4817]

Was literally just telling my friends about Melee Stats hoping a new one would drop soon 👀

[@illwill42]

The mindset of "they brought it on themselves by playing ganondorf" has never sat well with me. Bro gave him the works and still gets clowned on just because of the character he chose lol

[@TheZogeking]

Exceptionally good video. Thank you so much.

[@pacificguardian]

chudat simply cannot stop hustling

[@alexmoskowitz811]

The sound design in this is excellent 🎉

[@donkylefernandez4680]

"Logan hated the randomly moving platforms" Can we get a Mew2Check on that?

[@donkylefernandez4680]

I forgot Green Greens or whatever it's called existed but I remember seeing so many matches on that stage. I must be thinking of the smash 4 stage

[@Prodigial]

16:32 As a Peach player, I have always talked about Mute City coming back lol. It's insane that floaties really don't have a TRUE counterpick stage. Dreamland 64 is the best we've got given the blast zones, but the stage is so huge you can get camped real easy. The ideal legal stage for floaties would be Yoshi's Story with the blast zones of Dreamland 64, but it doesn't exist. Marth gets FD, Fox is insane on literally every stage, Falco gets Yoshi's, and floaties get nothing. It's funny to think about how this affects matchups. Mute City being legal would be a nerf to fast fallers and a buff for floaties. Stage selection has a HUGE impact on character viability which I think is always an interesting discussion.

[@winterwarden]

That genesis 2 part was a slow burn but the editing for the end made it all worth it

[@jorhey9346]

Great video! The game count part really felt like it dragged on though definitely think that could've been cut up or sped up in some way

[@aared]

This had such great delivery

[@Moss_Dude]

That was a rather beautiful video

[@LazyLee]

Great video mr stats

[@kittytakes4991]

I remember at my first tournament Silent Wolf had to play 1 game of grand finals on Kongo Jungle lmao

[@fernando47180]

Very interesting subject matter, and good narrative and voice over quality. Only thing I could ask is that you try to balance the volume of the music and your voice over a bit better. I'm having a hard time hearing you over some of the music, and I think that's a shame. Thanks for the video!

[@marcorodriguez8792]

9:20 damn. That hit me hard. I remember when I first saw that. Memories...

[@kyleolson8977]

"Think of stages like extreme Tennis courts" In fact, there are four top level professional Tennis (ITF) court surfaces with different play characteristics: Grass, Artificial Grass, Clay, and Hard (Acrylic), and ITF surfaces not used at top level play, Concrete, Asphalt and Carpet. All real tennis courts are the same size. The amount of the court used is larger in doubles play. I'm not a Tennis player, but I know enough to fill in the blanks I didn't know. As a side note, the beach footage you have is not Tennis, it is Badminton (I assume. I can't quite see what they are hitting). It would be impossible to play Tennis in anything but brick-like sand or water because the ball needs to bounce on every volley. It would be roughly like playing Basketball in the water. You can't dribble.

[@Blundabus1337]

People always talk about M2K and Hungrybox and Mango and Armada being gods, but PPMD was one too, but a different kind. Like a god of chaos. You might be able to stomp him on FD, but he'd just counter pick something weird and then proceed to make you look like a fool.

[@El_Omar2203]

I really like your use of classical music in this video

[@maplestory403]

love all the FFX music!

[@treehann]

The only true terrible stage is Brinstar Depths. Fuck that stage, even as a kid i hated playing on it

[@CERTAIND00M]

That might be the most incriminating 3 in the history of moving pictures. I've never glared harder at a single digit in my whole life. Well done.

[@tannerwallace7231]

I appreciate the amount of extra sets in Genesis 2.

[@mariepookie]

This made my oatmeal double on taste, amazing video

[@pacoramon9468]

I miss when tennis was played in wood and carpet, at least we still have clay as a fun surface.

[@turndownforwalt]

GOOD VIDEO

[@M4C3W1]

Always a fan of these videos… u guys are like the Jon Bois of the melee community. Wont be long before you guys start making hour long documentaries on the most unfortunate players in melee history or something lol

[@rosa28373]

MANGO USED TO BE A JIGGLYPUFF MAIN!!!111!!!!??????

[@ProSurviver]

i miss changing pokemon stadium, yeah it had some glitchy and weird stuff but it added variety

[@btf_flotsam478]

Note: the Mozart piece without a given name is the overture to "The Marriage of Figaro".

[@Tomatoffel]

bro finaly i realy wanted to know for a long time why some stages are banned

[@jsrsd]

insane to look at this like that, the early part of this vid is like looking into a lost or alternate history. beautiful

[@joshuakelly8266]

This is super interesting. As someone who only played smash casually, I always kinda wondered why people threw a fit at certain stages while, say in tekken, stages have different properties but are all legal. This helps a bit tho

[@skii_mask_]

THIS WAS SO GOOD!!!!!

[@pivotguydc1149]

when talking about Kongo at Genesis 2 and the 3 moved to the left side of the screen as the music went frantic made me think you were going to put 300

[@jean-francoislamothe9988]

Rainbow cruise is an awesome stage and i will die on this hill!

[@tamedbumble1348]

NEW MELEE STATS LETS GO

[@zdelrod829]

Ken not only brought us to the modern list, but had to put up with Chudat's Pokefloat counterpick (that set happened a little bit before my 1st birthday). I would love to see Ken come out of retirement and face chudat one last time, all these years later.

[@RedRemover5000]

Very well edited, informational, and well-scripted video. Personally, I view the story as being more of one of an institutional capture by players who favored one playstyle to create a ruleset that, while having the appearance of neutrality, served the purpose of favoring their preferred playstyle at the expense of others. In my view, the effect of those changes was that they made other playstyles less viable, which convinced players who would rather play differently to mostly either join them or leave the game, which is why it becomes increasingly insular even in the age of viable online play. I'm sure fox mains that like to blaster spam then rushdown are convinced Melee is as strong as it could possibly be (given its age and lack of official support), but the game having a ruleset that specializes towards that playstyle (even if the popular version of it I'm appealing to here is an exaggeration, which it is) makes it conversely less variable and therefore less interesting to outsiders. Speaking for myself, I'd rather see occasional matches of "lame" play than see the same matchups played the same way for a whole tournament.

[@csdgay]

when i saw the three slide to the left i thought it was gonna be 300 for second

[@noesunyoutuber7680]

I honestly had no idea that stages other than Final Destination were even allowed in Smash tournaments, I just assumed it was the accepted no-frills balanced option.

[@Welpidk]

29:32 seeing the 3 move over damn near made my heart drop, there’s no way they played it 300 times. Then the reveal made it so funny

[@01iviaa]

29:39 implies that 4+ genesis 2 attendees fell off a cliff.....can anyone explain