Contrary to popular belief, Melee is not dead.
Being at EVO is the most important thing in fighting games, at least from the outside looking in.
And in any other franchise, a newer, flashier sequel almost always replaces the older title at EVO.
But not in Smash.
Eighteen years after its launch, Melee is still, in the eyes of its players, the perfect Smash game. As far as the Melee community is concerned, it’s their game, and they have no intention of letting it go.
Written by Dimitri Pascaluta (@DPascaluta)
Edited by Sebastien Martin-Schultz (@wusomusic)
Hosted by Daniel Rosen (@Daniel_Rosen)
Graphics by Christian Pearson (@Chr_Pearson)
Footage Courtesy:
Music used under license from Associated Production Music LLC (”APM”).
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43 comments
5:40 sm4sh and melee to EVO Ultimate destroy the fan bases and melee survives to other tournaments
Hopefully the next smash game won’t be a new one but will be a remake of melee with more balance, different characters, and different stages. They could add characters that are already in ultimate like wolf, dedede, meta knight, wario, and olimar, then add characters that aren’t in ultimate like geno and probably banjo kazooie
It is dead
Someone said EVO gonna smell good now ??
While obviously its not goin anywhere overnight (thats a ridiculous notion), but if you ask me, this is sorta the start. Albiet, its a very….very slow start, but a start all the same
EVO wash the salt off your mirror!
Yes it does
It’s BS that “games can’t buy their way into evo”
Imagine if the Tekken community was like “We want the first Tekken Tag!” and the SF community was like “We want SF2!”
LIVING TOPH
1000th comment
Every game withers and gets replaced. Do you still see Street Fighter 2 in there? Tekken 3? Soul Calibur 2? Just move on.
Why do people get mad about UNIST when they should be mad at Samurai Shitshow getting in? It's not even out, and it looks like a far more generic and boring SFV, which is impressive.
7:31 is that melee elitist who rags on others for liking ultimate more than melee but still expects the smash community to support them when it gets bad
I glad that under night in birth earned it earned their Evo 2019 main stage spot. Melee had nine years on main stage. As a Guilty Gear player under night is amazing game.
the live chat replay is a scrub quotes goldmine
Boycott evo, tournaments are run in bad formats (unless you’re street fighter, cause that means evo cares about you) with their Bo3 up to winners finals
Yooo they should TOTALLY bring back divekick
Melee fans are upset they aren't in EVO, but here I am wishing I had $17k 6 years ago to get the chance to be at a major.
-a sad Skullgirls fan
Buy-ons are 100% a thing in any entertainment industry and that is how it works. "I know the guys and I've heard them say you can't buy your way on." Yeah sure ok buddy sounds legit
Sh-sh-shhhhh… but what if we just said it was dead?
Honestly the only people that think melee is dead are outsiders who haven't been part of the scene and part of the struggle.
It's hard to side with the Melee community, when they wanted to ban Jigs just because Hungry Box was the #1 player.
Anyone who thinks Ultimate is a "sincere successful attempt at uniting Smash 4 and Melee" has no idea what their talking about, and doesn't play Melee lol. For starters, there is no jump momentum. You know, the mechanic in Mario Bros. where you can run to jump further? It is a huge part of what Melee is and gives it so much of it's movement, speed and combos. Well it's gone. They didn't bother to program it, so Ultimate has Crash Bandicoot platforming instead. No jump momentum, no edge cancelling attacks, no perfect pivots, no true dash dance, no wavedash, no waveland, no push off, no running through your opponents (which is important for stage control and to cross up/mix up on shield), less hitstun, no l cancelling, no tech chase throws ( less nuanced grab game, less di traps), no real ledges. In Melee if you win stage control, you can grab the ledge to force your opponent to have to mix up their recovery over you, rewarding you with punish game. That's gone, so now everyone can grab the ledge always, so they fade back and recover low out of harms way (but not as bad as 4), magnetic ledges, the lack of the fastfaller dynamics, and much less utility and technical uses for moves.
Take Captain Falcon, in Melee he's a super unique character. He has a lot of airial drift that he uses with jump momentum to cover a lot of distance with his short hops. He uses this with his aerials which have, a double hit, crouch cancel break, juggle, and weak/strong hit knee to start combos . He can also tech chase throw an opponent to open them up an begin using those tools. Everything synergies. Then you look at Captain Falcon in Ultimate. All the mechanics that made his entire playstyle and gameplay are now gone. His variety and character are gone. He just plays exactly like every other character, but with Captain Falcon moves.
Melee is a very different game with a lot more going on mechanically. A lot of Nintendo fanboys will say things like "Nintendo is finally trying to unite the communities and appealing to Melee players". They said the exact same thing about Smash 4 when it came out, and it isn't true. So please stop saying things like Melee players can just "move on" to the new game now because Ultimate magically offers the same experience. It doesn't, not even close lol.
Ultimate killed Melee as an esport but not as a game. I will always love Melee
No, but it’s the start of the decline
I'm a bit late to the party on this, but there is a few things I want to make clear, as a fan of fighting games, and video games in general:
– Melee isn't dead, and odds are it won't be in the near future.
– EVO staff don't deserve the unbridled rage that Melee nuts gave them. They have their reasons for dropping the game, whatever they may be, and if this year pulls in lower numbers, then there is always next year.
– Samurai Shodown and Mortal Kombat 11, while not released yet, are expected to have a at least a decent turnout due to both games history with the FGC and old guard/potential new blood coming in for them.
– No game is safe at EVO. Mahvel got kicked off, so anything goes. Even SF, if the community had a hard fallout, could get kicked off.
– An EVO Classic/Retro EVO would be fucking awesome, since that would satisfy the fans of all the old classics, CvS2, Mahvel 2, 3rd Strike, SCII, and yes, even Melee. I think the EVO staff did say they heard about people asking for it, so maybe somewhere down the road that could happen
The fact that 2 of the games on the lineup haven't even been released yet is fucking ridiculous. No one knows if those are gonna be good games or not, how balanced they'll be or anything like that. And tekken and street fighter get a guaranteed place every year because they are legacy games, just like melee. Also, no gives 2 shits about soul caliber anymore so why is it there too
Yes it does. Give it up and let it die.
Melee isn't fun to watch and just ends up taking up space at most tournies it's featured at. Same ol' faces at the winners podium, same ol' characters, same ol' joke.
Just let it go guys. IT had an amazing run but it's time to move on. And take a shower or something, I know it's the meme that Melee players don't wash themselves but no fooling it feels like a lot of people just don't take care of themselves at tournaments, and that goes for everyone from people just coming to watch the show to active participants in any of the games, but it does feel like the few times I've watched Melee live I've always felt like I needed another shower and a gas-mask or something.
melee is trash
RIP MELEE
Evo is dead without melee.
literally bought UNIST because of EVO. i'm pretty hype about seeing this game on the big screen
So fucking stupid.
hugs hating on unist was so wack
Why is the smash community ( and especially melee holy shit ) always fucking whining when something even vaguely doesn't go their way..
Evo was made to preserve the classics… and yet they got rid of every classic game in their line up lol. Used to respect Evo, but honestly once they got rid of all classic games they just became another tournament… nothing special about it. They just turned into something the original creators didnt want. Kinda sad to see people put their lives to make a tournament to preserve classic games to only have it turn into the opposite… fuk you Evo, shouldn't have dropped Marvel Vs Capcom, SF2, and all those good old games
Funny how people are complaining about certain titles “buying” their way into evo when the melee community had to buy their way into evo to get started, though replace the word buy with donating to charity. (Though I would’ve preferred Melee over Samurai Showdown cause that game looks way to generic)
I'm more excited to watch Samurai Shodown than any other game at EVO this year. I wouldn't have watch melee anyway, I've seen it year after year and it gets tiring watching the same tiny few characters used every tournament over and over year after year.
Lmao Hungrybox
You know whats crazy and ironic?
Melee will probably out live Ultimate. Even if it gets 800 views on twitch after 5 years.
Finally…
They had to due to how bad the Melee players smelled.