Comments 221

Re: Talking Point: #ThankYouSakurai For Smash Ultimate, Now He Should Choose His Own Path

FNL

Can anyone explain to me what Sakurai actually personally does with Smash Bros? He constantly laments how exhausted and burnt out he is, but from what I've been able to gather from interviews and articles, his duties are basically:

  • Sketches character designs
  • Uses an action figure to demonstrate poses he wants his team to create
  • Occasional playtesting
  • Occasional adjustments of hit boxes
  • General directing ("I want the up+B move to be ___, I want the throw move to look like ____")
  • Meetings and interviews
  • Data entry

People constantly talk about the pace he "puts himself through" and how its "killing him", but I just can't seem to find any evidence of this being true outside of his own hearsay. He's been working on the same game (and only that game) for almost a decade, why is this a grueling 80 hour a week job? I wish we'd talk more about what a fantastic job his team does.

Re: Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Final Fighter Is... Kingdom Hearts' Sora!

FNL

@NIN10DOXD

I'm not even that annoyed with Sora, because I do agree that I've seen his name requested for a long time, I'll concede that this one makes sense, but my god, the amount of anime characters that all have the same hair cuts, faces and weapons in this game is a bit much. You have enough of them to do a spin-off fighting series. Nintendo alone has such a rich history that they could have drawn from over many of the others.

Re: Random: Sakurai Seems To Be Finally Taking A Break From Smash Bros. Development, With The PS5

FNL

@somnambulance

"Do we know to what extent he played them or is it that he simply purchased them and booted them up?"

He bragged about how he played Death Stranding all the way through to 100% completion. And that's a LONG game. There's no way it was the only game he did that with. Gamers who 100% games don't just stop at one.

The more we learn about this guy, it seems he's less burnt out from "producing" Smash Bros for 10 years and more because he stays up all night playing Playstation.

Re: Random: Don't Worry About Masahiro Sakurai's Health, He's "Okay" Right Now

FNL

@Maxz ...Is this projection or something? You just wrote a multi-paragraph rant full of deranged psychological assessments of a random poster on the internet who said that they don't like that every article about Sakurai for the past 5 years is filled with him whining about something.

Yeah, I've been "complaining about him for years". But what that amounts to is when I read one of these articles, I remark something to the effect of "oh, here we go again", or "maybe if he hates working on Smash Bros so much, he should move on". I don't seek out his posts to complain. They routinely appear on the front page of this very website.

"You act liked you’re surprised that people haven’t been reading your posts on Sakurai’s stiff shoulders, but… who in their right mind would read them, let alone actually remember them?"

I see you're not particularly adept with sarcasm or tongue-in-cheek comments, either.

Take a break, my man.

Re: Random: Don't Worry About Masahiro Sakurai's Health, He's "Okay" Right Now

FNL

@Not_Soos
"Well to make it weirder, I haven't seen a single person complaining about Sakurai until this article."

You haven't been reading my posts, then. I've been complaining about him for years. Ever since I noticed that the guy literally can't give a single interview without whining about something or criticizing Smash fans. Worse, he often complains about how "tired" and "busy" he is, but then simultaneously brags about how, that same year, he played 242 Playstation games. And not just "played once and put away", he obsessively 100%'ed Death Stranding.

Re: Masahiro Sakurai Talks About The Beginnings Of Kid Icarus: Uprising

FNL

"A sequel to Uprising would be difficult" Sakurai stated, adding "I don't really remember how to make games anymore. I've been working on the same one for the past 10 years." He continued "but if you want someone to add a bunch of androgynous characters with swords as DLC to Uprising, I'm your man!"

Re: Random: Sakurai Doesn't Appreciate Being Featured In Some Memes

FNL

@HamatoYoshi By his own account in interviews, he's mentioned that his work on Smash Bros basically amounts to "supervising" everyone else's work, doing data entry when it comes to setting the values for hit boxes and such, and obsessively focusing on minute details like whether Fire Emblem Swordfighter #68 should wiggle their toes after their UP + B or shuffle 2 pixels to the left.

@Richnj "That's the equivalent of booting up a new game everyday while at work. Are we sure he wasn't just trying to find inspiration for post Ultimate content?"

I mean, sure, we could pretend that's what it is. But that hypothetical scenario is completely undone by his own interviews, where he has stated that he was "playing Death Stranding feverishly until the very end". Reasonably, we would have to assume that this wasn't the first and only game that he played all the way through to completion. Death Stranding is not a short game, either.

Re: Random: Sakurai Doesn't Appreciate Being Featured In Some Memes

FNL

@HamatoYoshi My favorite is how he's allegedly the "hardest working man in video games" and everyone is begging him "oh, please take a break, daddy Sakurai! You have given us so much, you deserve to rest!"

And yet he bragged about how he played over 240 Playstation games in a year that he spent complaining about how tired and near-death he was from working on Smash Bros. Somehow he found that time for that.

Re: Atelier Ryza Developer Clarifies Its Stance On Video Game Censorship

FNL

@XBontendo

Don't ask me, I agree. If you don't like something for whatever reason, then don't buy from them/listen to them/watch them, boycott them, whatever.

I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of the Right for screeching so much about "cancel culture" when they're the worst offenders of it. I wouldn't mock them for it if they didn't make such a big deal out of it.

Re: Atelier Ryza Developer Clarifies Its Stance On Video Game Censorship

FNL

@Sun-Wu_Goku

https://level.medium.com/white-conservatives-invented-cancel-culture-da69c0beaf3

https://theoutline.com/post/6140/a-brief-history-of-batshit-conservative-protests?zd=1&zi=bl742xcq

> when's the last time the Christian Right got anything banned?

Maybe not the Christian Right, but the Right in general is constantly protesting and trying to cancel things.

Starbucks, Disney, Star Wars, the NFL, Amazon, Nordstroms, Goodyear Tires, Target, NIKE, Netflix, Budweiser, Oreos, the list goes on and on.

https://www.businessinsider.com/conservatives-boycott-brands-keurig-nfl-starbucks-2017-11#starbucks-3

https://www.thedailybeast.com/all-the-things-you-can-no-longer-buy-if-youre-a-true-maga-trump-fan

The Right has historically been the worst offenders when it comes to cancel culture and boycotts. It expands beyond boycotts against products to boycotts against actual social and civil movements.

But ok, Hannity tells you the left is crazy so keep going on that narrative.

Re: Review: Arcade Archives Sunset Riders - Japan's Take On The Wild West Is A Must-Have On Switch

FNL

  • "A simple note that explains that certain depictions and sentiments are product of their time and might not be considered ok in 'current year', should be enough."

I think that would be an acceptable solution that would make sense to anyone on the left, no matter how far they fall from the center.

The problem is, though, that I don't think I've ever seen a right-winger actually bring a solution to the table in these discussions. The moment anyone even so much as mentions addressing something like racism, they turn into screeching toddlers, throwing tantrums about how the left wants to "censor" and "oppress" them. I'm not even sure that the right would go for your suggestion anyway. I mean, look at Twitter - right-wingers get content warnings placed on their tweets when they say something vile, racist or Islamophobic and they immediately accuse Twitter of "silencing conservative voices/opinions".

So basically the only option to please someone on the right is to leave the racism untouched and don't even have a warning about it.

Re: Skater XL Comes To Switch This Summer With Plenty Of Top Brand Apparel And Boards

FNL

Is this a skateboarding game or a game where you try on skateboarding apparel and then ride around showing it off?

This is a really bad trailer. I don't know anything about this game beyond "you can wear REAL BRANDS while you skate!"

What does it bring to the table as a skateboarding game? What sets it apart from all the others? What are your objectives?

Re: Panzer Dragoon: Remake Flies Onto Nintendo Switch Today, Physical Version Coming Soon

FNL

@Ron22

I can't speak for RPGamer, but I've had nothing but positive experiences with Limited Run Games...

When it comes to the STANDARD releases of their titles. When it comes to their collector's editions, they're complete failures. I'd wager only 10% of those editions actually make it into the hands of regular collectors, most of them end up with scalpers and bots, given that they have no measures in place to ensure that legitimate people can buy them. I've stopped bothering with any of their special editions because of the frequency of times that I've been trying to pay for my order when the item sells out WHILE IN MY CART.

Imagine going to Wal-Mart and being in the checkout line, then someone takes the game out of your hands, cuts in front of you in the line and the cashier lets them purchase it.

Re: Masahiro Sakurai Says "It's A Total Blank Slate" After He Finishes Smash Bros. Ultimate's DLC

FNL

If I were a betting man, I would say that he will go on to produce a game using the Smash Bros engine called Fire Emblem Fighters where it features an exclusive all Fire Emblem cast.

He will then complain ad nauseam about how he's so tired and overworked and only sleeps 2 hours a night and starves himself, only eating bits of paper that he finds on the ground and locks himself into a trunk for no apparent reason just so he could have something more to complain about, all the while bragging about how he somehow found the time to play 648 PS4 games in the same year.

Re: No Smash Ultimate DLC Expected Beyond Fighters Pass 2, No Future Smash Games Planned

FNL

Spoiler alert:

  • Fighters Pass 2 will have 5 Fire Emblem characters, 4 of them being swordfighters, the other being a sword/magic hybrid.
  • There will never be another Smash Bros game as Sakurai will move onto a new series called Fire Emblem Fighters where he finally achieves his dream of developing a strictly Fire Emblem game built on the Smash Bros engine.

Re: Rumour: Nintendo Wanted Sora In Smash Bros. Ultimate, But Got Rejected By Disney

FNL

@the_beaver

Nobody mentions anything about Master Chief? Haven't you seen the video? He's talking about introducing either Sora or Master Chief from Halo, when he says Nintendo already tried Sora and failed. Soooo Master Chief on Smash!

Fast-forward a few months...

Barmburr CUTS into the competition!
Barmburr, the sophisticated sword-fighter from Fire Emblem: Two Deuces joins Smash!

Sakurai: "I was very excited that Nintendo let me select Barmburr for Smash, he is one of my favorites. Did you know that Barmburr in Japanese is おなら which, when directly translated to English, is 'Master Chief'. However, because Halo owns the name 'Master Chief' in the United States and Europe for video-game media, we had to re-localize the name to avoid any trouble. Also, don't blame me for another sword-fighter, Nintendo wanted it! I swear! Ha ha ha!"

Re: Sakurai Knows Smash Bros. Has Too Many Fire Emblem Characters, But It's Nintendo's Fault

FNL

@SegaBlueSky So I take it you've never seen pictures of the man over the years and how as he gets older, his face gets more childlike?

And I never said he had nothing to do with Byleth's selection. All I said was that you were making wild assumptions about someone you don't even know, and unless you can answer the above I'm afraid you haven't convinced me otherwise.

I don't really care whether I've convinced you of anything or not. You're free to be another Sakurai zealot, just as I'm free to give my opinions of him. I'm not sure why you felt the need to stick your nose in here and start messing with me in the first place.

Re: Sakurai Knows Smash Bros. Has Too Many Fire Emblem Characters, But It's Nintendo's Fault

FNL

@SegaBlueSky

> but creating conspiracy theories about Sakurai and assuming he’s some kind of bizarre narcissist is just weird.

Yeah, it's totally crazy to think that a guy who is obsessed with plastic surgery and botox would be a narcissist. It's also soooo totally unbelievable that, as an admitted massive Fire Emblem fanboy, who regularly draws Fire Emblem fan art, would have a hand in bringing all of these Fire Emblem characters to his pet project franchise.

Thanks for your valuable input.

Re: Feature: The Most Expensive Retro Games For Nintendo Systems

FNL

One of my finest days as a retro game collector was when I purchased a loose copy of Little Samson at a church rummage sale for $12. They mistook it for a religious game because it was in a plastic tub with games like Bible Adventures and King of Kings. At the same sale, I also picked up TWO sealed copies of Super Noah's Ark 3D for SNES.