64 > Brawl > Melee here. Honestly, the only reason that 64 ranks so high up there is because even with everything that could possibly be enhanced and tightened, nothing matches up to that manic WTF feeling that Smash 64 seemed to get perfectly. Brawl came the closest though.
As for me putting it up over Melee, I'd say it's because it had a better sense of balance (in b4 a picture of MetaKnight or Snake) and scale. There's never a moment where things feel like they're moving too fast for their own good (a complaint I used to hear a lot with the non tournament crowd). That faster and more precise level of play is now (even moreso) up to the skill level of the opponents in the ring rather than who knows the better exploits. Keep in mind this is my preference speaking. There is never a moment when I put away Brawl and play a different game or Smash 64 over it. That happened to me numerous times while playing Melee and I will never understand why. Brawl simply manages to keep things more lively and energetic it seems.
If you want to talk mechanics, whether stage, character or in general, again in my opinion, Brawl easily has the best set of them. Items had solid and satisfying physics again when compared to Melee's "bucket of bricks" throwing physics, I didn't feel bad when playing as any specific characters and winning with them due to brokenness (Fox & Falco in Melee, I'm looking at both of you), and the level designs while bland at first, have grown on me quite a lot. Sure, as a Smash veteran, I was a bit miffed at the loss of a few things, such as L canceling (didn't care much for wave/dash dancing) but hey, you work with what you've got. Meanwhile, if you focus solely on what was lost and don't experiment, you won't find things in this game that will appeal to you and might even work better for you and your play style than in Melee.
My only gripes with the game come from the online mode and the diversity of the character roster. Granted, as of now lag isn't such a terrible problem for me due to messing with the Wii's wireless settings and my router, there are still instances where a slight input delay have cost me matches that I've done brilliantly in otherwise. You would think that by now, there would have been an overhaul on the infrastructure used for Brawl so that matches would run more smoothly, but then again, something like that doesn't seem plausible for the future.
As for the character roster itself, Nintendo played it very conservatively in terms of diversifying the characters. Lyn should damn well have been playable. She could have offered a different style of swordsmanship that Smash desperately needed. Saki is another one as well. Why couldn't he have been just like his AT, a nimble speeder with a crazy mix of short and long range prowess? Lil' Mac is another one, he's a [tornado fang]ing boxer, something that just screams interesting in the world of Smash. There are others though (Issac, Mike Jones, Takamaru, Lip, Ashley, Captain Syrup, Daisy, etc.). I guess what I'm trying to say for this part is, why is it that Brawl, that was supposed to be this hugely different game from Melee & 64 feels like it's trapped in the Melee days in terms of the roster? Why is it that Brawl didn't have more unique spell casters, witches and warlocks? Why do the Star Fox characters all still share heavy similarities?
Why the [tornado fang] does Ganondorf, the [chameleon sting]ing king of darkness, still play mostly like Captain Falcon? Does that even make sense? (Excluding his side special which is of one of the best and most fitting and creative moves for him imo
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I think Jiggy made a note of this in the Dojo Thread GAF had a while back (I wasn't a member back then) and it's the truth, there were characters that should have been in Brawl because they would have played wildly unlike anything that was in the series up until that point and there are characters in the game right now that feel like they still have so much more progression and potential for unique skills and play styles.
All in all, I have to say that those of you who were simply looking for Melee 2.0, I can understand why you would feel that Brawl was a disappointment. As for myself, while I will never say that it isn't without it's fair share of quirks and issues, I can definitely say that it is a different and more varied experience to me than Melee was.
And to end this rant on a fun note, Lucas and Ganondorf for God Tier.
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", or maybe more insightful things, this is the thread where we can let all those thoughts out and maybe impress one another with an idea.
