Brawls to the Walls

I've been checking out the Official Smash Bros. Brawl website pretty religiously since they started doing their daily updates, and I gotta say, no matter how piddly or nonsensical the additions to the game have been so far, I've been chomping at the bit.

Even when it's as simple a change as the ability to bounce off your opponents' heads or the inclusion of a character NOBODY BUT ME REMEMBERS, I can't help but feeling excited. You read a few of the Game Developer's blog posts, and you get the feeling that this series is still in very good hands.

My friends and I got into a second-wind of Melee recently, probably as a result of the Countdown to Brawl. No one seems to appreciate my decision to play primarily as characters who are complete douchebags. If I'm in the mood to win, however, I'll stick to Yoshi, Fox, and Link, although I'm just now starting to appreciate the joy of playing with Zelda.

What's most impressive about the new game are claims that it will be ONLINE COMPATIBLE, meaning you'll be able to Smash around the world at a moment's notice. More shocking is that today's update indicates that the Single Player portion of the game might derivate from previous iterations in that it won't suck balls. Based on the mini-trailer, it's clear that the main story revolves around some cheap coliseum tryst between Nintendo's Original Closeted Duo: Mario and Kirby. God, upon hearing that his favorite mascots are befouling their loins with the love that dare not speak it's name (Voldemort), sends his Apocalyptic Warship to smite Nintendoland, Sodom and Gomorrah style. Zelda, sensing that her friends' Boystown antics have been found out, stops chastising Peach for being a beard and rushes to the scene of the crime, only to find that the prophesies were true, Skylab really has gone operational.

It's a little less linear than traditional Nintendo story-telling, but at least it's better than that one Final Fantasy game where it turned out you were the dream of a fictional country or whatever.