I'm back, after a VERY long time. Here's one reason why I don't go to vizzed anymore, or just about at all.

Alternate thread title: AI problems in all SSB games (Except SSB4)

Words capitalized where necessary!
Talking about level 9 CPUs where I talk about AI, and about the many bad cases of Brawl.

Many things wrong with all 3 current SSB games' AI, and a few fatal problems in brawl. (I will show 17 different issues)

Right before we begin, this was going to be a brawl problems thread, but it turned into AI flaws.



1. Speed... You're Too Slooooooooooow! (Melee to Brawl)

Smash 64: It is a little lame for N64 standards, slightly faster than brawl ( Note the revealed hint), but it's like Melee in many aspects.
Smash Melee: The speed is so quick for the reason why competitive play is so popular in Melee's fanbase. Just look at how fast Fox players can go, pressing so many different button combinations that it is almost impossible to tell what move Fox is doing without knowing how you can Short Hop Fast Fall L-cancel any aerials, not specials. The competitive scene is starting to die out since the game is 12 1/2 years old, but there are new players coming in to revive the game just a little longer.
Smash Brawl: It's now slower than the N64 game. Sakurai really knows how to screw with the fanbase for a popular fighting game series like if you thought of getting Falcon Punched. Not a problem, but HOW ABOUT 3!? So what does this have to do with competitiveness? Well, for one thing, it makes you suck at the first game if you play SSBM or SSBB too long. Even with many TAS videos on YouTube for SSBB that you could find by people such as chibiterasu17, brawl still looks slow. That can be unfortunate for SSBM fans back in early 2008 waiting for the game to come into America on March.


2. Air Dodging, now unrealisitic and stupid! (Melee to Brawl)

Smash 64: It was never possible to design this mechanic at the time of limits and such, but the good thing (not exactly...) is that fighting is more of defensive play than offense in many ways, such as being juggled with Utilt or Uairs, which are very easy common combos that are almost never used for combo startups.
Smash Melee: This new implemented air dodge sends you in the direction of the control stick the entire duration. It will throw you into helplessness so you need to fight back somehow when you try to come down. According to research on SmashWiki, uses for the air dodge were unintentionally discovered back in 2005 when tournaments did allow items in some rule sets, where a Luigi player attempted to catch an item being thrown at him, but he accidently air dodged into the ground attempting so. Imagine the reactions and surprises at the time. But still, 2005! The creator left it in on purpose because they didn't know the uses for air dodging into the ground until the time of developing Brawl. Uses for this air dodge became extremely useful in terms that Luigi, Ice Climbers, and Mewtwo need wavedashing for approaching, where the others needed it for some surprises and positioning their attacks, since it can double up as a mind game technique.
Smash Brawl: What a horrible joke this is... This air dodge can be used at any time, but the worst part is that you can't control the dodge, because it depends on your character's momentum, so wavedashing is impossible, all except for Yoshi's special technique called the "Dragonic Reverse", a psuedo-wavedash done by executing a double jump while moving and at just about the time when you start the jump, let go of the control stick and do a reverse "Egg Lay" by pressing the control stick away from the direction you're facing. The fact that this doesn't put you in helplessness at all makes it too easy to avoid comboes. In fact... there is NONE! (troll face)

3. Sudden Death stalling.

In the first Smash Bros game, if you were to go to sudden death and have 2 controllers untouched and have no items on, you can keep sudden death going non-stop. No bombs drop because it could've been never thought that people would soon discover sudden death stalling.
In Melee, bombs will drop, raining all over the stage, and some even spawn off the stage, but not above a ledgehogger ever. There are areas in stages where you can stand and never get hit without moving. Temple in the middle of the stage (you know, the big gap. ) is a good one, where it shows that after half a second of a bomb dropping down, it auto explodes.
In Brawl, they really do spawn on every possible area of any stage, excluding cleverly built custom stages. There are walk off stages that you can stand without death, such as Melee's Yoshi Island stage, or the Flat Zone II stage, or even the Bridge of Edlin, except that for the bridge stage, you have to jump over a horse guy that randomly comes and has a low chance of not actually hurting anyone who simply runs into him. If bombs could drop outside the normal stage boundaries and at an even faster rate in the next Smash Bros, I'll really get a laugh out of SSB3DS/WiiU.

4. Computer player AI is now more aggressive than ever!? STOP TAUNTING ME!!! Stop gang beating me up also!!!

In Smash 64, the AI didn't screw around with fighting for the fact that the CPU is capable of doing precise aiming with Yoshi's egg throw, and execute frame perfect pound attacks with Jiggly. (No joke! I got comboed 4 pounds in a row as Ness by Jiggly.) In a FFA, you can run away on a large stage (Mushroom Kingdom) and only if a computer player flys near you, they might attack. The AI was poor in taunt habits and with self-destruct flaws and quirks and exploits everywhere, the AI was easy to mess around and get juggled by. The AI can blindly walk into explosives, especially when they have hammers. They'll kill themselves too in that case. There are few ways of SD'ing a CPU. A common way is against level 9 Fox CPUs. Lure him to the left side of Sector Z, and then dodge the Fire Fox attack he does when he does execute it. He'll fly off the stage to SD.
In Melee, the AI is no doubt the easiest AI in the series. Except for level 6-9 CPUs. The AI slowly walks to you, and the AI never, EVER dashes to you. My theory is that the characters don't ever recognize dashing, because the developers must have underlooked or the AI could be just screwed up altogether. In fact, on Pokefloats, when the CPU is jumping to the 3rd balloon pokemon on the stage which is Psyduck, the CPU ACTUALLY runs off of Onix. Now that's a flaw! When they attempt approaches, the AI either uses projectiles (which is stupid because they STAND STILL when doing so), a Nair attack (which they do way too much), or jab spam you to death. When the AI starts jabbing, they don't ever stop, unless a few circumstances occur:
- AI sees a sheild to grab
- An important item spawns
- AI finds a different target
The AI can self-destruct in even more ways. In fact, all 25 level 9 CPUs could self-destruct themselves while you do nothing. Look it up on YouTube, it's funny. The AI had some of the worst taunting habits as in whenever a CPU kills anyone, even if it's another AI, that wait for the death to happen and then they taunt, especially if it's a star KO. The AI can taunt for no reason by jumping from them, which does depend on the character, the stage, and the AI level. I found it happening commonly on Final Destination. When the CPU knocks out any character, the AI goes to the very edge of a stage no matter what stage is picked, and when the flying character goes into a star, they'll taunt. They ALWAYS do so, unless you come off the respawn pad before the CPU walks into what I call a "taunt spot" When there's no target when they taunt, they do nothing, and just like Smash 64, the AI attacks you even when you just respawned. The AI also is programmed to grab anyone when the person puts up his/her shield. This makes more annoyance for the fact that CPUs will always do certain throws, such as Fox and Falco dthrow into shine, Captain Falcon fthrow or dthrow -> Raptor Boost -> Falcon Dive, etc. Samus, Link, and Young Link can easily miss their tether grab because if you dodge it, you can punish the AI by a smash attack. As long as you can react fast enough.
Now for Brawl. The AI is far more crazier than in Smash 64. If you pick a FFA, no matter WHAT level you pick for any of the CPUs, even level 1, the AI targets you most of the battle. The AI even gathers to taunt you if you self-destruct as soon as a match begins, which I literally have a snapshot on Battlefield with a jester cap Jigglypuff, an old-style wario in red like Mario, and King Dedede in old color costume, ALL taunting ME. It's no wonder why I never EVER do Free For Alls, because I'll throw my controller (or wii remote because Wii U) at the TV (Which I can't do ever) and wreck the room up because when I did FFAs with CPUs, they were all level 4. In a FFA I did a couple months ago with a sun hat Jigglypuff, a yellow Kirby, and fabulous Captain Falcon, all on level 4, they taunt me. Jigglypuff cheered for herself by saying her name, Kirby said "Hi~" to me in the obvious taunting fashion, and Captain Falcon LITERALLY told me to "Come on!" No joke. The AI CAN edgeguard, but very bad. The CPUs wait for you on the ledge and use certain attacks for spamming to attempt to get you. Examples such as Level 9 Pikachu constantly using Thunder Bolt and Thunder Jolt, and sometimes fsmashing, or even Fox and Falco attempting to use reflectors or lazers. Falco really puts in annoyance, where sometimes, when I used to fight level 4 Falco for practice, I would accidently SD all the time just by lazers when recovering. Yes, the AI can be stupidly cheap like that, and it's worse that unlike Melee, the AI taunts instantly no matter where they are so even Mario's taunt becomes unpunishable.

5. AI failures in stage recognization.

Smash 64's AI will walk into walls on certain stages in an attempt to reach the player, such as on Peach's Castle, or Pokemon Stadium. Also the CPUs can't recognize floor properly, so if you get a CPU of any level on top of the tower on the right side of Hyrule Castle, as long as a tornado doesn't come where you are, they will get stuck unless you move out. Same thing can happen to stop a FFA on Mushroom Kingdom, where if there are 3 level 1 Kirby CPUs, move to the bottom of the very left side of the stage, where there isn't a magnified view of yourself. The kirbys should jump to the top above the pipe and then get stuck forever in an attempt to try to drop down.

In Melee, the AI on level 9 has SD problems with the Melee Kongo Jungle stage. CPUs can get trapped in insanity spots, given the term by Omegatyrant, a Youtuber who exploits SSBM AI mostly. As a chracter with average size, KO Fox or Roy once, and then quickly run to the right side and stand in the middle. Fox will double jump and then Fire Fox into the stage, killing himself. Roy will use his Up B to the left of him and then go to the right where he will die. Fox has a 5% chance of breaking out. Roy will never get out without any interuptions.
Brawl AI has issues with the New Pork City and 75m stages. In the 75m level, the AI regardless of level, will think that you are all over the place when you stand on the top of the level near the top score and Donkey Kong. The AI will get you in atleast 10-15 seconds, but they will run back down most of the time. Eventually, they will attack, but it depends on the luck.

6. Edgeguarding and air attacking at its finest.

A level 5+ AI will try to fight off people trying to come back, but they fail a LOT. Mainly because like I said before, (at the beginning of this post) the AI tries to make sure they stay alive rather than try to spike you like they did in Melee. The only CPUs that can ACTUALLY edgeguard well are characters that fly, such as Pit, Kirby, Meta Knight, King Dedede, Jigglypuff, and Charizard. Everyone else is stuck to spamming attacks when the person is trying to get back on. Examples include the Star Fox team spamming lazers (Again, the Falco case), Mario and Luigi spamming fireballs and fsmash, most characters doing dsmash repeatedly, Pikachu most noted as the fact that he SPAMS Thunderbolt, one of his most powerful attacks and being by far my most hated attack in any video game EVER. There are specific cases in Melee where Ganon and C.Falcon use ^B to attack sometimes, including Fox/Falco using vB (Down Special) to reflect your Illusion/Phantasm recovery if you aim at the wrong time to the ledge. In the case of Fox hitting Falco, if you don't do directional influence, you'll die, because Fox's shinespike is quite strong and Falco's recovery is horrible despite the fact that he is one of the best.

7. Constant approaching (SSBM/SSBB)

Melee's AI is known for their constant approaching issues, where they will most of the time walk into your attacks. Melee shows this to a massive level, up to Ness's PK Flash and Ganondorf's Warlock Punch being easily to nail on CPUs. Brawl shows this in a similar case, where some low hopping characters constantly walk into King Dedede's infinite jab for a while, even at level 9 in both games.

8. Fail approach (All SSB games)

The AI has a massive problem just doing a simple thing. No, they don't just walk and then dash attack like stupid people seem to do a lot, but in each of the smash bros games, the AI has a massive issue. See the 4th problem for a reference on this. The first game has spamming projectile AI where it really is a spam game for CPUs. They approach by just spamming their projectiles which in most cases is the neutral special attack. Fox is the prime example of spam. Ness can take advantage of spam with his vB which absorbs all projectiles, no matter what.
In Melee, this is not much of a problem as 64 because of their different spamming problems.
In Brawl, Falco could use his lazer 4 times on the ground in a row at most. Sometimes firing 2 in a shorthop known as SHDL (Short Hop Double Lazer) Fox could use his standing lazers up to 10 times in a row because of his quick lazer fire, and that the AI doesn't use them much in the air. We have many common issues for AI attempting to approach, such as Captain Falcon spamming Falcon Punch, Bowser using Flamethrower, etc. There's even a SSBM exclusive standstill bug where standing on the edges of certain floating platforms and depending on the stage, Cpu character, and AI level, can make them stop completely. The AI will still attempt to use projectiles every once in a while, but the AI will stop approaching completely unless an item or another player is in play, the AI can switch targets when close to the other person and continue moving again.

9. Item wielding (SSB and SSBM)

You'd think a CPU could use items when they could fight okay, but in the first two games, they aren't good with them. Let alone use them PROPERLY. in Smash 64, the AI can't recognize you being invincible in which the CPU constantly attacks, despite the fact that you ARE invincible. This is also seen when you respawn in any situation 1v1. SSB AI can somewhat use items, but they suck with items like the fan or even the Ray Gun.
Melee's AI just flatout sucks at even using them! They almost never do smash item attacks involving a side attack. When the AI has a item, they behave as if they don't even have it. If you shield in this case, the CPU throws the item in an attempt to grab you which is predictable. If you attack the CPU when it has a star, it will shield, in which further proves that case.

10. The horrible CPU can't properly come back.

This is a serious issue with all the games. In the first installment in the series, you can gimp the AI at 0% if you can Falcon Punch and then spike with Falcon. If the AI is hit during recovery phase, 99% of the time, they will not attempt again no matter how weak the attack is. In Melee, the AI does retry if they get hit... If they don't get hit by a spike attack, or if they don't meteor cancel. The Ice Climbers can't recover if the partner is dead. Luigi can't recover, even at level 9. He resorts to spamming Green Missle and never using Super Jump Punch to recover at all. Ness can't use PK Thunder at levels 1-5, but 6-9, he will, but doesn't do that good at aiming at a tradjectory to recover, especially on Final Desinstion, Yoshi's Story, or Fountain of Dreams. 1% of the time they try to make it back, if you spam Fox's lazers, the AI reacts by air dodging and then dying because of their bad decision. Brawl uses mixup recoveries not too often which can predict them. The AI always tries even if they got hit no matter how strong, and no matter what, except for Fox lazers. The AI still can't fight off edgeguarders, but Kirby apprenty can, by using his Foward aerial to attack. The AI also moves back and forth to make them harder to predict. But nevertheless, the AI still kind of sucks at making it back.

11. Annoyance

Jab, jab, jab for Melee's AI.
Jab grabbing for SSB64 AI.
Shield Grab ABUSE for Brawl's AI, including TRIPLE TEAMING in a FFA.

BLAH BLAH!

12. Adaptive AI

In Melee, I play as green Kirby sometimes and against most characters (fastfallers), I use Fthrow > Uair. Recently, I have caught level 6 Kirby CPUs doing that constantly when they do grab me and throw me foward, excluding their Kirbycide attempts.
In Brawl, the AI can copy your playstyle and they get more stronger when you beat them. For playstyles, if you spam one attack and it hits the CPU a lot, they can use it way more often than they should. Falcon Punch FFA can cause your AI to spam Falcon Punch. For getting better, not only does the AI want to win, but they want YOU to LOSE. The AI can even chaingrab you if you do it enough to them. I have level 6 pikachu dthrow to uthrow and attempt to thunderbolt me, sometimes! I have Falco AI sometimes dthrow and then attempt to regrab but fail.

13. How do CPUs punish shield breaks?
By jabbing in just about all 3 games. Melee shows this even more. Normally, you could do full charged smash attacks, or even a very strong attack like PK Flash, or Warlock Punch.

14. What do CPUs do when they are following their target when it's in the air?

By just following them and doing upward attacks. Level 9 Melee CPUs do Nairs, like they always do. *Captain Obvious*

15. Ignoring human players (SSBB)

In the underground variation of the Mushroom Kingdom stage, the AI despite the level will attack the blocks in the stage for items even if items are off, in which the AI will ignore you like in 75m except in varying lengths depending on the part of the stage you're at.

16. AI on their last legs.

Can't beat level 9 Melee CPUs? Luigi shows you how in many ways in omegatyrant's video of Melee and even Project:M by doing NOTHING.

17. Real final issue.

TRIP TRIP TRIP TRIP TRIP TRIP!! (Sakurai laughs whenever you trip in secret.)

Overall, the AI is good somewhat, but they have numerous problems that I have a hard time trying not to relist. So that's that.

1. http://zippy.gfycat.com/KindheartedCookedBluetonguelizard.webm
2. Brawl's air-dodging is crap, and computers pretty much never air-dodge in Melee.
3. Hmm... thanks for the ledgehogging tip!
4. Melee's AI is silly. They don't shield, they attack at random times, and sometimes they'll taunt underneath where I spawn... They're so silly. The worst part is that they hardly ever use aerials. Never. That makes them too easy. Brawl's AI? Yeah, they always target the human player for some reason. But hey, at least they're not completely stupid!
5. ...Jungle Japes is hilarious against computers. They really screwed up making that stage.
6. I very very rarely see AI use aerials in Melee.
7. Falcon Punch. That's all I need to say.
8. As you can clearly see, I'm mainly focusing on commenting on Melee, so I have nothing to say about fail approaches.
9. AI don't even charge the homerun bat in SSB64/Melee. How embarrassing. And they suck at using the fan and the hammer. With the fan they're just like, "Ohhhh, I'll just slap you once every two seconds," and with the hammer they must be thinking, "Ooh! It's fun to jump up and down with the hammer! Up, down, up down, up down, heehee!"
10. Fun Fact: CPU Pikachu/Pichu literally never (not programmed to) charge their Skull Bash. Ever. And they never use it for a recovery. So why doesn't Luigi use both his recoveries? Yeah, Green Missile is way better, but they don't even use Super Jump Punch when they're beneath the stage. Silly Luigi... And no, sometimes any AI character doesn't use their recovery. They just... give up. No effort to get back and grab the ledge.
11. Shield grabbing is annoying, and Melee's AI really do jab too much. Especially as Ganondorf. It's just jab spam with Ganon.
12. Hah, that's cool.
13. I know, right? It's ridiculous! No smash attacks, just jabbing! It really angers me. They do that if you fall asleep (Bellossom) too.
14. Hmm?
15. Just let the AI kill each other in Mushroom Kingdom, then you'll have 4 stock against a single 1 stock 80% CPU.
16. Those videos are so funny! I've seen Melee's, but I didn't know Project M had it too!
17. Yup.

Any AI on the Sector Z stage is smash 64. They just get stuck at the back of the stage and cant get up...

Also, ness on jungle japes. He jumps twice and dies!

It looks like someone likes Super Smash Brothers. O_o