Sakurai: “I don’t think online play and Smash Bros. are a very good fit”
Nintendo’s blockbuster fighting game franchise Super Smash Bros. isn’t a good fit for online play, its creator Masahiro Sakurai has said.
Speaking in his latest YouTube video on game development, Sakurai discussed the addition of online play to the series in Smash Bros. Brawl for the Wii. In it, he lined out why he believed the series was better suited for local competition – for both philosophical and technical reasons.
Indeed, Sakurai addressed Nintendo’s often shaky online servers, saying that “network lag tends to make the game a pretty choppy experience”. Ultimately, though, it sounds like adding online play was something he had to do: “when it comes to technical issues, it doesn’t really matter what I personally think,” he said. “If my job is to do it, I’ll do it.”
