Retro Corner: Super Smash Bros (N64) Review · 3:59pm Jan 23rd, 2019
A new edition of Retro Corner is up as we take a look at the first Smash Bros on the N64. During the 90s, crossovers like the Verses Capcom series filled the arcades in gaming. Sure there were Battle Toads and Double Dragon probably the first one in gaming. However, Smash Bros also took this concept further outside the niche Capcom targeted with its verses series. Here's an interesting fact about the first game and Nintendo originally had no plans to bring this to North America. They apparently perceived it as some Mario Party spin-off at first. Something clearly changed their minds, but it weren't surprise me if Marvel verses Capcom convinced them. I'm sure there are many gamers who remember that funny commercial that got them into this series. I always looked forward to it on Kids WB when Pokemon aired during the afternoons after school.
The first game has aged since its release in 1999 on a console that was usually starved of the fighting genre. When Mortal Kombat 4 and Killer Instinct Gold are the only decent fighting games then Nintendo knew they did something wrong. It also didn't help that PS1 had Street Fighter 3 and the Tekken series to boot as well as a bunch of others. Not only was the N64 starved of RPGs but of the fighting genre as a whole. I do believe Smash Bros helped fill in that empty gap that third parties like Namco usually did on the Super NES. The same thing would happen when Ogre Battle 64 and Paper Mario helped fill that hungry RPG gap. The N64 was always known for its FPSs, Platformers and party games then the other popular genres. We all know that in Melee is where these mechanics and features really got refined in many ways.
