Lucas's moves have much more endlag than Ness in exchange for more power. I guess competitive fans prefer speed over power. Kinda like how Diddy Kong is more popular than K Rool or Zero Suit Samus is more popular than Ridley.
In the early days of interviews about Brawl, Sakurai said Lucas was intended to be an easier and more forgiving version of Ness. He was given 2 recovery options and an easier-to-steer PK Thunder, as well as a less situational neutral special and a straightforward version of PK Fire that works like a normal projectile. His bat is faster and more responsive, requiring less prediction and allowing for more reactive use. His up/down smashes are more intuitive than Ness' rotational ones, especially for beginners. His PKT borrows from the old one Ness had in Smash 64, which had tremendous range but moved somewhat slowly.
Obviously people are going to complain about PK Fire in the comments, but in my experience what makes him annoying is his aerials, non commital edgeguarding, and random ways he can kill you super early.
@@fubani4921 The fact that Earthbound has a cult following to begin with is impressive considering that Earthbound had poor sales at launch. Not helping matters is that Earthbound as a game is harder understand compared to Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger.
Earthbound has archaic controls even for its time, including the inability to rid oneself of useless key items. Clearly Earthbound was so unlike other RPGs and so touching and so relatable despite being fantastic and was so funny that it garnered a fanbase.
Been playing Ness since unlocking him on the 64. Haven't even scratched the surface of his competitive capabilities, but it brings a smile to my face just getting to rep the Mother series and see him shmooving around.
Probably a big reason why people play ness to begin with. You love the Mother series and want to play your favorite psychic 12-year old boi again? Welp only game that can do that is smash bros
@@franciscomendez8314 The fact that Earthbound has a cult following to begin with is impressive considering that Earthbound had poor sales at launch. Not helping matters is that Earthbound as a game is harder understand compared to Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger.
Ness in Smash Ultimate is in a similar boat to May in Guilty Gear (specifically Strive), they have a move that’s a noob stomper with a funny voice line that turned into a meme, but even when you play the character in higher levels, they can still work well, even if they’re still annoying
As a korean, i first picked up ness as a meme because “haha he looks like me”, but the character is so versatile while having a low skill floor that makes him so fun to play (at my skill level). This video explained in depth the reasons for why he felt so “easy/smooth”, thanks :)
Something to add for unfair ness stuff is that you can't shield against him at kill percent because of backthrow, and you can't not shield because of everything else. Last hit situations favor ness so hard, he has basically built in conditioning
Ness's down smash 2-frame is unlike any other in the game. 2-framing in general is conceptualized around having fantastic timing for a low risk, medium reward edge guard. This is completely different. It's a brain dead easy move to time, and has massive reward because *it's a smash attack.*
This video honestly made me realize Ness is respectable. Okay, now, I know I'm going to hell for saying such things, but, I mean, putting the pieces together, I realized Ness is a good character. I think all of us are guilty of taking each piece that makes him annoying, i.e., PK Fire, kill throws, stupid strong aerials, his yo yo, PK Thunder, and realize, Ness is just a solid character all around. I think his annoyance, plus the fact that he's not necessarily super broken, yet still a good pick, is what irritates us. It's so easy to get caught by Ness and get your shit rocked if you're not paying attention, but, now thinking about it, it less has to do with one very irritating gimmick that's hard to avoid, like Sonic's stupid speed, and more so his easier to avoid, albiet, still irritating, collection of gimmicks. At a certain point, though, you just gotta respect the fact that a character, while not the best, or even near the best, is still pretty good. Plus, GOD DAMN, competitive Ness is fucking nasty!
Always love playing ness, he can be so unconventional, while still being a damn solid character. It demands you to respect his matchup, cuz If you don't, you're gonna get killed in the most BS way LOL
Ness was the first character I picked up in ultimate and the amount of times I would just spam PK Fire on my friends and watch them rage created endless amounts of laughter and would be the reason I always name myself PK Fire when I play smash. Even if I’m not using Ness.
As a kid, Ness was always the character I wanted to play most in SSB64, but I couldn't really understand how to play him and gave up. Didn't even know what game he was from. All these years later, I finally completed Earthbound. It's one of my favorites. And now, in Smash Ultimate, I main Ness. He's by far my favorite, war crimes and all. Goofy life goals achieved.
My favorite Smash character. People always laugh at me for taking Ness. I always kick their asses 3 minutes later. He's a very underrated and misunderstood character and that's why I like using him so much. A very versatile character
I love earthbound as a whole and always loved playing ness because of how he's decent at evarything while having amazing aerials for pretty much anything you'd want to do, kinda sucks that pk fire spam has tainted his reputation so much because hañe has many more amazing and unique tools most people don't pay attention to because of it
Ness/Samus co-main here. The magnet switch-ups and PKT delays are incredibly fun and flexible once you master them. Also, the ability to be aggressive off-stage makes for some pretty hype comebacks. Obviously I'm biased, but high-level Ness play can be very exciting to watch!
I played a little Ness in Smash 4 but when first playing through Ult, he was the first character that felt "right" to play. I think that speaks for the fluidity of the character, and ease of use
when i bought and played smash for 3ds when the reveal for ultimate release i played as ness and i loved playing as him, hes a funky little dude with magic powers and a baseball bat
ironically when i started smash for the first time (and to my disappointment didn’t immediately unlock the characters my friend had), my scarily accurate impression of Ness made me main him :’)
There are two kinds of players: those who hate ness, and those who play him. Now that I've successfully failed to ragebait, I'm pretty sure even most high leel ness mains hate what I shall call for a lack of better words: "For Glory" Ness players because nobody likes laggy Ness strats except laggy Ness mains. A good Ness, uses bnbs, but a GREAT Ness has THE SAUCE with that magnet.
Speaking of learning curve. While ness's is linear and strong. Lucas's is like a spider web 🕸️ with him being at the center attempting to build it. There's so many ways for him to build & fortify it. There's SO many things to optimize with him. EDIT NOTE: The section below will be informative, but LONG. Ftilt - Active on frames 7-9, has 25 faf while only having 16 frames of endlag. Nigh impossible to punish on whiff. Stupidly safe even is fully staled. He has 7+ combo starters, most coming from falling aerials. They're fair (sour & sweet). Bair (sour & sweet). Dtilt's leg hitbox (beats frame 3 attack options from dtilt at 40 & beats DJ at 50 with angled up ftilt, leaving AD as the option against most of the cast). Utilt > fullhop uair around 25-35. Falling nair 1-3 > dtilt at 60. Nair 4 at low %s. Magnet at 0-18. Falling zair & Djcz. Dair from a falling uair/sweet bair. Falling nair 1-3 CANNOT be interrupted by most of the cast (except mythra foresight, brawler thrust uppercut, Samus upb, & Mario upb) & combos into dtilt at 60. Players only have around 15-18 frames of an SDI window for nair 1-3, making nair 1-3 > dtilt > ftilt a powerful staple. Mario at 50% frame advantage: dtilt > whiffed ftilt on AD away/behind is +16, AD down results in mario getting hit by the sourspot, AD up is at least + 41, AD down away results in mario getting hit by the sweetspot. AD down behind results in mario getting hit by sour ftilt. Dtilt is also frame 3 & -6 with 15 faf, which means on human reaction, his turn isn't over unless spammed. DJCZ is an incredible micro-spacing tool that can be done from any shorthop direction & enable lucas to move around without an audio or visual cue while DJCZ has 23 faf if done on frame 5 of a shorthop. DJCZ is -3 on shield if fresh & -6 with max stale (take off 3-4 frames from faf & shield safety on humans usually). It has similar range to Corrin's side b (dragon lunge) if sideb is delayed while being a combo starting kill confirm into fair, dash attack, or dash grab (or irar bair, dair, fsmash, or SHFF nair drag down > ftilt/whatever with a mirco-dash DJCZ). His zair also clanks 17.3% worth of projectile damage, which works wonderfully with his fsmash reflector (frame 11), pk fire clanking most projectiles, & magnet absorbing energy ones. PK freeze is a powerful advantage state tool that's great to use force players to alter their landings or recovery or even as a ledgetrapping tool to hit most characters on ledgehang. It requires 73-75 frames of committing to PK freeze's animation. Uncharged PK freeze is active on frame 40 & the endlag is 23 frames, so it’s 63 in total. So, 73-75 + 23 is 96-98. If a character times a normal getup perfectly, 1 frame before freeze detonates, lucas is +5-7, so you can still continue your pressure & ledgeplay. Against a perfectly timed ledge jump, Lucas is -15. Against a perfectly timed ledge roll, lucas is +18. Against a perfectly timed getup attack, Lucas is +28. The best options against PK freeze during ledgehang is options that grant lots of intangibility & the option that grants the most during ledgehang without being too risky is normal getup. This option is very telegraphed however, which makes reacting to it very easy, allowing lucas to retain his ledgetrapping while pressuring buffered ones the opposing character might do because of the unreactable 5 frame detonation grace period. pkt1 has around 11 different ways that can lead to gimps & all condition most characters offstage. 1. pkt1 > pkt2 recovery. Enables lucas to cover angles normal onstage pk thunder does not at the cost of increasing execution. 2. on stage pkt1 has the lowest skill floor & leads into number's 4, 5, 6, 7, & 8. 3. exclusively denying ledgesnap with the orb & tail. 4. using pk thunder, then hitting a surface to condition a player to use their resources more readily or preemptively. 5. aiming where an opponent will go/be. 6. aim for them directly with the orb. 7. using the tail to ensnare a character, preventing ledgesnapping, delaying & mixing up your stage tech timings. 8. shaping ambiguity. encompasses everything above. This regards making ovals around the ledge to deny immediate ledgesnaping. making circles, ovals, or squares to condition certain recovery trajectories. Using the tail to make letter shapes like 's' 'o' 'v' 'w' or even 'e' as examples. 9. pkt1 > pkt2 into force stage techs that you can control with wall riding & mixing up ledgesnapping by holding down. 10. shaping pkt1 beneath lucas to cover low recoveries while recovering yourself. 11. using pk thunder to carry characters to the blastzone.
Bro doesn't the wizard from fire emblem have a move worse than ok fire? His fire spell attacks shields, to which the pk fire just disappears. Also pk fire moves you back in air
7:00 look at this ness grab👀 the other character tries to grab ness & misses, then ness grabs him and throws him. That is so cheap ness must have huge range on his grab
Whenever I see Ness/Lucas in quick play, I'm way more terrified of Lucas. Ness is more of a 'pick up & play' character imo. Nice neutral and combos, some decent gimmicks and cool tech to make him effective
a Lucas in Public is HORRIFYING. To those of you who think that Ness has the most spam-mable specials in the game... *_OH BOY BUCKLE UP FOR LUCAS HEEEEEEE-_*
He's not neccesarily Meta-Proof, obviously he'd still struggle with the meta just like anyone would. But his sheer Versatility allows him this adaptability that some fighters like Mario don't have to such an extreme extent, to the point where it definitely makes him above average against meta fighters. That's why I love playing Ness. *_Funny Forward Aerial go brrr._*
I started trying out Ness recently. I seem to click with his gameplay even though I have very few hours playing him. Honestly what I like the most are the awesome setups and his “gameplay flow”. I like light floaty characters and that might be why he clicks with me. Not sure if he’ll ever be a character I put a ton of hours in, but definitely enjoying him nonetheless
Despite how the quickplay/elite mofos play Ness, he's a very fun character to play as and very technical. I can see why a lot of people despise Ness when fighting him no matter how great you are with the character
Hey, you need a kill move? Don't worry, just throw out a bunch of aerials or try to get a grab. One of those will kill. Eventually. Get them in a PK Fire if they keep moving, that'll stop em. But then he's also got cool PK Magnet stuff (that I definitely cannot do), soooo... Dunno, really.
Oh, didn't expect my main to show up. But Yeah, PK Fire isn't as OP as people say it is. Yes, it's a very good tool for Ness to use when appropriate, but spamming it is not recommended at all against a proficient player. Cause it has a lot of end lag, and isn't safe on shield.
Also, don't forget something: At high level play he has tons of weird character tricks, like down B being a frame 4 combo starter, the floaty double jump to mix up trayectory and even his neutral B being a surprisingly good platform cover, so it even rewards top level play... They inform me it was apparently a frame 7, my bad.
@@Oetam Ups, i mixed up my data. Is a frame 7 jump-cancelable, fixed knockback combo starter and extender. A good Ness Knows how to take stage control with it, while a bad one spams PK fire.
Yeah so basically he’s very rewarding at low-mid tier skilled play, relatively easy to play, and has some cheese mixed in that can catch many people off guard
As well as some genuine tech. Seriously, watch any ness main use PK magnet and you'll se how it's used to both drift momentum to scape disadvantage and to extend combos.
Steve is crazy….. he’s changing the stage and you have to make immediate changes and adapt to chase him which gets you killed… are there any characters that can break through his blocks and or make him seem more manageable??
For me, it's just that he's cute and I love his aura Like, he's just a little child wearing basic shirt and shorts playing with a yoyo and having magical powers I just loved the character even before looking at his moves
I grew up playing melee and I mained ness and link. I still love ness and he plays how I remember but I don’t like the changes that have been made to link. I’m sure he’s still great but I don’t play ultimate enough to master the differences. I will play young link much more because he feels like the traditional link, albeit smaller.
I have very decent fundamentals and main Samus. When random lands me Ness I'm thrown off gaurd by just how hard his recovery is to pull off without practice. I want one panic button to be my way back. Not a circle combo input.
I main ness just because he is fun to play. No matter what you are up against you know ness has the tools to deal with it. The fun is figuring it out. And like you said, they arent always the best tools, which makes it rewarding when you do figure it out.
Can you make a video talking about visual clarity? Was Playing against Rob and got annoyed by how many of his moves visually missed but still counted as a hit (especially his grab)
attack that hit stun for a long time, attack that invalidates the edge and can be spammed, back throw that doesnt have any sense in taking a slot that easily... i mean, its ok i guess... of course if ALL THE ROSTER have the same ways to invalidate all the oponents with the same tricks... but... that is not going to happen... right?
As a ness main who goes back and forth with ness/Lucas I somehow never get the hang of it when I comes to Lucas PK thunder while I’m more use to ness PK thunder. I also think for me never getting the hang of things when I switch is because I’m more use to ness then Lucas yes there kinda the same character but I some how find it difficult to play as Lucas then ness when I switch between them
@@Realbcb_ness Back in Sm4sh I only played Ness because I couldn't buy dlcs, but the moment I got my hands on Lucas I somehow got better results with him, I always found him to be a better Ness mainly because of PK Thunder and PK Freeze, also the aerials are more fun to use imo, specially Nair.
Been maining Ness since Melee and although I stopped being able to play regularly in the smash 4 era it's kind of surreal. In melee Ness wasn't a very good character with a lot of his moves and now he's a menace that will get a lot of people mad if you use him. I still can't wrap my head around PK magnet actually being a usable move.
Hot take: to make Ness not-toxic, it's actually not difficult; he just needs: Eliminate easy-bake, braindead, strategies built into his moveset. These include: - PK Thunder 1 should not auto-drag the opponent directly above Ness (i.e. for braindead up-air kill) - PK Fire should not chain into itself - PK Fire should not set up an easy dair kill at the ledge - Fair should not chain into itself 3 times in a row - Yoyo charge should not block ledge grab - PK Thunder 2 should have higher ending lag, and should kill later (~80% rather than ~50%)) - PK Thunder 2 should not be able to bounce off the wall and used a second time - Overall moveset should have normal knockback scaling (except for his trademark back-throw, and obvs will need a couple to remain as kill options, but not important which ones) Without an update similar to that, Smash would be a better game without Ness in it (at least in his current form). Come at me, I'm ready for a good debate
Counter point: Ness isn't broken, You just need to learn the match-up. There's a reason why pros consider him a mid/low-high teir. The changes you mentioned make it seem as if Ness is killing the meta like Steve, when in reality, he has plenty of weaknesses
@knighterrant at that point, then, it comes down to playstyle. I can count at least half of the roaster that I could consider having toxic play styles. I believe that the Links can be hella toxic considering the fact they can go the whole game just by spamming projectiles. Or Mythra, whose large hurtboxs and excellent frame data to be a pain in the ass. Also, if you're going to nerf the hell out of a character that has ok results in competitive, at least offer changes that improve other aspects of his moveset that isn't "toxic"
@@franciscomendez8314 This will sound radical, but imagine if the Smash community were to generously ban toxic characters from competitive play (e.g. Sonic, Steve, Aegis, etc). Not because they are impossible to defeat, but because they are neither entertaining to watch nor play against. Imagine a smaller competitive roster--you could ban half of them and still have 40+ fantastic characters!--retaining only the characters that have styles that are fun both to play and watch; that are a true showcase of skill, excellence, and creativity (e.g. Captain Falcon). It could be amazing, people just have to open their minds to it.
@knighterrant ya no, that's hella radical. You're confusing banning a character for the health of the game vs banning a character because you don't like how they play. We only recently banned Steve because the character had game breaking tech that invalidated multiple moves. Like I said before, the play style that a player decides to use doesn't reflect the character. Sure you could just spam PK Fire and hope for the best, OR you could learn how to double jump cancel and realize that Ness can actually pull off some pretty good stuff. TL;DR: Just learn the match-up
My friend has an elite smash Ness and we 1v1 he 3 stocked my incenaror and my main little mac Xd but I did find counter when I used greninja and won twice In a row although I should probs try to get into elite smash since greinja my lowest gsp lel
As an Earthbound fan and Ness main in each smash installment, it's very gratifying to see him finally become a threatening character in recent entries. Too bad he's stuck with the bad rep of PK fire spam, though.
This is definitely one of the reasons he's a popular character to play. My love for the Mother series fuels my want for Ness to win a major just that more people play Earthbound
@@franciscomendez8314 The fact that Earthbound has a cult following to begin with is impressive considering that Earthbound had poor sales at launch. Not helping matters is that Earthbound as a game is harder understand compared to Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger.
Why everyone plays Ness: because not only are 25% of his moves are so disgustingly good they’re degenerate, but you play you can boast that your opponent lost to a 10 year old.
@@Reed411 Honestly I’m just trying to learn my Link, not matchups right now. Nobody at my school has dared to main Ness and I almost never encounter one online for, some reason. D smash ledge hang, PK fire, back throw, and Fair are all what I’d consider to be degenerate moves. Everything else other than PK Flash and PK Thunder are oppressively good, though not quite degenerate. Down b is situational but good in those situations.
tbh. Ness is one of those characters that have a bad rep, so they are often outcasted and some people expect less from them, Like Sauce, Good combos and pretty much some things. Don’t get me wrong, Lucas is good and he was meant to be easier despite being more tech-ish, but he isn’t that hard, just underused. But In reality, Ness, Needs a bit than what people realize, and sometimes its not easy, but his normals and some things of him make up for it. I bet the Smash Community has barely seen any Crazy Ness clip at all or have just only seen him and assume he’s a PK Fire spammer out of nowhere.
I really hate Ness. This video is a perfect summary of why, and I'm sick of so many players maining him in online. I'm not the best player so I often see a lot of Ness players in lower GSP tiers trying to win with spammy and laggy moves.
That's how casuals on quickplay/elite smash play. They play super lame cause, 1) they know that they can get away with it most of the time. 2) the online is trash, so they take advantage of it...and 3) they take their GPS points very very seriously, so they're willing to do anything to keep their precious GPS points from dropping. Even though I main Ness, I do understand why you hate him, cause casuals who plays him just to spam can be frustrating
Just remember that your hate for this character stems from a janky and inconsistent version of them game courtesy of online play. Ness offline require a much higher skill gap to win and the gimmicks that make everyone so frustrated are easily avoidable or countered. Funny how big of a difference 10 frames of lag can make on ones self esteem.
For me, it's how doable his easy 'combos' are. I'm not good enough to reliably get the hype spikes, carries, and other dramatic finishes on most characters, but ness fair carry is SUPER easy to execute against bigger enemies, and feels extremely hype for someone who's more used to just spamming smash attacks. Playing ness gives me moments where I feel like a good player, regardless of my actual W/L.
As someone who used to play Ness, I never realized how nice it was to have a kill throw until I picked up literally any other character.
I'm going to guess your second character was not Incineroar.
Or K. Rool
Does Lucas count? 🤔
mewtwo also has an insanely strong back throw
Or samus?
Idk might just be bias.
"War crime back throw" might be my favorite phrase I've ever heard in regards to this game.
Can't wait for "Why No One Plays Lucas."
Lucas's moves have much more endlag than Ness in exchange for more power. I guess competitive fans prefer speed over power. Kinda like how Diddy Kong is more popular than K Rool or Zero Suit Samus is more popular than Ridley.
In the early days of interviews about Brawl, Sakurai said Lucas was intended to be an easier and more forgiving version of Ness. He was given 2 recovery options and an easier-to-steer PK Thunder, as well as a less situational neutral special and a straightforward version of PK Fire that works like a normal projectile. His bat is faster and more responsive, requiring less prediction and allowing for more reactive use. His up/down smashes are more intuitive than Ness' rotational ones, especially for beginners.
His PKT borrows from the old one Ness had in Smash 64, which had tremendous range but moved somewhat slowly.
@@WarningStrangerDanger and he ended up being the one with more tech lol
@@gabrielmoravargas4728 Lucas at various times across the lifespan of the game has had more, but was held back by certain matchups.
@@WarningStrangerDanger Yet ironically he's the more complex character, in the worst sense possible of needing to do more to acheive the same as Ness.
Obviously people are going to complain about PK Fire in the comments, but in my experience what makes him annoying is his aerials, non commital edgeguarding, and random ways he can kill you super early.
That yoyo down smash at the ledge, too, bro. It's straight bs.
People who hate PK Fire have never encounter a Ness played by someone over the age of 13.
@@moviegametime3891 I’m fortunate enough to play characters that can play around it, but yeah if your character doesn’t it’s so dumb.
For me, it's the fact that he can spam numerous disjointed aerials in one jump.
Yeah. Pkfire isn't actually that hard to play around, it just does a ton of damage and you can't sdi it
I just like the mother series. Anyone else like that, just playing the characters from the games they enjoyed?
yes
totally
yep
@@fubani4921 The fact that Earthbound has a cult following to begin with is impressive considering that Earthbound had poor sales at launch. Not helping matters is that Earthbound as a game is harder understand compared to Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger.
Earthbound has archaic controls even for its time, including the inability to rid oneself of useless key items. Clearly Earthbound was so unlike other RPGs and so touching and so relatable despite being fantastic and was so funny that it garnered a fanbase.
Been playing Ness since unlocking him on the 64. Haven't even scratched the surface of his competitive capabilities, but it brings a smile to my face just getting to rep the Mother series and see him shmooving around.
Probably a big reason why people play ness to begin with. You love the Mother series and want to play your favorite psychic 12-year old boi again? Welp only game that can do that is smash bros
@@franciscomendez8314 Hate to be that guy, but he's 13. Ninten is the one who's 12.
@@franciscomendez8314 The fact that Earthbound has a cult following to begin with is impressive considering that Earthbound had poor sales at launch. Not helping matters is that Earthbound as a game is harder understand compared to Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger.
Ness in Smash Ultimate is in a similar boat to May in Guilty Gear (specifically Strive), they have a move that’s a noob stomper with a funny voice line that turned into a meme, but even when you play the character in higher levels, they can still work well, even if they’re still annoying
Totsugeki 🐬
I main both may and ness lol
Totsugeki!!
As a korean, i first picked up ness as a meme because “haha he looks like me”, but the character is so versatile while having a low skill floor that makes him so fun to play (at my skill level). This video explained in depth the reasons for why he felt so “easy/smooth”, thanks :)
Something to add for unfair ness stuff is that you can't shield against him at kill percent because of backthrow, and you can't not shield because of everything else. Last hit situations favor ness so hard, he has basically built in conditioning
When Ness teaches you mixups.
@@iantaakalla8180 gives you free* mixups
@@jerrysandoval2001 yeah it’s straight up free
If you think he has free mixups you suck lmao. You need to be ready/conditioned hard. It isn't a 50/50 and all or easily avoidable
Ness's down smash 2-frame is unlike any other in the game. 2-framing in general is conceptualized around having fantastic timing for a low risk, medium reward edge guard. This is completely different. It's a brain dead easy move to time, and has massive reward because *it's a smash attack.*
This video honestly made me realize Ness is respectable. Okay, now, I know I'm going to hell for saying such things, but, I mean, putting the pieces together, I realized Ness is a good character. I think all of us are guilty of taking each piece that makes him annoying, i.e., PK Fire, kill throws, stupid strong aerials, his yo yo, PK Thunder, and realize, Ness is just a solid character all around. I think his annoyance, plus the fact that he's not necessarily super broken, yet still a good pick, is what irritates us. It's so easy to get caught by Ness and get your shit rocked if you're not paying attention, but, now thinking about it, it less has to do with one very irritating gimmick that's hard to avoid, like Sonic's stupid speed, and more so his easier to avoid, albiet, still irritating, collection of gimmicks. At a certain point, though, you just gotta respect the fact that a character, while not the best, or even near the best, is still pretty good. Plus, GOD DAMN, competitive Ness is fucking nasty!
Always love playing ness, he can be so unconventional, while still being a damn solid character. It demands you to respect his matchup, cuz If you don't, you're gonna get killed in the most BS way LOL
Ness was the first character I picked up in ultimate and the amount of times I would just spam PK Fire on my friends and watch them rage created endless amounts of laughter and would be the reason I always name myself PK Fire when I play smash. Even if I’m not using Ness.
ness is a meaning to N-intendo E-ntertainment S-ymhony S-istemy nintendo entert
Damn I never noticed that😮😮
I play Ness because i loved EarthBound
As a kid, Ness was always the character I wanted to play most in SSB64, but I couldn't really understand how to play him and gave up. Didn't even know what game he was from.
All these years later, I finally completed Earthbound. It's one of my favorites. And now, in Smash Ultimate, I main Ness. He's by far my favorite, war crimes and all.
Goofy life goals achieved.
My favorite Smash character. People always laugh at me for taking Ness. I always kick their asses 3 minutes later. He's a very underrated and misunderstood character and that's why I like using him so much. A very versatile character
This video describing Ness in full detail… was pure fiNESSe.
My friend has been playing exclusively Ness for years. I've basically considered Ness a DLC character since his frame data and gimmicks are insane.
I think one of the biggest factors in Ness being popular is that he is in every smash game
very true! couple that with his cult classic game title and you have a legacy following
I love earthbound as a whole and always loved playing ness because of how he's decent at evarything while having amazing aerials for pretty much anything you'd want to do, kinda sucks that pk fire spam has tainted his reputation so much because hañe has many more amazing and unique tools most people don't pay attention to because of it
Ness/Samus co-main here. The magnet switch-ups and PKT delays are incredibly fun and flexible once you master them. Also, the ability to be aggressive off-stage makes for some pretty hype comebacks. Obviously I'm biased, but high-level Ness play can be very exciting to watch!
@elle-p3108 you're not wrong though 😂
@The Egg Poor little mac can't catch a break, even his reveal trailer shows him getting BOXED offstage
When we needed it most, this series returned
I played a little Ness in Smash 4 but when first playing through Ult, he was the first character that felt "right" to play. I think that speaks for the fluidity of the character, and ease of use
As a ness main that was taught by my brother he was the right one for me as well
when i bought and played smash for 3ds when the reveal for ultimate release i played as ness and i loved playing as him, hes a funky little dude with magic powers and a baseball bat
Psi to be exact
ironically when i started smash for the first time (and to my disappointment didn’t immediately unlock the characters my friend had), my scarily accurate impression of Ness made me main him :’)
There are two kinds of players: those who hate ness, and those who play him.
Now that I've successfully failed to ragebait, I'm pretty sure even most high leel ness mains hate what I shall call for a lack of better words: "For Glory" Ness players because nobody likes laggy Ness strats except laggy Ness mains. A good Ness, uses bnbs, but a GREAT Ness has THE SAUCE with that magnet.
Speaking of learning curve. While ness's is linear and strong. Lucas's is like a spider web 🕸️ with him being at the center attempting to build it. There's so many ways for him to build & fortify it.
There's SO many things to optimize with him.
EDIT NOTE: The section below will be informative, but LONG.
Ftilt - Active on frames 7-9, has 25 faf while only having 16 frames of endlag. Nigh impossible to punish on whiff. Stupidly safe even is fully staled.
He has 7+ combo starters, most coming from falling aerials. They're fair (sour & sweet). Bair (sour & sweet). Dtilt's leg hitbox (beats frame 3 attack options from dtilt at 40 & beats DJ at 50 with angled up ftilt, leaving AD as the option against most of the cast). Utilt > fullhop uair around 25-35. Falling nair 1-3 > dtilt at 60. Nair 4 at low %s. Magnet at 0-18. Falling zair & Djcz. Dair from a falling uair/sweet bair.
Falling nair 1-3 CANNOT be interrupted by most of the cast (except mythra foresight, brawler thrust uppercut, Samus upb, & Mario upb) & combos into dtilt at 60. Players only have around 15-18 frames of an SDI window for nair 1-3, making nair 1-3 > dtilt > ftilt a powerful staple.
Mario at 50% frame advantage: dtilt > whiffed ftilt on AD away/behind is +16, AD down results in mario getting hit by the sourspot, AD up is at least + 41, AD down away results in mario getting hit by the sweetspot. AD down behind results in mario getting hit by sour ftilt. Dtilt is also frame 3 & -6 with 15 faf, which means on human reaction, his turn isn't over unless spammed.
DJCZ is an incredible micro-spacing tool that can be done from any shorthop direction & enable lucas to move around without an audio or visual cue while DJCZ has 23 faf if done on frame 5 of a shorthop. DJCZ is -3 on shield if fresh & -6 with max stale (take off 3-4 frames from faf & shield safety on humans usually). It has similar range to Corrin's side b (dragon lunge) if sideb is delayed while being a combo starting kill confirm into fair, dash attack, or dash grab (or irar bair, dair, fsmash, or SHFF nair drag down > ftilt/whatever with a mirco-dash DJCZ). His zair also clanks 17.3% worth of projectile damage, which works wonderfully with his fsmash reflector (frame 11), pk fire clanking most projectiles, & magnet absorbing energy ones.
PK freeze is a powerful advantage state tool that's great to use force players to alter their landings or recovery or even as a ledgetrapping tool to hit most characters on ledgehang. It requires 73-75 frames of committing to PK freeze's animation. Uncharged PK freeze is active on frame 40 & the endlag is 23 frames, so it’s 63 in total. So, 73-75 + 23 is 96-98. If a character times a normal getup perfectly, 1 frame before freeze detonates, lucas is +5-7, so you can still continue your pressure & ledgeplay. Against a perfectly timed ledge jump, Lucas is -15. Against a perfectly timed ledge roll, lucas is +18. Against a perfectly timed getup attack, Lucas is +28. The best options against PK freeze during ledgehang is options that grant lots of intangibility & the option that grants the most during ledgehang without being too risky is normal getup. This option is very telegraphed however, which makes reacting to it very easy, allowing lucas to retain his ledgetrapping while pressuring buffered ones the opposing character might do because of the unreactable 5 frame detonation grace period.
pkt1 has around 11 different ways that can lead to gimps & all condition most characters offstage.
1. pkt1 > pkt2 recovery. Enables lucas to cover angles normal onstage pk thunder does not at the cost of increasing execution.
2. on stage pkt1 has the lowest skill floor & leads into number's 4, 5, 6, 7, & 8.
3. exclusively denying ledgesnap with the orb & tail.
4. using pk thunder, then hitting a surface to condition a player to use their resources more readily or preemptively.
5. aiming where an opponent will go/be.
6. aim for them directly with the orb.
7. using the tail to ensnare a character, preventing ledgesnapping, delaying & mixing up your stage tech timings.
8. shaping ambiguity. encompasses everything above. This regards making ovals around the ledge to deny immediate ledgesnaping. making circles, ovals, or squares to condition certain recovery trajectories. Using the tail to make letter shapes like 's' 'o' 'v' 'w' or even 'e' as examples.
9. pkt1 > pkt2 into force stage techs that you can control with wall riding & mixing up ledgesnapping by holding down.
10. shaping pkt1 beneath lucas to cover low recoveries while recovering yourself.
11. using pk thunder to carry characters to the blastzone.
bro made an essay
@@elims3398 ong 😭
So yeah, Lucas is pretty cool
commenting so i can find this later
Bro doesn't the wizard from fire emblem have a move worse than ok fire? His fire spell attacks shields, to which the pk fire just disappears. Also pk fire moves you back in air
7:00 look at this ness grab👀 the other character tries to grab ness & misses, then ness grabs him and throws him. That is so cheap ness must have huge range on his grab
I got schmixed at a local Melee tourney by Ness. I placed 2nd... with Yoshi.
Also the techs and mix ups that players like gackt are figuring out still till this day is insane. From a semi infinite to new jank… ness is insane
It should be a 10 second video of him clearing his throat and then screaming "PK FIRE" at the top of his lungs
I'll never understand why Sakurai made pk thunder such a good juggling tool and edge guarding move
I've been maining Ness since N64. And haven't stopped since. He's more difficult to play than people think.
Pk fire is like a miso in the coffin. If your already losing and you get hit by that it’s demoralizing.
Whenever I see Ness/Lucas in quick play, I'm way more terrified of Lucas. Ness is more of a 'pick up & play' character imo. Nice neutral and combos, some decent gimmicks and cool tech to make him effective
a Lucas in Public is HORRIFYING. To those of you who think that Ness has the most spam-mable specials in the game... *_OH BOY BUCKLE UP FOR LUCAS HEEEEEEE-_*
He isn't necessarily meta resistant. Meta is almost always against him cause sword characters. He's just versatile. He still struggles.
Incin has the strongest back throw technically btw, ness has better knock back scaling from center stage however
He's not neccesarily Meta-Proof, obviously he'd still struggle with the meta just like anyone would. But his sheer Versatility allows him this adaptability that some fighters like Mario don't have to such an extreme extent, to the point where it definitely makes him above average against meta fighters. That's why I love playing Ness.
*_Funny Forward Aerial go brrr._*
2:56 nahh i thought hbox had waves
Ness is one of the best secondary characters, good for counter picks for people who struggle with him.
6:21 caught me off guard
With Fire Emblem Engage around the corner I think we need to see a “Why No One Plays Marth” video as soon as possible
Why does everyone play Ness? Well I dunno about competitive play, but in casual play its *to spam PK fire.*
I started trying out Ness recently. I seem to click with his gameplay even though I have very few hours playing him. Honestly what I like the most are the awesome setups and his “gameplay flow”. I like light floaty characters and that might be why he clicks with me. Not sure if he’ll ever be a character I put a ton of hours in, but definitely enjoying him nonetheless
Pretty amazing video as usual.
Despite how the quickplay/elite mofos play Ness, he's a very fun character to play as and very technical. I can see why a lot of people despise Ness when fighting him no matter how great you are with the character
Hey, you need a kill move? Don't worry, just throw out a bunch of aerials or try to get a grab. One of those will kill. Eventually. Get them in a PK Fire if they keep moving, that'll stop em.
But then he's also got cool PK Magnet stuff (that I definitely cannot do), soooo... Dunno, really.
Oh, didn't expect my main to show up.
But Yeah, PK Fire isn't as OP as people say it is. Yes, it's a very good tool for Ness to use when appropriate, but spamming it is not recommended at all against a proficient player. Cause it has a lot of end lag, and isn't safe on shield.
That's when you implement double jump cancel into the mix
Also, don't forget something: At high level play he has tons of weird character tricks, like down B being a frame 4 combo starter, the floaty double jump to mix up trayectory and even his neutral B being a surprisingly good platform cover, so it even rewards top level play...
They inform me it was apparently a frame 7, my bad.
Where’d you find that down b is a frame 4 combo starter
@@Oetam Ups, i mixed up my data. Is a frame 7 jump-cancelable, fixed knockback combo starter and extender. A good Ness Knows how to take stage control with it, while a bad one spams PK fire.
Why does the music sound like its from home alone
Yeah so basically he’s very rewarding at low-mid tier skilled play, relatively easy to play, and has some cheese mixed in that can catch many people off guard
As well as some genuine tech. Seriously, watch any ness main use PK magnet and you'll se how it's used to both drift momentum to scape disadvantage and to extend combos.
We don't main Ness because we want to.
We main Ness because we HAVE to.
Steve is crazy….. he’s changing the stage and you have to make immediate changes and adapt to chase him which gets you killed… are there any characters that can break through his blocks and or make him seem more manageable??
IIRC, PT (mostly because of Ivysaur), Shulk, Sephiroth, and Sonic all have good MUs against Steve
You've been on fire lately, Vars! Way to go with the work. Can't wait to see more
being a Ness mains vs. the Kirby spammers is so much fun bc all of his aerials beat up b down b and neutral b.
Why do I play Ness? Because EarthBound is frickin' GOATED. It's seriously such a good JRPG... GO PLAY IT IF YOU HAVEN'T!!!
For me, it's just that he's cute and I love his aura
Like, he's just a little child wearing basic shirt and shorts playing with a yoyo and having magical powers
I just loved the character even before looking at his moves
you are definitely younger than 16
@@seanbirch no I'm 18 lmao
@@pk_ades well, that just makes it worse, hahaha
@@seanbirch I don't see why but okay
@@pk_ades because you sound that young, so if you aren't actually, that's worse. simple. really
i been maining ness since melee and its good to see him at this level. He's the most powerful he has ever been in any smash game
Eagerly waiting for the "Why EVERYONE Plays:" for my favorite chatacter, Palutena!
I grew up playing melee and I mained ness and link. I still love ness and he plays how I remember but I don’t like the changes that have been made to link. I’m sure he’s still great but I don’t play ultimate enough to master the differences. I will play young link much more because he feels like the traditional link, albeit smaller.
Video hasn't even started yet and I know the answer:
PK FIRE PK FIRE PK FIRE PK FIRE PK FIRE PK FIRE
PK FIRE
PK FIRE
PK FIRE
PK FIRE
PK FIRE
I love these character analysis, your amazing commentary, and most of all this channel.
Keep up the good work ☺️👍
I have very decent fundamentals and main Samus. When random lands me Ness I'm thrown off gaurd by just how hard his recovery is to pull off without practice. I want one panic button to be my way back. Not a circle combo input.
His recovery is great when you have it mastered
I’ve been a Ness since Smash 64. I slogged through the Melee and Brawl days so I’ve earned whatever he’s got now. lol
I main ness just because he is fun to play. No matter what you are up against you know ness has the tools to deal with it. The fun is figuring it out. And like you said, they arent always the best tools, which makes it rewarding when you do figure it out.
His pk fire is an amzaing combo starter ,his yoyo and baseball bat and pk thunder are op
Can you make a video talking about visual clarity? Was Playing against Rob and got annoyed by how many of his moves visually missed but still counted as a hit (especially his grab)
"Listen. Free your mind and KNOW what you must do"
*spams pk fire and fair in neutral and yoyoes at ledge*
I main ness because of all the techs he has, the magnet movement options make him look sick and make me feel like a better player than I am haha
0:45 "Ness conspicuous"
attack that hit stun for a long time, attack that invalidates the edge and can be spammed, back throw that doesnt have any sense in taking a slot that easily... i mean, its ok i guess... of course if ALL THE ROSTER have the same ways to invalidate all the oponents with the same tricks... but... that is not going to happen... right?
I used to be a main Ness, but then I tried Lucas and found him to be way way better. I main both of them.
As a ness main who goes back and forth with ness/Lucas I somehow never get the hang of it when I comes to Lucas PK thunder while I’m more use to ness PK thunder. I also think for me never getting the hang of things when I switch is because I’m more use to ness then Lucas yes there kinda the same character but I some how find it difficult to play as Lucas then ness when I switch between them
@@Realbcb_ness Back in Sm4sh I only played Ness because I couldn't buy dlcs, but the moment I got my hands on Lucas I somehow got better results with him, I always found him to be a better Ness mainly because of PK Thunder and PK Freeze, also the aerials are more fun to use imo, specially Nair.
Been a Ness main since smash 4 and never changed since.
Hearing "2020 three years ago" was jarring lmao
There are SIX reasons people play Ness. They are, in order, “ PK FIRE, PK FIRE, PK FIRE, PK FIRE, PK FIRE, PK FIRE!!!!”
Back throw there you have it. And also pk fire
Been playing Ness since N64, main reason I got into Smash was because of him and Earthbound as well.
0:50 bruh I thought you brought in bestness
I will always love playing ness :) I remember when I played Smash on 3Ds I wouldn’t play any other character.
6:22 Caught me off guard 😂
how have you not made a video on banjo & kazooie yet
Lets not forget about Awestin.
Been maining Ness since Melee and although I stopped being able to play regularly in the smash 4 era it's kind of surreal. In melee Ness wasn't a very good character with a lot of his moves and now he's a menace that will get a lot of people mad if you use him. I still can't wrap my head around PK magnet actually being a usable move.
I’ve been waiting for this video!
That ragequit lmao 12:07
But that was the winner celebrating.
Hot take: to make Ness not-toxic, it's actually not difficult; he just needs: Eliminate easy-bake, braindead, strategies built into his moveset. These include:
- PK Thunder 1 should not auto-drag the opponent directly above Ness (i.e. for braindead up-air kill)
- PK Fire should not chain into itself
- PK Fire should not set up an easy dair kill at the ledge
- Fair should not chain into itself 3 times in a row
- Yoyo charge should not block ledge grab
- PK Thunder 2 should have higher ending lag, and should kill later (~80% rather than ~50%))
- PK Thunder 2 should not be able to bounce off the wall and used a second time
- Overall moveset should have normal knockback scaling (except for his trademark back-throw, and obvs will need a couple to remain as kill options, but not important which ones)
Without an update similar to that, Smash would be a better game without Ness in it (at least in his current form). Come at me, I'm ready for a good debate
Counter point: Ness isn't broken, You just need to learn the match-up. There's a reason why pros consider him a mid/low-high teir. The changes you mentioned make it seem as if Ness is killing the meta like Steve, when in reality, he has plenty of weaknesses
@@franciscomendez8314 I didn't say he was broken, I said he was toxic
@knighterrant at that point, then, it comes down to playstyle. I can count at least half of the roaster that I could consider having toxic play styles.
I believe that the Links can be hella toxic considering the fact they can go the whole game just by spamming projectiles. Or Mythra, whose large hurtboxs and excellent frame data to be a pain in the ass.
Also, if you're going to nerf the hell out of a character that has ok results in competitive, at least offer changes that improve other aspects of his moveset that isn't "toxic"
@@franciscomendez8314 This will sound radical, but imagine if the Smash community were to generously ban toxic characters from competitive play (e.g. Sonic, Steve, Aegis, etc). Not because they are impossible to defeat, but because they are neither entertaining to watch nor play against.
Imagine a smaller competitive roster--you could ban half of them and still have 40+ fantastic characters!--retaining only the characters that have styles that are fun both to play and watch; that are a true showcase of skill, excellence, and creativity (e.g. Captain Falcon).
It could be amazing, people just have to open their minds to it.
@knighterrant ya no, that's hella radical. You're confusing banning a character for the health of the game vs banning a character because you don't like how they play.
We only recently banned Steve because the character had game breaking tech that invalidated multiple moves.
Like I said before, the play style that a player decides to use doesn't reflect the character. Sure you could just spam PK Fire and hope for the best, OR you could learn how to double jump cancel and realize that Ness can actually pull off some pretty good stuff.
TL;DR: Just learn the match-up
Ness and Lucas are basically the pinnacles of how solid a high-tier can be.
Lucas isn't a high tier, also I don't think good characters should rely on insane kill throws to condition you against shielding at high percents
Thank you Vars! I'd love to see a why nobody plays Link vid
My friend has an elite smash Ness and we 1v1 he 3 stocked my incenaror and my main little mac Xd but I did find counter when I used greninja and won twice In a row although I should probs try to get into elite smash since greinja my lowest gsp lel
As an Earthbound fan and Ness main in each smash installment, it's very gratifying to see him finally become a threatening character in recent entries.
Too bad he's stuck with the bad rep of PK fire spam, though.
This is definitely one of the reasons he's a popular character to play. My love for the Mother series fuels my want for Ness to win a major just that more people play Earthbound
@@franciscomendez8314 The fact that Earthbound has a cult following to begin with is impressive considering that Earthbound had poor sales at launch. Not helping matters is that Earthbound as a game is harder understand compared to Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger.
Here because Joe Burrow mentioned he’s a “Ness” guy on “super smash bros” and I have absolutely no idea what any of that means.
Why everyone plays Ness: because not only are 25% of his moves are so disgustingly good they’re degenerate, but you play you can boast that your opponent lost to a 10 year old.
lol someone hasn't learned the matchup
@@Reed411 Honestly I’m just trying to learn my Link, not matchups right now. Nobody at my school has dared to main Ness and I almost never encounter one online for, some reason. D smash ledge hang, PK fire, back throw, and Fair are all what I’d consider to be degenerate moves. Everything else other than PK Flash and PK Thunder are oppressively good, though not quite degenerate. Down b is situational but good in those situations.
tbh. Ness is one of those characters that have a bad rep, so they are often outcasted and some people expect less from them, Like Sauce, Good combos and pretty much some things. Don’t get me wrong, Lucas is good and he was meant to be easier despite being more tech-ish, but he isn’t that hard, just underused. But In reality, Ness, Needs a bit than what people realize, and sometimes its not easy, but his normals and some things of him make up for it. I bet the Smash Community has barely seen any Crazy Ness clip at all or have just only seen him and assume he’s a PK Fire spammer out of nowhere.
I picked up Ness because I thought it would be funny beating the king of darkness and the triforce of power with a 16 year old boy.
This is my favorite vid , you should now do one on Lucas
I remember when he was weak AF in Melee and I mained him. Now I kind of hate him for been stupidly broken and cheap.
his physic and aerials are stupidly good
I really hate Ness. This video is a perfect summary of why, and I'm sick of so many players maining him in online. I'm not the best player so I often see a lot of Ness players in lower GSP tiers trying to win with spammy and laggy moves.
That's how casuals on quickplay/elite smash play. They play super lame cause, 1) they know that they can get away with it most of the time. 2) the online is trash, so they take advantage of it...and 3) they take their GPS points very very seriously, so they're willing to do anything to keep their precious GPS points from dropping.
Even though I main Ness, I do understand why you hate him, cause casuals who plays him just to spam can be frustrating
Just remember that your hate for this character stems from a janky and inconsistent version of them game courtesy of online play. Ness offline require a much higher skill gap to win and the gimmicks that make everyone so frustrated are easily avoidable or countered. Funny how big of a difference 10 frames of lag can make on ones self esteem.
Was Wavedash not a major? Scend won with Ness last year in August.
I swear that every video is titled Why Everyone or Why Nobody plays so and so.
For me, it's how doable his easy 'combos' are. I'm not good enough to reliably get the hype spikes, carries, and other dramatic finishes on most characters, but ness fair carry is SUPER easy to execute against bigger enemies, and feels extremely hype for someone who's more used to just spamming smash attacks.
Playing ness gives me moments where I feel like a good player, regardless of my actual W/L.
Can't wait for a Kazuya video
Ness is somehow brain dead and complex, annoying and fun he just kinda does whatever you want him to do.