User:MaskedMarth

Hello, I'm MaskedMarth!

File:Maskedmarth cat.jpg

Welcome to my userpage. I am a sysop, so if you have questions about SmashWiki, feel free to leave me a message on my talk page!

I frequent Smashboards and GameFAQs but I spend most of my Smash time on SmashWiki. I make a lot of little auxiliary edits and I try to organize projects and communication. I rarely overhaul an entire article, usually preferring to tweak and copyedit. I am also very absentminded - I'm prone to calling this wiki "Wikipedia" instead of "SmashWiki," and I sometimes leave nonsensical grammar when I reword an article - so please, mercilessly edit my contributions!

About me

I play video games, plain and simple. I specialize in Melee and Dance Dance Revolution, and I also know more than the average person about several other games (the Pokémon series, Mario Kart 64, Super Smash Bros.). Besides these games, I am not a very good player. I play games to review them, mostly. I haven't written a full-length review in a long time - I'm always worried that my writing skills are not ready for this challenge. I guess I'll keep you guys updated if ever I feel myself up to writing a review.

Gaming aside, I am a high school student. I don't like to pidgeon-hole my personality, but I could be characterized as "nerdy." I like to sing, draw, do math, write, and learn languages.

:: My Projects

I keep my goggles pointed towards these pages! These are past, present or future projects of mine; time is really not the issue for me, and I continue to improve even pages I have considerably written or edited (such as wavedash).

• Policies and guidelines
• Luigi (SSBM)
• Wavedash
• Main Page
  • SmashWiki:Article of the Week
  • SmashWiki:Did you know

:: Areas of expertise

These links encompass articles that I have some level of knowledge or expertise about. They represent a possible range of future projects for me.

• Captain Falcon in Super Smash Bros. Melee
  • Captain Falcon (SSBM)
  • Knee
• SSBM character attributes
  • Falling speed
  • Air speed
  • Weight
  • Recovery
• The community and its history
  • Smash World Forums
    • Smash Back Room
      • Tier list
      • List of previous tier lists
  • GameFAQs
    • Misty (trophy)
    • Kirby cheat
  • David Sirlin
    • Cheap

:: Declaration

This page layout was shamelessly snatched from Randall00, who blatantly stole it from Codu, who previously stole it mercilessly from Blankfaze.

:: See my other Wiki userpages

• Wikipedia
  • My Wikipedia userpage
  • Ma page utilisateur du Wikipédie français
  • Min användarsida på svenska Wikipedia

• Other wikis
  • My Golden Sun Universe userpage
  • My StrategyWiki userpage

:: Contact information

• Email: maskedfalcon@gmail.com
• AIM: maskedmarth
• MySpace: l_amour_et_la_liberte

:: Other sites I visit

• Flying Omelette
• Smashboards
• GameFAQs
• Lemmy's Land
• DDRFreak

Random lists, factoids, and other quirky MaskedMarth things

Like Randall00, from whom I stole this userpage layout, I am a numbers person, and I love to make lists, declare fun facts, and make commentary thereof. This section serves as a repository of information mostly for myself, though if you take an interest to these tidbits, read on, my friend....

Super Smash Bros. Melee

My best characters

1. Captain Falcon

2. Marth

3. Fox

4. Peach

5. Link

6. Dr. Mario

7. Sheik

8. Roy

This list is a general ranking of how well I can fight with each characters. I stress its "general" nature because I am no longer an active smasher, and even when I was, my abilities with each character ebbed and flowed. This is especially true when I played Fox - one match I would just "get" him and play very well; the next I'd be fumbling like a novice trying to use techniques beyond my capacity. I think the best way to consider this list is, if I was at a tournament, which character would I use in the first match of a round? I've counterpicked with Fox before, but I would not feel as confident using him as my main.

When I sign up for message boards, my username is usually "Masked[character]," where "[character]" is my main character at the time. You can deduce, therefore, that Marth used to be my main, and that I currently sign up for message boards under the name "MaskedFalcon." This naming tradition began when I signed up for GameFAQs and the name "Masked" was taken. My main character at the time was Sheik, whose very physical form is a mask, so I put the two together and the name stuck.

Favorite Smashers

Mew2King	Fox, Marth
Darkrain	Falcon
Isai Alvarado..	Falcon
Aniki	Link
Wes	Samus
Ken Hoang	Marth
Masashi	Fox
Korean DJ	Sheik

Here are a few of my favorite competitive smashers to watch. No particular order.

This list shows a preference for players with great "mindgames." I put the term in quotes because I think it is mistaken, in this context. For instance, one might say, "Ken is the best because he has the best mindgames." While mindgames certainly are a part of why Ken wins, the person is referring instead to the magic that sprouts from his simple, effortless-seeming style. To the casual viewer, Ken does not seem to even use advanced techniques - how many times have you heard "Ken doesn't wavedash?" Of course, he does; but he wavedashes only if it helps him in battle, and this lean, utilitarian playstyle is what separates him from the hundreds of wannabes.

Of course, this is not an exhaustive list of players I enjoy to watch. Azen (Mewtwo) vs. Chu (Samus) is one of my favorite videos, even though it's as old as time itself. Tapion's Captain Falcon is very refined. And most of the better players - PC Chris, Captain Jack, King, et cetera - are a pleasure to watch just because they're better. What makes them better? It is always fascinating to find out.

SSBM tier list

Tier 1: Fox, Falco, Marth

Tier 2: Sheik, Falcon, Peach

Tier 3: Samus, Link, Climbers, Doc

Tier 4: Ganondorf, Mario, Jiggly, Pikachu, Luigi

Tier 5: Y. Link, Roy, DK, Zelda

Tier 6: Ness, Yoshi, Bowser, G&W

Tier 7: Mewtwo, Kirby, Pichu

This is, in my opinion, what the SSBM tier list could - should? - look like. I can't say I have a well-informed opinion - I've been out of the competitive scene for a while - but there is a method to my madness. I do not believe my opinions on matchups differ greatly from common opinion, but my way of conflating them into a tier list may raise a few eyebrows. I'll explain a few key changes. You can figure out the rest with your imagination.

First, Marth. Throughout the years, I have always favored Marth, and put him higher than the standard Smash Back Room list. Clearly, there is a bias at work, but I believe that Ken's success with Marth reflects Marth's potential as a character. Marth has the matchups where they matter. His "losing" match against Sheik is much overblown. As player's techniques (particularly dash-dancing and DI) become more refined, Sheik becomes less able to launch Marth with anything but her grab, a fearsome attack to say the least, but something Marth can overcome.

Jigglypuff. I really didn't move her far, but I think the lowering of Jigglypuff is far overdue. Her strategy has remained stagnant in the past several years, even accounting for King's breath of fresh strategy. She also suffers from very bad matches against Fox, Marth and Sheik. She can poke holes against Peach and Falco are what keep her as high as she is, but I don't believe that Jigglypuff can be a standalone character. She needs support against her counters.

Link. He's considerably higher in this list. I admit that my bias towards Link springs mostly from my love for Aniki (one of my favorite smashers to watch). He transforms Link from a middling character into somebody that can contend against every character in the game, including Sheik. I believe that if more Link players adopted his common-sensical playstyle, Link would see much more tournament success.

I like making tier lists just because I think it's interesting to see how they pan out, given certain assumptions about matchups. Every so often I'll pull off a totally crazy tier list (and by that, I mean stuff like putting Link above Sheik or Jigglypuff in bottom tier) to see how my ideas pan out if I pull them to extremes. I never take my tier lists very seriously though, for several reasons - one, I just don't know enough about Smash for my tier lists to hold any ethos, and two, the tier list itself is less interesting than the reasoning that led to it.

Video games

Favorite games

This list is not necessarily in order, nor is it definitive. I have not played many games, especially recent games, so there are many great games (notably, Goldeneye007) that are not on this list. The games that are on this list, however, impress me with an unusual depth, brilliance or creativity.

• Super Mario Kart: my all-time favorite game, the controls and levels never cease to thrill me. Nintendo designed each course with both sense and flair. From every turn in the track unfolds a new experience; with every gopher hole and gravel patch, a challenge that can be overcome only with a conflagration of understanding and improvisation. And nothing matches the bombastic finale, Rainbow Road.
• Super Mario Bros. 3: much has been said about this masterpiece of a platformer, so I'll keep this short. Each world has a theme, and each level reflects its world's theme, never too literal, never too gimmicky, and always with intelligence and insight.
• Final Fantasy VI: this is the first and only RPG that really wows me. A heartfelt score and story are only appendages to meat of FFVI's success: its battles, which jerk you about in skin-on-teeth random fights and whose boss battles require foresight, improvisation, and a head for strategy that goes far beyond the "hit the right enemy with the right attack" formula that services most other RPG's. Best RPG ever? Perhaps.
• Super Mario Bros.
• Yoshi's Island
• Donkey Kong Country 2