Shulk's pretty high up. Not bad at all Monado boy.
The same way I see it. It takes away the core of the characters, and "dark versions of lighthearted series" are so overdone.
If you want to make a fanfic about series that are otherwise light and cheerful such as Mario and Kirby, you should do it in a way that fits the series while also having a more mature tone. It's not like Mario doesn't have darker plots anyway, but you should make something that still fits the series, otherwise I can't see a point in it.
I don't want to do any self-promoting, but I think it could work as an example; my Pokémon fanfic is pretty much me making my own version of the anime, which means it's for the most part a fun Slice of Life type of story with cute moments and all, but it also is going to hit some serious and darker moments, but the overall story is still a Pokémon journey where human and Pokémon make bonds with each other and overcome challenges together and all that. It just has some darker moments that come from my particular vision of the Pokémon universe and my trying to work out some worldbuilding in it, but it's still recognizable as the Pokémon world everybody knows and loves. At least that's my intention with it.
Making a story grimdark just because grimdark is a terrible idea.
edited 2nd Mar '15 11:07:34 AM by FullMoon
Is there a trope for when you have a pastel-themed art-style juxtaposed with a dark story?
@Fawriel: That really rings true for me. People complain of your Mega Man playin', and unManly shippin' tendencies? Don't take that crap; punch 'em in the nose! I can be a little guilty of shippin' myself at times.
edited 2nd Mar '15 11:30:56 AM by TroPartner
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My thoughts exactly. It's entirely possible to have darker moments without the whole fic being that way. I've seen things that got very dark sometimes but were still idealistic and hopeful in terms of tone.
If you end up writing something more serious than usual because that's just how you write, that's fine. But taking something that's usually light and silly and making it as dark and gritty as possible just for the sake of it? Probably not a good idea.
edited 2nd Mar '15 11:33:36 AM by SapphireBlue
I think execution is where it matters.
It's certainly possible to do a dark, gritty story based on a lighthearted franchise. The second and third Paper Marios get pretty dark while still feeling like Mario, and there's no reason it couldn't be taken a little bit further. If you can make a good story out of it then there's nothing wrong with some darkness. It's when you make something dark simply for the sake of darkness, like a teenager trying to be "edgy", that the premise is flawed from the start *coughsonicthehedgehogcough*.
edited 2nd Mar '15 11:34:38 AM by Anomalocaris20
You cannot firmly grasp the true form of Squidward's technique!
We talking Sonic 06 or Shadow? Because I found the latter's attempts to be dark and gritty unintentionally hilarious.
@Sapphire: The reason I'm acting so passionate about this is that I've just recently been thinking about it because of a friend's very dark fanfic. It just got me thinking about the point of darkness in fiction. His writing gets into some very painful psychological places at points, but ultimately offers a ray of hope in the end, and I think we both agreed that it would make no sense to take that ray of hope away and have it end badly, because if the story's about struggle with mental health, a bad end would communicate nothing to the reader but "nope, there's actually no hope if you're struggling, sorry about that."
I'm actually very much into a certain amount of darkness in fiction, but it has to be handled with care and purpose.
@Anom: Paper Mario is an interesting case, actually. I unfortunately haven't played any of the games myself, but I'm quite sure that the kind of "darkness" (a very vague term) they deal with is not the kind where characters die so others can be filled with righteous suffering or somesuch. I'd be very curious to explore exactly how they use darkness in a way that feels poignant without losing its sense of whimsy.
edited 2nd Mar '15 11:38:24 AM by Fawriel
The problem with dark Smash fanfics is not making one setting dark. It's unifying everything together to make it dark in a non-gratuitous way. How do you reconcile the light and cheerful worlds of Mario, Kirby, and Animal Crossing with the more broody, death filled worlds of Metroid and Fire Emblem? Tonally they're pretty distinct. Some are pretty flexible, like Zelda and Pokemon. Zelda can either be about a plucky boy on an adventure to save the princess and stab the evil pig man, or it can be about the death of a world, where everyone is dying or about to die, and darkness is one step away from conquering the kingdom if it hasn't already.
I'll come up with some ideas later. It can be done, but it needs to be handled with extra care due to the wide range of franchises it runs.
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You'd be surprised, actually. The villain of Super Paper Mario's entire motive is that he's suffering because his beloved died, and wants to destroy the world that took her away from him. It might sound unfitting for a Mario game but it's worked in quite well. Rather than watch an online playthrough I'd recommend buying the games, though, they're very enjoyable to play.
But I feel we're straying far from the subject of Super Smash Bros. here. This conversation would ideally be best continued either in some sort of fanfiction-relevant thread, or via PM.
edited 2nd Mar '15 11:49:57 AM by Anomalocaris20
You cannot firmly grasp the true form of Squidward's technique!![]()
It's fun to think about how we got a Big Blooper stage cameo in Smash before we had any sort of non-Bowser PM villain appearing at all.
edited 2nd Mar '15 12:07:46 PM by Demonfly
"Tell them to shut up and have some faith in me." - dead flashback guy![]()
Yeah I started getting a reputation here with my Greninja play so I decided "why not" and got a capture card in order to record stuff. Might do some L Ps later as well.
Which reminds me that I was making a Greninja highlights video and it was almost done when Windows Movie Maker just decided to mess with me and made me lose hours of work.
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What would you have as your first Let's Play? Also, I feel like playing a few matches against you.
Either Shovel Knight or Super Mario 3D World.
And I'm just about to leave for college
I'd be interested in watching those.
Call me butter, because I am on a roll! 3ds friend code: 5258-0885-3903 Wii U: Bowser CharizardOkay, I'm going to clear this up (TL DR version: my fanfic is mostly light with some dark elements thrown in):
My fanfic idea is not completely dark. The worst that happens is that characters die in Heroic Sacrifices.
Think of it more like Kid Icarus Uprising or Avatar: The Last Airbender, probably even Star Wars or Lord of the Rings in terms of tone. Lots of dark stuff happen, but would still be fairly lighthearted. It's more lighthearted than my original idea, which was a ripoff of Injustice: Gods Among Us. Like, no characters would actually cross the Despair Event Horizon, because other characters would stop that from happening. The good guys will undoubtedly win. No character will die unless they pull a Heroic Sacrifice. Again, death is really the only dark thing I have planned for this idea. So basically tone will be lighthearted with some dark elements.
I understand why you guys are wary, because some of these (namely Mario and Kirby) are lighthearted franchises. I'm done talking about the idea for now, now that I've hopefully cleared up any misconceptions. (also, the only fanfic ideas that I can think of are crossovers, darn internet ruined my mind!). I'd mostly make this for my enjoyment anyways,
Tier List:
Peach, why are you higher tier than Lucina or Samus? Aside from that, not much else to say because I've never used the custom moves.
First Let's Play: I'd personally go with either Star Fox 64 or Sonic Adventure 2 for me. Maybe Grand Theft Auto IV if I could not let people making fun of me for using cheats.
edited 2nd Mar '15 1:42:08 PM by powerpuffbats
AAAAUUUUGGGHHHH!!!!Any Super Smash Bros story that takes place in the Smash universe and not just the Nintendo universe should recognize the characters as trophies.
And recognizing them as anything but just spits in the face of authenticity.
Spiiiiiiiits...
Because OMG why is Mario beating up his little friend Yoshi?
You gotta believe me when I scare you away, all that I wish for is that you would stay

I'd be curious to see an optimized Palutena destroying people. I'd imagine it involves a lot of zipping around and stuff.
Even with specials, Diddy is still too good... sigh.
The only worthwhile things I can see coming out of the basic concept is either a parody (which ALSO has been done so often that it lost all potential shock value), or something meta that claims to tell the story of how Bowser kills Peach on his crusade to take over everything but actually tells a story about how terrible it is that innocent stories are expected to delve into meaningless cruelty in order to legitimize themselves in a cultural environment that equates cruelty with strength and sincerity with stupidity, something along those lines.
I mean, hey, by all means explain to me how I'm wrong, but until then, I just think powerpuffbats would be better off directing their creative energies literally anywhere else.
edited 2nd Mar '15 10:54:55 AM by Fawriel