SMASHED - What Happened to PlayStation All-Stars?

PlayStation merely uttering that name brings back a rush of memories to millions of gamers and non-gamers alike for much of its 20 plus year history PlayStation has been the king of the mountain from its early days with the one - platformer punch of Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon which still defined the console family to this day and a Golden Age of RPGs to the historic PlayStation 2 years debuting dozens of beloved franchises like Ratchet and Clank Sly Cooper God of War Shadow of the Colossus and jak and daxter that evoked this sense of exploration adventure growth and most importantly joy to the modern era defined by Sony's internal development teams pushing the ceiling for gaming ever higher both visually and otherwise releasing uncharted infamous gravity rushed The Last of Us horizon zero dawn and knack the PlayStation family has never stopped growing you would think that celebrating this family history would be a no-brainer and for a time it was as in none of the Sony think tanks seemingly had any interest in providing this sort of celebration and then finally after years upon years of PlayStation fans asking for it begging for it we were given our celebration a game that will forever be seen as a total failure PlayStation all-stars battle royale hey everybody and welcome to this episode of the golden bolt today I'm gonna do something entirely out of my wheelhouse rather than review a game pretend to be funny for a little bit and then move on to the next game I want to take a moment to really look at a game that had a massive impact on me and this channel and that game is PlayStation all-stars battle royale I'm gonna take you on a brief journey through this game's development and its history looking at it from three separate lenses the critical stance and public opinion at the time my own admittedly biased opinion from playing through the game as a fan and my current critical stance now what led to this game's perception as a failure what scared off the PlayStation higher-ups from pursuing this crossover concept further and is there hope for another PlayStation all-stars game in the future today on the fifth anniversary of PlayStation all-stars let's go back and find out but to do that first we have to go back six years October 5th 2011 PlayStation uploads a video to its YouTube channel titled Michael this commercial blew the doors off the internet when it was first revealed a part of the new long live play marketing campaign Michael is two minutes of pure unfiltered nostalgia featuring dozens of PlayStation and general gaming icons telling their stories reminiscing all with one focus Michael Michael Michael is you you were the one that helped Kratos in his fight against the gods you kept Solid Snake pushing onward when war kept changing you were responsible for all of it every moment that you remember in your gaming life every action that stuck out every jump that you made and even every jump that you missed it was all because of you as the camera pans up you see all of the hundreds of pictures of different Michael's all from different backgrounds that each had this soul thing in common gaming yes it was a PlayStation add at the end of the day but it was made with such love and such detail that it could resonate equally with everybody the Michael add received near universal praise it was that celebration that fans wanted surely any future celebrations would perform swimmingly after its start like that oh boy never mind this ladies and gentlemen is the public response to PlayStation all-stars Sony's four player crossover fighting game over a 30% dislike ratio on an e3 trailer with the comments loaded with insults the official reveal trailer and the Michael spot while we're on the subject have both been removed from the PlayStation YouTube channel but let's just say that people lightened up by e3 how did things shift so drastically from love and good vibes to infighting and vitriol part of the answer is found if you just scroll down in the comments of almost any video related to the game you'll find people that say one of two major things the first being this is a ripoff of Super Smash Bros even hearing me describe the game a four-player crossover fighting game yeah that sounds like smash the game upon reveal showed a few key differences from smash though most notably in the method of killing your opponents rather than Kaling your foes by knocking them off the stage the only way to win was to build up a super meter to level one two or three and unleash that super on your opponent's additionally each stage you fought on had interactive hazards and mashed up two different franchises like say jak and daxter and Hot Shots Golf fledgling developers SuperBot entertainment took inspiration from the leader of the genre while also looking for unique ways to stand out and dare I say improve on the formula naturally gamers took their battle positions you can find thousands of comments calling the game both a ripoff and a bad one of that because it changed things that they liked from smash bros one could even assume that many of these commenters were Nintendo fans that in their own eyes were simply defending their turf whatever the reason maybe PlayStation all-stars did not receive even a room-temperature reception from gamers the super system of fighting in particular was the subject of debate for months before and even years after battle Royales launch people complain just from looking at footage that attacks didn't feel like they mattered since you weren't doing damage to enemies you were just building a meter for yourself the risk/reward mechanic of the supers didn't click either the game was a hotly debated topic all over the web whenever people didn't dismiss it immediately that is throughout all of this none of the people commenting had actually touched the game yet meanwhile the world of gaming journalism saw things quite differently from the masses critics who got a hands-on look at all-stars generally were impressed by it and most were excited to see the game flesh out as it neared its launch naturally some reactions were more positive than others but there didn't seem to be anything original and I mean but to the press the game showed promise there would be this clear split between public and critical reactions for several months even after the game's demo hits stores and after its multiple online betas hit PSN once people did get to play the game response generally warmed up however people still couldn't acclimate to the unique mechanics as IGN's Greg Miller would later say after launch battle Royales biggest weakness was that it looked like smash bros people naturally played all-stars like it was melee or brawl had a bad time with it as a result and immediately would dismiss it now what was that second comment that you would see when looking at discussions of the game oh yeah the second biggest shortcoming of playstation allstars is one of timing SuperBot began development on the game in 2009 in fact SuperBot was created specifically for this game drawing in both younger and more experienced developers it is worth noting though that the first year of development actually focused on a different style of game entirely SuperBot had created a demo for a 4v4 captured the flag game in 2010 at Sony's suggestion development shifted to a one screen experience and the team naturally came to the 2d brawler genre and the codename title fight the roster was considered on a what have you done for me lately bassist none of the games 16 first party characters had been dormant for more than four years and most had games actively in development or seem to have something on the way the in-house lineup however wasn't all that the PlayStation brand had to offer the first decade of the console family's life was defined by games that Sony didn't own itself games like Final Fantasy Metal Gear Solid Devil May Cry Resident Evil Tekken Tomb Raider and of course crash and Spyro it just wouldn't be a true PlayStation celebration if SuperBot didn't also celebrate the independent franchises that helped hold down the fort so SuperBot pulled strings they made deals and they got high hachi from Tekken great they got riding from Metal Gear Solid okay cool I guess because snake wasn't smashed that whatever it works Big Daddy from bio Chuck didn't that game come out of here late on ps3 well whatever Big Daddy's an iconic figure in gaming I can accept that Plus Bioshock but supposed to have a Vita get is that is that Dante is that the emo Dante from The Devil May Cry reboot what huh why that is pretty much verbatim the initial reaction to each of these four guest characters Dante's mid-august profil was the straw that broke the camel's back though and the fanbase lashed out in idiot Lee and at the same time in the summer of 2012 the game's full roster was leaked by a user who hacked into the beta's code a roster of only 20 plus a character like new Dante drove the fanbase into this negative downward spiral that irreparably damaged any reputation and hype that the game had built up over the prior few months players wanted the real Dante not this cheap bootleg and while we're at it where the hell is crash where's Spyro where's Laura Croft our gex or cloud or Sora what kind of King roster is this I repeat the second biggest shortcoming of PlayStation all-stars is one of timing had the game started development even one year prior the original Dante would have very likely been the one that made the cut instead of the newer Dante as seen by 2011's Marvel vs. Capcom 3 Super Smash Bros Brawl had just released a year before its PlayStation counterpart would start development so snake was likely already out of the equation and those six franchises that I just listed that did not make it into battle Royales roster are owned by two companies that have changed significantly in the past five years Activision and Square Enix Square in 2009 had only just acquired the rights to Tomb Raider and gaxx and was in the middle of multiple corporate restructures and the development of Final Fantasy 13 this was well before a Final Fantasy 7 remake was even close to reality and Square was very much about looking forward not to the past that leaves the big ones Activision's crash and Spyro Sony's first two real mascots the orange Bandicoot in particular was asked for if not outright demanded by fans every step of the way the PR team at super bot after months of answering no comment now had a go-to response when asked about crash it takes two to tango meanwhile developer Toys for Bob was already hard at work developing a spiral game that would eventually become Skylanders and Activision had no interest in sharing that pie either looking at it even just half a decade later it is shocking to see the state of the industry by comparison in the past two years alone crash was revived with the insane trilogy a spiral remake could be on the way classic Dante reappeared in Marvel vs. Capcom if and a true devil may cry 5 is heavily rumored Tomb Raider is in a Renaissance a Final Fantasy 7 remake is in the works hell cloud was put into Smash had development of all-stars been shifted either up or down by even 2 years the game would have looked entirely different just in terms of roster alone instead we had a fanbase tearing itself apart from the inside a general audience salting the wounds from the outside and a developer with sopping wet band-aids trying to cover as many broken hearts as possible and that folks is where we're gonna leave off for now originally this was going to be only a one part video not a two-parter but at the 11th hour I discovered some info that has never before been revealed about this game from developers that worked on playstation allstars including to cut characters and a potential reason why this games post-launch support was cut early come back next week for part two we're on top of discussing these things I discussed the game's launch itself the post launch support that it did have the potential future of the playstation allstars series and my current critical opinion of the game itself as always thank you very much for watching if you liked the video make sure you hit the like button and share it with your friends and if you want to see more of this kind of content and more make sure you subscribe as always everybody stay golden [Music]

Channel: The Golden Bolt

Views: 167,182

Keywords: playstation all-stars history, smashed: the untold story of playstation all-stars, what happened to playstation all-stars, playstation all-stars what happened, playstation all stars review, playstation all-stars battle royale review, playstation allstars battle royale review, playstation all stars, playstation all-stars, ps all stars, playstation allstars battle royale, playstation all stars battle royale, playstation allstars, psas 2 leak, smash bros, Super smash bros

Id: 9AFyamDQc_k

Length: 12min 44sec (764 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 20 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/Universal04]

I’m praying for a sequel.

Purely because we could play characters like Aloy, Joel and Ellie and maybe even Spider-Man.

[u/dornwolf]

Would've loved to seem Sony take the branding all the way to Mario-esque levels. Do a kart racing game and party games would've been a blast.

[u/TheGamer4life94]

I didn't know you were the golden bolt :o love your videos!

[u/mcolwander90]

Such an underrated title. It had its issues, mostly in the presentation department, but it was a great foundation for an even better game. It's a shame it didn't sell well. Still hoping for a sequel because it could really be something special. We do still get "leaks" and rumors every year, so it's at least not forgotten. At some point, they got to be true, right?! :(

Currently playing it now on my Vita before the servers close. It's as fun as I remembered. Though I'm not doing so hot haha.

[u/Jerith-]

Quick note: The reason the video is two parts is because of those exclusive interviews I mention in the title! I had finished the video a day or two before the game's fifth anniversary (11/20/17), but an old friend from the PSAS community got in touch and showed me the interviews. For the sake of their privacy, I didn't list them by name (or by their community nicknames, since most of the devs were members of the fighting game community in some way), but these were verified members of significance within SuperBot. Hopefully you guys understand why I can't share their names!

[u/rtubbs]

I remember seeing a render for Dart from legend of dragoon then heard they decided not to put him I the game :(

[u/PM_ME_YOUR_MONTRALS]

I had a lot of fun with this game when it first came out. I wish people weren't such bitches about it. It was awesome.

[u/TokenGeekOffical]

God, I really want a sequel for this game. It goes without saying from me personally, but great video! It was even better the second time.

[u/Harris7123]

It shuts down October 25th, not today.