This is not to say that you can’t enjoy playing online; With Friends play has provided me plenty of enjoyment. Getting a list of friends together, and being able to play people you know online, is plenty of fun even with the aforementioned button lag, and you can even try some other modes online cooperatively, such as Home-Run Contest. With Anyone, though, feels pointless. There’s a chance that the entire game will be lagged up beyond being playable, and since you can’t talk to your opponents, see who they are, or follow them, you may as well play against three computers, especially since the A.I. really has been ramped up this time around. Spectator is a bit of fun, but betting on people simply from which characters they chose is a bit of a lacking betting experience. You may as well draw numbers out of a hat.

Besides everything just mentioned, Brawl brings a grab bag of goodies to the table. The ability to take snapshots of whatever you want, or to save up to three minutes of replay data whenever you like, is going to add a lot to the fun factor for a fair amount of players. The Stage Builder, too, is a resource filled to the brim with potential; as long as you have a good imagination, you’ll have fun there. But even if you don’t, you’ll still benefit: Nintendo is regularly sending out new Custom Stage data for you to play on, designed by others, as well as snapshots to see and replays to watch. This is good use of the Wii’s internet capabilities, and I only wish the Wii could download it automatically; from the looks of it, you have to connect to Nintendo WFC to get your new goodies.

Trophies return, and they’re just as informative and amusing as they were before; perusing them and learning tidbits about Brawl or Nintendo is fun whever you feel like doing so. Stickers offer a bit of the same benefit, though not so much. The Chronicle is sort of interesting, but in reality it’s just a list of games; it’s hard to get excited about it. Masterpieces, a group of Virtual Console demos for you to try, is a nice distraction, but the extraordinarily short playtime (sometimes as low as thirty seconds) makes the experience lackluster, to say the least.