As a preface, I want to get one thing straight here. I do not think boomhits are a bad thing and am at no point trying to get a concept like this across! They are merely a possible ingredient that you can decide to add to (or randomly have appear and decide to keep in) your replays. Kind of like how chocolate is not a necessary component of a cake but a chocolate cake sure can be delicious!

Now that's out of the way, let me throw the main concept out here. Generally, boomhits are vastly overrated by the community. I think a good part of this is due to many replay makers starting off on the multiplayer side of the game, where there is a much greater focus on harder hits, higher points and greater dismemberments making a better battle. Sure, I'd agree there's nothing wrong with the way this works - that's pretty much how multiplayer is meant to be played. However, single player is a completely different ball game in practice and this is largely due to one feature - the ability to try again.

Since you can test your moves, experiment with variations, correct your mistakes and tweak every last joint until you get the desired result, single player really needs to be looked at differently. The "bigger = better" consensus of multiplayer need not apply here. You need to adopt a different mindset to be able to appreciate a smooth, flowing kick to the neck that only gets a decap can be as good as a similarly smooth kick to the chest that breaks both pecs and the chest joint combined. The actual placing of the kick should not matter so much, it's the kick itself, along with the movements preceding and following it that should be the focus of attention here.

If you are going for a joint cluster such as the chest though, it's an opinion among many people that it's best to get as many dismemberments as possible in that hit. Sure, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that but at the end of the day it's just that, an opinion. Just because someone didn't spend an extra 15 minutes tweaking a hit to get one extra dismemberment doesn't mean their replay is now objectively worse than it could have been. Maybe they were looking to make a delicious savoury replay and the chocolate boomhit would have completely ruined the intended flavour?



This thread is open to discussion on the above article. Keep it civil and feel free to post/link replays to illustrate your points (NOT for C&C purposes).

Man I agree 100%
Boom hits are cool but like you said " like chocolate is not a necessary component of a cake but a chocolate cake sure can be delicious"

i always thought about it, everyone saying that if i don't get boomhits i'm not a good player, thats totally wrong. A replay should be judged by its style, power is not all that we need. Sure boomhits looks nice, but not nescessary, but still then people will judge you hardly just because you can't make boomhits. Each time i try to do boomhits i lose my time trying it, and when i can't do i just don't make it, because its not needed.

IF somehow someone can't make booms, don't be sad, he/she don't need 'em, you will learn it with time.

100 % agreed,Ive been playing for almost a year now and Ive only achived 3 booms, and people still call me noob and stuff.

I started to think that boomhits were overrated when I first saw somebody going for every possible boomhit spot in one replay and making it painfully obvious at what they were aiming for. The boomhit looks good when it's spontaneous, not forceful effort on the players part to achieve it. For that reason, I have always valued replays that ended after all natural momentum from the setup had ended. It looks more stylish imo.

That's right, everybody loves the chocolate. But nobody sees the value of plain o' vanilla.

Imo boom hits are not overrated at all. Why? Because they show true precision, power, replay-making knowledge and experience. Not only this but they most of them look awesome and stylish.

Sure you can make a non-boom replay but a lot of them look like random dismemberments, not much time perfecting it and so on. Or at least that's how most of them are ( implying there are exceptions).


From what I've seen so far since I've been making replays, most of the people who complain about boomhits being overrated are those who don't like spending too much time making replays or those that are not good enough to aim their hits to pinpoint accuracy. Honestly, I was among the above until I decided to try to learn them and now I love them.

Boomhits are overrated. They're not bad or anything, but I think people misunderstand the whole thing. Boomhits are awesome, when they're spontaneous (like Oracle said) and they look great if they're executed in the right way (nograb etc.) However, giving people critique for not achieving boomhits at every single time possible isn't that good IMO.

For me, style and fluidity are the main factors of a good replay. I admit that I used to be addicted to boomhits and hated it when I didn't get them in my first try. But now, to me boomhits are not necessary, however when you get them then why not keep them? But this is after all, a matter of taste though and I guess people nowadays want to watch replays including huge ultraH4X bewms and I'm not here to complain about their opinions. Thing is, booms aren't everything in a replay and it saddens me that people would reject fluid and stylish splitcaps for instance, for messy bewm madman replays. I think boomy madmen are getting a tad mainstream to me. I'd love to see some more original replays such as juggling with body parts, arm-clubbing, realism etc. But that's just me.

Boomhits are easy to make and they look nice. Obviously, since they are easy, every noob can do them. That's why they become so popular.

Check out some oldschool replaymakers and will see the difference. Sure, today people may do much greater replays, but you can easily see the perfect taste that players had back in the days.

Noweb's replays, must see.

Back then people looked more at style rather than the amount of dismemberments in a short span of time and yes, I think Noweb is like the "godfather" of madman replays. His style was very original and from what I've seen it really looked like he was tearing Uke to shreds. Like a mad man.