Something that bugs me is the reasoning they give for why assists are gone. "some characters were only picked for their assist" or "if a character didn't have a good assist they weren't picked", that sort of thing.
Isn't that bullshit? It's like saying a character is picked for a strong anti-air, or lack of strong anti-airs. It's just one of many facets of a character, that if you balanced your game properly, there'd be incentive to pick everybody regardless of whether they're strong at any one particular area.
And it's also straight-up untrue - Zero and Wolverine aren't known for their assists, but were regarded as VERY strong. Meanwhile, I guess there's Rocket Raccoon and Haggar who were picked primarily for assists, but weren't very good alone? But they could still get the job done. We all remember Kusoru and KBR. Mostly the commonly picked characters were good on both sides of the field, like Magneto or Doom. The ones like Ryu or She-Hulk, who never saw play, were just inferior in all aspects. That's not the fault of assists, that's the fault of the game designers.
like, just say the real reason assists are gone - it's too much for the casual player to comprehend, so it's outta here. At least be honest about it.