Fans have found a way to make tournaments possibly by imposing certain rules.
The most extreme cases would be to ban certain things like Summons or Feral Chaos.
Sadly the game itself never went mainstream, at least not here. Japan even had tournaments and they have their own rules,(but never as big as other fighters)
It goes without saying that I want this game to have an impact, at least as big as something like Smash,and possibly get a spot in EVO.
For DDFF, the meta have been split into 2 camp. The western meta focus on play to win and play the game 'how it's meant to play,' as such, big major tournament doesn't impose many limits expect for the extreme broken one (i.e Feral Chaos) though there are soft limits between players e.g chase, summon, etc...
The Japanese side accept that the game is broken and so have their own ruleset that limits equipments and certain character abilities. They also have own set of unmentioned rule like prohibit camping to avoid making the game a turtle fest. You can tell from watch replays videos that the JP side is more aggressive and flashy to watch.
Regarding with coming big as Smash, I don't think Dissdia can compete with the Nintendo's branding when it comes to mass appeal. The psp games certainly didn't help with it's abysmal online infrastructure and I fear FF is not as relevant as it was a decade ago. The only reason that Smash is this big is due to it's community. It'd be great if the game somehow blew up and make it to EVO though.
I was never into the competitive scene for Dissidia, but I would read things every now and then.
After I read stuff about AST (and Exdeath), I kinda realized the game was not very fit for competitive play, due to poor balancing.
That being said, this poor balancing imo is the game's only actual fault as a "fighting game". I disagree with the thought that this game needs a complete reboot in terms of mechanics or that it needs to become more "traditional". They got the systems, it feels good, just balance it and the game is good to go.
And yeah, watching high level play is amazing and I'm going to spend a lot of time watching this new Dissidia when it comes out.
I agree that making Dissidia more 'traditional' would be a great loss since it never was intended to be a 'traditional' fighter. I hope that Dissidia 3 is not a major overhaul (though some of the character's move-sets, seems to be the same according to the trailer) but on the other hand, they can't follow their previous mindset of just making the game flashy with tons of fancy effects if they want the game to have some leg and to be taken seriously.
The Assist Gauge would be the first thing I'd change when it comes to rebalancing. Changing that alone makes some characters lose their fangs. I'd probably nerf some of Exdeath's stuff too, but the Assist Gauge would come first.
I would nerf the massive advantage that you gain from having 2 bar AST - make it so that 2 bars change do not stagger and lock your opponent AST. Exdeath's stuff mostly resolve around a glitch that allow him to cancel a guard into another move during its start up so that can be easily fix. I would also change the AST themselves as there are only 5 worth using in a cast of 20+ (aerith is so dumb) as well as the chase mechanic that allows a 50/50 mixup whenever some one get hit with a 9f poke which is hilariously bad. Furthermore, I would make it so that zoner cannot run for 90% of the game in medium-large map and compensate but giving them decent spacing tools/revamp how their magic work.