Brawl Central (website)

:Not to be confused with Team:Brawl Central.
Brawl Central (later known as Nintendo Hub, VGDistrict, and finally Smash Bros Central) was an unofficial Super Smash Bros. Brawl fansite that was created on November 16th, 2006 by "Chris". "The Buzz Saw" would join Chris shortly after to help with programming and backend assistance with the site. Brawl Central acted like the Smash Bros. DOJO!! by providing information related to Super Smash Bros. Brawl and translating sources from Japanese magazines and forums. The website, under its final name Smash Bros Central, was shut down in 2014.
==History==
Brawl Central was started and run by Smash Bros. players and Smash World Forums (SWF) members "Chris" and "the Buzz Saw". At some point, 3 other admins ("T3h Kaiser", "Pumpkins", and "NGW") were appointed, with Buzz retiring. The main website featured many different pieces of information and news of Nintendo and other video game related news, constantly being updated by news editors. News editors included NGW, Kagato, Ferret, Xiammes, Kirby173, and Rocky. Brawl Central would later broaden itself and include a forum for community discussion on January 15th, 2008. The forum's section had members gather and discuss topics ranging from video games to questions and forum games. The administrators and moderators kept the site clean, although members sometimes got to "vote" in regards to whether or not something should be deleted. The forum would include many character-specific clans for Super Smash Brothers Brawl. Some of the clans included "The Aura Wielders" (Lucario), "K.I.N.G.S" (King Dedede), "Aethercide" (Ike), "The Galaxian Enforcers" (Metaknight), "FALCON PAWNCH!" (Cpt. Falcon), etc. 
Brawl Central hosted many elaborate Wi-Fi tournaments during its tenure. The big tournaments were , , and . Notable players who attended these tournaments include , Yonex204, , , , FIERCE, , , ridleynkrool, and boomshakalaka. Many tournament matches remain available on Brawl Central's old YouTube channel.
In 2008, Brawl Central rebranded to Nintendo Hub. Many of the Brawl-related features were kept, such as character boards and competitive Brawl forums. However, the site had expanded to encompass many more series, with over 20 forums related to game series, mostly those from first-party Nintendo franchises. Examples of non-Nintendo brands include the Guitar Hero / Rock Band forum, and the Gears of War and Halo forums. It later rebranded to VGDistrict.
On November 2009, T3h Kaiser and other admins, moderators, and forum members were tired with the way that the admin Chris ran VGDistrict and thus left to make Xugo Gaming. VGD was set to close down later that month, but on November 24th, Chris decided to keep the site open and used cheaper hosting to help try to secure the site's financial stability. On Friday, December 11th, 2009 VGDistrict was revamped and all previous members and posts were deleted. One of the most notable changes from the switch to VGDistrict, besides veering away from the Nintendo-centric branding, was the revamped homepage. The homepage now featured dedicated sections for featured members, gaming news, sponsors, gaming tournaments, and a link to VGD's new gaming podcast, the D-cast, run by forum members RnR and Adamated87.
VGDistrict ran until around June 2013, where it shut down, rebranded, and began redirecting to Smash Bros Central, which added features such as a wiki and tournaments.Last archive of Smash Bros Central The pivot from VGDistrict to Smash Bros Central was an effort by Chris to capitalize on the hype of the upcoming Super Smash Bros. 4. One of SBC's new moderators, Proto Man, would post daily Miiverse updates from Masahiro Sakurai to Smash Bros Central's homepage. Smash Bros Central also started its own podcast, called "The Smash Bros Central Podcast." The SBC podcast would have standalone episodes with set Nintendo topics, and special episodes with Nintendo Direct/E3 Reactions.DBC Podcast E3 Episode Podcast hosts/guests included: GSNinja, Lauren, Proto Man, SilverX, Ismar, PK_Awesome, Karazure, Liam, Scan, Rocky, Logshot, and Genow. Smash Bros Central would remain active until around January 2014, where the site would no longer run, effectively ending the website's overall existence.
===Domain Post-Shutdown===
Archives of the domain show activity in,https://web.archive.org/web/20150726025324/http://smashbroscentral.com/ and soon after, the domain would be taken up by a business company,https://web.archive.org/web/20160518040156/http://smashbroscentral.com/ containing dozens of articles relating to business studies. Tab names would simply be labelled "Business". This would continue being used until around March of 2018, where the website would be open for purchase again.
In June of 2018, Smash Bros Central's website returned with a black screen saying "Soon...". It once again sported the Smash Bros Central name on tabs, implying an intention to return. As of 15th April 2024, however, the same screen remains.
The domain for VGDistrict would not see use after January 2014 until July 2017, where it became a redirect for SSBWorld.https://web.archive.org/web/20170705131505/vgdistrict.com On April 22nd, 2020, the domain name for VGDistrict expired and was auctioned on GoDaddy's website.auction page The domain name was valued at $1,305 USD based on domains of similar naming conventions, but ended with no sale. In September of 2020, it was sold by a Chinese vendor, though the resultant website was taken down.
==Gallery==
VGDistrictLogo1.png|VGDistrict Logo
VGDistrictLogo2.png|VGDistrict's abbreviated logo.
NintendoHub2.png|Nintendo Hub Banner - Ness.
NintendoHub3.png|Nintendo Hub Banner - Samus.
NintendoHub4.png|Nintendo Hub Halloween Theme.
SmashBrosCentral1.png|Smash Bros Central's appearance.
SmashBrosCentral2.png
VGDistrict1.png|VGDistrict pre-launch
ClanBannersBrawlCentral.png|Clan Banners from the Brawl Central era.
BrawlCentralBanner1.png|Brawl Central banner featuring Sonic and Wolf.
==Trivia==
*Brawl Central's YouTube channel produced several famous moveset swapping videos in 2008, the first of which heavily contributed to the notoriety of Pikaman. Said video has since garnered over 6 million views.
==See also==
*Brawl Central's YouTube Channel
*Smash Bros Central's YouTube Channel
==References==
Category:Defunct websites