One divisive element of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is how hard it leans into competitive play, which has been perceived as coming at the detriment of content aimed at casual players such as items and a story mode. According to Ludosity CEO Joel Nyström, Nickelodeon specifically wanted the game to be able to attract a competitive audience, and chose Ludosity as a lead development team due to the positive reception of their first platform fighter, Slap City, from competitive Super Smash Bros. players. 2 years later in 2023, the game's gameplay designer and community manager Thaddeus Crews would respond to a tweet from YouTuber TierZoo complaining about a focus on complicated competitive techniques in non-Smash platform fighters, as well as some replies to the tweet complaining about 1v1-based platform fighter design as a whole, with a clarification on why Ludosity's platform fighters have been marketed so directly at competitive players, as well as why he feels other games in the subgenre are marketed as such: