Super Smash Bros. for Wii U/ 3DS Review

Super Smash Bros. for Wii U/3DS review

Hello again! So we’ve finally made it to the end of the Smash Bros. series (at least for now that is) with Smash 4. I will be looking at both versions of the game and will compare and contrast them throughout the review. Smash 4 is yet another expansion to the prestigious Super Smash Bros. series and this time comes in 2 flavors. There’s the usual console release, but for the first time ever, a handheld Smash Bros. has been made! It’s really interesting how there are 2 versions of this game. So how do they stack up against one another? How are the new characters introduced in this game? What has this game done to expand on the already amazing series? All of these questions will be answered in this review!

(Graphics) I’m not going to beat around the bush here; both versions of Smash 4 are absolutely gorgeous. Of course the Wii U version looks better, but the 3DS version is truly a sight to behold when you actually play the game in person. It doesn’t look that good in captured footage, it’s something you really need to see for yourself. It’s amazing that the game is in a pretty stable 60 fps on the 3DS. He The characters move in 60 fps but the assist trophies and Pokéball Pokémon move at 30 frames to balance it out. A few other things like Olimar’s Pikmin move at 30 fps as well. The framrate does dip quite a bit when things get a little chaotic, but a 2-player match on a stage without hazards will run just fine on the 3DS version. The Wii U version is drop-dead gorgeous. I love the art direction of the game and think it is absolutely perfect for Smash. The 3DS version somewhat has this style as well besides the cel-shading, but it really shines on the Wii U. Gone are the days of realism from Brawl as the characters now boast bright colors. Some characters like Shulk do look a little more realistic, but they have relatively bright colors. The style gets the Nintendo feel down perfectly. The framerate is 60 fps for everything that moves on the Wii U version. There are many different lighting effects in the Wii U version used in certain areas as well with the regular lighting, the nighttime effects on Battlefield, the extra glow some of the lights give the characters in stages like in the Mario Kart 8 stage, and the way the characters look in some of the intergalactic stages. Smash 4 is simply a marble to look at.

(Plot) There isn’t any real plot to Smash 4. There’s no story mode like in Brawl, which is a bit disappointing because of how cool the Subspace cutscenes are, but that was sort of brought back in the form of newcomer trailers. The story mode gave a sense of unity with the characters and a deepened sense of it being a crossover. While this game still has that feel, the interaction between the characters in Brawl felt more like my favorite video game characters were together than in this game. That might just be me though.

(Gameplay part 1) Like its predecessors, Smash 4 has a wealth of game modes and unlockables on both versions. The returning modes across both games are the signature Vs. mode, Classic, All-Star, Multi-Man  (now Multi-Man Smash), Trophies, Photo Album, Replays, Records, Training, online, Target Smash, and Home Run Contest. Vs. mode is the same as usual but with a few new items, Assist Trophies, Pokémon, special rules, stages, and even a new feature that allow for up to 8 CPUs/players to participate at a time known as 8-Player Smash, exclusive to the Wii U version. This is arguably one of the more noteworthy additions to the game, as the maximum amount had been 4 for the entire series up to this point. Every stage in the game now has an “Omega” form, which gives every stage a flat, Final Destination-like layout, giving the more hardcore players some more variety. Classic Mode works differently depending on the version. In the 3DS version, you’re given 3 different paths that you can change between matches. You go through about 4 or 5 matches with a given character/set of characters/team/giant/metal like usual and then fight a gauntlet of Miis (which replace the Alloys from Brawl) and then face off against Master Hand (and Crazy Hand if on a higher difficulty) at the end as always. The Wii U version puts your character on a board of sorts that you can move to different clusters of characters until the board is cleared. You then fight a team of Miis like in the 3DS version, and then the bosses. The difficulty settings have been changed, giving you a scale that goes from 0 to 9.0. It’s very similar to the difficulty settings in Kid Icarus Uprising. You’re rewarded better goodies from taking on higher difficulties. If you loose a battle, you don’t only loose points, but get knocked down to a lower setting and potentially loose some of your prizes. It’s more brutal than in previous games in that sense and harder to beat on the highest difficulties. However, beating it on a 9.0 difficulty is very satisfying. The final boss varies depending on your difficulty setting. Between 0 and 4.0, it’s just Master Hand, while anything above that gives you Master and Crazy Hand, who share an HP, making the fight easier than usual. You can pick between just Master hand or both of them (and possibly some of Master Core) on some settings, but the higher ones give you no option on the 3DS version while any difficulty that qualifies for both of them gives you both of them on the Wii U version. The shared HP and shorter fight is because of Master Core, who emerges from Master Hand in the middle of the battle at certain difficulties. The number of forms Master Core has depends on just how high your difficulty setting is, but on the highest difficulty it has 5 forms on the 3DS version and 6 on the Wii U version, so it’s a pretty lengthy battle. It has a humanoid, beast, sword, shadow, and core form in both versions while the Wii U version also has Master Fortress, where you go through a maze of sorts and destroy the giant pulsating parts. The shadow form is a giant shadow of whatever character you’re playing as. The core form is the easiest, as you just smash away at it until it flies off the screen. It’ll KO you if you’re not fast enough though. The first few forms are definitely the hardest, and are mostly why clearing at a maximum difficulty is no easy feat. I recommend using a heavyweight power character like Ganondorf or Bowser if you’re going for a 9.0 difficulty. You may find using custom equipment the most beneficial in this mode, which I’ll cover in a bit. You clear it and get your trophy as usual and then go through the credits. The new difficulty system is definitely a welcome addition seeing as 3 hard options were so reluctant in Brawl, and the high-risk, high-reward system is really nice. I like how the 3DS version handled the progression better, as the Wii U version’s Classic Mode tends to get a little chaotic because there it really likes to show you the 5+ player battles. All-Star mode is unlocked from the start, but you don’t get the full and genuine experience until you’ve unlocked all the characters (and downloaded all the DLC characters!). It works more like Multi-Man Smash to make sure you can get through all the characters in a timely fashion (because there are a lot in this game!) and you fight the characters in their order of debut. It goes from oldest to newest on the 3DS version while on the Wii U version it’s the other way around. It does feel a little cheaper than in Melee and Brawl as it really feels like you’re just smashing away at hordes of characters, but I do like how they have it set up to show each individual character’s debut. It was likely made unlockable from the start because of the DLC characters. Multi-Man Smash is basically the same as usual, except you have a “rival”, which is a copy of your character that you can fight. As I mentioned earlier, it also replaces Alloys with Miis. It uses Miis saved onto your system as well as Mii Fighters that you’ve created. There are more trophies than ever in this game, and you can even buy them for in-game money and score some of them through a mode called Trophy Rush, where the length of it depends on how much money you spend on it. You hit a bunch of crates until you get in “fever” mode where the trophies start trickling down. You can now upload your replays to YouTube. The game has a ranking system of sorts with Global Smash Power, which measure how many players from around the world you’ve scored higher than on the extra modes. The game also gives you tips that pop up before each battle. They can be anything about the game’s modes, characters, stages, items, or what have you. The online mode has been revamped, giving you the option to voice chat with your friends only and when you select “with anyone”, you have 2 modes: For Fun and For Glory. For Fun is more casual, has items on, and randomly picks any stage except Final Destination. You’re not ranked in For Fun. For Glory has 2 stock matches that only take place on Final Destination or Omega Form stages with no items and a ranking system. You get banned if you do something like disconnect from the match or self-destruct. I don’t exactly agree with the banning for disconnection. I understand that they don’t want people to go online and troll others by doing that, but sometimes you have to get off of the game to go do something. We have lives too, Nintendo. It just doesn’t feel fair to ban someone for having places to go. That being said, the online in Smash 4 runs circles around Brawl’s online. It’s smoother and has more variety. There’s also Spectator Mode, which allows you to place bets on who you think will win a match. There was something like this in Brawl, but it’s fleshed out more in this game. It has special competitions against certain characters. I honestly never use it and don’t really see the point in doing so unless you want some more money and don’t feel like playing any other mode that gives you money. You can share your custom stages, replays, and Mii Fighters online too. I wish there was a search system for those though. Target Smash has been changed and no longer consists of levels that you go through to break targets. Instead, you damage a bomb until it launches into the targets, which are protected by wooden blocks. Sounds familiar? Yes, it’s a lot like Angry Birds and I think it’s just ok. It’s basically a mish-mesh of Home Run Contest (which also makes a return in this game) and Angry Birds. I miss Break the Targets. And Board the Platforms too in fact. Home Run Contest is pretty much the same as it was in Brawl. You can scan amiibo, Nintendo’s new and ridiculously popular NFC figure line, for each character and train them up to be a killing machine. It’s pretty fun and some of the best utilization of amiibo yet. It’s interesting to see you teach a cpu-controlled character to fight and then basically try to outsmart yourself when playing against them at high enough levels. They level up the more you fight them with a cap of 50. Your amiibo can even give you gifts such as money of custom equipment. You can feed them equipment too to affect their stats. You just have to go out of your way to buy the figures, which can greatly vary in rarity depending on what character(s) you want the amiibo for. Amiibo also double as nice merchandise to put on your shelves, desks, or wherever you wanna put them. A lot of people have dedicated their time to collecting them. I have a few myself, but I certainly wouldn’t call myself an amiibo fanatic. It’s making a lot of money for Nintendo, heck they’ve sold about twice as much as the Wii U has, but I seriously hope Nintendo doesn’t get wrapped up with amiibo because I feel like it’s a fad and like with their casual audience with the Wii, it will eventually loose its popularity. Only time will tell though. Ok, sorry for rambling, back to the review!

Now for the version exclusive modes. The 3DS version has Smash Run, a mode that’s basically a marriage between Adventure mode and Kirby Air Ride’s City Trial. You go around a large map defeating enemies from many different games and collect stat boosts for 5 minutes and then have a final match. It can range to a special type of battle to a race to the finish. There will be instances where a there will be more of a certain stat boost than usual or a room where you complete a certain challenge that rewards you with stat boosts and even some custom material. You have special powers on the bottom screen that you can score in Smash Run. They’re things like homing missiles, a giant laser, and an automatic jet pack equipment. You can build the sets of these that you take into Smash Run or just choose random, which is what I do. I personally love this mode and play it almost every time I boot up the 3DS version. It’s different every time you play it and the stat boost collecting has an addictive feel to it. It’s also a fun way to unlock stuff. They also did a great job with selecting a wide range of enemies from Nintendo games and some 3^rd party enemies too, which makes me both really wish the Wii U version had something like this and I feel that the Subspace Emissary would’ve benefited greatly from having the enemies more like this. The Wii U version has Smash Tour, which…I don’t like quite as much. You go around a board game-like map with up to 3 other players. You start out with a random assortment of characters and with each battle you get into, you loose the characters that are defeated in the battles. They act as your stock. You can get trophies that grant you special abilities such as changing the map. You can get stat boosts in this mode too. After the last turn, there’s a final battle. Like Smash Run, it’s different every time you play it, but you have less control over how Smash Tour goes over. I get that they wanted to make a Smash Bros. board game mode to resemble Mario Party, but I’m not a huge fan of it. It’s somewhat fun, I guess, but it feels like there’s too much going on at once to really take in. Smash Run is easy enough to understand at its core while Smash Tour feels all over the place. They should’ve done something more akin to Melee’s Adventure Mode. There’s a minigame in the 3DS version called Street Smash, which utilizes the Streetpass function of the 3DS to have you make your own little character chip to push other players’ chips off of an arena. It’s ok I guess, I rarely use it and forgot it even existed for a while. The Wii U version brings back the Stage Builder, Masterpieces, Movies, and Trophy photography, but those are all only on the Wii U. The Stage Builder now utilizes the Gamepad and it works really well with it and feels a little more fleshed out than in Brawl. The masterpieces now direct you to the Eshop. The movies are the clear movies from Classic and All-Star mode, the intro, and the reveal trailers from before the game was released. They removed Chronicle, but I don’t think it was really anything to write home about so I don’t care that it’s gone. The trophy photography is now a little more customizable and you can upload your photos to Miiverse. Speaking of Miiverse, there’s a new stage that displays Miiverse posts related to any characters fighting on the stage. They’re supposed to “cheer them on” but since it’s Miiverse there has been some…interesting stuff put onto that stage. One more mode is more of a new mechanic but I’ve mentioned custom material a few times so far in this review. You can now equip each character with special equipment to boost their stats at the expense of another. You can even get different special moves, which are mostly variations of pre-existing moves, like how Mario can have a larger and more powerful fire ball that moves slowly or a quick one that does no knockback. Some are more different than that though. I do think custom moves are nice additions, but there’s a big problem with them. With the exception of the Mii Fighters, Palutena, and the DLC characters, who have no custom moves to speak of, you have to unlock every single special move for every character. That means 2 variations of each of their 4 special moves for 48 characters. That is a lot of moves to unlock. The worst part is that you can get rewarded moves that you already have. This was a terrible design choice. I can understand making the equipment unlockable, but they should’ve at last given every character at least one other variation of each of their special moves so we could experiment with them earlier on, but that’s not the case. Regardless, custom moves bring a new layer of strategy to the table and it’s nice to see that. This was the first game to ever get a line of amiibo figures, and there’s one for each character. You can scan them and make them your training buddy. It’s actually pretty nice. They can even unlock some stuff for you. From what I’ve seen, collecting the amiibo seems to be an experience in of itself. I only have 4, 3 of which are for Smash (Mario, Mega Man, and Toon Link), but I recognize that there are people who are crazy for those things. Good for them. So Smash 4 has a lot of modes, most of which are fun to play through, but I feel like some of the quality from the previous games’ extra modes is missing. It might be from having a larger roster, but I feel that they could’ve made them a little better. What we have is high quality, it’s just that I wish that they kept Target Smash the way it was and have an open map mode of some sort for the Wii U version.

Before I get into the characters, I want to quickly talk about the game’s physics. This game’s physics are a mix between Melee and Brawl’s and I feel that it’s the best of both worlds. Melee and Brawl both felt a little too stiff in their own ways at times, but Smash 4 is buttery smooth. The feel you get from landing strong attacks feels especially good in Smash 4, mostly because the effects have been amped up by quite a bit. Characters do tend to last a while, especially in earlier patches, but playing a match on 2 stocks lasts a reasonable amount of time in my opinion. Combos are easier to execute than in Brawl, but maybe not quite as prevalent as in Melee. It has the same hitstun multiplier as Melee and Brawl, it’s just that Melee had techniques that elongated combos and Brawl had a glitch that allowed characters to cancel hitstun. There don’t seem to be a ton of intricacies like in Melee and it seems like there’s less than in Brawl, but the game is more aggressive than Brawl (and quite a bit faster too), making competitive matches more fun to watch than for Brawl. Even if the game doesn’t have many techniques, it doesn’t make it any less competitive. How competitive something is or isn’t is rather suggestive, and there are still plenty of people who aren’t satisfied with Smash 4 on a competitive level. Those people should just play what they like best. While I definitely support the hardcore players and think Sakurai should be a little nicer to them, I don’t think we’re ever going to get a Smash Bros. game that feels exactly like Melee. That’d be pretty boring if you ask me. The game has a distinct feel from the rest of the series and I like that each Smash game has its own feel to it, making each title unique. I love the feel of this game myself and think it’s the best physics engine in the series. Now on to the roster!

(Gameplay part 2) Smash 4 has a really big roster of 58 characters, all with their own playstyle regardless of whether or not they’re a clone. This is pretty impressive for a fighting game. Like with Brawl, I’m not going to cover all of the veterans, but rather the ones that I feel got a significant enough change to talk about or if I have a particular opinion about them in this game. I am covering all of the newcomers as usual. Let’s begin!

Luigi remains his comical self in this game. He feels better than he did in Brawl and now has a new jump animation. He also sticks to the side of a stage if you side B onto it. It’s pretty funny. His biggest change is his final smash. Instead of the…interesting dance he did in Brawl, he now pulls out his Poltergust and sucks his opponents up. It’s pretty cool.

Bowser is definitely at his best in this game. He’s now geared to be equally competent in 1v1 and free for all matches. While none of his specials or his final smash have changed from Brawl to this game, some of Bowser’s grabs, aerials, smashes, and tilts have been reworked and now he’s awesome. His new side smash has a ridiculous amount of range. He throws his body out with the move. Bowser sort of reminds me of a wrestler in this game. As a side note, he has his old moveset as Giga Bowser.

Peach has a few new animations. He up smash now surrounds her in a twirling ribbon of sorts and she has a completely new up aerial where she spreads a rainbow around her. Her side B also comes out much faster. Her final smash also generates bigger peaches than in Brawl. I guess you can say that she makes you taste the rainbow.

Wario has had a few changes to him. His head gets bigger in some of his attacks and he’s a little more expressive. His side smash has been changed to a big punch too. His new up smash is similar to that of Mario’s. He’s still wah-tastic.

Dr. Mario makes a triumphant return after being absent in Brawl. Not much has changed about him, but he’s less of a clone here due to keeping the down B tornado that Mario hasn’t had since FLUDD replaced it in Brawl. It wouldn’t have made sense for Dr. Mario to use FLUDD. His final smash is like Mario’s except his pills! That’s something!

Donkey Kong can now use his down B in the air! How cool! He feels quite a bit better than he did in Brawl too. His dash attacks has been changed too. He now rolls like he does in the Donkey Kong Country games. His final smash is the same, except it now has a thing that makes it easier to see when you need to press A to beat on his drums.

Diddy Kong has mostly the same moveset, except he can now only use one banana at a time, and his jetpack can fly off of him if you charge up all the way and don’t let go of the button input. He was infamous among competitive players for a while for being “broken”. He had a combo that pretty much always hit that killed a decent number of times. It’s doing a down throw and an up aerial. It’s been dubbed the “hoo-hah” by fans. Once the patch that allowed for Mewtwo to be downloaded came, Diddy was nerfed, but I never really thought he was broken in the first place. Diddy Kong has pretty low defense and his recovery is easy to disrupt or miss with too, but I’m glad the hoo-hah was nerfed so everyone could shut up about it.

Link is considerably better in this game than he was in Brawl. Not only does he look great in this game, but also he just feels better. I still prefer his cel-shaded reincarnation, but Link is fun to play every now and then for me. He has a new dash attack that resembles his target lock stab from the 3D Zelda games and it’s pretty useful.

Zelda is now separate from Sheik. Her new down B has her summon a phantom knight that both protects her and does damage. It’s a pretty cool move. Other than that she hasn’t been changed too much. I still find her fun to play as every now and then.

Sheik is back and better than ever. She keeps her speed and great combo ability, but now has 2 entirely new moves. Her side B is now called Burst Grenade, which is a move where she throw a small grenade that explodes after a few seconds and can draw opponents in slightly. It feels somewhat similar to Snake’s grenade. Her other new move, being her new down B, is Bouncing Fish. Bouncing Fish has Sheik lunge forward and do a drop kick. Her neutral B has more knockback now too. Sheik is considered the best character in the game because of her placement in tournaments. While Sheik is very good in this game, she has a somewhat steep learning curve. Her kill power is noticeably low in this game, so you have to rely on her combos that bring foes off the stage, which are rather hard to get the hang of.

Toon Link hasn’t changed much from Brawl and is still one of my most used characters. However, this time he’s more of a secondary. His down air no longer has the pogo stick-like feel to it, going straight down instead. I’ve adapted to it though, and still love the little guy.

Samus remains mostly the same but has received two notable changes: one being that Samus, like Zelda is with Sheik, is now separate from Zero Suit Samus, and she has received a new design. Unlike in the past games where she appeared similarly to how she does in Super Metroid, her appearance is now based off of her design from Other M. I think she looks pretty nice in her new design. She certainly has some cool alts. I don’t play her often, but Samus is still cool.

Zero Suit Samus has received quite a few upgrades in this game. Her up B is now a kicking combination that starts by having her launch into the air. Her side smash is now a kick instead of a whipping attack as well. Like suited Samus, Zero Suit Samus is designed similarly to her appearance in Other M. She also now has jet boots that somewhat resemble high heels. Her new final smash involves her getting into her ship and shooting characters with an on-screen reticle a la Snake. It’s pretty cool if a little too good. Zero Suit Samus has also placed high in a number of tournaments, likely due to her high agility, quick mobility, good combo game, and powerful moves. She’s pretty good in this game, but not exactly broken. I feel that her defenses are low enough andher moves are easy enough to avoid that countering her doesn’t feel like much of an issue. Zero Suit Samus CPUs do tend to dodge a lot, which can be annoying.

Pit has gotten quite a few changes from the transition from Brawl to Smash 4. First off, his design is now his Kid Icarus Uprising design and his voice has been changed to match how he sounds in Uprising (which sounds WAY better than what he sounded like in Brawl). Some of Pit’s moves have more knockback. Gliding has been taken out of this game, so Pit can no longer do that. He now shoots straight up for his up B, making it a lot fairer than it was in Brawl. His side B is now him using the Upperdash arm, which works like Captain Falcon’s side B in this game. It can reflect projectiles too. His down B has changed with him using two shields, one on each side of him. These are called the Guardian Orbitars. They break if you keep them out for too long.  His final smash is now him using the three sacred treasures from Uprising. Pit feels like a new character with how many changes he’s received. He’s fun to play around with every now and then for me and is well balanced in this game.

Ike was a character I wasn’t expecting to return but was pleasantly surprised to see return. He hasn’t changed moveset wise, but he has been redesigned to match his appearance in Radiant Dawn. He looks a lot more buff.

Roy is back and I couldn’t be happier. He’s received a great new design that’s a combination of his appearance in Binding Blade and in Awakening. His neutral tilt and down air are now different, and he retains the overhead slash for his neutral B which Marth lost in brawl, so Roy feels pretty different from Marth (and Lucina for that matter).  He’s better than ever too. He remains to be a fun and satisfying character to play as and is a secondary/main of mine. He didn’t come to the game until a little later as DLC, but he was worth the wait. It’s a bummer he was leaked, though. Roy is still my boy.

Kirby has had a number of changes. First off, he feels noticeably heavier than he was in Brawl. It felt weird at first but now it feels fine. Kirby’s side B has been upgraded, giving it the fire element that the Hammer ability has in the game that has gotten me through so many bosses in Kirby games. It works like Dedede’s down B, except you can charge it infinitely; it just starts hurting you after a certain amount of time. Kirby’s final smash has also changed, now being his Sword super ability from Return to Dreamland. It was a welcome change and something that I was pretty sure would happen.

 

King Dedede is more expressive than he was in Brawl, giving him more personality. That’s a common theme with the veterans in this game. Dedede can now only throw Gordos with his side B. The Gordos are double-edged swords of sorts since they can deal plenty of knockback but can be hit back at him to do just as much damage. He feels fairer than in Brawl, but I do still find him a bit annoying to fight. One thing that baffles me though is that they changed his Final Smash, but it’s not him transforming into Masked Dedede. Instead, it’s a super hammer attack of sorts.

Meta Knight is way more balanced in this game than in Brawl. His moves were given some more knockback and lag, and since gliding isn’t in this game, his recovery has been nerfed too. His up B is a straight vertical and somewhat circular swoop. He’s still a good character, it’s just that he requires an above decent amount of skill now.

Pikachu has received a few changes from Brawl. Its down B now comes out of a thundercloud, which means it no longer takes up a whole section of the screen, making it easier to avoid and balancing Pikachu better! Hallelujah! Pikachu has also gotten an updated design to better reflect its appearance in the newer Pokémon generations, now being thinner and standing up straighter.

Charizard is now its own standalone character, with Ivysaur and Squirtle nowhere in sight along with the trainer. I was expecting there to be a new Pokémon trainer with newer starters, preferably the Unova starters, but I had a feeling that Charizard could come back because of its renewed relevancy. It’s hard to tell who’s returning when it comes to Pokémon characters in Smash. Anyway, Charizard has a few new moves in its arsenal. Charizard now uses Flare Blitz for its side B in which is does a charged dash that crashes into opponents but, like in the games, does damage to itself every time the move is used. Charizard still has Rock Smash, it’s just been moved to being its down B instead of its side B. Charizard can no longer glide due to the mechanic being scrapped. Charizard’s forward aerial now involves it slashing its claws. Charizard also has a new up aerial that’s a head-butt instead of a bite. Charizrd’s final smash is now Charizard mega evolving into Mega Charizard X, where it can fly around, use Fire Blast, and Dragon Rush. According to competitive players, Charizard has been mostly nerfed in Smash 4 and is considered a low tier character. I still enjoy using it from time to time despite this.

Lucario is back and has received some beneficial buffs. Lucario is another character I didn’t expect to return, but did anyway. It makes sense since Lucario is a really popular Pokémon along with Charizard and has been consistently relevant since it was introduced. Anyway, Lucario’s aura is now even stronger, making Lucario ridiculously powerful at high percents. Lucario’s up B covers more distance and its side B is a more reliable move now. Lucario’s smash attacks are also much faster. I considered maining Lucario for a while but ultimately dropped it in favor for other characters. Lucario’s final smash is now Mega Lucario, where it mega evolves and is at max aura power regardless of percentage. The aura is even stronger with Lucario than it was before.

Mewtwo makes a triumphant return after being absent from Brawl and the game’s initial roster. I, along with many others, thought that Mewtwo was going to return due to its new mega evolutions and just because it’s so popular, but shockingly it wasn’t initially in Smash 4. However, the confirmation of DLC was simultaneous with the announcement of Mewtwo’s return. Mewtwo has received a few changes, mostly with its side and down B. Its side B is now a reliable recovery option and can reflect projectiles more easily. Its down B has better range. Mewtwo is actually lighter than in Melee, making it one of the lightest characters in the game. I think Mewtwo is quite a bit better in this game than in Melee, and apparently Mewtwo is really starting to catch on with competitive players. Mewtwo’s final smash is Mega Mewtwo Y, where it sends shockwaves that blank out its opponents’ minds. It’s good to have Mewtwo back. Let’s hope it doesn’t get cut again, eh?

ROB has gotten a few changes. ROB’s neutral B now has more range and its final smash is now a giant laser beam that branches off into several other beams. It’s way better than its old final smash. ROB is another character I thought was getting cut just because nobody seems to like ROB in Smash, but that doesn’t mean much in the end. ROB now has a Virtual Boy alt, which I find pretty funny. I rarely play ROB but I’ll admit that ROB can be pretty fun to play as.

Ness has the same moveset, but in this game he’s considered a pretty viable character in the competitive scene. For the while he was even a top tier character. His PK Thunder crash combination is now really powerful and can KO opponents at low percentages. He also has a new voice actor. His final smash is he same, except you can now control where the comets fall.

Captian Falcon has all of the same moves as in Brawl, but his side B now has a different arch to it. He’s also a lot better than he was in Brawl too. The Falcon Punch is as flashy as ever too.

Olimar has been changed quite a bit from Brawl. He can now only use 3 Pikmin at a time instead of 8. His up B has now changed to having Winged Pikmin carry him, but the distance he can travel with his up B is shorter if he has more Pikmin with him. He’s been nerfed pretty badly with all of this in mind, and I rarely play him. I was never really a fan of  exactly the same as Olimar does, just with a different appearance and voice.

Sonic retains his moveset from Brawl outside of a new down smash that is just like Fox’s, but his moves have more knockback than in Brawl. I’m disappointed that they didn’t give him some of his other moves like his boost of the color powers from Sonic Colors, but they did give Sonic much more personality and he feels more like Sonic than in Brawl, so that’s a plus.

So those are all of the veterans I am covering in this review. Overall, even with the characters I didn’t mention, the characters have been given a lot more personality and TLC than in Brawl. This more then carries over with the newcomers.

Villager from Animal Crossing is a very unique character with plenty of versatility. Villager has a number of moves that can be used in creative ways such as the gyro, which the Villager can ride on like a rocket but can also just use it as a projectile. Projectiles can be stored and thrown back by the Villager with his/her neutral B. Villager also has a move where s/he can plant a seed, then water it, turning it into a tree, and finally chop it down, which can do a lot of damage to opponents hit by the falling tree. However, the axe the Villager uses to cut down the tree can also just be used as a regular move, making the villager look like a violent serial killer. The tree can hurt opponents if they’re in the way of the tree when it sprouts up. There may end up being leftover wood that can be thrown from the tree. Villager also uses other items from Animal Crossing such as a pot, slingshot, firework rocket, and an umbrella to name a few. Villager is a mid-weight character with great recovery but is slow on the ground as a compromise. There’s certainly a lot packed into this character and you can get pretty creative with Villager. Even though I’ve never played Animal Crossing and it doesn’t interest me much, Villager is a very fun character to play every now and then.

Mega Man, the super fighting robot of Capcom, has finally joined to battle. Oh man, I love Mega Man in this game. From the first trailer at E3 2013, I felt that this character was going to be my main. After playing as him at the BestBuy event and winning, I became further invested into Mega Man. To this day, Mega Man is by far my favorite character to play as in Smash 4. I was aware of the series that he’s from before he was revealed and even sampled it, but I became even more interested after his confirmation for this game. I’ve since grown to love the series. Mega Man is basically taken straight from the classic series and put into Smash Bros. exactly how he is in his games. The attention to detail is remarkable. He moves, attacks, jumps, and even nudges his foot forward exactly the same as he does in the NES Mega Man games. He even has all of the same sound effects for his moves. Mega Man is unique in that his regular and forward tilt as well as his neutral aerial is all his power pellets (a.k.a. “lemons”). He’s the only character to share the same move on the ground and in the air, and if you’ve played his games, it makes sense because a lot of what you do in Mega Man games involves jumping and shooting the pellets.  Some of his moves are altered to work better for Smash, such as the Flame Pillar coming out on both sides of him for a down smash and the spark ability to be a melee attack for his up smash instead of a projectile like in Mega Man 3. Most of his moves work like they do in the games they hail from though. The metal blade can be thrown in 8 different directions like in Mega Man 2, except it’s not nearly as spammable as it was in that game. Other characters can pick up and throw the metal blade too. Mega Man is another very versatile character that may rely heavily on projectiles, but can hit pretty hard with up-close moves too. It’s really fun to use his projectiles and then follow them up with strong melee attacks. His metal blade allows for a lot of different follow-up options and his flame sword, his forward aerial, along with his slide (down tilt) and top spin (dash attack) are all great for combos. Mega Man is just a lot of fun to use and I’ve grown very attached to him in this game. I also like that the biggest Mega Man player in the tournament scene comes from Georgia, which is where I also live. Mega Man’s final smash is incredible. It involves him shooting out a hole that sucks enemies in, and he along with the other incarnations of the character then proceed to shoot a giant laser beam. This whole character feels like a love letter to Mega Man fans and I love it.

Wii Fit Trainer was an interesting addition. Certainly not expected, but I feel that s/he was handled well and is a good representative of Nintendo’s casual games. Wii Fit Trainer uses a lot of stretches and yoga poses for attacks as well as objects from the game Wii Fit such as hula hoops and a soccer ball and can even use deep breathing as a move that’ll power him/her up if the button is pressed right when the 2 circles in the move meet. S/he can even shoot the sun at opponents! That’s pretty crazy. Wii Fit Trainer will randomly give you fitness tips from time to time such as, “try to keep your balance!” Keeping true to the whole idea of Wii Fit, Wii Fit trainer’s stats are balanced. What I mean by that is that s/he is a jack-of-all-trades and master of none type of character. I sometimes play Wii Fit Trainer but not very often. I’m not a huge fan of how the character plays. Despite that, it’s entertaining to play as Wii Fit Trainer every now and then.

Rosalina, while being yet another Mario character in Smash Bros., was in my opinion the best choice for a new Mario character (as far as the main series goes, that is) to be playable in Super Smash Bros.. I had an idea of what her moves would be but I was pleasantly surprised as to how she was handled. She has Luma on her side. Rosalina in a way treats Luma as a puppet. Luma can be shot away from Rosalina and deal and take damage for her. Luma can, however, explode, and it’ll take a little while for another one to spawn, which can leave Rosalina a little vunerable. Luma adds for a lot of potential mix-ups and can really put opponents under pressure. Rosalina has consistently been high on the tier list for this game for a reason. She can be vunerable without Luma and her defenses aren’t exactly stellar, but her strengths more then make up for it. She’s also just a really fun character to play as. I even considered her a pocket character for a little while but ultimately decided not to focus on her. She’s still a great character and fun to play as, though. She was also revealed the day before my birthday, so that was a nice unintended birthday present!

Little Mac is one of the most interesting additions to the Smash Bros. roster ever. He was highly requested to be playable after only being an assist trophy in Brawl and got a hue upgrade. Little Mac has a very unique playstyle. He’s the epitome of a double-edged sword. On the one hand, Little Mac is incredibly fast and can hit hard. However, his defenses are low and his recovery is terrible. He’s a character you’ll want to jump as least as you can with. His aerials also don’t do much of anything. As Little Mac deals and takes damage, a meter that appears above his percentage goes up. Once filled, Little Mac can unleash the KO Punch, a move that will deal massive damage and knockback if it hits an opponent. It’ll only not KO opponents hit by it if they’re at low percentages. It’s a very satisfying move to pull off. I imagined that Little Mac was going to work like this in Smash but I didn’t see the KO Punch coming. I like playing as him every once in a while. He was actually the very first character I played as in any version of Smash 4, being the first character I played in the 3DS demo at Best Buy. He’s been the target of jokes because of how he can jump off of the stage with his side B if you’re not careful enough with him. Little Mac has great alts too, some include him as a wireframe character in reference to the original Punch Out and you can even play as him with his pink hoodie on! There’s also a chance that his trainer Doc Luis will shout something to motivate him when he taunts. A lot of effort was put into this new fighter and I think it paid off.

Greninja was certainly a surprise but a pleasant one at that. I remember the in the reveal trailer when they showed its shadow as it charged up a projectile. I, along with many others, thought it was Mewtwo, but was surprised to find out that the Water type amphibian starter Pokémon from the Kalos region was being added to the mix. Greninja was actually one of the first characters I played as in Smash 4. I played the 3DS demo at Best Buy as Greninja and took a liking to it. I ended up being invested in other characters more so in the end, but Greninja is a fun character to play as. Its Water Shuriken is definitely more useful here than in the Pokémon games. It’s also cool how it has Substitute for a counter, which has Greninja fake out with either a log or a highly detailed substitute doll. Greninja can even disappear and attack out of the shadow with its side B, Shadow Sneak, which has got to be my favorite of Greninja’s moves.  Greninja has certainly received a lot of attention with its inclusion in this game and current prevalence in the Pokémon series. It comes to show that pretty much any character that gets into Smash becomes a celebrity of sorts.

Mii Fighters are highly customizable characters. It felt like a given that these guys would eventually make it into Smash Bros. given their presence in Mario Kart and general popularity. You can now have any character you want in Smash. Nintendo has even released DLC costumes for characters that people wanted but ultimately didn’t join the battle such as King K. Rool and Geno. I guess that’s better than nothing. The Mii fighters come in 3 different types; Brawler, Swordfighter, and Gunner. The Brawlers play closest to Little Mac. They fight empty-handed and rely on strong melee attacks. Swordfighters feel similar to Link and can use a number of weapons. Gunners are similar to Samus and can fire energy from arm cannons are well as use a jetpack and fire missiles. They’re all pretty basic characters, which makes sense since they have a bunch of different options for custom moves and have customizable appearances. Other characters have custom moves, but for the most part they’re variations of their default specials. The Miis actually have completely different moves for their custom specials. They’re not the only ones, though. There’s another character I’ll get to soon that works somewhat similarly to these guys. It’s fun to mess around with the Miis and to create your own characters. Aside from the Brawler, they’re not particularly good when compared to the rest of the roster, but they aren’t terrible. The possibilities are endless with these characters.

  

Palutena is a character that I really wanted to be playable in this game and I got my wish! She’s a great character in Kid Icarus Uprising and I wanted to see what they would do with her in Smash. They handled her interestingly like many newcomers in this game. All of her specials are moves that you can use to assist you in Kid Icarus Uprising. Palutena, like the Mii Fighters, has custom specials that are completely different from her default special moves. My favorite moves to use with her include Lightweight, which makes her lighter but faster, which actually really helps her, Reflect, a default move where she pushes a giant reflect barrier that can reflect projectiles as well as push opponents away from her if time correctly, and Explosive Flame, where she fire a giant fiery ball. Palutena was my secondary for a while but I have since moved her to being a pocket character. . Another move I really like from her is her up smash, which is a tall pillar of light with a lot of range and great knockback and damage.  I feel that she was worsened with the first or second balance patch. I still enjoy playing as her quite a bit despite me losing some interest in her, so I consider her a pocket. Many players criticize her. A lot of people think she is useless. Some people think she shouldn’t be in the game because they don’t think she’s an important enough character to deserve a spot in Smash Bros. and that her addition to the game was out of Sakurai’s bias for Kid Icarus. I think that while she isn’t a high tier character by any means, she can be utilized effectively. As for importance to Nintendo and Sakurai’s bias, while Palutena isn’t as big of a name as Mario or Link, it’s nice to have more female characters in the game. Also, Kid Icarus has come to be more popular thanks to Brawl and Uprising, so I feel that the addition of more Kid Icarus characters was only natural. I might be a bit biased myself, but regardless, I think Palutena was a nice addition to the roster.

 

Pac-Man is one of the most recognizable characters in gaming, so having him in Smash Bros. is great. While it feels like they had to stretch a bit for his moveset, he’s still a really cool retro character. I’m glad they went with this design and not his obnoxious looking design from the TV show Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures. He has a charge up attack that cycles through the collectible food items from the arcade game. The ones that take longer to get to are more powerful but they can all be utilized in creative ways. Pac-Man can take the form of his classic appearance in some of his moves. He can summon a fire hydrant that can spike opponents but can also spray out water that’ll push opponents back. It can be used against him though. It’s a pretty neat move. Pac-Man can jump on a trampoline that just like the trampolines from Mappy. Anyone can use the trampolines and the more times you jump on it, the higher you will jump. It will go away after it’s jumped on 3 times or if Pac-Man uses the move again. Pac-Man can even use the ghosts from his game for his smash attacks. I’m not sure how that works but ok. Pac-Man turns into a giant version of his classic appearance and eats opponents like how he can eat the ghosts once he touches the big pellets in the game. He has a taunt where he’ll have little sprites from different classic Namco games, making Pac-Man part Pac-Man representative and partly representing Namco’s old arcade days as a whole. Pac-Man is an interesting character and fun to use, if a bit slow, but I prefer other characters to him.

Robin is one of my favorite additions to this game’s roster. I, along with many others, was expecting Chrom to be the new Fire Emblem character in these games, but we were wrong. I had seen a lot of people have Robin on their roster predictions or wish lists and I didn’t think they would add him/her because the Miis would be the avatar character to be in Smash 4 but it turns out that they just have Robin in his/her default appearance. However, after seeing Robin in these games, I am very glad they chose him as Chrom wouldn’t have been nearly as interesting and unique as Robin is. Robin can use powerful tomes and can fight with 2 different swords, the Bronze Sword and the Levin Sword. The durability system from the Fire Emblem games is translated into this character as using magic moves and move with the Levin Sword is limited. You can often switch between the sword being your main weapon and the tomes being secondary and vice-versa. Robin can charge up his/her neutral special, which are the different types of Thunder from Fire Emblem Awakening. The longer the charge, the stronger the Thunder spells. The Thunder will burn out quicker if the more powerful tiers of the move are used more often than the weaker ones. I initially thought that the durability system was going to cripple Robin, but I was wrong. It doesn’t take too long to regain access the tomes after using them up. You can actually throw the books of used up tomes at opponents as well as a used Levin Sword. I love using Robin and at one point even had him/her as a secondary but since Roy’s release I have moved Robin to a pocket character. Chrom is sort of still there in Robin’s Final Smash where the 2 team up against opponents and in some of Robin’s victory poses. Robin truly did tip the scales.

 

Lucina was revealed alongside Robin and it turns out that she is a clone of Marth. I had the feeling that would happen if she were to be included, and because of that I wanted her as an alt instead, but Sakurai wanted her to have a different playstyle so she got her own separate slot. I feel that of the 3 characters that got this treatment in the game, Lucina was the least necessary. She really didn’t need a different sweetspot (which in her case is a lack thereof). Lucina’s blade is balanced through all parts of it, meaning her attacks do the same amount of damage regardless of where she is relative to her opponents. She’s good for players who don’t want to deal with the sweetspots that Marth and Roy have. I feel that those people are a minority, but I could be wrong. Lucina is also faster than Marth. I actually had Lucina as a secondary for a while because I felt that she was the closest character to Roy. I had fun with her for a while but grew bored of using her. She’s still a decent character, I just feel that there are others in the roster that are better and more deserving of being playable in this game than Lucina.

Shulk was a character that, despite me not having played the game he’s from, I wanted in this game. I thought that he looked cool and would be a good representative of one of Nintendo’s lesser-known properties. I did eventually get Xenoblade Chronicles on the 3DS and I quite like it. Part of why I wanted Shulk was because I wanted the awesome tracks from his game to be in Smash-most notably You Will Know Our Names. I kept waiting for his reveal trailer because a character reveal coupled with a theme like that was a match made in heaven. Unfortunately Shulk was leaked a few days before his official reveal, taking away the surprise factor, but his trailer is still great. Shulk is a very unique character in that he utilizes the Monado Arts, which can affect his stats both in Xenoblade and in Smash. He has the Jump, Speed, Shield, Buster, and Smash. Jump gives him a higher jump at the cost of power and speed, Speed gives him a high speed stat at the cost of jump height and power, Shield gives him high defenses at the expense of speed and power, Buster gives him higher damage output at the cost of knockback, and Smash gives him high knockback at the cost of damage output and defense. What I usually do when I use Shulk is start with Buster to rack up damage and then switch to Smash to knock opponents away. I also switch to Shield at high percentages and I use Jump and Speed as a start instead of Buster at times. Along with the Monado Arts, Shulk has some of his other moves from Xenoblade Chronicles. His Vision move is his counter and is probably the strongest one in the game. He steps back and then does a big forward slash when countering. Shulk is a character that I use pretty often, as he’s really fun to play as. He’s especially helpful in the extra modes. His Smash attacks have a lot of range, which makes him useful in a number of extra modes due to the focus on clearing the screen of enemies. His Shield art makes it easier to endure more Crazy Orders challenges. Smash Run is all about stat boosts so having Shulk in there is really helpful. I just really feel Shulk.

Dark Pit is literally a clone of Pit. I feel that he could’ve used a different set of weapons to differentiate himself from Pit, but I understand that he was a last minute character. He does use a different bow and arm weapon, but they’re just replacements for what Pit has. It makes sense that he isn’t an alt for regular Pit seeing that he doesn’t use the 3 Sacred Treasures. However, he is pretty much the exact same as Pit with a different coat of paint. He has the same stats as Pit. They could’ve at least given him more different custom moves than Pit, but nope, they didn’t. The only real difference is that his arrows have less control and his Final Smash involves him shooting a giant laser from his staff that they didn’t bother implementing into his moveset. It’s pretty much Zelda and Sheik’s Final Smash. He also has a different victory theme and his personality, so there’s that.  I’ve been pretty negative so far with Dark Pit but there are a few positive things about him. For one, he has his likable personality from Kid Icarus Uprising. He’s also enjoyable to play as, seeing that he’s almost the exact same as Pit. I feel that some different stats and maybe having his up B work differently wouldn’t have been too much to ask for, but they might not have had time to do any of this. If you like Pit, you’ll like Dark Pit. If you don’t like Pit, then you won’t like Dark Pit. I guess it’s pretty neat to see them together at the very least.

Bowser Jr. is a character that I did not want to see in this game as a playable character, but here we are. I just don’t like him as a character and feel that there are enough Mario characters in Smash as is. With that being said, Bowser Jr. was actually handled well. All of his alts are the 7 Koopalings, which is admittedly cool. While I don’t care for them either, I’ll admit that it was neat, even if the Koopalings aren’t exactly related to Bowser Jr. Bowser Jr. fights in the Koopa Clown Car, which can shoot cannon balls, eject wind-up toy bombs, and can even transform into a car. You can ditch the car with up B though, which gives Bowser Jr./the Koopalings different aerials than in the clown car. They also take less damage wen the car is hit vs. when their actual bodies are hit, which is pretty neat. They’re pretty average when it comes to stats, but they’re pretty heavy for small characters. The reveal trailer was also awesome, even if they showed it after the 3DS version came out, thus ruining the surprise factor. I probably would’ve had a pretty bad bias and would like the trailer less and not see the good in it as much so if it were to be a surprise. Bowser Jr./the Koopalings transforms into Shadow Mario for their Final Smash, who proceeds to paint a giant ‘X’ on the screen which damages anyone who touches it. I don’t remember the Koopalings ever being able to transform into Shadow Mario and it’s not a terribly useful Final Smash in my opinion, but Ok I guess. I’ve grown to be less annoyed by these guys as time as went on, but they’re still not my cup of tea.

Duck Hunt was an odd but very charming addition to the Smash Bros. roster. Since Melee, we’ve gotten an oddball unlockable retro character in every Smash Bros. game. Duck Hunt fits the bill for that role in Smash 4 (no pun intended). Anyway, at first I was confused as to why they called it ‘Duck Hunt’ instead of ‘Duck Hunt DOG’ seeing as that was who you were controlling, but when they officially revealed this character for the game, they clarified that it was a combination of the dog, the duck, and for the smash attacks, an unknown person pointing the NES Zapper at the screen and shooting. In the European version of Smash 4, they call Duck Hunt ‘Duck Hunt Duo’ even though it’s technically a trio. Moving on from the name, Duck Hunt is really homage to all the games that used the NES Zapper. This is similar to how Pac-Man represents the arcade days of Namco along with his own game. Duck Hunt’s Final Smash is hilarious. It’s a 8-bit showdown between the gunmen from Hogan’s Alley that opponents get caught in the middle of. They do a slow motion gunshot that hits the opponent(s). Duck Hunt is a fun character to play once in a blue moon, but I’m not particularly fond of Duck Hunt. I like Duck Hunt; I just don’t like Duck Hunt that much. It was a really neat idea though, and retro gamers are glad that they finally get to hurt the annoying dog without cheat codes (Not that I condone animal abuse, mind you).

Ryu, the most iconic fighting game character of all time, joins Smash Bros.. That’s pretty exciting. I didn’t think that 3^rd party companies could add more than 1 character, but it turns out that I was wrong. I also thought he wouldn’t fit in very well with the Nintendo characters, but I was also wrong about that, Ryu fits in nicely with the rest of the game’s roster. Ryu is pretty much taken straight from Street Fighter and put into Smash. All of his moves, animations, and sound effects are all exactly as they are in his games. They even implemented the button input system. How it works in this game is that he can use his Hadouken, Shoryuken, and Tetsumaki Senpukyaku with regular special inputs, but can use stronger versions of them if  you input the combinations from Street Fighter. He also has the Focus Attack from Street Fighter 4, which I can best describe as a semi-counter with super armor. He also has the light, medium, and heavy system with his tilts and aerials. You get a light hit when tapping the input for them and a medium when holding them down longer. The ‘heavy’ version is using his smash attacks. There are a lot of ways you can mix these moves up along with his specials to do all sorts of combos. I thought he was gonna be broken when I first saw his combos in the DLC direct. Ryu also 2 Fianl Smashes. He has the hinku Hadouken if his opponents are far away and the Shin Shoryuken if they’re up close. Ryu was sadly leaked along with Roy a day before said direct, with files found with their names in earlier versions of the game, ruining the surprise. Ryu is a very hard character to master and arguably the most complex character in Smash Bros. history. I like to play him often to try and see if I can get the hang of him. He’s very fun to play as. He can really dominate when in the right hands, but he has a very steep learning curve, so he’s not broken by any means. Using Ryu is like doing karate. You need discipline and true skill to master him and can kick serious ass once mastered.

Cloud from Final Fantasy VII somehow actually made it into Smash Bros. I did not think this was even possible like many other people. Final Fantasy is an iconic game franchise that has a good history with Nintendo, but FFVII was never released on a Nintendo platform. It was pretty much the break-up letter to Nintendo from Square Enix. Cloud is a PlayStation icon of all things. I thought that if a Final Fantasy character were to be added into Smash, it’d be the Black Mage or another character from a Final Fantasy game that has actually been released on a Nintendo platform, but instead we get Cloud. It makes some sense, seeing as Cloud has appeared in some games released on Nintendo platforms, most notably in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories for the GBA, and FFVII is the most popular and best-selling game in the series, so it’s not the biggest stretch. Cloud is pretty much a finishing blow to PlayStation All-Stars, seeing as he would’ve been perfect for that game. If Crash and Spyro actually manage to make it into Smash in the future then PlayStation All-Stars will become even more of a laughing stock. Anyway, on to how Cloud plays. Cloud is a pretty fast character that can hit hard thanks to the giant sword he has known as the Buster Sword.  His defenses aren’t too shabby either. His recovery isn’t so good though; he’s like the Little Mac of sword characters. Cloud’s special moves are his Limit Break moves, but his down special charges the limit meter that powers up his Limit Breaks once fully charged. It’s sort of a combination between Ryu’s specials and how they can become stronger in certain circumstances and Little Mac’s power meter. If you input down B with a fully charged limit meter, you use Finishing Touch, a move with tons of knockback but the move only does 1% damage, which is an interesting trade-off. His up B will help him recover better if used in limit break form. His Final Smash in Omnislash, a move that he uses to finish off the final boss in Final Fantasy VII. It’s a lot like Ike’s Great Aether. Cloud is a very fun character to use. While I don’t main him, I do use him pretty often because there’s something very satisfying about playing him. He’s a very easy character to learn, which is why I think a lot of competitive players are using him now, and his sword swipes are satisfying. Cloud fits in with the cast better than I thought he would. He’s a lot like how Snake was in this game, being recognized as an iconic character from the PlayStation library but being in a fighting game with Nintendo All-Stars and characters with close ties to Nintendo such as Mega Man and Sonic. It’s going to be interesting to see who else from 3^rd parties will join Smash in future installments, given this character, Ryu, and another character I’ll get to soon. It feels like the possibilities are limitless now.

Corrin, while not being a character that was asked for by many, was still a nice addition to the roster. Before I talk about his moveset and all of that, I need to address the elephant in the room; Yes, Corrin marks the 6^th character in the Fire Emblem series to be in Smash 4. It’s a huge growth from Melee and Brawl’s 2. It can be argued that there are too many Fire Emblem characters now considering that the series isn’t very popular compared to other franchises represented in Smash like Mario, Zelda, or Pokémon. However, there aren’t as many stages and trophies to represent the series, so I suppose that’s a trade-off. Also, Fire Emblem is getting to be quite a bit more popular, which was hugely in part thanks to the Smash Bros. series, and is pretty popular in Japan. It’s no longer as obscure as Mother or Xenoblade. I did think that this character would eventually be in Smash, but s/he came sooner than I thought s/he would. Anyway, Corrin has a lot of ranged sword and lance attacks. S/he transforms into a dragon for a number of them. Corrin is probably the closest we’ll get to the Dragonborn in Smash Bros., but with some of these 3^rd party characters, who knows. There’s oe move that’s a charge-up projectile that will stun opponents, leaving you open to attack them for a brief period of time. Corrin’s most unique move is the lunging move where Corrin can mount his/her lance into the ground to either do a forward kicking attack, pin enemies, allowing for a follow-up, or doing one of the 2 aforementioned things and canceling the move. Corrin has a counter like most Fire Emblem characters do, his/hers possibly being the strongest of the Fire Emblem characters’ counters. S/he also has a recovery up B called Dragon Ascent, which shares the name with a move that Rayquaza can learn in Pokémon OmegaRuby/AlphaSaphire. I just find that interesting. His/her Final Smash is a giant whirlpool that sucks in opponents. It’s cool to look at.Corrin is a fun character to play as. S/he isn’t too hard to learn either. Corrin actually somewhat feels like a Project M character, so Project M enthusiasts may find interest in Corrin.  Corrin may not be the dream character everyone wanted, but s/he was still a nice addition. I would’ve chosen the Inklings to represent a new game, but Corrin wasn’t a terrible choice.

And we come to a climactic finale with these character bios with Bayonetta, the character that was surprisingly chosen from the Smash Bros. Fighter Ballot. I should talk about the ballot actually. Nintendo hosted a ballot in 2015 where fans could suggest characters to add to Smash Bros. with an explanation as to why they should be in the game. It was the first time they had ever done this on a global scale and many people speculated that Shovel Knight, Shantae, Rayman, Wolf, or King K. Rool among other characters would be the ‘winner(s)’. Of course there were trolls who voted for characters like Shrek or Goku. It wasn’t clear how many characters they would add from the ballot or if there was going to be a clear-cut winner, but for 6 months discussion was rampant about whom Sakurai would pick from the fan suggestions. The final Smash Direct came in December of that year and revealed that Bayonetta was ultimately the winner of the ballot, being the #1 most voted character worldwide among recognizable characters (I’m still not entirely sure what that means- did that many people vote for cartoon characters or was there trouble getting the other 3^rd party suggestions in? Will they ever officially release the ballot results? Only time will tell.) I never thought that Bayonetta could possibly be in Smash Bros., she comes from a game with a lot of cussing, blood, and stripping naked. Not exactly a character you’d expect to see fighting Mario or Pikachu. However, against all odds, they were able to make her appropriate enough to fit the family-friendly feel of Super Smash Bros. while bringing a very unique playstyle. Bayonetta can pull off some insane combos and was even banned from tournaments for a while for being considered broken. She’s very over-the-top and fabulous as she is in her own games. Her defenses aren’t great though. She has Witch Time, which acts as a counter that slows down herself and the opponent that triggered the move. She can execute combos better with Witch Time, but it’s a little hard to actually pull off. She can continue to shoot bullets that only do damage after using her ground attacks. Her smash attacks have ridiculous range, but a lot of lag. Her Final Smash involves her entering Witch Time and then after doing an effective enough combo, finishing off opponents with a giant demon that devours opponents. She’s a very fun character to play as and I use her rather often. I like that she ended up being the ballot winner seeing as she wasn’t a character that people saw coming. I would’ve liked to see Shovel Knight or the Inklings, sure, but I would’ve seen them coming. It was more exciting to see a character like this get in and I think it helped Bayonetta 2 sell 1 million copies, something rare for the company that made the game (Platinum Games). With her, Cloud, Ryu, and the other 3^rd party additions in this game, it’s come to prove that Smash Bros. is more than a Nintendo crossover; it’s the ultimate crossover video game and I don’t think any crossover in gaming will reach the level of quality or hype that Super Smash Bros. has.

And with that, I have covered every single character in the Smash Bros. series. It’s been quite a ride, and it was my favorite part of all these reviews. The newcomers in Smash 4 are undoubtedly the best the series has seen, with just as much quantity as there is quality. It feels like most of the characters they added were well justified and almost all of them bring fresh and new playstyles to the table. Any newer game in the series has gigantic shoes to fill. Any character that is added from here on out in future Smash Bros. games should have something unique or some unique mechanic to them and the same amount of TLC and balance the characters in this game have. With what we have here, you can only go up. Let’s hope that Nintendo doesn’t loose track of what’s most important, though. Anyway, with that, the Smash 4 roster is definitely the best in the series. It’s widely varied and well balanced.

 (Music) At this point I’m beating a dead horse, but why not grind it to dust? Smash 4’s soundtrack is unsurprisingly incredible, with tons of great themes, with just about all of gaming’s most iconic music spread across a game cartridge and a disc. I even have the official soundtrack, which was a bonus of registering both games on Club Nintendo. It’s even more of the awesomeness from Brawl and that’s all that was needed.

(Conclusion) So, to wrap up this long period of me reviewing Smash Bros. game, we come to the final verdict. Super Smash Bros. for Wii U/3DS are awesome games. They have all of what’s made the series great and then some. While I do miss some of what was in Brawl or Melee and not these games, the quality and quantity of the roster and smooth gameplay more than make up for it and make these 2 the best games in the series and my favorite. Melee and Brawl are still incredible games in their own right though. Riding the hype train for this game was unlike anything I had ever experienced and I hope to catch it again for future installments. While this may be the end for Sakurai’s involvement in the series, I’m sure it’s still going to go on seeing as it makes a lot of money. The Super Smash Bros. series is truly unlike anything else as it not only brings together a lot of iconic characters, but also has created games that people will still be playing on a regular basis over a decade after release. I’ve put hundreds of hours into both versions of the game and don’t plan on stopping completely anytime soon. I hope to meet other people and make some great friendships through these games. I recommend these games to anyone. If you’re more of a handheld gamer then the 3DS version will certainly tickle your fancy, but the Wii U version is the definitive version. Get both if you can, I feel that both experiences have their own benefits that justify purchasing them. And with that, I am finished with the Smash a thon. It’s been good and I’ve spent over 2 years writing these reviews, so being at the end of it is a bit bittersweet. Smash Bros. is one of my favorite all time game franchises but I don’t know that it’s my absolute favorite. I think that’d be Pokémon, which holds more sentimental value for me. That could change one day, who knows, but for now, that’s how I feel. From here on out, I’m going to change how I review things. Instead of going through each specific category, I’m going to write about a specific thing that I feel I can talk the most about regarding the game. See you next time! Here’s to more smashing!