Here, as promised, is the twentieth portion (including my review and bonus characters) of my in-depth Super Smash Bros. Brawl critique for Rorschach’s contest.

After writing this all out, I realized it is way too long for a single post. I’ll break it down into two characters at a time and release them over the course of the week so you can read who you like at your own leisure.

The following will detail my impressions and thoughts of every character in the final roster, two at a time. So, if you haven’t finished unlocking the entire roster, or have been living under a fucking rock for a couple months, don’t read any further. There may be a surprise or two mentioned herein. I’ll also offer up one or two suggestions for additional characters that I feel should have made the roster or deserve a spot in the next iteration. Enjoy.

Olimar

Olimar is the biggest mystery to me in Brawl. I’m sure that sentiment is felt by many, so at least we’re likely in the same boat. After spending a bunch of time with Olimar I still am left with a resounding “WTF?” when it comes to the majority of his moves and how he handles. Maybe I just don’t “get” him. Let’s delve deeper to find out.



For one thing, I commend Nintendo for even attempting to translate a character like Olimar into the Smash series. Pikmin isn’t exactly the most normal of concepts to place inside a fighting game. The mini space dude commands plant creatures. He doesn’t have laser beams or explosive rockets or uppercuts or anything of the sort from his series to translate over. It’s almost a miracle they managed to place him in at all, let alone have him be half decent.

Olimar, as I stated, is a little space man that basically uses mind control to force his little plant people to do his bidding. In Brawl, that hasn’t changed much. His neutral B move grabs a randomly chosen Pikmin from the ground, which clearly means it can’t be done in the air (note: there are five varieties of Pikmin with slightly different attack properties). These come in handy as general attacks using his Over+B toss move, wherein he grabs the Pikmin next in line and throws them like any item. Only, if the Pikmin survives it will run back to Olimar, or at least try to. Should they get lost or confused you can use Down+B to recall all Pikmin to your side.

The different Pikmin themselves mean very little to me in combat. First off, I can never tell which is next in line because I’m always running around or switching directions and what have you. That means tossing them is a crapshoot for me. I can’t plan strategically if I have no fucking clue which is next in line, ya know?

I also get annoyed because I can rarely tell when one dies and one survives. I know there’s a little ghost image that shows them “passing on” but in the middle of a truly hectic battle I can’t watch all portions of the stage and my opponents and be able to pick out a faint little ghost-like image amongst the chaos. This means much of my match is spent hitting the ground and spamming neutral B just to double check my Pikmin numbers and get them back to capacity.


See how annoying this can potentially get?

Olimar’s Up+B recovery is one of the very few useful recovery moves I use as an actual attack on a common basis. He whips out his chain of Pikmin and opponents get dealt whatever type of damage the Pikmin does in full as they get hit by the whip. This means they can be dealt some pretty serious damage if you hit them with the entire whip from close range. It’s really his only powerful special move.

When the match first starts he will have three Pikmin with him to begin. From there you can pluck three more out to have six total. This is important for some of his special moves (such as Up+B recovery) because the more he has, the larger the range on certain attacks. It is to be equally noted that from every respawn thereafter he begins with no default Pikmin. You must pluck them out ASAP if you want to utilize your full arsenal. That annoys me.

Olimars standard A attacks are truly a mixed bag for me. Save for his Up Smash+A and aerial Over Smash+A attacks I couldn’t discern a single stand out move that did good damage. I tried, I really did. His moves have such a generally small amount of knockback, though, that it’s extremely difficult to tell when he’s doing lots of damage and when he’s not. One could argue this is a strategic decision so your enemies don’t know they’re being ravaged, and you can pick them off later, but it just annoyed the shit out of me. It makes playing with Olimar seem unrewarding. He seems weak because there’s no feedback as to doing a good job and really hitting someone hard. I often did a ton of damage with him but could rarely remember ever getting a “good” hit on anyone during the battle. That was just odd to me.

Olimar’s Final Smash is pretty decent (and wholly annoying). He flies up above the stage in his rocket as night falls on the stage below. As he’s in the sky the big plant monster things come and chomp on your opponents (who must still somehow manage to stay on the stage AND avoid each other’s attacks). General damage is pretty high, although I find KO’s coming more from people falling off then actually being knocked off the stage. It’s still pretty damn effective, though.

Olimar = Win. He’s a quirky dude. He somehow deals tons of damage. I just wish that fact was communicated more clearly to the player(s). Again, maybe it’s all a part of his strategy. I just think it’s annoying. I’m more proud to see him represented than anything else, weird ass moveset or not.

Captain Falcon

I really have no clue why certain characters like Captain Falcon and Luigi (and Ness and Jigglypuff) are STILL considered hidden characters. They’ve been in the series since game one, damn it. We know they’re gonna show up (some against my liking). Just give them a normal roster spot. Shit.


Ahoy.

Anyway, Captain Falcon is back and his moveset isn’t changed all that much. He still has his neutral B Falcon Punch, his Down+B Falcon Kick, as well as his Up+B recovery move that explodes on contact with enemies. He’s also still one of the most annoying players in the game because he insists on yelling the name of whatever move he’s pulling off upon execution. Sigh. Overall, he plays pretty much the exact same manner he always has. This will make some people hate him and some people love him. It makes me hate him, but not ‘cause of the moveset itself.

I noticed two differences to Captain Falcon when I played with him in Brawl. The first was that his Over+B move was a rushing uppercut move. It’s a decent move and helps him close the gap on enemies a little too far out of reach. I don’t recall this move in either of the other games but maybe I’m wrong. I never played much with him to begin with and I haven’t played those games in years.

The second thing I noticed is that Captain Falcon has a disproportionate amount of moves that can be cancelled mid-move by an enemy attack. In general, the Captain is a pretty lithe fighter. His standard A attacks are quick and can often be spammed to good effect. His special B moves, though, often take time to charge a little bit, or at least for the animation to play out. During this charge/animation time his moves can be interrupted by pretty much anything. This makes pulling off a move effectively a wholly unique accomplishment. His moves are so finicky that it’s no fun to play with him. The time it takes to kick some ass is spent getting pissed off because someone else interrupted you. Fuckers. Maybe it’s just because his moves take longer, or maybe it truly is because more can be interrupted than other players, I don’t know. I do know it sucks to never land a solid hit with him, though.


Road rage at its finest.

Captain Falcon’s Final Smash is pretty damn epic. It’s technically a single hit move wherein his F-Zero ship, the Blue Falcon, dashes across the screen. Anyone who gets hit by it lands on an F-Zero race track and gets run down by the Captain himself, manning the ship with an evil grimace on his face. Getting hit is almost always an instant KO, unless your opponent had a very low hit %. Either way it has tons of knockback and can send opponents flying high, ready to be juggled and aerial smashed regardless. Overall it’s one the best and flashiest single hit FSs in the game.

Captain Falcon = Fail. Despite the fact he’s a true veteran and has an awesome Final Smash, the fact the rest of his moveset is so damn hard to pull off it makes him no fun to play as. If they give him some invulnerability during more moves so that he can actually execute them (timing be damned, enemies could get out of the fucking way, ya know) then maybe he’d be fun to play as again. As he stands, he’s one of the most nerfed characters in the game and wholly terrible because of it. Claiming the timing is part of the strategy and that hitting with a quality Falcon Punch is exhilarating may be true, but it doesn’t make me like him more when there are other characters I could fight with more easily and more effectively with than him AND have fun while doing so. They really missed the boat with the Captain this time around.

Thanks for reading. Stay tuned for my critique of Jigglypuff and Lucas!

Or read my review of the game!

Or, if you need to catch up on old critiques try these:

First Row:
Mario and DK
Link and Samus
Kirby and Fox
Pikachu and Marth
Mr Game & Watch

Second Row:
Luigi and Diddy Kong
Zelda/Sheik and Pit
Meta Knight and Falco
Pokemon Trainer
Ike and Snake

Third Row:
Peach and Yoshi
Ganondorf and Ice Climbers
Kind Dedede and Wolf
Lucario and Ness
Sonic plus BONUS Knuckles

Fourth Row:
Bowser and Wario
Toon Link and R.O.B.

And my bonus characters who should have made the roster:

Mega Man
Bomberman
See Sonic's critique for Knuckles

Thanks for reading!