Smasher:Mew2King
Mew2King, commonly known as M2K, is an American smasher from Cinnaminson, New Jersey, who currently resides in Orlando, Florida. He has one of the longest competitive careers in Smash, having begun competition in 2005. He is widely considered to be the greatest overall Smash player of all time due to his proficiency in nearly every Smash title, which includes being one of Super Smash Bros. Melee's "Five Gods" and being the greatest Super Smash Bros. Brawl player of all time. His acute chaingrabbing, camping, punish game, and comboing, as well as his extremely optimal and technical playstyle, earned him the nickname The Robot.
Mew2King rose to prominence in Melee, where he is considered one of the greatest players of all time due to his status as one of the "Five Gods" and being ranked in the top 10 every year he was active. He was the definitive best player in 2007 and one of the two best players in 2008 (along with Mang0). Originally beginning as a Fox player, he later added Marth and Sheik to his repertoire and tri-mained these characters for the vast majority of his Melee career. Best known for the latter two, he is considered one of the greatest Marth players of all time (along with Ken and Zain) and was one of the heaviest contributors to the Marth metagame alongside Ken. He was also one of the greatest Sheik players of all time (along with Plup and Jmook) and one of the greatest Fox players of all time. He was last ranked 10th on MPGR 2019 prior to his hiatus from the game. Mew2King was also one of the first and most important contributors to helping understand Smash as a whole, making many discoveries about Melee on his own by testing several aspects of the game, such as character weight, falling speed, attack knockback, priority, and game physics, and storing this information on SmashBoards as a repository for Melee statistics.
Mew2King had an arguably greater career in Brawl, where he is considered the greatest player of all time. Playing as Meta Knight, Mew2King was regarded as the best player in the world for most of the game's competitive lifespan (2008-2011, 2013), and contributed significantly to Meta Knight's status as the best character in the game; by the end of the game's active lifespan, most top players were playing or had a secondary Meta Knight. He was ranked 5th on SSBBRank 2014 (the game's final ranking during its active lifespan), and was last ranked 12th on SSBBRank 2016-2017. Alongside Brawl, Mew2King also played the mod Project M and was considered one of the best Project M players in the game's early years, being retroactively considered a top 5 player from 2013 to 2015.
Mew2King has also had notable, albeit lesser, results in other Smash games. In Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, he was considered one of the best Cloud players during 2017, placing in the top 8 at a few majors. He was last ranked 26th on the PGR v2 and ultimately ranked 69th on the PGR 100. In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Mew2King is a Pyra and Mythra player, originally playing Bowser, and has made a handful of top 64 runs at majors and supermajors. He was last ranked 133rd on the OrionRank North America Top 200.
Mew2King stepped away from Melee in 2024, citing that negativity within the community has affected his mental state.[1] Since then, he had competed at a couple of events and coached several Smash players, including Sparg0 and Hungrybox.
Tournament history[edit]
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2004-2007: Joining the Melee Scene[edit]
As a young teenager, Mew2King was known for his predictable play; his opponents disparaged him as "The Robot". Most of his Melee experience had been against CPU opponents, causing him to struggle in mindgames against other players at local tournaments. As a solitary personality with no practice partners, Mew2King instead turned to mining data and theorycrafting responses. In 2004, he and SuperDoodleMan datamined hitboxes, frame data, knockback physics, and other Melee technical details that are still referenced today.
With his intense dedication to technical play, Mew2King eventually became a dominant force in Melee in 2006.
2008-2013: Era of the Five Gods[edit]
After Brawl's release in 2008, Mew2King continued to play Melee while also honing his skills in Brawl. Despite being stretched thin between two games, he was considered the undisputed best player for Brawl and one of the two best players for Melee alongside Mango during some time from 2008 to mid-2009.
During late 2013, after years of not winning a major Melee tournament, Mew2King went on a winning streak which saw him win The Big House 3 as well as almost every other singles event he entered, taking sets off of players who he had seldom defeated in that recent time, including Mango, Hungrybox, and PPMD. This is commonly referred to as "The Return of the King".
2013-2019: Unto Retirement[edit]
Mew2King dabbled in SSB4; however, he was notorious for dropping out of national SSB4 tournaments to focus on Melee, generally if he was sent to losers bracket early in pools. He initially mained Diddy Kong. However, upon the release of update 1.0.6, which heavily nerfed Diddy Kong and removed his notorious "Hoo-Hah" combo, Mew2King was left unable to play Diddy as well as he had before, lamenting that he went from being the second best Diddy Kong player to not even a top 10 Diddy. He tested with multiple characters in the game such as Captain Falcon, Mario, Rosalina & Luma, Mii Brawler, and Donkey Kong attempting to get a new main. Donkey Kong notably got him 3rd at PAX Prime 2015 and 5th at SKTAR 4, leading him to be ranked as a top 5 SSB4 Donkey Kong player on the PGR V3. He popularized the "Ding Dong", a combo involving a cargo up throw into up aerial which can kill at low percentages. Despite his efforts, Mew2King did not feel confident in any character and was doubtful that he would achieve the same success from before the update. He would later go on to say because of this that he was not too fond of SSB4 as a competitive game but thought it was great casually, something he has also said about Smash 64.
Upon the release of Cloud as DLC however, Mew2King recanted his statement, picking the new character up as his main, and now being allowed to once again adopt his signature playstyle. Mew2King has commented that "Cloud makes [him] actually love Smash 4", reflecting in his newfound desire to practice the game heavily and better tournament placings in 2016, leading him to be considered one of the best SSB4 players in North America throughout the year. With Mew2King's resurgence using Cloud, he has taken sets off many top players, the most notable being the #1 and #2 players in the world at the time, ZeRo and Ally.
Mew2King further improved his Melee game in 2016, 3-0ing Armada Smash Summit 2 as well as winning Clutch City Clash and Shine 2016, one of the largest Melee events of all time, as well as other smaller regional tournaments such as Endgame and Apex 2016. He also had one of the most legendary losers' runs in the history of the game at UGC Smash Open: after being knocked into the losers' bracket in round 1 of Winners' bracket by n0ne, he defeated Duck, Mango, Ice, SFAT, n0ne, Leffen, Hungrybox, and Armada before losing to Armada in Set 2 of Grand Finals. Other notable performances in 2016 include 2nd at CEO 2016, 3rd at Smash 'N' Splash 2, WTFox 2 (where he notably 3-0d Hungrybox), and Super Smash Con 2016, and 5th at EVO 2016. In 2017, he defeated Armada and Leffen at Canada Cup 2017, taking home the title. He also won CEO Dreamland, defeating Hungrybox in the process, and took 2nd at Super Smash Con 2017 under Mango. In 2018, M2K took home his first supermajor tournament in almost a decade at Smash Summit 6, where he defeated Armada twice. Later in the year, at Super Smash Con 2018, M2K found himself in yet another Grand Finals against Armada, 3-0ing Hungrybox to reach there. M2K would take Armada to Set 2 Game 10 in what is almost unanimously considered one of the greatest Melee sets of all time. Both players were at near peak performance, but Armada would edge it out to take home his final Melee trophy before retirement. After the release of Ultimate, M2K would focus largely on the new game, essentially "soft-retiring" from Melee. He briefly returned to the Melee scene in October at The Big House 9, defeating iBDW and Hungrybox before falling to Zain and Fiction.
Playing Smash 4 at Get On My Level 2016, Mew2King became the fifth player to take a set off of ZeRo (after Mr. ConCon, Vinnie, Seagull Joe, and Nairo), and the first player to ever defeat ZeRo in a best of 5 set without losing a single game. Mew2King played Cloud for the whole set, while ZeRo played Diddy Kong game 1, and switched to Sheik for games 2 and 3. He also placed 5th at Shine 2016, defeating Larry Lurr 3-0.
Playstyle[edit]
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Melee[edit]
Mew2King is arguably the best defensive player in the world. He has one of the best powershielding abilities among all Smash players, and can effectively bait bad decisions from other players. Mew2King is a very punish-heavy player, and focuses on getting one crucial hit, then converting that hit into a position where he is primed to begin a combo and the opponent has limited options. Once he lands an opening move, he will usually land harsh punishes which tend to lead to a KO, due to his knowledge of character weights and KO percents. These punishes also usually encompass all of the opponent's tech and DI options, making them nearly impossible to escape. He also has arguably the best edgeguarding game, due to his aforementioned superb option coverage, as well as some of the best recovery mix-up tactics.
Mew2King is considered one of the top players on Final Destination; as Marth against fastfallers, he is extremely consistent in chaingrabbing and comboing them from 0% to a KO off of a single conversion, and as Sheik, he can lock down other characters, mostly mid-tiered characters, longer than he could than on stages with platforms. His character choices seem to be stage specific, particularly on the opponent's counterpick; he will usually pick Marth on Final Destination and Fountain of Dreams, Sheik on Dream Land, and Fox or Marth on Pokémon Stadium; he is more flexible on the remaining two stages.
Mew2King, however, has a weaker neutral game compared to other players of his caliber. His neutral game focuses on unorthodox approaches, which he employs to force his opponents into positions where they have limited options, usually reduced down to a 50/50 situation where he can exploit his superior knowledge of character hitboxes. While this strategy works well against Fox and Falco as he only needs one exchange win to convert into a KO, it is not as strong against floaty characters that are more difficult to combo, and can be exploited by clever baits from players of his caliber.[2]
Mew2King is also known for heavily counterpicking in specific matchups, sometimes with disappointing results. For example, he will only play Fox against Jigglypuff, as Fox is technically superior in that matchup, though he has seen mixed results against Hungrybox. He was the first top player to recognize the potential of Snowy, even teaming with him at Dreamhack Denver - a Puff player that Armada and Leffen train with for the Jigglypuff matchup. He will usually play Peach against Ice Climbers at high-level play just because she has a greater advantage against the Climbers than any of his mains, instead of learning the matchup with Marth or Fox, who are considered to also have winning matchups. Because his Peach is not practiced to the same level as his mains, he has lost at least once to almost every notable Ice Climbers player, and has even lost games to Nintendude's Peach and ChuDat's Jigglypuff. Occasionally, Mew2King has counterpicked Jigglypuff in certain games against other Jigglypuff players, such as Mango and Hungrybox, which generally lead to his defeat. He is also known for his use of several low tier characters, and has been considered one of the four best Melee Mewtwo players (alongside Taj, Leffen, and Zoma) and arguably the best Pichu player in the world.
Mew2King tends to struggle to remain composed when losing, particularly when the crowd is cheering for the other player, as seen against aMSa at Kings of Cali 4 and against Armada at EVO 2013. This was especially an issue before the adoption of noise-cancelling headphones at tournaments.
Brawl[edit]
In Brawl, Mew2King possessed an extremely deadly punish game with his Meta Knight, able to exploit small mistakes into a huge advantage for him. To provoke opponents into making mistakes, he would often shark and drift to open holes, but will ensure he will not be too aggressive, lest he be punished by foes that capitalize on overextensions. He implements Shuttle Loop into his recovery often, mixing them up with multiple jumps and all of his other specials. He was also considered to be one of the best King Dedede players shortly after Brawl's release, and was known to still use the character along with Falco in tournaments where Meta Knight was banned.
SSB4[edit]
In SSB4, Mew2King was initially a Diddy Kong main, heavily utilizing the character's powerful air game to net several great placings in tournaments, and he was considered one of the best Diddy Kong players in the world in the early metagame. He felt disillusioned by update 1.0.6 and soon adopted Cloud as his main upon his DLC release.
With his use of Cloud, Mew2King retains his signature defensive playstyle, using Cloud's impressive reach to zone out his opponents while charging his Limit Break gauge, and punishing the opponent's mistakes should they approach him incorrectly. He is notorious for using Cloud's Limit Break specials very liberally, instead of saving them for more opportune moments or retaining Limit Break for the increase in movement stats, to the point he sometimes even garners an early KO with them. Mew2King is also a proponent of taking to the air rather than staying grounded for the majority of the match, and going for off-stage edgeguards, even in spite of Cloud's sub-par recovery without Limit Break.
However, his excessive Limit Charging can leave openings for other characters to either tack on damage, charge their respective special moves, or spawn an item that can completely change the matchup (such as Diddy Kong's Banana Peel). Like in Melee, Mew2King tends to go for risky, yet very rewarding options in certain situations, which may lead to either character or both characters losing a stock, such as in a match at Apex 2016 against Nietono.
Rankings[edit]
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This article or section is incomplete. You can help SmashWiki by expanding or finishing it. The editor who added this tag elaborates: Non-global rankings |
Super Smash Bros. Melee[edit]
RetroSSBMRank[edit]
| Ranking | Time period | Rank | Character(s) | Notes |
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| RetroSSBMRank 2006 | 2006 | 6th |  |
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| RetroSSBMRank 2007 | 2007 | 1st |  |
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| RetroSSBMRank 2008 | 2008 | 1st |  |
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| RetroSSBMRank 2009 | 2009 | 4th | |
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| RetroSSBMRank 2010 | 2010 | 4th | |
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| RetroSSBMRank 2011 | 2011 | 5th | |
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| RetroSSBMRank 2012 | 2012 | 5th | |
SSBMRank/MPGR[edit]
| Ranking | Time period | Rank | Character(s) | Notes |
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| SSBMRank 2013 | January - November 2013 | 3rd | |
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| Summer 2014 SSBMRank | January - May 2014 | 3rd | |
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| SSBMRank 2014 | January - October 5th, 2014 | 4th | |
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| Summer 2015 SSBMRank | January - July 2015 | 6th | |
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| SSBMRank 2015 | 2015 | 5th | |
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| SSBMRank 2016 | January 15th - December 4th, 2016 | 4th |  |
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| Summer 2017 SSBMRank | December 10th, 2016 - June 18th, 2017 | 4th | |
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| SSBMRank 2017 | December 10th, 2016 - December 10th, 2017 | 4th | |
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| Summer 2018 MPGR | December 15th, 2017 - July 2018 | 5th |  |
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| MPGR 2018 | December 15th, 2017 - December 16th, 2018 | 6th | |
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| MPGR 2019 | December 17th, 2018 - December 8th, 2019 | 10th | |
Top 100 Melee Players of All Time[edit]
| Ranking | Time period | Rank | Character(s) | Notes |
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| First List | January 10th, 2004 - January 21st, 2018 | 5th | |
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| Second List | January 10th, 2004 - February 3rd, 2019 | 5th | |
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| Third List | January 10th, 2004 - February 16th, 2020 | 5th | |
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| Fourth List | January 10th, 2004 - September 12th, 2021 | 5th | |
Super Smash Bros. Brawl[edit]
SSBBRank[edit]
| Ranking | Time period | Rank | Character(s) | Notes |
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| SSBBRank 2014 | January 11th, 2013 - June 1st, 2014 | 5th |  |
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| SSBBRank 2016-2017 | May 20th, 2016 - November 26th, 2017 | 12th | |
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U[edit]
Panda Global Rankings[edit]
| Ranking | Time period | Rank | Character(s) | Notes |
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| PGR v1 | January 30th, 2015 - May 7th, 2016 | 28th |  |
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| PGR v2 | May 13th - December 18th, 2016 | 26th | |
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| PGR 100 | January 20th, 2015 - November 18th, 2018 | 69th | |
OrionRank[edit]
| Ranking | Time period | Rank | Character(s) | Notes |
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| OrionRank 2016 | March 15th - December 18th, 2016 | 19th | |
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| OrionRank 2017 | December 24th, 2016 - December 24th, 2017 | 92nd |  |
Project M / Project+[edit]
All Time Project M/Project+ Rankings[edit]
| Ranking | Time period | Rank | Character(s) | Notes |
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| Project M/+ All Time Top 100 | February 19th, 2011 - October 26th, 2024 | 11th |  |