Peach (SSB4)

Peach in Super Smash Bros. 4
Universe	Mario
Other playable appearances	in Melee in Brawl in Ultimate
Availability	Starter
Final Smash	Peach Blossom
Tier	B (20)

Peach (ピーチ, Peach) is a playable character in Super Smash Bros. 4. Her return to the series was confirmed on September 12th, 2013, the day before the 28th anniversary of Super Mario Bros., the landmark NES game in which she debuted. She is among the first wave of compatible amiibo figures.

Peach's then voice-actress Samantha Kelly reprised her role as Peach in Smash 4, albeit via voice clips from Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

Peach is ranked at 20th place out of 54 characters on the tier list, placing her at the bottom of the B tier. This is a moderate improvement from her prior rank of 19th out of 38 in Brawl. Peach's unusual ability to float gives her a uniquely strong air game, and can be used to great effect in a variety of ways, such as softening her disadvantage state, using aerials at ground level, or attacking while holding a throwing item. Floating, combined with the descending properties of her up special, gives her a near-unlimited horizontal recovery. In addition, her item-based Vegetable projectiles are similarly versatile, and pair well with floating.

Many of Peach's attributes are problematic on their own, and even worse in the context of each other. Her lightweight status, very low falling speed, and tall hurtbox make her easy to KO, especially off the top, without making her hard to hit or combo in return. Peach also has one of the worst ground games, with low dash speed, and lackluster ground-based normal attacks. Her Vegetables also cover a shorter distance than most projectiles when thrown, which, when combined with her slow movement and lack of disjoints, allows good zoning and spacing tools to effectively wall her out.

Despite having average representation, Peach has attained strong results and wins against top players, largely thanks to Samsora, who has achieved great placings at majors like GameTyrant Expo 2017.

Attributes

Peach is a tall, light character who is quite slow in terms of walking speed, dashing speed, air speed, and falling speed. While this is an unfavorable combination of traits, it is compensated for by her unique floating ability. Her float ability grants her the power to hover at any height she chooses, giving her a distinct advantage in combat. This, combined with a potent aerial moveset, makes her a force to be reckoned with.

Peach can play an effective keep-away game. Vegetable serves as her projectile, and as a throwable item, it is quite a versatile one; the move also has a 1/250 chance of spawning a powerful Bob-omb and a 1/166 chance of spawning a shield-shattering Mr. Saturn. Peach's floating ability also helps her to control space; floating low to the ground and using retreating aerials makes her difficult to punish, and this greatly helps her own approach as well, as with good spacing she can attack the opponent's shield with little fear of reprisal. Floating can increase her mobility and movement options, allowing her to frustrate her opponents with quick and unpredictable mixups. Her tilt attacks are less safe, but given the right opportunity, have decent combo potential. She has a decent grab game, as her down throw can be followed up with a variety of moves, and her back throw is relatively strong. All of this gives her a solid set of options in the neutral game.

Peach does not have trouble KOing, either. Her forward aerial's high knockback makes it her best finishing move, and it can be used while floating to "fish" for a kill with relative safety. Her back throw is also a good KO option. Floating allows for effective edgeguarding as well, potentially leading to early KOs. Peach also has a potent if somewhat situational set of smash attacks; her forward smash cycles through three weapons, each with their own useful properties; her down smash is a multi-hit attack good for catching rolls and edge recovery options; and her up smash is a particularly powerful move when sweetspotted.

Peach does, of course, have drawbacks, mainly relating to her slow movement. Faster opponents may be able to overwhelm her before she can begin throwing vegetables or otherwise defend herself. If thrown into the air, she can have difficulty landing, and this, along with her low weight, makes her susceptible to juggling and vertical KOs. Peach's ability to approach suffers against characters with long reach and disjoints, as she lacks the agility to get in close before they can hit her. Her recovery is also a potential point of failure, as while she can travel a great deal of horizontal distance, she is left vulnerable if forced to rely on Peach Parasol, and her vertical recovery is average at best (discounting the incredibly dangerous and situational Bob-omb), as well as predictable and slow, making it possible for her to be gimped. Due to this, Peach has a very high learning curve.

In terms of custom moves, Peach has a few notable ones. Sleepy Toad knocks airborne opponents and puts grounded opponents to sleep, allowing for great follow-ups. Light Veggie is great at keeping projectiles out in the open for a while, disrupting her opponents' neutral game. Parasol High Jump addresses her issues regarding vertical recovery, but loses its ability to deal damage as it rises, and severely hinders Peach's horizontal recovery. Flying Peach Bomber also assists Peach's recovery by extending her impressive horizontal distance even more, as well as dealing more damage overall, at the cost of a smaller hitbox. All of her other customs are situational and inferior in comparison to her standard moves, notably Heavy Veggie, which travels vastly less distance than the default Veggie when thrown.

Changes from Super Smash Bros. Brawl

Peach has received a mix of buffs and nerfs in the transition from Brawl to SSB4, but she was buffed overall relative to the cast. Peach's overall mobility has improved due to having a better double jump, quicker dashing speed, and better air speed. Her ground game has been particularly improved thanks to her stronger smash attacks, faster Peach Bomber, and her tilt attacks, leading to many follow-ups (due to the changes to hitstun canceling). Furthermore, her dash attack, forward aerial, and back throw received significant increases in knockback, improving her KO power and reducing one of the main weaknesses she had in Brawl. Peach's approaches from below are also safer with the gain of a new up aerial. She also has a slightly easier time defending against juggles and aerial follow-ups due to her improved air dodge and slightly faster falling speed. Her grab game is also better, as while her dash grab and standing grab are laggier, her forward throw, up throw, and especially her back throw are all stronger, and the removal of hitstun canceling has made her down throw a more potent combo throw.

However, Peach has seen various nerfs as well. Her damage output and frame data are overall worse, with many attacks dealing less damage and/or being laggier. While her aerial mobility was improved, her overall aerial game was not. Her aerials have higher landing lag overall, and they auto-cancel later, with her forward aerial in particular suffering from its later auto-cancel window. Her neutral aerial is slower, and both it and her back aerial can no longer link their clean hits into their late hits; her up aerial has less combo potential; and her down aerial is weaker, and its final hit has higher knockback, making it a less effective combo tool (although this is largely compensated for by the general mechanic changes). Lastly, Vegetable now takes longer to pluck, as Peach has lost all of the advanced techniques she once had, worsening her projectile game.

The general mechanics changes of SSB4 both helped and hindered Peach. On the negative side, the removal of edgehogging makes it much more difficult for Peach to edgeguard, while benefiting her recovery less than most other characters. Peach is also too slow to benefit from the new untechable reeling animation, while still lacking reliable tools to lock opponents. The removal of chain grabbing does not highly benefit Peach, as she was not only already immune to most chain grabs due to her floaty status, but it also removes her ability to chain grab with her down throw. Lastly, the most significant change that hindered her was the removal of glide tossing, as she was one of the most prominent users of the technique in Brawl, and it overall further worsens her projectile game. Due to her status as a lightweight, Peach's lackluster endurance prevents her from making effective use of the rage mechanic herself. On the other hand, her opponents can use the rage mechanic to KO Peach relatively early.

On the positive side, however, she heavily benefits from rage if she can survive long enough make use of it due to her kill moves being even stronger and her Peach Parasol being able to kill opponents at insanely early percents. The changes to hitstun and the weakening of DI also heavily benefit her combo game, as many more of her moves can link into each other, while she remains fairly difficult for most characters to combo. The weakening of SDI also benefits moves such as her down smash and down aerial, with the latter also benefiting from the changes to hitstun.

Despite the nerfs to her damage output, frame data, and projectile game, Peach is a stronger character overall relative to the cast, having greater KO potential and being less susceptible to juggling, and the changes to the game's mechanics help her more than they hinder her, as she received multiple significant benefits from them while only receiving one significant hindrance. As a result, she has seen greater results in competitive play.

Aesthetics

• Due to the aesthetics being used in this game, Peach looks sleeker and more cartoony than she did in Melee and Brawl. Her facial features are softer, and her dress is more vibrant and less detailed. The lace and other parts of Peach's dress are also now fully modeled, in contrast to Melee and Brawl, where they were simply textured on a flat mesh.
• Peach has received two new alternate costumes, one of which is based on her appearance as Fire Peach in Super Mario 3D World.
• Peach has a new victory pose: she now twirls with hearts surrounding her, poses, then says "This is fun!" This replaces her old victory animation, where she holds her hands together.
• Except her orange costume, all of her alternate costumes now have the same earring color as her default costume.
• Like other characters, Peach is more expressive. For example, she now scowls during certain attacks.
• Peach now holds her dress when running, akin to her running animation from Super Mario 3D World.
• Many new animations accompany Peach's established attacks in the form of hearts, rainbows, and magic sparkles.
• The underside of Peach's dress is now obscured by shadows, obscuring her undergarments that were previously visible in Melee and Brawl.
• Both of Peach's KO screams in Brawl had swapped places; the alternate KO scream is the main KO scream and vice versa, matching the order on the game files.
• Peach's previously unused damage yells from Brawl's Sound Test are now heard when taking high knockback.

Attributes

• Peach dashes faster (1.35 → 1.4175).
• Peach's air speed is higher (0.893 → 0.95).
• Peach is slightly lighter (90 → 89) hindering her endurance while making her no less susceptible to combos due to her higher falling speed/gravity.
• Peach's falling speed is slightly greater (1.05 → 1.15), although it remains the second lowest.
• Peach's fast fall is noticeably faster (1.47 → 1.84), although it remains the second lowest.
• Peach's gravity is slightly higher (0.0632 → 0.068).
• Peach's double jump grants much more height (multiplier 0.7x → 1x), though it still grants much less height than its Melee counterpart.
• Peach's walking speed when carrying heavy items is much faster.
• Back roll has less startup lag (frame 5 → 4) and both rolls have less ending lag (FAF 32 → 31).
• Rolls have a shorter duration (frames 4-19/5-20 → 4-17).
• Air dodge has less startup lag with a longer duration (frames 4-19 → 3-28), and it has less ending lag (FAF 50 → 34), which has ended its status as the worst air dodge among the cast.
• Spot dodge has more startup lag with a shorter duration (frames 2-20 → 3-18) and it has more ending lag (FAF 26 → 28).
• Peach's item toss is weaker (1 → 0.9633333).

Ground attacks

• Neutral attack:
  • Neutral attack's first hit deals less damage (3% → 2%).
  • The first hit has smaller hitboxes (3.5u/2.4u/3.5u/2.5u → 3u/2.4u/2.4u), and the far hitbox has been moved closer to Peach (x offset: 4 → 2.5), reducing its range.
  • Both hits have more ending lag (FAF 20 (hit 1)/23 (hit 2) → 28/30).
  • The back shoulder hitbox on both hits has been removed.
  • The second hit's near hitboxes are larger (2.4u/3.5u → 3u/4u).
  • The second hit's far hitbox is smaller (3.5u → 3u), and it has been moved closer to Peach (x offset: 4 → 2.5), reducing its range.
• Forward tilt:
  • Forward tilt's clean foot hitbox deals more knockback (35 (base), 85 (scaling) → 55/102), improving its KO potential despite its lower damage.
  • The late hit deals much more knockback (50 (base), 55 (scaling) → 40/120).
  • The changes to hitstun canceling/Directional Influence improve forward tilt's ability to set up juggles.
  • The late hit now launches opponents towards Peach (90° → 92°).
  • Forward tilt has more startup lag with a shorter duration (frames 6-8 (clean)/9-16 (late) → 7 (clean leg)/8-9 (clean leg and foot)/10-15 (late)).
    • The increased startup lag on the foot hitbox in particular noticeably reduces the move's range below Peach.
  • The clean hit deals much less damage (13%/11%/10% → 7%/7%/8%), and it launches opponents at less favorable angles (90°/100°/80° → 88°/80°/75°). This hinders the body/leg hitboxes' KO potential despite their increased knockback (35 (base), 85 (scaling) → 50/102), and even the foot hitbox is weaker than the previous body hitbox.
  • The foot hitbox has been moved closer to Peach (x/y offset: 0/7 → 6/1), reducing its range.
  • The late hit's leg and body hitboxes have been removed.
  • The late hit has a higher hitlag multiplier (1x → 1.2x).
  • Forward tilt has a new animation where Peach raises one arm in front of her torso and she does not bend backwards nearly as much as she did in Brawl. This increases the size of her hurtbox while performing this move.
• Up tilt:
  • Up tilt has less startup lag (frame 10 → 9).
    • However, its total duration was unchanged, giving it slightly more ending lag.
  • Up tilt launches opponents at a much higher angle (65° → 94°/92°), improving its KO potential, as well as improving its ability to set up juggles and greatly reducing its susceptibility to DI.
  • The body hitbox deals more knockback (60 (base), 70 (scaling) → 65/84), which, along with the previous change, greatly improves its KO potential.
  • The body hitbox has been positioned lower (y offset: 17 → 13), and it now uses an extended hitbox, making it much easier to land, especially against grounded opponents.
  • The heart blast deals much less damage (13% → 8%) and its knockback was not fully compensated (60 (base), 70 (scaling) → 40/84), greatly hindering its KO potential despite its more favorable launch angle.
  • The heart blast is smaller (11u → 8u).
  • As the sweetspot is now positioned on Peach's body, the move is much harder to sweetspot with (especially against larger characters), due to the sweetspot being smaller and having lower priority (ID# 0 → 1).
  • Up tilt no longer grants intangibility to Peach's head and arm.
  • Peach no longer winks while performing her up tilt.
  • Peach no longer lifts her skirt with her right hand while performing her up tilt, despite the animation being unchanged.
• Down tilt:
  • Peach's arm is now intangible from frames 9-14 when performing down tilt.
  • The hitbox against grounded opponents is now extended, giving it more horizontal range relative to Peach.
    • However, this hitbox is also smaller (5.1u → 3.8u), giving it less vertical range.
  • The hitbox against grounded opponents is now static.
  • Down tilt has more startup lag (frame 12 → 13).
    • However, its total duration was unchanged, giving it slightly less ending lag.
  • Down tilt deals less damage (10% → 7%) without full compensation on its knockback scaling (100 → 105), noticeably hindering its KO potential.
    • However, when combined with the changes to hitstun canceling/DI, this improves the move's combo potential against aerial opponents.
      • However, against grounded opponents, this is negated by the fact that grounded meteor smashes can now be teched, hindering the move's effectiveness against grounded opponents overall.
  • The aerial hitbox is smaller (5.1u → 4.5u), and it has been moved closer to Peach (x offset: 2 → 0), noticeably reducing its range.
  • Down tilt's arm and body hitboxes have been removed, reducing the move's range behind Peach.
    • This also means that the move can no longer meteor smash aerial opponents, significantly hindering its edgeguarding potential.
  • Down tilt has a new animation where Peach performs a straighter arm swipe. This gives the move less vertical range, especially considering the removal of the arm and body hitboxes.
    • This new animation is also longer, (34 frames → 41), increasing the amount of time Peach cannot walk after performing the move.
    • Peach also does move nearly as far forward when performing the move, slightly reducing its horizontal range, despite its increased disjoint, and making it much less effective as a pseudo crawl.
    • Peach also does not move nearly as far back after performing the move, making it easier to whiff punish and removing the backwards slide Peach could do by interrupting the down tilt at the right time, removing down tilt's use as an advanced movement option.
• Dash attack:
  • Dash attack's first hit now has set knockback (30 (base), 50 (scaling) → 50/70 (set)/100), making it connect more reliably with the second hit at higher percents.
  • The second hit deals more damage (4% → 6%) and has increased knockback scaling (125 → 140), greatly improving its KO potential.
  • Dash attack now has a magic effect, and uses a magic sound effect, rather than a normal effect and punch sound effect, respectively.
  • The first hit's angles have been altered (361° → 50°/70°).
    • This makes dash attack connect more reliably when used near an edge.
    • However, this also makes dash attack connect less reliably against aerial opponents, especially the near hitbox.
    • Additionally, this also means that the first hit can no longer occasionally lock and trip.
  • The first hit has smaller hitboxes (5u/4u/4u → 4u/3u).
  • The head hitbox on both hits has been removed.
• Forward smash:
  • Forward smash cycles regularly between the tennis racket, golf club, and frying pan, instead of picking them at random, making the move much more consistent.
  • Forward smash has a shorter duration (frames 15-19 → 15-17), and it has more ending lag (FAF 41 → 46).
  • The body hitbox has been removed on all variants.
  • Peach now swings all three items in with one hand instead of both.
• Golf Club:
  • The golf club has more base knockback but less knockback scaling (50 (base), 70 (scaling) → 60/65), which makes it weaker overall.
  • The large ground hitbox is smaller (9u → 7u).
  • The handle hitbox has been moved closer to Peach (y offset: -0.4 → 0).
• Tennis Racket:
  • The tennis racket's sourspots deal more damage (12% → 13%) and knockback (40/30 (base), 60 (scaling) → 80/56).
  • The large ground hitbox deals more base knockback but less knockback scaling (40 (base), 100 (scaling) → 86/60). While this makes the move stronger when used near the horizontal blastzone, this also makes the move noticeably weaker overall.
  • The large ground hitbox is smaller (8u → 7u).
• Frying Pan:
  • The frying pan deals much more knockback (30 (base), 68 (scaling) → 70/65).
• Up smash:
  • Up smash's sourspots deal more damage (8% → 12%) and knockback (30 (base), 100 (scaling) → 40/97).
  • The 15% sweetspot deals slightly more knockback (40 (base), 100 (scaling) → 50/97).
  • The 15% sweetspot is larger (5u → 5.8u).
  • The late hit has increased base knockback (40 → 60).
  • The attack now produces a stab effect, rather than a normal effect.
  • Peach now produces a pink ribbon when she performs her up smash.
  • The sweetspots have swapped positions, with the 17% sweetspot now being positioned on Peach's hand.
  • The 17% sweetspot is smaller (4u → 2.5u), giving it less range despite it now using an extended hitbox.
  • The 17% sweetspot deals less knockback (40 (base), 100 scaling) → 27/97), significantly hindering its KO potential to the point where it is now weaker than the 15% sweetspot.
  • The 17% sweetspot now takes priority over the 15% sweetspot (ID# 1 → 0). Because the 17% sweetspot is no longer the strongest, this hinders the move overall.
  • The late hit's hitboxes have swapped priority, making the sweetspot harder to land.
• Down smash:
  • Down smash has received a fifth hit, which deals much more knockback (38 (base), 80 (scaling) → 40/180) and launches opponents forwards (145° → 361°), significantly improving its KO potential.
    • This new final hit also increases down smash's duration (frames 6-7, 11-12, 16-17, 21-22 → 6-7, 11-12, 16-17, 21-22, 26-27).
    • However, this new final hit also launches opponents at a higher angle (145° → 361°).
    • This new final hit has a very significant hitlag multiplier (3x).
  • The first four hits now have set knockback (38 (base), 80 (scaling) → 30/20 (set)/100) and have altered angles (145° → 15°/170°), making them connect far more reliably.
  • Down smash has more ending lag (FAF 45 → 55).
  • Down smash deals less damage (5% (hits 1-4)/20% (total) → 2%/3% (hits 1-4)/3% (hit 5)/11%-15% (total)).
  • Down smash has smaller hitboxes (4.3u/4.3u/5u/5u → 2.5u/3.2u/3.2u (hits 1-4)/4.3u (hit 4), giving it less range, despite the hitboxes now being extended.

Aerial attacks

• An issue where Peach's float would be cancelled if she interrupted an aerial during her float has been fixed. As none of Peach's aerials were interruptible in Brawl, however, this does not change Peach's float game.
• All aerials have longer animations (49 frames (neutral)/54 (forward/back)/35 (up)/39 (down) → 57/75/63/53/47), increasing the amount of time Peach cannot grab ledges after performing an aerial.
• Neutral aerial:
  • Neutral aerial has less ending lag (FAF 50 → 49).
  • The hand hitboxes are slightly larger (2.88u → 3u).
  • Neutral aerial has more startup lag with a shorter duration (frames 3-6 (clean)/7-23(late) → 5-8/9-19).
  • The body hitbox is much smaller (4.32u → 2.5u).
  • The late hit deals less damage (10%/9% → 6%/5%), making it much weaker.
    • However, this also improves the late hit's follow-up potential at higher percents.
  • If Peach cancels her float after landing the clean hit, she can no longer connect both hits of neutral aerial, significantly reducing its maximum damage output (23% → 13%).
• Forward aerial:
  • Forward aerial deals more knockback (60 (base), 68 (scaling) → 45/84).
  • Forward aerial has a longer duration (frame 16-19 → 16-20), increasing its range below Peach.
  • Forward aerial has more ending lag (FAF 55 → 58).
  • Forward aerial auto-cancels much later (frame 20 → 41), no longer doing so straight after the hitboxes are no longer active. This drastically hinders forward aerial's use as a spacing tool, as Peach can no longer land completely safely with it, unless she spaces it.
    • This also removes forward aerial's follow-up potential at very low percents.
  • Forward aerial has a shorter initial auto-cancel window (frames 1-15 → 1-9).
• Back aerial:
  • Back aerial has less ending lag (FAF 55 → 54).
  • Back aerial's hitbox has been positioned further out (z offset: -4 → -5), improving its range.
  • As with most back aerials, back aerial now always launches opponents behind Peach.
  • Back aerial has a shorter duration (frames 6-8 (clean)/9-19 (late) → 6-7/8-13).
  • Back aerial has double the amount of landing lag (9 frames → 18), greatly hindering its safety and follow-up potential.
  • Back aerial auto-cancels later (frame 20 → 30), no longer doing so straight after the hitboxes are no longer active.
  • The clean hit deals less damage (14%/13% → 12%), although its knockback scaling was compensated (80 → 92).
  • The front hitbox has been removed, reducing back aerial's range in front of Peach.
  • If Peach cancels her float after landing the clean hit, she can no longer connect both hits of back aerial, significantly reducing its maximum damage output (21% → 12%).
• Up aerial:
  • Peach has a new up aerial: an arm swipe that draws a rainbow, consisting of two hits dealing 4% and 6% respectively.
  • Up aerial now uses a string of extended hitboxes which match the rainbow, giving it greater horizontal reach, and making it more disjointed.
  • Up aerial has a longer duration (frames 8-12 → 10-13 (hit 1)/15-19 (hit 2)).
    • These changes make this up aerial a superior juggling option in comparison to the previous up aerial.
  • The second hit now always launches opponents vertically (80°/361° → 76°/70°).
    • This allows it to set opponents (especially grounded) up for a juggle more consistently.
    • However, this also means that it can no longer set up certain grounded follow-ups, lock/trip, or be used as an edge-guarding tool, as there is no longer a horizontal launching hitbox.
    • In addition to this, it launches opponents at a lower angle compared to the previous vertical launching hitboxes, hindering its KO potential and making it more susceptible to DI.
  • Up aerial has more startup lag (frame 8 → 10) and ending lag (FAF 36 → 46).
  • Up aerial has more landing lag (9 frames → 12).
  • Up aerial auto-cancels much later (frame 23 → 41).
  • Up aerial has a shorter initial auto-cancel window (frames 1-7 → 1-4).
  • Up aerial deals less damage (13%/12%/11% → 4% (hit 1)/6% (hit 2)/10% (total)), without full compensation on the second hit's knockback (0 (base), 100 (scaling) → 50/112).
  • Up aerial has much less range below Peach, making it much harder to connect against grounded opponents.
  • Due to it now being a multi-hit, up aerial is less reliable overall.
    • Altogether, these changes significantly hinder up aerial's damage-racking potential, especially against grounded opponents.
• Down aerial: