Super Smash Bros. (universe)

Super Smash Bros. (universe)
Developer(s)	HAL Laboratory Intelligent Systems Sora Ltd. Game Arts Monolith Soft Paon Bandai Namco
Publisher(s)	Nintendo
Designer(s)	Masahiro Sakurai
Genre(s)	Fighting
Console/platform of origin	Nintendo 64
First installment	Super Smash Bros. (1999)
Latest installment	Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018)

The Super Smash Bros. universe (大乱闘スマッシュブラザーズ, Great Fray Smash Brothers) refers to the collection of characters, stages, and properties that are original to the Super Smash Bros. series. It is featured alongside other non-original licensed game characters and properties within Smash games. It is the universe of the Smash Bros. series in-and-of itself. The iconic Super Smash Bros. logo represents both the series and universe.

Franchise description

During 1998, Kirby series creator Masahiro Sakurai, working at Nintendo second-party developer HAL Laboratory, pursued interest in making a fighting game for four players. From the outset, he did not have any ideas and used exceedingly basic character designs. When he presented the concept (provisionally called Dragon King: The Fighting Game) to his superior, Satoru Iwata - then the president of HAL Laboratory - Iwata helped Sakurai find ways to make the game original since many fighting games did not sell well, and Sakurai's first idea was to insert a wide variety of popular characters from different Nintendo franchises and have them fight in a crossover. Sakurai knew he would not receive permission to do this by asking, and therefore secretly created a prototype of the Nintendo 64 fighter in advance and only informed his superiors of it after carefully balancing his first four character inclusions: Mario, Donkey Kong, Samus Aran, and Fox McCloud. Fortunately for him, the idea was approved, and Sakurai developed the game, Super Smash Bros., as a low-budget crossover fighter that was intended to be released exclusively in Japan. The finished product's nearly-unique spin on free-roaming, multi-directional fighting on two-dimensional platform-filled planes is said to have been inspired by an obscure 1994 arcade fighting game by Namco titled The Outfoxies.

Super Smash Bros. was released in Japan on January 21, 1999, and despite little promotion, the game was a surprise and breakout hit, ultimately selling nearly 2 million copies domestically, and after it was decided to localize the game, it was commercially successful internationally as well, selling nearly 3 million copies in the United States. Despite some criticism toward its single player, it received praise for its unique take on fighting games; its simple-to-learn, accessible, and responsive gameplay; and above all else its mix of fan-favorite aesthetics, characters, and music, particularly with Pokémon, which had then reached the height of its initial explosion of worldwide popularity.

Following the success of Super Smash Bros., Sakurai became the head of production for a sequel that was intended as a borderline launch title for the next Nintendo system, the GameCube. Sakurai described his lifestyle during this period as "destructive", working on the game for 13 straight months with no holidays and short weekends, and he found it to be the biggest project he worked on up to that point. Unlike the first game, which was an experimental venture, Sakurai felt great pressure to deliver a quality sequel that would be lauded as one of the system's premier titles. The game would also exhibit an enormous graphical advancement beyond the Nintendo 64, and to this end, the game's opening FMV was developed by HAL in conjunction with three separate graphic houses in Tokyo. The game was released shortly after the GameCube's launch in both Japan and the United States near the end of 2001 as Super Smash Bros. Melee, and received critical acclaim as both a strong fundamental improvement and a massive expansion of content over its predecessor. The game became the best-selling GameCube game, with more than seven million copies sold worldwide. By this point, the series' relevance as a potent advertisement vehicle for all of Nintendo's IPs represented within it, past and present, was apparent; the representation of two characters from the then-Japan-exclusive Fire Emblem series, who were nearly cut out from international versions of Melee, prompted Nintendo's future decision to release almost all subsequent installments of the series worldwide.

During what became a seven-year hiatus for the Smash Bros. series, Sakurai left HAL Laboratory in 2003 to start his own company, Sora Ltd., so that he could create games separately from the sequel-heavy schedules of HAL. Meanwhile, Satoru Iwata succeeded Hiroshi Yamauchi as Nintendo's fourth president in 2002. At a pre-E3 2005 press conference, Iwata announced that the next installment of Super Smash Bros. was soon to be in development for its next console and would be a launch title that utilized the console's Wi-Fi based online capabilities. The announcement came as a surprise to Sakurai as he was not informed of Nintendo's intent to release another Smash Bros. game, and was only asked after the conference by Iwata to again serve as director; Sakurai agreed, and development began in October 2005. What followed was a development project handled by roughly 100 individuals working full time. The game was officially showcased at the E3 2006 conference as Super Smash Bros. Brawl, but its actual release dates, set for early 2008, were well over a year after the Wii console's launch. Prior to release, among the most noteworthy and publicized inclusions in the game were a vastly redesigned Pit, representing a revival of the long-dormant Kid Icarus series, and the first-ever inclusions of third-party characters in the series: Solid Snake from Metal Gear, which rumor claims series director Hideo Kojima had asked to be included in Melee, and Sonic from his respective series, satisfying a long-awaited crossover with historical rival mascot Mario. Brawl had also encouraged an enormous amount of pre-release hype and speculation by regularly posting blog updates five days a week, detailing new features, characters, and other elements of the game on the official website, the "Smash Bros. DOJO!!", for over eight months straight.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl was critically and commercially successful upon release, garnering praise for its new focus on improved single-player content, an expanded and more varied cast, and what was then one of the largest video game soundtracks in history, and became the fastest-selling game in Nintendo of America's history and a seller of over 10 million units total. However, the game garnered criticism for its long loading times, its borderline unplayable online mode, and, among competitive players and even a few established ones, the general slower pace of the game compared to Melee, with the absence of some advanced movement and attack mechanics and the introduction of mechanics such as hitstun canceling resulting in much more defensive gameplay. The game's Adventure Mode, The Subspace Emissary, was also a major point of contention between those who found it to be a repetitive slog that took much away from what Brawl could have been and those who found it to be grand and the best part of the game, the latter of which became a particularly common viewpoint in the years following the game's launch. The introduction of random tripping, however, was near universally despised due to it being a non-negotiable element of randomized chance that could singlehandedly dictate the outcome of a match. In an interview two-and-a-half years after the release of Brawl, Sakurai revealed that he himself retrospectively considered Melee to be "the sharpest game in the series".

Immediately after Sakurai employed his redesign of the Kid Icarus series' aesthetic in the 3DS title Kid Icarus: Uprising, released in March 2012, he announced the beginning of development of the fourth installment in the Smash Bros. series, which would be a joint venture between Sora and Namco Bandai Games and would be co-directed with Yoshito Higuchi, who had previously directed and produced several games in Namco's Tales series. The first showcase of the project took place at the Nintendo Direct presentation preceding E3 2013, where it was shown that the series would, for the first time, develop and release a pair of titles simultaneously for separate platforms: Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Super Smash Bros. for Wii U. Prior to the showcase, Sakurai indicated that the games would receive a different development approach for measuring character balance, and after the showcase, Sakurai confirmed the removal of randomized tripping while dashing. In contrast to Melee and Brawl, the game would not feature an Adventure Mode, as Sakurai felt the massive workload he undertook to develop the SSE was invalidated by people reuploading the cutscenes online: with this in mind, newcomers to the series from this point on would receive stylized video trailers announcing their introduction, a method that Sakurai found would benefit from being shared online.

The games received praise for building off of what was established by the series further, while helping to bridge the gap between Melee and Brawl players, on top of being able to be taken on the go for the first time with the 3DS version of the game. Both games were criticized for a perceived lack of content, and though being able to play Smash anywhere was praised, the 3DS' limited controls setup was not. Owing to being on less successful platforms, both games were less successful than Brawl, with the Wii U version selling less than the 3DS version despite the former being preferred for tournament play.

A year after the release of the Nintendo Switch console, Sakurai started work on the next game in the series. His goal was to "make the impossible possible," by including all characters from the past games. When he announced his intentions to the boardroom of directors, the room fell silent. In March 2018, a teaser trailer was released in the middle of a Nintendo Direct presentation, featuring the Inklings from the Splatoon franchise. The game was formally announced as Super Smash Bros. Ultimate during E3 of the same year, showcasing all the previous fighters and the "Everyone Is Here" tagline, and revealing that Namco Bandai would again be the co-developer. The game was shown to have an increased focus on competitive play, while keeping it accessible for newcomers as well. During a Smash Direct showcase in October, Sakurai announced that trophies, which otherwise would have taken up much development time, they were being removed in favor of spirits, equippable items that augmented fighters, similar to stickers and equipment in previous games. Spirits also replace Event matches, by augmenting opponents in ways similar to the depicted character, and the focus of the returning Adventure Mode. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate ended up becoming not just the best selling title in the series and the fastest selling Nintendo game (the latter until Pokémon Sword and Shield a year later), but the single best selling fighting game of all time at over 22 million copies worldwide as of 2020.

The Super Smash Bros. series is a large departure from the traditional fighting game formula: instead of having two characters trade and block each other's blows until one's health meter is depleted, knock-outs in these games are strictly achieved by sending opponents hurtling away far enough off the stage that they cannot avoid coming into contact with one of the four linear boundaries surrounding the stage. Instead of a life bar that decreases, each character has a percentage-based damage meter that raises each time they are hit by an attack, which translates into all subsequent attacks incurred by that character sending them away farther than before. Every character is designed and intended to feel and play uniquely from the rest in terms of the different moves and movements they are capable of, among many other things about them, and when a character is sent flying away from the stage horizontally, they have the opportunity to return to the stage without falling below out of the stage with both a mid-air double jump and a special move that constitutes a third jump. Many options are available to diversify gameplay, such as items that may be picked up and used, selectable stages that may feature their own dynamic hazards in their designs and layouts, and a large variety of different modes and settings for customizing matches.

Many players and groups in the competitive playerbase and community for the series choose to play each game with very specific settings and disallow much of the available content in order to minimize luck as a factor. This leads to developed metagames for each installment where top-tier players, often playing for prizes and prestige under accepted professional rulesets defined by players that organize Smash Bros.-centered tournaments around the world, and regularly use precise skill and exploit game physics in order to compete. Like many games that allow for competitive play, such as Pokémon, each character in each game's cast of playable characters is graded by the community on how much inherently "better" or "worse" it is in comparison to other characters in competitive environments, and these "tier lists" spawn much community debate of their own. A further point of contention is the practice of creating and distributing unofficial modifications that fix perceived flaws and degenerate aspects with the core game design and character balance. However, the most publicized mod for Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Project M, has since been featured alongside the official games themselves at national video gaming tournaments and events.

Every game adds new franchises, either published by Nintendo or involved with a third-party company closely associated with the history of Nintendo as a company, that may be represented with at least one playable fighter, and may additionally be represented with stages, items, and collectibles themed after that franchise. Meanwhile, existing franchises and modes receive new and expanded content with each additional installment of Smash:

• Super Smash Bros. (1999), for the Nintendo 64, introduces the Super Mario franchise and designates two of its recurring characters, Donkey Kong and Yoshi, as representatives of their own respective "subfranchises". It also represents The Legend of Zelda, Metroid, Kirby, Star Fox, and Pokémon as primary franchises from the outset, and unlockable characters additionally represent the F-Zero series and EarthBound. The game features 12 playable characters total, and for each character, single-player content includes both a target-smashing stage and a platforming stage that may be completed for setting time records.

• Super Smash Bros. Melee (2001), for the GameCube, introduces representation for the 1984 NES game Ice Climber as an example of a defunct "retro" franchise, and unlockable characters introduce characters of the formerly-Japan-exclusive Fire Emblem series and the historically-significant Game & Watch handheld line. A total of 25 character choices on the select screen effectively allows a total of 26 playable characters in the game, due to the interchangeable characters Sheik and Zelda. A vast amount of new content is debuted, such as special modes and scenarios and an overarching collection aspect in the form of hundreds of trophies that may be earned and viewed at any time, complete with descriptions and a selection of games the basis for the trophy appeared in.

• Super Smash Bros. Brawl (2008), for the Wii, adds Wario and identifies him as from another subset of the Mario universe, while debuting a massive redesign of Pit and the Kid Icarus series and featuring the recent Pikmin series as well. Unlockable characters introduce the first characters from third-party franchises in the series, Solid Snake from Konami's Metal Gear Solid franchise and Sonic the Hedgehog from SEGA's series of the same name, and also recognize the historically-significant R.O.B. peripheral and give it a playable role. A total of 35 character choices on the select screen allows for a total of 39 playable characters in the game, and every character has an all-new "super attack" called a Final Smash that is typically made unavailable in competitive play. In addition to more of everything, such as another collection aspect in the form of stickers, the game introduces a lengthy single player adventure mode titled The Subspace Emissary, which is the first instance of a Smash Bros. game telling a complete crossover narrative with its extensive cast.

• Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U (2014) is the first instance of the series releasing two separate versions of the game for different platforms on the 3DS and Wii U, and there are content differences between versions such as stages. New franchises that have primary representation are Animal Crossing, which previously received a great deal of content in Brawl but no playable character, the Wii Fit line of fitness hardware and software, Punch-Out!!, Monolith Soft's Xenoblade Chronicles series, the well-known NES classic, Duck Hunt, the third-party Mega Man franchise by Capcom, and the third-party Pac-Man franchise by Namco. Furthermore, the Mii avatars that became available for use in Nintendo hardware and software in 2006 with the release of the Wii are playable as characters representative of the Smash Bros. series. After the game's release, additional downloadable content became available and brought back Mewtwo from Pokémon and Roy from Fire Emblem, as well as Lucas from EarthBound. In addition, three more third-party franchises joined the series, including Capcom's Street Fighter, SEGA & PlatinumGames' Bayonetta and in a move that shocked the gaming industry, Square Enix's flagship series, Final Fantasy. The 3DS version was released on September 13, 2014 (Japan), October 2, 2014 (Germany (stores only)), October 3, 2014 (Americas and Europe), and October 4, 2014 (Australia), while the Wii U version released on November 21, 2014 in the Americas, November 28, 2014 in Europe, November 29, 2014 in Australia, and December 6, 2014 in Japan.

• Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018) is a title for the Nintendo Switch released on December 7, 2018. This game features all previous veterans and also added the Splatoon and Konami's Castlevania universes to the list of universes with playable characters, including - for the first time ever in any Nintendo game - Ridley from Metroid; for the first time after a decade-long absence, King K. Rool from the Donkey Kong Country series, Isabelle - who appeared in the previous game as an Assist Trophy - from Animal Crossing: New Leaf, and Incineroar from Pokémon Sun & Moon as playable fighters. In addition, fighters who were previously known as clones were now given the new official name of echo fighters, with Princess Daisy from Super Mario, Chrom from Fire Emblem Awakening, Ken Masters from Street Fighter and Dark Samus from Metroid Prime being added to the roster as Echo Fighters of Peach, Roy, Ryu, and Samus, respectively. It will also have five DLC fighters featured as part of the Fighters Pass, with a separate sixth character in the form of a generic Piranha Plant from the Mario franchise. At the 2018 Game Awards, Joker from the smash hit JRPG Persona 5 was announced to be the first new downloadable challenger in the Fighters Pass, to be followed up at E3 2019 with the announcements of Hero in their many incarnations from the Dragon Quest series (with 4 in particular being playable) and Rare's iconic bird & bear duo, Banjo & Kazooie. At the September Direct, it was revealed that not only would SNK's unofficial mascot, Terry Bogard from Fatal Fury and King of Fighters join the battle as the 4th challenger pack in the Pass but also that more individual DLC fighters beyond the pass were now in development. During a January livestream, Byleth from Fire Emblem Three Houses was revealed as the final member of what is now referred to "Vol. 1" of the pass with confirmation of a second season dubbed Vol. 2 which will have six more fighters added by the end of 2021. During the March 2020 Nintendo Direct Mini, it was formally revealed that the first new challenger of Vol. 2 would be a character from ARMS but did not say which fighter would be chosen to appear in Ultimate. In a Mr. Sakurai Presents video on June 22nd, Min Min was revealed as the official fighter from ARMS and the opening newcomer of the Fighters Pass Vol. 2. 3 months later on October 1st, it was announced that Steve (along with Alex, Zombie, and Enderman as alternate skins) from Minecraft, the best selling video game of all time would join as the second newcomer of Vol. 2, with a Mr. Sakurai Presents presentation to go live two days afterwards on the 3rd. At the Game Awards 2020, it was announced that Cloud’s archenemy, Sephiroth of Final Fantasy VII fame, would be joining the roster sometime before the end of December 2020 with his own Mr. Sakurai Presents presentation on the 17th. At the beginning of the February 2021 Nintendo Direct, Rex's 2-in-1 partner from Xenoblade Chronicles 2, Pyra and Mythra would be entering the battlefield, eventually releasing on March 4, 2021. At E3 2021, it was announced that Tekken 's poster child and on-again/off-again hero/villain of the series, Kazuya Mishima will dropkick his way into the action before the end of July with a special Mr. Sakurai Presents showcase on June 28th. Finally, on October 5, the final Mr. Sakurai Presents video was broadcast, revealing Kingdom Hearts protagonist Sora as the final challenger.

In Super Smash Bros.

The first game in the series, Super Smash Bros., can be said to feature much more than a standard universe's worth of content based on the universe introduced in the game itself, compared even to the Mario universe - despite its lack of a playable character or a stage selectable in multiplayer.

Boss

• 
  Master Hand: A giant floating right-hand glove and the narrator, this entity is described as the imaginary link between the real world and the Smash Bros. tournaments and can be considered the be-all, end-all host of the series. He features a voice that is heard calling out the names of fighters on the character select screen, as well as calling the status of matches before, during, and after matches, so he can be considered the narrator of the series as well, sharing his voice actor with said announcer in order to drive that point home. He functions as the "final boss" of the game in that the final match of the single-player mode pits the player's character against Master Hand in a 1-on-1 duel. He fights with a variety of unique movements and motions, and instead of a percentage meter, he carries a "traditional" health meter that lowers when taking damage from opponents. Reducing it to zero will defeat him and end the 1P Game in success for the player.

Fighting Team Characters

• 
  Fighting Polygon Team: The "generic fighter grunts" of the game; these are purple, untextured, blocky entities whose shapes and motions are modeled vaguely after the proper fighters in the game. They appear only in the game's single-player mode in two stages: The Race to the Finish stage, in which three of them are obstacles in the player's path to the finish, and in the subsequent Fighting Polygon Team stage, where the player must battle a total of 30 of them as easy-to-KO opponents in a match similar to the Multi-Man Melee/Brawl/Smash of later games. There are twelve varieties of Fighting Polygons, just as there are twelve distinctive fighters in the game.

Stages

The first Smash game features a lot of environments thematically original to the game itself, and none of these are selectable in the game's multiplayer mode (hacking aside); they are only available as single player content. The following stages would work as multiplayer stages if they were available in the multiplayer mode:

• 
  Meta Crystal: A small and simple stage consisting of a big platform with a small platform above it, this is the single-player stage where the battle against Metal Mario takes place. It is based on the part of Hazy Maze Cave from Super Mario 64 where Mario would find the Green ! Switch.
• 
  Duel Zone: As with Final Destination above, Battlefield is not referred to as such yet, but rather is known as "Duel Zone" or "Fighting Polygon Stage" in-game. Likewise, it has the same four-platform layout as later Battlefield stages and serves the same purpose, as the home to the Fighting Polygon Team in the penultimate single-player battle.
• 
  Final Destination: Known as "Master Hand's Residence" in-game, this prototypical Final Destination otherwise serves the same purpose as its successors in later games. It is a flat, featureless platform laid against a space background and is where the player fights Master Hand in the final battle of the game's 1P Game.

The following stages are more "mini-game"-centric stages featured as single-player content:

• Break the Targets!: Twelve separate maze-like stages are accessible as single-player Target Test challenges in the Target Test mode. There is one stage for each character, and it is specifically constructed to test the character's ability to attack all ten targets in the stage as fast as possible in the time limit. The character will be required to go through their respective Target Test stage early in the game's main single-player mode.

• Board the Platforms!: Likewise, twelve separate maze-like stages are accessible as single-player Board the Platform challenges in the Board the Platform mode. There is one stage for each character, and it is specifically constructed to test the character's ability to jump onto all ten yellow platforms in the stage as fast as possible in the time limit. The character will be required to go through his respective Board the Platform stage later on in the game's main single-player mode.

• Race to the Finish!: This five-story stage is a single-player mini-game where the character must race from the upper left to the lower right of the stage and reach the end as fast as possible within the time limit, while avoiding obstacles such as floating bumpers, rolling bombs, and three computer-controlled Fighting Polygon opponents.

Items

A large proportion of the game's items are original to the game itself.

• Beam Sword: A powerful energy sword, this bludgeoning weapon carries sound effects similar to a Lightsaber in the Star Wars movie franchise in the Japanese version of the game, but they was changed for the U.S. release, possibly to avoid copyright trouble.
• Home-Run Bat: This bludgeoning item is the most potentially deadly offensive measure in the game; while normally featuring unremarkable power with standard attacks, a smash attack with the Bat carries so much knockback that it often causes a one-hit KO to the target, regardless of how healthy the opponent is. Some consider it a property native to the EarthBound franchise, but Melee's Trophy Gallery identifies the bat as having made its first game appearance in the original Smash and not EarthBound.
• Fan: The polar opposite to the Home-Run Bat and the Hammer, the Fan is weak enough that picking it up may be considered a handicap. While it can attack extremely quickly, it does tiny damage and offers no knockback, so it is generally not considered a helpful item. However, it deals considerable damage against shields, and can quickly lead to a shield break if the opponent is not careful.
• Bumper: A unique item not seen in the sequel (but spiritually replaced by the Flipper), the thrown Bumper creates an obstacle on the ground that knocks back any opponent that touches it. The bumper, in response, slides in the opposite direction. If another opponent gets in its way, the process repeats. The Bumper returned in Super Smash Bros. Brawl and all subsequent games.
• Ray Gun: This item is the standard projectile weapon, firing laser beams that do good knockback. Melee describes it as having originated in this game, contrary to the popular belief that it originates from the Star Fox universe.
• Motion-Sensor Bomb: An item that sticks to the surface it is thrown on. It will detonate if a player steps on it. Despite being labeled as an original item, it is based on the Proximity Mine from GoldenEye 007.
• Crate: One of the game's four item containment units, the crate is by far the biggest. It is a giant wooden box with the Smash symbol on it, and it can be picked up, carried, and hurled at opponents as a projectile. When it crashes into the ground, it splinters and up to three items contained inside can appear.
• Barrel: Another item that can contain items within, the Barrel is somewhat less large and may contain fewer items than the Crate, but as a hurled weapon, it can roll on its side before breaking. Some consider it a property native to the Donkey Kong franchise, but Melee's Trophy Gallery identifies the barrel as having made its first game appearance in the original Smash and not Donkey Kong. It is not to be confused with Melee's Barrel Cannon item.
• Capsule: This pill-shaped item contains a single item inside. It can be thrown as a fast projectile.
• Egg: This is a white egg that acts just like a Capsule. Some consider it a property native to the Pokémon franchise, especially considering that Eggs are scattered about by the appearance of the Pokémon Chansey, but Melee's Trophy Gallery identifies the Egg as having made its first game appearance in the original Smash and not Pokémon. All four of the game's item-containment units have a chance that they contain an explosive rather than an item, so these units can sometimes be used as Bob-ombs.

Music

These are the main musical tracks unique to the game found within the Sound Test:

• Opening: The music heard during the game's opening cinema movie, this is fast-paced music interspersed with parts of track 45.
• How to Play: Low-key music heard during the How to Play segment.
• Character Introduction Stage: Very discrete music heard in the Characters and VS Records sub-menus.
• Menu Screen: Extremely discrete "music" heard on the game's main menu screen.
• Battle Results: This music plays on the match complete screen after one of the 10 character victory fanfare tracks plays for the winning character.
• Training Mode: Low-key music heard while playing the Training mode.
• Ending Point: Climactic battle music heard in the final battle against Master Hand.
• Bonus Game: Music heard on any of the Break the Targets, the Board the Platforms stages and Race to the Finish stage.
• All Clear: Discrete, low key music played at the score display screen following the Master Hand battle.
• Duel Zone: Synthesized battle music heard on the battle against the Fighting Polygon Team.
• Meta Crystal: Heavy techno music that plays when battling Metal Mario in Single-player mode.
• Staff Roll: An original composition that is one of the main themes of both the game and the overall Smash Bros. series. It is heard throughout the ending credits.

There are also many short pieces counted as "music" heard in response to in-game occurrences. These tracks original to the game itself include Meta Crystal (Intro), Ending Point (Intro), Ending Point (Master Hand Appearance), Duel Zone (Victory), Bonus Game (Clear), Lose Bonus Game, A Character Appears, The Prize, Ending, Continue, and Game Over.

In Super Smash Bros. Melee

The sequel to Super Smash Bros., Super Smash Bros. Melee, is noted for being an immensely larger game than its predecessor. The number of original properties featured in the game is seemingly increased proportionally.

Bosses

Like in the previous game, none of the game's characters are considered true "characters" in that they cannot be selected for play without hacking. These all make specific appearances as single-player opponents.

• 
  Master Hand: The "master of ceremonies" and "narrator" of the series returns in Melee as a "final boss" enemy like before, but it is no longer the only one. With a slightly redesigned look and some new moves, Master Hand is otherwise not much different as a final boss of the game's "Classic" (Single-Player) Mode, though he can perform some two-on-one moves with his newly introduced "twin", Crazy Hand.
• 
  Crazy Hand: The "twin brother" of Master Hand, Crazy Hand is a left hand and is a "hidden boss" in the game. It is described as the embodiment of a child who derives pleasure from destroying his creations, as opposed to Master Hand's will to play around. In the final bout of Classic mode on Normal, Hard, or Very Hard difficulty, when Master Hand has had over half of his hit points depleted, Crazy Hand will erratically enter the battle and join the fight against the player, making it a tougher two-on-one battle. Crazy Hand features at least three of his own unique attacks, and the two Hands will occasionally perform a special two-hand super attack together. If the player can beat both enemies in the match, the Crazy Hand KO bonus will be awarded. Both Hands can also be fought at Event 50: Final Destination Match.
• 
  Giga Bowser: A gargantuan, powered-up version of the Mario universe character Bowser, himself the heftiest fighter in the standard Melee roster. Giga Bowser, whose body is proportionally different to Bowser, has larger horns, and a frenzied expression on his face, is a hidden final boss in the game's Adventure Mode. At Normal difficulty or above, if the player gets to the final battle against Giant Bowser and defeats him in under 18 minutes, he will "revive" as Giga Bowser to rematch the player; defeating him will yield the Giga Bowser KO bonus and the Giga Bowser trophy. Giga Bowser receives an enormous handicap in his Adventure Mode appearance; he also appears in Event 51: The Showdown, with less of a handicap.

Fighting Team Characters

• Fighting Wire Frames: The spiritual successors to the Fighting Polygon Team, pink wire-frame models of fighters without special talents. Their insides feature a vague skeletal and organ system, however, and a red Smash-universe symbol resides where each Wire Frame's face should be. Unlike the Fighting Polygons, however, the Wire Frames come only in two varieties: Male and Female. Male Wire Frames feature the body structure and movement/attack style of Captain Falcon/Ganondorf while the females are the same with Zelda. They appear in Adventure Mode, Multi-Man Melee, and some Event matches.

Other NPCs

The Sandbag from the Home-Run Contest mode might be considered a character because it registers damage as an opponent, and can even be played as when the game is hacked, though it has no moveset past movement and a single jump.

There is also a character named NONE which can be selected when the games debug mode is selected. It is most likely a removed testing character, as the game crashes upon its selection.

Stages

The game contains more environments thematically original to the game itself than the previous game. The two Multiplayer-friendly stages that follow, however, are indeed unlockable for selection.

• 
  Battlefield (Unlockable): The Fighting Polygon Stage from SSB returns with its popularized name of Battlefield. It is the site of many stages and events such as the Multi-Man Melee competitions and is where Fighting Wire Frames are always fought. Due to its basic and standard layout, the stage is very popular. Interesting to note: the emblem for this stage is not the normal Smash Bros. Emblem.

• 
  Final Destination (Unlockable): The Master Hand's Residence arena returns as the "final battle arena" of the game. The flat, featureless platform is where many single-player boss encounters take place, and it is also among the most popular stages for use in tournaments. It floats through outer space, then seems to travel through a wormhole where it will then appear in an earth-like world where landscapes are visible in the background.

The following stages are more "mini-game"-centric stages featured as single-player content:

• Target Test: Like in the previous game, each character has their own separate maze-like stage that is accessible as a single-player Target Test challenge in the Target Test mode. There is one stage for each character, and it is specifically constructed to test the character's ability to attack all ten targets in the stage as fast as possible in the time limit. The character will be required to go through his respective Target Test stage early in the game's Classic mode. A total of 25 target test stages reside in the game for normal play; a 26th is locked away, however, available only through hacking. This stage belongs to Sheik, but it was cut, likely to encourage strategic transforming.

• Race to the Finish!: The successor to the previous game's Race to the Finish, this stage is laid out very differently; it is now a left-to-right path dotted with potential exits, and the aim is to get as close to the end as possible in the time limit.

• Snag trophies!: This bonus stage in Classic mode is a minigame in which a platform has a container of sorts in the middle, and three trophies will fall down from the sky. The character is to try and attack the falling trophies so they will fall into the container, in order to earn them, and collecting all three will yield the Collector bonus.

• All-Star Rest Area: This grassland environment is the hub between matches in the All-Star Mode. It contains three Heart Containers and a portal in the center that transports the player to the next bout. In the background the progress of the All-Star Mode is displayed; trophies of the opponents defeated thus far stand on the ground, while portraits of the next opponents are displayed in the air above. This features music from the Kirby series.

• Home-Run Stadium: This baseball stadium is the site of the Home-Run Contest mini-game. On an elevated platform, the Sandbag resides, and in ten seconds the character must damage it without knocking it off the platform, then use the nearby Home-Run Bat to send Sandbag flying east, where the distance traveled is recorded. The stage seems to stretch on endlessly to the east.

Like the previous game, there are some environments that can be seen only through hacking. TEST is a very wide white-ground stage with several aerial platforms shaped differently, with the background being a photo of a bar used as a test for rendering graphics. The name indicates that it was used for testing, like the previous Kirby Beta Stage 2. Hidden in the game's debug menu are the titles of two other stages that crash the game when selected: 10-2 and DUMMY. DUMMY can be opened up with a special hack, however, and the stage reveals itself to be completely empty, black space without any death-line borders. For fun, some players like to hack in death lines and activate an infinite double-jumping hack to allow for a completely aerial bout.

Items

Bold italics denote an item new to the Smash Bros. series.
Compared to the characters and stages, Melee's collection of original items is not much different at all from its predecessor.

• Beam Sword: Returns from Smash 64 as a bludgeoning weapon, but the length of its blade now changes based on the power of the attack swinging it. Its power and knockback have been degraded to a large degree.
• Home-Run Bat: Returns from Smash 64 essentially unaltered.
• Fan: Returns from Smash 64 essentially unaltered.
• Ray Gun: Returns from Smash 64 essentially unaltered.
• Motion-Sensor Bomb: Returns from Smash 64, essentially unaltered. Curiously, its design changes depending on the version. In Japanese versions, the item uses its design from Perfect Dark, while other versions retain its GoldenEye 007 appearance.
• Crate: Returns from Smash 64 essentially unaltered.
• Barrel: Returns from Smash 64 essentially unaltered.
• Capsule: Returns from Smash 64 essentially unaltered.
• Egg: Returns from Smash 64 essentially unaltered.
• Food: A new item that randomly spawns as tiny health-replenishers. There are 27 varieties of food in the game, and they restore usually 3% or so health per item.
• Party Ball: A new containment unit, this is a big yellow ball that can be carried and hurled like the other containment units, but after it is thrown it will float up, make a noise, and open up to drop a bunch of stuff. Sometimes it drops random items, sometimes it drops a load of Food, and sometimes it drops Bob-ombs.

Music

• Opening: The music heard during Melee's opening FMV, this is the official theme song of the game, orchestrated with slight bits of a chorus. It is Song 0 in the Sound Test.
• Metal Battle: Fast and heavy music that plays whenever the player confronts a metal opponent in single-player modes. It is Song 51 in the Sound Test.
• Battlefield: A techno remix of the Menu 1 music, this is heard as the primary track on the Battlefield stage outside the Multi-Man Melee mode, and in the Race to the Finish mode. It is Song 52 in the Sound Test.
• Final Destination: This is a climactic orchestration of the ending credits music of the original SSB, used as primary "final match" music only on the Final Destination stage. It is Song 53 in the Sound Test.
• Menu 1: The epically orchestrated music heard as the primary track in Melee's menu screens. This has been remixed as stage music for Battlefield in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. It is Song 54 in the Sound Test.
• Menu 2: A more laid back track heard as the secondary track in the menu screens of Melee. It is a medley of the official Super Smash Bros. Melee opening theme and Menu 1. It is Song 55 in the Sound Test.
• How to Play: Music heard during the How to Play video within Melee's Archives section. It is Song 56 in the Sound Test.
• Targets!: The techno music heard in almost all characters Target Test stages, as well as the Home-Run Contest. It is Song 57 in the Sound Test.
• Multi-Man Melee 1: Synthesized rock variant of the opening theme, heard half the time in the Multi-Man Melee mode, and also as the secondary track of Battlefield in Vs. mode. It is Song 58 in the Sound Test.
• Multi-Man Melee 2: A more fast-paced rock variant of the opening theme, heard half the time in the Multi-Man Melee mode, and also as the secondary track of Final Destination in Vs. mode. It is Song 59 in the Sound Test.
• Tournament 1: Heavy music heard half the time outside of battle during a Tournament Melee. It is Song 61 in the Sound Test.
• Tournament 2: Heavy music heard half the time outside of battle during a Tournament Melee. It is Song 62 in the Sound Test.
• Trophy: Soft synthesized menu music heard at the Trophy Lottery and the Trophy Collector. It is Song 63 in the Sound Test.
• Warning Siren: Troubling music heard during the part of the Adventure mode that occurs in the Brinstar Escape Shaft. It is Song 78 in the Sound Test.

In addition, a lot of tracks original to the Smash Bros. series are listed as "music", but do not loop and are merely short pieces meant to signify occurrences. These include Classic Intro (64), Adventure Intro (65), Stage Clear 1 (66), Stage Clear 2 (67), Continue (68), Game Over (69), New Trophy! (70), Rare Trophy (71), Challenger! (72), New Feature 1 (73), New Feature 2 (74), New Feature 3 (75), Trophy Fall Ending (SFX) (79), Ending (80), Master Hand Intro (SFX) (81), Crazy Hand Intro (SFX) (82), Giga Bowser Intro (SFX) (83), and Giga Bowser (84) plays only when battling Giga Bowser in Final Destination.

In Super Smash Bros. Brawl

There were plenty of things introduced in the Smash Bros. series not introduced elsewhere appear in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Most prominent among them is a major single-player mode of the game called The Subspace Emissary, a side-scrolling Adventure Mode game where characters contend with the machinations of an interdimensional force called the Subspace Army. None of the unlockable characters (if the Subspace Emissary method is not used) are unlocked on the stages Battlefield or Final Destination (as they are not considered home stages) except Ganondorf, Super Smash Bros. universe stages on Classic Mode only occur on the final two stages, and Battlefield and Final Destination are never fought in All-Star Mode.

Characters

The following distinctive entities