Toon Link (PM)

Toon Link is one of the many playable characters in the Brawl mod Project M. His moveset is heavily altered from Brawl, mixing in elements from both 's and Smash 64 's movesets.

Toon Link ranks 21st out of 41 on the official tier list, at the midst of the B tier. This is a considerable drop from his Brawl placement, where he ranked 13th out of 38. In the official Project+ tier list, he places even lower, falling to 30-31 of 42 characters, now residing near the bottom of B-tier.

Attributes
In Project M, Toon Link was substantially decloned and now fights with a mashup of moves taken from other Links, including the original Super Smash Bros. Link, Young Link from Melee, and some of his other incarnations from the Legend of Zelda series. Toon Link also received minor buffs to his existing Brawl moves, allowing him to have better KO options in addition to his characteristic camping capabilities and fast swordplay.

Approaching Toon Link remains a difficult task, and each of his tools have been tweaked to make them better suited for heckling opponents in different situations. His bombs hit multiple times, have excellent damage potential, and up to three can exist at once, making them great for covering an approach or disrupting an opponent's. His bow behaves like Young Link's, and trades some damage and distance capabilities for fiery arrows that stick into the floor and damage foes that contact them, which enhances his stage control. His boomerang, which also behaves like Young Link's, allows him to cover more angles and deals very high damage when hitting foes at point-blank range. These reworked projectiles allow Toon Link to have coverage options for foes at any range.

Most of Toon Link's sword moves have received damage and knockback buffs, and others were replaced with new ones. The third hit of his jab combo, inspired by an attack from the thrust combo from Wind Waker, now moves him forward and ends quickly, letting him begin the combo again and repeatedly push foes backward. His dash attack and new forward-smash also serve the purpose of helping Toon Link gain ground, and the latter covers a wide area while protecting Toon Link from incoming attacks or recoveries. Together with his projectiles, Toon Link's sword moves provide him with a fierce edgeguarding game.

However, Toon Link suffers from recovery problems that he did not have in Brawl. His aerial up-special, while a powerful finishing move that now hits just once, lacks the recovery capabilities it used to have. Toon Link now also weighs the same as Young Link did in Melee, a substantial drop in weight that hinders his survivability and makes Toon Link capable of being KOed in just a few hits. Although Project M has diversified his recovery options with new tether mechanics and the aerial glide toss in conjunction with bomb recovery, getting Toon Link back on stage is often time-consuming and easy for edgeguarding opponents to predict and exploit.

Thus, as in Brawl, Toon Link must rely on his projectiles to soften up opponents before using his fast movement and attacking speed to overwhelm them. While his camping power allows him to make mistakes when foes are at range, he must finish foes in close combat quickly and accurately, especially when he is edgeguarding, as his own predictable recovery and light weight make it easy for foes to reverse the match and KO him.

Changes from Brawl to PM
Toon Link has seen a mix of buffs and nerfs from the transition from Brawl to Project M. He has been significantly reworked with some of his moves being based on although he was mainly changed to more closely resemble. Toon Link overall has greater KO potential and his specials were re-purposed to give him greater stage control. He also has greater combo potential as the removal of hitstun canceling, the universally increased falling speeds and the introduction of L-canceling have given him much more potent juggling.

He has seen some nerfs however. His horizontal endurance is significantly worse as he is lighter and his recovery is much worse. His double jump and his Spin Attack cover much less distance making him easier to edgeguard while making it much riskier for him to edgeguard. His grab aerial is also a worse spacing and combo tool as while it has more range, it has much more landing lag which hinders its safety and combo potential. His mobility has also been reduced in some ways as his ground speed is worse, he has worse air acceleration and his traction is much higher which makes his new wavedash cover a shorter distance compared to a majority of the cast.

Overall, Toon Link remains a solid character who maintains his strong zoning tools with even greater kill power at the cost of his endurance.

v3.6

 * Prior to the closing of Project M website, between the releases of v3.6β and v3.6 there was a bug fix posted on the site specifically for this glitch.
 * Prior to the closing of Project M website, between the releases of v3.6β and v3.6 there was a bug fix posted on the site specifically for this glitch.

Moveset
Up to date as of version 3.6.

Notable tech
Labbing Discord Tech Post

Notable players

 * -The best solo Toon Link in the world, ranked 10th on PMRank 2018. Placed 2nd at Blacklisted 2, 9th at We Tech Those 2, and 4th at SuperNova 2.
 * -Tri-mained Toon Link with Marth and Roy before retiring.

Project M
Beginning in 2.0, Toon Link received an alternate costume based on his casual clothing (also known as the ) from . When using the alternate costume, Toon Link wears a patterned jumper, bracelets and brown pants instead of his normal, and no cap. He also uses the (given to him near the beginning of the game by Orca, the island's swordsman) instead of the Master Sword, along with an original wooden shield based on Young Link's  from . This costume has two additional recolors so that it can be used in Team Battles.

The recolors for the outset costume references the goddesses of the. The front bears their symbols from the he must collect in Wind Waker, while the back bears the emblems of the  that Young Link must collect in Ocarina of Time.


 * Blue: While based off the normal clothes, it also references, who represents Wisdom.
 * Green: References, who represent Courage.
 * Red: References, who represents Power.

Project+
Toon Link received new costumes representing various Zelda games that use the "Toon Link" design.

One costume is inspired by from . Extra details include changing his shield to match its Phantom Hourglass design, and replacing the Master Sword with the.

His Outset outfit introduced in Project M was updated to better accurately represent The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. Alongside two additional recolors, the goddess emblems have been removed on all recolors and are replaced with emblems inspired by the various Special Charts that are crucial to Link's quest in The Wind Waker. These include:


 * Green - Inspired by Tingle's Chart and the IN-credible Chart, key items that are related to Tingle. Appropriately, the emblem is Tingle's head.
 * Red - Inspired by red charts that reveal hidden treasure, like the Octo Chart, Beedle's Chart, Light Ring Chart, etc. The emblem is a question mark.
 * Purple - Inspired by the Triforce Charts, which reveal locations of the scattered pieces of the Triforce of Courage. Appropriately, the emblem is that of Zelda's lore, the Triforce. This costume is a darker purple with a white emblem, compared to the chart's original lighter purple with a golden emblem.
 * Black - A "dark" costume, inspired by the Ghost Ship Chart needed to locate the signature . The emblem is a skull and crossbones, a symbol often depicted on pirate ships. This costume is black with a white emblem, compared to the chart's original biege with a blue emblem.



Z-Secret Costume (Conductor Link): Based on the protagonist from , a descendant of the Hero of Winds who is a train engineer for New Hyrule. Rather than the traditional green, he dons a dark blue suit, brown gloves and a red cap. The Master Sword and its sheathe are replaced with the and its sheathe, and his shield now matches its Spirit Tracks design.

R-Secret Costume (Minish Cap): Based on the protagonist from , who plays a pivotal part of shaping the Four Sword Saga. Extra details include his sword being replaced with the, and his standard cap is replaced with , a Minish sage who is turned into a green hat until the end of the game.

Trivia

 * In Project M v3.0, Toon Link's costume had an odd hole in his head, and crashed the game when a Metal Box was used.
 * In Project M, Toon Link is the only version of Link with an alternate costume that does not include his signature hat. Project+ would include three more costumes that follow this trait, bringing it up to four.
 * The Outset and Lineback costumes give him no hat at all. The secret costumes give him different hats altogether; the engineer cap and Ezlo (who acts as a "hat" of sorts).