Isabelle (SSBU)


 * Isabelle Turns Over A New Leaf!

Isabelle (, Shizue) is a playable character in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. She was announced as a newcomer at the end of the September 13, 2018 Nintendo Direct in tandem with the then-untitled . Despite sharing many moves with, Isabelle is not classified as an Echo Fighter and instead functions as a semi-clone. As a result, Isabelle is classified as Fighter #68.

Although Isabelle speaks within her home series and reveal trailer, she is completely mute in Ultimate.

Isabelle is ranked 73rd out of 82 on the current tier list, placing her at the top of the D+ tier. Isabelle possesses good defensive play, and excellent ledge trapping; owing to her slingshot, special moves, and fast close-range moves. Isabelle also has a good juggle, making it difficult for the opponent’s to safely land via her up aerial, up tilt, and aforementioned traits. Notably, Isabelle's unique jab gives her the ability to perform the "Wobbelle" technique, which can trap opponents at the ledge up to KO percentages. Somewhat akin to Sonic's perception in Ultimate, Isabelle is often considered to be frustrating to play against, particularly for her tendency to avoid unsafe interactions in some matchups. This can cause opponent's to make risky approaches, providing opportunities for Isabelle to punish.

However, Isabelle has numerous drawbacks. Some include poor offense, low damage output, sluggish movement, low weight, a slow grab, and a difficulty in closing stocks. In addition, both Lloid Trap and Fishing Rod have significant flaws that hinder their reliability. Isabelle’s Lloid Trap can be easily destroyed by many characters, causing a explosion that uniquely hurts the user. Furthermore, if the trap hasn’t been set off or destroyed within ten seconds, it will disappear entirely. Fishing Rod will sometimes disconnect if a platform obstructs Isabelle’s ability to reel in her line. In addition, what happens when this occurs is rather unpredictable; ranging from breaking off immediately, to bringing her catch in, without performing a throw. While the latter can be desirable, the effect is neither common nor controllable. Losing her catch often results in no punish, and can leave her vulnerable to a counter attack.

On the whole, Isabelle's weaknesses considerably hold her back in competitive play. Despite receiving buffs in subsequent balance patches and securing results from players such as and, she is still considered to be outclassed by Villager in the most important aspects.

How to unlock
Complete one of the following: Isabelle must then be defeated on Town and City (the Ω form is used in World of Light).
 * Play VS. matches, with Isabelle being the 21st character to be unlocked.
 * Clear with  or any character in its unlock tree, being the 5th character unlocked after.
 * Have Isabelle join the player's party in World of Light.

Attributes
Isabelle is a moderately short and floaty lightweight with slow overall mobility. As a semi-clone of her fellow fighter, she is similar to him in many aspects. However, Isabelle is characterized by a lighter weight and lacks the ability to wall jump. Aside from her slower fall speed, she demonstrates marginally faster mobility, both on the ground and in the air. Moreover, Isabelle also has multiple attacks that are unique to her (such as all of her smash attacks), and even the moves she shares with Villager have different animations and mechanics.

Isabelle's grounded moves have their utility mainly due to their range and low startup, as all of her standard grounded moves have less than 10 frames of startup. Neutral attack is Isabelle's fastest grounded move, and while it is a weak single-hit move, it can be used to combo into her smash attacks at high percentages and is a reliable jab lock. Forward tilt is useful when spaced thanks to its decent knockback and range, while also serving as a situational KO option at higher percentages. Up tilt's disjointed hitbox makes it an effective anti-air attack and juggling option, while its low knockback and relatively fast speed also make it a useful combo move. Down tilt possesses decent range as well, while the sweetspot close to her is strong enough to KO at high percentages.

Dash attack is a projectile that can be used on platforms against opponents on the ground or on lower platforms, and it can also be used near the ledge for edgeguarding or potentially as a 2 frame punish. Her smash attacks also have some utility as well: forward smash is her strongest KO option if sweetspotted; up smash hits twice and is her best vertical KO move while also comboing into up aerial at low percentages; and down smash is a semi-spike that can be used for KOing near the ledge, edgeguarding, and 2 frame punishes.

Isabelle's aerials autocancel in a short hop. Neutral aerial is Isabelle's fastest aerial and typically her best out of shield option, and has sex kick properties that enable it to combo into Isabelle's other moves or break out of combos. Forward and back aerials involve her firing slingshot pellets that are useful for approaching, spacing and edgeguarding; back aerial has slower startup but less ending lag than forward aerial, and is stronger as well. Finally, up and down aerials have her always swing two turnips as opposed to also one or three like Villager, making them more consistent overall. With her ability to maintain offstage presence, due to her floaty nature, Isabelle's mix of fast and long-ranged aerials make edgeguarding one of the focal points of her strengths.

Isabelle's grab game also has some utility. Isabelle uses a net as part of her tether grab, which has a longer range than normal grabs, but more startup and ending lag as a result; however, Isabelle does not have a grab aerial in spite of said long-ranged grab. Isabelle can notably use her grab to pocket items. Down throw can be used to initiate aerial combos, forward throw can setup edgeguards rather effectively, and back throw is a potent KO throw, being among the strongest back throws in the game. Up throw deals decent damage, but its lack of utility otherwise makes it Isabelle's least useful throw.

Isabelle sports versatile special moves. Her neutral special, Pocket, allows her to steal an opponent's projectile and send it back at them, helping to discourage projectile camping against her. Her down special, Lloid Trap, has her planting Lloid into the ground. Lloid Trap will active whenever an opponent walks over Lloid or can be activated manually, making it useful for surprising opponents, though it also takes notable time to plant and leaves her vulnerable, not being active until frame 51. However, despite this flaw, Lloid establishes another notable strength Isabelle possesses, ledge trapping; when planted in the correct position, Lloid alone can cover rolling and jumping get up's while Isabelle herself can attempt to cover other get-up options, allowing her to have an easier time maintaining advantage.

In addition, Lloid has other forms of utility; it can combo into up aerial if Isabelle is close enough, making it a KO confirm at higher percentages. Lloid also has the niche application known as "Glyroid"; when manually detonating Lloid during her initial dash, Isabelle will quickly slide a short distance, allowing it to be used as a movement mix-up for approaching. Her side special, Fishing Rod, allows her to grab and throw opponents from distances farther than her grab can, while it also functions as a tether recovery and an edgeguarding tool, as the fact that it can hang offstage allows her to catch opponents with slower recoveries. Her up special, Balloon Trip, provides vast vertical and horizontal distance, though it travels a slightly shorter distance than Villager's version. This, in addition to her Fishing Rod's great horizontal distance, makes Isabelle notoriously difficult to gimp.

However, Isabelle does have her flaws, one of the most notable being her disadvantage state. Due to her floatiness and low weight, she struggles to return to the ground safely, which makes her more vulnerable to juggling and early knockouts. Additionally, Isabelle’s aerials offer limited coverage beneath her. Her options for mixing up movement are limited, with B-reversing Pocket and committal directional air dodges being among the few options available.

Many of her special moves have major flaws. While her Fishing Rod is a versatile command grab with a very good range, it is flawed in many ways. Unlike all other grabs in the game, it is unusually capable of being shielded and suffers from a lot of ending lag, making it very punishable. Lloid Trap is also very flawed; planting Lloid leaves her vulnerable and takes 51 frames to be active, it disappears after only 10 seconds and can easily be destroyed due to it only having 8% of HP, and in some cases the resulting explosion will damage Isabelle herself and some characters can even run through it without getting affected. While Isabelle's recovery is very long-distanced, she has no way to defend herself while using Balloon Trip, due to the move lacking a hitbox, and popping the balloons will render her helpless, meaning that despite her recovery being fairly good on paper, it is among the most easily edgeguarded in practice. Finally, Isabelle notably lacks some of Villager's most important tools for zoning in the neutral game, namely Lloid Rocket and Timber, making her noticeably worse at zoning than her counterpart.

Overall, Isabelle is a more risk adverse character than Villager, having inferior zoning and camping ability, but greater punish options and more reliable stage control. This is partially due to her special attacks having notable flaws, as well as possessing inferior endurance due to her lighter weight and slower falling speed. Some of her benefits are directly tied to being in an advantageous game state, despite having a worse neutral than Villager, making her strengths less accessible. As a result, Isabelle has a negative competitive reception, as many top professional players view her not only as an inferior counterpart to Villager (who by himself has rather mixed competitive reception and poor tournament representation), but also potentially as one of the worst characters in the game.

Isabelle's tournament representation reflects this, as it is very poor in all regions, and her most significant results are either from the very early days of Ultimate's meta or her being used as a secondary or pocket to other characters.

Update history
Isabelle received a mix of buffs, nerfs and glitch fixes via game updates, but was buffed overall. Update 1.0.0 decreased the landing lag of her up and down aerials, which made them safer to use for set-ups and in general. Lloid Trap's detection range was also increased noticeably. Fishing Rod's line length was also increased when cast via a smash input, although the move itself received a few nerfs: its tilt inputted line's length was decreased, the smash input's frame window was shortened, and the rod's hook travels slower.

Update 2.0.0 fixed some infamous glitches, such as the infinite Assist Trophy glitch and Slingshot Crash, as well as enabled Isabelle's neutral aerial to auto-cancel earlier. Update 3.0.0 nerfed her forward and back aerials' shield damage as part of a near-universal nerf to projectiles. More notably, this same update modified Fishing Rod in two ways: its hook gained the ability to catch an opponent while it is idle, thus granting it a guaranteed set-up for a 2 frame punish, but at the cost of its active frames being decreased significantly. However, update 3.1.0 undid these changes to Fishing Rod.

In update 4.0.0, Isabelle received a number of worthwhile buffs. She travels farther when rolling, which compliments her defensive playstyle. Isabelle's neutral attack, which was near-universally viewed by players as one the worst moves of any kind in the game, received a number of changes that noticeably improve its utility, most notably granting her a unique edge trap technique dubbed the "Wobbelle". Her up smash and Fishing Rod's up throw became stronger KOing options, thanks to their increased knockback scaling. Lastly, Fishing Rod and Lloid Trap had their lag decreased; in particular, Lloid Trap's decreased start-up lag enables it to function much better against most opponents that dash over it.

Following update 7.0.0's buff to Fishing Rod's tether range, update 8.0.0 granted Isabelle a number of worthwhile buffs, similarly to update 4.0.0. Her up tilt, dash attack, up smash, and down aerial each had their lag decreased by varying amounts, with up tilt in particular becoming much more effective for combos as a result. In addition, Isabelle's up aerial received more base knockback, and her pummel's hitbox was enlarged in order to improve its consistency.

Update 13.0.0 granted Isabelle her final buffs, with the most notable of these being to her down smash: its KO potential was improved via increased knockback, whereas the enlargement and repositioning of its hitboxes improved its reliability both as a "Wobbelle" KO confirm and as a 2 frame punish. Down tilt's ending lag was decreased; in addition to making the move safer overall, this enables its close hitbox to set up at low percentages, similarly to dash attack's close hitbox as of update 8.0.0. Forward smash's clean hitbox became slightly easier to land, thanks to it gaining 1 more active frame. Lastly, forward throw's knockback was increased, which improved its utility as a stage control option.

Despite overall buffs, Isabelle fares worse now than she did at the launch of Ultimate. While her buffs are beneficial, they fail to address her fundamental issues, and the introduction of DLC characters has brought about several unfavorable matchups. Furthermore, the universal nerf to projectile shield damage has weakened Isabelle's defensive play and neutral game, especially due to her heavy reliance on her slingshot.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Moveset

 * Isabelle possess a tether grab, which is her side special.

For a gallery of Isabelle's hitboxes, see here.

On-screen appearance

 * Isabelle exits the while cheering before it shrinks and then disappears into a puff of smoke.



Taunts

 * Up taunt: Waves her hand while looking toward the screen. It is based on the "Greetings".
 * Side taunt: Claps her hands while facing the screen. It is based on the "Delight" reaction.
 * Down taunt: Dances, waving her arms in an inward circular motion while stepping in place. She then jumps up, and lands facing the screen with her arms spread out. It is based on the "Complete" reaction in .

Idle poses

 * Closes her eyes and stretches her arms.
 * Turns around twice and inspects her outfit while wagging her tail.

Crowd cheer
 

Victory poses

 * Left: Waves twice and spreads her arms.
 * Up: Waves goodbye to as he flies upward in the background, then turns toward the camera and strikes a pose similar to the one in her Ultimate render.
 * Right: Dusts herself off, jumps twice, and poses triumphantly with her hands on her hips. Her final pose is based on the "Pride" reaction.

Tier placement and history
When Isabelle was first revealed, there was a glimmer of hope for the character due to her similar neutral and campy patient playstyle with. On release, she was considered to be generally effective, as she shared some abilities from Villager: her slingshot was considered a good option for zoning and/or approaching and edgeguarding, and her Pocket prevented camping from other zoners. Isabelle's unique tools were also considered: Lloid Trap functioned as an effective tool for stage control, forcing reactions from her opponent and setting up an aerial combo, while Fishing Rod became rather notorious for hindering with recoveries and being rather challenging to contend with, especially at lower skill levels.

However, Isabelle's representation quickly dropped after the first few months, with players considering her not as good of a character as initially imagined. In addition to sharing the same weaknesses as Villager, Isabelle has additional flaws that hinder her (such as her infamously short smash attacks), while her camping game does not benefit as much to Ultimate's engine.

As a result of these factors, Isabelle has not made a significant impact in tournaments and has little representation throughout Ultimate's current metagame. This is also exacerbated by the fact that she is outshined by her original counterpart, Villager, who is also struggling in the meta with limited representation, despite being considered a better character than her. Due to Villager's stronger presence and Isabelle's weaknesses, numerous professionals view her as one of the worst characters in the game. On the other hand, a few other players believes the character is underrated and has potential due to her strong camping game and effective edge tools. Furthermore, dedicated players such as, , and use her as either a solo main or a secondary and have placed well at both the regional and national levels. Finally, updates 4.0.0, 8.0.0 and 13.0.0 gave Isabelle several buffs that improved her neutral game; 4.0.0 in particular introduced her neutral attack's "Wobbelle" technique, which can trap the opponent at an edge reliably with her neutral attack until KO percentages. As of now, she is considered a low-tier, ranked 73rd out of 82 on the current tier list.

Most historically significant players
See also: Category:Isabelle players (SSBU)


 * - The best Isabelle player in the United States. Placed 17th at and, 25th at , and 33rd at  with wins on the likes of , , and . Ranked 8th on the Georgia Power Rankings.
 * - One of the best Isabelle players in the United States. Placed 7th at, 9th at both and , and 13th at .  Has wins over , , and . Ranked 2nd on the Arizona Power Rankings.
 * - The best Isabelle player in Europe. Placed 1st at, 3rd at , 4th at , and 7th at both and  with wins over players such as , , and . Ranked 30th on the PGRU v3 EU.
 * - Has an Isabelle secondary that he regularly uses in bracket. Placed 2nd at, 7th at , 9th at both and , and 49th at . Ranked 31st on the Japan Player Rankings.
 * - The best Isabelle player in Mexico. Placed 2nd at, 5th at , 7th at both and , and 9th at  with wins over , , and . Ranked as high as 18th, and is currently ranked 24th, on the Mexican Power Rankings.

: Best in Show
Isabelle's opponents consist of nearly every female fighter that appears in the base roster of Ultimate. The only exemptions are and Spiky-eared. Popo of the is the only male fighter fought in this route, although this is because neither Popo nor Nana can spawn alone, regardless of which of them is the leading Ice Climber. Additionally, the music tracks alternate depending on the Round: odd numbered Rounds play title themes from the series, whereas even numbered Rounds play songs from that stage's home universe.

Credits roll after completing Classic Mode. Completing it as Isabelle has  accompany the credits.

Role in World of Light
Although Isabelle does not appear in the World of Light opening cutscene, she was vaporized and later imprisoned alongside the rest of the fighters (sans ) when Galeem unleashed his beams of light.

Isabelle can be found near a small town on a secluded road that requires the spirit of Kapp'n (Wild World) to be driven through a tunnel to reach. Freeing her unlocks a path to the town. From the Northwestern Town, the player must defeat the spirit of Ashnard, then take the bus to reach her fighter battle.

Spirit
Isabelle's fighter spirit can be obtained by completing. It is also available periodically for purchase in the shop for 300 Gold, but only after Isabelle has been unlocked. Unlocking Isabelle in World of Light allows the player to preview the spirit below in the Spirit List under the name "???". As a fighter spirit, it cannot be used in Spirit Battles and is purely aesthetic. Her fighter spirit has an alternate version that replaces it with her artwork in Ultimate.

In Spirit Battles
Conditions in italic aren't listed on the Spirit Battle preview screen.

Trivia

 * Isabelle is the fourth character to be announced in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate that was previously featured as a Mii costume in Super Smash Bros. 4. The others are, , and.
 * She uses a party popper for her forward smash, which is used by the Mii Gunner outfit based on her instead of an arm cannon.
 * Isabelle is also the fourth summonable character to become a fighter in a later installment, following Charizard, Little Mac, and Dark Samus. Like Little Mac and Dark Samus, she was an Assist Trophy prior to gaining this distinction.
 * The Nintendo Direct that revealed Isabelle as a fighter was supposed to air on September 6th, 2018. However, an earthquake struck Hokkaidō, Japan that day. Its aftermath prompted Nintendo to postpone the Direct—and by extension, news of Isabelle's inclusion in Ultimate—by one week, out of respect for those affected by the tremor. This makes Isabelle the only playable character in the series' history whose reveal was explicitly delayed for any given reason.
 * Isabelle's reveal trailer initially appeared to be a reveal trailer for a new Nintendo Switch installment of the series and was followed by an actual teaser trailer confirming the then-unnamed  for 2019.
 * is even seen watching Isabelle's own trailer on his computer before telling the audience he has to get back to work in order to prepare for the upcoming game. This segment can be considered its own mini teaser for New Horizons since Tom Nook is the primary helper at the beginning of that game instead of Isabelle as in .
 * At one point, Isabelle wishes that the mayor "wasn't so busy with the campsite and Smash." 'The campsite' refers to , which was released in October 2017.
 * This is the second time that an upcoming Nintendo game has been teased through a character reveal trailer. The first was , which was teased by wielding the then-unnamed  in  and 's reveal trailer.
 * In her reveal trailer, Isabelle opens an envelope inviting her to join Super Smash Bros. that is enclosed with a wax seal in the shape of the Super Smash Bros. logo. This is a callback to 's reveal in the first trailer for SSB4, and it is the second time (following Villager's reveal) that a Smash invitation was received via physical post.
 * ,, , and  also received similar invitations in their respective reveal trailers for Ultimate.
 * There was an error on Isabelle's page on Ultimate's official website where her Animal Crossing symbol is the same shade of green as Villager's instead of chartreuse, her background color.
 * Strangely, Isabelle's reveal trailer shows that Ultimate was still Rating Pending, even though the rating had already been revealed to be rated E10+ at the time. Whether this was an error on Nintendo's or ESRB's part is unknown, though European trailers kept the PEGI 12 rating.
 * In a Famitsu column, Masahiro Sakurai noted that because Isabelle and have significantly different proportions and personalities, it was not possible for Isabelle to be Villager's Echo Fighter. Therefore she was developed as a unique character, although she still shares many moves with Villager. This makes Isabelle the only type of clone so far whose reasoning for not being labeled as an Echo Fighter has been explicitly confirmed.
 * Isabelle is the only character in the base roster whose official confirmation was not part of a Super Smash Bros.-centered Nintendo Direct. Instead, she was revealed as part of a general Nintendo Direct.
 * Isabelle is one of five characters with a "hit-grab" (a grab that can be blocked). The others are, , and.
 * She is also the only character to have this property in the base game, since Skewer didn't gain this property until update, and the others were introduced as DLC.
 * Notably, all of these fighters debuted in Ultimate.
 * Similar to Chomp, fighters trapped in Isabelle's grab appear to have the upper half of their models removed, presumably so that even large characters can fit inside the net. This also happens with Villager.
 * With a weight value of 88, Isabelle is the lightest newcomer in the base version of Ultimate.
 * She is, however, the third lightest newcomer overall, behind (85 units) and  (79 units), respectively.
 * In the initial design document for Ultimate, Isabelle was described as "A variation on Villager. She fights using office supplies and public property.".