Delfino Plaza

Delfino Plaza (, Dolphic Town) is a stage in Super Smash Bros. Brawl based on the 2002 game Super Mario Sunshine released for Nintendo GameCube. It returns as a familiar stage in and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Players battle on a floating platform, which then drops the characters off at a certain location before picking them up again and transporting them to another location, essentially touring them around the area.

In Wii U, is fought here for his unlocking battle, while in Ultimate,  is fought here for his unlocking battle.

Stage overview
The battle begins on a main platform that uses propeller-propulsion with two small transparent platforms above it and another large arching transparent platform above them. However, the arrangement of the platforms on changes each time the main platform picks characters up to move them to a different location. The formats are:
 * The starting arrangement of platforms described above.
 * The large main platform with three small platforms above it; one high up in the center and two lower ones to the left and right of the ledges.
 * The large main platform with two small platforms above it; one on the left and the other, slightly higher, on the right.
 * The large main platform with three small platforms above it; one high up in the middle and the other two lower, slanting diagonally down towards the stage from the left and right respectively.

The stage hovers toward Isle Delfino, which resides in the background, and drops players off at numerous landmarks around the island. All of these variants make Delfino Plaza the stage with the most individual fighting arenas in Brawl. The locales are landed on in a random order and they are as follows:
 * The small, dune-shaped island to the east of a plaza. A warp pipe and a palm tree sit in the background here.
 * The second, slightly larger island on the far western area of the main plaza. Both islands are surrounded by the ocean which, can be swum in.
 * The three grass-covered stone spires near the shoreline. Players can swim in the sea between the spires and also on the edges.
 * The row of buildings in front of the Shine Gate.
 * The Shine Gate. Two platforms have been attached to either side.
 * The walkway at the front of the main courtyard. The Pianta statue is absent from its usual spot.
 * The area in front of the dolphin fountain with a staircase on both sides.
 * The area with a line of beach umbrellas to the left of the Shine Gate.
 * The two areas on the western edge of the island. A shallow veranda sits in between, which characters can walk around in, and a deeper section requires swimming to navigate.

Differences from Super Mario Sunshine

 * The city's size has been decreased, proved by comparing with characters on this stage and in Super Mario Sunshine.
 * The manholes are red, whereas they were normally blue in Super Mario Sunshine.
 * The palm trees have a different design. While the design used in Smash does appear in other levels in Sunshine, they are not in Delfino Plaza.
 * The Grand Pianta Statue does not appear on the background of the stage.
 * Additionally, the boxes containing the three variations of F.L.U.D.D. nozzles are also no longer in the background.
 * The cannon that transported Mario to is no longer present.
 * The Shine Gate has two platforms at each side that were not present in Super Mario Sunshine.
 * The large Shine Sprite on the Shine Gate spins on this stage, but it doesn't in Super Mario Sunshine. The only time it ever spins is when players spray it with water to clean black goop off it. After the Shine Sprite revealed for making it clean is collected, the large Shine Sprite permanently stays still.
 * There is a platform on one section of the level that is in the water, and was originally absent in Sunshine.
 * On the front of the plaza (one of the sections where players can battle), the ledges were rounded in Sunshine, but were made rectangular to fight on this stage.
 * The red pipes on top of both the Shine Gate that led to and the building in front of it which led to  are no longer present.
 * Although the mosaic in front of the dolphin statue is still present, the giant beam of sunlight that teleported Mario to is missing.
 * The paint portals on the boat house (leading to ) and the lighthouse (leading to ) have both been removed on this stage.
 * The Yoshi egg that used to be in the Plaza has been taken out.
 * The umbrellas in Delfino Plaza have no bouncing properties, unlike in Sunshine.
 * No s are seen in the stage, while they were abundant in Sunshine.
 * The water in many parts of the stage is shallower than in Super Mario Sunshine.
 * The Pipe on the small island that leads to the level is no longer covered by an.
 * The boats are different, as they are lacking the umbrellas.

Ω forms and Battlefield form
The Ω form uses the base platform with an extra bottom layer. Like many touring stages, the stage does not stop at any places of interest. Star KOs are possible here.

In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, the main platform of the Ω form and Battlefield form is made of a decorated tile design that is unique to these forms, and the main platform is resized and reshaped to match and, respectively. The three soft platforms of the Battlefield form resemble the soft platforms of the regular form.

Origin
This stage is based on Delfino Plaza from . It is the largest city on, and it acts as the hub area for the game, as all seven levels are accessed from there in various ways.

Some areas of Isle Delfino that visits include:, a commercial fishing area; , an amusement park built on an island; , a small airport built on three islands; and an active volcano named , where the final boss fight against  takes place. All these locations could be seen from a distance from Delfino Plaza, and are retained in the far background of this stage. Due to heavy reuse of models from Super Mario Sunshine, this stage is very close to how it is presented in Super Mario Sunshine, with the primary difference being that the whole area is scaled down.

While the floating platforms themselves are unique to Smash Bros., the propellers keeping them in the air highly resemble those seen on the, one of 's alternate forms.

In Brawl
This stage is usually a counterpick, as while the stage is fairly unintrusive, the ability to shark on the main hovering platform, and some parts of the stage having walls and walk-offs, give a fairly large advantage to certain characters (most infamously and ).

While usually legal, this stage is often banned in stage conservative rulesets, such as the Japanese ruleset. The aforementioned reasons for why it's a counterpick are seen as too much for a legal stage by those with a conservative mindset. Such players also usually see Meta Knight as too powerful on the stage, thus use the rationale that they must ban the stage to prevent Meta Knight players from getting a "free win" on their counterpick.

In Smash 4
Delfino Plaza was once again legal as a counterpick in the early stages of the Smash 4 metagame. However, as many characters were able to KO early on the top blast line, which drastically shifts downward during the transitions, it was seen as too powerful for characters with great vertical KO moves (such as or ) and against particularly floaty or light characters (such as  or, who would also benefit from the blast line shift due to Luma's strong up aerial). Since Smash 4's release, there have been more stages to choose from over Delfino Plaza (such as ), and it has been banned in major rulesets as of GENESIS 3.

In Ultimate
Delfino Plaza has been universally banned since the release of Ultimate. Although the stage's top blast zone no longer fluctuates to the same degree as Smash 4, the walls, walkoff blast zones, and water in most transformations, as well as the transforming itself, are viewed by the community as far less acceptable traits in a competitive stagelist compared to years prior.

Glitches

 * If a player uses a "Multi-Kick" attack (such as Peach's down aerial) while the platform is landing at the beach island, the player can fall through it and end up swimming underneath.
 * If the stage is reset - either by restarting in Training Mode or via Sudden Death - as the platform comes to rest in certain locations in the town, the models for some buildings, centerpieces, or even intractable objects and floors will not be visible, and will remain invisible until the locations are visited again. This occurs because in some locations of the stage, when there is no way of viewing these buildings with the camera, the game will temporarily stop rendering them to reduce potential game lag (a process known as culling). However, resetting the stage skips the cue for the buildings to be made visible again, causing the glitch. It can be seen in action here. This glitch also returns in Ultimate, and is similar to a glitch seen in Super Mario Sunshine itself.

Update history
 1.0.6
 * Added 8-player mode version of the stage's Ω form.

Trivia

 * At the stone spires, Pokémon Trainer can be seen far in the background on the grass part at the volcano's foot if he is selected.
 * If is met in Classic or All-Star, but the player has not unlocked the Mario Bros. stage, he is fought on Delfino Plaza.
 * In the beta version of Brawl, the music track "Castle/Boss Fortress (Super Mario World/SMB 3)" was one of the tracks in Delfino Plaza's My Music selection (as shown in a screenshot on the Smash Bros. DOJO!! website). For the final version of Brawl, though, the track was moved to Luigi's Mansion.
 * By using a hacked camera, one can see that only half of Corona Mountain is part of the stage. Also, in Brawl, areas inside buildings and under manhole covers are surprisingly detailed when using a hacked camera, suggesting that the model was taken directly out of Super Mario Sunshine.
 * In Ultimate, at the area with a line of beach umbrellas to the left of the Shine Gate, the player can actually swim in water if the character becomes small enough to do so.
 * In Ultimate, the large Shine Sprite inside of the Shine Gate will disappear whenever something causes an effect in the background, such as Shadow the Hedgehog or Color TV-Game 15.
 * In Ultimate, the following Assist Trophies can only appear on this stage's Battlefield and Omega forms: Andross, Kapp'n, Devil and the Squid Sisters. Additionally, the following Poké Ball Pokémon can only be summoned on the Battlefield and Omega forms: Abra, Lunala and Marshadow.
 * The Moon cannot be summoned on this stage at all.
 * Unlike Skyloft, a stage similar to Delfino Plaza, with hazards turned off, the stage still travels around instead of being static. This also applies to Prism Tower. This is likely due to Skyloft's terrain actually being able to damage characters while the stage transitions.