Mr. Game & Watch (SSBM)

Mr. Game & Watch (, Mr. Game & Watch) is a character in Super Smash Bros. Melee. He was designed as a composite representation of various generic characters featured in the Game & Watch series, created by in 1980. He is the last character to be unlocked in the game.

Mr. Game & Watch is currently ranked 19th in Melee's tier list, at the bottom of the C- tier, which is his worst placement in the series. Mr. Game & Watch's positive attributes include extremely powerful KO moves that have a long duration as well as a slew of moderately effective special moves, two of which (Judgment and Oil Panic) can OHKO. However, Mr. Game & Watch's flaws are due to how he was translated to Melee; he has a bad approach due to his slow overall speed, and outside of his throws, his neutral game is rather predictable. His high hitstun and frailty also make him an easy target for combos. Mr. Game & Watch also has the dubious distinction of being the only character in the game who cannot L-cancel most of his aerial attacks, and is considered to have the worst shield in the game, as it fails to completely cover his entire body after even slight damage. All of this gives him very poor matchups against a majority of the cast, especially against higher-tiered characters.

How to unlock
For players to unlock Mr. Game & Watch, the Classic Mode, Adventure Mode or Target Test has to be cleared with all other characters.

Alternately, players can play 1,000 versus matches to fight Mr. Game & Watch.

Mr. Game & Watch must then be fought and defeated on Flat Zone.

Attributes
Mr. Game & Watch generally acts as a speedy, weak character; however, he does have some incredibly powerful KO moves, most of which are slow (with the exception of his down tilt). Mr. Game & Watch's attributes tend to be scattered; he has an average falling speed, an above average air speed, an average traction, and the second lightest weight in the game. As a result of these attributes, Mr. Game & Watch has a wavedash that grants decent distance and speed.

Mr. Game & Watch is notable for having unusual properties in most of his attacks; his forward tilt and forward smash, for instance, have sex kick properties, harming others even after the primary hitbox dissipates. Additionally, his up smash and neutral aerial have long hitboxes that do not run out of power, making them good KO options. Additionally, Mr. Game & Watch has many disjointed hitboxes in his attacks (particularly his down smash), giving him deceptively decent range.

Mr. Game & Watch's aerial game is his strongest asset, as his aerials have large disjointed hitboxes, evident with his neutral aerial, often KO'ing opponents under 125%, while having a very large hitbox that covers him. His forward aerial is his best approaching tool as it can be L-canceled and has fast startup, though it has heavy landing lag when not L-canceled. His back aerial is multi-hitting and has a disjointed hitbox, making it somewhat unpredictable to counter. His up aerial is a two-hit attack, with the second hit having high KO power. It can also be used to juggle fast fallers and heavy characters. Lastly, his meteor smashing down aerial is effective at countering foes from below and KO'ing (the sourspot is slightly weaker than the sweetspot and sends foes on a diagonal trajectory). The down aerial's landing hitboxes add 5%-6% more damage, for a total of 19%-20% if the primary hitbox strikes first.

Mr. Game & Watch's specials also allow for significant power; Oil Panic can absorb projectiles and result in a powerful resulting projectile, and his Judgment has near OHKO potential. Mr. Game & Watch also has a rather good recovery from Fire; despite a lack of options and general predictability, it grants him significant vertical distance. The low hitstun and knockback, as well as an unpredictable trajectory gives Chef potential edgeguard capability.

Mr. Game & Watch's grab game is also decent, despite his below-average grab range. The resulting trajectories of his throws gives him solid chaingrab and combo potential, and as all his throws look identical, he can perform mindgames on opponents by challenging the player's perception of where they will end up.

Mr. Game & Watch's main flaw, however, is his awful approach. An awkward dash, mediocre wavedash, and slow, weak tilts on the ground (except for his down tilt) results in him heavily struggling on the ground, causing him to be reliant on dashdancing and foxtrotting to traverse stages. His aerial approach is just as poor; despite an above average falling speed and an average short hop, he has among the worst SHFFLs in the game, primarily due to the fact that his aerials have significant ending lag, and that his neutral, back, and up aerials have the dubious distinction of not having the ability to be L-cancelled due to a programming error that lists them as special moves.

Mr. Game & Watch's defensive game also suffers; despite a relatively small size and a very low crouch, he is very easy to shield stab due to having the smallest max shield in Melee due to a coding error, and his remaining defensive capabilities are poor, with short, slow rolling dodges and an equally short sidestep dodge. Due to his slow tilts and smashes and mostly situational specials, he has poor out of shield options. His recovery also suffers; despite its respectable vertical distance and average horizontal distance, Fire is very predictable and easy to read, inviting edgeguarding or edgehogging.

Mr. Game & Watch also suffers due to his ability to be easily combo'd; his light weight and high periods of hitstun makes him a viable target for combos and juggles, and his light weight also makes him very easy to KO, only making him more vulnerable.

Version history
NTSC 1.02

Moveset
For a gallery of Mr. Game & Watch's hitboxes, see here.

Stats
NTSC

PAL

Most historically significant players

 * See also: Category:Mr. Game & Watch players (SSBM)


 * - An old-school Mr. Game & Watch player from the Golden Age; he retired from Melee, and later reappeared in the Smash 4 and Ultimate scenes. Placed 9th at and.
 * - Co-mains Mr. Game & Watch with . Considered to be the current best Mr. Game & Watch player in the world. Placed 17th at and . Currently Power Ranked 15th in the Florida Power Rankings.
 * - Considered to be the best Mr. Game & Watch player in the world prior to hiatus from competition. Placed 17th at, 25th at , and 33rd at with wins over , , , and ; Qerb was also ranked as an honorable mention on the MPGR 2019, the only Mr. Game & Watch player to receive such a distinction on a global ranking.
 * - Old-school player from 2005 who returned to competition in 2019, co-mains Mr. Game & Watch with . Placed 17th at and 33rd at  with both  and Mr. Game & Watch.
 * - Widely considered the best Mr. Game & Watch player in Europe. Placed 1st at, 7th at , 9th at , and 25th at . Currently ranked 8th on the United Kingdom Power Rankings, with notable wins over , , and.

Tier placement and history
Mr. Game & Watch has historically been considered to be a poor character in competitive play, with negative traits ranging from poor endurance, susceptibility to chaingrabs and various KO setups (despite his light weight), inconsistent approaching options, lag in his many of his attacks, and the inability to L-cancel some of his aerials. While a small group of smashers discovered that Mr. Game & Watch had potential, such as his raw power and strong punish game that allowed for flashy combos, his flaws and bad matchups have hindered such showings at the highest levels of play. As a result of his flaws, he has consistently remained in the lower ends of tiers, failing to make significant rises.

In recent years, however, has been noticeably successful with him, placing well in many major tournament series such as Super Smash Con as the sole representative of his character. Qerb achieved an honorable mention in the 2019 MPGR, indicating that he was considered close to Top 100 level even with a low-tiered character. Since many of the characters around Mr. Game & Watch on the tier list, such as and, do not have many comparisons to contend with Qerb's level of results, some argue that he deserves to be placed slightly higher than his current rank. Other players such as disagree, believing that his theoretical potential and matchup spread are still much worse than those characters. As it stands, however, he is generally agreed to be a low-tiered character who still possesses significant difficulty contending against many matchups. With a noticeable rise in Game & Watch players, as well as his metagame still being developed, he currently ranks 19th in the current tier list.

In
Mr. Game & Watch can appear as an ally in the team battle and the giant battle. However, he only appears as an opponent in the multi-character battle, where he is fought on Flat Zone.

In Adventure Mode
Adventure Mode makes no concessions to Mr. Game & Watch when he is unlocked.

In All-Star Mode
In All-Star Mode, Mr. Game & Watch appears as the final character the player fights against; his battle is the only one guaranteed to occur at the end, and he does not ally with any other character. The player must fight against a team of twenty-five Mr. Game & Watches, five at a time, on Flat Zone. Defeating all of them allows the player to complete the mode.

In Event Matches
Mr. Game & Watch appears in the following event matches:
 * Event 40: All-Star Match 4: Mr. Game & Watch is the last opponent fought in this series of staged battles. The selected character battles him on the Flat Zone stage with a stock of 2 while Mr. Game & Watch has 1. With a timer of four minutes, the player must defeat him and the other four characters one-by-one with the overall time and damage:, , , and.
 * Event 45: Game & Watch Forever!: Mr. Game & Watch is the player's character, going up against twenty five other Mr. Game & Watches, similar to the final battle of All-Star Mode. However, the player's Mr. Game & Watch, while having three lives, is also light, allowing him to be KO'd easily.

Trophies
In addition to the normal trophy about Mr. Game & Watch as a character, there are two trophies about him as a fighter that are unlocked by completing the Adventure and All-Star modes on any difficulty with Mr. Game & Watch.

Trivia

 * Mr. Game & Watch, along with, and , are the only characters in Melee to have an attack that causes recoil damage.  also counts, if he copies Roy's or Pichu's neutral special moves.
 * Mr. Game & Watch's and Jigglypuff's "head sprites" are the only ones to show their entire bodies. Melee also marks the only time Mr. Game & Watch's head sprite shows his whole body. Starting with Brawl, his head sprite only shows just his head.
 * Melee reads Mr. Game & Watch's neutral, back, and up aerials as special moves, not as aerial attacks; this explains why they cannot be L-canceled. This error was fixed in Brawl.
 * Despite his animations looking like 2D sprites, Mr. Game & Watch actually uses a fully-rendered 3D model, with the values for the z-axis set to zero, thus flattening him (the same method which flattens other characters on Flat Zone.) Mr. Game & Watch's dimensions can best be seen when he's turning while using a or when he is being grabbed and pummeled.
 * However, even when he does appear to be 3D, he is still flattened out, and moving the camera will not give the player a three-dimensional view of him.
 * Mr. Game & Watch, and Young Link are the only characters in Melee that don't finish their defeat noises upon being KO'd horizontally or falling.
 * Despite not being a clone, Mr. Game & Watch curiously shares many movement attributes with, namely walking speed, falling speed, fast falling speed, traction, and gravity.
 * Coincidentally, multiple Game & Watch games such as Donkey Kong; Mario Bros.; and Mario's Cement Factory featured Mario in a form more closely resembling Mr. Game & Watch, and the Game & Watch Gallery series featured alternate versions of classic Game & Watch games with Mario characters.
 * Mr. Game & Watch is the only unlockable character in Melee who has four, rather than three, unlock methods.
 * This is the only game where Mr. Game & Watch's down tilt is rendered in 2D instead of 3D.
 * Mr. Game & Watch is the only character to use their default color in All Star, as well as the only character to use their default color in their Smash Blue trophy.