Ganondorf (PM)

Ganondorf is a playable character in the Brawl mod Project M. He was buffed significantly in Project M after being mostly reverted to his Melee version. However, some Brawl attributes were maintained, and part of his moveset was changed to make him more well-rounded.

Ganondorf is currently ranked 37th out of 41 on the official tier list, placing him in the lower half of the D tier. This is a significant drop from his placement in Melee as 14th out of 26, but a moderate improvement over his place on the Brawl tier list, where he is ranked last at the bottom of the tier list.

Attributes
Despite Ganondorf mostly being based on his Melee iteration, he remains a semi-clone of, as he was in Brawl; most of Ganondorf's moves continue to use their respective animations from Brawl. Ganondorf is a slower, stronger, and heavier version of Falcon with more reach as a result of his larger build. Many of Ganondorf's positive attributes from the past two games were retained, making him more formidable than he was in Melee and Brawl.

Ganondorf is a powerful character like he was in Melee. Being one of the strongest characters, his attacks inflict dangerously high knockback, with some being able to KO at relatively low percentages. His combos, while often short, are capable of quickly racking up extremely high damage, and many of his aerials are excellent for both killing and edgeguarding. Ganondorf also has the most powerful meteor smash in his down aerial and one of the strongest spikes in his aerial Wizard's Foot.

Ganondorf is unique in that he is one of the only two characters who is capable of lengthening his recovery (the other being Captain Falcon with his Falcon Kick), by executing his aerial Wizard's Foot. For every attempt of the move, Ganondorf will restore his midair jump, thus bringing him closer to the stage and greatly increasing his horizontal recovery. It is worth noting, the Wizard's Foot must complete to restore his jump. His up special, Dark Dive, still possesses the arm swipe attack at its peak and the ability to grab an opponent on the ledge from Brawl, both of which may save him on occasion. However, Ganondorf normally has trouble with recovery, because of his low jump height, high gravity, and low air speed. Additionally, Dark Dive does not offer much vertical or horizontal distance while being very predictable and easy to edgeguard and edgehog.

Back in Melee and Brawl, Ganondorf struggled against projectile users due to his tall size and no projectile of his own, as well as off-stage survivability due to a poor recovery, but these issues are somewhat addressed in Project M due to the advent of Dead Man's Volley & Drift. This new move gives Ganondorf a reflector that sends projectiles back at double their original speed, arming him with a moderately effective anti-projectile option. In addition to buffs such as slightly higher mid-air jumps and aerial Wizard's Foot restoring mid-air jumps, the new move also provides brief floating when used in the air, allowing Ganondorf to recover better to the stage while giving him more options for recovery mix-ups. Dead Man's Volley & Drift serves as a useful tool for Ganondorf, diminishing several of his major issues and allowing him to compete better. Despite this, he often still has trouble against characters who possess a strong projectile game.

Ganondorf's flaws include his large and tall stature, which combined with his heavier weight and high gravity, makes him a bigger and more easily comboed target. He also possesses one of the slowest dashing speeds despite it being significantly faster than it was in Brawl, hindering his ability to catch up to his opponents on foot. Lastly, even with all of his specials being usable for recovering, his recovery is still somewhat predictable due to it being mostly linear.

Ganondorf's buffs from Brawl to Project M, such as his combo starter Flame Choke (although it was slightly nerfed), DACUS, improved tilts, improvements to Dark Dive, and being equipped with an extra recovery tool that doubles as a reflector, grant him better tournament success than in Melee or Brawl. However, he still struggles to keep up with the faster and more combo-heavy characters such as and.

Changes from Melee to PM
Given the nerfs Ganondorf received in Brawl that made him plummet to the very bottom of the tier list, he is significantly buffed in Project M. Most of his favorable traits from Melee return, along with Brawl's tilt attacks and Flame Choke, restoring his recovery, speed, combo and K.O.ing ability. Some of his more powerful moves have been given less ending lag or greater reach and many late weak hitboxes and sourspots were removed. His situational moves have been replaced with weaker but much more practical moves: his new up tilt comes out much faster, and his new neutral special Dead Man's Volley & Drift is a reflector that doubles as a floating maneuver. To compensate for the loss of Warlock Punch, Ganondorf's down taunt now serves as an attack that functions similarly to it. Finally, several of Ganondorf's animations have been overhauled, which combined with the addition of Dead Man's Volley makes him a slightly more accurate representation of his appearance in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.



Moveset
Up to date as of version 3.6.

Most historically significant players

 * - The current best player in Spain, who ranked 2nd on the most recent European Project M Power Rankings.
 * - While is his main, he had a strong Ganondorf secondary that he frequently used on route to being one of the best PM players in the mid-2010s. Some of his most notable results using Ganondorf as a secondary include winning, , and . He was ranked 5th on PMRank 2016 with his secondary Ganondorf.
 * - The best solo Ganondorf main in the world. Some of his most notable results include placing 9th at, 25th at both and , and 49th at . Ranked 6th on the SoCal Power Rankings with wins over  and.

Notable tech
Labbing Discord Tech Post

Project M
Beginning in version 3.5, Ganondorf received an alternate costume based on his appearance in Melee, itself from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and the Nintendo Gamecube tech demo. This costume also includes an aesthetic change; when playing as Melee Ganondorf, he brandishes the sword he is depicted with (but never uses) in Melee as well as the Gamecube tech demo, rather than the Sword of Sages (from The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess).

The Melee costumes come with recolors for team battles, as well as an original purple recolor; it consequently replaces his Ocarina of Time color scheme to make room.

Project+
In Project+, Ganondorf received even more alternate costumes that further represent Zelda lore.

One of these costumes represents the Fallen Hero timeline, a potential storyline in the franchise where Link fails to defeat Ganon in Ocarina of Time and Hyrule faces its inevitable ruin. This timeline, where games such as the original The Legend of Zelda for the NES and A Link to the Past take place, is the inspiration for Ganondorf's alternate costume; more specifically, his appearance as the monster Ganon, a massive porcine transformation of his former self from the Triforce of Power. His sword, like the Melee costume, aesthetically changes to his trident as seen in A Link to the Past. This costume includes recolors which are loosely inspired by other incarnations of Ganon, such as the ones seen in Twilight Princess, Ocarina of Time and Four Swords Adventures.



All Costumes:

Default

Black

Blue

Green: Possibly based on Ganondorf's appearance in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.

Red

Ocarina Default: Based on Ganondorf's appearance in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Ocarina Red

Ocarina Green

Ocarina Blue

Ocarina Purple

Ocarina Tan: Based on Ganondorf's appearance in Super Smash Bros. Melee, due to him having a tan cape instead of a red cape, and in turn, also based on his appearance in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time when Young Link has a nightmare about encountering him that comes true after the three have been collected before being brought to the.

Ganon: Ganon, the pig-like demon form of Ganondorf that appears in most of the games in the Zelda series. Design-wise, this depiction is an amalgamation of his appearances in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Ganon Black: Based on Ganon's appearance in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, with a white circular marking on his chest resembling the wound he received when he survived being executed by the.

Ganon Blue: Based on Ganon's in-game sprites from The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons, The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages, and The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures.

Ganon Green: Based on Ganon's appearance in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

Ganon Red: Based on Ganon's in-game sprite from The Legend of Zelda when he becomes stunned long enough for Link to fire a Silver Arrow to kill him in one shot.

Z-Secret Costume: Phantom Ganon: Based on Phantom Ganon, a ghostly doppelgänger of Ganondorf fought by Link in the Forest Temple in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. R-Secret Costume: Warrior Ganondorf: Based on Ganondorf's appearance in Hyrule Warriors.

Trivia

 * Oddly, prior to Version 3.6, whenever the player selected Ganondorf with the red or blue Ocarina of Time costumes, the stock icons would be reversed. (The blue costume would use the red stock icon and vice versa.) A similar issue also happened with Meta Knight's Dark and Concept Art costumes.
 * The purple Ocarina of Time costume will occasionally show a blue underside of its cape during certain animations.