British English
Within the video game community, British English is a term used to refer to the region of Europe, Asia (minus Japan), Africa, most of South America, and Australia. The term comes from the analog television encoding system Phase Alternate Line, the primary method of encoding analog TV for these parts of the world.
British English is most commonly used as shorthand for "the European version of a game". Historically, Europe is usually the third and final region for games made in Japan to be released, as games have to be translated into several languages, a process that takes both more time and more space than the American English region. In addition, due to cultural differences, the English translation cannot always be simply copied from the American version of the game. As a result, British English releases are often the final version of the game, with all known bugs fixed and possibly significant changes added.
Summary of British English releases of the Super Smash Bros. series
Super Smash Bros.
The original Super Smash Bros.'s British English release is not notably different than its American English version, retaining all its changes while slightly buffing or nerfing a few characters. British English systems only run at 50 hertz as opposed to 60 hertz on American English systems (it can be changed between 50 hertz and 60 hertz by holding the B button during the boot-up of the game though). Despite this, the game has been optimized to run at the same speed as the American English versions. There are two separate British English releases; an Australian and a European release. The European version has language options for French and German, and Link's stats differ between the two British English versions.
Super Smash Bros. Melee
The British English version of Melee used the American English 1.2 version as its base, but then added balancing changes to several characters, resulting in dramatic metagame differences between the two regions. For example, Falco's down aerial can no longer spike opponents during the late hit, and so is harder to use effectively. Fox, Sheik, and Marth have also been nerfed in notable ways.
It should be noted that many of the British English version's attributes—such as Falco's down aerial and the semi-spike being removed from the entirety of Link's Spin Attack—are used in all versions of Brawl. As a result, it appears that the developers used the British English version of Melee as the base when developing Brawl.
Super Smash Bros. Brawl
In order for cross-region online play to be possible, most of the differences between versions of Brawl are purely aesthetic, though they are still encoded differently. However, Masterpieces are slightly different in the British English version, running at 50 hertz as opposed to the American English version's 60 hertz, thus making them slightly slower.
Super Smash Bros. 4 / Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Neither version of Smash 4, nor Ultimate, use analog connections; as such, the gameplay is identical in both the British English and American English versions of these games, again accommodating for cross-region multiplayer. However, the British English version of Smash 4 uses a variety of different names for characters, moves, and items, most notably Duck Hunt Duo, Mii Sword Fighters, Housewarming Party, Duck Jump Duo, and (in both SSB4 and Ultimate) the Football. Some names and voices are also changed on the Spanish and French languages between both regions. In addition, both Wii Fit Trainers have different voices in the British English versions, and completely different translations are used for incidental text such as trophy descriptions. Masterpieces, however, are now identical to the American English version, running at 60 hertz. As the Nintendo Switch is region free, Ultimate essentially only has one version, with all of its regional differences built into the cartridge.
