Weight
- Not to be confused with falling speed or gravity.
Weight is a measure of how far a character can be knocked back by an attack, if all other factors (such as damage) are constant. Weight is the main factor in the amount of knockback a character receives, although it is not the only one - gravity also has a small part.
Overview
Weight's main purpose is the determination of how difficult it it to send a character flying. In this sense, it is usually considered an advantage for a character to be heavy, as knockback is the main metric of winning games. In addition, as many throws are slower to execute on heavier targets, heavier characters have more time to properly react to throws and DI correctly. Because the animation continues moving at its weight-affected speed once the target is let go, this can also affect the practicality of throw combos; Mr. Game & Watch's down throw-to-down smash combo is much easier to escape for heavier characters, while the Ice Climbers's infinite chaingrabs are more difficult to perfom on heavyweights.
Being a lighter character has its advantages, though. Weight-sensitive platforms such as those of Mushroom Kingdom and Rainbow Cruise fall slower with less weight on board, making them safer to use for lighter characters. Many combos are less effective on lighter characters, with their higher received knockback making it easier to escape - two notorious examples are Fox's waveshine combos in Melee and King Dedede's chaingrabs in Brawl, with characters lighter than 87 units taking enough knockback to fall down and be ineligible for the proper continuation. Finally, certain weight-based throws have hitboxes that appear for very short lengths of time, and if the target is very light, the animation may progress fast enough that the hitbox appears and vanishes in less than a frame without hitting. This makes the lightest characters take less damage from certain throws (notably, Bowser's down throw in NTSC Melee and Link's down throw in Brawl miss their pre-throw hit on Jigglypuff).
In general, heavy characters tend to have stronger attacks, larger range, worse recovery, bigger hurtboxes, higher falling speed, and slower movement, with light characters possessing weaker attacks, shorter range, better recovery, smaller hurtboxes, slower falling speed, and faster movement. However, this is a very loose correlation that many characters defy in some way - Samus is heavy but slow-falling, Wario is heavy but small and highly maneuverable, Zelda is medium-light with slow and strong attacks, and Fox is very light with very high falling speed and lackluster recovery.
Super Smash Bros. weight values
Source: [1]
These values use a different scale than the later games - heavier characters have lower numbers, representing a direct multiplier in the knockback formula. For comparison purposes, the equivalent value in the newer system is also listed.
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Super Smash Bros. Melee weight values
Following are the characters in Super Smash Bros. Melee, ranked in order of heaviest to lightest. The Metal Box multiplies a character's base weight by 3, the Super Mushroom by 8/5ths, and the Poison Mushroom by 5/8ths.
Rank | Character | Weight (NTSC) | Weight (PAL) |
---|---|---|---|
n/a | Giga Bowser | 140 | 140 |
1 | Bowser | 117 | 118 |
2 | Donkey Kong | 114 | 114 |
3 (NTSC) 4 (PAL) |
Samus | 110 | 110 |
4 (NTSC) 5 (PAL) |
Ganondorf | 109 | 109 |
5 (NTSC) 3 (PAL) |
Yoshi | 108 | 111 |
6-7 | C. Falcon | 104 | 104 |
6-7 | Link | 104 | 104 |
8-10 (NTSC) 8-9 (PAL) |
Dr. Mario | 100 | 100 |
8-10 (NTSC) 8-9 (PAL) |
Luigi | 100 | 100 |
8-10 (NTSC) 10 (PAL) |
Mario | 100 | 98 |
11 | Ness | 94 | 94 |
12-14 | Peach | 90 | 90 |
12-14 | Sheik | 90 | 90 |
12-14 | Zelda | 90 | 90 |
15 | Ice Climbers | 88 | 88 |
16 (NTSC) 16-19 (PAL) |
Marth | 87 | 85 |
17-19 (NTSC) 16-19 (PAL) |
Mewtwo | 85 | 85 |
17-19 (NTSC) 16-19 (PAL) |
Roy | 85 | 85 |
17-19 (NTSC) 16-19 (PAL) |
Young Link | 85 | 85 |
20-21 | Falco | 80 | 80 |
20-21 | Pikachu | 80 | 80 |
22 (NTSC) 23 (PAL) |
Fox | 75 | 73 |
23 (NTSC) 22 (PAL) |
Kirby | 70 | 74 |
24-25 | Jigglypuff | 60 | 60 |
24-25 | Mr. Game & Watch | 60 | 60 |
26 | Pichu | 55 | 55 |
Super Smash Bros. Brawl weight values
This is a list of characters' weights in Super Smash Bros. Brawl.
Rank | Character | Weight |
---|---|---|
1 | Bowser | 120 |
2 | Donkey Kong | 116 |
3 | Snake | 113 |
4 | King Dedede | 112 |
5 | Charizard | 110 |
6 | Ganondorf | 109 |
7 | Samus | 108 |
8-9 | Yoshi | 107 |
8-9 | Wario | 107 |
10 | R.O.B. | 106 |
11 | Ike | 105 |
12-13 | Captain Falcon | 104 |
12-13 | Link | 104 |
14 | Wolf | 102 |
15-16 | Lucario | 100 |
15-16 | Ivysaur | 100 |
17 | Mario | 98 |
18 | Luigi | 97 |
19 | Sonic | 95 |
20-22 | Ness | 94 |
20-22 | Lucas | 94 |
20-22 | Pit | 94 |
23 | Diddy Kong | 93 |
24-25 | Ice Climbers | 92 |
24-25 | Toon Link | 92 |
26 | Peach | 90 |
27 | Marth | 87 |
28-29 | Sheik | 85 |
28-29 | Zelda | 85 |
30-31 | Falco | 82 |
30-31 | Olimar | 82 |
32 | Zero Suit Samus | 81 |
33 | Fox | 80 |
34-35 | Meta Knight | 79 |
34-35 | Pikachu | 79 |
36 | Kirby | 78 |
37-38 | Mr. Game & Watch | 75 |
37-38 | Squirtle | 75 |
39 | Jigglypuff | 68 |
Notes
- According to Super Smash Bros. Melee's Blue Smash Trophy of him, Mario's mass is the standard upon which other Smash fighters are measured. While this is true in NTSC Melee (having a weight of 100), the PAL version drops Mario's weight to a slightly-below-standard 98.
- In each game, the resident enemy team all have the same weight as Mario, despite each being based off characters of different weights.
- In Brawl, Giga Bowser and Wario-Man are programmed to have weights of 400 and 130 respectively; however they cannot be knocked back, so their weight only has an effect on certain stage elements (such as Rainbow Cruise's see-saw platforms).