Oil Panic
| Oil Panic | |
|---|---|
 Oil Panic in Brawl | |
| User | Mr. Game & Watch |
| Universe | Game & Watch |
| “ | [Mr. Game and Watch] can also catch missile weapons with Oil Panic; once he's caught three, he can dump the bucket on his foes. | ” |
Oil Panic (オイルパニック) is Mr. Game & Watch's down special move. It is a unique move in that it can be held for as long as the player decides. Any energy-based projectiles (such as PK Flash or a Ray Gun shot) will be absorbed and put into the bucket. Unlike most other chargeable attacks, Oil Panic keeps its "charges" across stocks - i.e., if Mr. Game & Watch is KO'd with two units of oil, he will still have those two units when he respawns.
Using Oil Panic, three attacks can be absorbed, and then Mr. Game & Watch will automatically put the bucket away. The oil gathered can be used later as an attack with the potential for extreme damage and knockback, determined by adding up how much damage each of the projectiles absorbed would have done (2.8 times the combined damage of the absorbed attacks, capped as noted below). As such, the attack has extremely high knockback, enough to one-hit KO if it has absorbed 3 fully-charged PK Flashes or 3 other projectiles that are strong. The power of the attack when it has absorbed 3 PK Flashes is so great that when it is shielded, the recoil causes Mr. Game & Watch to fly backwards at extremely high speeds. The attack is even deadlier because it has almost no start-up lag, long reach, and a hitbox with a very long duration.
The maximum damage it can inflict is 200% in Melee and 60% in Brawl, and since Oil Panic's knockback is determined by the damage absorbed, its knockback caps at these percentages as well. In Brawl, at the moment the projectile is absorbed, there is a brief moment of invincibility.
Oil Panic cannot absorb non-energy based projectiles, such as Link's Arrows from Hero's Bow.
Kamikaze glitch
There's a glitch known as the Kamikaze glitch in Melee where if Mr. Game & Watch attacks a shielding opponent with Oil Panic after it absorbed three strong enough projectiles, such as three fully charged PK Flashes, the opponent's shield will shatter and Mr. Game & Watch will be sent flying back at extreme speeds invariably to his death unless there's a wall behind him. If Mr. Game & Watch collides into anyone along his trajectory, they will be sent vertically with extreme knockback, also resulting in OHKOs. This is the only instance in Melee where someone can be harmed by colliding with a launched opponent that was not thrown.
Bucket Braking
In Brawl, Oil Panic gained an interesting and very useful property. When Mr. Game & Watch uses an empty Oil Panic while in knockback, he will halt all momentum. As such, when used for momentum canceling, Mr. Game & Watch completely negates all momentum upon the first frame of activation. When used in conjunction with DI, Mr. Game & Watch is capable of surviving far beyond other characters of his weight class such as Squirtle and even outlasting heavier middleweights such as Mario.
Oil Panic is considered to be the best momentum cancelling special move in Brawl as it completely negates all momentum upon the first frame of activation, as well as having almost no risk of using it since it doesn't move Mr. Game & Watch back towards the stage or make him helpless unlike other special moves do that negate momentum. As such, mastering this technique is essential for competitive Mr. Game & Watch players. When used for momentum cancelling, it is often referred to as "Bucket Braking".
Note that Oil Panic will not negate any momentum at all if the bucket is full.
Origin
Oil Panic is a Game & Watch game, taking place at a gasoline station, where the player would attempt to catch drops of oil from a leaking pipe. The bucked becomes full at three drops. Once the bucket was full, the player would then have to pour the oil out the window to be caught by the assistant waiting below. If the man was not below the controlled character, the player would miss, causing the oil to splash over a customer waiting below. Oil Panic's bottom screen appears in the stage Flat Zone 2.
Trivia
- Ness and Lucas have a similar special move that absorbs energy-based projectiles, but it is used to heal themselves instead of storing them to use as an attack. These two moves, along with Oil Panic, are the only special moves that absorb projectiles.
- In both Melee and Brawl, an Oil Panic at the maximum power is the attack with the highest priority as it contains the most damaging hitbox that does not have invincibility frames, such as Counters and Final Smashes.
- Oil Panic is the only attack in the series to be an OHKO that is neither a Final Smash nor the move of a character from the Fire Emblem series.
