Its The Same Now It Sucks / Super Smash Bros.

Super Smash Bros., as a long runner, has accumulated a wealth of content throughout its existence. However, large swathes of that content have garnered complaints for remaining relatively static in contrast to the things that have changed around them both within the Smash series and in the various source materials.

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Characters — Movesets

In Smash's early days,^note Smash 64, Melee, and - to a lesser extent - Brawl movesets tended to be a lot more basic, with normal moves just being standard melee attacks while more varied and "wacky" options like projectiles, reflectors, recoveries, and Summon to Hand weapons were reserved for special moves. Newer fighters,^note Smash 4 and on by contrast, tend to be designed with more of an eye towards moves from and nods to their home series, with the aforementioned "wacky" moves often being normal moves on the newer characters. This often results in the older fighters being derided for their movesets compared to newer ones for having shallower portrayals that downplay their signature elements and abilities, being perceived as vanilla, outdated, and/or unfaithful by contrast. In general, Sakurai and the various development teams usually keep older fighters' movesets almost unchanged from when they were introduced presumably to avoid alienating people who enjoy those characters; this works out fine for some fighters,^note Such as Captain Falcon and the Star Fox fighters, who have become fan-favorite fighters in spite of not drawing from their home games much - and perhaps because there wasn't much to work with for a fighting game anyway but for others it can cause the Grandfather Clause to show its ugly side, with characters having disliked movesets for decades while newer characters get to be Truer to the Text of their home franchises, with mechanics exclusive to them while the older characters lacked them, and things that made them more complete.

• Mario has traditionally been a basic Jack of All Stats Shotoclone with simple melee moves like punches, kicks, and headbutts. While this does result in Mario functioning like an obligatory "beginner's character" as standard in most fighting games, it also results in him feeling less like Mario and more like a standard brawler with only a few token Mario-relevant things tacked on via his specials ^note a fireball based on the Fire Flower from across the series, his cape based on the Cape Feather from Super Mario World, F.L.U.D.D. from Super Mario Sunshine, and the Super Jump Punch, which resembles the jump from the first Super Mario Bros. and a minority of his normal attacks. ^note his jab combo is based on the signature punch-punch-kick, his down smash is based on the "breakdance" kick, and his back throw is based on how he throws Bowser, all derived from Super Mario 64. Another source of complaints is Mario's Final Smash, which ever since Brawl has been a generic fire-based Kamehame Hadoken. Given that Mario is Nintendo's flagship character and has a wealth of games to his name, it's incredibly easy to find complaints about his moves and conceptual reworks to make more nods to his franchise; his rather basic Final Smash, due to the mechanic's nature as a flashy finishing move, attracts these comments very frequently, with several people suggesting the highly-marketed Tyrannosaurus rex Capture from Odyssey due to Cappy being little more than a cameo throughout Ultimate. Tellingly, when a fanmade trailer for an 8-bit rendition of Mario as a separate fighter from his existing Smash version became popular in late 2020, many people commented that his moves, which incorporated several Mario powerups in unique ways, were more interesting than the actual Mario's moveset.
• While Donkey Kong has incorporated a few moves from his home series, like the roll as his dash attack or the Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs from Donkey Kong Jungle Beat as a Final Smash, and some moves from Smash later made it to his actual games, the majority of DK's moveset consists of generic punches, kicks, and slaps. Typically his Headbutt and Spinning Kong moves get the most flak, since they're more likely to seen as baseless and uninteresting moves which could be replaced with something that better represents Donkey Kong's franchise and traits, such as his penchant for throwing barrels, the usage of barrel cannons to travel (which are a recurring mechanic in Smash and were even an item in Melee), or his Coconut Shooter. Spinning Kong is also one of the worst recovery moves, as Donkey Kong barely even gets height from using it. The fan project Super Smash Bros. Crusade attempts to address this as of its 0.9.5 update by replacing Spinning Kong with a Barrel Cannon launch and replacing his Headbutt with a Barrel Toss.
• Link, in spite of getting a few changes in Ultimate, has garnered criticism for not being changed enough, as he has not one, but two clones who use all the same equipment as him (a sword, shield, Bow, Boomerang, and Bombs) in spite of the Zelda series being known for its varied arrays of items and gear. It's regularly suggested that his Breath of the Wild-centric rework should've been taken further (such as using different unique melee weapons like clubs and spears, Sheikah Slate powers like Stasis and Cryonis and Champion abilities like Revali's Gale and Urbosa's Fury), rather than having his BotW content amount to an outfit change, Remote Bombs in place of his impact bombs, and the ability to use two arrows with the Bow. Some have even suggested that "Champion/Wild Link" should have been a separate character from the "classic" Link (such as giving Link a full rework while keeping Young Link, who would no longer be a Moveset Clone, the same as he was in Melee, or changing both Link and Young Link while reintroducing Twilight Princess Link or even Ocarina of Time Adult Link to retain the moveset as it was shown in earlier installments), so that both those who wanted a Breath of the Wild-centric revamp and people who wanted to keep the classic tools would be satisfied.
• Samus in Smash has traditionally been a slow, floaty, melee-based fighter who occasionally camps behind projectiles, when her portrayal in Metroid proper, though she does jump in a somewhat floaty, graceful manner, can be more of a Lightning Bruiser who uses her high mobility in tandem with a highly-varied projectile arsenal, which starting with Samus Returns became interspersed with quick melee attacks. Her new neutral aerial was based off one move in a certain game, but after Samus Returns, one of the more popular things that many would want for her altered moveset would be giving her the Melee Counter, at least for up tilt, and giving her something more to stand out. The floatiness was an accurate portrayal of Samus's mobility back in her first three games, but as her home franchise has gone on, she's become more agile and started to fall faster- something Smash mainly represents via Zero Suit Samus. The majority of Samus's normal attacks are kicks with the rest using her Arm Cannon to fire short-ranged explosions that are functionally melee attacks, all of which look basic and unimpressive. On the other hand, Samus only uses weapons typical of her franchise in her specials (Charge Shot, Missiles and Super Missiles, Bombs, and the Screw Attack) and her grab (Grapple Beam), and even then in ways that greatly diverge from their behaviors in the Metroid series. Her moveset design was considered acceptable at worst as late as Brawl since it kept to the 64 and Melee standards of basic melee for normals and projectiles/recoveries for specials, but later games added multiple characters^note Mega Man, Mii Gunner, and to a lesser extent Villager and Bayonetta whose movesets show that projectile or pseudo-projectile normals can work, making many feel that Samus's melee-focused Smash moveset is off-base from her home franchise's abilities when compared to them. A minority argues that Samus's clunky Smash portrayal actively harms peoples' perceptions of Metroid.
• Kirby has been derided not only for his moveset's lack of Kirby-relevant things and low use of the moves he has access to with his several Copy Abilities, but also for being a Low-Tier Letdown starting with Melee and sticking there for the better part of a decade before returning here from "Smash 4" and the buffs he later received not alleviating his weaknesses. The majority of his moves are typical kicks that could be done by anyone and with only some of them matching the Fighter ability, with the Copy Abilities that are a staple of his series only making it into his jab, dash attack, forward smash, specials, and throws. Even some of his oldest moves, the Slide Kick and Air Bullet, barely come up in Smash; the latter is frequently suggested as a change not just to give Kirby more of his signature moves, but to give him a decent projectile without needing to copy one, due to his infamous susceptibility to projectile camping, either that or the orb from his very first Copy Ability in the series, Beam. Even the Star Bullet was restricted to inhaling enemies prior to Ultimate, and that game enabled him to spit back a minority of projectiles as Star Bullets too, while inhaling projectiles can heal him but not that much, causing Kirby to maintain his weakness against most of the others. His lack of moves from Copy Abilities also limits his options, like range in most of his attacks, with only a few disjoints on some moves, no proper projectiles and a lack of options to deal with pressure and projectiles. The worst issue for Kirby are his special moves, consisting in a more poorly performing set of special moves that don't mesh well with his other moves: Hammer Flip is way too slow to catch more experienced players, being considered one of the worst special moves, Final Cutter has slow startup that makes it useless as an out-of-shield option, it doesn't cover Kirby from directly above and he takes about two seconds to land and use the projectile of the move, Inhale gives him his Copy Abilities but could use more speed and range and Kirby can lose the copy ability without a chance to regain it in its star form if he gets hit too much and Stone has noticeable lag when Kirby transforms, grabs will ignore the move and it's risky to use to fight juggles because it has a notable startup in the air. As for how it functions as a moveset, his aerials are versatile but it's hard for him to use them to his full potential due to his infamously low-to-bottom-tier air speed without much to compensate, and most his grounded attacks, while solid moves, lack good range. While he is among the lightest characters in the series, characters that are just as light as him or lighter have a lot of things to compensate, such as very high speed and great approach, but while he does have a good advantage state and combo game and fast attacks, a powerful punish game and a long-reaching recovery, he lacks the range, the disadvantage state, a good set of special moves and the air mobility to make the most of his moveset, making it hard to get anywhere with him.
• Luigi started as a clone of Mario, and even though he was decloned into a semiclone from Melee onward to become more distinct from his brother, he always kept some weird animations that are generally comedic and can't be taken seriously, and those include two of his taunts, all his victory animations, the third hit of his jab where he hits with his butt, Green Missile and his dash attack, which has a flurry of punches with a rather childish animation, originally missing the hit-box for some of the punches in Melee. Smash 4 gave him a new Final Smash with the Poltergust, which was also used in Ultimate, revamping his grab game to be based around it with Luigi's Mansion 3 about to be released, but he's still stuck with those weird animations. He also generally shares the same stats as Mario in the franchise, but in Smash, apart from being slower on the ground, the main issue with his mobility is that his air speed is terrible, the worst of the cast before Brawl and the second worst afterwards, while his air acceleration is too slow to compensate in a similiar way to Mario, who has a much better air speed than him, and considering that they have most of the same attributes, outside of jump height and traction, it doesn't make a lot of sense for him to be so much slower in mid-air. Sure, it might be for balance reasons to avoid making his combos too broken, as seen with his phenomenal air game and incredibly fast aerials, but it doesn't even match the games, unlike Kirby, who does move noticeably slower when he flies in his own games. His animations would make him a funny character, but when his awkward animations constantly get reused without meshing well with his personality, it gets old and becomes irritating over time, and that is a problem. This, combined with Luigi's overall powerful advantage state, fearsome combos, his amazing aerial attacks with high reward but with no risk and without much effort and his gimmicky Green Missile, which has RNG with its misfire mechanic, it doesn't exactly give people a positive impression of him and may have the side effect of alienating his fans. From what we know, his combos might not be the only reason why he was nerfed in Smash 4's 1.1.1 patch. Fans also would like to see some electric effects on some of his attacks with some lightning-based moves based off the Thunderhand, similiarly to how Dr. Mario has an electric effect in his forward smash instead of a fire effect.
• Jigglypuff is similar to Kirby in that it's a pink puffball who, ever since after Melee, has languished as a reputedly terrible character, for reasons including lack of speed (though on the ground rather than in the air), lack of range, light weight, and shield breaks affecting it worse than the entire rest of the roster due to it flying straight to the sky KO line and dying instantly if it happens with open air above. Infamously, not only did it get several nerfs from Brawl to 4 despite already being bad in the former game, but it received no balance changes and only a single bug fix throughout the entirety of 4's lifespan. One particular point of contention is Jigglypuff's retcon to being a Fairy-type in the Pokémon's sixth generation, which has resulted in several calls for its moveset to have more Fairy-type moves like Play Rough or Dazzling Gleam to reflect the typing change.
• With Ultimate, while the Pokémon Trainer returned with their transformation mechanic in tow (sweeping up Charizard with them) and a new transforming newcomer in Pyra & Mythra was later announced for DLC, Sheik and Zelda remain split apart, like in the 3DS game. The two of them have not fared well in Ultimate's competitive scene, even with the buffs they both received in patches, which some attribute to the both of them still using the same movesets from Melee which were designed to cover each other's weaknesses (lack of mobility and damage racking for Zelda, and lack of kill power and strong projectile options for Sheik); without the ability to transform, they just end up having to live with these major weaknesses and no way to fix them, resulting in suggestions to regroup Zelda and Sheik back into a transforming fighter, like in Melee and Brawl, since the limitation of the 3DS game is gone.
• Young Link in Ultimate coexists alongside Link and Toon Link as a trio of Links who all use the same equipment in minor variations. Because any or all of them could be changed to diversify the lineup, it's often suggested that Young Link could add some of the transformation masks into his moveset, as there aren't many shapeshifters in Smash, and the various species of Zelda could easily enable attack options for a Hylian hero that none of the three use. Young Link also shares his Final Smash, the Triforce Slash, with Toon Link; the idea of having Young Link use the masks extends here into making Young Link use his Fierce Deity Mask for his Final Smash, similarly to his specials in Hyrule Warriors.
• Ganondorf is easily the most notorious case of moveset retention throughout the Smash series. Throughout his home series, Ganondorf tends to be depicted as a Magic Knight, boasting skill with swords and tridents as well as powerful sorcery... but his portrayal throughout the Smash series is infamous for being none of that. Due to his addition to Melee being late in the game's development cycle, his moveset was cribbed almost entirely from another character with a similar body build, local Supernatural Martial Artist Captain Falcon, with Falcon's fire-element attacks swapped out for darkness effects. Since then, the only moves that Ganondorf has had outright replaced are his smash attacks (in Ultimate only), where he wields the SpaceWorld 2000 tech demo sword - something that's also divided people; some think this was enough to make Ganondorf faithful to his character, and some think Ganondorf as a whole should be overhauled entirely. Fanmade Smash projects like Project M, Super Smash Flash 2, and Super Smash Bros. Crusade tend to change a large number of moves and animations for Ganondorf in response to complaints about the official games leaving him relatively static.
• Mewtwo, similarly to Samus, has perpetually been a floaty physical fighter in Smash, despite its reputation as one of the most known Psychic-type Pokémon. It somewhat rarely actually lives up to the image of a badass psychic, as most of its moveset is devoted to Tail Slaps and dark energy, while the actual psychic powers from its brain only come up in a handful of special moves, a few telekinetic throws, and its item-holding animation.
• Dark Pit is frequently derogated for being a complete clone of Pit for every move except his Final Smash. His home game, Kid Icarus: Uprising, has all sorts of unique weapons that could be made into a different moveset, and he also brings the Dark Pit Staff as his Final Smash, which could be included in his other attacks to spice up Pit's moveset, similarly to how Chrom uses the Aether-like Soaring Slash instead of a move more akin to Roy's Blazer.
• Among Brawl veterans with minimal changes, no name will be heard more often than Sonic. Sonic’s primarily classic based moveset that continues in Ultimate, with the most contested part being the number of moves he has where he spins in his ball form. Sonic has the Spin Dash as a side special, the very similar Spin Charge as a down special, and three more Spin Dashes as a down throw, a floor attack, and a ledge attack, while he also curls into a ball for up smash, neutral special, and neutral aerial. As for the rest of Sonic's moveset, the sole changes to it since his introduction are down smash (a split kick) and dash attack (a flying kick). Masahiro Sakurai has stated that Sonic's moveset partly took inspiration from Sonic the Fighters, which, while a notable game on its own, means that Sonic represents about three games from his very long-running franchise. Fanmade Smash projects typically work off of the base the real Smash provides, but add in moves from games like Sonic Battle and the Sonic Advance Trilogy like the Sonic Eagle or the Sonic Draft to widen what Sonic shows of his series. His description of a Simple, yet Awesome inspired play style of the Classic games has generally been frowned upon by those who prefer the post-Adventure games with more dynamic moves.
• Toon Link, as the third fighter in Ultimate to use the Hylian hero's moveset (and the second one to use the Triforce Slash), has attracted complaints about redundancy like the other two. Ideas to change Toon Link usually involve giving him normal Zelda items that have yet to appear in Smash, whether from The Wind Waker (like the Grappling Hook, Deku Leaf, and Skull Hammer) or from other games (like the Fire and Ice Rods, the various Canes, the Pegasus Boots, and the Roc's Feather and Cape).

Characters — Other

• A few portrayals of characters throughout the series have garnered criticism for varying wildly from what they seem like in their home canon:
  • Mario has infamously been portrayed as a gritty and serious Perpetual Frowner since Melee. While his more serious portrayal can at least be explained with his experience in his adventures making him the veteran of the group, this is at the expense of his true personality as a character who takes on daunting adventures with enthusiasm, and the lower-pitched and raspier voice clips he got since Brawl also highlighted this. There are hints of the classic happy-go-lucky Fun Personified Nice Guy characterization of his home games, but most of them only started to come around during Ultimate.
  • Donkey Kong has had a few canon voices and a set personality for ages, but in Smash he's treated like an actual gorilla as opposed to the prime primate himself, making him utterly primal, which isn't how he's usually portrayed. His "voice" in Smash consists of realistic ape-like roars, and his boisterous and silly sides are usually constrained to a handful of animations.
    • His little buddy Diddy was also deprived of his canon voice, instead receiving chimp-like screeches that also make him animalistic, and while his animations do match his personality, his voice clips do not.
  • There are several voice clips that Yoshi uses in both his and the Mario series that he has yet to receive in Smash, still being largely stuck with his original voice set.
  • Luigi is, to some at least, a completely different character in Smash, personality-wise. His expressions mainly show him either fearful or being a goofball, and he has several weird and awkward animations that make his attacks feel like desperate reflexes instead of being deliberate and focused like Mario's, as seen with two of his taunts, all his victory animations, the butt bump in third hit of his jab, Green Missile and his dash attack, which has a flurry of childish punches with an hysterical face. "Ultimate" gave him angrier and more serious faces when charging Green Missile or using forward aerial, but that's it for his facial expressions. Sure, Luigi is known for being shy and getting easily startled, but Smash flanderized him by portraying him as an awkward coward whose attacks look desperate attempts to protect himself and don't feel deliberate, while some other sources, like his Final Smash from Brawl, the Negative Zone (which is described as the negative feelings he felt about being in Mario's shadow), his footstooling Mario in Melee and how often he's shown using his down taunt on him while he's hanging on the ledge in character trailers, or even his Congratulations screen in the original strongly hinting at some apparent desire to punch Mario in the head, make him come off as resentful of his brother, which is not true. While Luigi is known for being timid, clumsy, not very confident and a bit of a scaredy-cat with a dislike for danger, they don't make his personality, and at the same time, those traits won him the love of many fans with his several funny moments. He's also a Nice Guy like Mario, is loyal to him regardless of their fame inequality in-universe and isn't so cowardly to the point of having no spine and being unable to face his fears to protect his loved ones, nor is he so clumsy to the point that he's incompetent, making him the Lovable Coward type that many knew and loved. Smash 4 gave him a new Final Smash with the Poltergust, which was also used in Ultimate, revamping his grab game to be based around it with Luigi's Mansion 3 about to be released, but he's still stuck with those weird animations, and with such a jarring and one-dimensional personality change, combined with his overall powerful advantage state, his amazing aerial attacks with high reward but with no risk and without much effort and his gimmicky Green Missile, which has RNG with its misfire mechanic, it doesn't exactly give people a positive impression of Luigi, especially since the animations generally lack his trademark charm that made him so loved by his fans. Fans also would like to see some electric effects on some of his attacks with some lightning-based moves based off the Thunderhand, similarly to how Dr. Mario has an electric effect in his forward smash instead of a fire effect.
  • A big example of a personality change in Smash is Captain Falcon. In his home series, he is a blunt and calm bounty hunter who is also kind, only acting assertive when dealing with his enemies. In the Super Smash Bros. series, Falcon is a lot more aggressive, screaming frequently when he uses his special moves, and yells a lot in general. He may be assertively dealing with opponents in Smash after all, but some would say that personality like this would be more suitable for Samurai Goroh, Michael Chain, or Bio Rex. The fact that Captain Falcon has fire-based superpowers in Smash is also inaccurate to his character, since he was never shown to have powers in any F-Zero game before Smash. It would work better for Super Arrow, a superhero, to have powers like this.
  • Peach's personality in Smash Bros. is vastly different from her portrayal in her home series. She is normally a gentle and sweet person who cares for others, rarely getting angry (though pronounced such rare moments could be), but Smash makes her act more flirtatious and sassy, such as in her taunts and victory poses. She also has a few attacks (her back aerial, back throw, down throw, and Peach Bomber) that have her use her backside and/or hip, which, never seen isn't true to her character - save for, perhaps, her flippant behavior in the Strikers games, though most characters lose their cool far more in that game than in most others - and makes her seem a bit over-sexualized. There is also the cutscene in the Subspace Emissary where, despite Snake instructing her and Zelda to stay in their room, both of them (Zelda as Sheik) still recklessly go outside anyway, even though there is a dogfight with the Halberd and Fox's Arwing. Peach would not willingly endanger herself like this.
  • There's plenty of people who were pleased to have Daisy in, but some of her fans weren't too happy with her being represented as almost identical to Peach (the only differences she has are a few animation and effect swaps; she originally had a difference in her turnips' knockback, but that was patched to be the same as Peach's in version 3.0.0). With Daisy being this similar to a girly girl like Peach, it minimizes her tomboy characterization from the Mario spinoffs, such as the sport games she's known for, with her only significant difference being her energetic personality.
  • Bowser is treated like a Godzilla expy in Smash, being depicted as incredibly bestial and only emitting roars and grunts, despite usually having varying traits throughout the Super Mario franchise, such as a boisterous attitude, a Large Ham personality, and Evil Overlord elements complete with his Evil Laugh, which is absent from these fighting games. Despite his upright and more true-to-series coloring with his redesign in 4, he still comes across as "off" when compared to Jr. and the seven Koopalings, who retain much more of the color (both figuratively and literally) and cartoony design aspects of their home series.
  • While Wario did get to show his villainous chops in Brawl's Subspace Emissary, his portrayal outside of that mode tends to be derided for depicting him as a comedic Fat Slob at the expense of his other character traits; a particular example of this is the announcement of his Smash debut (which for some was their first ever exposure to Wario), which spotlighted him crashing his motorcycle and then delivering a mushroom cloud-level fart. His farts were used in one game before Brawl, but this was just a trait and never the crux of his character. This is in contrast to both Wario Land and WarioWare,as well as the spin-offs in the Mario franchise giving him distinct personality traits like boisterousness, greed, and making him a mischievous troublemaker, sometimes going too far when he causes trouble, but also a Jerk with a Heart of Gold depending on the occasion.
  • Olimar's portrayal moreso focuses on the antics of the Pikmin rather than the character himself, and as a result, he tends to come off as an awkward buffoon and not an experienced space explorer with a job. His animations sends mixed messages on Olimar's character, as certain animations give Olimar the impression of a competent leader while others (namely his taunts and victory poses) portray him as silly. This is more egregious with Smash 4 onwards, where none of his animations changed to reflect on Olimar's developed character in Pikmin 3. It is also where Alph is introduced an alternate skin for Olimar, and due to sharing the same animations, they also are inconsistent with Alph's character as well.
  • Lucina is normally the same as the other Fire Emblem characters, but in her victory poses, if she wins against Marth or Ike, she comes off as more arrogant and cocky. She says to Marth "THIS is the Hero King?" and to Ike "And they call YOU the Radiant Hero?", It is quite out of character for Lucina to say this to two legendary swordsmen, and while she is a serious protagonist, this is jarring, especially in the Western versions.
  • Just like Bowser, King K. Rool acts more bestial and emits realistic roars, instead of retaining his Bad Boss and Evil Is Hammy traits. His Ax-Crazy personality in his home series was minimal, but Smash Bros. turns this up to eleven, mostly when K. Rool runs on all fours when dashing, and in his reveal trailer, although one might guess the character does so from being excited to finally make it in these games.
• Fans were nonplussed to see Samus with her Metroid: Other M armor again instead of switching to the more well-received armor from Metroid: Samus Returns, especially since Mario and Link got aesthetic changes from their latest adventures, Ridley is primarily based on his Super Metroid appearance, and Dark Samus represents the Metroid Prime Trilogy as a moveset clone of Samus. As Samus' Fighter Spirit uses her Samus Returns artwork and Nintendo has used her Samus Returns design as the "definitive" Samus design ever since that game's release ^note prior to its release and during most of the development of Ultimate, they used her Other M design, some fans speculated that this wasn't due to laziness or Magnum Opus Dissonance, but rather the fact that Samus Returns was introduced too late in the development cycle for Ultimate for its elements to be properly incorporated beyond music and Spirits.
• Dark Samus' move-set is also missing some attacks seen in Echoes and Corruption. The character being an Echo Fighter/clone in Ultimate, and thus, despite likewise not having thrown any form of kick or punch ^note except to start an elevator at one point notwithstanding, as this doppelganger would more or less have to copy Samus' A button attacks, Dark Samus, in those Prime games, has never used the (Morph Ball) Bombs, but did charge up and use the Boost Ball to rocket around ala Yoshi's Egg Roll or Jigglypuff's Rollout, for instance. Also, rather than the Screw Attack, Dark Samus would jump up, charge energy, and end up careening in and crashing in a strong explosion, and then pausing in a Phazon shield before resuming mobility. That her Charge Shot and Missiles could also have been made to act like they do in her boss battles could also reduce the feeling of playing as a boss that fans have enjoyed battling. Nonetheless, fans of the Prime games might be less perplexed here in that Dark Samus was made from stealing one of Samus Aran's armored suits, and it could make sense for her to use Bombs, or other attacks not seen used in her home series, like the Grapple Beam.
• While many people were elated for the Pokémon Trainer to return, some fans were disappointed that their Final Smash was mostly unchanged from Brawl, largely because it resulted in the removal of the popular Mega Charizard X from Smash 4 — one of the very few cases where a Super Mode was removed from a Final Smash. This is especially notable given that its first appearance in any Pokémon media was under Red's control in Pokémon Origins, and that keeping Charizard's Mega Evolution would have allowed for an additional Mythology Gag. However, more people give them a free pass compared to Mario's and especially Young Link's Final Smashes, since Charizard is no longer a solo character and the unchanged Triple Finish allows all three Starter Mons to be treated equally, and that it's considered a Boring, but Practical attack that is ultimately more potent than Mega Charizard X in Smash 4 and many other Final Smashes in general.
• Sonic's alternate costumes tend to be derided for almost all being varying shades of blue. While Sonic did get a white alt and his black bracelet alt was changed to have black fur in For 3DS/Wii U, that still has left him with six different costumes that all have similar colors. While there is a mandate that says that Sonic has to be blue, there could be more obvious accessories like his Riders and Rivals outfits.
• Pac-Man's alternate costumes don't get a lot of respect for being very hard to distinguish ^note five of them give Pac-Man different colors of the same accessories, one gives him slightly different accessories, and one makes his gloves and shoes plaid. Unlike similar accessory-gaining characters like Pikachu, Jigglypuff, and Sonic, Pac-Man's body color doesn't change at all, and he retains the same alts in Ultimate that he had in Smash 4. Not only does Pac not receive any self-referential costumes like other characters do, but he gets to have incredibly annoying Mirror Matches due to the changes being minimal at best.

Franchise Representation

• Final Fantasy:
  • The paltry Final Fantasy VII representation got this upon Ultimate's launch, with no new content whatsoever and the only representation being Cloud (still voiced in Japanese even with Marth and Roy receiving English voices)^note Although this is not entirely Nintendo/Bandai-Namco or Square Enix's fault as there are certain difficulties with acquiring Cloud's English voice actor Steve Burton due to his contract with Square-Enix and it's unknown if Cody Christian falls under the same category. Even if Cloud's English VA was acquired, there is still the chance that Sephiroth's English VA's might be unattainable, making their voices extremely dissonant, so even if Sephiroth's VA was attainable but Cloud's wasn't, it was better and safer to just keep them both dubbed in Japanese for consistency., his stage, his Fighter Spirits, and two music tracks. With the release of Sephiroth in late 2020, most of these complaints have been alleviated with the iconic villain bringing proper FF7 representation with him via an extra stage, more music tracks and a proper array of Spirits, though some fans are disappointed that both he and Cloud remain undubbed because no other fighters besides Min Min and Kazuya^note who each only have one voice actor worldwide speak non-English languages in the English version of the game.^note This goes hand-in-hand with the They Changed It, Now It Sucks! complaints surrounding Mewtwo's and Hero's Japanese lines being outright removed in international versions of the game, since Cloud and Sephiroth make it seem even more unnecessary and arbitrary, whereas having all four characters speak Japanese would at least seem less out of place.
  • Since Cloud was included as DLC for 3DS/Wii U, fans of the Final Fantasy franchise outside of FF7 have felt left out in the cold, seeing it as yet another symptom of Square Enix's favoritism towards FF7 over the other titles. Even with the Sephiroth update, Ultimate makes virtually no effort to represent Final Fantasy outside of FF7. No music tracks from any other game in the franchise are present, and even the spirits of franchise-spanning characters Chocobo and Moogle, Ifrit, and Shiva are still based on how they appeared in the remake. Fans of the series other than FF7 find this glaring seeing as other non-linear JRPG series such as Persona, Xenoblade Chronicles, and fellow Square Enix series Dragon Quest have representation of multiple games in their respective series. This is a sore point in particular to fans of FF1 to FF6, when the franchise was released exclusively for Nintendo consoles; while many of the post-FF6 games would later see release on the Switch, this means that the era of Final Fantasy with the greatest ties to Nintendo history is completely excluded.
• Donkey Kong: While Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Country, Donkey Kong Country 2, Donkey Kong 64, Donkey Kong Country Returns, and Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, have decent representation, Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! has close to no representation to call for, only having Dixie Kong and Kiddy Kong in their hovercraft, Ellie the Elephant, and Baron K. Roolsenstein as Spirits in Ultimate, and King K. Rool using his Propellerpack as his recovery move with no other sign of his mad scientist personality, to boot when his Blunderbuss/Pirate Cannon has him put on a captain's hat. There are no songs at all or any stages from Donkey Kong Country 3 either, which is disappointing.
• The Legend of Zelda not getting a single newcomer since Toon Link in Brawl, and by extension, the series not getting a non-Moveset Clone fighter since Zelda and Sheik in Melee. To compare, the other big names of Nintendo each received a new fighter in each new entry; Super Mario Bros. added Rosalina, Bowser Jr., & the Koopalings in Smash 4 and Daisy & Piranha Plant in Ultimate, Pokémon added Greninja in Smash 4 and Incineroar in Ultimate, and Fire Emblem added Robin, Lucina & Corrin in Smash 4 and Chrom & Byleth in Ultimate. To make matters worse, after not getting any newcomers in Smash 4, the Donkey Kong series gained King K. Rool and the Metroid series earned 2 fighters, Ridley and Dark Samus in Ultimate! And yet the Zelda series has had a good portion of its unique characters, both heroes and villains, relegated to Assist Trophies. This makes the franchise's playable representation in Smash seem very limited since all of the playable characters are incarnations of the main trio of Link, Zelda, and Ganon, all of whom have controversies of their own.^note The three Links for sharing a base moveset with minor variations, Zelda for her consistently poor moveset design, Sheik for being The Artifact while other Zelda One-Shot Characters remain Assist Trophies, and Ganondorf for remaining based on Captain Falcon with little of his magical prowess and swordsmanship. Impa and Skull Kid are two of the most popular picks for newcomers of the series, and although Skull Kid has been an Assist Trophy since Smash 4, Impa has only been a spirit in Ultimate. Many fans speculate that the lack of characters beyond incarnations of Link, Zelda, and Ganon are due to the developers' reluctance to include any One-Shot Character from the franchise on the grounds or the idea that they are only important to their games of origin and not the franchise as a whole; Sheik's presence has divided this perception between those who feel her presence disproves this as another "fan rule" and those who feel Sheik is merely a case of Early-Installment Weirdness that the developers are reluctant to repeat.
• The Kirby series often receives complaints for perceived "Sakurai Bias", or the emphasis on Kirby content from the games that Sakurai was Director and Game Designer on; Dream Land, Adventure, Super Star, and Air Ride. More than half of the music for the franchise comes from those four games, while most other games only get direct ports of their tracks, and only four remixes incorporate games he didn't lead for. ^note Boss Theme Medley, 02 Battle, Forest/Nature Area, and the Squeak Squad Theme. Additionally, all of the Kirby stages are based on games he worked on; Dream Land GB is based on Dream Land, Fountain of Dreams debuted in Adventure, and Dream Land, Green Greens, Halberd, and The Great Cave Offensive all take inspiration from various subgames of Super Star. ^note It's worth noting that according to Sakurai, Dream Land GB was originally going to be based on Super Mario Land, while The Great Cave Offensive began as a Kirby's Epic Yarn stage, but was retooled to avoid redundancy when they decided to make a stage based on the then-recently-announced Yoshi's Woolly World. This is the only Nintendo-owned franchise with such a limit to the timespan of stages chosen, as even later games of now-long abandoned franchises have gotten stage representation, such as New Pork City or Port Town Aero Dive, while Kirby is still using the year 1996 for its threshold. ^note Word of God says The Great Cave Offensive was chosen due to Super Star Ultra (2008), but the stage's graphics reflect more on the original's artstyle for most areas. Melee's Green Greens stage does however, have hints of Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards (2000) on its artstyle though. Even the selection of items and Assist Trophies that hail from the Kirby series all debuted in Sakurai's games. This is also suspected to be the reason why the series has only ever had 3 playable characters, as most of the requests for new Kirby fighters are from games Sakurai didn't design. Bandana Dee, though he debuted in Super Star, only became an Ascended Extra in Kirby's Return to Dream Land; Gooey, the Animal Friends, Adeleine, and Ribbon are all part of the Dark Matter Trilogy ^note which designer Shinichi Shimomura directed instead, for instance, before he apparently went AWOL after directing Nightmare in Dreamland; and Sakurai left HAL after Air Ride, so anyone who debuted after that game, like Daroach and the Squeaks, Magolor, Taranza, and Susie, has no involvement from him.
• Although WarioWare is a significant part of Wario's history, fans of the Wario Land series, and some fans of both series, dislike that Wario's representation has always put WarioWare first and Wario Land second, with the latter series being treated as a bit part of both Wario's character and his franchise's representation despite it being a well-received series, as well as where Wario first got his start as a playable character. It's not uncommon to see people wish that Wario had been introduced in Melee, so that the Wario Land series could've gained a foothold in Smash before it fell by the wayside. Major fan works like Project M, Super Smash Flash 2, and Super Smash Bros. Crusade generally agree with this perception, as Wario on the whole usually pulls in more Wario Land content and ends up either as a Land-centric character, or a balance between Wario Land and WarioWare. All of them rework or replace several of Wario's moves and animations to add more references to the platforming games, make his default outfit his overalls instead of his biker outfit, and have stages based on content from his platforming adventures; Project M replaces the WarioWare Inc. stage with "Wario Land" (which resembles Wario's treasure-filled castle from Wario World with a layout based on WarioWare Inc.'s elevator section), Flash 2 recreates WarioWare Inc. and adds Emerald Cave, a stage based on Palm Tree Paradise from Wario Land 4, and Crusade as of its 0.9.4 update aims to compromise both Land and Ware by having both the Bike as a side-special and shoulder bash as a forward-Smash, giving Wario a DK-like Cargo Throw, and having Rice Beach and WarioWare Inc. as stages.
• The Sonic the Hedgehog franchise is a frequent source of complaints due to an intersection of disappointing representation aspects; Sonic himself has a moveset only based on classic games, his franchise has an infamous dearth of music and still only has one remix as of Ultimate (20 songs total, 19 of them ported from Sonic's home games), his two stages have the same Green Hill Zone aesthetic in the face of a variety of available landscapes - including the likes of carnivals and even casino-themed areas, and Sonic is his franchise's only fighter while everyone else from his games has been relegated to consolation prizes (stage cameos, Trophies, Assist Trophies, Mii Costumes and Spirits). Short of the infamous minimal content that came with Final Fantasy pre-Sephiroth, Sonic's franchise is one of the third-party series most known for awful representation, but unlike Final Fantasy, Sonic the Hedgehog has had to contend with it for one game longer.
• Pac-Man is one of the few series with a fighter in Smash to receive no new content for their home franchise between 4 and Ultimate (though there are three new songs from non-Pac-Man Namco franchises); in fact, their already-small amount of content was reduced in the latter. Ultimate only has three Pac-Man songs (and 11 songs from all of Namco, only one more than Wii U), one stage (down from two, one in 3DS and one in Wii U), and five spirits (down from 15 trophies between 3DS and Wii U), all of which were also trophies.
• Kingdom Hearts, compared to other Square Enix series represented in Smash, is considered a slight improvement but still suffers from lesser versions of the same pitfalls that Final Fantasy did. While Sora is voiced in both English and Japanese, most of his voice clips are Voice Grunting and Calling Your Attacks with no longer quotes, making him come across similar to the Heroic Mime characters. There are more than 2 music tracks, but they consist of a very limited selection of songs from Kingdom Hearts, with two exceptions;^note The remix of "Fragments of Sorrow" is from Kingdom Hearts II, though the song originated from KH1, and one can obtain a swing remix of "Dearly Beloved" from an Old Save Bonus of Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory. they are also the orchestrated versions from 1.5 and 2.5 ReMIX, which is a step above Dragon Quest's music representation. Sora's alternate costumes^note which nonetheless use his KH1 face and hairstyle and the Spirits added to the game at least offer a nice selection, but the limited music selection can feel awkward for some of the Spirit battles related to characters who usually have their own leitmotif. And while the big Original Generation characters are represented in Smash (something not addressed with FF until Sephiroth's addition), anything related to Disney characters and worlds is Exiled from Continuity, causing the series' representation to feel even more limited.

Stages

• Wii U and Ultimate feature stages from the original Nintendo 64 title, which were conspicuously absent from Brawl. However, with the exception of Mushroom Kingdom (which more closely resembles the graphics of Super Mario Bros.^note and, gameplay-wise, allows the pipe above the abyss to be entered), they're straight ports, with no attempt to graphically improve them (other than a higher video resolution), making the high-definition fighters and items look out-of-place against the bare polygonal shapes and blurry textures. This is especially annoying considering the gorgeous remakes of these stages featured in Project M, including Hyrule Castle and Peach's Castle. Adding fuel to the fire, even though Ultimate gives most stages from Melee, Brawl, and 3DS updated appearances a la Mario Kart 8, the Nintendo 64 stages still look more or less the same as they did in 1999.
• A common complaint across the series is that the majority of the Super Mario-series levels are either fairly basic and non-hostile early-game levels ^note Peach's Castle 64 and Melee, Mushroom Kingdom 64 and Melee, Mushroom Kingdom II, Delfino Plaza, Mushroomy Kingdom, Figure-8 Circuit, 3D Land, Golden Plains, Mario Galaxy, Mario Circuit, the initial phase of Mushroom Kingdom U, Super Mario Maker or levels that otherwise lack standout settings. The Mario series has a whole wealth of unique locations over its decades of life, from Bowser's Castle (a highly-requested stage throughout the entire franchise, which has to date only appeared in the background of the Paper Mario stage), to Bowser's airship fleets or tank and ship armadas, to the RPG areas which haven't been touched upon like the Beanbean Kingdom or the Star-tied places like Star Hill, Star Road, Star Haven, and the Star Shrine, to spinoff locations like the other tracks of Mario Kart, boards of Mario Party, and non-standard playing fields of the sports games, to even the various unique settings of the 2D and 3D games, but Smash rarely delves into the vast majority of these areas. It's quite telling that Bowser's Castle by itself is guaranteed to appear in every well-known mod and fangame of Smash such as Project M, Flash 2, Smash Remix, and Crusade, in addition to being a very common Stage Builder subject in Ultimate, but there's still no standalone iteration of such in an official Smash game.
• Pac-Land continuing to be the sole Pac-Man stage in Ultimate as it was in Smash Wii U has garnered complaints and backlash from fans who wished that the 3DS Pac-Maze stage was chosen as his stage instead. Although Pac-Land is the game that Pac-Man's moveset is derived from, many claim that although the game was groundbreaking for the side-scrolling platformer genre, it isn't nearly as popular as the original Pac-Man arcade game which featured the iconic maze used in the 3DS stage, a setting that is seen as better fitting for Pac-Man's home stage.^note Sakurai has gone on the record saying that Pac-Land was chosen over Pac-Maze due to the technical aspect of the stage with the Power Pellets and ghosts which was supported by multiple screens across multiple consoles, which the Wii U and Switch would be unable to replicate, complicated by 8-player battles. A solution from fans is to simply mark the ghosts with player icons like the Poké Balls and Assist Trophies, or alternatively to simply do away with that mechanic altogether and keep the stage as-is. Another complaint is that the original music from the Pac-Land arcade game wasn't even used or added for its respective stage (by legal purposes from Hanna-Barbera owning the music), making the stage's inclusion feel even more pointless.

Music

• Although the music used throughout the series wasn't particularly criticized prior to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, the leadup and release of that game saw much more scrutiny of the song list, particularly in regards to what was not on it this many years into Smash's lifetime.
  • A large number of Mario games have managed to fly under the radar when it comes to music:
    • In regards to the Nintendo 64 era, Super Mario 64 has four songs (two remixes, one of Slider ported from Melee and one of the Bob-omb Battlefield theme ported from 4, as well as the original versions of those songs ported from SM64 itself), and Mario Kart 64 has one song (a remix of Luigi Raceway, recycled from Brawl). No other music from that console exists for the plumber, mainline or spinoff.
    • The GameCube era hasn't fared much better, consisting only of ports of the Delfino Plaza and Ricco Harbor themes from Super Mario Sunshine (with a remix of the former being the sole new track from that era), a port of the Rainbow Road theme from Mario Kart: Double Dash!!, a medley/remix recycled from Brawl of the title screen themes from Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour and Mario Power Tennis (named for the franchises instead of after the specific instalments, no less), and the Rogueport section of the Paper Mario Medley.
    • The entire subseries of Mario RPGs only has ten songs to its name. Paper Mario in particular, despite having been around for 18 years by the time Ultimate released, only has the Paper Mario Medley from the previous Smash (consisting of Blue Skies, White Clouds from Sticker Star, Rogueport from The Thousand-Year Door, and Battleship from Sticker Star) and a port of the Color Splash battle theme, with Sticker Star and The Thousand-Year Door not getting a single non-medley song, Color Splash only getting a fairly basic song, and Super Paper Mario and Paper Mario 64 not getting songs at all. Mario & Luigi fares a bit better, with eight songs total^note the Gritzy Desert remix from Brawl, direct ports of Tough Guy Alert! and The Grand Finale which were also ported to For Wii U, the Try, Try Again remix from 3DS/Wii U, and direct ports of Time's Running Out!, Mixed-Up Scramble, Attack and Run!, and This is Minion Turf! that are new to the series, but just like with Paper Mario, their only remixes are ports, and an entire game (Superstar Saga in this case) is shafted, resulting in an incredibly limited selection from a series that's been going on for 15 years. Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle also has no music from either the main game or the Donkey Kong Adventure DLC, and Super Mario RPG has nothing either (not even with the Geno Mii costume, in spite of the reveal for it using "Beware the Forest's Mushrooms").
  • Wario holds the dubious honor of being one of the few fighters whose series received no new music whatsoever; Wario Land, as in For Wii U, only has a port of the Stonecarving City theme from Wario Land: Shake It!, while WarioWare's ten songs are all ports from the last two Smash games.
  • There are no new songs from the original Metroid Prime Trilogy, with only one new remix ("Vs. Parasite Queen") of a song previously featured in Brawl and Wii U. Once again, there's only one song from Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (a straight port of the multiplayer song "Hunters", itself a remix of Upper Brinstar from Super Metroid) and no songs from Metroid Prime 3: Corruption among the listed tracks, which is very disappointing given that both games have very impressive soundtracks. This also means that, despite being Promoted to Playable, Dark Samus's leitmotif is completely absent from Ultimate.
  • Pokémon still has no tracks from non-mainline games and all the sourced tracks are from one game being from X & Y.
  • Sonic still has only one remix, the Angel Island Zone track that accompanied him in Brawl. His remaining music mostly consists of his home games' main themes and a few level themes. While Sonic did get ports of Lights, Camera, Action! from Mania and Fist Bump and Sunset Heights from Forces, fans have bemoaned that even his victory theme is taken directly from Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), leaving him the only character to not have a victory theme composed specifically for Smash.
  • While the Namco music in this game has gotten much love thanks to its new hits in the Galaga and Mappy Medleys plus the Dragon Spirit track, the actual Pac-Man franchise still has just the three songs it had in 3DS/Wii U, with no tunes from anything beyond the arcade titles, such as Pac-Man World or Pac-Man Championship Edition.
  • System software is still represented only by the Mii Channel and Wii Shop Channel themes and their remixes, as opposed to their DSi, 3DS, and Wii U successors, not helped by the fact that Ultimate was released shortly before the Wii Shop Channel shut down.
• The decision to continue to classify the Melee Yoshi's Island stage as a Yoshi universe stage in Ultimate (despite being based on Super Mario World) means that because of how music selection works, most of the music taken or remixed from World can't be played on it, unlike in the previous games.
• Several songs which were shortened for Smash 4 remain abridged in this game; among others, the iconic DK Rap^note which removed the Lanky Kong and Chunky Kong verses, as well as the "take it to the fridge" ending portion, Pollyanna, Brinstar (Melee), and King K. Rool / Ship Deck 2 all remain shortened. This is in spite of the level of music added in DLC going heavily against the claims of the music space being too tight, like Terry's 50 songs or Sephiroth's six-minutes-long "Advent: One-Winged Angel"; even if there was genuinely no space in the base game, Ultimate has received plenty of free post-launch updates that the original songs could've been included in.

Other

• When Snake was confirmed to be a returning veteran for Ultimate, there was hope among the Metal Gear fans that the "Snake's Codec Calls" would gain new conversations for the characters that weren't in Brawl. Sadly, that wasn't the case due to several reasons, one of them being the fact that Hideo Kojima retired the character Roy Campbell from the Metal Gear series out of respect for Takeshi Aono, his original Japanese VA, who passed away in 2012. Despite David Hayter himself being active in promoting Ultimate, Snake's performance was entirely archive footage because of this. There were also a few inconsistencies within the conversations recycled from Brawl:
  • Alph and the female Pokémon Trainer are referred to as if they're Olimar and the male Pokémon Trainer respectively.
  • Sheik and Zero Suit Samus are referred to as transformations, which was the case in Brawl but not in 3DS/Wii U onward.
  • Diddy Kong's conversation refers to an element of his moveset which was removed after Brawl.
  • Brawl is still mentioned by name in Jigglypuff's and Sonic's English-language conversations. This isn't the case in Japanese, which used the series name.
• There still isn't a character other than Yoshi with a non-standard shield (hence the spotted egg). Dark Samus having used a quick Phazon Shield that does minor damage, ^note think Powdered Toast Man's down special in All Star Brawl [1]but was not seen providing protection from attacks from above, would be just one example of different shields' potential.

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