Super Smash Bros.: Melee (GameCube)

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Description

The sequel to HAL Laboratory's Super Smash Bros., which pitted Nintendo characters against each other, ups the ante by including more levels, more characters, and more game modes.

The game is a Nintendo fighting game with different rules to it. Instead of knocking your opponent's health down, you knock him or her out of the battle field. You choose from the wealth of Nintendo characters like Mario, Bowser, Yoshi, different Pokémon, and even Link and then either fight through the single-player portion, featuring modes like Classic, Adventure, and Event Mode or battle it out with your friends in a four-player frenzy. More characters and stages are unlocked as hidden objectives are met, and coins rewarded for playing in all modes can be spent on a capsule toy machine. The toys in the machine represent games from Nintendo's entire video game history, and each can be viewed in 3D with a brief description. Also, with the simplified fighting controls, it's pretty easy for even your non-gaming friends to just pick-up and play.

Playable characters come from the following games:

• Game & Watch (Mr. Game & Watch)
• Donkey Kong (Donkey Kong)
• Mario Bros. (Mario, Luigi)
• Super Mario Bros. (Princess Peach, Bowser)
• Metroid (Samus)
• The Legend of Zelda (Link)
• Ice Climber (Ice Climbers)
• Dr. Mario (Dr. Mario)
• Fire Emblem: Ankoku Ryū to Hikari no Tsurugi (Marth)
• F-Zero (Captain Falcon)
• Super Mario World (Yoshi)
• Kirby's Dream Land (Kirby)
• Star Fox (Fox, Falco)
• Earthbound (Ness)
• Pokémon Red/Blue (Pikachu, Jigglypuff, Mewtwo)
• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (Young Link, Princess Zelda/Shiek, Ganondorf)
• Pokémon Gold/Silver (Pichu)
• Fire Emblem: Fuuin no Tsurugi (Roy)

Screenshots

Promo Images

Trailer

Alternate Titles

• "大乱闘スマッシュブラザーズDX" -- Japanese spelling
• "SSB:M" -- Common name
• "Smash" -- Shortened slang title
• "대난투 스매시 브라더스 DX" -- Korean spelling
• "Dairantou Smash Brothers DX" -- Japanese title

Part of the Following Groups

• Franchise crossovers
• Game Feature: BGM/Music Player
• Game Feature: Free Camera Photo Mode
• Genre: Versus fighting
• Nintendo Player's Choice releases
• Super Smash Brothers series

User Reviews

One Of The First. Still The Best.	Guy Chapman (2001)
Incomparable	Jon Collins (28)
Crack on a 3-inch DVD	WizardX (117)	unrated
It'll last you a decade.	BigJKO (71)
I used to dream about a game like this when I was a kid. Thank you Nintendo for making it come true (again)!	WildKard (12984)
SMASH your opponents to the moon.	Da-Flea (33)
More characters, more levels, and a lot better graphics than the prequel...	Jim Fun (252)	unrated
Gaming at its finest.	Pixelspeech (1006)
A great game that I still love to play, even after almost 4 years of use!	Phillip Leffel (3)
Nintendo's BEST-EVER multi-player fighting game!	Dark Cloud (35)

Critic Reviews

IGN	Dec 03, 2001	9.6 out of 10	96
PGNx Media	May 14, 2002	9.5 out of 10	95
Gaming Target	Mar 25, 2002	9.3 out of 10	93
Game Informer Magazine	Feb, 2002	9.25 out of 10	92
Gamesmania.de	Aug 01, 2002	85 out of 100	85
N-Zone	Jul 06, 2003	84 out of 100	84
Game Revolution	Dec, 2002	B+	83
Digital Press - Classic Video Games	Sep 26, 2005	8 out of 10	80
The Age	May 30, 2002		80
The Video Game Critic	Apr 10, 2008	B	75

Forums

Topic	# Posts	Last Post
Colon (or, rather, lack thereof) in title	8	Tracy Poff (2025) Dec 13, 2015

Trivia

1001 Video Games

Super Smash Bros. Melee appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Fire Emblem

Prior to this game's release, no game in Nintendo's Fire Emblem series had ever received an official North American release, which caused some confusion among western gamers who were introduced to Marth and Roy (two Fire Emblem characters) via Super Smash Bros. Melee. Initially they were going to be exclusive to the Japanese version of the game. However, when the developers were working on the North American version, they received favorable attention, so they were kept in the Western version.

Mr. Game and Watch

Even though the secret character Mr. Game and Watch is stylized as a 2D character, he is actually a 3D model of his 2D form. The Mr. Game and Watch model is flattened and his shading is different. This can be especially noticed when he's thrown or picking up an item box.

Ness

The character Ness was going to be replaced by Lucas, the main protagonist of Mother 3. However, due to the delay of Mother 3, the developers kept Ness.

Ratings

This was Mario's very first appearance in a game with an ESRB rating higher than E (Everyone).

Snake

Apparently, Hideo Kojima, director of the Metal Gear Solid series, "begged" Nintendo to include Solid Snake as playable character in Melee. However, the game was too into development for this to happen, but Snake appears in Brawl.

Soundtrack

• There exists a re-recorded soundtrack for this game, released solely as a bonus for Nintendo Power readers. It features all of the "arranged" tracks as played in a concert. Unfortunately, the orchestra is poor, and virtually none of the renditions are as good as the ones within the game.
• The Final Destination's sound track, if you listen closely enough, has some arrangements from the original Smash Bros. theme near the end.

Trophies

A trophy from the Japanese version of the game was removed for the US release: The trophy of Tamagon, a character from the Japanese-only Famicom (NES) title, Devil World was taken out due to the use of the word "Devil" in the game's title. His description read:

Tamagon
This is the main character of a Japanese NES game never released in North America. In this quirky maze game, your goal was to work your way through a series of scrolling mazes while battling the cyclopean henchmen of a large, winged demon. Tamagon not only had to worry about the evil creatures, but also the walls, which were extremely harmful.

Demon World
Japan Only

Some of the trophies have a few oddities when examined up close. The Barrel Cannon trophy reads "2L84ME" on the bottom. The Daisy trophy also has a third eye if you zoom in and rotate until you clip through her hair on the back of her head.

In addition, two trophies were changed for the US release. Topi was changed from a Seal (as he appears in the Japanese version of Ice Climber) to the Yeti-like creature in the Amercian version. The Proximity Mine was also changed from the Perfect Dark version in the Japanese release to the Goldeneye version (which was also used in the original Super Smash Bros.) for the US release with the game title mysteriously labeled "TOP SECRET."

Awards

• 4Players
  • 2002 – #8 Best GameCube Game of the Year (Readers' Vote)
• EGM
  • February 2006 (Issue 200) - #92 on the "Greatest Games of Their Time" list
• GameSpy
  • 2001 – GameCube Fighting Game of the Year

Information also contributed by Big John WV, Bob the Stickman, colm52, Mark Ennis, Nelson340, Tiago Jaques and WizardX

Related Web Sites

• Super Smash Bros. (Nintendo's Official Site.)