supersmashbros
Latest
Nintendo's Switch might play GameCube games
Following years of pining after GameCube games on the Virtual Console, it looks like Nintendo fans will soon be getting their wish. According to a recent report by Eurogamer, the Nintendo Switch is rumored to be the first Nintendo console to offer GameCube games on its Virtual Console. Citing several sources within the company, the article states that Nintendo already has classic titles like Super Mario Sunshine, Luigi's Mansion and Super Smash Bros. Melee running on the Switch.
Play as Cloud in 'Super Smash Bros.' today, Bayonetta later
Final Fantasy VII's Cloud takes his Buster Sword to Super Smash Bros. today, series creator Masahiro Sakurai announced during Nintendo's final presentation dedicated to the rapid-fire fighting game. The company revealed Cloud as a Super Smash Bros. character in November, during its Nintendo Direct livestream. Cloud will be available for $6 in the 3DS and Wii U versions of the game.
Watch Nintendo's final 'Super Smash Bros.' show here
Today's the day. Nintendo's final presentation dedicated to Super Smash Bros. starts at 5PM ET (2PM PT). Nintendo generally announces updates to the game during its Nintendo Direct livestreams, but this show is dedicated to Super Smash Bros. for the Wii U and 3DS. The company's recent commitment to regular Smash Bros. updates helped it enter the modern era of gaming, as our own Aaron Souppouris argued earlier this month. Watch today's show with us below.
Nintendo's future lies in its 'Super Smash Bros.' updates
Nintendo will host the last "Direct" presentation for Super Smash Bros. (SSB) on December 15th at 5PM ET. As those that follow Directs will know, this is the third presentation dedicated solely to the brawler, alongside frequent SSB announcements through the regular Nintendo Directs. It's been a refreshing year of experimentation and additions from Nintendo; we've seen eight stages and five characters announced as DLC so far, and it's likely the final show will give us a couple more surprises. This slow but steady dripfeed of content wasn't a fresh idea -- games like Call of Duty have been doing similar things for years -- but Nintendo's adoption of the technique broke new ground for the company.
Beloved 'Super Smash Bros' mod Project M is finished
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U is a staggering game packed with imaginative characters, stages and modes, but some players still prefer older instalments in the franchise. Super Smash Bros. Melee for Gamecube is one of the most popular, especially in the competitive scene, and for years a mod known as "Project M" has been retooling the Wii version, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, to play more like its predecessor. It's been worked on for years by a community group called the Project M Development Team (PMDT), which, to many fans' dismay, has now decided to stop and move on.
Um, Cloud from 'Final Fantasy VII' is heading to Smash Bros.
You haven't accidentally stumbled into an alternate reality where Final Fantasy VII was developed by Nintendo. But, the following is still true: Cloud from Final Fantasy VII will be a playable character in Super Smash Bros. This is what we get for living in a world where the Nintendo PlayStation actually exists. Nintendo dropped the announcement right at the end of its Nintendo Direct livestream today.
'Super Smash Bros.' gets tournament modes and YouTube replays
Nintendo isn't done with the 3DS and Wii U versions of Super Smash Bros. just yet. The company has released an update today which adds tournament modes and the ability to post video replays to YouTube. Both features were teased just before E3, but we weren't expecting a slew of new character outfits and stages to go along with them. Nintendo is offering the Hyrule Castle and Peach's Castle arenas from the original Super Smash Bros. on N64, priced at $1.99 per platform or $2.99 across both. They're joined by a deluge of Mii fighter costumes, including King K. Rool from Donkey Kong, Chrom from Fire Emblem: Awakening and Lloyd Irving from Tales of Symphonia. All eight are available for $0.75 or $1.15 across both 3DS and Wii U. Alternatively, you can get everything as a bundle for $9.98 or $15.18 on both Nintendo systems. One last thing: there's a K.K. Slider Mii Fighter costume from Animal Crossing too. It's free to download and looks darn cute.
Watch the world's biggest fighting game tournament right here
This weekend over 6,000 folks from 47 countries will descend into Las Vegas to kick the (virtual) snot out of each other. That's because the 13th annual Evolution fighting game tournament, otherwise known as Evo 2015, starts today with world warriors competing across nine games including Killer Instinct, Mortal Kombat X, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and Ultra Street Fighter IV. They're battling for over $300,000 in prize money and in case you couldn't make it to Sin City for the show, we've got you covered. The competition starts at 12 pm Eastern / 9 am Pacific today and goes until the final street fighting man or woman is defeated Sunday night. As you might expect, the entire event's being broadcast via Twitch and you can park it right here on Engadget to watch the whole thing!
People love Nintendo's plastic Amiibo figures: 'nearly' 2.6 million sold
Nintendo has announced that sales of its Amiibo figures are "nearly double" that of Super Smash Bros. game sales on the Wii U. (Nintendo sold 1.3 million copies of the title in the tail end of 2014, and so math tells us that figure sales float around the 2.6 million mark, which is pretty incredible.) Last month, Nintendo stated that figure sales were roughly equal to the game sales, meaning people apparently buying more figures now. Nintendo stated that some figures have already been discontinued, much to eBay profiteers' delight. Naturally, a little bit of rarity can help give sales a lift.
Recommended Reading: The Orion capsule's great radiation test
Recommended Reading highlights the best long-form writing on technology and more in print and on the web. Some weeks, you'll also find short reviews of books that we think are worth your time. We hope you enjoy the read. How a Spacecraft Like Orion Survives the Harsh Radiation of Orbit by Matthew Braga, Motherboard Radiation isn't a new issue facing the range of things NASA blasts into space, but it's of particular importance to study how the recently launched Orion capsule handles it. There's a lot of new tech on board the spacecraft rather than the usual proven components, so NASA needs to pay even closer attention to how the whole thing holds up in orbit. Motherboard takes a look at how it's done.
'Super Smash Bros. for Wii U': The Joystiq Review
"Who would win in a fight?" is the lighthearted crux of the Super Smash Bros. series, and it's impressive how extensive that conversation has become. Pitting beloved video game characters in unlikely rivalries seems as amusing as it did during the series' 1999 debut, especially when it involves a mix of iconic faces and left-field picks. With fresh contenders, several new competition types and a lite resemblance of Pokémon training in the form of Amiibos, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U is a meaty talking point that proves the "Who's the best?" debate is still well worth having. Smash's bouts remain layered –- newcomers can focus on throwing basic attacks by combining button presses with tilts of the joystick, learning deep-cut mastery of evasions and timing in-air knockouts as they add matches to their career. Whatever nuances your play style adopts, everyone's victory involves launching opponents from shared platforms, heaping damage on them to make banishing them to the oblivion beyond the screen's edges more feasible. Click here for the full review!
Forget quadratic equations, play 'Super Smash Bros.' on your TI-83
The geniuses that guided Rosetta's lander onto a freaking comet no doubt put their TI-83 programmable calculators to good use, but you know what the rest of us were doing with them? Yeah, playing Wolfenstein. Now you can misspend physics class with another game: Super Smash Bros. Programmer Hayleia managed to port it over to the TI-83/84, and even left the code open for anyone to modify. It has a great zoom effect to make better use of that low-res screen, though for now you've only got Fox and Falco to play with. Yes, yes, we know that there are brand new versions of Super Smash Bros. for 3DS and Wii U (soon) with over 40 playable characters each, and you should totally try those. Meanwhile, you've got something to do (while appearing productive) when your trig prof hits a new level of boredom.
Nintendo suddenly resurgent on the strength of Super Smash Bros.
Super Smash Bros. isn't just fun to play, it also gave Nintendo a fun financial quarter. For the first time in a while, the Japanese company turned a profit, 24 billion yen worth ($224 million) to be exact. That's a big (Wii) U-turn over last quarter, when it managed to lose 9.9 billion yen ($97 million). Overall, Nintendo sold 3.2 million copies of Super Smash Bros. worldwide and 1.3 million 3DS units, not bad considering that sales started late in the quarter. Plus, the game hasn't even launched yet on the Wii U, but sales of that console were also up 22 percent in anticipation of the November 21st launch. Along with upcoming Amiibo figurines, all that should set Nintendo up for a nice Christmas quarter. Despite the good news, however, overall sales are still down 12.8 percent over last year -- and Super Smash Bros. games don't come along every day.
The hardware of Super Smash Bros. for Wii U (hands-on)
When Nintendo announced the re-release of years old game controllers from the Nintendo GameCube home console, it was more than a little surprising. What's Nintendo doing re-releasing gamepads from 2001 for its still new-ish game console? And more importantly, why? It's because of crazy people like me. In case it weren't already clear, I'm a longtime fan of Nintendo's Smash Bros. franchise -- a 2D fighting game featuring a massive cross-section of Nintendo's biggest gaming franchises. Mario fights Zelda, for instance; I wrote a piece breaking down how it works and why it's such a wonderful franchise right here. So, what do GameCube controllers have to do with any of this? Simple: The GameCube version of Smash Bros. (Melee) is considered by many fans, including myself, to be the series' best work to date. Beyond the game itself, the GameCube controller was heralded as a perfect fit for the series. And that's why Nintendo's re-releasing a gamepad from over 10 years ago, as well as an adapter: so the controllers will work with the upcoming Wii U version, dubbed "Super Smash Bros. for Wii U". Still weird, but a bit more logical now, eh? I spent a few hours this morning both using the re-issued controllers and seeing how the NFC-based Amiibo figurines work on the Wii U version of Smash Bros. Let's get crazy.
Here's how Nintendo's Amiibo toys work in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U
Nintendo was dropping Smash Brothers info-bombs left and right last night, but the company also felt compelled to dive a little deeper into how the Wii U version of the game will play with those curious little Amiibos. You know, the Nintendo character-themed figurines that both look adorable and store game information via NFC? Now, thanks to the marketing wizards in Redmond, we've got a four-minute chronicle of young love, combat and tiny figures that explains just about everything. Key takeaways? You're not actually playing as your Amiibo character -- instead, the little avatar springs to life as a support character, getting in people's faces and generally having a grand ol' time once you tap the figure to your Wii U's gamepad.
'Super Smash Bros. for Wii U' adds an eight-player mode for double the madness
Think you know everything there is to about Super Smash Bros for Wii U? Think again: during today's Smash-centric Nintendo Direct event, the gaming giant announced an eight-player mode for absolutely bananas action. How will you even keep track of all that madness on the Wii U? We're willing to find out. There are sure to be some more announcements from the broadcast, and we've embedded the video just after the break. Update: Remember the create-a-stage feature from Super Smash Bros. Brawl? Well it's back in the Wii U version and it's gotten a pretty big upgrade thanks to the console's touchscreen-based Gamepad. You can now draw out your custom levels using the stylus (sorta like Mario Maker) and even share them online with others. Pretty neat!
Let's look at each game console's lineup of exclusives for holiday 2014
Can you smell that? It's the aroma of game lovers' tears everywhere as they realize their bank accounts likely can't sustain buying every title coming out in the annual deluge of fall video game releases. That's to say nothing of the amount of time you'd need to play absolutely everything that's come out since September. Or even on November 18th alone! But what is each console offering exclusively this holiday? That's a bit more manageable, and we compare them below.
'Super Smash Bros.' coming to Wii U on November 21st
The launch of a new Super Smash Bros. game for the first time in six years on 3DS was great news, but it left us wondering: when the heck is it coming to Wii U? Luckily, Nintendo has quickly answered that question. It'll arrive to the big console on November 21st in North America for $59.99, and in the UK on December 5th for £39.99 (see the new game trailer below). Being Nintendo, there's more, of course. You'll be able to pick up a set of 12 Amiibo figures for $12.99 (with six more coming by December) and even use a GameCube to control your Wii U too, thanks to a $19.99 adapter. In fact, if you want the whole shebang -- GameCube, Super Smash Bros. and the adapter -- Nintendo's also offering the complete bundle for $100.
When 'Super Smash Bros.' hits Wii U, you'll be able to control it with a 3DS
If you need another method of controlling Super Smash Bros whenever it actually releases for Wii U, Nintendo apparently has you covered. Spotted by a Japanese gamer on Twitter and IGN (the handheld version is already out in the East), the 3DS version offers the option to connect the portable to Nintendo's HD console to exchange customized characters. What's more, there's a menu saying that you "can use it as a controller," too -- perfect for any future couch-based tournaments, we'd imagine. Granted, you'll almost assuredly have to own the game on both platforms for this to happen, but what Nintendo fan wouldn't anyway? We've reached out to Nintendo for confirmation on the matter and will update this post should we hear back.
Here are Nintendo's new 'Super Smash Bros.' Amiibo toys for Wii U
Toy-based gaming is not only alive and well, but it's also expanding to more franchises. This time it's Nintendo's turn: Following in the footsteps of games like Skylanders and Disney Infinity, Nintendo announced the Amiibo, which are plastic figurines that you scan into your Wii U by holding them on the GamePad. As soon as the toy is scanned, its corresponding character -- Mario is a primary example -- appears in the game with its own unique score, experience points and skills. The point of doing this is so you can either partner with or fight against these virtual characters. Additionally, the more the Amiibo fights, the better it will become. The toys, which were shown off for the first time at E3, will initially be available for (and compatible with) Super Smash Bros. this holiday season, but more games will be compatible later on, such as Mario Kart 8 and Mario Party 10.
