Why NO ONE Plays: Zelda | Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

Comments · 245

• XY

  @xypherloll · 1 month ago

  title should have been: “Why NO ONE OFFLINE plays Zelda”

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• BU

  @bub-b1r · 1 month ago

  Elite Smash would beg to differ

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• EM

  @emberthefox4951 · 1 month ago

  Zelda is a prime example of why I feel that Smash 6 needs to be a reboot focused on reworking kits over adding new characters.  Zelda's only so weak because her kit was supposed to be the missing pieces to Sheik's puzzle.  Now that they're different characters and Zelda has no second half of the puzzle to lean on, she's left with a kit designed to feel incomplete that needs to be the whole picture by itself.

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• MA

  @marcaguilar9785 · 1 month ago (edited)

  Nah people play Zelda, I play Zelda, we just all drown in pools but it's fine, we out here bro.

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• PH

  @philbusiness52 · 1 month ago

  I’ve mailed Zelda for most of this game’s lifecycle. I have well over 3000 hours with the character.<br><br>You are MOSTLY correct. There is ONE VERY IMPORTANT detail you missed though. When you set up a full charge phantom and Zelda can move, she can send phantom out ANYTIME SHE WANTS. She doesn’t have to wait for the timer. This is incredibly important for a lot of scenarios and provides a ton of mixups. If i shield is she going to run up and grab? Will she send it out early if i try to move? I use this all the time.

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• DE

  @DesynchronizationXS · 1 month ago (edited)

  <b>I saw this coming.</b><br><br>She was cursed to being near the bottom of the tier list in EVERY Smash game possible since Melee. She never caught a break at all, even at her best in Ultimate.

  106

• GA

  @gameboyn64 · 1 month ago

  As a zelda main these are her issues:<br>Mediocre air acceleration with average air speed<br><br>Mediocre fall speed with terrible gravity <br><br>Mediocre weight <br><br>Relatively tall<br><br>Terrible run speed<br><br>F-tilt is slow, thin, swings high, and has a high priority sour spot<br><br>Down tilt&apos;s only chance at comboing is tight percent windows and bad di<br><br>Up smash is incredibly laggy, can&apos;t hit battlefield platforms, not a particularly wide hitbox, and is somehow too high to hit characters as tall as link standing next to her<br><br>Neutral air hits high, is one of the only multi hits in the entire game that doesn&apos;t use the auto link hitbox dispite using one in smash 4, it launches away which can mean behind her sometimes, and it&apos;s not particularly safe on shield <br><br>Fair is almost never safe on shield, the sour spot is almost never safe on hit, and when used out of a rising short hop it is in lag till zelda hits the ground where it still doesn&apos;t even auto cancel<br><br>Up air is like ivysaur&apos;s if it was 2 frames slower, about half the size, and really high up on an already tall character so it covers little space around zelda herself and has little to no chance hitting a grounded opponent. It also leaves her completely exposed when trying to hit someone on a platform. It&apos;s also difficult to catch aerial opponents with good air mobility due to its high startup and limited horizontal range<br><br>Nayru&apos;s love is laggyer than hell making it highly punishable and difficult to use effectively in the counter projectile game<br><br>Din&apos;s fire has a minimum 44 frame start up, can&apos;t even realistically kill unless used close to max length, isn&apos;t particularly maneuverable, and even has a sour spot<br><br>Farore&apos;s wind doesn&apos;t use fixed knockback so it can fail at high and low percent, it has a sour spot so it can be inconsistent, it&apos;s prone to missing due to di or hurtbox shifting, the aerial version launches diagonally for a bizarre reason<br><br>Phantom is extremely committal and has a bizarre point blank blind spot, it&apos;s ability to tank incoming hits is inconsistent, it becomes easier to play around the more practice you have against it, it crumble when zelda gets hit making it less effective against opponent with the ability to hit at range or rush in quick

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• KR

  @krdjmtc · 1 month ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3FHePI3gfo&amp;t=138">2:18</a> &nbsp;My brother would call Zelda’s back air the “force kick”

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• FE

  @FeatherWeightFighter · 1 month ago (edited)

  That really is the crux of the issue. <br><br>I feel even as a character in melee the main issue was transforming wasn’t plausible to easily switch to use Zelda for a quick finisher. <br><br>As a separate entity she isn’t given anything to make up for the lack of sheik doing all the heavily lifting in movement, initiative and neutral. <br><br>I feel though her weaknesses invoking her sluggish movement and just pretty bad initiative could’ve been implemented if her specials were reworked to not leave her more vulnerable than if she were to just slowly run at you. A simple change of just making it so dins fire didn’t need to be held down and automatically locked on to the opponent before exploding at its max travel speed would solve her almost all her competitive issues and solidify her as a character designed to use zoney esc projectile tools not to deny an opponent but overwhelm them enough to give her more safety to get in with her moves alongside creative comboing and nice coverage of her vulnerable spots in her more up close tilts, smashes and ariels.<br><br>Sounds a bit nutty but a free canceling if not just throw and forget EFFECTIVE projectile is exactly what she needs to pair with her reworked phantom slash to have some of the best ledge camping AND stage pressure a character could perhaps have in the game.<br><br>She should be using her specials and in general more defensive forms of plays and tools to grant passage for her to get up close to finish with those powerful close range attacks she has always been known for in her kit in place of a speed sheik variation that was in concept intended to do it for her.<br><br>Her phantom in ultimate is exactly what she should be having in her kit, deceitful projectiles or hitboxes that make you hesitate or force guess what she’s gonna do AND WHEN with it so it distracts or takes the priority in their perception while she runs up and counter options your response to her set up.

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• FL

  @floofzykitty · 1 month ago

  Zelda&apos;s Phantom, like Din&apos;s Fire, is what you call a fake zoning tool. A tool that seems like it is for zoning, but really the character using it has no way to actually capitalise on it.<br><br>Actual offline Zeldas rarely use the Phantom because it&apos;s more of an edge guarding tool. There is always a correct response the opponent can do in neutral because Zelda is too slow to follow up on it and the Phantom attacks too soon. The move would actually be better if it stuck around for longer.

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• JO

  @JohnSmith-gi2oy · 1 month ago

  And not even to mention her CLASSICAL spike capabilities

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• RE

  @Redguard赤 · 1 month ago

  thank you for including the consistently-executed Reverse Displaced Phantom gameplay footage at the end, because genuinely that tech is a massive buff for her if you can pull it off

  1