Characters that Were the Least Well Implemented in Super Smash Bros.

Olimar is just a really boring character, that doesn't really show much the charm of the Pikmin franchise. So first, there is a considerable design overlap between his side special, his smash attacks, and his grab, which are all sending pikmins to people, so this isn't really a creative moveset. I think his side special would be more interesting if you could aim it to throw it in different angles. We could also get a move that allows to leave a Pikmin on a certain portion of the stage, and let it do it's attacks there. Second, while in the Pikmin franchise, you truly care about your pikmins, and don't want them to die, in Smash, you can get back your pikmins so easily, that you don't care that much if they die. I feel like getting a flower pikmin should be a much bigger reward than it currently is, so that you would really want to keep them alive for as long as possible, or maybe you could make picking up pikmin much slower. There are also problems like how technical this character is, yet you could also just spam smash attacks and call it a day. I do realize Olimar is a very hard character to implement in Smash, which is why I only consider it the third least well implemented in Smash, but we can still do better with this guy.

In my opinion, Little Mac is the worst implemented character in Smash, and here is why. First, I am ok with characters being weaker in the air and stronger on the ground (or even vice versa). I think Piranha Plant or if you go into other platform fighters, Toph in Nickelodeon All Star Brawl, are well made grounded fighters for example. The thing with Little Mac is that they made his aerials almost useless instead of just weaker than the norm, making his design way too polarizing in my opinion. Not to mention he isn't even that strong on the ground, with a poor grab game, and his ground moves, while not terrible in any means, the fact that his aerials are quite unquestionably the worst aerials in the games, while for best ground moves there is a much bigger competition, and in fact, Little Mac isn't always considered the best in every categories. When I think of amazing ground moves, I think of Roy's jab, ROB's down tilt, Snake's up tilt, and other moves before thinking about one of Little Mac's ground moves. He also has an underwhelming Neutral Special so that's nice. Not only that, but this gameplay, makes people want to flee little mac in the air to dodge all his dangerous moves, which isn't fun to watch.

So we covered how Little Mac isn't that good to use, AND isn't that fun to play against. But the worst part about all of this, is that I feel like this design is unfaithful to the design of Punch Out! You see, if I would make a grounded fighter, I would choose a character which is known for how lacking his air abilities are. Piranha Plant for example, who generally stays on one place, and can't really move to catch his prey and needs to rely on traps instead, which is how he is in Smash. Or if we ever decide to put Captain Toad in Smash, making him a ground fighter would make sense, since the whole gimmick of his gameplay is that he goes through platforming levels without the ability to jump. Punch Out however, while Little Mac doesn't jump in this game,... more

If I have to vote for the most poorly implemented franchise in Smash, it would probably be Sonic the Hedgehog. Despite being one of the biggest video game franchises of all time, the two stages we have are basically a variation of green hill, we only have a single remix of a Sonic song, Sonic has been in this game since Brawl, yet he didn't get a second rep, even though other third party franchises got this treatment, and the worst of all, Sonic is one of the worst implemented characters in Smash. So first, his gameplay completely contradicts his character. So Sonic is probably the campiest character in all of Smash. Let that sink in! The character which the whole thing is speed, is the character that creates the slowest matches in Smash. Sure you COULD play Sonic more agressively, but it is more optimal to hit the opponent, usually with a spindash, and run away to safety, and some Sonic players are probably doing it without realizing it. Not only that, but Sonic has probably the most underwhelming moveset in all of Smash. So Sonic obviously has MANY games under his belt. Many games where you could take inspiration from to create a varied and interesting moveset. Sadly, most of his moves consist of going into a ball, and most notably, his side special, and his down special, while having different properties are still very similar, and way too redundant visually. I do realize that Sonic is probably like that because he was a last minute addition for Brawl, and therefore was rushed, but why is he still like this in the other Smash games? If you turn his side special into the boost, and that it gets more powerful if you fill the boost gauge by hitting enemies, it would already make Sonic a lot better implemented. The only reason why he isn't the worst implemented character in all of Smash for me, is that at least his combos are cool looking, even though he is not a character where you often want to use them.

Now, Mii Swordsman, or Mii Swordfighter as I prefer to call him/her seems like a strange pick. Miis are made to be whoever you want, and not to represent a character that is from another video game. You might also wonder, why Mii Swordfighter instead of the others? Well, first things first, there is a good reason why most of the time Miis aren't used in tournaments: they are a bit boring. To be fair however, I don't think there was much they could have done much to improve them on that aspect, since they are supposed to be whoever you want, and unless you give them more options for a moveset, which is unrealistic due to how much time it would take to develop, you can't give each moves too much personality, or else it might be a personality you don't want for the character you want to create. However, Mii Swordsfighter's biggest problem is that where Mii Brawler does a good job at being a close range combo demon, and Mii Gunner does a good job at being a projectile zoner, Mii Swordfighter clearly should have been the one that excels at the mid range, by spacing with his sword and everything, except his special attacks makes him more of a projectile zoner than anything. In fact, he/she is considered more of a zoner than Mii Gunner, which is crazy. Overall, Mii Swordfighter should at least focus more on his/her sword than projectiles next time he/she appears in another Smash game (if there is one after Ultimate).

Palutena is a goddess. Because of that, you should FEEL power when using her or fighting her, kind of like how you feel Ganondorf's and Sephiroth's power when using or fighting against them. While some attacks do make you feel that power, like her up Smash, she overall doesn't feel that powerful, and that's despite her being a super strong character in Smash Ultimate. I think the reason of that is because in Smash 4 she was suppose to showcase custom moves, and some of those custom moves were actually a good showcase of her power, but they weren't on her base moveset... and now Ultimate got rid of custom moves, so now that power is gone. I also more or less get her archetype. Overall, Palutena just needs to feel more powerful.

Metroid is a franchise with multiple appeals, but Samus in Smash, isn't a very good representation of any of them. It's a franchise famous for speedrunning and its movement, but moving around with Samus isn't really that fun, and mostly revolve around camping with projectiles. The moves that aren't her projectile don't really feel that good to use, so you are incentivise to play this campy playstyle that doesn't really fit with the Metroid franchise in my opinion, especially the later titles which focuses a lot on action. Samus also has a variety of weapons that could make for a wilder arsenal than she currently have, since most of it is quite basic if you ask to me. Imagine if she got the speedbooster. I bet it would be interesting to implement. Overall, Samus should have an overhaul to represent more of her franchise.

So if you know me for a long time, you know I have a certain beef with the character of Daisy. I feel like in the games she is in, we insist that she is a tomboy, and that she is different from Peach, but with some exception, we tell it instead of showing it. So imagine how funny I find it that when Daisy ends up in Smash, she ends up to be not only an echo fighter of Peach, but the echo fighter with the least gameplay difference from the fighter she is based on. The only difference is a slight difference in the hurt box of her character. That being said, even though I find this funny, since it confirms my thoughts I had about Daisy, I would have been happy to see a game finally truly differentiating the two, and that Daisy truly becomes a tomboy full of energy. She should be a more agressive but less calculating Peach. There are also some things that doesn't make any sense now that Daisy is a clone of Peach, such as the fact she uses Toad, even though she has no connection to Toads, same with the turnips, and she should have a taunt where she says "Hi! I'm Daisy!", because common! Her final smash also should be different. So yeah, even though I don't care about Daisy, I wished that Smash would have been the game that made me like her.

Bayonetta isn't that bad personally. Sure her Smash attacks lack impact notably, but her combos are quite flashy, and at least in Ultimate she isn't broken anymore.

For one of Nintendo's biggest franchises, the Legend of Zelda isn't represented the best. Most of the characters are a variation of Link, with not as much changes I would have hope between each Link, Ganondorf lacks references in his moveset, and we didn't get a new rep that isn't a Link since Melee! And while Zelda herself isn't the most frustrating example of how her franchise is badly represented in Smash, I do think she is the least well implemented Zelda character of them all. At least Ganondorf is really good at selling his immense power, where as Zelda is mostly a mess. It is weird mix of moves that don't make for an interesting or coherent moveset. To make matters worse, she was considered one of the weakest characters in all the Smash games she is in, except for Ultimate, where her moveset depends too much on Phantom, which isn't the most engaging gameplay style. I just don't get what Zelda is supposed to be. The reason why I don't put her higher is because at the end of the day, Zelda is a character that doesn't do that much in her own games, so I guess it would be hard to implement that in Smash.

Why was sore in smash again? Really?

Most of the characters in this list are characters from games I know about, since it's easier to judge a character when you played the game they came from. However, I did decide to look at other people's opinion on Smash characters from franchise I don't know about, and overall, the characters from games I didn't play don't have that much complains overall, and seem to be well designed. However, I will say Robin do look like he/she needs to reworked a little bit. So I kind of admire Robin's concept. He/she plays like no other Fire Emblem characters, and his/her design was made to represent aspect of the Fire Emblem franchise like ressource management. However, I don't feel like Robin represents ressource management in the Fire Emblem franchise as ideally as he/she could have. Ideally, Robin should have been a character where the goal is to use their tomes and electric sword at the ideal moment. In practice however, while the way the tomes are handle is generally well done, since it's just a matter of using or not using special attacks, if you have the electric sword equipped, you are forced to use it for Robin's smash attacks and most notably, aerials, and you can't save it at another moment later in the match. Personally, I would take out nosferatu, since this is not a very useful attack in Robin's kit, and replace it with the ability to switch from electric sword, to bronze sword. There are also some little issues like how you need magic to recover, which isn't the best design decision. If we need to cut Fire Emblem characters in the next Smash game, I do think we should keep Robin, but perhaps it would be best to give him/her a rework.

So, honestly, Diddy Kong is far from the worst implemented character in Smash. However, I will say that he is a bit boring. Something that Smash tends to do with animalistic character like those from the Donkey Kong franchise is to make them closer to the animal they are based on, and perhaps this is why. Diddy Kong feels a bit too close to a real monkey, and this makes him not as expressive as he could have been. He is still expressive enough with some of his taunts, and the explosion of his peanut gun, but he is a bit too basic. I feel like Diddy should be a faster, wilder, but frailer Donkey Kong, but that's not really what I feel like with Diddy Kong in Smash. Most of those things are nitpick, but I still feel like Diddy Kong deserves a more expressive moveset.

As someone who thinks Pac Man is the most well integrated character from Smash 4, I disagree with his inclusion on this list.