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GC

North America

Super Smash Bros. Melee

by Ed Shih - October 11, 2001, 4:14 am EDT

At last week's Gamer's Summit, I finally got to try out the 1 player mode...and I got to play around with Kirby and the Ice Climbers. Life is good.

Having experienced plenty of multiplayer action at E3, I made it a point to get in some good time with the single player part of SSBM. There are 4 modes of play for a solo game, Adventure, Event, Stadium, and one other unnamed mode (?????). Unfortunately, though, only 1 mode, Adventure, was available at the Gamer’s Summit. The gameplay in Adventure mode consists of side-scrolling platform action mixed with boss battles that takes place in a fixed arena. The Gamer’s Summit version begins in the Mushroom Kingdom where the player must battle through Goombas, Koopas, and Koopa Paratroopers to reach a mid-level battle with several Yoshis. From there, it’s more battling through Goombas, Koopas, and Paratroopers until the end of the level, appropriately marked by a flagpole. After passing the flagpole, the action switches to the Peach’s Castle where Mario and Princess Peach await, marking the end of the Mushroom Kingdom level.

Next up in Adventure mode is DK’s Jungle which is a simple one-on-one battle with DK on his home turf. Unlike the Mushroom Kingdom, there’s no lead up to this battle. The Underground Maze follows DK’s Jungle. In this Zelda-themed level, the player must fight through Zombies and Octorocks to reach 5 Boss Rooms scattered throughout the large level where Link, clothed in various colored outfits, awaits. This level presented the biggest challenge for me, as you have a set time limit to find all the Boss Rooms. Once you know where to go, though, the level becomes a lot more manageable.

The final level of the Adventure mode in the Gamer’s Summit demo takes place on the Planet Zebes where the player battles, who else, Samus Aran. Like the DK’s Jungle level, there is no lead up to the battle. However, once Samus is defeated, in typical Metroid fashion, a self-destruct sequence begins and the player must escape using a series of vertical platforms.

That pretty much sums up the Adventure mode. On the whole, it played pretty well. The side scrolling elements help pad the boss battles giving you something more to do compared to the single player mode of the original. The various enemies of the side scrolling areas aren’t too tough to beat but in groups can pose a threat and wear you down to make the boss battles tougher. It’s also cool to travel through the themed worlds, if only to relive fond memories of classic Nintendo games. I’m looking forward to seeing what the other side scrolling levels are like, particularly the Kirby one. (Note: I’m assuming that there are more Adventure mode levels, one for each main character, but can’t confirm this for sure.)

Speaking of Kirby, I was glad to see him playable. He plays close to the same although he has picked up a mallet attack along with a slight change to his smash attack. Another character, or rather 2 characters, that I was happy to see playable are the Ice Climbers. They’re pretty tricky to use, but I can see how they could be a deadly duo. You mainly have control of Bobo (the boy Ice Climber) while Nana (the girl, obviously) follows you around and sort of mimics you. This usually means you have the duo fighting together, but if you move around correctly, you can attack 2 opponents at once. A different, cool tactic that I was able to pull off involved positioning Nana and Bobo back-to-back so they could attack in opposite directions. Of course, should you lose Nana, things get a bit tougher. Not only are your attack abilities decreased, the duo’s double-jump move requires both Nana and Bobo; no Nana, no double-jump. Although, I never really learned how to use the 2 effectively at all times, the Ice Climbers look to be a very interesting new addition to the Smash Brothers line up.

On the whole, Super Smash Brothers Melee is shaping up quite nicely. The multiplayer mode is as good as ever and the single player experience is definitely improved. Add a good selection of secret characters and a trophy mode where you can spend your tokens you’ve collected and you’ve got even more replay value. All in all, SSBM is likely to be one hell of a game...as if you couldn’t have guessed that before.

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GC

Game Profile

Genre Fighting
Developer HAL Laboratory
Players1 - 4

Worldwide Releases

na: Super Smash Bros. Melee
Release Dec 02, 2001
PublisherNintendo
RatingTeen
jpn: Dairantou Smash Brothers DX
Release Nov 21, 2001
PublisherNintendo
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