"A refreshing, innovative experience that's marred by a few glaring flaws."

Unless you've been living under an elephant-sized rock for the past eight years, chances are that you're very familiar with HAL Laboratories' (of Kirby fame) Super Smash Bros. series. An incredibly popular party fighter series, those not intimate with the history behind it may be surprised to discover that the original game, 1999's unexpected hit Super Smash Bros., started out as a low-budget title slated for a Japan-only release. The game received very little promotion, as Nintendo was not expecting to game to fare well (as evidenced by the aforementioned budget provided to HAL during its developmental phase).

The game was released in Japan on January 21st, selling nearly 2 million copies. After witnessing the unexpected success of the game in the Land of the Rising Sun, Nintendo brought the game over to North America a little more than three months after its original release on April 26th. Once again, the game performed well in the stores, with even more copies being purchased than in Japan.

Fans fell in love with the simple-yet-genius premise of the game – pick from one of a dozen of your beloved Nintendo mascots and beat the crap out of up to three other players. The game was praised for its shying away from the more traditional standards of fighting games by incorporating the use of items to help turn the tide of a battle, a simple control scheme that made it a very beginner-friendly game, and the lack of health bars, opting for a unique damage-percentage based counter that I will address later on.

Given the wild success of the game, it should come as no surprise that HAL Laboratories would follow up with Super Smash Bros. Melee, released a month after the debut of Nintendo's then-latest video game console, the GameCube, was a mega-hit: over 7 million copies have been sold to date, making it the best-selling game ever released for the GameCube. Almost 8 years after the release of the game, fans are eagerly awaiting the release of the third entry in the series, Super Smash Bros. Brawl. By now you may be asking yourself the following: why is this series so popular? Overlooking the fact that the game has several flaws, there's a simple answer to this question: it's generally just pure fun.

Super Smash Bros. is generally considered to be THE premier game in the party-fighter sub-genre, to which games such as the Power Stone series belong. As I mentioned previously, the game introduced a myriad of features and concepts never before seen in the gaming world. Ignoring the obvious fact that this is the very first fighting game to contain characters from classic Nintendo series, such as Super Mario, Pokemon, The Legend of Zelda, and several other franchises, Super Smash Bros. (herein referred to as "SSB") introduced a brand new way of playing a fighter. Rather than pummeling your opponent with several special attacks and super moves until their health bar is depleted, you try to get rid of your opponent – literally. You're attempting to knock your opponent out – of the arena, that is. The idea is to make your opponent accumulate enough damage (as indicated by their damage-percentage meter) so that when you hit them with a strong enough attack, they are sent flying into the sky, left unable to return back to the stage.

To aid you in accomplishing this goal, each character has a lengthy, unique moveset: a plethora of standing and aerial attacks are available by pressing the A button and tilting the Control Stick in a certain direction. A unique feature is that every character also has a set of "smash attacks": these attacks are more powerful than your standard attacks and are generally used not to build up your opponent's damage meter, but to knock them out of the arena. These attacks are performed by "smashing" (i.e., tapping) the Control Stick in whichever direction you desire and pressing the A button simultaneously. Each character also possesses an arsenal of special attacks (three to be exact), performed by use of the B button and the Control Stick. These moves are generally the signature moves of each character, as well as moves derived from the character's game or series; Mario's B attack is his famous fireball, while Link can use his trusty bombs by pressing Down + B.

You may have noticed that not much effort is required to perform these moves; a simple press of a button and (an optional) flick of the Control Stick is all that is required. One of the biggest draws for casual and beginners players is the control scheme, which is ideal for pick-up-and-play gaming. Instead of spending hours practicing complex button combinations required to perform special moves, you can just pick up a controller and begin smashing. However, to appeal to the more hardcore fans of the series, the seemingly-simple mechanics of the game, such as shielding and recovery, are actually quite complicated (as you'll discover while playing). In the end, the learning curve is small, but you will need to spend quite a bit of time playing if you wish to master it.

While playing through the game's single-player mode, you may find yourself wondering, "Why are these characters battling one another?" The answer is…well, no one actually knows. Beating the story mode offers a bit of a glimpse into this subject by revealing that the characters are really just toys in some bored child's toy box, but there is no concrete explanation. While this may be a point of criticism for others, the story (or lack thereof) matters not to me, as that's not the focus of the game. This game is meant to provide a fun experience and nothing else, which you can get by playing through the previously-referenced story mode or the VS. mode (the real draw of the game).

The 1P mode is quite honestly the weakest point of the game; it's as if the developers were working on the VS. mode and were getting ready to release the game when they remembered that a 1P mode was pretty much a requisite for any fighting game. You can choose from eight characters (12, if you've unlocked everyone): Mario, Link, Samus Aran, Donkey Kong, Fox McCloud, Pikachu, Kirby, and Yoshi; Jigglypuff, Captain Falcon, Ness, and Luigi become available completing certain goals. After making your selection, you then engage in a series of fights, leading to a penultimate battle with the game's boss, a disembodied hand known only as "Master Hand". The problem with the single-player game is that it's largely static; aside from the few times you gain an ally, everything about it is fixed. The order in which you fight characters remains the same through each playthrough, making this a very predictable (and boring after the first three times) experience.

As I've mentioned earlier in this review, the VS. mode is the greatest offering from the game. Up to four players may battle on one of eight stages, one from or inspired by each franchise represented in the game. The stages bring a touch of platforming to the game: levels generally contain multiple levels and sections which can only be reached through jumping and careful maneuvering. Each of the stages are unique and range in size from small (Peach's Castle, for example) to extremely large (Sector Z and Hyrule Castle). For those who don't have many opportunities to play with others, worry not: the multiplayer game gives you the option of playing with any combination of human or computer-controlled players, although the former provides a much richer and enjoyable experience.

Almost every aspect of a match can be adjusted; you can change how often you want items to appear, as well as if a certain item should be spawned. Items can turn the tide of a battle in a second and are considered by traditionalists to be "cheap", so the option to turn off all items is also available. You can participate in either a free-for-all, in which the last person standing is the winner, or a team battle, which follows the same concept of a free-for-all, except with the victory being shared by a teammate. You can also choose the type of battle you desire: a timed match, in which the person with the most kills when time runs out wins; or a stock match, in which each player has a limited number of lives.

The graphics leave much to be desired – characters are rough and jagged and the hit effects look as if they were made in MS Paint. Donkey Kong looks more like a brown blob than the fierce ape we've come to know him as. Granted, this is a Nintendo 64 game (N64 games are infamous for having jagged, blurry graphics due to the hardware), considering how late into the system's lifetime it was released, HAL could've done far much more in this department. The graphics are not "poor" by any means, but they're not exactly pleasing to look at, particularly on a larger television. This is completely understandable, however: as I said in the opening paragraph, the developers weren't exactly working with the greatest budget in the world and this game wasn't expected to do so well, so it seemed a bit pointless (from a business perspective) to put so much into a game that probably wasn't going to do much in terms of profits for the company.

The sounds department is a bit of a mixed bag: the sound effects produced when you deliver a blow resemble pathetically cheap-sounding clangs more so than anything else. However, the music is top-notch: as you duke it out on each stage, you will take a trip down memory lane. Mario's famous overworld song, the blaring trumpets and horns of the classic Legend of Zelda theme, and even the title theme music of Pokemon Yellow are all available in the game. For the older players, this little blast of nostalgia is very much welcome and only makes for a more pleasing time.

SSB's multiplayer mode is addictively fun, giving it nigh-infinite replay value. There are quite a few secrets contained within the game: aside from the secret characters mentioned earlier, there's a secret stage and certain options and mode that can't be accessed until they are unlocked. Unfortunately, most of these unlockables can only be discovered after completing various goals in the single-player game, which means that whether you like it or not, you're probably going to have to play the 1P mode at least four times. Due to the staleness of the single-player game, this ends up being more a chore than something enjoyable, but it is well worth it. While the single player mode isn't exactly something you'll be clamoring to play after unlocking everything, you will definitely never tire of the VS. mode.

Super Smash Bros., while far from being the greatest game ever or even the greatest game released for the Nintendo 64, is a good game in its own right. After spending a bit of time playing it, you'll understand why this game has spun off into an incredibly successful series. The refreshing gameplay, the unique features that can't be found in other fighters, and being able to pit your favorite Nintendo characters against each other make this game a must-play. While Melee outclasses this game in virtually every aspect, this is still a classic that every Nintendo 64 owner should have as part of his/her library.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/11/07, Updated 07/12/07