The Morality of Smash Bros

With the release of Smash Bros Ultimate imminent, Nintendo have decided to do a cross-celebration with Splatoon, with a Splatfest being held next weekend between those who main heroes and villains. But what if you’re not sure what side you come down on based on your favourite characters? Here is a guide to the morality of the Smash roster, to provide some clarity.

Mario

He is the archetypal hero, ready to jump in and help those in need wherever necessary. We’ll forgive the turtle-stomping and the mushroom addiction, and the fact that he once taunted a baby monkey with his caged father. Then there is that whole criminal record thing after the incident in Delfino Plaza, although some may argue he was framed. But apart from all of that, he’s a good guy. Allegedly.

Donkey Kong

Donkey Kong is an ape, and the animal kingdom does not have the concept of good and evil. Some may argue he was a villain in the old DK games (let’s not go into the Kong lineage argument here), but what if he was just a confused animal in an unfamiliar environment who lashed out in a way incomprehensible to us humans? But is he also not a hero in the DK Country games? Well, depends on who you ask, because his quest mainly revolves around hoarding all the bananas of the jungle for himself, and quite frankly, if you’re part of the 1% you can never truly be good.

Link / Young Link / Toon Link

Link’s a pretty good guy. He’s usually defined as “The Hero of X” in each of his games so I’d say this is pretty clear-cut. You’re good to go.

Samus / Zero Suit Samus

Sure, saving the universe from deadly parasites is pretty heroic, but her job is “bounty hunter”, which can go either way. We haven’t seen her full CV so we don’t know if her record is one of stopping dangerous criminals, or taking money to round up dissidents of a corrupt government. More information is required.

Dark Samus

Okay, this one’s clear. When you’re a creature made from a material that only causes pain and corruption to everything it touches, it’s pretty hard to argue you’re heroic.

Yoshi

Currently awaiting trial for tax fraud, Yoshi is very much on the villain side. If you exist within a society, you must contribute to its upkeep, which includes paying your fair share. Rot in jail, Yoshi.

Kirby

Kirby is a precious ball of joy who smiles gleefully as he swallows you whole and absorbs your essence. Definitely a hero.

Fox

The leader of the Star Fox team seems like a good guy all round. He cares for his teammates, they seem to take on jobs designed to stop oppression and misery, and he never makes obnoxious noises like the real foxes on my street like to do at 2am. What a nice guy.

Falco

Falco is the dick of the Star Fox team, who does what he wants and will straight up walk off in a strop if he’s in a bad mood. Not cool. Possibly not evil though.

Pokémon Trainer

Here’s a five-hour debate on the ethics of enslaving small creatures in tiny balls and forcing them to fight each other.

Pikachu / Jigglypuff / Pichu / Lucario / Greninja / Incineroar

Pokémon are only as good or bad as the person who trains them. If you’re a plucky, never-aging child, then your Pokémon will probably be nice and want to make friends with the other small animals they’ve electrocuted and beaten in your name. But if you’re a member of Team Rocket then your Pokémon will be more malicious and/or the best character in the anime. Dat’s right!

Mewtwo

But what about Mewtwo? Well, if we’re going by The First Movie, then Mewtwo’s a bit of an evil guy, creating an army of clones and made them fight their originals. But is he truly a bad guy? Or is Dr Frankenstein the true monster? Yes, he pitted Pokémon and trainers against each other, but not until they set aside their differences did he see the true power they all share inside. He came to learn that the circumstances of one’s birth are irrelevant; it’s what you do with the gift of life that determines who you are.

Luigi

Luigi’s a pretty nice guy. He does his best despite his obvious anxiety issues and has a side business cleaning up old stately homes that’s good honest work. A true working class hero.

Ness

He’s a small boy who regularly calls his mother before destroying an unknowable Eldritch horror, so I’m going to put him down as a good guy.

Lucas

He’s a small boy who regularly calls his mot….oh. Oh. I’m so sorry.

Captain Falcon

See the argument for Samus, except with less of the whole “saving the universe from parasites” thing. Falcon’s also more villainous because his career is probably contributing to climate change, unless more environmentally-friendly racecars have been developed in the future.

Peach

Ostensibly a good person, I guess. Sadly, we don’t know how benevolent a ruler she is, and for all we know she probably oppresses the people of the Mushroom Kingdom while living her life of luxury. The jury is out (and by that I mean a parliamentary committee is discussing it).

Daisy

She’s the fun princess. 10/10 would hang out with Daisy over Peach any day. Hero.

Bowser

A giant angry dinosaur wearing spikes from a Hot Topic is pretty evil. Or misunderstood. But mostly evil.

Ice Climbers

They’re just mountain climbers. They exist for the thrill of climbing a mountain. Unless the mountain is sentient and planning to murder the surrounding villages, their ability to conquer it will do nothing to the morality of the world around them.

Zelda

I mean, she has her own Legend, that’s usually the domain of heroes right there.

Sheik

Zelda, a scarf and some binding don’t allow you to enter the contest a second time. Just for that, you’re going in the villain column.

Dr Mario

Getting a fake online doctorate as a cover for your opiates racket is as villainous as it comes, Mario.

Marth

*reads Fire Emblem wiki to learn anything he can about Marth* He…is a nice pacifist boy…who leads his people to war anyway? I guess? I don’t know, hero probably.

Chrom / Lucina / Robin

Chrom and Lucina seem like good people so they’re heroes. Robin doesn’t join in with Chrom’s Dungeons and Dragons game, so he’s more on the villains side.

Roy

*checks Fire Emblem wiki again* He’s our boy, I guess?

Ike

He fights for his friends, and makes sure people are prepared. What a nice bloke. Hero.

Corrin

The male Corrin is just Liquid Snake cosplaying as a dragon, and I don’t know how to feel about that.

Ganondorf

I mean, he’s called the Great King of Evil, so you tell me. I mean, he could be misunderstood, but he straight up murdered a sage for no reason once, so it’s hard to justify that.

Mr Game & Watch

An original Greenhouse Game & Watch is £175 on eBay?! God, that’s evil

Meta Knight / King Dedede

Meta Knight is a Kirby cousin going through That Teenage Phase, and Dedede is a jovial penguin who sometimes does naughty things but always apologises. Their morality is incredibly fluid.

Pit / Palutena

Pit’s merely Palutena’s representative, so his morality is defined by her orders. She seems good, I guess, but it’s only a matter of time before she abuses her power and orders Pit to commit genocide. One to keep an eye on.

Dark Pit

This is just Pit going through That Teenage Phase, so we’ll let that pass.

Wario

He’s gross, greedy and has no regard to the highway code when riding his motorcycle so this seems pretty clear-cut. However, his video game company has yet to employ microtransactions and lootboxes, so relative to the likes of EA and Activision, he’s a pretty good guy.

Snake

Snake’s no hero. Never was, never will be. He’s just a soldier. There are no heroes and villains in war, just killing. (This goes on for four hours in a Codec screen)

Diddy Kong

He probably stole that hat off a tourist, the monster.

Sonic

He’s a good guy who likes to free animals from torture. But the state of his series has been downright criminal for about 15 years, and that’s truly villainous.

Olimar

Olimar serves the corporate machine, forcing the indigenous people to do his bidding, including forcing them to die for him, simply so he can harvest the planet’s resources for money. What a bastard.

R.O.B.

As the anthology series Black Mirror has taught us, technology is only as moral as the people who use it. R.O.B. has no concept of good or evil. It operates off pure logic. It experiences no emotion. It could kill you in a heartbeat and would feel nothing when it did so. But right now, it seems fine.

Wolf

He never specifies why he can’t let us do that, but it’s clearly Wolf doesn’t respect other people’s agency to make their own choices, so he’s definitely not a good guy.

Villager

Yes, the meme about Villager’s fixed smile making him look like a serial killer when he’s holding an axe. Haha very funny. But Villager is a truly tragic character, trapped into servitude by a cruel raccoon who will keep him in debt until death. He’s a hero in my eyes for enduring this torture.

Mega Man

He’s a robot built to kill, but unlike R.O.B. is highly sentient and can feel emotion. But will this sentience give him the morality to protect us from the Robot Masters, or will he tire of this servitude and rise up and enslave us all?

Wii Fit Trainer

The morality of the Wii Fit Trainer entirely depends on how you feel about exercise. If you’re hangover and she’s making you do the tree pose, then sure, she’s evil. But she merely cares about your wellbeing and wants you to have good posture. Keep your bottom tucked in!

Rosalina

She is neutral. She is the mistress of a universe much greater than all of us. It cares not for our morality, and so neither does she.

Little Mac

He’s a boxer. He’s neutral. He has beaten up Mike Tyson though, and that guy’s a dick, so that’s pretty heroic.

Mii Fighters

If you’re making a Mii of Hitler, then straight to the villains column for you.

Pac-Man

Pac-Man exists only to feed. He desires only to consume all. He must be stopped.

Shulk

Shulk likes to go around yelling about how he’s “really feeling it” and has “got a good rhythm going” and quite frankly anyone who thinks that behaviour is acceptable is totally a villain.

Bowser Jr

A child is merely the product of his upbringing, and his terrible evil behaviour is down to his father. Perhaps he can be reformed through proper intervention from social services, but until then he’s a villain.

Duck Hunt

That dog laughs at anyone who can’t perfectly murder innocent waterfowl. How. Dare. He.

Ryu

Ryu is just a competitor in a fighting tournament. As long as everything with this tournament is above board and all the paperwork has been filed, then he’s a good guy.

Ken

Ken is the American Ryu, so the same but the paperwork needs to be done in the US.

Cloud

He’s a member of a terrorist organisation, but he did stop the apocalypse. The jury is out.

Bayonetta

By the Christian definition, a witch from Inferno (aka “Hell”) who summons demons made of her own hair in order to brutally murder angels is pretty goddamn evil. Unless of course she operates in a world where the forces of heaven may not be truly the forces of good. Which she does.

Inkling

The Inklings in Smash Bros are the same as those in Splatoon, who will be participating in a Splatfest between heroes and villains. Some of these Inklings will side with the heroes, some will side with the villains. They are the true neutrals, and their battle will decide which morality is triumphant. Except for any Inkling who said pineapple on pizza is good in a recent Splatfest, as they are the true villains.

Ridley

Despite being occasionally affected by the very same space parasites he’s determined to unleash on the universe, he still wants to go ahead with his plan. Super evil, and also not very clever.

Belmont Boys

The family dutifully stop Dracula every few generations, which is nice of them. And considering how much Dracula disrespects glassware, this is a noble pursuit.

King K Rool

Anyone whose name is a terrible pun on the word cruel should be locked in the tower forever.

Isabelle

She’s a precious puppy who’s doing her best and deserves to be protected at all costs. She is truly the greatest hero of them all.

Piranha Plant

It’s a fucking plant.

So that’s every character assessed on their morality. I hope this has been enlightening for you.

Chronological Game Challenge: Super Smash Bros / Silent Hill

Hello! It’s been a while yet again, but this time around I’m not planning on posting reviews every day to catch up on where I am, and instead Wednesdays will be review time! For the time being, I’ll be posting double reviews until I get closer to where I currently am in playing games, and then revert to single updates again.

Now, with all that out the way, let’s start my first reviews of 1999!

Super Smash Bros
Publisher: Nintendo | Developer: HAL Laboratory | Year: 1999
Original System: Nintendo 64
Played on: Wii Virtual Console

Goal: Complete 1P Mode with every character, including unlockables

Actual Outcome: Completed a few characters, but didn’t have the enthusiasm to play as everyone

We all love Super Smash Bros. The idea of characters from different franchises kicking the crap out of each other to settle those age-old arguments of whether Mario or Sonic would win in a fight is an idea that dates back to childhood for many of us. The fact that now we actually can have Mario and Sonic fight, while Pac-Man and Cloud from Final Fantasy VII toss in a few additional jabs, is a dream come true for many.

But that’s Smash 4. We’re in 1999 for the challenge, so rather than the slick Wii U and 3DS companion titles, we’re going back to where all this began – a bit of semi-experimental weirdness Masahiro Sakurai tossed together between Kirby titles.

And weird is the best description for Super Smash Bros 64. When you load the game up, an intro plays showing that all the characters are toys being played with by a disembodied hand. Then we land on the menu screen, where the music is some atmospheric spookiness that makes you wonder if you picked up the terrible creepypasta edition by mistake. It’s the first sign that something’s a little off about this game.

Things get back to normal in the character select, where a jaunty tune plays while you choose between the initial eight-strong roster, featuring Mario, Donkey Kong, Link, Yoshi, Kirby, Metroid’s Samus Aran, Star Fox’s Fox McCloud and Pokémon mascot Pikachu. Then you’re thrown into the main 1P Mode where you kick Link off Hyrule Castle and continue through a series of battles.

And then the mini-games happen, where you’re suddenly dumped into an industrial nightmare realm where you must inexplicably break targets or jump onto specific platforms. Then there’s a run through a rejected Metroid room being chased by faceless abominations before you finally face off against the disembodied hand from the intro in a dark void. And when I played this when I was younger, I had no idea what was happening with any of this.

It’s clear from its presentation and weird design choices that this began life as an unrelated game before a bunch of Nintendo characters were dumped in. It’s clear that the developers weren’t sure how to expand a fighting game concept because the amount of content is rather small. It’s clear that Smash 64 is not a game that was going to age well, and surprise! It hasn’t!

Mechanically, Smash 64 is very awkward to play when you’re used to the Wii U edition. While Smash 4 is a sleek, speedy experience, Smash 64 is clunky and feels slightly laggy. It also suffers because rolling feels difficult to pull off, and air dodging is non-existent. And in a game series that tends to encourage being in the air, this lack of air dodging is alien to me now.

Graphically, things aren’t much better. Every character seems to be made from fewer polygons than their own games on the same system – compare Mario here to his model back in Super Mario 64, or Link’s model vs. Ocarina of Time – and as such the angular collection of cubes everyone turns into makes it seem like everyone’s a training dummy. Especially today, where even the 3DS Smash models are comparable to models in current Nintendo systems.

In the end, Smash 64 isn’t particularly worth playing any more. It’s clunky, it’s weird and it lacks the finesse and content of its sequels. A curiosity to see where the series began, but little more.

Silent Hill
Publisher: Konami | Developer: KCET | Year: 1999
Original System: PlayStation
Played on: PS3 (original PS1 disc)

Goal: Rescue Cheryl and escape Silent Hill

Actual Outcome: Got to the spoilery boss fight in the theme park and quit from frustration

1999 is the year of survival horror, apparently. As we move through it, you’ll be seeing a lot of different survival horror titles in a variety of different forms. And where better to start this celebration of spookiness than with the beginning of the most beloved psychological horror series of all time?

Silent Hill is, of course, Konami’s attempt at taking the Resident Evil formula out of the b-movie shlock horror, and take it to darker, more unpleasant places. While the series has suffered a number of setbacks over the years, the sequel is still held up as one of the greatest horror games ever made, but what about this first one? Is it as terrifying as ever? Or has it lost some of its effectiveness over the years?

Silent Hill has aged fairly badly graphically. The large polygons, the awkward animations, the noticeable pop-up – all of these things mean that Silent Hill is a creaky experience that doesn’t hold up on a surface level. And yet, all of this seems to add to experience in very weird ways. The low-poly monster designs make them even more incomprehensible than they probably should be, the shakiness of everything makes it look like Blair Witch style found footage, and of course, the pop-up was nicely covered up by proclaiming it to be spooky fog that envelops the town. Silent Hill is that rare game that shows its age but somehow works better for it.

It helps that the design of the game is so beautiful in how disgusting and unnerving it is. The game carries a great sense of unease throughout your time with it, from the unfathomable architecture of the locations to the puzzles of twisted logic that you have to solve. Every part of Silent Hill has great thought behind it, and it’s clear that the team weren’t merely cashing in on Resident Evil’s success. They were making their own unique beast, that takes you to the darkest reaches of the psyche, chains you down and leaves you to deal with the demons. This is not campy. This is a measured attempt to burrow into your brain and lay parasitic eggs of discomfort. And it does this to great effect.

The sound design, for instance, is some of the best in video games. A horrifying soundscape of clanging metal, sirens, detuned guitars and noises that no man should ever hear, this soundtrack isn’t the most tuneful, but it does its job a hundred times better than many other games of the era. It’s an integral part of the experience and it would so much worse without it.

So, I have high praise for Silent Hill. Of course, as a mysterious exploration game, this gets everything right. Working out the game’s moon logic is part of the joy, if you can call it that.

It’s just a shame that all of this is ripped to shreds any time combat rears its gaping maw. Jesus Christ, was the combat added at the last minute to try and justify it as a PS1 game? While Resident Evil fights are worth skipping for ammo conservation, Silent Hill’s fights are worth skipping because they’re a pain in the arse. I don’t recall a single time when I thought “I’ll stop and try and take these guys out” in normal gameplay, and when I had to fight a boss, I died a little inside.

This is why I didn’t actually finish Silent Hill. It wasn’t out of fear or an obtuse puzzle, it was because the boss at the amusement park was capable of killing me from a distance with two hits, and I could barely get a shot in, or figure out the awkward sidestep mechanic. The animations were slow and unwieldy, and while I get this was because the developers were trying to concoct a way to make you feel like a helpless everyman, it was not fun.

And then there are moments where they just throw enemy after enemy at you. The harbour is a perfect example. A narrow space where every corner seems to feature something else determined to tear your face off. It’s less horrifying and more like that scene in The Simpsons where Sideshow Bob steps on a million rakes.

It’s such a shame, because Silent Hill is so fantastic in every other way, and I wanted to love it a whole lot more than I ended up doing. The combat damages all the good of the atmosphere, the level design, the sound design and the mysterious puzzles. And that is the true horror of Silent Hill.