Evo was a difficult weekend for the fighting game community (FGC), with big wins for domestic abusers and allegations of some extremely unsavoury behaviour too. Thankfully for the world of Super Smash Bros at least there was a chance to bounce back just a week later with arguably the biggest event since the Summit, Super Smash Con 2019, and it’s fair to say the community that rounded out the weekend at Evo showed the best it has to offer once more.
Both Melee and Ultimate were featured, and we’ll get into that soon, but there was also a plethora of other action to wrap up. Smash 64 saw EnVy’s newest signing Wizzrobe take on some legends and lose, having forfeited Melee, and Brawl, Smash 4, Super Smash Flash, Slap City and more were all prominently featured on the stream network at points over the weekend. Minor hiccups aside, it was a bit of a banger, so let’s get into what went on.
Ultimate Warrior
At the moment, there are some very interesting narratives in the modern Smash world, and MKLeo is quickly establishing himself as the Armada of the games you can’t wavedash in. having risen to the pinnacle by the time Smash 4 went the way of the dodo, he has now proven on multiple occasions that he is the best player in Smash Bros Ultimate too, winning with a variety of characters including Ike, Lucina, and most recently Joker, with predictable results for anyone who remembers Smash 4.
One of the modern plagues in fighting games, and to be honest beyond as well, is DLC, which is exciting for the casual but can introduce wildly unbalanced elements to the competitive scene. After Nintendo designed Brawl to be anti-competitive with a stupidly OP best character, and then made victory a $5.99 purchase with the release of Bayonetta in Smash 4, it seems like the Joker character from Persona 5 is the latest patch to piss off the people.
The conversations over recent weeks have all been about whether Joker should be nerfed, mainly as a result of MKLeo’s dominance, and led to the above tweet from Leffen, as well as many other top players coming out and saying it’s not the character, but the man that is too good. That may well be true, but it is slightly ironic from a Melee scene that is currently debating whether or not they should introduce rules to make beating ICs easier, or stop Puff grabbing the ledge, rather than just learn to counter those things…
Melee is back
There is no doubt MKLeo deserved his win, although there were moments along the way when it was very doubtful if he’d make the final, including a heartbreaking loss for Japanese sensation Zackray. Eventually the best came through though, and the same was true in Melee, which returned with a bang after Evo decided to cut it for some developer cash…sorry, reasons beyond their control.
In the oldest surviving fighting game, it was the god-slayer Leffen who ruled supreme, raising the TSM banner high above the venue and his arms in the air at the conclusion of his dominant win over Liquid’s Hungrybox. The world number one has been off-colour since the unsavoury incident that saw objects thrown at him from the crowd in the wake of a win over Mango at Pound 2019, and he was unable to stand in the way of Leffen’s technical onslaught, losing 3-0 in winners finals and by the same score in set one of Grands.
The victory was made more impressive by the fact he also made a run in Ultimate, taking out one of the all-time Brawl legends Salem before losing to TSM team-mate Tweek, and marks one of the strongest weekends in competitive Smash history. With the event also being held up as a triumph for the scene, it’s safe to say Smash is in good health, and Melee is back thanks to one Fox main with the perfect gamer genes.
