We return once again with the Smash franchise and its doubles.
4. Clone Characters
Clone characters have always been a strange topic throughout the series. Their purpose is to ease development time by taking an already pre-existing character, change some of their moves or properties, and change the model and animations. The first of these was in the N64 release, with Luigi’s moveset being very reminiscient of Mario’s with some differences. Over time, most clones would gain significant differences from their main counterparts to allow for different playstyles. Ganondorf’s moves would change more significantly from Captain Falcon’s, gaining his sword in Ultimate for the first time. All three Links would deviate slightly from each other, Young Link holding the playstyle of regular Link of older games and Breath of the Wild’s Link taking that name instead, with more power and important differences. Toon Link would reflect his more cartoony nature more compared to the other two links. Pichu is so radically different from Pikachu now it’s almost like Melee Pichu is forgotten. Only recently has the concept returned, with the new moniker of Echo fighters. They are denoted by the small greek letter epsilon (ε) near their fighter number, which is the same number as the fighter they are a clone of. A few important examples of echoes are Chrom, a character from the modern era of Fire Emblem, and Dark Samus, making their first playable appearance and their second smash appearance after being part of the assist trophy line back in Smash for 3DS and Wii U.
5. Master Core(Smash for 3DS and Wii U)
Master Core is a secret boss in the Classic Modes for the 4th generation of Smash games, those being the 3DS and Wii U entries. It is encountered by playing through and surviving the mode on intensities 7.0 and higher, and a new form is added every 0.5 intensity until 9.0, where the full Master Core fight is available. In this fight, it starts out with Master and Crazy Hand, until a little damage is deal to either and Master Hand begins to convulse. Crazy Hand vanishes into smoke, and the darkness that makes up each form, the Swarm, breaks out of Master hand. Using the 9.0 intensity fight, the first form is Master Giant. It towers over every character, swiping and slamming Final Destination over and over until enough damage is dealt to its head. It reverts back to Swarm and becomes Master Beast, a large dog-lion like fusion. It can tilt the stage, create lightning sparks, and bite with such force that the knockback could take a stock even at medium percent. After returning to swarm, the Master Edges form. it is a group of blades that slash and slice the player at great speed, and have a few projectiles combined with its free movement. It is the most dangerous of the forms after Master Beast, and is the transfer point from the hardest form to the easiest. The last regular form is Master Shadow, a copy of the fighter that you are playing. Once defeated, on any intensity lower than 9.0, the fight ends, but on 9.0 the final form is the greatest of the 6: Master Fortress. It is a dark labyrinth, not too dissimilar to the 3DS’s Smash Run mode. It is a linear gauntlet of enemies composed of Swarm and checkpoints with blobs of Swarm energy that must be destroyed to continue. Deep in the heart of the labyrinth is the core of the fortress, and destroying it returns the player to Final Destination, where the Swarm has departed. All that’s left is the final piece of the core, the titular Master Core. After destroying it, the level and the Classic run is over.
Considering some of the lore aspects the franchise had been subtly hinting at over the years, this fight is very important. The darkness erupting from Master Hand is comparable to some of Masahiro Sakurai’s darkest days, where he was considering concluding the series or handing it off to another director. He does develop each entry as if its the last, after all. The Giant form represents the final boss of Super Smash Bros. Brawl’s Subspace Emissary, Tabuu, and the connotations of taboos against more childish games and toys as one grows older conformed into a representation of the fear of that taboo. The Beast form could represent one of two things: Sakurai’s longing to be free from a tightened schedule of long workdays and tiredness, to be home with his pets and family, or it could be his tiredness making him snap at people that are bothering his work. Both make sense in the connotation of a dog, and the lion-like aspects could have been added for a ferocity factor. The Master Edges could represent how design considerations that were criticized cut into Sakurai’s self-esteem like a group of knives. Good examples of criticisms that would have done the most damage were how Melee was so competitively amazing and Brawl was a full departure from that, and how overpowered the DLC characters were in both Smash 4 and Ultimate. The Master Shadow could represent Sakurai’s darker thoughts, the secrets he has to keep from the fans for future plans, and thoughts of how the franchise might end concerning him. The fortress could represent everything together all at once, which is how it affects Sakurai in real life: these feelings aren’t in stages, they usually hit him all together. The last form, the spherical core, represents Sakurai at the end of development. He is calm, collected, and ready to give the game out to the world. He doesn’t struggle to add anything at the last minute, as there is no need; he is just finished.
The Master Core fight and its connotations would be one of the largest chunks of lore about the series until Ultimate’s release, so it would have to be major to last that long. It assuredly was.
Next week will be only one entry, about Ultimate’s clone bosses and final boss. It will be a long entry, detailing everything about the World of Light game mode.
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