Super Smash Brothers

Summary

Genre: Fighter
Number of players: 1-4
Rumble Pak: Yes
Controller Pak: No
Expansion Pak: Not used


Ever since the sickly sweet Yoshi's Story I've wanted to give Yoshi a right belting, and now, thanks to SSB, this is finally possible! Yes, your favourite Nintendo characters are here to beat each other into submission, in a battle to the bloody death. Well, actually, until your character falls down a large cliff. Not quite as satisfying, granted, but this IS Nintendo remember.

Gameplay: Smash Brothers is actually a very fun game to play, despite this lack of gore and satisfying carnage, however, and although there are certainly a VERY limited amount of moves your character can make, you can never grow tired of it. Well, you can in single player, as with most fighting games, but this game really takes off in multiplayer mode.

The characters all have unique moves, which is of course a very good thing, but where SSB starts to falter is its major lack of moves that each character can pull off. It really does get very repetitive using the same few decent moves that each character gets over and over again. This is a real shame, because other than this, the game is very very good, and is the best beat em up on the Nintendo 64 to date.

Challenge: The game has many differing difficulties, ranging from very easy to very hard. Not too complex a system, as I'm sure most will agree. As with many Nintendo games, you could just about forget about the first two difficulties from the off - even if this is your first go, you'll still find it waaaaay too easy to be fun.

Normal difficulty setting shouldn't pose too difficult a challenge either. Well, not for a skilled player anyway, but Mav did have a bit of trouble at this skill setting. The other two skill settings should prove a bit of a challenge, but lets face it, you don't generally buy a fighter to play by yourself. In fact, if SSB didn't have a multiplayer mode, you could expect the score below (which you've already checked, I'm sure) to be significantly lower. But it does, so we're happy.

Graphics: Graphically, SSB is ok. Nothing spectacular. They do the job, but not much more. The characters themselves are ok, and when you look at them close up (which you can do in training mode) you can see that a fair bit of effort has gone into them, but in general gameplay you don't really notice.

Sounds: Soundwise the game is very good. The nine arenas all have their own themes in the background, and all the characters make their own unique shrieks of pain or grunts in exertion.

Multiplayer: Up to four of you can play against each other, 1 vs 3, 2 vs 2 or a free for all. This is absolutely top fun. Not only does the game never slow down, but there really is never a dull moment. The arenas are all very small, so it is impossible to get away from your opponents no matter how hard you try!

Summing up: In short, this game is well worth getting. You'll be up all night on the multiplayer mode, and while the single player game does wear a bit thin after a while, you'll find it very difficult to grow tired of smashing Pikachu into the dirt!!!


Gamesmark: 83%


Reviewer: Tangycheese