Smash Advent Calendar - Day 30 - Fox

Day 30 is the ever popular Fox, of the "Star Fox" series. This guy is incredibly popular, appearing in every Smash Bros. game so far and being played by tons of top competitive players in each game, particularly Melee. Every game has seen him change appearance drastically as he starred in new games but it seems like his softer, rounder look has stuck for good as he looks almost identical to his Brawl form now.

Fox is quite an original character in terms of his playstyle. Before Smash Bros, he had never really stepped out of his ship in any playable role, bar an unlockable transport mode in the multiplayer mode in "Lylat Wars". Because of this, much of his moveset is completely original. He is incredibly fast, for one, and fights like a true martial arts expert with his normal attacks, throwing out flips, trips and kicks all over the place.

His special moves are varied; Side+B and Up+B are quite strange, one being an instantaneous ninja-style attack and the other being a flying kick engulfed in flames. It's hard to see where these came from but they're just part of Fox by this point. His other specials make a little more sense, Neutral+B being a laser blaster and Down+B sees him flick out a reflective shield - both attacks look very futuristic so suit Fox well. In fact, all of these moves seem to really suit the character well, demonstrating Sakurai's ability to formulate original movesets with only a vague base.

This train had no chance in a race against Fox.

Fox started well in his Smash Bros career, being one of the strongest contenders in the N64 original. His speed was well matched with strong attacks across the board and fast aerial attacks that can be Z-Cancelled to great effect. These contribute to an aerial game unrivaled when SHFF'd - that's "short hop fast fall". This carried over to Melee in a big way, with new techniques developing such as "waveshining". This essentially allowed Fox to Use his Down+B to perform a very quick attack, wavedash out of it and follow up into a combo. This technique is common is high level play and played a good part in making Fox as good as he is.

In Brawl, Fox lost out a fair bit. Given that Brawl is a slower and floatier game engine overall, a lot of Fox's raw and intimidating speed and extreme gravity faded away. Still, he retained a decent speed compared to a fair amount of the cast and his aerials were still quick and packed a punch. His blaster was also just as lethal in Brawl as it was in Melee, sacrificing stopping power for a terrific amount of its per second. His smashes also stayed fairly strong, in particular his up smash which comes out without much delay. Obviously, he lost advanced techniques in the game transition, but I find that they were fairly broken anyway - a controversial opinion but I like games to play as designed, not mutated through glitches.

Fox does have some flaws. Though helpful is some situations, his heavy gravity leaves him incredibly susceptible to combos and juggles, and when large chains and KO combos are involved, Fox ends up at a loss. He can't stop approaching enemies with his projectile and he has to rely on a few attacks to KO in Brawl, making him a bit predictable.

Overall, I think Fox is one of the most loved characters in Smash Bros. history and it's easy to see why that is. He is a fun and interesting character with a lot of personality to him. So much of Melee's rich and interesting gameplay mechanics were discovered or made use of through Fox and that has secured him a place in many gamers hearts.

What do you think of Fox? Prefer his obscene mechanics in Melee? Or the solid gameplay with no gimmicks in Brawl? Let me know in the comments below or over on the facebook page.