Three years later, the final balance update for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is out, bringing the last significant changes to the 82-character roster. After two Fighters Pass expansions with 12 new characters, Ultimate received a surprising amount of support in the last three years. Tons of balance changes have come and gone throughout that time, ranging from things like quality of life improvements for all players, to significant changes to characters in positive and negative ways. Most of the balance changes applied to Ultimate were well-received, outside of a few characters who were nerfed a bit too hard, and the latest patch doesn't really change that notion.
The last balance update for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Version 13.0.1, doesn't make any particularly wide-sweeping changes to the game. However, a few characters in the competitive meta did see some surprisingly significant adjustments, like the nerfs to Steve, Pyra/Mythra, and Min Min. Some serious buffs also came to Ryu and Ken, Inkling, Meta Knight, and Link as well. Overall, this patch was surprisingly comprehensive; and even though this patch was not as big as some previous updates, this final update brought an unexpected amount of adjustments.
Winners of Patch 13.0.1: DK, Link, Bowser Jr. Ryu/Ken, Piranha Plant
Update 13.0.1 benefitted several characters that the many members of the competitive community would consider low-tier. While some of the adjustments were a bit questionable, a majority of the noteworthy buffs made a lot of sense for the characters in question, who saw big improvements to their kits.
Donkey Kong in particular was one character that saw few but significant buffs to the character's moveset, improving down tilt hitstun, increased super armor on Giant Punch, and a safer jab combo. Link similarly saw miniscule but impactful buffs, with a faster jab combo, a closer launch angle with better combo/string potential, and a stronger up smash attack. Meta Knight saw significant buffs thanks to just a few strength and knockback adjustments to his forward air, back air, and up throw attacks. Ike and Ice Climbers also saw similarly few adjustments that could be huge, like Ike's jab, up smash, and side special, as well as Ice Climbers' dash attack and down smash.
In terms of significant overhauls for characters, quite a few low-tier characters saw some much-needed improvements. Bowser Jr.'s hitboxes had their consistency improved for moves like dash attack and down tilt, while moves like up smash and side special have greater strength and knockback. Ryu's moveset in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate saw some powerful improvements, like a faster side tilt (strong version) attack, slightly stronger fireballs at all strengths, and reduced endlag for side special (Tatsu) as well. Inkling saw a slew of buffs to their moveset, including stronger tilt attacks, larger strong hitbox on forward smash, and greater range on neutral special as well. Piranha Plant also saw similar buffs to tilts and their down air attack, as well as less endlag on down special.
Several other characters saw very minor buffs not worth highlighting in-depth, but overall, patch 13.0.1 was very kind to several characters that did have some glaring flaws. While many of the changes aren't likely to massively shift the viability of these buffed characters, they will certainly benefit those who main them already.
Losers of Patch 13.0.1: Min Min, Pyra/Mythra, Steve
On the flip side, several very strong characters saw significant nerfs. Even though some would argue these characters didn't need them, or other characters deserved nerfs more, these changes were largely subtle but positive updates to existing high-tier characters. Min Min's overall offensive pressure was decreased via reduced shield damage from her Megawatt attacks, introducing more recovery on her neutral air attack, and reducing the active frames on her Dragon's beam side smash attack.
Pyra/Mythra had certain setups removed due to attack adjustments, like adding more recovery to Pyra's side special, and less knockback from Mythra's side smash. Minecraft's Steve multi-hit up smash had the hitstun adjusted to avoid some easy follow-ups for Steve players who manage to land the full attack. Other than that, the last major change to newer characters was to adjust the get up animations of characters to match the universal getup animation length of all characters. All of these changes round out the last major character balance update for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's roster.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Overall Competitive Balance
For Super Smash Bros. Ultimate fans, it is a bit of an unexpected patch to end the game's balance adjustment life on. Some fans would argue that a few problematic top-tier characters were still left untouched as of update 13.0.1, pointing out examples like Pikachu, Game & Watch, or R.O.B. as characters that are still the best in the game. Other fans were genuinely surprised at how many balance changes actually came with this update. However, generally speaking, any major issue with the game's competitive balance would have been raised by now. Even if there are some particularly broken characters, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is in a good state currently.
Especially compared to Super Smash Bros. For Wii U/3DS, where Bayonetta was essentially dominating the competitive meta by the end, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate has a healthy spread of characters on the roster that can perform well in tournament. Sure, there are outliers that are still hard stuck in certain tiers, but with a roster of 80ish characters, it's impressive that the game's meta has shaken out in the way that it has.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is available now on Nintendo Switch.
Source: Nintendo