Earlier this year at E3, Nintendo wasted no time in getting fans excited for Super Smash Bros Ultimate by revealing a brand new addition to the massive roster. The Metroid villain Ridley, a character that director Masahiro Sakurai previously admitted wasn't possible due to his size, is actually a playable fighter in this latest iteration. While that should make his legion of fans excited, Ridley isn't available right off the bat, forcing players to first unlock him before he's available for use.
Like every other character in Super Smash Bros Ultimate, players have three different ways to unlock the high ranking space pirate. Use this guide to unlock the Metroid villain, Ridley.
Classic Mode
Since the game launched earlier this month, fans have discovered a particular pattern for unlocking new characters through Super Smash Bros Ultimate's Classic Mode. Unlike King K. Rool, who's unlocked for finishing the mode for the first time using Link, Ridley can be challenged by beating it with Yoshi after the sixth clear.
Beating this mode with any of the original Smash Bros characters unlocks a particular, preset character. In this case, players can use Yoshi or any character previously unlocked from his path. This includes Lucario, Marth, Ryu, Ganondorf, or Lucina.
World of Light
Alternatively, players can also come across him within the game's single player story campaign, World of Light. Each character can be found in different parts of the map and can be unlocked by finishing certain matches. For Ridley, players will need to head to Dracula's Castle in the Dark World. Once there, they'll need to defeat The Creature & Flea Man spirit before the final encounter.
Keep in mind that World of Light features a sprawling map and is much more time-consuming than other parts of the game. While it's possible to unlock new characters by playing this mode, it's certainly not the most efficient way to do so for players who want to quickly build out their roster.
Random Challenger
Super Smash Bros Ultimate also gives players a chance to unlock new fighters after playing Vs Matches after for a set amount of time. Initially, the order of characters that appear seemed random, but after some digging by the Smash Bros subreddit, it was discovered that this order is also predetermined. If no other characters were unlocked through Classic Mode or World of Light, Ridley appears as the 25th challenger. However, for each character unlocked, the game jumps to the next character that has not yet been unlocked in the list.
Whichever path the player chooses, the journey will be a long one as there are 74 characters to unlock in total. However, savvy players have found a way to unlock new fighters mush quicker than Nintendo has likely intended. By exiting the game after unlocking a new fighter and restarting it, the 10-minute cooldown timer is essentially removed and triggers a new challenger much faster than normal.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is out now exclusively for the Nintendo Switch.