Unlocking new characters in any iteration of Super Smash Bros. has always taken some time, but with Smash Bros. Ultimate's massive roster, gamers could potentially spend hours if not days trying to access the full list of all 74 fighters. While the World of Light story mode has had players excited since its reveal, it's a slow way to go about unlocking characters. Here's how to unlock every fighter more quickly.
This technique requires playing Classic Mode. As with former Super Smash Bros. games, successfully completing a run through Classic Mode will reward the player with a new fighter encounter at the end. For this reason, it's a good idea to keep the difficulty turned down to where the player can easily beat all enemies, assuming that unlocking the full roster fast is the main goal. This will prevent players from either being slowed down by losing a match or potentially running out of gold and tickets to continue from where they lost. Each character's Classic Mode has unique bosses, so be prepared for higher difficulty near the end.
It's worth noting that if the player loses their fight against the new challenger, that doesn't mean that all hope is lost. Challengers will periodically reappear to be fought, and can be accessed by going to the main menu, selecting Games & More, and then clicking on a small door in the bottom right of the screen. If a challenger the player lost to previously is available for a rematch, the door will appear; if there aren't any rematches currently available, try again later. Unlike prior versions of Smash Bros., this means that players won't have to do another run through Classic Mode just to try and beat the same challenger again, which shaves a considerable amount of time off unlocking new characters.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate has managed to keep the hype train rolling all the way up to its release, with the surprise announcement of Persona 5's Joker being added as a DLC fighter. Although the game is now officially available, with four mystery DLC characters still being kept a secret, there's bound to be more pleasant surprises for fans of the franchise in the near future.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is out now exclusively for the Nintendo Switch.