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Wednesday, August 13, 2014

Reminder: Don't Hate On Meta Knight!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - For a certain developer team's mistakes.

Well. Meta Knight is confirmed to return in Super Smash Bros. 4. No one should be surprised. Ever since appearing in Kirby's Adventure, Meta Knight has been a mainstay of the Kirby series and one of Masahiro Sakurai's darlings.

Sakurai post of the day Miiverse Meta Knight returns Halberd
Masahiro Sakurai brings Meta Knight back into Super Smash Bros. 4!

I've always liked him too.

Meta Knight Miiverse drawing
This was basically my first attempt at actually drawing something on Miiverse... and thankfully, one of my last.

I just have only one problem with Meta Knight: He was broken in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Overpowered. Way too good. Back when he was first announced in the DOJO!! nearly seven years ago (of course he was in the announcement trailer too), I never thought he would be this broken. In fact, in a discussion with a friend one time before the game was launched, I believe I actually said the words, "Meta Knight will never be top tier." After all, he would be the fast-moving but weak attacks archetype. He wouldn't be able to KO you and he'd be a light-weight! Rubbish! You know who was also fast, weak, and light? Pichu.

I probably should've kept that story to myself, since no one besides me and that friend (and he'll never read this or repeat that story to anyone else since he's probably forgotten about it by now) knew about it. So what did I not know at the time?

I didn't know that Meta Knight could recover from anywhere on the stage. I didn't know that his moves would have extremely high priority — they cancel the moves of his opponents and then proceed to hit the opponent. I did not know that he would have spammable moves like Mach Tornado that turn him into a whirling ball of priority that some characters cannot hit through and instantly lose. I didn't know he actually WOULD have kill moves, however unorthodox they are (Shuttle Loop, the second hit of his Down-Smash, his glide attack.)

Super Smash Bros. Brawl Meta Knight Shuttle Loop
Shuttle Loop in Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

Meta Knight Shuttle Loop Super Smash Bros. For Wii U
The "changed quite a bit" Shuttle Loop in Super Smash Bros. 4.

It resulted in Meta Knight having no negative match-ups. In other words, he was good against every character. It got to the point where he was banned from tournaments. (Not permanently, though.) Every Brawl player played Meta Knight. And this wasn't just a competitive problem, either. Meta Knight was designed as an easy-to-play character, meaning that in the casual sphere, he was still broken. Casual players had unwritten/unspoken rules not to pick Meta Knight!

All of this resulted in people hating on Meta Knight. But why? He's so cool. He gets his own victory theme, unlike anyone else in Brawl.


More importantly, he's cool in his own games. Of utmost coolness, he gets his own playable speedrun modes like in Kirby Nightmare in Dreamland and Kirby Super Star Ultra. He's also playable (and also broken) in Kirby Air Ride in the modes that do not matter.

Meta Knight skyrocketed to popularity in Meta Knight's Revenge, a sub-game in Kirby Super Star. He had his own faction of warriors, along with the Battleship Halberd. Those two things were the basis for his and his minions' appearances in my famous fan-fiction, Events of Star World. The whole Halberd crew was there, including the break-out star the Captain of the Halberd (also known as Captain Vul). As a result, I'm the biggest Captain Vul fan you'll see. My AIM avatar is Captain Vul!

Captain Vul keychain Kirby Triple Deluxe cameo collectible
Vul's latest appearance in a videogame, as a keychain in Kirby Triple Deluxe. Image courtesy of KoopaTV friend MarioSun90.

Meta Knights Smash Run Captain Vul trophy Super Smash Bros. 3DS Miiverse
Looking back at this request over three years later, nothing that I wanted happened.

Captain Vul is also my skin (that I made) on the Planet Koopa forum. You can see he features in the Planet Koopa Advertisement Video I wrote about here. Meta Knight is an amazing fellow for putting up with Vul's antics, and Meta Knight is also amazing in his own right.

He's one of those quiet, competent, sexy warriors. Here's our Meta Knight file footage:

Meta Knight whip Kirby anime
I personally know people who have let themselves loose upon seeing this picture.

Whether he's taunting people to fight him, throwing candy at you, employing Reaganesque policies of wanting the denizens of Dream Land to stop being lazy welfare queens, or speaking in a seductive Mexican accent, Meta Knight is spectacular to have around in any game. Just because he's a symbol of how Super Smash Bros. Brawl is imperfect does not mean that Meta Knight himself is a villain. Well, he technically is, but... you know what I mean!

Blame Sakurai instead! ...If you dare.

Here's to hoping Meta Knight is balanced along with the rest of the cast this time.


Ludwig did not actually play any iteration of Kirby Super Star before writing Events of Star World, but he became a Meta Knight fan as a result of writing that story. You can currently read it at deviantART or download it as a Word document if you're a Planet Koopa member.


KoopaTV guest poster RockSoap loves Meta Knight too!
People judge Little Mac by his Super Smash Bros. appearance, as well. As a joke.
Bayonetta is getting the Meta Knight treatment, but worse, since she's also the star of her own franchise.

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