Super Smash Bros. Melee Review

The famous fact is that Sakurai's team built this in about thirteen months, and the famous consequence is that nobody had time to sand down the physics. What survived is a movement system with wavedashing, L cancelling, edge cancels and dash dancing, none of which were designed as features, and together they form a skill ceiling deeper than most purpose built fighting games. Two decades of tournaments have never exhausted it. As a package it is also enormous for its era, with twenty six characters, a trophy collection that is a genuine museum of Nintendo history and single player modes that are more substantial than the sequels bothered with.

The counterarguments are honest ones. Balance is wildly uneven, with a small tier of characters dominating everything below them, the technical execution barrier is steep enough to exclude casual players entirely, and the four player item chaos it was actually designed for is a different game from the one it is famous for. Both games are good. One of them is immortal.