Zelda

Zelda (ゼルダ, Zelda) is a playable character in Super Smash Bros. All Stars. She was announced on August 23rd, 2018, the date on which The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds was released in Japan. Jun Mizusawa reprises her role, albeit via recycled voice clips from Brawl.

Zelda is currently ranked 55th out of 58 on the tier list, placing her in the F tier. This is a marginal improvement from her placement in Brawl, where she was ranked 37th out of 38. Zelda possesses some strengths, with Farore's Wind arguably being her most notable one: it has utility as both a long-ranged recovery move and her strongest finisher (especially from out of shield), with its power enabling her to KO middleweights and heavyweights as low as 50% and 70%, respectively. Her defensive playstyle has also improved somewhat thanks to Nayru's Love having increased intangibility and her new down special, Phantom Slash, which is a useful spacing and edge-guarding option. Zelda has also gained a capable damage racking game, thanks to changes inherent during SSB4 's launch and from subsequent game updates. Outside of these newfound improvements, Zelda retains a number of fairly powerful attacks, particularly her forward smash, up smash, up aerial, down aerial and Lightning Kicks.

However, Zelda's numerous weaknesses are severe enough to largely outweigh these strengths. The most notable of these is the removal of Transform, as Sheik has become an entirely separate character. This is compounded even further by the massive amount of buffs Sheik received. Incidentally, Zelda's special moves, aside from Farore's Wind, are burdened with inherent and/or new weaknesses. Nayru's Love deals less damage, while the removal of momentum canceling makes its Naryu's Love Jump technique now much less effective for recovery. Din's Fire now deals less damage, which is further compounded by it now consisting of a sweetspot and a sourspot. Additionally, it is still easily avoidable in singles play and renders Zelda helpless when used in midair. Lastly, Phantom Slash requires charging to cover any actual distance, and can even be rendered temporarily inactive if the Phantom is destroyed.

Like in previous installments, Zelda's approach, mobility, survivability, and neutral game are also among the most ineffective in their respective categories. And despite having a number of attacks that boast impressive power, her KO potential is nonetheless inconsistent, due to several of these moves only being effective when using their sweetspots, most notably her Lightning Kicks.

Overall, Zelda's glaring flaws have resulted in her garnering poor representation in competitive play. While she has only managed to win a few local tournaments in singles and doubles play thanks to ven, Fairess, Purple Guy and Zolda, ven has also managed to managed to achieve a handful of decent placings at regional tournaments.