The platform Fighter Landscape in 2024

For decades, the Super Smash Brothers franchise was the literal definition of a Platform Fighter. The few attempts there were to create a game similar to it, most famously PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale, were called smash-clones. 

But we are now over a decade detached from that, and with Super Smash Bros Ultimate seeing its last major update in October 2021, the door has been left wide open for competitors to step up to the plate and see if they can swing for a hit, double, or potentially a homerun.

With that in mind, lets meet the roster of the Platform Fighter hopefuls of the 2024-25 season.

Super Smash Bros Melee

Sometimes, you make such a great game that it defies convention and becomes a cornerstone of its own community. Not only that, it produces community figures that then reach well beyond its own space. Mang0, Hbox, Ludwig, and many more were all at one point or continue to be part of the SSBM community.

It's not just "an old game," either. The community has developed its own tools to support Melee's future. Most prominent among these is Slippi, which revitalized the online scene and opened the door for new players. Its replay features, matchmaking, and, most importantly, rollback netcode all contribute to making Melee a game that, yes, is visually outdated but nonetheless fun.

Brawlhalla

Indeed, the small indie studio that Ubisoft later brought continues to develop arguably a top 3 entry in the platform fighter genre. A free-to-play game with a decade of development, improvements, and, more recently, a long list of collaborations with other media franchises ranging from Ray-man to Avatar and even Star Wars. 

A game that was on the heels of current trends like Twitch drops and collaborations also spears heads, perhaps one of the more stable esports offerings out there. Entering year nine of their competitive circuit.

Rivals 2

Following a widely successful Kickstarter campaign, Rivals 2, the sequel to the positively fun Rivals of Aether, is coming out sometime in 2024, with new graphics and fighters but all the same care and attention as the original. Its development team has gone to great lengths in keeping Rivals 2 true to its form, and with some behind-the-doors playtesting already underway, it may still find its way to many locals as the go-to platform fighter that most choose to play because it is fun as opposed to just because it's a sweaty competitive bracket.

Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2

The original was not able to shake the world; its sequel is not either, but it is worth keeping an eye on a title that, for all its shortcomings, was able to secure a sequel. NASB 2 might not ever be at an Evo, Combo Breaker, or Frosty Faustings stage. Still, it certainly carries with it much of the same DNA that makes games like Smash fun for a whole portion of the audience that does not instinctively know how to wave dash, or the importance of shield drop options. Its a fun silly party platform fighter with enough depth under its surface to warrant a few hours of play.

MultiVersus

Multiversus is a funky game. Warner Brothers Games has greenlit a live service game in the platform fighter genre, and it's clear from the rest of its catalog and its owners' comments that its vision is squarely on that side of the industry. So, after almost a year of silence following what was a critically well-received beta that even won them the Game Awards for Best Fighting Game, MVS is finally back. with a May 28th release date, MultiVersus may finally be in players' hands for long enough to start spreading across the platform fighter-verse.

A long list of changes is likely to follow in the coming weeks as developer Player First Games unravels their carefully planned game onto the world's stage. But the hope for many is that it will carry on the improvements seen throughout the beta.

Super Smash Bros Ultimate

We will end where we started this piece, in Ultimate. Clearly, the game is not dead, it enjoys a huge playerbase and big tournaments too. But with Nintendo's ever encroaching, and often not welcomed, arm, as well as the realization that the game that it is now will forever be, it's hard to give it a glowing recommendation.

Its lack of rollback and hard-to-swallow unbalanced gameplay makes it difficult to continue supporting into the future. When a character has proven to be so problematic for the competitive scene that its often banned, except when it isn't or when there is a full moon, or maybe this month it will be allowed under the solar eclipse locals only, well then, why bother?

And yet, saying Kazuya Mishima EWGF Mario while Sonic is powering up to knock Sephiroth off the stage, you can't help but smile a little at the sheer absurdity of it all. Games like Rivals and Brawlhalla live in their own world; they have a suspension of belief on their side. But so far, no platform fighter outside Melee decades ago has captured the glee of seeing the absurd manifest.