Ice Climbers

It’s definitely hard to find delicious healthy vegetables in freezingly cold northern mountains. But the inhabitants of such areas know perfectly well how important it is to regularly have their portion of vitamins — that’s why they constantly hunt eggplants, carrots, cabbages, cucumbers, and other tasty stuff. Alas, the Condor, White Bears, Topis, and Nitpickers have chosen an evil way to obtain these goodies. They have stolen vegetables from two humans, Popo and Nana. And these characters have to activate their ice climbing skills, take the food back, and teach those impudent beasts a lesson.

It’s a plot of the classic Nintendo game Ice Climber, which was released for the NES consoles in 1985. The adventure itself is totally not about the story, though — it’s about your playing skills. You control one of the characters and try to reach the mountain peak to obtain vegetables. Nana and Popo have mallets to destroy ice blocks and thus open a way up. They also use this weapon to defeat enemies. It’s a vertically scrolling platform, one of the best in this specific niche. 

Ice Climber was released for the arcade machines Nintendo Vs. series — thanks to its two-player mode. It’s available on the Switch through the Nintendo Online service.

Ice Climbers in the fighting series Super Smash Bros.

This game is an example of how Nintendo cherishes their heritage (even if they don’t plan to return to it in the near future). Popo and Nana have been added to the Smash roster as Ice Climbers with the Melee game. 

They are pretty unique fighters. The player controls only one of the Ice Climbers, and most of the time, the second one automatically copies all the movements. In some situations, the second Ice Climber can act separately — it’s the advanced technique named desynching.

The Ice Climbers are also present in Brawl but not in Super Smash Bros. 4. The developers faced technical difficulties with adding these characters into the 3DS version of the game, so Masahiro Sakurai decided to remove them — he wanted the roster to be identical for 3DS and Wii U.

Ice Climbers in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

The Ice Climbers return to Smash Ultimate, becoming unlockable characters for the first time.

Two Ice Climbers act together, and their ability to fight separately becomes trickier in comparison to the previous installments. Popo deals more damage, while Nana is a  bit faster. You can choose who is your primary character.

The Ice Climbers are midweight Smash characters with very decent attacking abilities, with a projectile (Ice Shot), and even with a freezing feature (Blizzard).

Difficulties with the Ice Climbers start when they become separated (for example, when one of them has been KO’ed). These SSBU characters are quite tricky, so you should learn how to use their techniques to your advantage. Their recovery option is just not good in many situations.

Unlock the Ice Climbers in SSBU by:

• Playing the VS. Matches. They are the 10th to appear
• Clearing the Classic Mode with Link. The Ice Climbers are 2nd to unlock
• Obtaining them in the story mode World of Light