Cuphead

Cuphead
File:CupheadSpirit.jpeg Official artwork of Cuphead from Cuphead.
Universe	Cuphead
Debut	Cuphead (2017)
Smash Bros. appearances	Ultimate
Most recent non-Smash appearance	Cuphead: Tesla Edition (2019)
Console/platform of origin	Microsoft Windows, Xbox One
Species	Cup
Gender	Male
Place of origin	Inkwell Isles
Created by	Chad Moldenhauer Jared Moldenhauer

Cuphead (カップヘッド, Cuphead) is the eponymous main character of the indie-developed run-and-gun platformer, Cuphead. He is an anthropomorphic teacup whose design pays homage to vintage cartoon characters like Felix the Cat and Mickey Mouse.

Origin

Cuphead lives in the Inkwell Isles with his brother, Mugman, and his caretaker, the Elder Kettle. Despite the Elder Kettle's warnings, the brothers wandered far away from their home and found themselves at the Devil's Casino. Their winning streak impressed the casino's owner, the Devil, who tempted them by betting all of the casino's riches, promising to take away the brothers' souls should they lose. Blinded by greed and ignorant of his brother's warning, Cuphead rolled the dice, but ultimately lost the gamble. With the brothers pleading for their lives spared, the Devil cut a deal with them, letting them live should they retrieve the soul contracts of the debtors who previously gambled with him. After receiving a potion from the Elder Kettle that allowed them to fire bullets through finger snaps, the brothers set off to collect the soul contracts, encountering the Devil's cronies along the way. After Cuphead and Mugman returned all of the contracts, the Devil offers them the choice of handing the contracts to him and have them join his team. After refusing, they defeat the Devil and burn the soul contracts, releasing the debtors from his grasp.

In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

As a costume

The Cuphead Mii costume in Ultimate.

Cuphead appears as a downloadable Mii Gunner costume as part of Round 5 for Ultimate. He is the second indie character to appear as a Mii costume, following Sans. Upon downloading the costume, the song Floral Fury is unlocked as an additional music track in the "Other" category. Like Sans, Cuphead appears as a fully modeled character; his "mask" is just his head, instead of a mask with the Mii's face visible like other character-based costumes. Much like in his game, his "gun" is simply his hand in reference to the myriad of attacks that Cuphead performs by making a gun formation with his fingers.

Cuphead's reveal trailer makes many references to his game. It opens with an imitation of the storybook-style opening of Cuphead, with the screenshot closely matching to its first "page". Said screenshot features has a Villager using a bug net (resembling Mugman) and uses the phrase "a good day for a swell battle", something that's said before boss fights. Mushroomy Kingdom is used in the trailer, referencing the sepia colour palette and grained filter of Cuphead. The Cuphead Mii Gunner uses moves that are similar to weapons from the game: Bomb Drop mirrors the Lobber, and forward smash and forward aerial both mirror the Peashooter. In addition, the way the screen scrolls, the Gunner's usage of projectiles, and the usage of Stamina mode all reference the "Run-and-Gun" minigames that appear in the game. The characters fought in his reveal trailer are references to various bosses from his game: Piranha Plant represents Cagney Carnation (whose theme song, "Floral Fury", is the track included with the costume); blue Kirby represents Goopy Le Grande; green Charizard represents Grim Matchstick; and Falco represents Wally Warbles. His reveal ends on New Pork City, which resembles the Devil's Casino due to its flashing neon signs and searchlights; the stage is also used for his spirit battle.

Spirit

Additionally, Cuphead appears as a spirit, released via the Spirit Board event Ready? Wallop! on February 14, 2020.

No.	Image	Name	Type	Class	Slot	Ability	Series
1,398	File:CupheadSpirit.jpeg	Cuphead		★★★	1	Shooting Items Power ↑	Cuphead

Trivia

A comparison of Cuphead's intro (top) with its reference in his reveal trailer (bottom).

• Cuphead is the first and so far only Mii Costume to have a pre-rendered segment in his trailer.
  • Cuphead is also the first Mii costume implied to have received an invitation.
• Cuphead is the only DLC Mii Costume to appear in a Spirit Battle: specifically, those of Cuphead himself and his brother Mugman. If the costume is not purchased, the Mii Gunner is replaced with a red Mega Man.
• Sans and Cuphead, as Mii Costumes, share several distinctions between them:
  • Like Sans, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate marks Cuphead's first video game appearance in 3D.
  • As both of their games' logos are white, their reveal trailers contrast them against a black background, with the black color of Ultimate's logo being inverted accordingly.
  • Cuphead is the second Mii costume to come with a song. Unlike Sans, however, Floral Fury is directly ripped from an existing source, rather than being a remix.
• As a reference to inconsistencies seen in posters for cartoons from the 1930s and 1940s, Cuphead has different colorations seen across his home game, with the in-game appearance using white gloves and brown shoes, the results screen appearance using yellow gloves and brown shoes, and the overworld map appearance using white gloves and yellow shoes. However, Cuphead's spirit in Ultimate is edited from its basis (being that of the results screen), changing his yellow gloves to white. This was likely done to have it match with the in-game appearance of Cuphead (both in his home game and Ultimate), which uses the white gloves.
• The Cuphead Mask is the first Mii Hat that visibly shrinks the Mii's head, as Cuphead's head is shorter than a Mii's.
• Cuphead's gun hand is noticely larger than his other hand, most likely due to the size of Mii Gunner's gun by comparision.

External links

Articles on Wikia and Gamepedia.