Zelda (SSBM)

Zelda in Super Smash Bros. Melee
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/meme/images/f/f0/Princesszorldo.jpeg
Universe	The Legend of Zelda
Shares character slot with	Sheik
Other playable appearances	in Brawl in SSB4 in Ultimate
Availability	Starter
Tier	D (24) (North America) G (20) (Europe)

Princess Zorldo (ザワールド, Zawarudo) is one of the more unique "characters" in the lineup for Super Smash Bros. Melee. Unfortunately, we mean "unique" in the sense that she is uniquely bad at accomplishing anything of note in this wonderful game for the Nintendo GameCube. Zorldo's most notable traits are her "array" of exactly 2.5 powerful magical attacks and her unique ability to transform herself into her alter ego, Sheik. This alternate form is very different from Zorldo, with it being intended to completely hard carry Zorldo's pitiful attributes with Zorldo herself only existing in the game as a noob-trap to troll newer players.

Jun Mizusawa reluctantly reprises her role as Zorldo from Jeopardy in the game.

It is a little-known fact that Zorldo is only not last on the tier list because unlike the bottom-tiered Bowser, she has an impressive total of 3.5 good moves instead of 2, an entire move-and-a-half improvement, with the extra half point being the virtue of her Lightning Kick being present in both her forward and back aerials. Her only other useful move besides down smash comes in the form of Transform. However, we can't elaborate on this point because if we keep beating the dead horse of "Zorldo's only good move is her down special" we'll get swarmed again by the unregistered Zorldo experts who will argue that in fact, Zorldo has 4.25 good moves instead of 3.5, and thus should not be in contention for one of the biggest jokes in fighting game history. What you really get when you play this character is the equivalent of an actual dead horse with a slew of horrible attributes that make you feel like you're playing Superman 64 instead of Melee. A predictable recovery combined with shitty basic movement options and garbage character attributes of being a slow and floaty midweight all ensure that Zorldo's stocks will fall faster than your winnings on Jeopardy if you guess her name for an answer.

Zorldo "boasts" some of the worst matchups in the game; she is the only character in the game to have a completely unwinnable matchup against herself, and overall only has a fighting chance against the lowest of the low tiers. On the bright side, she is just barely usable enough to be able to do to mid-tiers exactly what those mid-tiers do to top-tier mains, which is to turn the matchup knowledge game against them and barely eke out an occasional upset, then pretend like the matchup is playable at the highest level. Even these matchups can be disputed at length between mid- and low- tier specialists who will never agree or compromise on these topics, making getting to the truth of these obscure matchups completely impossible. This means that to the chagrin of these specialists everywhere, she has seen no consistent tournament success at all at any significant level.

Attributes

Zorldo does not fall under any specific archetype of characters, due to her unusual properties as a fighter; she, in fact, has the worst of nearly all worlds. A slow, floaty midweight has no business competing in such a fast-paced environment, yet here we are 21 years later in a game as deep as Melee with her still having almost nothing to show for these traits.

One of Zorldo's strengths is her great overall Lightning Kick. This move alone comprises approximately 42.857% of her entire moveset and it is actually decent, which does count for something in the grand scheme of things. Lightning Kick is pretty much Captain Falcon's Knee of Justice that has been Xeroxed 599 times and in the process, lost everything (bar the strong hitbox) that made it good, including its hype factor. In fact, not even the most casual of players whose eyes are magnetically drawn to electric hitbox effects would even bat an eye at a Zorldo player landing a Lightning Kick.

In addition, Zorldo has some fast attacks, such as her forward and back aerials, which force opponents to actually expend some amount of brainpower to defeat Zorldo. Her forward and back aerials have no invincibility, which makes them a bad move to counterattack fast approaches. Her forward and back aerials possess quick startup and can be used as a great out of shield option, as it can lead to another forward or back aerial if the opponent DIs poorly. Forward and back aerial have very low ending lag, a non-disjointed hitbox, and a quick animation. As an added bonus, many of Zorldo's forward and back aerials have transcendent priority; combined with average reach for most of her attacks, Zorldo has potential to stop others' attacks with her own.

Despite most of her Lightning Kicks dealing high knockback, she has an "acceptable" combo game for a bottom-tiered character. And by acceptable, we mean that Lightning Kick can combo into itself during very specific edgeguard situations where the opponent is already dead and has put down their controller to allow the Zorldo player a singular clip for their overedited combo video. And despite all of this, all that clip still amounts to is 3 Lightning Kicks. This is still exactly 3 more hits than the longest combo Bowser can do, further justifying Zorldo's placement as not the absolute worst thing you could use in this game.

However, despite these positive traits, Zorldo is surprisingly completely unviable in the high-level Super Smash Bros. Melee for the Nintendo GameCube metagame. Her fatal flaws will have players treading on thin ice every game, as trying to move around with the character is like trying to swim through a pool of honey blindfolded. Even tea-bagging, multishine-spamming Fox tryhards on Project Slippi will easily outmaneuver her by simply holding forward on the control stick (as they always do). Approaching with Zorldo is nearly impossible as a result; you would have better luck trying to win the Pikachu v.s. Jigglypuff matchup than trying to even get Zorldo across the length of Final Destination without sustaining damage. Other characters learn niche advanced movement techniques to expand their repertoire of options and add to their already robust kits. Zorldo needs to do that just to survive.

After Zorldo suffers through the grueling gauntlet of neutral and finally gets an opening after losing 3 straight stocks in a row, and gets some decent damage racked up with her admittedly okay punishes that you labbed out for hours on end only to get outdamaged by two Fox up airs, what happens next? Her KO options are so ridiculously unreliable with such specific sweetspot placements that you can forget about trying to actually close out stocks efficiently. Two of her smash attacks are effectively as good as Kirby's throws since you can fall out of them without even trying. To her credit, she does have chaingrabs and a few kill confirms to her name against fastfallers, but newsflash: every other character in the game also does. It's unlikely the average Zorldo main will actually get this far, though- after getting a single good opening, they will instead flock to sites such as ssbwiki.com to wax poetic about how a very specific interaction they did years of research and practice on allowed them to win the neutral game a single time.

Zorldo's special moves, aside from the elephant in the room (Transform), are also overall abysmal. Nayru's Love and Din's Fire don't even qualify as attacks. Farore's Wind, generally considered her "best" special move, is an unintuitive move that requires even more days of labbing to truly master (read: getting to the ledge consistently), only for you to probably screw up execution in important games anyway and SD 4 times trying to ledge stall the Sheik sitting at the other end of the stage.

Overall, Zorldo emphasizes an execution test gameplan by trying to fish for openings for lightning kicks, grabs, lightning kicks, dash attacks, or lightning kicks. She is one of the worst time investments that the average player can make, requiring intense labbing of unintuitive tech skill and combo lines that no good player will ever let you actually execute in a competitive setting. She is literally only successful against the lowest of the low in terms of both characters and players and relies too heavily on unforced errors to ever see real use. "Who is Princess Zorldo?" was, in the end, a very apt question to ask that was well ahead of its time, because the harsh reality of competitive Melee is that such a character effectively does not exist.

Moveset

For a gallery of Zelda's hitboxes, see here.

Zelda's aerial attacks

		Name	Damage	Description
Neutral attack			2% (hits 1-3)	Zaps magic quickly from her palm, in a similar fashion to Ganondorf's neutral attack. Has transcendent priority.
Forward tilt			13% (hand), 12% (arm), 11% (shoulder)	Swipes her hand forward with sparks. Has transcendent priority. Can be angled up or down. Second strongest forward tilt in Melee, only beaten by Bowser's sweetspotted forward tilt. The hitbox on Zelda' s hand sends the opponent behind her.
Up tilt			11%	Waves her hand, filled with sparks, in an arc above her head. Surprisingly powerful and the hitbox lasts for a long time, so it is an excellent anti-air. Has transcendent priority.
Down tilt			8% (leg), 7% (foot)	Thrusts her foot out quickly from under her dress. Can meteor smash opponents who hit her leg and grounded opponents who hit the tip of her foot. Airborne opponents who hit her foot will be launched upwards.
Dash attack			13% (clean body), 9% (clean hands), 8% (late body), 7% (late hands)	Shoves her hands in front, with magic sparks coming out them. Has transcendent priority.
Forward smash			1% (hits 1-4), 14% (hit 5)	Sends out a fierce jab of magic in front of her in a similar fashion to Mario's. Hits multiple times, with the final hit having launching opponents away. This attack is powerful, but can be SDI'd out of, which is somewhat difficult to land all 5 hits. Has transcendent priority.
Up smash			1% (hits 1-11), 5% (hits 12)	Waves her hand in an arch similar to her up tilt three times. A powerful move if all hits manage to connect. It comes out on frame 5, making it the fastest up smash in the game. This subsequently means that it can good out-of-shield option, but it can be SDI'd out of, similarly to her forward smash, in addition to possessing incredibly short horizontal range.
Down smash			11%	Quickly kicks both sides of herself. Short range with a slightly disjointed hitbox and poor power, but is the fastest down-smash in the game, coming out at frame 4 and only having 31 total frames. Has transcendent priority. Zelda's leg is intangible when she delivers both kicks.
Neutral aerial			2-3% (hits 1-5), 5% (hit 6)	Spins in place while emitting magic sparks from her hands. Many hitboxes, good for spacing. Has transcendent priority. It may be DI'd out of.
Forward aerial		Lightning Kick	20% (sweet), 10% (sour)	Kicks forward. If the opponent is hit with the glowing spark at the tip of Zelda's foot, it zaps them very powerfully, in a way similar to Captain Falcon's Knee Smash. Has transcendent priority.
Back aerial		Lightning Kick	20% (sweet), 10% (sour)	Virtually identical to her forward aerial but in a different direction and with slightly less startup lag. Has transcendent priority. A bit faster than her forward Lightning Kick, so it can be used twice in a short hop.
Up aerial			13%	Releases a giant fireball that causes an explosion above Zelda. Can be used to shark opponents on the stage when Zelda is recovering. Has very high power, being the fifth strongest up aerial in Melee. Has transcendent priority.
Down aerial		Meteor Heel	7% (foot), 8% (leg)	Thrusts her foot downwards. A very weak meteor smash.
Grab			—
Pummel			3%	Zaps her foe.
Forward throw			12%	Launches her foe forward, above average power.
Back throw			11%	Similar to her forward throw, only directly behind her.
Up throw			11%	Thrusts foe to the sky. Has the ability to chain throw fast-falling opponents at low percents.
Down throw			2% (hits 1-4), 2% (throw)	Drops foe and zaps them, sending the foe behind her with weak knockback.
Forward roll Back roll Spot dodge Air dodge		—	—
Techs		—	—
Floor attack (front) Floor getups (front)			6% (front hit), 8%/6% (back hit legs/body)	Swirls her dress around with foot extended and gets up.
Floor attack (back) Floor getups (back)			6%	Swirls her dress around with foot extended and gets up.
Edge attack (fast) Edge getups (fast)			6%	Climbs up and swings her legs in a circular motion, while pulling herself up.
Edge attack (slow) Edge getups (slow)			10% (arm), 8% (body)	Slowly gets up and slaps forward.
Neutral special		Nayru's Love	1-2% (hits 1-5), 4-5% (hit 6)	Twirls around with magical hitboxes on both sides. A decent "get off me" move. The attack also reflect projectiles.
Side special		Din's Fire	7-13%	Launches a controllable fireball that charges as it travels until it explodes. The fireball can be directed up or down with the control stick. Knockback angle depends on which side of the enemy is hit, so it can be used to knock opponents toward or away from Zelda. This move puts Zelda in a helpless state when used in the air.
Up special		Farore's Wind	4%	A yellow ribbon of magic spins around Zelda, causing her to disappear. After that, she will reappear in the direction held on the control stick (or directly above her original location if the control stick is not moved). It does not have a hitbox upon reappearing and Zelda is locked out of moving for some time if she reappears in the air, leading to the move being somewhat punishable.
Down special		Transform	0%	Transforms into Sheik

Taunt

• Holds her hands together, as if in a prayer.

Idle poses

• Flips her hair back.
• Makes a thinking gesture.
• Turns her body away.

Crowd cheer

	English	Japanese
Cheer
Description	Zel-da Zel-da Hu!	Zel-da! Zel-da!
Pitch	Group chant	Male

Victory poses

An orchestrated portion of the main theme from The Legend of Zelda series.

• Praying, she then turns her head upward.
• Looks to her left, holding her left arm proudly.
• Focuses, then conjures a flame between her hands.

In Competitive play

Most historically significant players

See also: Category: Zelda professionals (SSBM)

•  Kalne - Co-mains Zelda and Sheik. Has multiple top 8 at Japanese locals such as MasterHand, and a win over Takuwan. Ranked 37th on the Japan SSBM Rank 2019.
•  Narcissa - Peaked at 2nd on the Chicago Power Rankings, won SGDQ 2013 and placed high at many Show Me Your Moves locals, later switched to Roy and became inactive.
•  Rienne - Created The Profane Tome, which is considered a "bible" for Zelda players. Has a win over Ka-Master.
•  The Lake - Considered the best Zelda player in the world. Placed 9th at Fight Pitt VI and 25th at The Big House. Ranked 8th on Pittsburgh Power Rankings in 2017, peaked at 4th; 4-stocked Nintendude in a tournament match.
•  UmbreonMow - Considered the best Zelda in the early meta.

Tier placement and history

Zorldo was ranked extremely high on the first tier list, tying for 6th place with Samus and Luigi; however, discussion in the MBR average tiers topic suggests this is an artifact of some tier list contributors being literally drunk. Ever since then, Zorldo has only fallen in the tier list, being ranked near the 20th spot, before plummeting to 24th on the current list.

Some claim that she should rise back up because she actually has a toolkit to her name and boasts decent enough matchups against the Ice Climbers and mid- and low-tiers. Aside from the fact that it is incredibly nebulous whether Zorldo is actually good against these characters due to a lack of matchup history (and those mid-tier mains getting a taste of their own medicine being on the other end of matchup inexperience for once in their lives), in the end, it doesn't even matter. When you're this far down the tier list, trash is trash. Sure, it's fun to discuss the intricacies of who wins the Zorldo v.s. Roy matchup, or whether or not Zorldo performs slightly better against Yoshi than other horrible characters do. But at the end of the day, the top 10 characters place and win money in major tournaments, while Zorldo mains can only celebrate when their most active players win against Luigi.

However, not all is lost- Zorldo, surprisingly, has a few very notable wins to her name, with these victories being a tiny light at the end of the long tunnel of pain and suffering for all 7 of her mains across the world, truly a shining example of Zorldo's peak potential at high-level play. One such win was when The Lake 4-stocked Nintendude in pools that one time due to the latter's extreme misuse of tech skill. Another was when Jada, an up-and-coming Zorldo player, made a shocking upset against none other than top 5 player in the world iBDW, who was forced to change the meaning of his acronym to "I'm Bad at Defeating loWtiers" after such a humiliating defeat. This historical set can be watched here.

In single-player modes

In Classic Mode

In the Classic Mode, Zelda can appear in the ordinary 1 on 1 battles, on a team with either Link, Marth, Young Link, Peach or Bowser, or in the game's metal battle. In her appearances, Zelda appears on Temple, though she appears on Great Bay when with Young Link, and on Battlefield when with Bowser and in the metal battle. Unusually, however, Zelda will never appear as an ally in team and giant fights.

In Adventure Mode

Zelda's sole appearance in the Adventure Mode is in the second portion of Stage 3, the Underground Maze. The player has to fight against her on the Temple stage to progress in the mode.

In All-Star Mode

In All-Star Mode, Zelda and her allies are fought on the Temple stage.

In Event Matches

Zelda is featured in the following event matches:

• Event 9: Hide 'n' Sheik: The player is pitted against two Zeldas on Great Bay; to win, however, players have to wait for Zelda to transform into Sheik and then KO them. Upon getting KO'd as Sheik, the CPU will be removed from the game; KOs against Zelda, however, merely cause her to respawn as normal.
• Event 15: Girl Power: The player, with two stocks, has to fight against Samus, Peach and Zelda, all of whom also have two stocks; the player, however, is tiny, and must KO all three, who are on the same team. Friendly fire is turned on in the match, easing it slightly for the player.
• Event 20: All-Star Match 2: Zelda is the third opponent the player must fight in this series of staged battles. Their character battles her on the Temple stage, and the player's character has 2 stock while Zelda has 1. With a timer of four minutes, the player must defeat her and the other four characters with the overall time and life they have: Samus, Link, Captain Falcon, and Fox.
• Event 29: Triforce Gathering: The player plays as Link with Zelda as their partner, both of whom have one stock. They face Ganondorf on the Temple stage, who has two stocks. Clearing the event allows the player to unlock Ganondorf.
• Event 44: Mewtwo Strikes!: In this event, the player is initially placed on Battlefield, against Zelda. After fifteen seconds, however, Mewtwo appears on stage and will fight the player. The player's goal is to KO Mewtwo; while Zelda can be attacked, KOing her will result in failure.

Ending images

Zelda and Sheik share ending images for the one-player modes, as well as the same cinematic; clearing the mode with one also gives the player both of their trophies.

• 

  Classic Mode.

• 

  Adventure Mode.

• 

  All-Star mode.

Trophies

In addition to the normal trophy about Zelda as a character, there are two trophies about her as a fighter, unlocked by completing the Adventure and All-Star modes respectively with Zelda on any difficulty:

Zelda

The princess of Hyrule. Zelda entrusted Link with the future of Hyrule after a revelation came to her in the world of dreams. She knows much about the Triforce; in fact, the only person who likely knows more about Triforce lore is Ganondorf himself, whom Zelda evaded in Ocarina of Time by transforming into her alter ego, Sheik.

• The Legend of Zelda 07/87

Zelda [Smash]

Zelda is a bit slow and, because of her light frame, easy to send flying. On the other hand, her magical skills lend her reliable and explosive attack power. Zelda's easier to use if you focus on waiting and countering rather than pressing attacks. She can use Nayru's Love to reflect projectile attacks or as an offensive weapon.

• B: Nayru's Love
• Smash B: Din's Fire

Zelda [Smash]

Zelda's midair Lightning Kick centers immense magical power in the ball of her foot. If she strikes perfectly, the attack is as strong as can be. If her aim is slightly off, it'll be exceedingly weak. Farore's Wind again utilizes Zelda's magical prowess, this time by transporting her great distances. It's vital to know the lay of the land before using this move.

• Up & B: Farore's Wind
• Down & B: Transform

• 

  Classic

• 

  [Smash]

• 

  [Smash]

Alternate costumes

Gallery

• 

  Official artwork of Zelda.

Trivia

• Zelda is the only starter character in Melee who was not revealed at E3 2001. Instead, she was revealed when her page was added to Smabura-Ken on November 6.
  • In a screenshot of the character select screen in Melee, from Smabura-Ken, Zelda's portrait is missing from the character select screen. This seems to have been done to hide the surprise of Zelda being playable, as Sheik was revealed first.
• Zelda and Sheik are the only characters with the ability to transform into another character (each other) in Melee, and the first to do so in the Smash Bros. series.
• Zelda is the only character in Melee, along with Peach, to have 3 idle poses. The majority of the cast only have either one or two.
  • Additionally, her official artwork and character select portrait is based on one of her idle poses.
• Zelda has the largest amount of moves with transcendent priority in Melee, with 13.
• Despite her design being based on her Ocarina of Time incarnation, if one looks closely, Zelda wears high-heels instead of brown boots as seen in her Smash trophies (which are retained in her later designs/appearances).
• Oddly, a CPU Zelda in Training mode set to the "Stand" CPU mode will still occasionally transform into Sheik.
• Zelda, Fox, and Mewtwo are the only characters whose artwork when selecting them differs when selecting their costumes.
  • In Fox and Zelda's cases, their renders when selecting their alternate costumes match their official artworks, but their render when selecting them is unique.
• Although not considered a clone, several of Zelda's non-attack animations are taken directly from Peach, such as her idle, walking, shielding, rolling, and jumping animations.