Mushroom Kingdom (SSB)

Mushroom Kingdom
Universe	Mario
Appears in	SSB
Availability	Unlockable
Unlock criteria	Clear 1-Player mode with the eight starter characters, and play every other stage in Vs. Mode.
Tracks available	Track #13
Tournament legality Super Smash Bros. Singles: Banned Doubles: Banned
Article on Super Mario Wiki	Mushroom Kingdom (stage)

Mushroom Kingdom (いにしえの王国, Ancient Kingdom) is the only unlockable VS. Mode stage in Super Smash Bros., and is not available in any other Smash game, although there's the graphically similar stage Mushroom Kingdom in Super Smash Bros. Melee. This stage is unlocked by clearing 1P Game with the eight original characters and by playing on every already playable stages in VS. Mode. This stage is the only one which is never seen in 1-Player mode. Even if this stage is unlocked, Mario and Luigi will still be fought on Peach's Castle.

In competitive play

This stage is universally banned in standard tournaments due to hazards such as the POW blocks and randomized Piranha Plants disrupting gameplay, the pipes allowing heavy side camping, and the walk-off blast lines allowing even further side camping and allowing characters who can chaingrab past the blast line (such as Pikachu using its forward throw) to KO at very low percentages. It is the only stage along with Sector Z that has never been considered to be legal, though is a common friendly stage due to its randomness.

Layout

In the middle of this stage is a pit. To the right of it, there are two soft floating platforms, and a pipe to the right of them. To the left of the hole, there is a single floating soft platform, and a solid brick platform left of that which extends to the edge of the stage.

Features

Official art of Mushroom Kingdom from Smash 64.

• This stage is unique in that it is grounded, and does not feature an open gap to the side, making it possible to self-destruct by merely by walking off the stage. Although no other Smash Bros. stage is like this, this attribute is found in many stages in the three subsequent games. This is even further referenced by a "danger" sign that appears beyond the blast line.
• There are three pipes which characters can warp in between. When standing on a pipe, if the player presses down on the controller, their character will transfer through to another pipe. One of these pipes is on the ground to the right of the stage, and another is on top of the brick platform to the left. There is a third pipe in the chasm, through which a character may come out of, but not enter. Characters are randomly sent to either pipe, although if one pipe is blocked, the character will always come out of the alternate pipe. Additionally, two Piranha Plants occasionally come out of the pipes and inflict low damage (5%), but can be knocked away with a powerful attack. The Piranha Plants knock any characters who hit them straight upward with very low knockback, even at very high percentages, and they can be used during combos or to setup moves. Using the pipes is not typically a reliable strategy, as the player may exit into the abyss, which could lead to the player falling down the bottom blast line and self-destructing, or at minimum being left open to attack.
• In the middle of this stage is a fissure, which is the place players can be KO'd by falling down. Above the crevasse is a scale with two soft platforms. It is possible to stand on the two platforms, but the character's weight will unbalance them. If unbalanced too far, the system will break and fall into the cravat, and then regenerate a few seconds afterwards. This gap is the cause of many AI flaws.
• Occasionally, a small, rectangular POW Block will appear in one of several locations in the air. Hitting it with an attack will cause the screen to vibrate, with every character touching the ground or a platform being dealt 20% damage and great knockback.
• This is the only stage in Smash 64 where the theme music is directly ported from another game, that game being Super Mario Bros. Super Smash Bros. Melee would later feature three stages (excluding Past Stages) where an original music track from another game appears on the stage (one of them as an alternate track), and from Super Smash Bros. Brawl onwards, numerous songs ripped directly from their sources were heard on some of the stages.
• During a timed match, the hurry up theme from Super Mario Bros. plays during the final 30 seconds. This also happens during Sudden Death.

Origin

This stage has a variety of elements from Super Mario Bros., some of which can be seen here in World 1-1.

This stage is from Super Mario Bros. In Super Mario Bros. the player can go down pipes to an underground level or bonus level; when underground, the player has to go into pipe to return to the overground. In this stage, these green pipes are retained and can be used to warp to two other parts of the stage. Super Mario Bros. also feature these scale-like platforms that go down on the platform the player is standing on while the other platform goes up. These platforms are in this stage and work as they did in Super Mario Bros.

In the arcade game Mario Bros., the goal is to hit the enemies from under a platform to flip them over and get to the top of the platform to kick them off. If the player feels overwhelmed by how many enemies are on the screen at once, the player can go to a POW block to knock all the enemies on their back. In this stage a POW block appears. If a player is to hit the POW block it sends his or her opponents upward.

There are many elements in the background from Super Mario Bros. such as Hammer Bros., giant mushroom platforms, vines, a flag pole, etc.

The music is the original overworld theme in Super Mario Bros., it would be reused for Melee's Mushroom Kingdom.

Trivia

• Every subsequent installment in the Super Smash Bros. series has had a Mushroom Kingdom based stage (a stage related to "Mushroom Kingdom"; or any name based on that word). Melee had Mushroom Kingdom and the Super Mario Bros. 2-based Mushroom Kingdom II, Brawl had Mushroomy Kingdom, and Super Smash Bros. 4 had Mushroom Kingdom U in the Wii U version and Mushroomy Kingdom as a returning stage in the 3DS version.
• The pipes that can be drawn on the PictoChat 2 stage in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS likely reference this stage, as they can be entered in a similar manner and one of them is situated over a pit.
  • Although pipes also appear in Mushroomy Kingdom, 3D Land, and Super Mario Maker, they cannot be used by the player as they are in this stage or in PictoChat 2.

• The German name of this stage translates to "Donut Plains", an unrelated location from Super Mario World.