Spike

This article is about the Melee usage of "spike". For information about Super Smash Bros. and Brawl's "spikes," see Meteor Smash.

File:Wizard's Foot Spike.jpg

An image of Ganondorf's spike, during Wizard's Foot, in Melee.

A Spike is a type of attack in the Super Smash Bros. Melee that sends the opponent downward until the hitstun wears off. A spike is not to be confused with a meteor smash, which also sends the opponent downward, but the knockback of which can be cancelled before the hitstun wears off through meteor cancelling.

When referring to Super Smash Bros. and Brawl, people often use the terms "spike" and "meteor smash" interchangeably, as all downwards-hitting attacks in both games are meteor smashes.

Technical information

Attacks with angles outside of this range are not recognized as meteor smashes, and are therefore semi-spikes.

In Melee, hitboxes that send opponents at an angle between 260 and 280 degrees are recognised by the game as meteor smashes. However, there exist some hitboxes that send opponents downward, but at a diagonal trajectory outside this angle window. As a result, the game does not recognise them as meteor smashes, and are thus unable to be meteor cancelled. In Brawl, the angle window for what the game recognises as meteor smashes was increased to being between 230 and 310 degrees, enough so to cover the downward diagonal trajectory the spikes in Melee had. As a result, the spiking hitboxes in Melee that retained their trajectories are recognised as meteor smashes in Brawl, and are capable of being meteor cancelled.

Game application

Spikes have the benefits of meteor smashes; knocking the opponent downward with gravity assisting the knockback. But they do so however, without the drawback of the opponent having the ability to completely negate the knockback with a jump or recovery move. As a result, spikes are extremely effective KO moves in edge guarding situations - recovering from even moderately powerful spikes is usually impossible above extremely low percents. Because of this, many smashers who main characters with practical spikes try to integrate spikes into play as often as possible.

List of spikes in Super Smash Bros. Melee

Characters with useable spikes

Captain Falcon - Down aerial; the so-called nipple spike, as only the top hitbox of the three hitboxes of Falcon's down air is a spike. The two lower hitboxes meteor smash. While notoriously difficult to land, it is the most powerful spike in Melee.
Falco - Down aerial; while the spike lasts for its entire duration in NTSC regions, only the first half of attack spikes in PAL regions.
Fox - Down aerial; extremely weak, set knockback.
Ganondorf - Down special, Wizard's Foot, the entirety of its hitbox duration when used in the air.
Marth - Down aerial when tipped; its angle was adjusted in PAL regions to a meteor smash angle, thus being a meteor smash in PAL regions.
Roy - Up Smash; only works if an airborne opponent is hit with the tip of the sword.

Other spikes

Dr. Mario's up smash contains a spike, though it only hits grounded opponents.
Master Hand - Some of Master Hand's hitboxes have been revealed to have spiking hitboxes via hacking, though it is currently unclear which attacks the hitboxes match up with.
Pokéball Pokémon:
- Entei - The very tip of the attack spikes opponents into the thick of it.
- Clefairy - When Gust is used, the topmost part of the attack has a spike.
- Ho-oh - The entire attack except the last hit involves two spikes of slightly different angles.

Spikes in Super Smash Bros. Brawl

It is technically possible for spikes to exist in unmodified Brawl; the increased meteor smash angle window does not include all downward angles. And if the angle of a hitbox in Brawl is hacked to outside the standard 0-360 range of angles (for example, 630, which would equal a meteor smash angle of 270), the game will not recognize it as a meteor smash, and it will therefore act as a spike.

There are a few boss hitboxes with angles in the -70 to -90 range, which while unconfirmed is very likely to not be detected as a meteor smash. Aside from these bosses, however, no known hitboxes in the game naturally have such angles, and there are no known hitboxes that hit opponents at an angle lower than what would be considered a semi-spike, but above what the game would consider a meteor smash. As such, spikes are considered a removed element in Brawl.