Fighting Games Friday: The Ultimate Despair
The reveal of Final Fantasy VII villain Sephiroth for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate drew one of the biggest reactions among the announcements at the Game Awards just over a week ago, even though his impending arrival on the roster isn’t that big of a surprise. He’ll be joining that game’s hero, Cloud Strife, to make for the second character appearing from the Final Fantasy franchise in the Smash Bros. series. Merely seeing a character like Sephiroth in Smash Bros. left a big impression on fans of both games, in the kind of trailer only director Masahiro Sakurai and the Smash team were capable of creating. The Game Awards was no place to detail his move set and the content he’ll come with, which, as has become tradition, was saved for a separate presentation.
Sephiroth will put his extremely long Masamune blade to use for his basic and special attacks, and rely on a repertoire of magic attacks. His move set takes cues from the original game and other fighting/versus game appearances, though implemented in a way that makes his Smash appearance somewhat unique. Since the Masamune is a light sword despite its length compared to the Buster Sword, Sephiroth himself is a quicker and lighter character compared to Cloud. He’s also a tall, husky pretty man, so his hitbox is larger, and the lightness means he can be knocked off his feet and into the air easier. There had to be a tradeoff for his reach.
He retains a number of techniques from appearances in other games, but some stuck out during the presentation more than others. The trademark Octaslash returns from other titles, including the Dissidia: Final Fantasy games, which travels a good distance and can hit one or more characters multiple times. It’s not as flashy compared to the Dissidia Final Fantasy NT version, but the startup is variable. He can also use a variety of Flare attacks, some of which will explode after the projectile travels a distance. Sephiroth will automatically counterattack after the defensive Scintilla technique, and it can block and dissipate projectiles — including charged projectiles. Missing means whiffing the attack, so it probably shouldn’t be used recklessly. These moves seem great, but guessing where he could land on tier lists at this point would be a fool’s game.
There was no way Sephiroth’s Final Smash wouldn’t involve him transforming into Safer Sephiroth and summoning Meteor to hit characters on the stage. It’s a nice touch that the camera angle before it hits resembles the final battle from the original FFVII. There was also no way he wouldn’t have an alternate outfit that leaves him coatless and shows all that muscle, as he appeared near the end of FFVII.
Sakurai addressed how the Final Fantasy soundtrack selection has been lacking compared to other franchises represented in Smash Ultimate for a while, with only two tracks. This was unsurprisingly due to copyright issues, specifically different hurdles within different territories around the world. This won’t be a problem anymore, as Sephiroth is coming with nine tracks, four of which will be remixes from well-known Japanese game composers. The “Opening — Bombing Mission,” “Aerith’s Theme,” “Main Theme of Final Fantasy VII,” and “Cosmo Canyon” tracks will be remixed by Yuzo Koshiro, Keiichi Okabe, Motoi Sakuraba, and Yoko Shimomura, respectively. They’re not holding back this time. The Northern Cave stage is also a sight to behold with how the background images shift during battle.
Sephiroth and the other content will officially release for Fighters Pass Vol. 2 holders and separately for $5.99 on December 22nd, but there’s a twist: Players who purchased the pass can get him right now if they beat the Sephiroth Challenge. The challenge involves defeating Sephiroth to unlock access to him and the Northern Cave stage; it’s not exactly easy to do for the average player, but is reportedly doable. The mode will only be available until Sephiroth is fully available next Tuesday, so players should get their fill now.
New Mii Fighters are also coming as part of this pack, which will include Barret, Tifa, and Aerith from FFVII, and… Geno from Super Mario RPG. Geno was featured here thanks to SMRPG being developed by Squaresoft (though most of the developers have long departed, and formed the now-defunct AlphaDream), but this crushed the dreams of anyone who continued to hold out hope that Geno would be added as a full character. This never had a big chance of happening considering how obscure the character is these days, but it nonetheless stung for fans.
With Sephiroth’s arrival (or impending arrival if you’re not willing to take the Challenge), three more characters remain for Fighter’s Pass Vol. 2. This is the final season of DLC for the game unless Sakurai and crew change their minds, which means the guessing games will be intense from here. Good luck out there.
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Geoff
News Editor | Geoff is some nerd who writes for a blog and thinks he's knowledgeable. He write a lot about video games, but is capable of writing about other subjects, too. Twitter
