The 'Shroom:Issue LXIII/Brawl Tactics

Brawl Tactics by

What's up, Brawlers? FunkyK here with this month's issue of Brawl Tactics!

This month, I will be covering the Legend of Zelda stage Bridge of Eldin!

This stage succumbs to the same curse as Temple in Melee: they are both huge stages. Bridge of Eldin is not nearly as massive as Temple is, but it's one of the bigger stages introduced in Brawl.

Let's talk about the size first. This stage is just one flat bridge. You would think that this would make it easier, since there are no moving platforms, no upper or lower levels, no hidden areas, easy, right? Well, not always. If you are an avid two-player brawler, you shouldn't have much trouble with this. It's when you expand to three- to four-player brawls that this becomes a problem. I am talking about the camera positioning. The camera is set so that whenever someone moves away from the center, it will pan out so that person will never go off-camera. This makes the stage seem much bigger, and with the bigger stage, you will get more air-space between the ground and KO height at the top. Basically, when you launch your opponents, you will either need the force of an Electrode explosion or the launch power of a bumper. Most of the time, when you send your opponent flying, they will go up in an arc and come back down on the other side of the bridge, if they've manipulated it well, thus giving them time to recover and forcing you to run all the way across the darn thing to get them. The camera positioning not only hinders vertical KOs, it also makes it hard to see what you are doing. When the fighters are at either end of the stage, the camera will stay panned out, and small items like Deku Nuts, Screw Attacks, and Franklin Badges will be lost until it's too late, as well as making it nearly impossible to identify poisonous Mushrooms without hitting the camera function and zooming in, which can ruin your plan entirely. Items also fall on the far sides often, so you will have to run all over the place to get to them when the middle is gone, but more about that later. If you have vision problems, like I do, you might have a hard time keeping up with the action when the camera is this far away.

Now, on to the positives for this stage's size! It seems like this is the perfect stage for a certain type of Final Smash- that's right, the straight-shot. All four of the LoZ characters have one of these, as well as Marth, Mario, and Samus. The straight shot is perfect for a Zero Laser, and the length of the bridge will keep Marth from getting a KO, unless you use his right at the edge of the sides. Ganondorf has the best advantage here. Beast Ganon has a HUGE range, and dragging your opponent over that much of the stage will do a lot of damage, as well as pulling in anyone who might have escaped at the beginning. This stage is also good for characters like Snake, where you have to aim at your opponent. The lack of any other ledges helps to keep your opponent in one place. Really, only a few characters get the short end of the stick here, like Luigi, Donkey Kong, and Jigglypuff. When your Final Smash is stuck at one end of the stage, your opponents will be laughing at you from the other side. Try to draw them in close, then surprise them. Besides the Final Smash pluses, this stage has pretty short sides compared to its height. You might find it easier to just lauch your opponent off the side, as I do, and it works when the camera is fully panned out.

After that, you might think this is just a lame bridge, if you've never played on it before. But experienced Brawlers and LoZ players know that this is not the case. I speak, of course, of King Bulbin and Lord Bulbo. After about a minute into your brawl, more or less, they will charge onto the stage, full-force, and drop a bomb right in the middle of it. You will know when he's coming. If you miss the war horn and the rumbling, the camera will pan out to look at whatever direction he's coming from, unless you are already standing on that side of the stage. You'll want to watch out for him, too. If you're in his path, he will run you over. You have to jump over Lord Bulbo and hit King Bulbin so he falls back. Until he gets up, he won't do any more damage to the other players. But he will drop the bomb regardless of when you hit him. You don't have very long with the thing, so I suggest evacuating as soon as possible. It doesn't do a whole lot of damage when it explodes, but the force will launch you right to the sides, and if you've got about 50% damage, you will get KO'ed. If you can trap your opponents near the bomb before it explodes, you should be good to go.

So you now have to deal with a huge hole in the middle of the stage. This forces the battle to be fought on either side, which can get annoying with the camera situation. If your opponent runs around a lot, you will have a lot of chasing to do to get at them. I would suggest that you avoid trying to cross over the hole if you are using a bigger character such as Bowser, and definitely if you are using an Up Special that can send you plummeting to your death, like Ike or Kirby. This can get especially tricky when the Smash Ball comes out. It will take its sweet time moving from side to side, and characters who enjoy an extra couple of jumps will get the advantage when it's stuck in the middle. When it comes to this, you will just have to wait it out for a Twilight Portal to put everything back together again.

Well, that's all for me this month, Brawlers! Hope this inspires you to cross a few bridges, and maybe win a match or two! See you next month on BRAWL TACTICS!