Smash It Up! - Reader's Arenas

CoroCoro's character reveal turned out to be a bust, as no new information on any element of Brawl ended up debuting in the pages of that publication. The SmashBros.com blog did get around to confirming a couple of new Assist Trophies, though, which is more major character news than we've had in quite a while – Waluigi and Stafy, both featured in past editions of Smash It Up!, will both be Assistants in Brawl.

The lack of new character news caused us to refocus our feature last week, turning away from the traditional lineup of possible mascots and instead taking a look at a handful of wishlist fighting stages. The fan community welcomed the shift with open arms, as it's a breath of fresh air to talk about something other than the fighting roster for a change. Here are a few of the comments received:

Potomo: "They all sound good. The only one I don't really like is the "under the sea," one. Also thank you for switching to stages."

csaskater: "I love all of these ideas, fantastic job. The ones I want to see the most though would be Green Hill Zone, Bowser's Castle, and Construction Site. If those are not all stages in this game, I will be disappointed. I can live without the other two."

pokemaniac5999: "I'm surprised Luigi's Mansion wasn't there... Reader's choice?? Oh, by the way, great job. The nice, refreshing change of pace was appreciated. We need more of these stage Smash it Ups! "

sam.26: "We NEED a stage based off of Luigi's masion. Like Dry_Bones would say, Readers choice or DIE."

Man, what's with the death threats recently? I'm getting a little scared at this point, and so I've got no choice but to shamefully concede to the fans' demands and award this week's Reader's Choice to:

Luigi's Mansion
First Appearance: Luigi's Mansion, GameCube, 2001
Suggested By: sam.26

Several of you weighed in with your suggestions of Luigi's Mansion, but sam.26 was first to the punch – and he's right when he says we NEED a stage based on the brother in green's house of horrors. Luigi's Mansion was a launch title for the GameCube in 2001, and had to tide over fans of the Mario franchise while Super Mario Sunshine stayed in development for another several months. The game put Mario's little twin brother Luigi into his first title role, as he explored a haunted mansion filled with ghosts and defeated them by sucking them up with a super-powered vacuum.

The Mansion itself really became the star of the game as you explored it more and more, eventually seeing every interior area before having a final showdown up on the roof. And that's where Luigi's Mansion would make a great arena for Brawl. Put all the fighters up on the roof of the building and fight it out, while various ghosties and ghoulies appear in the background or even step in to interfere in the fight. Luigi would be able to claim the Mansion as his home stage, of course, and it would be perfectly appropriate since it's highly likely that his Poltergust 3000 backpack will be integrated into his standard moveset this time around.

It seems like a great idea, and indeed Luigi's Mansion might have already been confirmed. There was a brief appearance of a background that looked like it could be the mansion in a recent promotional video, as Squirtle demonstrated one of his special moves. Let's hope that's exactly what it was, and that the Mansion makes a comeback.

Well, now, that should curb the death threats, right? Right? Yeah, probably not good enough, is it? OK, then, seems like a fine enough time to jump into an idea I've been holding back on bringing out for a while. Let's do an all Reader's Choice edition this time.

Really, there were so many great suggestions for stages from you guys that it's silly to just pick one and brush off the rest. So here are five more Reader's Choice stage suggestions, interpreted with a few extra IGN ideas. We'll dub this edition "Reader's Arenas."

Mt. Dedede
First Appearance: Kirby's Dream Land, Game Boy, 1991
Suggested By: TheNakedGamer

Our favorite, uncomfortable-to-be-around, wears-no-clothes forum friend TheNakedGamer was the first to mention this possibility, which was considered for our last edition but didn't quite make the cut – Mt. Dedede. We talked last time about Bowser's Castle, and how Bowser deserves to have his own home stage in Brawl. Well, King Dedede should get the same treatment – with a Brawlified version of his own home fortress serving as a new fighting arena.

Mt. Dedede is the King's fortress on a peak, and looks to be a fairly standard castle from the outside. But in its innermost chambers, there exists, of all things, a wrestling ring. A good old squared circle, the likes of which you'd see on WWE Monday Night Raw. The ring was the site of the final battle from Kirby's original adventure, as also appeared again in several subsequent games like Kirby Super Star on the SNES. You can see from the images below that it was a pretty basic location when first seen on the Game Boy, but later came alive with color and depth, and a crowd of on-lookers cheering in the background.

Mt. Dedede would be the perfect home stage for King Dedede, and would also be the perfect excuse to remix the King's nearly famous battle music. (Click here to download a MIDI version and have a listen, to refresh your memory.)

Tourian
First Appearance: Metroid, NES, 1987
Suggested By: msanis88

The Smash series needs to do something new with Metroid. It was represented in Smash 64 by a stage with rising lava. Then it was represented in Melee by a stage with rising lava. Now, coming up in Brawl, it's set to be represented by a stage with – shocker – rising lava. Boooring. Give us something different.

There are tons of much more interesting locations to exploit in the Metroid series, and it's time we see a few of them utilized instead of the same old Norfair stuff. The entire Prime series seems to just be getting outright ignored by Brawl's developers, which is a shame, but even still the in-house Nintendo-developed installments of the series have lots of other locations to choose from. msanis88 suggests Mother Brain's chamber, in the region of Planet Zebes called Tourian.

It's an excellent choice. Mother Brain can't exactly be a fighter herself, or an Assist Trophy. Maybe a boss character, but the last option – a stage hazard, would be very interesting to see. The stage could be laid out with the same style of floating platforms seen below, with some walls made of destructible Zebetites providing random barriers. Metroids could swarm the screen and attack on occasion, and Mother Brain herself could take up residence in her tradition location on the far left side of the screen. It would be unique, it would be interesting, and for goodness sakes it would be different than the old lava-rising Norfair.

The Wetlands
First Appearance: Duck Hunt, NES, 1985
Suggested By: mysterio905

Back in the Animal Kingdom installment of Smash It Up!, we suggested the infamous laughing Duck Hunt Dog as a possible playable fighter. And while giving the hound a playable spot is certainly a stretch, we'd still love to see him included in some way. Maybe as an Assist Trophy, but even better would be as an element in a Duck Hunt stage.

"The Wetlands" is what we'll call the area where the original Duck Hunt takes place, a grassy marsh where you, as a hunter, have gone to test your aim and luck on the local flying fowl. The laughing dog appears and flushes out the flock, as you then fire off shots with your Zapper. Sometimes the ducks manage to hide themselves, either behind the large tree on the left or the bush on the right.

As a Brawl arena, the Wetlands could have a similar theme of concealment – the tall grasses could mask your position, especially if you took advantage of Smash's newly-added crawling mechanic. And as a stage hazard, a hovering cursor could occasionally appear on the screen and fire shots at you and your opponents – you yourself would be the hunted, instead of the hunter. Hiding behind a bush, tree or patch of grass could be the way you'd avoid getting blasted, while you worked to smash your opponents out of their own hiding spots and into the path of danger.

Galaxy Tour
First Appearance: Super Mario Galaxy, Wii, 2007
Suggested By: One-Eyed_Bart

Spherical worlds. The vast majority of you Wii-owning readers have likely spent the past month enjoying the experience of playing around on spherical worlds, as Super Mario Galaxy has arrived on Wii and proven to be home to some of Nintendo's most imaginative level design yet. But what if the concept of hovering planetoids, traversable in all directions, became the basis for a stage in Brawl?

It could be an amazing arena, as you and your opponents ran and fought in a full 360 degrees while running around a circular sphere. The way to smash an opponent off the stage would be to hit them in any direction – really, any direction, as up, down, left, right and every angle in-between would all be possibilities. The only catch would be the planetoid's natural gravity – you'd have to hit your foe hard enough for them to "break free" of the planet's downward-pulling force and send them sailing to score a point.

And even more interesting than a single spherical world would be One-Eyed_Bart's concept of a "Galaxy Tour," which would see the fight constantly shifting to a variety of differently sized and shaped planets all drawn from Mario's latest adventure. He blasts off all the time, jumping from one asteroid or hovering block to another, so it would be an even better representation of the game to be constantly on the move. Different planetoids could have greater or lesser gravity, too, making it sometimes easier to score kills, and sometimes more difficult.

There's tons of potential here, but, unfortunately, it would have taken considerable foresight and programming prowess to get such a stage into Brawl. The Mario Galaxy stage may be one that has to stay on the wishlist until the next installment of the Smash series enters development, whenever in the future that would be.

Inside the Pit
First Appearance: Tetris, Game Boy, 1989
Suggested By: Emunator

I didn't forget it – relax. By far the most popular and demanded Reader's Choice for a stage is one that would definitely be a huge amount of fun, and that's an arena set in the bottom of the pit of a Tetris playfield. You'd begin the match on even ground. But then giant-sized Tetris pieces would begin to cascade into play from above, slowly stacking themselves up and constantly changing the shape and platform layout of the arena. As pieces fell down, they'd be aerial platforms – but also huge hazards, as if you got caught underneath one when it settled into place on the bottom of the well, you'd be instantly squashed and killed.

Tetris wasn't originally designed by Nintendo. But the company did license the rights to publish versions of it for both the Game Boy (seen on the left below) and the NES almost 20 years ago. Then, just last year, a new edition called Tetris DS (seen on the right below) graced the Big N's current portable system. It's certainly a possibility, then, that Brawl could utilize the Tetris property and concept to create a Smash Bros. stage. And we hope they do.

The good news is that even if it doesn't happen, you can bet fans all over the world will be flooding Nintendo's Wi-Fi Connection with Tetris-based stages built in Brawl's Stage Builder. It'd be a cinch, wouldn't it? Nothing but basic square blocks to place.

Well, readers, I hope that's enough to calm your spirits and make you put away your murdering weapons for the time being. And that's going to be it for stage suggestions for now – next time, we'll be doing Items. And we want to hear what objects, weapons or other assorted gadgets and gizmos from Nintendo's history would make good additions to the Super Smash Bros. series. Make your opinion known by leaving your comments below with the "Add Comment" feature, or by visiting our Smash Bros. message board. Your concept could be chosen for inclusion in the next edition of the Smash It Up! series, so make your idea public knowledge before someone else beats you to it.

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