Super Smash Bros. Wii U has eight player battles, MewTwo

By Brenna Hillier

Super Smash Bros. Wii U is the subject of today’s Nintendo Direct, with plenty of great news rolling out for fans.

Super Smash Bros. Wii U will have eight-player battles, Nintendo confirmed during the presentation today.

It’s an offline only mode, and only available on certain stages, but still very cool, and confirms speculation triggered by unused audio files found in the 3DS version. There will also be a five-player mode.

In other mode news, Coin battles are confirmed, and there’ll be a mode called Special Smash in which you can customise item drops (including switching them off) among other parameters to make “absurd” matches.

Unlike the 3DS version, Classic mode is now based on your skill, with no path choices. You can bring a friend and play Classic mode with two players. You can up the difficulty to earn better rewards. Completing classic mode rewards you with an ending cinematic, and each character has their own cinematic.

All-Star mode is different from the 3DS version; you’ll start by facing off against the newest characters and proceed in reverse chronological order. This mode also caters for two players.

Smash Tour is a board game mode for up to four players. You can unlock new characters in this mode.

The Stadium now supports multiplayer.

Another new mode called Special Orders features Master Hand and Crazy Hand. Players will have to follow orders and complete objectives in battles. You need to spend gold or use a pass to participate in Crazy Hand.

Characters

There will be 40 characters available right from the start of the game, before you start unlocking extras. Your customised Mii character can be imported from the 3DS.

MewTwo is joining the roster, but won’t be available until northern spring 2015. He’ll be a free DLC character for those who own both the 3DS and Wii U versions of the game.

Stages

There will be much larger stages than in the 3DS version, including Palutena’s Temple, Temple, Big Battlefield. Three new stages were shown – a Miiverse level; Jungle Hijinx; and The Great Cave Offensive, inspired by Kirby Super Star. The Wii U version has a greater number of stages than the 3DS version.

There’s also a custom stage creation suite, using the Wii U Game Pad to directly draw geometry.

Multiplayer

Nintendo recommends the Wii U LAN adapter if you don’t have a good WiFi connection.

You can bring a friend with you to challenge anyone in online play.

A 64-player custom tournament mode is planned, but won’t be available at launch.

You can use the GamePad’s microphone to talk with friends in lobbies and menus, but not during online play.

Miscellaneous

Custom controller layouts are supported.

There will be many more trophies, which can be customised with images captured in Photo Mode. You can earn trophies in All-Star mode or Trophy Rush, which supports two players. Some trophies will include demos for retro games, with links to purchase the full thing in the eShop.

Amiibo characters will grow in experience by battling or if you feed them spare equipment. You can pit them against others, challenge them yourself and make them fight each other. If you take your figures to other people’s consoles to play, you may get an XP boost. Amiibo will bring you presents when they come back from battles.

A sharing suite will be implemented post-launch, allowing users to easily swap screenshots, videos and custom stages.

Nintendo is very proud of the soundtrack. All the music from the 3DS version returns, as well as loads of new stuff, including some from new composers. You’ll be able to select which music you want in menus. The full soundtrack of both games will be available from Club Nintendo as a two disc set, for a limited time only.

Nintendo had more than 50 new facts to share about Super Smash Bros. Wii U and we definitely missed a few, so watch the presentation replay to see them all. That’s the embed just below.