8:12 Unrelated to the topic but i find this image really funny. Looks like ZSS as a Cop is chassing criminals in Wario who is panicking, Wolf who wants to shoot her back, Joker who is running like he can never be caught and PT who is finding them an escape route.

I personally think that Joker is definitely a bait and punish character. I used to play him like a rush down, similar to how I play Mythra but I kept doing poorly. Once I made the realization that he's a bait and punish character and not a rush down aggressive character I started getting a lot better results

Tbh I think the pandemic had something to do with the rise of zoners. It was an online meta, so zoners naturally got a bit of a buff, but then people had all this time to lab and realize, "Oh, this is unironically kind of broken!" Edit: This seems unrelated to the video, but I'm tryna say that I don't think rushdown characters got worse. I just think that the zoners got better over time.

The thing is that every character designed to be rush down has the tools to be better at bait and punish character since fast movment and safe hitboxes are the best way to force panic and win interactions,unless your shiek and you have to constantly be in your opponent's face to get back a percent lead every rushdown designed character is better at being a bait and punish character.

Smash Ultimate has gradually morphed into a "first to initiate, first to lose" vibe so I'm not surprised

I think it's hilarious that Light is the leading player in a dying archetype, because he's notoriously bad at ANY other character, so it seems like he'd have a lot of difficulty switching to adapt

I think it's a matter of adapting to the current meta Examples are Yoshi, Joker and Wolf, characters that can play very rushdown heavy or slow down and cap / play for baIt and punish. Looking at Yoshi, Yoshidora often plays very spacing oriented, using eggs, fair and bair to try gain center stage and condition the opponent into a bad spot, and then Yoshi can just pull his usual bread and butter combos to get a percent lead and from there it's just a matter of landing an edgeguard, a kill confirm or a raw kill move Even though Yoshi is mostly a rushdown character, due to how the game is being played and the characters that are popular, you can't play full in your face offense, you have to force an opening through spacing and your neutral tools. Wolf has become very Blaster Spam focused, because it's a safe way to preassure What keeps Pikachu from being a bottom tier is thunderjolt, you can run in with it and force the opponent to jump or shield, and if you read it you can punish, but you can't just brainlessly run in because you are stubby, you need a plan and setup It's not a dead archetype, nor is it ruined, but you have to play it differently, you can't just outmash the opponent, you have to know when and how to run in. It's just shaking off the bad habit many have of just "haha run in and mash A".

Joker seems more like a character that uses his mobility and tiny hurtbox to schmove around opponents and find openings, similar to Metaknight with his jumps and fast falls or Wario with his aerial drift Wario I would also say is more of a schmovement thread the needle character, and Wolf is the definition of bait and punish. PT is obviously a mix of archetypes but I would say only Squirtle is a rush down

Some of them have, but before watching the video I would say it's not them specifically, just the playstyle itself. Only characters who genuinely have to hold forward (who weren't the best of those characters to begin with) are falling away, like Falcon and Roy (where even Roy could be more of an issue with his players being uncomfortable with the forced change in playstyle).

at 10:20 Cosmos actually recently tweeted he's trying to make the inkling work again, and he's dropping PaM.

I think a big contributor to this is not being able to shield out of dash. In earlier games every character had access to this insane defensive option. Now you have to commit to dashing, which makes closing space much harder than earlier games. Without this defensive option, rushdowns have very little to protect themselves from ults slew of confirms and high-damage moves

Unfortunately the meta has shifted more towards defensive playstyle, which is why zoners and whiff punish characters are more viable. This has also made it so that sets are more boring too watch imo

I think gameplay is overall more healthy when rushdown characters are strong because there is an inherent level of risk in taking aggressive actions and that risk should be rewarded. Second, I think the game is more entertaining to watch and has a higher overall skill ceiling when these characters are played.

I play very rushdown style mii brawler. And I found the most difficult part is when I make a small mistake and then get bodied hard, or when my opponent adapts to all of my options and I feel I have no more entry points. I can be pretty rough.

It's funny that Sonic was supposed originally to be a rushdown character. But Sakurai refuses to let go of Brawl moveset they made in the last minute.

In conclussion: FP2 was a *massive mistake.* Rushdown was already being learned.

The more I play the more I discovered that rushdown and aggression is at a larger disadvantage as if you wiff you are going to get punished hard and a lot of rush down characters don't have the best disadvantages.

Video Idea: Why LITERALLY NO ONE plays Mii Swordfighter. I would love to see their flaws explained in depth.

Sheik, joker, diddy kong, zss and chrom are not rush down characters. Just because they are fast does not make them rush down. Rush down is an archetype based on playstyle. If you play any of these characters as if they were fox or pikachu you would lose against any half witted player. Their speed is not just to close distance but to set up their superior neutral and for zss to enable her evasive ability and whiff punishing. But for someone like falcon, his speed is mainly for closing distance because his neutral is pretty ass even with his high speed.

Is Captain Falcon the type of character that warrants a video with the title "Why No One Plays" or "Why Everyone Plays"? Or perhaps a different title altogether like "Why (Not) Everyone Plays Captain Falcon"? He seems very common at lower levels of play but not very common at all in higher levels.

Personally I feel like every rushdown character has had to transform into a bait and punish character. with how good out of shield options are in the high level meta it feels like a lot of characters one might consider "rushdown" moreso just camp at burst range and throw out stuff until someone comes into their protective bubble and gets clipped by it or whiffs a move nearby so they can punish. kazuya and steve 0-deaths I think also scare people into desperately not wanting to get clipped by a move, so they play them like this. This was lowkey a thing before with luigi and a few other advantage heavy characters but I think this fear really took off once they saw how broken these two characters combos are.

Rush down characters are easily the best to watch. The switch to characters who excel against rush down is gonna hurt the watchability of Smash long term. It’s sad to see this laid out and sucks that Smash is moving away from having fun with characters to camping and waiting

Imo, if your character can be generalized as a rush down, then by default they are also able to bait and punish. Vice versa might not hold the same results, though.

I think another important note is that almost every game, especially platform fighters like smash, gradually shifts towards more patient play as the meta develops. Even Melee is noticeably more meticulous given many top players heavy emphasis on positioning, which goes to show defensive options won't matter as much as the ability to maintain an advantage when everyone can potentially 0td off of any stray interaction. (Which is why I believe Sonic has seen a significant rise) As far as Light's antithetical playstyle gets him, eventually people will grind out these sorts of uncomfortable interactions and develop such an acute game sense that these strategies will inherently become less effective.

11:37, that roy didnt just go for a read he went for a whole book xD

I just got into competing in smash ultimate after being a long time viewer and I main sheik, with a rushdown falco and cloud secondary, and I prioritize aggression, and as I've started to enter tournaments I have become very aware that movement both forwards and backwards become very important especially against matchups like diddy, where movement and bait and punish game becomes so important, Even if it is less fun than absolutely not letting the other player play the game, focusing on options like movement help me to still enjoy the intricacies of Smash and make me a better player.

The archetypical rushdown characters are Fox and Captain Falcon. Get in fast, do a lot of damage, get out fast, and rely almost completely on fast movement and fast frame data to do that. One of their other trademark features is that they are glass cannons: they have among the worst disadvantage states in the game, and are often very easy to KO or edge guard. The difference between brawlers and rushdowns is thay brawlers have a much better disadvantage state, and arent super easy to kill in comparison. Brawlers also tend to have a bit slower frame data.

Terry mythra roy and Fox is one of the few rushdown characters that adapt the New slower paced more bait and punish playstyle

The problem with rush down is they have poor Edge guarding safe options. Joker with out arsen grenjia the pikas are the only true safe rush down off stage fighters everyone else has a much greater risk to reward where it’s better to just stay on stage even the ones I mention still prefer to stay on stage and spam back air

Always love your videos mate

I think part of whiff punishing being favored over rushdown is that they're two sides of the same coin, but rushdown is more committal. Where whiff punishing is punishing endlag, rushdown requires you to punish startup by using your faster frame data. It's essentially always easier to react to a move whiffing (startup, active frames, and endlag) rather than just the startup, where it's almost always a read. Lastly, dedicated rushdowns usually still have strong whiff punishing, but many whiff punishers can't rush down as well.

Love you Vars, you somehow always post a video on the topic I’m thinking about at the right time I’m thinking about it

the fire nation joke made me laugh

I think a good way to tell you are playing a rush down character is if you are holding foward most of the match

My personal verdict on rushdown brawlers: I think rushdown-ers are mostly decent. However, I think that smaller rushdown-ers (E.g: Pikachu and Pichu) do better than the most due to their size (especially Pika). Smaller size = less of a chance of getting hit. Pretty simple, right? I suppose that by now, with the passing of time, people have learn't how to properly deal with them. It's crazy that Light's still been keeping Fox alive. Dude deserves respect.

Video Idea: The History of 8 Player Smash

I think the major reason is that most rushdown characters have a deceptively high skill floor and deceptively low skill ceiling. Watch any upper mid/high tier players and you'll see that they're much more focused on fishing for glancing blows to stun their opponent into a combo/kill attack. What makes a rushdown character so menacing is how safe yet precise these glancing blows are to throw out. You need to be smart about how you throw them out but these characters have such a slim window to be punished. A high level player is much smarter about when to start spamming attacks. As the meta progresses, everyone starts learning the optimal neutrals of these rushdown characters and are much better able to counter. High level rushdown players are more quickly realizing the limited toolsets of their mains once their opponent knows their playbook. Either through heavy punishers like Steve and Kazuya knowing a characters optimal neutral or through longer disjointed attacks like Aegis not giving rushdown characters room to breath while being unable to get in. The more prevalent parry meta makes this even more difficult for rushdown characters.

Love the channel but youve gotta upgrade your mic or change your sound mixing it is very hard to hear you

Rush downs have become more difficult overall due to defensive options and invincibility became much more prominent. They have always been more of a glass canon (or have a glaring weakness), but now get exploited more by tools that majority of characters have. That being said there are 2 things that make a good rush down, that you mentioned, but didn’t go into much detail on 1: rush downs often have to use their tools to force options. A character like Roy, who can struggle offstage or at an awkward midrange excels at racking up damage, taking early stocks, pressuring shield, and having good and safe frame data. Swinging aimlessly no longer works as well, but precise timings can gain an early lead where now someone needs to approach you to exploit weaknesses. Terry is very similar in current practicality and execution 2: offence is defence. A lot of rush downs excel at pressuring and have great tools or movement or both to always make someone uncomfortable. I’ll examine Light like you did, the reason he does so well with Fox is because he rarely commits to a hard shield and doesn’t throw out options without purpose. You might say he’s mashing when he bairs Glutonny’s Leo’s or Sonix’s shield 5 times at ledge, but it’s how fox plays defence. Those bairs are all spaced where a burst option struggles and won’t amount to much if they even manage to hit. He’s trying to pressure a roll or jump, or condition into shield, saying “you can’t hit me, if you move you lose your stock”. On top of that he knows Fox falls insanely fast, and uses short and full hops, as well as fast falls and double jumps, to mix up his landings and stay untouchable What makes a good rush down currently is their ability to pressure defensively and explode offensively

Anyone know what song is playing in the background?

great video!

Damn, I didn't think that Rushdowns were falling off. I thought that they were still broken and still taking games, sets and tourneys. But you convinced me completely otherwise, especially with the dodging mention (But that still happens online anyways with the Bad netcode). The best way to understand the process of the game itself is by watching the pros. Everybody knows the Unga Bunga tactics and are baiting them perfectly. No wonder the Rushdown fighters were dropped by their mains.

Props for the ff14 music. Took me a second to recognize it

The reason why people say FP2 is ruining the game is because even though every fighter has a hard counter, when you’re being forced to use specific characters to counter a few, very OP ones, that’s a problem

Looking at the patch notes it feels so weird to see cloud buffed cuz now he's the one dominating the meta

Wario is not a rushdown character, his ability to hold forward is limited and his kit is far more specialised to whiff-punishing.

I think Rushdown fell off because they're only good against slow opponents and almost none of em are Meta, and trying to rush down characters like zoners won't work when many if them have strong out of shield punishes forcing you to slow down

Dhalsim has had hurtboxes on his limbs since SNES…and someone still thought disjoints on min min was a good idea :(

Loved this

camping/zoning is just too strong in smash brothers. Its more balanced in other fighting games due to lack of available screen but smash is unique where the stage is tremendously bigger in all directions, playing a character that isnt lightning fast and doesnt have a fireball of some kind just feels bad, and its made worse when the other person does.

Since the meta is evolving organically, its just a matter of tie before rushdown becomes meta again

the only reason why rushdowns were ever "viable" was because ppl wanted to play this way. Not interacting is the best way to win since melee.

Spectating wise, I suppose I'm in the minority or not being indifferent or favorited to watching specific character types. I just like watching Smash in its many forms. Fun I think is still pretty subjective too, but that's to joy of smash. Still nice video! The FFXIV music almost made me think I was running the game while watching this lol.

I’m surprised kazuya isn’t top 5 honestly the damage output is insane and his punish game with the ewgf is also insane

Can't wait for a video about the "choosing to lose" characters 🙏

Cool video, do you want to do some 1v1s

I will always play rushdowns even if they have fallen off cause they’re fun

Cosmos going back to Inkling now

Love the use of XIV music. Yesssss

I see you with that FF14 music.

Incineroar is bad at approaching so he can only really punish people and wall them out which makes your prioritize positioning better and microspacing for a whiff punish The most aggressive spot for incineroar is high above in the air adjacent to someone on the ground

smartboarddddd back at it again lets go man

12:04 So... Sonix. Honestly I'd be cool with more people playing patient and aggressive as need be.

rushdowns still work, but the changing meta does mean different playstyles will be needed for rushdowns to perform again.

I feel like a Why NO ONE Plays Duck Hunt would be interesting since as a below average smash player, he seems pretty good but on the official tier list, he's in C- tier and I'm not sure why.

Rushdowns fell off because the game didn't benefit them as much compared to zoners, bait and punish, turtlers, keep aways and other more defensive archetypes in reality. Make most moves safe in the game and you can't exactly punish mistakes now can you. Passive aggressive isn't agressive now is it and thats what spamming safe moves on a shield is. Rushdowns usually have significantly less reward and safety compared to other characters too. FP2 isn't what caused this. People figured out the gamestate is all. If rushdowns make a comeback it won't be from them rushing down but moreso from them taking more defensive playstyles and embodying a similar style to kazuya and bait and punish types. Also still waiting for people to start parrying more. It can be good in some situations and not only that but even if the opponent has a safe move and you parry as long as it aint samus or a projectile character that can punish parries you could use it as a tool to get in someone's head and even those with the proper timing you could use parries. Defense is just inherently stronger in ultimate and whiff punishing is significantly weaker to the point it does not exist which contributes to rushdowns struggling. Hitbox interpolation being more whack, hurtbox shifting being a bigger deal, lack of crossups, lack of large combos because of balloon knockback, lack of threatening grabs for a lot of the cast and its not hard to see why the rushdowns fell off. Ultimate is just a major game of cheese and advantage and if you don't have a monster neutral, monster advantage, or majorly cheesy gimmick your character is gonna struggle hard regardless how well they are designed. Cloud rose because of his monstrous neutral while his advantage leaves a lot to be desired while roy fell because his neutral isn't strong enough to carry his advantage when his advantage won't be having him TOD characters. Aegis fell off a while ago and the proof is in the results of everytime someone uses them and loses constantly which happens a lot now. Ultimate was never an aggressive game to begin with.

Can you do “Why No One Plays Bowser Jr”

Yes and this is why I kinda hate smash ultimate lately. The meta rewards camping and playing slow/cheesy as opposed to being more combo based like I really wish it was... The meta has made the game so boring and lame and Im just waiting for Rivals 2 at this point.

I should go back to Fox. He is just the best character in this game.

most diddy kong mentions in a vars video

Music pls it’s so good 😊

I feel this has already aged because Cosmos started playing Inkling again 💀

You should make a pacman or pokemon trainer video

Joker is definitely a rush down but he’s a rush down like sonic. It’s not optimal to play him like that better to play bait and punish

I haven't played this game in over a year

Chrom is a Swordie and Terry is a Footsie

I think there is a distinction with playing rushdown properly (bobbing and weaving) and unga bunga.

You can’t say that Ned held on to ranking better than gluto did 😭 Gluto is still top 10, Ned is not top 150

Yeah the meta has shifted to way lamer playstyles and to characters nobody enjoys fighting. Here's to hoping smash 6 doesn't make the same mistakes if/when it comes

Why is Mr. Game & Watch consider as an "anti-rushdown" fighter? Can you explain this?

Still waiting for why no one plays causal smash / CAUSAL SMAHS IS DESD

Very based of you for the FF14 bgm

In my opinion there are two ways to play sonic play like a Rush down or play campy I would also call Mii brawler a Rush down because of his combos

Yoshi’s doing ok, but he’s arguably a trapper. I think he’s a rushdown as well as a trapper tbh

YAWN!!!

Had to do a double take take the FF14 music playing in the background

I would say Rushdown hasn't disappeared, but been melded with other architypes. Steve is a Trapper/Rushdown Aegis and Joker are Bait & Punish/Rushdown (Pyra/Joker & Mythra/Arsene)

I still feel that fighter pass 2 ruined the game as a spectator buffer ruined it as a player for me but fighter pass 2 made the game so dull as a spectator and also the people just made adaptations would make rushdowns useless in melee I feel it was the fact that every character can wall you out now which made it worse

zero suit :(

Fox is still strong and sees high level play from Light. Terry is still strong and sees high level play from Riddles when he wants to. Captain Falcon is not a bad pick. The players themselves have been struggling.

slaaldad samus

I know this is irrelevant but hearing FFXIV music over smash just reminds me of how much I've wanted a FFXIV fighter for years 😔

isn’t Sonic a rush down? i play him like one

Do why everyone plays Dr Mario

wow the change was wierd

Only inkling. Also terry is not a rush down

not tryna horny-post but zss at 8:10 oh my goodness

People just realized Smash Ultimate is a casual and spam-heavy "keepaway" battle game. I sat "keepaway" because its a better representation of the playstype than "zoner." "Zoner" is a term coward/keepaway players made up to feel better about their playstyle. I dont call Smash a fighting game because it doesnt really involve fisticuffs... its a battle game. You battle with your long range guns and pokes. Thank god I play Tekken and only bust this game out for parties. Its true face has finally been revealed. Guy who made the video is now coming around to realizing it. Imagine treating Smash as an actual legit fighting game.... these realizations are the inevitable result.

Roy still feels too 6 to me so idk rush down still rlly good against not Steve and kaz and rob

the risk reward ratio is too high to gamble a win