End of Day



End of Day is the name of Olimar's Final Smash. Captain Olimar takes off in his spaceship (which traps and hurts enemies, doing about 27% damage from entering to take-off), leaving his opponents alone for Red Bulborbs (a common Pikmin enemy) to attack them. During the duration of the Bulborb attacks, the opponents receive about 47% damage. Afterwards, the ship crash lands back onto the stage, hurting (34%) anyone in its path. A perfectly performed End of Day attack can cause nearly 100% damage to the opponents, plus the final explosion is a One-hit KO except in very specific circumstances, placing this Final Smash as one of the most devastating in the entire game. Despite being left behind, Olimar's Pikmin are unharmed, but left vulnerable to attack. It is advised to use Pikmin Order after the Final Smash ends to get them back to Olimar as quickly as possible.

Upon activation of this move, the camera will follow Olimar's ascent into space and then fixate on the sky, meaning that opposition players struggle to see what they are doing or where they are going. The time of day changes to nighttime for the duration of this Final Smash, no matter what stage one is playing on. Strangely enough, pausing the match whilst this attack is going on won't give an ordinary view of the stage like it normally would. This is because the Bulborbs are not actually summoned; although still images of the creatures can be spotted popping up at the bottom of the screen, the characters are able to move around freely and do not suffer any knockback or even flinch while taking damage from them.

When finishing the move, the explosion from the crashing ship sends Olimar shooting up to the top of the screen in a state similar to helplessness (it uses the tumbling animation, but he cannot perform any attacks until he touches solid ground, just like when he is helpless). Until Olimar lands from this jump, the Pikmin will not move to him and he can't perform Pikmin Order. Opponents can then kill Pikmin quickly before they react.

The confirmation of the move at Smash Bros. DOJO!! stated that if more fighters are present, the move does more damage. On the other hand, if more fighters are dueling when this Final Smash is initiated, then there is more of a chance that the fighters would steal Olimar's KOs. Masahiro Sakurai stated that this was to balance the move out.

Remember that Olimar's ship always falls at the center of the stage, so is a good idea to pitfall trap the opponents at the center and upper part of the stage. The ship's liftoff can trap opponents in the stage, similar to the effect caused by the Pitfall item or Donkey Kong's Headbutt special move, but only if they are close to the ship at liftoff. Thus a good strategy in one-on-one combat is to, with a Smash Ball equipped, lure an opponent to a spot where they can be hit by the returning rocket, then attempt to use the Final Smash to pitfall trap them there. This can be done on multiple opponents but is very difficult.

Olimar's ship is a Meteor Smash if it hits a foe in midair. Another possible use of End of Day therefore is to edgeguard by intercepting recovering enemies with the ship, and it's also virtually impossible to Meteor Cancel.

However, End of Day can be avoided by characters with high vertical recovery like Pit and R.O.B. or characters with multiple midair jumps such as Kirby and Jigglypuff, although it may be difficult to tell if you are going to land on the ground or not, or if you are within range of the ship's attack when it falls.

Trophy Info
''Olimar's Final Smash. Dusk falls, and his spaceship makes a landing. Olimar takes the Onion, with all his Pikmin aboard, and blasts off for the stars. In Pikmin, native life-forms grew active and violent at night, making it lethal to remain on the surface--this is why Olimar would take his Onions and leave at night. This technique breaks the framework of the game.''

Origin
Olimar's Final Smash originates from Pikmin on the Nintendo Gamecube, where at the end of each day (hence the name), Olimar would have to gather up his army and then fly off into the atmosphere in his ship, the Dolphin, along with the Pikmin Onions. If any Pikmin are left behind they are eaten by predators on the surface - in the cutscenes, Red Bulborbs are shown to hunt at night, which is why they were the selected enemies for the attack in SSBB. The vessel used by the Captain in Brawl, known as the Hocotate Ship, is taken from Pikmin 2 and the landing could possibly be a reference to either the ship crash at the beginning or the bad end of the first Pikmin.

Trivia

 * The trophy states that Olimar takes the Onion, but he takes his ship, the Hocotate Ship. In fact, Onions don't even appear in his Final Smash. Furthermore, Olimar leaves the Pikmin behind, even though it says he takes them aboard.
 * If on the top layer of blocks on the underground section of Mushroomy Kingdom, a player can completely avoid the Bulborbs during Olimar's Final Smash.
 * Certain stages (such as custom stages) will cause Olimar to SD after using this Final Smash; since the ship will always fall in the center of the stage, it will drop right through if there is no platform in the middle. This can also happen just before the loop in Mushroomy Kingdom 1-2. (Of course, this will probably not actually count as an SD due to Brawl's illogical KO-alloting system.)
 * If the Final Smash is used when the stage has been flipped upside-down on Spear Pillar, the Bulborbs will still appear on the bottom of the screen, in the night sky. Strangely, opponents are still damaged even though they aren't being touched by the Bulborbs.
 * Strangely, if a character manages to get in the screen with the night sky during the final smash, if in the right position, Olimar's ship will hit said character and Star KO them.
 * In New Pork City the tower thats on the top of the stage in the background, can be seen in the night sky.
 * In Yoshi's Island (SSBB), you can see the moon where Yoshi fought Raphael the Raven.
 * Because the attack involves moving the screen away from the main stage, in a team battle, teammates can take hoop damage even if Friendly Fire is off.
 * In the underground section of Castle Siege, instead of the night sky you can see the roof of the cave.
 * Meta Knight and Pit are the only characters that can completely avoid Olimar's Final Smash without help from platforms. Jigglypuff and Kirby can dodge it too, but they need a platform to kick start their jumps high enough to avoid the Final Smash.
 * Olimar can SD by using his Final Smash on a custom stage with no floor in the center.
 * Olimar can also SD in a glitch in [Mushroomy Kingdom]. For this to work, Olimar will have to use his FS right where the stage loops. If done right, the Hocotate Ship will fall through the floor and Olimar will SD.