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This article is about Link's appearance in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. For other uses, see Link.

Link (リンク, Link) is a starting veteran representing the Legend of Zelda universe. He was confirmed for Super Smash Bros. Brawl He was one of the original 4 members to be confirmed as returning playable character at E3 2006, with the other three being Mario, Kirby, and Pikachu.

Akira Sasanuma, who previously voiced Link in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, reprises his role as the character in Brawl, with recycled voice clips from the game, replacing Nobuyuki Hiyama in 64 & Melee.

Link is ranked 35th on the tier list. Link's projectiles grant him a very strong camping game as well as great range, and he has solid potential vertical endurance. However, Link also suffers from sluggish mobility and moves, and his recovery is extremely poor.

Attributes[]

Link is a heavyweight character, which significantly impacts his mobility and recovery alongside his fast falling speed and slow air speed, though this gives him great vertical endurance, making him difficult to KO.

Link possesses a versatile moveset in his disjointed reach with the Master Sword, projectiles, and Clawshot. All of these traits grant Link a powerful defensive game, making him capable of disrupting approaches from a distance. Link's tilts come out relatively fast, and his aerials, while hampered by his slow air speed, are useful for juggling and spacing.

Link's KO options are powerful, with his smash attacks possessing good speed and powerful, and can lead to potential setups, particularly his down smash. Link's up and down aerials are also good for setups, juggling, and KOing at mid-percentages.

Link possesses a very powerful grab game due to his Clawshot being an extended grab. He also possesses a fast pummel, and his throws can easily chain into other moves.

Link's Special Moves are highly versatile for zoning and setups. Hero's Bow is useful for racking up damage and initiates stalemates against reflectors. Gale Boomerang can gimp recoveries as well as draw in items and opponents close to Link for combo options. Spin Attack is useful for knocking opponents away and juggling opponents. Finally, Bomb can be used to space opponents out due to its moderate power and can be used to aid in Link's recovery.

However, Link possesses a very poor recovery due to his low jumps, slow air speed, and little movement Spin Attack grants. His mobility is also subpar and his attacks have high ending lag, making him an easy character to punish if any of his attacks miss. His projectiles and extended grab can be negated easily by characters excelling in pressuring and negating projectiles.

Overall, Link's high power and respectable camping ability is largely offset by his terrible recovery, unreliable frame data and poor mobility; this gives him a poor approach and almost no reliable method of recovering. Because of his overwhelming weaknesses, he is widely considered non-viable in tournament play, and his representation is almost nonexistent at a competitive level.

Changes from Melee[]

While Link was buffed in power, the nerfs in his mobility drastically nerfed him as a character overall. Most importantly, his recovery is drastically weakened due to Spin Attack gaining little momentum and his lower jumps. In addition, the loss of L-Cancelling and wavedashing diminished Link's approach, and further compounding with his sluggish attacks.

However, Link's zoning game was buffed due to Hero's Bow's faster speed and stronger damage, and Gale Boomerang alleviates some of Link's approach problems by bringing opponents to him. Finally, Link can now use a Tether recovery, which somewhat improves his lackluster recovery, and his Grab Aerial is much more useful for setting up combos.

Cosmetically, Link's design is based off his older appearance from The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, with his weapons being changed their appearance to reflect this, and his Hookshot is now replaced by the Clawshot. Link's black palette swap was reworked to be based on Dark Link, and he now has a yellow costume. He is now voiced by Akira Sasanuma, who had previously voiced Link in Twilight Princess.

Attributes[]

Ground Attacks[]

Aerial Attacks[]

  • Neutral Aerial's initial hit deals less damage and knockback.
  • First hit of Forward Aerial deals less knockback and damage, but second hit deals more damage and knockback.
  • Up Aerial's initial hit deals less damage and knockback, but later hit deals more damage and knockback.
  • Down Aerial deals more knockback.
  • Grab Aerial has no landing lag and has its knockback altered.

Grab and Throws[]

  • Throws deal more damage.
  • Up throw deals much more knockback.

Special Moves[]

  • Hero's Bow charges faster, and arrows travel further and faster.
  • Gale Boomerang replaces Boomerang, creating a miniature tornado when returning to Link that pulls in items and fighters.
  • Spin Attack can be charged when grounded, but gains little horizontal distance when used in the air.
  • Bomb can no longer be hit with aerial Spin Attack while midair.

Moveset[]

Ground Attacks[]

Normal[]

  • Neutral Attack: Slashes twice before stabbing forward. 4% first hit, 3% second hit, 5% third hit.
  • Forward Tilt: Performs an overhead swipe. 13%.
  • Up Tilt: Swings the Master Sword above him in an arc. 9%.
  • Down Tilt: Sweeps the Master Sword across the ground. 12%.
  • Dash Attack: Swings the Master Sword over his shoulder. 12% blade, 10% tip, 11% arm and body

Smash Attacks[]

  • Forward Smash: Performs an inward slash. 15-21% blade, 14-19.6% body. Performs an outward slash if button is pressed again. 17-23.8% blade, 20-28% arm, 19-26.6% body.
  • Up Smash: Slashes three times above him. 4-5.6% first hit, 3-4.2% second hit, 10-14% third hit (blade), 9-12.6% third hit (arm), 8-11.2% third hit (body).
  • Down Smash: Slashes in front of him before slashing behind him. 16-22.4% first hit (blade and body), 14-19.6% first hit (tip), 17-23.8% first hit (arm), 16-22.4% second hit (blade and body), 17-23.8% second hit (arm).

Aerial Attacks[]

  • Neutral Aerial: Kicks outwards. 10% clean, 6% late.
  • Forward Aerial: Performs two sword slashes. 9% first hit, 12% second hit.
  • Back Aerial: Performs two spinning kicks behind him. 4% first hit, 7% second hit.
  • Up Aerial: Stabs the Master Sword upward. 15% clean, 13% late.
  • Down Aerial: Thrusts the Master Sword downwards. 22% clean, 18% late, 8% bounce.
  • Grab Aerial: Fires his Clawshot forwards. 4% first hit, 6% second hit.

Grab and Throws[]

  • Pummel: Hits the opponent with the hilt of the Master Sword. 2%.
  • Forward Throw: Throws the opponent in front of him and kicks them. 4% throw, 3% kick.
  • Back Throw: Throws the opponent behind them and kicks them. 4% throw, 3% kick.
  • Up Throw: Throws the opponent above him before slashing in an arc. 2% throw, 5% slash.
  • Down Throw: Slams the opponent into the ground before elbow-dropping them. 4% throw, 3% drop.

Special Moves[]

Link's Special Moves
Super Smash Bros. Melee Brawl 3DS/Wii U Ultimate
Standard Special Boomerang Bow Hero's Bow Bow and Arrows
Side Special Boomerang Gale Boomerang Boomerang
Up Special Spin Attack
Down Special Bomb Remote Bomb
Final Smash Triforce Slash Ancient Bow and Arrow

Taunts[]

  • Up: Twirls his sword twice and spins the sword while sheathing it. Similar to his Twilight Princess "victory pose", which he performs after defeating a boss, learning a hidden sword technique, or putting his sword away at a specific moment after beating a common enemy.
  • Down: Link's mysterious taunt from the original. He pulls his knee to his chest and draws his sword back behind his head. Similar to Lucario's down taunt. May be loosely based on Link's attacking pose from Zelda II.
  • Side: Takes out Navi, a fairy, who will fly around him.

Idle Animations[]

  • Twirls his sword around.
  • Looks to his side.

On-Screen Appearance[]

  • Link flies in his Recorder's tornado and lands on the stage.

In Competitive Play[]

Link has among the worst matchup spreads in Brawl. He soft counters two characters, Ganondorf and Zelda, and is even with three, but is soft countered by seven, countered by 20, and hard countered by four. He suffers against characters who can outspeed him such as Sonic and Sheik, characters who can out camp him such as Falco, or characters that can chaingrab him to death such as Ice Climbers and King Dedede. Overall, Link has very few advantageous matchups, and his positive matchups are rarely seen in competitive play.

Tier placement and history[]

Despite the considerable power buffs he received in Brawl, his amazing momentum cancelling, and being given a usable DACUS, Link has perpetually hovered among Brawl's bottom four characters since the first tier list. Link's terrible and extremely gimpable recovery has always significantly limited his survivability even in the early inexperienced Brawl metagame, and his very sluggish attacks and terrible mobility significantly inhibited Link's ability to effectively compete since day one. Link has had some renowned players, such as KirinBlaze and Legan in the United States, Izaw in Europe, and Scabe in Australia, but none of these players have ever achieved much beyond the local level, and they have all since dropped Link for a better character (such as Izaw dropping Link for Sheik), or stopped playing Brawl competitively altogether. As such, Link's competitive prospects have never gotten any better over the years, and while he is not usually thought of as a candidate for worst character, it is extremely unlikely Link will ever rise beyond the bottom tier, as he has a minuscule player base and Brawls metagame has become mostly stagnant.

Role In Subspace Emissary[]

Link's role begins with him walking through a forest with his fairy companion, Navi. Upon reaching the Master Sword's resting place, Link pulls the sword from its pedestal, wielding it once more. In a clearing of the forest is a napping Yoshi, who Link at first pays no mind to. However, the Halberd soon flies over the clearing, dropping Shadow Bugs which soon form into Primids. At this point, Link and Yoshi form a team and battle through the enemies while in pursuit of the Halberd, only to lose their aforementioned target as it flies far off into the distance, though they quickly continue their pursuit.

Subspace link

Link in the SSE

Link's next appearance plays out depending on which princess is saved earlier on in the story. If Peach was saved, Link and Yoshi do battle with a Shadowbug clone of Peach (who had recently been turned into a trophy by Bowser) after it attempted to turn an unsuspecting Mario and Pit into trophies until Link prevented the attack by slicing the Dark Cannon in half. Upon defeating the clone of Peach, Link is attacked by Mario, who witnessed the defeat of Peach's copy as it reverts into Shadowbugs and drifts away, mistaking it for the real Peach. Then Link and Yoshi fight him and Pit. If Zelda is saved earlier on, then it is she who is cloned, and Mario and Pit fight the clone of her, and must then fend off an attack by Link and Yoshi, as Link thinks Mario killed the real Zelda. After the defeat (and subsequent trophification) of Mario and Pit/Link and Yoshi, King Dedede arrives in a cargo, and snatches the trophies of the fallen duo with an arm attached to it. Fortunately, Kirby (who had accompanied Peach/Zelda earlier) appears and frees the two trophies, and revives them as well. Upon revival, Pit/Link fires an arrow at the incoming cargo, slowing it down a little. The five characters then form an alliance and pursue Dedede.

During their pursuit, they find Dedede's cargo (now empty) parked outside of a cave, and decide to enter it. After getting out of the cave, they find Dedede's trashed hideout, and, upon finding a hole in the wall, they decide to enter it. After they get out of the hole, they find Bowser, who Mario tries to attack until Bowser raises Peach/Zelda's trophy as a shield, forcing him to miss. Pit then fires an arrow at Bowser, which he barely dodges, before escaping in his Koopa Clown Car.

They then pursue the Ancient Minister in a desert, trying to stop him from detonating another Subspace Bomb. Mario and Link begin to approach the Minister while dodging the lasers he fires at them. Despite their best efforts, the Subspace Bomb still explodes while the heroes barely escape the blast.

Link later appears after the team makes its way to the desert, where they aid another group (consisting of Marth, Ike, the Ice Climbers, Lucas, and the Pokémon Trainer) in fighting off the Subspace Army. Later, Link and Zelda are both present when meeting Tabuu in Entrance to Subspace, but they are defeated by Tabuu's Offwaves. If Link and Zelda's trophy forms are retrieved after the initial attack by Tabuu, they will both be shown agreeing to revive Ganondorf (who was turned into a trophy earlier on when he tried to attack Tabuu on his own), at which point they show him where their common target is. Link helps the other heroes throughout the rest of the story.


Playable appearances[]

The Forest The Lake Shore The Cave The Wilds (Part II) The Canyon Entrance to Subspace The Great Maze (if rescued in Subspace (Part II))


Exclusive stickers

These stickers can only be used by Link, or a select few including him:


Boomerang: [Weapon] Attack +4


Colin: [Specials: Direct] Attack +4


Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule: [Electric] Attack +31


Darknut: [Slash] Attack +13


Epona & Link: [Arm, Leg] Attack +9


Fierce Deity Link: [Slash] Attack +21


Happy Mask Salesman: [Leg] Attack +9


Hylian Shield (The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess): [Slash] Resistance +10


Lantern: [Flame] Resistance +7


Legend of Outset: [Arm] Attack +26


Linebeck: [Throwing] Attack +20


Link (The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past): [Electric] Resistance +31


Link (The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess): [Slash] Resistance +27


Link (The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker): [Flame] Attack +31


Link with Goron Mask: [Slash] Attack +17


Link's Grandma: [Arm, Leg] Attack +2


Lon Lon Milk: Launch Power +18


Midna & Wolf Link: [Leg] Attack +26


Moblin: [Slash] Attack +15


Octorok: [Leg] Attack +4


Piece of Heart: Heart Container Effect +50


Salvatore: [Electric] Attack +9


Sheik: [Body, Spin] Attack +17


Tingle (The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker): [Flame] Resistance +24


Young Zelda (The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap): [Normal] Resistance +16


Zant: [Weapon] Attack +7


Zelda (The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time): [Flame] Resistance +18


In Event Matches[]

Solo Events[]

  • Event 10: All-Star Battle Regulars: Link is one of the opponents that must be fought in this event. All opponents are starter characters from the original Super Smash Bros. game.
  • Event 18: Dark Link Duel: Link must defeat Dark Link in a 200 HP battle on Bridge of Eldin.
  • Event 33: Advent of the Evil King: As Ganondorf, the player must defeat Link, Zelda, and Pit on Temple.

Co-op Events[]

  • Co-Op Event 7: Battle of the Dark Sides: Link and Samus must defeat Dark Link and Dark Samus in a 200 HP battle on Bridge of Eldin.
  • Co-Op Event 13: Blades of the Quick and Mighty: Marth and Ike must defeat Link, Meta Knight, and Ganondorf on Temple.
  • Co-Op Event 21: The True All-Star Battle: Two players select a character and take on the entire roster on Battlefield.




Costume Gallery[]

Alt-link3

Link's Changeable clothing.

Trivia[]

  • Link, Olimar, the Ice Climbers and Toon Link are the only characters in Super Smash Bros. Brawl who are left-handed.
  • Link, Bowser, Luigi, Toon Link, and Yoshi are the only characters to wear their default costumes in team battles, when they are on the green team.
  • Closely viewed, one can see that Link wears chain mail under his tunic.
  • Link's bomb, along with Snake's grenade can deal damage to his teammate when fighting Team Battles.
  • Link's different Tunics are reminiscent of the 6 medallions from Ocarina of Time with the exception of the Spirit Medallion which is not featured. The Red and Blue Tunics also relate towards the Goron and Zora Armour respectively.
  • His K.O. scream is simillar to his cry from Twilight Princess if he were to die from lava.
  • Link is the only character to have a new on-screen appearance in Brawl out of the original 12.
  • Link, Ganondorf, Bowser and Mario, are the only returning characters in Brawl to have one completely different special move. In Link's case, his side special has been changed.

Gallery[]

External links[]

ZeldaSymbol The Legend of Zelda universe
Characters Link (64  · Melee  · Brawl  · 3DS/Wii U  · Ultimate)
Sheik (Melee  · Brawl  · 3DS/Wii U  · Ultimate)
Princess Zelda (Melee  · Brawl  · 3DS/Wii U  · Ultimate)
Young Link (Melee  · Ultimate)
Ganondorf (Melee  · Brawl  · 3DS/Wii U  · Ultimate)
Toon Link (Brawl  · 3DS/Wii U  · Ultimate)
Side characters Bosses Dark Link  · Ganon
Assist Trophies Tingle  · Skull Kid  · Midna  · Ghirahim  · Moon
Mii Fighter Costumes Link  · Princess Zelda  · Sheik  · Majora's Mask  · Yiga Clan  · Skull Kid  · Ancient Soldier Gear
Background characters Four Giants  · Moon  · Tingle  · Toon Link  · Alfonso
Stage Hazards King Bulblin  · Koume and Kotake
Enemies Bubble  · Cucco  · Darknut  · Like Like  · Octorok  · Peahat  · ReDead  · Stalfos
Other Navi  · Beedle
Stages Hyrule Castle  · Great Bay  · Temple  · Bridge of Eldin  · Pirate Ship  · Gerudo Valley  · Spirit Train  · Skyloft  · Great Plateau Tower
Underground Maze  · Majora's Mask
Items Beetle  · Bombchu  · Bunny Hood  · Cucco  · Deku Nut  · Fairy Bottle  · Gust Bellows  · Heart Container  · Triforce
Music List of Music (The Legend of Zelda series)
Collectibles Trophies Melee Trophies  · Brawl Trophies  · 3DS Trophies  · Wii U Trophies
Stickers List of stickers (The Legend of Zelda series)
Spirits List of spirits (The Legend of Zelda series)
Masterpieces The Legend of Zelda  · Zelda II: The Adventure of Link  · The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
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