A Critique on Every Smash Bros. Stage Ever

[Vintage Creep]

Mushroom Kingdom (Super Mario Bros.)
Melee's iteration of Mushroom Kingdom takes us back to the original Super Mario Bros. once again, and is basically a remake of the original stage in Smash 64, even if a little simpler. The much loved by me pipes disappear this time around, letting space to a few more platforms (this time around they're all breakable) and a second moving one which acts as a weight scale. There are two pits to accomodate this, and at the center a weird sad face formed by blocks. Or is it pareidolia?
And that's it, basically. The details on it are far better and this stage reminds me of the original game even more than the original stage, becoming, to me. We're nearing the retro stage mania that will start with Brawl, wherte stages heavily based on old classics will basically look like a port of that game entirely. Here, we're still seeing some upgrade in textures and some different aesthetic choices, but with the next one those will fade away even more.
Let's cut to the chase, is it better or worse than the original Mushroom Kingdom? Well, it depends on the way I wake up honestly. The stage by itself is fine, there are maybe too many blocks... blocking the way, but it plays fun and it looks great. The disappearance of the pipes is honestly nitpicky, I'll admit it, but I miss them.
Other than that, I have not much to say about this stage, to be honest. For some reason, I've been more fond for the next one, which might seem contradictory since it's an even simpler stage to begin with, and I'm complaining about this one being not as complex as the original.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Mushroom Kingdom II (Super Mario Bros. 2)
Mario, being Mario, gets not two, not three, but four stages to be represented in Melee, and this is the last one. Well, technically, with Yoshi's Island, he gets 5. Sakurai splitted this 50/50, two were to represent the 3D games of Mario, which at the time was, well, just one, and two were to remind hardcore players of the good old 2D days. Super Mario Bros. 2 is not really an obvious choice to go with in my opinion, since it was a complete departure of the original idea mechanically, which has never been revisited since, but hey, it worked. Mushroom Kingdom II (which doesn't take place in Mushroom Kingdom by the way) is a simple yet effective stage. The layout as you can see is extremely easy, but it prolongs a little bit to the lower part to make possible those sweet recovery wall-jumps. Every once in a while, logs appear from the waterfalls and floating carpet with a Pidgit appears as an additional platform on the higher part. The only hazard in this stage is Birdo, the most underrated villain in the history of Super Mario, shooting eggs from her mouth which can actually be caught like in the first game.
As I said, the layout is extremely simple, but this little mechanics put this stage above the other in my opinion for the same old reason why I love stages like this: they focus on using elements that appear in the original game, and implement them in Super Smash Bros. succesfully. Nothing particularly mind-blowing about catching eggs mid-air, but it's a brilliant touch.
Another reason why I like this stage so much is how it looks: not only it's almost 1:1 with Super Mario Bros. 2, but the colors are fantastic and vibrant, the waterfall effect shows it'll never get old because it was nice to look at even in 2001, and the music was great. This stage and the other Kingdom were the only ones in Melee in which the music changed at the end of the match to reflect the fact that time was running out.
Out of all the four major Mario stages in Melee, this one and Rainbow Cruise I feel are my favorites. One for its bold innovation, and one for its strong connection to tradition. I'm starting to realize these are the two types of stages I like the most in Smash Bros.: you either do something which you know it works, and you do it well, or you go ballistic and risk it, hopefully bringing freshness to the franchise, even if not perfectly at the first try.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Icicle Mountain (Ice Climber)
Ice Climbers and Mr. Game & Watch were the two weird, unexpected additions to the roster of Melee, so they only get one stage each, but their fate is still better of Marth's and Roy's one, which get none even though their franchise has the same amount of playable fighters alone. Strange.
Anyway, Icicle Mountain is a scrolling stage kind of like Rainbow Cruise, with the difference that it moves only vertically, mostly up, and at random speed too. It's the first of its kind, and this approach will be revisited later in Brawl, and it makes absolutely perfect sense since its source material. Common enemies from the original game also appear as mostly passive hazards, probably because if not they would get too much in the way of the player trying to survive the climbing while also fighting against enemy AI.
I have two big problems with this stage though that makes me ultimately reject this attempt, and it's not the main gimmick of it moving upwards and downwards which makes it of course not a great choice for competitive gameplay.
First and most important to me is its appearance. Don't get me wrong, it's serviceable, but it looks extremely barren and generic, and those many platforms are too thin, they break up the layout in my opinion. But worst of all, I literally have no idea why Sakurai chose this realistic approach in contrast to a modern rendition of the original game's artstyle. Ice Climber is a one and done franchise, the game never got a sequel, so it would make sense to me to take its original aesthetic, at least for the first stage from the franchise in Smash Bros., and replicate it with higher textures. This would also be a winning artistic choice because the vibrant colors of the original game would clash and mesh so much better with Smash Bros.'s crazy own elements, instead of this greyish, kind of sad and barren rendition.
The second reason why I dislike this stage is actually tied to the first one, and it rides on the same ideal I have for Smash Bros. to take as much as possible from its source material when creating a character or a stage.
I never needed the urge to talk about how the original game worked in this write-ups, but here it goes I guess. Ice Climber was a platformer of course, with the main difference being that you had to scale a huge mountain with you hammer. Like an actual climber, you had to break the ice in your path to continue with your quest, creating holes in the platforms to jump in to the next level. This, while gimmicky and possibly annoying, applies so well to Smash Bros. that it's baffling to me that Sakurai didn't even attempt to implement it in Icicle Mountain. Small ice blocks to appear in the stage to be fair, and they're breakable, but it hardly compares to the constant feat you had in the original game.
The concept is so vastly interesting to me because if it did work like in the original game, and every floor of the stage was basically blocked by an entire tile of breakable objects, automatically an in-game cooperation would rise between two actual opponents, since creating a gap in the ice to pass through would be essential not only to survive yourself, but also to continue the battle against your adversary. Just think about it: two players, battling to survive against the stage, only to find themselves on the top part of the level where the actual battle against each other starts.
Maybe not a lot of players in the fanbase would like this idea, but it's the only logical way Sakurai should go in my opinion. As you know, this of course didn't happen in Brawl, since Ice Climbers' stage in there is going to be even more detached from the source material, and the characters have been savagely cut in Smash 4, which didn't get a stage from Ice Climber.
So, Smash 5 or DLC is my only hope to see an actual great Ice Climber stage. The ironic part? I think Icicle Mountain is fine. But what could've been...

 

[Vintage Creep]

Flat Zone (Game & Watch: Helmet)
I decided to put the entire picture of the stage as representation because it's so cool and classic I couldn't avoid it (you can see it in-game only when you pause). The actual field of view of this stage is the screen of this little series of consoles released by Nintendo in the early 80's, making this stage the one taken from the oldest original material for now.
To emphasise the retro-aesthetic of the stage, the characters appearing in battle are actually 2D textures rather than 3D models, which is to this day a pretty good idea from Sakurai.
The rest of the stage though, uh, I'm not the biggest fan of. And I bet you're like: "What? This is taken 1:1 from the original source material and you don't like it?". Well, let's just say that I appreciate the idea, but Sakurai will try this two more times, both a lot more succesfully than here. The basic layout of the stage is pretty good, it's a walk-off one which I like every once in a while, and the rest is so basic to be harmless.
The hazards though are way, way, waaaaay too unforgiving and intrusive. Basically, random tools will fall from the upper part of the stage in large numbers, and they fall fast and hit hard. Some of them even manage to one-hit-KO you which is unacceptable to me since it happens so often that it rains tools.
I like everything about this stage except that single feature, and the frustrating part is that it probably just needs to be nerfed a bit to be enjoyable, rather than cut off entirely.
This happens, kinda, in Smash Bros. U, where this stage returns, kinda. In a pretty interesting move by Sakurai, this stage gets incorporated with another extremely similar one, becoming a transforming stage with different phases. The Helmet one, which is this one, remains basically the same, but since it's not the only appearing it's not as annoying as it was in Melee.
It basically got diluted, like some people do with wine which is too strong with the help of water. It became edible, and introduced Smash Bros. to a neat way to make some stages return while fusing them with more recent ones (Pokémon Stadium X anyone?).

 

[Vintage Creep]

Final Destination (Super Smash Bros.)
Here we are, we reached the end game, Melee's last stage for this write-up, Melee's Final Destination. How is it possible that such an incredibly basic, simple stage has the strength to bring me back so ****ing much? Final Destination is a flat surface, and that's it. It's even more ridiculously simple than Battlefield, but an aura of fear and excitement sorrounds it.
It's basic design demands respect. It demands tactic. It demands you to know the game from the inside out. There's no fun to be having here, just fists to throw. You have no excuse, there's no hazard blocking your way, no random effect wrongly terminating you. Every character here is equal. Young Link and Link can meet through time and space. That cute fluffy thing that goes like Kirby is equal to the king of darkness, Ganondorf. There's no difference between Dr. Mario and Samus Aran, they both have to fight.
The artstyle of Melee is perfect to represent this. Where are we, really? This is Master Hand's domain, apparently in the middle of unkwnon space. A black orb under the stage seems like it represents both the beginning and the end, like something catastrophic is going to happen out of nowhere. I think that even more than Battlefield, Final Destination better encompasses the whole point behind Smash Bros. This thing is crazy, but also epic.

Brawl's rendition of Final Destination wasn't a big departure like it happened with Battlefield, it mantained the general feel while adding some phases to the background which heavily changed the lightning and tone of the stage with time. I chose this picture (not a great take to be honest but could'nt find any better) that shows the end of the cycle. Its starts like Melee, in a pitch black void which looks like endless space, and then it races through the atmosphere, ending on this infinite ocean at sunset, the same used in the opening of the game. I love this rendition, it follows perfectly the theme of Brawl's game about a bunch of soldiers fighting against a common enemy, and then taking a rest in this heavenly place which reminds me of a Nintendo-like Valhalla.

The 3DS rendition, because of technical limitations, is kind of disappointing, it reverts back to the Melee one. The background is simple and kind of static, even though we get a glimpse of the awesome Wii U rendition in the form of the main platform, divided in two parts, one blue and one red, this time to represent the double version of the game, both portable and on home console.

And here it is, the final Final Destination so far. Wii U's example of the epic battle that is born every time you boot up a game from this fantastic franchis is represented in the background in the most ballistic, crazy, ridiculous, balls-to-the-wall careless way imaginable. The Earth is literally CRASHING against the Sun I mean come on. It's so stupid it's awesome, and it makes it, in my opinion, the best edition of Final Destination ever. And it's hard for me to pick, they're all so good (except the lesser 3DS one of course).
Melee embraced the body horror vibe of an enemy creepingly making its way into our world, Brawl depicted an epic war led by rivals-now-comrades against the very same invasor, and Smash 4 is a painting of two worlds clashing against each other, but ultimately fusing together creating a new world altogether.
I can't wait to see what happens with the next Final Destination. Will we get back to the techno-thriller rendition of Melee, or will we explore further into epicness?

 

[RealLuigisWearPink]

Forgetting something?

I get that 64 Final Destination and 64 Battlefield (And Meta Crystal where you fight Metal Mario for that matter) aren't in VS mode, but they're still stages.

Anyway, I like most of Melee's stages, but I despise Icicle Mountain. Can't wait to hear what you have to say on Brawl, that's where it gets really interesting imo.

 

[Vintage Creep]

I decided to talk only about VS stages because those are the ones I remember the most and have a chance to actually come back in the future, so if there are upgrades to be done in my opinion I flesh them out a bit.
I kind of like to talk about unplayable stages in VS mode too, but I would've to include the Melee Adventure ones (would love to talk about the Zelda dungeon stage, or the Metroid escape one), and even all the Brawl Subspace Emissary ones. It would become too long and difficult. Battlefield and Final Destination 64 could be the only exceptions, but there's nothing particular to talk about to be honest. Let's just say they do their work and call it a day ahahah.
Yeah, Brawl is damn interesting. I'm taking notes about what I want to say regarding some of the stages, and I can already see some of my ideas could be quite controversial. 3DS' ones too will be interesting, since I really don't like that game because of reasons, but some of the stages are so damn good... I will be hella conflicted about them.
Maybe I'm going too fast and should leave people the time to respond to my critiques, but I'm having too much fun about doing these things. I start thinking about doing one, two write-ups at most, and end up vomiting 5 or 6 of them in a row. It doesn't leave much breath for discussion, but hey maybe it'll pick up in the future.
Anyway, if Ice Climbers come back, this is how their stage NEEDS to look:

I'm not kidding, ****'s frustrating as hell.

 

[RealLuigisWearPink]

Anyway, if Ice Climbers come back, this is how their stage NEEDS to look:

I'm not kidding, ****'s frustrating as hell.

Agreed. A retro, throwback stage based off their ONLY GAME seems like the perfect route for these two.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Probably the most hyped up title in the series, it unfortunately ended up being the most disapponting installment to many because of its floaty and more casual gameplay. The game was full of content like crazy, and it was much more inventive than Melee arguably, but was more akin to something like Mario Kart. The infamous slipping mechanic was introduced, the Smash Ball final move was kind of unbalanced, much of the development time was used to build an immense, for a fighting game, story mode, and in general, this was Nintendo's attempt to expand even more the fanbase. It succeeded, might as well admit it, and now that Smash 4 is out, I believe that Brawl was a necessary step for the franchise and it could've been a lot worse considering the general direction Nintendo was taking in the Wii era.
All this obviously had a big impact in the stage selection of the game. We're going to analyze 29 stages with this part of the write-up, the biggest number of new stages introduced in a single game if you count 3DS and WiiU as two separate games (which I do). To these ones 12 stages are to be added for their return from Melee, but we're not going to talk about them again. The 29 Brawl stages are the most diverse, original, gimmicky and, to be fair, interesting added in the series so far. Sakurai avoided the Battlefield layout to be repeated like a plague, and the two/three simpler stages have still something going on to differentiate them from the rest. This, as we'll find out, is not always a good thing, because in Brawl, I feel, is when Sakurai decided to sacrifice some quality design just to be able to say that this particular stage is something Smash Bros. hasn't seen yet.
Since the game is kind of frowned upon by most of the fanbase, I doubt a lot of these stages are liked except the obvious ones (Smashville and Lylat Cruise), but it would be a disservice to say that they're all bad. In my opinion, actually, a lot of the Brawl stages are pretty great and fun.
Touring stages, scrolling stages, transforming stages, there's even a stage in which you play minigames! Sakurai went all out and it's not surprising: the development time for Melee was a little under 2 years and look what he was able to achieve, so with 6 whopping years to work with this time around, it was expected something as crazy as Brawl.
The best part about Brawl's stage selection in my opinion is that Sakurai started to get comfortable about representing franchises which didn't have a playable character in the game (this was even bigger in Smash 4), and he wasn't so adamant about forcing himself in keeping the stage selection similar for all characters. Star Fox and F-Zero for example get only one new stage, which is understandable considering the state the series were and are now. Mario though gets 5 even if no new characters are added for the franchise (Dr. Mario is actually cut), but expands beyond the main Mario series. Luigi's Mansion and Mario Kart join the fray adding a much needed variety instead of the usual.
In general, I understand why Sakurai did what he did, and I loved Brawl back then, the amount of new content was enough for me to abandon almost completely Melee even though I liked the gameplay less, and I think this is where Smash Bros. really started to research a lot in its source material for everything new which was going to be introduced, or almost at least. Let's start with a good example of a stage, one of my favorites of the bunch actually:

Delfino Plaza (Super Mario Sunshine)
A new kind of touring stage, Delfino Plaza doesn't follow a line, but is placed instead in a central HUB, and the main platform that moves, where the battle takes place, positions itself in various parts of the arena, each one with a completely different layout. The central HUB where this stage is located is actually, well, an HUB: Delfino Island from Sunshine makes a return after 4 years, and it was the biggest breath of fresh air for Mario ever. I love Sunshine, to this day I consider it the most underrated Mario game ever, so seeing Brawl giving attention to a place which we'll probably never see again was surprising, especially since next year would be Super Mario Galaxy's advent to our homes.
Delfino Plaza doesn't offer any hazard, the complexity of the stage is relegated only to the interchangeable platforms where you find yourself fighting on. You can get a nice and smooth area with a little bit of sea left and right like the start of the level, the part composed by small columns near the lighthouse, or the giant Shiny tower you see on the image.
It's a perfect stage because it introduces both new players to Smash, presenting them a variety of situations unrivaled by many if not all the other stages in the game (randomly, there are nine different zones to land in, and even the platforms that bring you there change their configuration even if slightly), and also updates Melee players with new mechanics like swimming.
The stage, also, looks pretty damn beautiful even on Wii. The upgrade in HD was fantastic, but Delfino Plaza cements itself as a much more interesting HUB world for Smash, certainly more than 64's Peach's Castle, one that I think will be surpassed only by the upcoming Odyssey on Switch.
The main concept of the stage works perfectly to represent general big landscapes from a certain game. It would've been kind of underwhelming if this stage was sitting simply on a little space of Delfino Plaza, a limitation of previous games, but with this new idea it is possible to see every road, house, I mean, every detail basically from the town. It's a perfect formula which will return obviously, even if not always when expected.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Luigi's Mansion (Luigi's Mansion)
This is another great stage taken from a Mario spin-off, the first of its kind which is still considered part of the main series. The stage is pretty simple in its layout, it takes place in a two-floor mansion, and the walls in the front disappear when characters enter it, revealing the rooms inside. The amount of details put into the different halls is incredible, my favorite one being the lower-right one, with that goofy painting which I think represents one of the ghosts of the original game.
The background too looks great, with that giant moon taking most part of it, and I like that finally Smash got its first "horror" stage. Arguably there are more stages that look a bit more menacing like the Metroid ones, but this one is the first that I consider an horror trope even if kind of goofy and ridiculous (I mean, it's about Luigi fighting Casper-like ghosts). Until we get actual survival horror representation in Smash Bros though I won't be satisfied, I'm still waiting for a Fatal Frame rep (a stage is much more possible than a character), or even a Resident Evil or Eternal Darkness one. I know that Smash Bros. isn't really much suited for survival horror stuff, but they can edulcorate it a bit to make it viable. I'm a big horror games fan and Nintendo does have something under its roof, I hope they'll someday have the courage to push themselves into it. I mean, Bayonetta is in Smash 4, and many thought that was impossible considering the main target of these games.
Anyway, returning to the stage: another big thing introduced in Brawl was breakable elements in the stage. In this case, the entire mansion is completely destructible. If you hit the pillars holding the attic and the second floor, you can literally tear it down during the fight, and if you're playing with four characters, chances are that's totally going to happen. After a while though, the mansion will come back by itself, and that's not possible sadly when you play with more than four players (the stage came back in Smash Wii U).
Another great thing about this level is that it introduced two fantastic remixes of the Tetris themes, and they actually fit perfectly in this. I used to pick this stage mostly for that, I love those two tunes.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Mushroomy Kingdom (Super Mario Bros.)
This is the first controversial stage introduced in Brawl and for good reason. It is a scrolling stage, from left to right this time around, and it's an exact replica of the World 1-1 of Super Mario Bros., with every single block and platform reproduced here to make it feel like you're in the actual game.
The point is that, well, it doesn't look like that at all. In a totally unexpected twist, Sakurai decided that the artstyle of this level should be simil-post-apocalyptic, an abandoned wasteland that wouldn't feel wrong out of a Mad Max movie, devoid of all the Goombas and Koopas that appeared in the game, like if they went extinct. The artistic reason behind this choice is that Sakurai wanted to pass the idea that Super Mario Bros.'s world is now forgotten, with 3D taken over on 2D (this wasn't true at all to be honest with the New series starting a couple of years prior), and this is how the levels would look like now if we decided to revisit them. It's... especially weird. To be fair, we had already two stages of Mushroom Kingdom which replicated the style pretty closely, so another one would feel over-doing it, but this is actually a 1:1 rendition.
I have no idea why Sakurai was pushed to this direction, the idea at its core is actually pretty neat (taking a completely recognizable element from a famous franchise such as Mario, and changing its artstyle) but the result is just ugly. It's bland, barren, sad, and frankly, uninteresting. Combine this with the fact that scrolling stages aren't really the favorite from the franchise, and it's not surprising this stage isn't particularly loved by the fanbase.
It's kind of a pity because, from a gameplay point of view, I think the stage plays fine, the moving camera isn't much of an issue even if it makes battles here a throwing fest, but it's just ugly looking.

In another unexpected twist, this stage is also a double one. Yes, randomly, if you pick this stage, instead of a remake of level 1-1, you could get a remake of level 1-2, also from Super Mario Bros.
I always preferred this one instead that 1-1, simply because its artstyle matches a lot more with the source material. In fact, if it was only 1-2, you wouldn't even get the impression that this stage is meant to represent an abandoned Super Mario Bros.
Even from a gameplay standpoint, this stage is more fun and interesting because it becomes harder to get rid of opponents, and the higher platform, walkable like in the original game, makes room for a lot of fun fights.
The stage comes back on Smash 3DS weirdly enough, and the lower pixelation makes it only worse. The artstyle is kind of bad, but at least in Brawl it looked good, on 3DS it's just a completely ugly and forgettable stage. Probably the biggest misstep in representing Mushroom Kingdom, and it's a total pity: I can imagine this stage returning with completely redone textures to match the actual games, and becoming instantly better.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Mario Circuit (Mario Kart series)
The first trip into the Mario Kart universe for Smash Bros. was pretty simple and straight-forward, and choosing to having it take place in one of the most common tracks in the games makes sense. It would take another game to get a Rainbow Road stage, but for the first one, I guess Mario Circuit is fine. The stage isn't taken from a precise game, even though it heavily reminds of the figure-8 track from Mario Kart DS, but has many elements that remind me of Double Dash!! or Mario Kart Wii.
It's a walk-off stage with a couple of sliding platforms over it, and a central one that could honestly be removed in my opinion: it's not really useful in a match of Smash Bros., and it doesn't make sense in-lore if you take a look at the stage, since the racers would never touch it normally.
The racers (a bunch of Shy Guys) act like the F-Zero vehicles in Mute City, and hit you from either the background of the screen, or from the left depending at which point of the race they are. It's a simple idea, but I like that you're forced to battle in the two floors based on the point the race it's at, it adds a lot of flavor to an otherwise forgettable stage.
Both subsequent Mario Kart stages proved to be leagues better than this one, both visually and mechanically, so I really don't understand why Mario Circuit came back on WiiU, especially since the other Mario Kart stage was also a Mario Circuit (an actual one taken from Mario Kart 8 instead than being modelled from the ground up). It would've made much more sense on 3DS, which got Rainbow Road, but to be honest, it's not the most baffling stage returning in Smash 4 as we'll see.

 

[RealLuigisWearPink]

Always thought Mushroomy Kingdom would've been better as a full blown retro stage with 2d sprites ripped straight from the original SMB, have the enemies from the game as hazards, and take it a step further and throw in 1-3 and 1-4.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Rumble Falls (Donkey Kong Jungle Beat)
This scrolling stage is similar to Icicle Mountain but exclusively moves upwards. Once the summit is reached, a transition effect simply brings the characters back to the beginning of the stage and the trip is repeated, and every once in a while, randomly, a signal speeds up the camera of the stage just because.
Throughout the stage there are multiple elements that give some flair to the stage: ladders that can actually be climbed (a new mechanic in Brawl), strong spikes that can one-hit-KO anyone, buttons to press to activate some platforms and so on.
My favorite part of the level though is near the end, when the airplane comes in. It would've been interesting if instead than starting again, the stage just stopped there, in the higher area. I think the reason why Sakurai doesn't do stuff like this is because he's afraid that for long matches, the introductory part of the players just "getting to" the stage would be troublesome and annoying, but in this case it would help removing the waterfall part of the stage, which isn't that great.
Donkey Kong wasn't lucky at all in Brawl regarding stages, both of his came as gimmicky as hell, to the point of being almost unplayable in a competent manner, but this one is at least decent. Get rid of the spikes (or at least nerf them to oblivion) and consider the idea of it being only the top part, and maybe we can talk for this to come back.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Bridge Of Eldin (The Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess)
Like in Great Bay, the choice of Eldin Bridge as the representative for Twilight Princess in the new Smash Bros. was quite odd, but it turned out pretty good in the end. Let's start by saying that the stage looks spectacular (to be fair, this image is from its rendition in Smash Wii U, but even in Brawl it looked great). The time is constantly set on a sunset in this stage, which is fitting for its source material, being TP one of the most crepuscular and dark game in the franchise.
In the background Hyrule Castle is visible, omnipresent, and it looks both menacing and regal. I also like the valley that forms under the Bridge, which if I remember right is where Lake Hylia is placed in this game.
The platform layout in this stage is one of the simplest in the entire franchise, a walk-off flat surface. It's even more basic than Final Destination, at least in its first form.
Every once in a while, Bulblin, a fat orc riding a pork (I loved this definition sorry) charges through the stage from left to right or viceversa. It's pretty easy to avoid as an hazard per se, but sometimes he leaves a bomb behind him. When the bomb explodes, right in the middle of the bridge a giant crater is formed. The pit is potentially pretty dangerous since it's kind of massive by Smash Bros. standards, and if an opponent doesn't want you to reach the other side that easily he can be a pain.
After a while, a portal brings back the lost part of the bridge and the process repeats itself until the match ends.
I'm kind of conflicted personally about this stage, I can't decide if I like it or not. It's maybe too simple in its layout, it looks beautiful but the repetitiveness of it all makes it after a few matches a very boring pick.
I think Twilight Princess had many more memorable places where a stage could've take place in, even though I like that Sakurai went for something not so obvious like a touring Hyrule stage.

 

[Nemesis561]

Hey this write up is awesome, thanks for doing this, I've been reading during my downtime at work

 

[ryuu seika]

Not looked at your Brawl stage reviews yet but I just have to chime in and say that, while I have certainly been enjoying this thread, I disagree with your thoughts on Final Destination. The Brawl rendition straight up sucks.

In melee, the stage is a fusion of miscellaneous colourful yet artificial architecture and unreal digital elements, all surrounding a black hole in deep space. It's a sort of realism meets otherworldly design that suggests creation by a higher power.
It was the home of a being who could only partially materialise into our plane of existence. The mighty hand of the stage's master.

Then, when Smash 4 came along, the stage completely changed to take on a rather overdone fire and ice theme. It was dumb, it was cheesy and it was very clearly a rip off of Soul Calibur's theming for the astral realm. And yet, in ripping off their earlier work, Namco also brought something great to the stage. They gave it life.

Even before the 3DS version released, it could clearly be seen that the stage had veins. It had blood, of some sort at least, flowing through it. It was as much a living creature as the entity you fought there. Maybe even more so. And that was just so cool.

Personally I liked the 3DS and Wii versions equally since the main focus, the stage, was identical in both. The 3DS gave us a toned down version of Melee and Brawl's space flight background, though, while the Wii blew the Hollywood orange v blue cliche way out of proportion by pitting the sun against our water-based planet.

To me, this was a step too far into the real world but it was also upping the cheesiness to another level, which I loved. Ultimately, I liked both versions equally.

Going back in time a bit, 64's FD didn't have a lot going on with its design, in part due to console limitations I'm sure, but it also had a rather mystic feel to it, perhaps being the seal on this unknown entity.

But Brawl, what did Brawl bring to the table? A scrap of aeroplane wing or other, similar metal, just floating around, doing nothing. It was so lame compared to every other version.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Yeah it's cheesy but it's the very same reason I love it. Just straight up ridiculous and crazy.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Pirate Ship (The Legend Of Zelda: The Wind Waker)
The sea was the real protagonist of Link's first venture into the Gamecube world, acting as one of the most interesting and peculiar hubworld for the Zelda series. The stage was added along Toon Link, which replaced Young Link, and it's one of my favorites from the series. We're aboard Tetra's sailing ship, even if it's a majorly simplified and smaller version of it mostly. The platform layout is pretty good in my opinion, the ship lands itself (pun intended) pretty well to the game, its structure offers interesting traversal and gameplay options, especially the mainmast section.
From time to time, behind the ship, the King of Red Lions will appear. He's much smaller but also acts as a platform if you need him to, most of the time to escape the main battle on Tetra's ship and chill a bit trying not to get caught.
Obviously, the whole sea permits this stage to utilize to great extenct the swimming mechanic, even though it's pretty dangerous: if you get touched by the front of the ship, this will act as a spike and send you to the bottom of the ocean instantly.
Other hazards are a bunch of enemies in the background launching bombs on the ship, and they hit pretty hard. I would've loved for some part of the ship to break because of this since Brawl introduced breakable stages, the mainmast could fall, the front could be shortened, it might have added some interesting changes to the battles but I guess it couldn't be done for technical limitations.
Also randomly, the ship could hit a reef on the left part of the screen, which will put the ship itself in a diagonal position and add a few platform for a while. Every once in a while, a tornado will sent the ship in the air, introducing another new gameplay mechanic for Brawl, which I call "floaty falling". Brawl itself was already a pretty floaty game compared to Melee, but a couple of stages have these "wind events" that will make falling extremely slow. I think the idea is fine, it can be annoying but the variety is enough for it to have sense.
Aesthetically, the stage looks fantastic, especially in HD on Wii U (it was added as DLC). Everyone loves Wind Waker's artstyle (I refuse to believe the opposite), it's full of vibrant colors and just brings me a smile everytime I see it. The stage, also, is pretty damn good, making it one of the best Zelda stages ever to date.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Norfair (Super Metroid)
Umh, we already have Planet Zebes and Brinstar as Metroid stages that have lava from the bottom as the major hazard, so what can we do to make Norfair a little different from the usual? Well, let's have lava come from every ****ing direction! Left, right, whatever, even from the background, let's put a giant scary wave of lava falling over the characters! Why the hell not?
Norfair is busy. Very busy. The structure is simple (five platforms forming a V), but there's literally no safe zone here, kinda. The platforms can go down into the volcano (or is it the lava emerging?), waves of lava can come from both sides (even though they're fairly easy to avoid)... and then there's the wave from the background, which is massive, completely engulfs the stage in flames, and to be honest, it looks pretty awesome.
You can avoid the lava in two ways: if you chose a character that jumps high enough like Meta Knight, you can just go over it exiting the screen zone, or you can either battle it out to get inside the safe zone that appears from time to time (a little capsule which protects you from the lava and even most opponent attacks).
Now, I know the main critique for this stage is that it's "another Metroid lava stage", and I get it. It got kind of repetitive in Brawl, since every single iteration of Smash Bros. had a stage that worked similar to this, and they were all taken from the same franchise. It seems like Sakurai really doesn't know what to do differently for Samus Aran (I mean, even Zero Suit Samus is criticized because it's the second Metroid rep, and she's still Samus), but honestly, just by looking at it, the stage is fine.
It's rare for a stage with such massively intrusive hazards to also be fun to play in, and it's something that Metroid stages always get right for some reason. They have balance: yes, the hazards are bullies, but you can easily avoid them, and they're not always on screen.
My biggest problem with this line of thinking is that Metroid has so many interesting places to represent: Phendrana from Prime is one of the most thrown around, and it would work completely different from these stages. Even Meridia, the Sanctuary, they could all be represented somehow.
Nonetheless, I still like Norfair quite a bit. Maybe it's my Metroid fanboysm talking, but I can't help it. I love the lava / volcano theme in videogames, it's a trope that always works and looks oustanding. Norfair got an upgrade in HD too, and it looks beautiful in Smash U.
Let's just say that I understand people hating on this one, but well, I'm full of love.

 

[ryuu seika]

Pirate Ship is simply too chaotic to ever feel like a fair fight due to things like the seemingly random bombs and and the instadeath catapult. It's visually very nice and I love the layout but would prefer far fewer extraneous hazards.

Norfair, on the other hand, creates the chaos by using stupidly OP but heavily signposted hazards to force the players into bad situations. It's essentially Wario Ware but with more punishment for screwing up and no way to work together.
Oh and a bad platform arrangement.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Frigate Orpheon (Metroid Prime)
The first and only Metroid stage ever not featuring lava or acid is taken from the Gamecube's masterpiece Prime, and it's one of the first areas you'll find yourself in. I guess this can be considered the spiritual successor to Melee's Brinstar Depths because of its many similarities.
Aesthetically, even if completely different, it has the same trope of a stage with a giant boss in the background, which in reality though never attacks the player and isn't an hazard per se. The Parasite Queen doesn't act at all, she merely watches the fight.
Without an actual reason, every once in a while the stage flips itself over at 180 degrees, so you'll find yourself fighting on the other platform in the top of the screen. The flip is pretty fast, surely a lot more than the builder's rotation in Brinstar Depths, but there is plenty of time to react to the signals of it.
All in all, I find myself liking even this stage here in the end. It's lost the novelty of it since its main gimmick strongly reminds me of Brinstar Depths, but it admittedly functions differently so it has its own charm.
I like to finally see a 3D Metroid represented in Smash Bros., but this is where I started to think that Sakurai just wasn't very fond of the franchise maybe. The 2D stages are all kind of obvious and the first 3D stage is literally one of the first things you'd see in the 3D games. It's like Sakurai tried Prime out, got to the first boss and then was like "Eh, OK, this'll do.".
Like Brinstar Depths, Frigate Orpheon stayed relegated to its own game. I believe the main gimmick of the stage is a mechanic that isn't easy to port to the next game, which is sad, I love this kind of stage that change layout this way.
But even I, that as you remember am a big fan of Brinstar Depths, still think Metroid deserved something more special in Brawl.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Yoshi's Island (Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island)
The third game in a row getting a stage named Yoshi's Island, and all three are based on three different games! This one is extremely simple, but all around my favorite of the bunch. First off, it looks extremely pleasing to the eye, they finally went for World 2's aesthetic, and not even the weird drab color palette of Brawl stopped this stage to looking good.
Like Battlefield changes the time of the day in a circle, this rendition of Yoshi's Island breezes through all the different seasons, with autumn and winter being my favorites of the bunch (the one represented here is spring).
I don't know why but there's something right about doing Yoshi levels in an easy peasy platform layout, without major hazards. I'm not saying the games from the franchise are easy, but their artstyle lends itself well to a simple layout.
Yoshi's Island is basically two platforms forming a trapeze, and that's it. A common enemy of the game, the Blarggwich, appears here as an additional platform from both sides every once in a while, so it's actually more useful than dangerous.
I like how all the platforms except the main one move a bit by tilting, but other than that, not much else to say.
The stage comes back on 3DS, and it's weirdly enough Yoshi's only stage in that game.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Halberd (Kirby Super Star)
Halberd is a fascinating stage for reasons that go beyond it's actual role in multiplayer as we'll see. The stage doesn't really take place entirely on Meta Knight's ship, but it starts in an hangar, from which a floating platform will fly off. The platform will soar in the air through the clouds while the Halberd stays in the background, just chilling. I guess you could consider it a touring stage at its core, since the platforms take us on different places, even if only two in total.
And really the hangar won't be seen more than once in a match, since the platforms lands on the Halberd, then takes off after a while only to get back on the same ship repeatedly, until the match ends.
On the Halberd itself, the main hazard is the Combo Cannon, which will attack in a variety of ways. It either takes charge to launch a beam against a player, or attack with it's claws, or just drop a bomb on the stage which will fall slowly.
All attacks are fairly easy to avoid, but it's kind of annoying making this the worst part of the stage to me.
Halberd, as I said, is fascinating to me for two reasons. First, it looks like absolutely nothing out of a Kirby game, kind of like Fountain Of Dreams, but then again I'm pretty oblivious of that franchise as a whole so I don't know. It looks amazing anyway, I love the red sky idea, it gives a dystopian feel to it all, it's maybe the most "steampunk" stage in Smash Bros. ever.
The second fascinating thing about this stage is that it's also pivotal for the single-player mode "Subspace Emissary". I mean I guess this was again Sakurai's bias towards its own franchise, but the Halberd appears fairly often in cutscenes (the best being the Sheik ones in my opinion) and even has a boss on it, Duon. I remember the cutscene of when the ship gets destroyed like it was yesterday, that sound effect always seemed like a scream to me which is weird and kind of creepy.
The stage came back on Smash Wii U, along with another pretty weird Kirby stage. Since Sakurai created the franchise, his knowledge of it permits him to choose pretty unexpected place to turn into a stage in Smash Bros., and this to feels one of the weirdest. Is the Halberd such an important and famous place in Kirby Super Star to fans?

 

[Vintage Creep]

Lylat Cruise (Star Fox Assault)
Finally a stage not taken directly from Star Fox 64, and finally a Star Fox stage that doesn't take place on the Great Fox. For the occasion, Sakurai actually created the lore for an original ship, called Pleiades, where the characters actually fight on. It always strucked me as weird that Sakurai had to give us an explanation for there to be these platforms you see to exist, he could've just been silent and call it a day and nobody would've thought any different.
Anyway, Sakurai went for a much more simplistic design, to the point that this stage is one of the few used competitively in Brawl. The layout is very simple, even though the ship itself tilts a bit to the left and right, and that can be deceptive. For some reason, I remember various instances in which I couldn't reach back to the platform with a jump, when I actually thought I could easily do it.
The background looks outstanding, the first actual background in a Star Fox stage that reminds me of the high-octane adrenaline-fueled space battles of the original games. Asteroids avoided by the centimeter, epic space battles between armies, a trip through Corneria's actual atmosphere, a skirmish between Star Fox and Star Wolf... It's Star Fox and it's all here.
The fact that we're seeing the back of the ship we're on also is a reminder of the franchise's actual on-rail shooter gameplay, which is very nice. Sakurai brought it back in fact, for Smash Wii U.
It's weird because this, so far, is the stage that has taken more artistic freedom into recreating the Star Fox franchise, but it's also the one that reminds me the most of the feeling you'd get by playing those games. Sector Z and Corneria were good sure, but they actually seemed like they took place "behind the scenes" of the game, and the real battle was taking place elsewhere. This doesn't happen on Lylat Cruise. I'm not a big fan at all of Assault, though, and I vastly prefer Adventures even though it's the less starfoxy Star Fox ever, and knowing that we'll probably never have a stage based on Dinosaur Planet breaks my heart.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Pokémon Stadium 2 (Pokémon series)
Melee's Pokémon Stadium was a great concept to bring back for Brawl, and Sakurai delivered. The core idea is the same: it's a transforming stage with a neutral basic form, and then four others, each one representing an element from the RPG series. This time around we got Electric, Flying, Ice and Ground.
So without further ado, let's dive in:

Right off the bat the first noticeable difference is that Pokémon Stadium 2 now has actual Pokémons appearing on the stage. The Electric type features Electivire and Magnezone, both fourth gen beasts (it's a pattern, most Pokémons appearing in Brawl are from there, including Lucario, but Sakurai managed to slip in a lot of gen 1 nostalgia with the Pokémon Trainer).
The second thing noticeable is that the Stadium's transformations act as the type they want to represent. In this case, the platform layout remains fairly simple, but the main platform (except for the central part) is formed by conveyor belts that move the characters out of the stage, so you'll have to run against them to fight your opponent. It's a nice thing to have the Electric type go beyond an aesthetic change (I guess that this could be considered a steel transformation too), but it can be kind of annoying. Personally, out of all the transformations, this is my least favorite, since I think they could've done something different, less annoying and more representative of the electric type. Let's say something like a bunch of caves that when triggered, they'd shock the player or something like that.

The Flying transformation is even simpler than Electric's, becoming basically Final Destination with windmills in the background, but the whole physics mechanic changed here. To reflect the flying type, the gravity effect is much lower, making you jump way higher than normal and slowing down the fall. It becomes even floatier than normal Brawl and I'm sure everyone and their mom hated this, but I kind of like it. Star KOs become much easier to connect and in general there's something amusing about characters basically being unable to stay with their feet on the ground.

The Ground type doesn't present any gameplay alteration, but has a more interesting platform layout which reminds me of the Rock type in the first Pokémon Stadium. I love the aesthetic touches on this one, it's by far the best looking of the bunch with the Omanyte's fossils in the boulder there, the excavating tools scattered throughout. It looks pretty great but it seemed kind of a boring addition compared to the others, especially because of its similarity to the Rock type in Melee. I think a Poison or a Psychic type could've been much more interesting to explore, but well, it's still nice (and there's always possibility for Pokémon Stadium 3 in Smash 5).

The last form of the stage is the Ice transformation, which of course makes every solid walkable platform also slippery. It is an obvious change for the element, but well, it works. Everyone hates the tripping mechanic, but here at least made sense. I also like how this stage looks, and I still believe that was Sakurai's cat. It had to be.

All in all, which one of the two ways is better: do you prefer the change being only aesthetic and in platform layout, or do you prefer, where possible, for the gameplay in general to be alterated to reflect the type's transformation? Melee's Stadium, probably for technical limitations, just changed the battleground, but the game itself stayed the same. Brawl's Stadium instead, went all in with the gimmicks. In the end of the day, my opinion is that both stages are pretty great, and it depends on one's taste to prefer one over the other. For me, I like both. I think Smash Bros. has to be a perfect balance of "simple" stages and "gimmick" stages. I'd argue Stadium 2's gimmick aren't even that intrusive or game-breaking though.
Pokémon Stadium 2 came back on Wii U, but Brawl is still the only game in which we can play both Stadiums. I think the next game will be the perfect occasion to create a new one, or even fuse these two making Pokémon Stadium X, now with EIGHT different transformations. It would be cool and kind of interesting to see this concept updated in future installments, with maybe one day having every single type in the Pokémon universe represented this way.
Sakurai didn't bring the Stadium concept back per se, but the last installment had a stage which reminds of this idea at its core, as we'll see.

 

[ryuu seika]

Personally, I found both the electric and the air transformations to be very intrusive, the air one leaving my already floaty character completely helpless in the air and unable to touch down. Perhaps in Melee it would have worked ok but in a floaty game and as a player of floaty characters, I couldn't stand it in the slightest. Between these two forms, stadium 2 took everything 1 did and wrecked it.

I wasn't a big fan of Halberd, either. Largely because it spent more time on random flying platforms than anywhere else and, when you finally did get to the stage itself, it punished you massively for being there.

Brawl, in general, didn't have the best stage designs IMO. 4 really improved in that regard.

 

[Vintage Creep]

I dunno, Smash 4 had Magicant and Wily's Castle.
Out of all the hazards, I find most Brawl stages at least bearable. And also I hate much more stages with terrible platfoem layout to traverse (I'm coming, 75m).

 

[Vintage Creep]

Spear Pillar (Pokémon Diamond & Pearl)
Sakurai returns to using an actual famous place from a Pokémon game after experimenting in Melee. This is an end-game location, where you had the possibility of capturing the cover legendary of that generation, either Palkia or Dialga. I always found the layout of this stage fairly interesting, basically two Final Destinations on top of each other, creating a tunnel in the middle. The top part instead is where the fourth generation legendaries will appear, as I said Dialga, Palkia, or, non canonically, Cresselia.
Every Pokémon has different effects on the match and I like that Sakurai took inspiration by the time/space theme of the fourth generation Pokémon games. Dialga, other than being able to attack players with swipes, being the embodiment of time, can slow down the time of the match, making everyone move slowly. Palkia, on the other hand, is the incarnation of space can have various effects: it can completely mirror the stage so that you'll move the opposite direction you tilt the joypad in, or even tilt the stage at 180 degrees forcing you to play upside down.
There are other minor attacks both of them can do, like launching a giant beam inside the tunnel, breaking down the stage to pieces... Cresselia's attacks are fairly useless in comparison, she just throws a bunch of light "shoryukens".
What can I say, I like this stage too. The hazards are indeed incredibly intrusive, but there's a difference in hazards that obstruct you in doing what you want to do, and hazards that simply make it harder for you doing it.
Let's say the stage is mirrored because of Palkia's attack. It's an unavoidable hazard, there's nothing you can do either with luck or skill to continue battling without being under that effect. Some would argue that that is unfair, but the hazards hits everyone. It just changes the rules, for a moment, you have to play with controls mirrored, which requires a higher level of skill and control. If you fight poorly when the effect is on, it just means your opponent is better than you at adapting to new elements and environments.
Of course, some may prefer still battling without them, so that's why an hazard toggle really would be a neat addition for Smash 5 (100% it's gonna appear in Smash Switch Deluxe), but I don't consider them a weak design decision.
Anyway, Spear Pillar also looks great in my opinion, I love the crystals in the cave there which I guess are artistic freedom, and the Pokémon models are actually pretty good. It would be nice to see this return in HD sometime in the future.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Port Town Aero Dive (F-Zero GX)
Falcon's new track is taken directly and pretty faithfully by revered masterpiece F-Zero GX on the Gamecube. It is a recreation of Mute City's main design idea from Melee, even if much more complex and interesting. A touring stage through this F-Zero track with the difference that the platform stops even outside of it (there's an hovering area over the track where the platform stops and F-Zero racers will never reach you here).
Just to differentiate it a bit more from Mute City, the platform even stops at different angolations, replicating the same lateral camera position like in Melee's Big Blue. This is right before the F-Zero racers launch from a platform so there's a moment in which they actually can be on the left part of the stage, almost touching the higher part of the camera and being hard to avoid.
Other than differences in platform layouts though, the stage is essentially a remake of Mute City in a different location. Racers are a little faster and dangerous, and the stage in general ends up being far more hazardous than the previous one.
Port Town as a location was always an interesting choice to me, it's not exactly either the most recognizable or the best looking of the possible tracks from GX (Metropolis, Fire Field, Sand Ocean, or even the Casino would be more endearing to look at). We may consider it an unoffical stage for R.O.B., a character which still doesn't have a single stage going on for him (I mean, why not Gyromite?).
The brownish look of this stage always kind of turned me off, which is weird since the same location looked incredible in the original game. But in Smash Bros., especially in Brawl, the absence of vibrant colors and contrast makes the stages look automatically less interesting, which is a shame since I think this is a really good one.
Even in HD on Smash Wii U I don't think the stage looks particularly beautiful, even if the impressive amount of details and renders is objective. But I guess this is my need for a Fire Field Cylinder Knot stage to happen talking.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Castle Siege (Fire Emblem series)
With the franchise finally taking off thanks to Melee, Ike's inclusion in the roster, and many future installments coming fast to Nintendo consoles, Fire Emblem finally got its own stage in Brawl after a weird absence in Melee. And what a stage, actually!
This is one of the very first stages shown for Brawl, appearing in the announcement trailer, and I have a theory regarding its inception. In Melee, there is data for a cancelled Fire Emblem stage called AKANEIA, which apparently represented a castle under enemy attack like in this one. It never happened, and Marth and Roy had to set with a Fire Emblem song appearing in the Temple stage from Zelda, but at least one of them got vindicated in Brawl. Probably scrapped for its transforming mechanic being too much for Melee (that's my assumption), AKANEIA was brought back by Sakurai and repainted as a general representation of the franchise in Brawl.
Castle Siege in fact doesn't refer to any Fire Emblem in particular, even though in the background of the second phase, a sprite of the Black Knight from Path Of Radiance can be seen. I'm an occasional Fire Emblem player, I've played bits and pieces of a couple of games, so certainly I'm not the right one to search for proofs regarding where and when this Siege takes place exactly.
So I'll just talk about the stage itself. The first phase is outside of the castle, even outside of the walls, on a platform which I guess is a tower or something. The layout is simple but the level of details in here is fantastic. I have some form of fetish for flags in Smash Bros. stage, so here I can get my kink, but the real impressive stuff is the castle itself and the epic battle happening in the background. It may to be honest seem like Fire Emblem as a saga is much more action-heavy than it actually is if you take this stage for reference, but hey, it looks good so whatever.

The layout gets a little more complicated in the middle section and it adds breakable element to the stage (this right here is the reason why I think AKANEIA was cut from Melee since I guess the Gamecube wasn't strong enough to have this mechanic work properly). The two statues which literally keep a platform in their hands can be destroyed, but why would you do that? They look awesome. The main platform on the ground is a walkoff, and in general the platform layout, while still quite simple, is kind of weird to traverse thanks to the two cloth platforms in the higher part. This part looks great too: it's rare to see actual people in the background, even if they're completely immobile. It adds life to the whole section and reminds you that a battle is actually taking place in here.

Maybe Fire Emblem fans can explain this last section to me, but for the third phase of the stage, you find yourself in literal Hell. You're on a giant boulder which tilts randomly (maybe I'm wrong, but player disposition on the platform doesn't change the tilt direction) under the castle itself, so down inside the earth that you're apparently reaching the planet's core. The background looks astonishingly good again, and in general the theme of the stage being about descent and ascent is pretty good. I've read lava sections do appear in Fire Emblem games from time to time, but I don't know exactly in which games.
In general, the stage is pretty interesting especially because every section is completely different from the other one as layout: the first is a modified Battlefield , the second is a walkoff, and the last one is a tilting Final Destination. The main platform looks and acts completely different in each phase which is a nice theme to add to the stage.
Castle Siege returns in Smash Wii U, looking even better, and transforming stages are going to be a mainstay for Fire Emblem representation in the future as we'll see.

 

[Vintage Creep]

WarioWare, Inc. (WarioWare series)
This is an hard one to talk about. By far, probably the gimmickyest stage ever in Smash Bros. to date, WarioWare literally brings Mario Party into Smash Bros. Literally the opposite of what a competitive stage should be, WarioWare starts extremely simple. It's basically Battlefield with two platforms on top instead of one, and that's it, but then...

This stage just randomly drops you in the middle of many minigames taken directly from the WarioWare franchise, ranging from the Gamecube game to the brilliant Touched! installment on DS, you're forced to take on various hilariously stupid tasks like popping balloons, avoid giant feet which will try to crush you, jump at the right moment to escape an earthquake, or even just stay completely immobile for a few seconds.
And, I don't care if it's going to be spectacularly controversial, I absolutely adore it. This is when Sakurai just said "**** it!" and did whatever he wanted to do, making Smash Bros. Brawl officially a party game over a fighting game. Why do I like it?
Well, the "hazards", if we want to call them that, actually reward you when you succeed in completing the task, either with a small health recovery, or a small frame of invincibility, or just random items to use in the battle. If you fail, you simply get nothing. The idea is simple, but the mechanic itself works brilliantly because you have a choice: you can either care about the minigame you're thrown intro, or you can continue and try to hit your opponent risiking to fail your task and not get a reward.
It adds a layer of strategy that, even if you won't appreciate from a competitive standpoint, actually add intersting scenarios regarding gameplay. Take the statue minigame for example: you have to stay completely immobile to get the reward, but this leaves you in the hands of another player. Will he stay immobile too or will he decide to rack up some easy damage by hitting you, while not getting the reward? Will you make the same decision?
Out of all the possible microgames on the stage (all ripped directly from the games as far as aesthetic and mechanics work), that was my favorite for that exact reason. The urge of moving and just try to kill everyone was hard to fight but the reward system makes it work.
Of course, the reward is random so you might not get what you actually need, but it's never bad so there's always a reason to do it. The risk/reward factor has never been more present in a Smash Bros. stage ever, so deliberately at least.
And let's be honest, the stage is funny as hell to look at. WarioWare in general as a series has that perfect Japanese humor that for once translates pretty well even to a western audience, and for that reason alone I just can't hate on this stage.
It follows all my rules for a perfect stage: it looks great, it plays good, and the source material has never been stronger on this one. Of course it's gimmicky and all, but what do you expect from a WarioWare game? This certainly is not the franchise from which create a basic stage in the vein of Final Destination and such.
It returned on 3DS, sadly as the only Wario franchise rep, which sounded odd to me. We realized now that Sakurai doesn't seem to care about the Wario Land / Shake series, but a stage based on that one, much simpler and hazardless, would have been a nice addition to counterpart WarioWare, Inc., especially since 3DS was supposed to be a celebration of portable games.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Distant Planet (Pikmin franchise)
Olimar & Pikmin got upgrated from trophy in Melee to full-fledged playable character in Brawl, so here's their stage, meant to represent the series in general, or well, the two games released for Gamecube at the time.
I always found this one pretty weird and honestly not very good because of its platform layout and the random, kind of clunky way the hazard on the right (a giant Bulborb that can eat you if you land inside its mouth and bring you out of the screen as it leaves).
The left part of the stage is a long diagonal walkoff platform which sadly reminds me of Melee's Yoshi's Island, and if you remember I really did not like that stage. For some reason the direction this platform goes just annoys me to no end, it's weird to walk on, hard to fight on, and all in all pretty useless. Worsening it all is also the fact that every once in a while rain will create a waterfall on this platform, dragging you down in the pit. I liked, on the other hand, how the central part of the stage works and reacts when you jump on it, moving a bit.
Then there's the Bulborb, which again always seemed pretty broken to me. It doesn't actually react to anything out of its mouth, so you could just chill on top of its nose for a while without risking too much. It's basically impossible to throw an enemy inside its mouth, so you really had to have suicidal tendencies for this hazard to actually make a move.
Small colored badges appear exclusively on this stage, and you can throw them inside the ship-like onions on the stage to get an item in return, but I don't remember ever using this feature, so that felt kind of pointless too because items still appeared randomly on the stage like in every other one.
In general, I always found this stage a good amount of nice ideas developed pretty badly, which is a shame. It looks nice at least, even on 3DS, but Smash WiiU will give Pikmin a much better stage in my opinion, less gimmicky and more comfortable to fight in. This one, eh. I remember loving only the music.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Smashville (Animal Crossing: Wild World)
One of the few stages in Brawl considered legal in competitive play, Smashville is a basic Final Destination with a single moving platform hovering on it, but it looks great.
In a game so full of gimmicky, complicated, sometimes convoluted stages, one like this was painfully needed, and Animal Crossing is a perfect franchise to base a simple stage on since, well, the games don't offer much elements that can be used as hazards or obstacles. I have a theory that Mr. Resetti was supposed to be its main hazard, but then Sakurai made it an assist trophy because he realized that he had to leave something to the competitive crowd.
Being so simple, Smashville offers the possibility to really expand its aesthetic design, so not only a wide variety of NPCs appear in the background of the platform, but the main land on which the stage hovers on is incredibly detailed and moves around inspired by the way the original games look.
Also, a very nice feature makes the stage look like its time follows the one saved on the Wii's memory, so if you play at night, the stage will be set at night, if you play at morning, it'll be morning, and so on. On Saturday nights, K.K. Slider appears singing you a song, and that is lovely. Sakurai managed to sprinkle an impressive amount of elements from the franchise without affecting gameplay whatsoever, so it doesn't surprise me that, at least from the competitive side of things, this is one of the favorite stages ever in all of Smash Bros.
Personally, I like it a lot even if I'm not an Animal Crossing player, but then it came back on WiiU. I'll never understand this decision since Smash U had another original AC stage which looks and acts basically the same, making this addition extremely redundant. I guess it was extremely easy to port, and Sakurai went like "Why not?" which is understendable, but at least he would've had to change its successor quite a bit.

 

[Vintage Creep]

New Pork City (Mother 3)
Such a weird choice to make Mother the franchise on which trying to replicate the same overwhelming feeling Temple in Melee had, but with Lucas in, Sakurai went for that, and here it is. Visually, New Pork City looks spectacular to me. I love the purple palette, the amount of details in signs and advertising bills in the background, the lights moving way past the buildings and the music make this an awesome stage to look at. Too bad it's, well, not very fun.
Instead than being a compact structure of a single platform like Temple, New Pork City is instead a group of solitary single platforms here and there, most seemingly at random, making the whole thing a chore to traverse, especially if you choose a fat slow character like Bowser, or characters with limited recovery abilites like... Like Lucas! Even Lucas has an hard time playing on his own stage, and that just feels wrong for some reason.
There's an hazard which can one-hit-KO you, the Ultimate Chimera, but it's extremely easy to avoid so it's not much of a problem. The real hazard to me has always been the way the stage itself is designed, it's just a jumble random mess with platforms seemingly placed at random, and the stage, while seeming pretty big, is actually a lot smaller than it looks, it's just that the background is a nice distraction.
It's so close to be decent though, I believe a little work on it can actually repair it, like uniting that lower-left platform, which is just there because Sakurai realized that zone would feel too empty without it, with the higher left one. The ladders appearing in Rumble Falls would be a much needed addition to this stage, so that every character potentially can traverse it without issue.
A simple HD remake wouldn't be enough, so maybe that's the reason it never returned, even if I think it would've make perfect sense on Smash Wii U for the 8-player mode. Maybe actually adjusting the platform design would be too much of an effort to warrant its return, and Sakurai just decided to scrap it out of existence. I will not miss it too much, to be honest, but out of all the bad stages in Smash Bros., this one is the only which I feel could be easily improved.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Summit (Ice Climber / Balloon Fight)
The second and last (for now) Ice Climbers stage rep is another one that has very little to share from its source material, so little in fact that another Nintendo franchise from the NES era bleeds in just because. I kind of get it to be honest, I mean they're both one-off games older than me and probably a large chunk of Smash Bros. players, so there really is no much of a problem in fusing them into one single element in the game.
Summit is a much simpler stage than Icicle Mountain, but still is surprisingly complicated for being taken by such a simple game. The platform layout of the mountain isn't too uncomfortable, but the main platform is ice, which means that slipping and... TRIPPING is much more present, except for the Ice Climbers which walk normally. I like this, it makes sense and having one advantage such as this restricted to a single stage isn't that game-breaking to me.
The darker block of ice in the left can be broken, and many vegetables from the original game appear as edible items exclusively on Summit, healing damage.
After a while, global warming does its catastrophic damages and the iceberg detaches from the summit, and crashes into the sea at fast pace. During this time, the float mechanic appears again like in Pirate Ship and Pokémon Stadium 2, and then the process repeats itself again and again.
During the time the iceberg is in the water, a fish from Balloon Fight appears as the major enemy hazard in the stage, jumping out of the water trying to eat everyone.
It is, overall, another weak attempt at representing Ice Climber in any way, even though mechanically is not so bad. There is interesting stuff happening, sorta, but the result still manages to be kind of generic and boring, more akin to the "ice level trope" in videogames than an actual representation of a franchise. It's even more saddening when you realize that this is it for Ice Climbers. They would not return in Smash 4, missing the chance of getting a good stage for themselves again.
I do not hate this stage, it plays better than Icicle Mountain, but feels as an even bigger departure from the source material, and one which really does not make much sense. As we'll see soon, Brawl explored the possibility of replicating certain games 1:1 with three stages, one which we already analyzed (Mushroomy Kingdom) and two which we're close to do (75m and Mario Bros.). They didn't end up too well, to be honest, so I'm conflicted on what I am implying, but maybe it would've been more memorable than Summit.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Skyworld (Kid Icarus franchise)
With Pit's inclusion in Brawl's roster, Sakurai decided to give him a little treat in the form of a pretty simple and yet fun stage.
Let's talk about the layout first. It is another semi-Battlefield, a modified version of the basic stage with platforms positioned in a slightly different part of the screen, and one other major difference: everything here is breakable. Every single tile of the platform can be broken with certain moves, but that won't do much since the clouds beneath them still act as a platform, even though you can go through them now by pressing down on the stick or by getting spiked by an opponent. Under the main platform, another small one moves left and right, acting as Randall in Yoshi's Story basically.
The idea is very simple and yet the stage manages to have its own flavor: the fact that you can modify the terrain and change the way it works adds a little bit of depth to the battles on here which isn't present in any other stage. So far, this is the only one which is completely breakable, even though of course platforms magically reappear after a while.
As a franchise, Kid Icarus was completely rebranded by Sakurai himself in the vein he redesigned Ice Climbers too, but this time around this turned out to be a beta test of sort for the reboot of Kid Icarus made by the man himself a few years after Brawl with Uprising on 3DS. Even though the artstyle is much more basic than what the game turned out to be (still my favorite 3DS game ever and one of 2012 finest games in general), you can see some elements in here that will be later reused.
I really like how this stage looks, even though it has basically nothing to do with the original Skyworld levels in the two old Kid Icarus games. The statues appearing in the background, the floating island are very cool and it's one of those rare instances in which having a stage being simply a random platform in the middle of nothing makes sense in lore.
The game came back in Smash Wii U, accompanied by a much more complicated Kid Icarus rep.

 

[Vintage Creep]

75m (Donkey Kong)
Hey, remember how much I love when Sakurai uses elements and mechanics from the source material to create a level for Smash Bros.? Well, this is a straight up port of a level of the original Donkey Kong, down to every single platform position, the way the enemies and hazards behave, and even the look and aesthetic of it, so I must love it right? No. No. NO.
I honestly believe this is the worst stage ever introduced in a Smash Bros. installment, simply because it's, well, unplayable. Having a SMASH BROS. match in here is basically almost impossible because of the amount of hazards being thrown at you, and sheer amount of difficulty you have simply traversing the stage to get to your opponent.
The ladders work like in Rumble Falls, but when there they were somewhat useful to survive the waterfall, in here they just get in the way. Everytime I just wanted to jump from one platform to the other, I ended up scaling the ladders instead, becoming an easy target for my opponents. The little fire enemies move extremely slow sure, but they still manage to be annoying because they're positioned in the two locations you'd be most comfortable fighting on.
The higher part of the stage is easier, when DK just chills in the background. But every once in a while, like in the game, he will decide to come out, becoming a massive untouchable ******** which creates smal earthquakes and throws his tools at you, which fall on the right part of the stage (again, where it's easier to fight on in general).
I kind of like the whole idea behind it, keeping the original feel of the game in every single element, from the looks to the mechanic itself, but this here just doesn't work at all for Smash Bros.
I dreaded this stage back in Brawl, and for some reason Sakurai brought it back in Smash WiiU. I just hate it, and don't want to spend much more time talking about it, it's that bad.

 

[ryuu seika]

I dunno, Smash 4 had Magicant and Wily's Castle.

Both of which were fundamentally good stages, just with attrocious hazards tacked on last minute. Which, I guess, could also be said for Pirate Ship but not for things like Norfair, Spear Pillar and that Pikmin stage.

Spear Pillar, however, could have actually been ok without the lasers, even if the other hazards were both quite intrusive and integral to the theming.

Oh and Castle Siege has a 4th form you missed: Blank, white, misty, unimaginative walk off. The transitions are so lazy and it feels like a slide show.

 

[Vintage Creep]

Yeah I forgot to talk about the transtions, they're pretty ugly but I don't how much better they could've been really.