Preston Ward Condra Ranks All 35 Super Smash Bros 64 & Melee Stages

by Preston Ward Condra

A project I initially made back in June 2009. I critiqued, discussed and ranked all of the Super Smash Bros 64 and Melee stages from worst to best. I wrote this down, when I was 15 years old. As with all of my other stories, I wrote over 10 years ago? I won't be fixing any of the spelling mistakes, that may or may not be present here. Enjoy reading this now ladies and gentlemen.

4. 33 - Flat Zone

If you recall in my previous countdown ranking, you would know that Flat Zone 2 didn't rank very high on the list not even making the Top 20 on the previous countdown. What we have here is, Flat Zone worse then Flat Zone 2 IMO, with it not even making the Top 30 in this list. I find Flat Zone to be a pretty crappy stage with bland and frustrating action in it.

The main gameplay problem I had with this stage is much like what Icicle Mountain suffers from. There is no support recovery whatsoever in this stage. Since there is no platform recovery on the sides of the stage, it's extremely easy for your opponent to simply pick you up and toss or throw you around one of the sides of the stage. Due to no support recovery on the sides let alone, the top of the stage, this would lead with your opponents to easily trap you on one of the sides of the stage and KO you.

Another main problem I had with this stage, is the stage is small. Very small. Aside from a few main platforms that pop up in this stage from time to time as gameplay action goes on, most of the fighting action is taken place on a bland, bottom and small screen inside of a Game and Watch system with you basically just fighting with your opponents to see who can knock each other out first by simply just throwing and cheapily trapping you on one of the sides with no platform support sides in the stage. The gameplay flow can ran in a very cramped and slow pace due to the stage being so small. Because of this, Flat Zone makes for a stage that is not very fun at all. You will probably find yourself KO'ed more then you are just trying to have some simple fighting action in the stage.

On one final note that makes this stage even more bad, is the poor camera control system in the stage. Much like New Pork City, the camera system that keeps track of combat in Flat Zone would zoom out of battle at random times for no reason whatsoever. This can be extremely problematic, especially when there is a four player fight going on in the stage.

Overall, I found this stage to be annoying, bland and boring to enjoy back in Melee. Not very fun at all.