Do you know the three letters that Smash players
fear? No, it’s not SDI, we’re not talking about
Smash 4. We’re talking about Ultimate, and in this
game, It’s Z-S-S! That’s right, we’re talking about Nintendo’s
leading lady, one of the best and most iconic characters in gaming. Metroid was Nintendo’s first crack at a
dark and eerie sci-fi title and boy did they succeed. Metroid quickly became one of their flagship
franchises and helped birth a whole genre of games – metroidvania. Zero Suit Samus became a playable version
of Samus in Metroid: Zero Mission, where Samus’s suit and ship gets destroyed, leaving her
stuck with just her Zero Suit and a pistol. That’s where Samus’s electric stun gun
comes from. In Smash, Zero Suit Samus first appeared in
Brawl, where she spawned with pieces of her power suit that she could throw. Anyways, where Samus is a heavy, high artillery
zoner Zero Suit Samus is a fast, dynamic rushdown character.
ZSS is one of the fastest characters in the
game by almost every movement metric and has tons of swift, high utility moves. Add threatening early kill setups and wild
movement options to that and ZSS becomes one of the scariest rushdown characters in the
game. Not only that, but she’s definitely the
best Metroid character in the game, though unfortunately that’s not saying too much. ZSS is also one of the most unique rushdown
characters. She’s got range, stuns, and even a tether
grab and zair, stuff you might not even think to put in a rushdown kit. And that makes her a popular and beloved character
in the Ultimate community. So naturally, you might be thinking about
trying your hand at Nintendo’s baddest bounty hunter.
Well, if that’s the case you’ve come to
the right place. We’re gonna get you set up with a beginner’s
overview of ZSS. And we’re gonna do it by focusing on three
core parts of her kit – her incredible movement, her tech chasing, and her style. Before we get into it, if you’re looking
for even more advanced guides then check out Proguides.com. At Proguides.com you can find, character guides,
courses from top smash pros like MKLeo, and one on one coaching. Now let’s get started with movement. Forget the different colored blasters or the
morph ball puzzles, with ZSS movement is what will open doors.
First, let’s talk about the raw data. ZSS has the 9th highest air speed, the 6th
highest run speed, and the highest initial dash speed in the game. For the uninitiated, the initial dash is the
animation that happens before the run and it’s a big part of movement in Smash Ultimate. We go more into that in our physics video
linked below in the description.
Those stats are uniquely good. Other fighters tend to be fast in one or two
areas. Wolf is super fast in the air but not as fast
on the ground. Sheik is super quick on the ground but not
so fast in the air. Characters like Captain Falcon run fast but
have super clunky initial dashes. ZSS has it all and only a handful of characters,
like Roy, Chrom, and Sonic, can rival the raw speed she has on every front. However, none of them can rival the mobility
she gets from her down special, Flip Jump. Flip Jump is a hugely versatile movement option
that ZSS can use in a lot of situations but particularly off stage, in advantage or disadvantage.
When ZSS activates Flip Jump, she vaults in
the direction she’s facing, covering a wide arc of space pretty quickly. This move can be used to cover lots of vertical
or horizontal distance and can be used on the ground or in the air. It doesn’t put her into a helpless state
either. That means that after she uses it she can
still jump or use up special. It’s also comes with an attack, Flip Kick. If you press any attack button a bit after
activating flip jump, from frame 14 onwards, ZSS will throw out a strong hitbox from her
feet. There’s more nuance there, but we’ll get
to that later. Seems pretty basic right? Well, that’s just the start. Flip Jump will move in the direction ZSS faces
at first, but you can reverse its direction by flicking the stick the other way in the
early stages of the move.
That’s the first 4 frames for the tech heads
out there. This is what’s called a b-reverse. While you’re moving you also have huge control
over your momentum normally. Then, if you want more control, you can use
your flip kick. Flip kicking towards your jump will carry
your momentum forward and flip kicking away will basically stop your momentum. Alright, we’re getting a bit less basic
right? There’s still a lot more. Flip jump can also be used as a wall jump
and can actually wall jump three times. Usually you won’t be able to use it that
often. But you can bounce off the ledge using this
feature and smack an opponent off stage without using your second jump. Since ZSS can also wall jump, she can basically
climb up stages like Yoshi’s Island. Now let’s get weird with it. Flip Jump can also be used to cancel horizontal
knockback. When the opponent lands a haymaker that sends
you left or right, you can spam flip jump to get out of the knockback faster and potentially
survive. Flip Jump also has three different kinds of
hits.
There’s the footstool hit, which you get
automatically by touching the top of an opponent in the jump. This buries on stage and has a small spike
off stage. Then there’s the leg hitbox of flip kick,
which knocks away. Then there’s the heel hitbox, which is one
of the strongest spikes in the game and will kill opponents off stage at about 50%. This hitbox doesn’t care about anyone’s
recovery. Flip Jump also has invincibility during its
start up from frames 3-12. In some cases, you can use it in place of
an air dodge. That’s a bit more advanced, right? All those little details add up to make an
already good movement into an incredible one. ZSS’s Flip kick can be used to edgeguard,
recover, to stay alive after a big hit, to escape juggle situations, to cap off combos,
get early kills, and make aerial movement harder to read.
This is why ZSS may have the best movement
in the entire game. Not only does she have great raw stats, she
also has an insane mobility tool. If you’re just starting out, be sure to
go into training mode and play around with Flip Jump. There are even more details, applications,
and drawbacks to the move that we didn’t discuss. Getting a feel for the move will let you make
plays with ZSS. Getting mastery of the move will let you win
games with ZSS. And it’ll let you hear that sweet, sweet
meteor spike sound all more often. A big part of ZSS’s play comes from mastering
her quick and elusive movement in general.
While ZSS is standing, she’s tall and easy
to hit. When she runs or jumps, her speed and even
her jump animations can make her harder to hit. This is why you don’t see ZSS’s rock the
Zackray staredown very often. Samus doesn’t wanna take hits when the armor’s
off, she wants to trick opponents with elusive movements and counterattack. At the start, the easiest way to do this is
by foxtrotting. However, as you get better with ZSS you’ll
want to use your aerial movement more often. ZSS’s ground moves are more useful for knocking
an opponent away or reading them for a kill. Her aerial moves are where she gets more follow
ups and damage. Your counter attacking is stronger in the
air, as is your movement. That’s why you’ll see pros like Marss
spend a lot of time in the air. And remember to mix things up. Every option is a bad option if you use it
all the time. Good opponents will punish you for running,
jumping, and Flip Jumping in the same patterns.
The goal of your movement should be to make
people miss then use your speed to follow up. Flip jump responsibly, Metroid fans. So you’ve started moving around and stumping
the opponent. You’ve made them miss and you’re landing
counter hits. Now it’s time to capitalize with tech chasing
and follow ups. Tech chasing is the old and powerful art inside
every Smash game. When someone falls down, they can tech, meaning
they press the dodge or shield button right as they land to quickly stand up. Though teching is often the best option, it
is punishable. Tech chasing is the term for following an
opponent, predicting their tech and punishing it. Nowadays, we use it more generally for following
up on grounded opponents. Though the quickplay highlight reels say otherwise,
ZSS doesn’t have a ton of long-lasting combos. ZSS can pull off crazy zero to deaths and
huge combo strings, but only if the opponent lets her by not responding to her moves correctly.
Playing against a good ZSS can feel like playing
against a good combo character too, because ZSS keeps opponents in disadvantage for so
long. But ZSS isn’t using combos to do that as
much as she’s using tech chasing. If you look at ZSS’s kit, you can see that
she’s designed to tech chase. Lots of ZSS’s moves will knock down, ground,
or stun an opponent. ZSS has a huge amount of speed and movement
tools that let her catch up to an opponent as they fall. ZSS also has tons of mid range moves and big
hitboxes that can reach the opponent as they land or cover different options.
This is what makes ZSS so cool and so challenging. Unlike other characters, you don’t get free
damage from an oppressive combo game. You also don’t get free kills from strong
moves. But you do get the ability to harass the opponent
and make their disadvantage feel like an electric hell. There’s a lot that goes into tech chasing,
so let’s start off simple. When you tech chase, your goal is to cover
an opponent’s options. You want to cover every option, but usually
you can’t. So you want to try and cover the option they
pick. When you get the chance to tech chase, your
opponent will often have the option to tech or hit the ground then roll in towards you,
away from you, get up attack, or stand up.
ZSS has ways to handle all these options. Her longer reaching hitboxes like side special
and grab can sometimes catch rolls away from her. Her grab or her stunning normal special can
punish a normal get up or a tech. Get up attack is usually the easiest option
to punish since it’s the laggiest, you just have to stay out of its range, hit from above
with an aerial, or shield it.
But for ZSS, the holy grail is the roll in. ZSS can cover an opponent rolling in with
a lot of her options, including her down smash. ZSS’s down smash is super unique. Instead of knocking opponents back, it locks
them in hit stun for an increasing amount of time based on their percent and how long
you charge it. So if a ZSS knocks an opponent down, they
can read that the opponent will roll in, charge a down smash then hard punish with whatever
she wants. Down smash into boost kick or upsmash are
two common ways ZSS takes stocks. This is why you’ll see Marss and other top
ZSS players often throw out a down smash near a grounded opponent. If they read the roll in, then Samus is cashing
in on that bounty real fast. If they miss the read, they don’t often
get punished because their opponent doesn’t have the time to land a hit.
It’s not just high reward, it’s also low
risk. Though it is low risk, you do have to be careful
to space it so get up attack won’t hit you and release it quickly enough that you can
shield or dodge a counter attack. On top of all that, ZSS’s crazy speed lets
her hit grounded opponents before they can do anything. As ZSS, you could run in and hit an opponent
or even stun them with her neutral special to extend their hit stun and get a better
follow up. ZSS is also great at juggle scenarios too. If ZSS knocks an opponent up, she gets even
more dangerous. Her up smash, up tilt, and up air all have
big upward hitboxes that can catch an opponent’s landing. Her up tilt has such a wide hitbox that it
can also cover most of a platform. That means ZSS can cover most of an opponent’s
options when they hit a platform.
ZSS can then use platforms to extend combos
and basically up air her opponents into the heavens. This is really what makes ZSS so oppressive. It’s not combos, it’s follow ups. If you fall down, ZSS is gonna be there to
catch you… then dunk you into the blast zone. Alright, alright that’s enough of tech. That’s enough of movement. That’s enough of frame data and option coverage
and all that mental stuff. Let’s talk the heart! The magic! The… Style! ZSS has a ton of strengths we could talk about. Her defensive options are great. Her early kills and edgeguards are great. Her neutral tools are great. But more than any of that, she’s defined
by style. You look up stylish in the fighting game dictionary
and you see a picture of Zero Suit Samus. Now, when we say stylish, we’re not talking
about the wildly impractical heels. We’re talking about early kills, flashy
set ups, deep edgeguards, ladder combos, hard reads, all that stuff. That’s the kind of thing that’s stylish
in the fighting game world.
And it’s the kind of stuff that ZSS does. A good ZSS can carry a player off stage with
forward airs or chain aerials into a Flip Kick for an early gimp. A good ZSS player can read a ledge option
so hard they make it look like they’re controlling both characters. A great ZSS player does this stuff to even
the strongest players. There aren’t a lot of shortcuts to getting
that style. It takes a lot of work and practice to get
there. First, know your combo starters – things like
neutral air, forward air, and up air. Second, know your neutral tools, things like
neutral special, grab, zair, well-spaced fairs, and quick grounded moves like jab and forward
tilt to knock opponents away.
Third, know your big punish tools, things
like down smash, up special, side special, Flip Kick, and up smash. Know that if you miss these, you’re gonna
get punished. And finally, master your movement! Learn to control Flip Jump momentum, recover
from low points with wall jumps, and trick opponents with fox trots and jumps. Then, after all that start to learn your opponent. If they get lazy with anything – their recovery,
their get up options, their ledge options – then look for a punish. If they start to show a habit, read it for
a kill. That’s what ZSS is built for and that’s
why we see her take early stocks at the highest levels. If ZSS can read an opponent, then they might
as well start asking the Space Pirates for mechanical body parts right now. Because they’re about to lose life and limb. If you want raw tech chases, crazy movement,
and stylish outplays, then ZSS is the character for you.
Just remember, that flashy gameplay comes
at a cost. ZSS is super lightweight – only one unit of
weight heavier than Olimar. One mistake may cost them the game, but the
same goes for you. And one quick strategy to help you stay in
the game is that big red subscribe button! Right there, that one. Mash that now to to salvage your final stock
in competitive Smash, and we’ll be sure to take you all the way to the victory you
want and deserve..
