Basic Techniques
Standard Attacks
| Button(s) | Description/notes |
|---|---|
|
A weak jab. Very unremarkable. |
|
|
A jab-to-punch combo. Also not very good. |
| Forward +
|
A fairly quick kick. |
| Dash +
|
Samus lunges at you and hits you with her shoulder. |
 +
|
Samus hits the ground with her power beam and causes a small explosion. It launches the enemy upwards. |
 +
|
Samus raises her leg, holds it there for a moment, then brings it crashing down. This can be used to counter some air attacks if timed properly. |
| Smash Forward +
|
Samus punches you really hard with her gun. It is not as fast as Samus' other moves and shouldn't be used frequently. |
| Smash +
|
Samus swings her leg on the ground 360 degrees around her entire body, hitting anything standing in front of or behind her. |
| Smash +
|
Samus shoots flames into the air, catching an enemy who is attacking from above. This move can juggle an opponent for 5 hits, with the last one sending them upwards. Samus requires a little recovery after using this move so she is left vulnerable for around a second. |
Aerial Attacks
| Button(s) | Description/notes |
|---|---|
|
|
A kick that stays deployed for about 1 second. Gets quite decent priority and is very useful for attacking enemies from above. An optimal strategy is to deploy the kick as you fast-fall onto the opponent. |
| Forward +
|
Samus shoots some flames in front of her. No knockback, but fairly decent damage. |
| Back +
|
Samus swings her foot behind her. Roughly equivalent to her sex kick, only behind her instead of in front. |
| +
|
This is Samus' meteor smash. She hits the opponent with her gun, and he skyrockets downwards into oblivion. This move does damage about a second after you start it, so you want to start it as you're still moving upwards. |
| +
|
Samus contorts herself into what can best be described as a screw shape, and juggles the opponent by spinning around quickly causing continuous damage. The final hit kicks them away. |
|
A unique attack, where with most players doubles as in mid-air, Samus will use her Grappling Beam when you press in mid-air. It does damage if you hit an opponent with the extending tip, and can hook onto walls. You can only use this move once in the air and you cannot grapple onto walls continuously. Also, when you have hooked the beam onto a wall, hold down or again to retract the beam to bring Samus up.
|
Special Attacks
| Button(s) | Attack | Description/notes |
|---|---|---|
|
Charge Shot | Press once to charge up. Press again to fire. Does most damage when fully charged, which takes a few seconds. Tap left or right to roll if you anticipate that you will be unable to finish the charge. Can be fired in the air, but not charged.
|
| +
|
Screw Attack | Samus curls up into a ball and shoots upwards as she spins very quickly, doing moderate damage to anyone she hits. Can be used to reach a ledge that is too high after bomb jumping fails you. |
| +
|
Bomb | Samus morphs into her famous Maru Mari/morph ball form and lays a bomb. These bombs explode after about a second, and do a low amount of damage. They can be used as a dodge to make Samus "slippery", but are best used as a recovery move. See bomb jump in the advanced techniques. |
 ( ) +
|
Homing Missile | Samus fires a homing missile which does moderate damage and slows down the further it goes. Generally not as good as the Power Missile below. |
| Smash () +
|
Power Missile | Samus fires a missile which sacrifices the homing capabilities in favour of a stronger and faster missile. For effective use tactics, see missile cancel in the advanced techniques. |
Throws
Samus will extend her Grappling Beam and reel her opponent in if the tip connects. It's best to use this while dashing, because the animation is faster.
| Button(s) | Description/notes |
|---|---|
|
|
Samus whips the opponent into the ground. This is Samus' best throw because it allows her to combo out of it, with a smash attack or a charge shot for example. |
| Forward | Samus flings the opponent forwards. Not very remarkable. |
|
|
Not surprisingly, Samus throws the opponent upwards. This could be used as an aerial setup. |
| Back | Samus throws the opponent backwards. |
Advanced Techniques
Bomb jump
A must for Samus players, the bomb jump is one of Samus' best assets. She can use it to get back onto a ledge from extremely long horizontal distances. The technique is executed by repeatedly laying bombs ( + ) and guiding oneself so that one lands on them and bounces into the air towards the ledge. This is repeated over and over until the player reaches the ledge. A Samus player who has mastered the bomb jump can recover from just about any hit except for a meteor smash or a hit that sends her off the screen instantly.
Samus can actually jump using her Bombs to propel her. She cannot stay in the air indefinitely, but it is very useful as a recovery. Basically, after being knocked off the stage, lay a bomb, fall a little, lay another bomb (causing you to stall long enough for the first bomb to explode), then push the control stick in the direction you wish to go (DI), then repeat the process. Samus can also grapple the stage when she gets close enough.
Super wavedash
This causes Samus to shoot across the screen at a distance aproximately the width of the Final Destination stage, with nearly instant speed. It would be very useful as a form of evasion, but it is very difficult to execute consistently. It is performed by laying a bomb, then, right after Samus hits the ground, you'll see an unmorphing animation. Thats when you smash the control stick as quickly as possible in the opposite direction the player wants to travel, and then in the direction the player wants to travel. The timing for this technique is extremely precise - it can only be executed in the window of 2 frames. You must synchronize when you slam forward and backward by hitting backwards then at the time of the morphing "gel" animation, press forward.
Extended Grab
Press up and down on the 
while tapping . You can only grab by pressing again and home to the other players by holding 
. It may take many tries to get right.
Samus can extend her grapple by rapidly pressing up and down on the and pressing the while her grapple is extended. If done successfully her grapple will be 2-3 times longer and have the ability to home in on enemies by pressing the 
, to grab, you must press again as it lands on the enemy. The process of extending the grapple can leave you open, so it helps to jump into a grapple to make things less easy on your opponent. Also, the grapple resets each life.
Alt. method; works 100% of the time: simply do a short hop, immediately when you become airborn hold and simply rotate the (fast as you can) counter-clockwise once and press . Shows you after you rotate the pad once you should hit the ground. Now you will have an extended Grapple Beam!
Wall Grapple
When using Link, Young Link, or Samus, pressing or + or + to use the character's hookshot (Link and Young Link) or grappling beam (Samus). This can be done during the aforementioned characters' air dodges. It can connect to most solid ledges or walls and will allow the character to hang there; pressing reels the character back up towards the stage. A triple jump attack ( + ) can be performed immediately afterwards. The air dodge can be used to position the character properly before using this recovery technique, since the hookshot/grappling beam will not connect if the character is too close or far from a wall. If it hits an enemy it does some damage and has minimal knockback.
In general, this move is more effective than the + for recovery, except in stages like DK 64 where it won't work.
Missile Canceling
This is a technique particular to Samus, similar to Falco's short hop laser. Before you land on the ground from jumping, fire a missile, the landing will cancel the missile animation and reduce normal missile firing lag. Samus can then use the missile as a cover for her approach. The lag from missiles can also be alleviated with the use of bombs. Drop a bomb, move away, drop a second bomb, and move back to the first bomb. It will explode and propel you up (fire first missile), DI toward second bomb which will explode and propel you up (fire second missile), then the second missile is canceled cause you land on the ground, after landing fire the third missile.