Because it’s unlucky number 13 this time, I resolve to analyze something a bit… more SPOOKIER.

LUIGI’S MANSION

Yeah, it just looks freaky. Who knows if the mansion is levitating spookily by itself or just the top of some huge, disoriented stem of an mystic plant. Yeah, I’d like to think the latter. Luigi’s Mansion is one of the more quirkier and novel stages. At first glance, you’d think, “How in the world can you battle on that?” But then…

Yes, these are the “innards” of the mansion. When a character edges “dangerously” close to the mansion’s interior, the inside of the mansion is beautifully shown. You can actually brawl in the little space provided. The amazing thing is, it has more than one form…

HISTORY

It all dates back to Luigi’s Mansion, the GameCube game. It’s where Luigi uses his vacuum cleaner, the Poultergust 3000, to suck up all the ghosts in his new mansion, which is of course haunted. We of course see the mansion’s ins and outs in the game, but the Brawl version is slightly made-over to be simpler.

Luigi is the protagonist in Luigi’s Mansion. Luigi, of course, is also in Brawl, and is actually faring quite well with his whimsical techniques and odd abilities. The brother of Mario was created in 1983 in the Mario Bros. franchise. After sharing minimal fame with Mario, who usually was the protagonist, Luigi enjoyed his first main game in Luigi’s Mansion.

The Luigi’s Mansion stage in Brawl is the mansion where much of the Luigi’s Mansion plot occurs.

PROPERTIES

There are usually three levels of Luigi’s Mansion to brawl on:

-The first level (ground floor),
-The second level,
-And the roof.

Luigi’s Mansion is, as said earlier, quite a novel stage. In the beginning, the stage looks unfit for dueling as the ceilings and floors of the mansion can hinder Usmash kills. However, a good piece of information would be that only the bottom left and the bottom right platforms (the left and right parts of the floor of the second level in Luigi’s Mansion’s interior) are unpassable via jump or duck. Any character may go through the mdidle platform (between the bottom left and the bottom right), the two platforms under the middle platform and even the roof.

Don’t enjoy the small space given to brawl on Luigi’s Mansion? The golden poles keep the mansion intact. If you hit the poles for long enough, they will break, and one part of Luigi’s Mansion will crumple to the ground.

-The top-left pole, if broken, will destroy the left half of the roof.
-The top-right pole, if broken, will destroy the right half of the roof.

Only after these poles are broken may you break the bottom poles. The bottom poles will not break no matter how hard you hit them if you don’t break the ones on top first. It makes sense, because a mansion with the top parts floating in the air, but the bottom parts crumpled into debris would be very odd.

-The bottom-left pole, if broken, will destroy the bottom left half of the mansion.
-The bottom-right pole, if broken, will destroy the bottom right half of the mansion.

Once all poles are broken, you are pitted with a Final Destination-like stage. So, you can actually break these poles to your advantage. Brawl as fast as you can while on the Final Destination-like stage, because after a while the entire mansion pops back from the ground. This means you’re back to the beginning again, and you have to break the pillars and crumple another mansion. Great. Note that most projectiles will not go past the pole and will directly do damage to it (an example against would be Ivysaur’s Razor Leaf, as it goes through most things, even characters anyways).

Also, the main platform (the vine, yeah the vine) is a square platform, not a trapezoid, so recover carefully. There are also two stray, moving platforms at the ends of the stage (you can’t see them in either picture above), but those are of little significance in the relatively big space you are given.

I really love the spooky look of the mansion. Perfect setting for a duel. I especially love how big the moon is… it seems your closer to outer space than you are on a planet.

COMMENTS, OPINIONS, STRATEGIES

If you are a slow character, you obviously have a disadvantage here. Because you can bounce off the bottom left and the bottom right platforms of the intact mansion, you are combo’d very easily. Break the top pillars fast, because after you break those then a makeshift FD resides on the remnants of the second level on the mansion. Brawl there until you are able to break the bottom pillars, where then you are no longer at complete disadvantage. It’s not the end of the world if you don’t break the top pillars, since you’ll go through the roof, but you are extremely vulnerable to Usmash/Star Finishes when the pillars are not broken. A simple Usmash/Utilt will send you up, and then the opponent will proceed to jump on the roof, where he can Uair/Usmash/Utilt you to your grave sooner than expected. It is recommended that Charizard should use his fast UpB on the roof, where getting a KO is relatively simple. Use the moves with the least lag, as any sort of weakness can result in a deadly combo.

Faster characters, you’re in for luck. Use your most damaging moves (but not the ones with most knockback) on the bottom part of the mansion. If you get a lucky Usmash or Utilt in, chances are your opponent will be stuck for a long time, because they will bounce off the wall and still be in hitbox range. Use this to your advantage. Once they are at good percentages, kill with your fastest move (after all, you might be vulnerable to getting combo’d as well). Kirby and Yoshi always have their reliable Fsmash, Fox and Falco have great Dsmashes (perfect for Luigi’s Mansion in fact), Ness and Wario’s throw’s don’t disappoint (Ness’ is Bthrow and Wario’s is Fthrow), etc.

Edge guarding game is relatively similar to FD. Don’t edge guard the ones with good recoveries unless your attack nets an absolute kill (that means no to many combo’ing aerials, like Falco’s Fair, Sonic’s Fair, and Lucario’s Fair). Dedede’s Fair is relatively safe when playing against recoverers like Snake (watch out for Super Armor) and Lucas. Playing against tether recoveries are the same; hit them off, grab the ledge, and use FF – Z – Z for Link, TL, and other fellow tether characters if they are dangerously close. The opponent’s tether recovery should not latch onto the ledge if you are already grabbing it.

The bottom left and right platforms are not as useless as you think they may be. Many character’s Uairs can bypass the platform’s thin shape and hit opponents above. For example, if the opponent was on the left part of the second floor, and I was a Yoshi on the left part of the ground floor, I could SH + Uair and hit my opponent through the ceiling. This works really well especially if your opponent starts the match on the second level, while you start the match on the bottom floor.

—–

Luigi’s Mansion is often overlooked because it looks… well, unusable at first glance. In hindsight, the platforms should produce some negative annoyance towards many characters. However, I believe that the stage brings more uniqueness to the ever-boring Final Destination and Smashville, yet the stage does not prove to be completely unfair to any character. Whether it’s a fair dueling stage or not depends on the player’s point of view; whether it’s a FUN stage, especially for combo’ers, is a no-brainer. Of course it’s fun.

Weird things somehow always prevail over rather sane and normal things in terms of “fun” factor. Yay for evil.

Happy Brawling!

-Atmc

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