Overview

All hail the king of Dream Land! King Dedede floats into the fray with a powerful hammer and a kit that emulates Kirby without copying him (no pun intended). For starters, King Dedede can float like Kirby, giving him the equivalent of a quintuple jump. After double-jumping, tapping or holding the Jump button gives him up to three more chances to increase his altitude. Like Kirby, this also gives Dedede an easy way to change direction in midair; most fighters are committed to the direction they’re facing once they leave the ground, unless an orientation-swapping trick is used instantly after starting an airborne special. But King Dedede needs only triple/quadruple/quintuple-jump in the desired direction, and he’ll face that way.

Aside from the recovery staying power afforded by having air movement like Kirby’s, Dedede also emulates his arch-enemy with his Inhale move. Just like Kirby, he sucks in hapless nearby victims, able to spit them out to inflict damage and to put them into dangerous positions offstage.

When he’s not busy copying his nemesis, King Dedede outfits himself with a toolbox of slow, incredibly hard-hitting moves, mostly using his barrel hammer. Playing Dedede means compensating for the long windup on his strikes, but the benefits are both high damage and virtually unmatched shield-shattering ability. Even an uncharged side smash is likely to shatter the block of a defender. As a bonus, as long as hammer swings are well-spaced, King Dedede’s swings will never lose out to a challenger’s attack that strikes at the same time.

King Dedede Vitals

Movement Options

Movement Ranks