by Doc – Owner, Founder, Can Never Look at Ramen the Same Way Again
I should probably start by saying that yes, this article is mostly speculation, but we do have some evidence to support what I’m about to say in this piece. However, as with all pre-release amiibo, everything’s up for debate until the amiibo hits shelves and hits the official amiibo tier list.
We do have footage of the Min Min amiibo here, so give this a watch before you carry on with your reading. And as always, give the Amazon Affiliates link a click so we can keep the lights on, if you would be so kind.
Min Min amiibo By Your Side
When Min Min was released, everyone was thinking the same thing. The entire Smash community collectively said “Good Lord, what can stop this character?” and the amiibo community was no exception. It’s not hard to see why – those arms are insanely large hitboxes.
This question is doubly important with amiibo combat. Human players can counterpick Min Min and use characters with options to work around Min Min’s fists. Amiibo have no such option, and even if they did, they’re subject to the limitations of the AI. This presents, for the umpteenth time, a problem in the meta – a new amiibo has a mechanic that’s unbeatable and we have no reasonably doable way to get around it.
We’ve had a lot of characters with mechanics like this. We’ve had:
- Incineroar‘s Alolan Whip
- Ness’ PK Fire
- Mii Gunner‘s Missiles (pre-10.0)
- Terry‘s moveset as a whole, including but not limited to Go! moves and setups for Powerdunk/Forward Smash
Incineroar, and sometimes Terry, are so broken that they’re banned from the meta, and there’s been talk of Ness bans and Gunner bans through history as well. You’ll notice that each of these moves have something in common, too.
They’re horizontally-used moves.
Each of these moves is for use on-stage, and extends horizontally, not vertically. It’s pretty clear, based on this and on other pieces and videos in the Amiibo Doctor media base, that amiibo combat is a horizontally-focused game. Otherwise we’d see playstyles like juggling be dominant in the meta even for a short period of time.
Min Min is the new queen of horizontal gameplay, taking the crown from Incineroar. There’s nobody who can lock down chunks of the stage the way that Min Min does. Her attacks are just too damn large to be easily avoided.
Min Min May Not Be Totally Dominant
However, if you’ll watch the video linked to previously, you’ll see that Min Min isn’t unbeatable. If you keep an eye on the ebb and flow of the battle, you’ll see that once “The Wall” (Min Min’s fists) get broken through, she’s got few options. Most of her options are fairly slow, or at least not worth their weight on defense.
Min Min is unusually balanced in this way. At a distance, almost any distance, she’s got control. She’s even more focused on stage control than Snake is, and unlike Snake she doesn’t need special AI to manipulate the stage. However, she’s very vulnerable to combos, and has few options to respond when she’s in the air up close to an opponent.
How to Beat the Min Min amiibo
I think the path to beating the Min Min amiibo is through combos. Faster, combo-heavy characters that can get through The Wall are going to have a heyday with racking up damage. There’s not a lot of high tiers that fit that archetype (none, really) but that just means that low tiers can have some time in the sun.
Given that Min Min will likely be a character who is most threatened by the ability to counterpick to characters with a better matchup, I’d anticipate she’ll have a harder time in arena tournaments where counterpicking is legal for the loser of the first match. Then the loser against Min Min can select an alternate that’ll burn her ramen ass for good.
Amiibo Doctor 