No. 14 Cinderella Run: s0ft at Apex 2014

Despite Hungrybox and Mango’s success at the top level with her, Jigglypuff isn’t often considered a top tier character in the same way that her contemporaries like Fox, Falco and Marth are. While the post-Brawl era had a fair share of people claiming that Jigglypuff was overpowered or cheap, the fact remained that after Mango stopped playing her, Hungrybox was the character’s only representative at the top level.

At the end of 2013, in the first ever edition of SSBMRank, only two Jigglypuffs ranked within the Top 100: Hungrybox (No. 5) and Darc (No. 45). Heading into Apex 2014, what was then the biggest Apex ever, no one could have imagined that a Jigglypuff outside of Hungrybox and maybe Mango’s rusty Jigglypuff had a chance of making it to a top eight. How unlikely would it have been for anyone to predicted an unranked Jigglypuff main to suddenly burst into the top eight of Melee’s biggest stage ever?

S0ft wasn’t a nobody in the scene, being one of Georgia’s best players, but having been playing Melee at least since the release of Super Smash Bros. Brawl, s0ft didn’t have any extremely notable major performances. In addition to placing 33rd at Revival of Melee, he also finish with the same result at Apex 2013. Unless you were from the South, chances are that you didn’t even know who he was. Apex 2014 changed that.

For his Round 1 pool, the Georgia Jigglypuff wasn’t even necessarily projected to make it out. Hax, now transitioning into maining Fox over Captain Falcon, was the heavy favorite, but s0ft also had other killers in his pool. Players like Vudujin, NamiNami, Rat and D1 (yes – that D1) were considered legitimate threats to make it out as the No. 2.

At this point, Hax was being heralded by the East Coast as its newest savior. Though there were quite a few skeptics of Hax’s switch to Fox, he had as many supporters say that this was the first step en route to Hax eventually becoming the best player in the world, as he was already ranked No. 6 with Captain Falcon.

In hindsight, this is certainly ridiculous, but keep in mind that the title for being the Melee No. 1 was wide open. Between Mango taking care of his newborn son, both Hungrybox and Dr. PeePee in relative slumps, and Mew2King on a tear of winning smaller tournaments, Apex 2014 was the perfect time for Hax to grab the mantle and ascend to godhood. S0ft, however, had different plans.

Making his way to winners finals of the pool, s0ft clutched out a last stock victory against Hax in the first game, before promptly getting four-stocked game two. In their last game, s0ft lost a three to one stock lead before making a hard read on Hax’s recovery and landing a forward smash to take the set. In SSBMRank history, it was the first time a member outside of the Top 100 defeated a player in the Top 10. Many at the time were impressed by s0ft, but expected him to get quickly eliminated from Round 2 pools.

After defeating Harriet, s0ft found himself playing against Ice, Germany’s best player and then thought of as one of Europe’s most promising players. Some at the time even dubbed him as “the European Mew2King” due to his amazing punish game and proficiency with Sheik (then his main) and Marth.

Dominantly winning their first game, which included what has to be the worst rest punish of all time by Ice, s0ft lost a heart breaking second game against Ice’s Fox, missing an upthrow to rest on Pokemon Stadium. Nonetheless, s0ft solidly two-stocked Ice again on game three. Suddenly, the unranked player now had wins over the world’s No. 6 and No. 13 player – and now he had to play Mew2King in winners quarters. He was the only player left in winners bracket that wasn’t ranked within the MIOM Top 100.

Though he got three stocked to start the set, s0ft managed to bring Mew2King to last stock game 2, just whiffing a grab near the left side of Fountain of Dreams and getting promptly sent to losers. Here, s0ft played Ice once again, but this time he had to prove that the results of their first set weren’t a fluke. To make matters more complicated, Ice had Armada in his corner coaching him, while s0ft had Hungrybox.

While the first game was close, s0ft managed to turn it into a two stock after a quick empty jump in front of Ice’s shield, after which s0ft quickly up aired the top of Sheik to convert into a rest. Within the first half of their second game, s0ft went down two stocks to three, before once again clutching yet another rest and evening it up, eventually leading to a last stock situation. Although s0ft’s cheeky spot dodge rest didn’t net him the initial KO he needed to move into top eight, another rest gave him and the South a victory.

Now in top eight, s0ft had to play Colbol, a Fox with plenty of experience playing against Jigglypuff due to Hungrybox being in the same region. To the surprise of many, s0ft took the first game, before losing the second and third, ending his greatest tournament run ever and one of Melee’s most remarkable journeys.

After his Apex 2014 performance, s0ft continued to travel and attend major tourneys, though he never quite lived up to the lofty expectations that came from it. He had decent regional performances and attended enough tournaments to qualify for MLG Anaheim 2014’s final bracket, but he also never placed top eight at a significant Melee national again, even finishing a disappointing 49th at EVO 2014.  By the end of 2014, he was ranked No. 64.

You could look at this say that it proves s0ft’s Apex 2014 as fairly lucky, but keep in mind that s0ft was not even expected to make it out of pools to start the year. More than half a decade after he started playing, he was able to upset players considered massive favorites over the vast majority of professional players, let alone unranked ones. Ending the year as a Top 100 player was more than what was expected from him. His Apex 2014 showing is forever notched into Melee’s history – and arguably the “documentary” era’s first true underdog run.

EDITOR’S NOTE: S0ft unexpectedly contacted me immediately after I posted about n0ne’s run and indirectly guessed that he would be next on the list. Most of the information and assumptions I’ve written here came straight from his account!