With two weeks left to go before Tipped Off 16, I have some time to write about basically whatever I wanted. In fact, for last week’s column, I gave my spot to a dear friend of mine (YarnYoshi). Thankfully, I am back to save you from him again and bring you back to our regularly scheduled programming.
For those of you that have followed me for a very long time, you’ll know that I’ve always loved a good bit of history. Practically speaking, the sheer magnitude of community history we have differentiates Melee from every other competitive game. In 2025, it seems like we have quite a bit of history in the making on our hands, which is what brings me to this week’s Monday Morning Marth. For today’s column, I’m going to talk about what I think are the most fascinating historical storylines in the scene as of right now.
Hungrybox’s Climb to GOATdom
Mang0, Armada, and Hungrybox have long been considered an untouchable top three of sorts for being the greatest players of all-time. By sheer major count and status as reigning No. 1 player in the most “esports” era of the game, Hungrybox has an outside shot at the title. If the criteria were simply who was the best when they were around, however, it would be clearly Armada because of his near untouchable head-to-heads. Meanwhile, if you went with a balance of the two, also considering the quality of major wins, and factoring in longevity, you’d go with Mang0. It’s possible that there are still some Ken truthers in the scene, and maybe you totally disagree with the way I’ve summarized each of the three’s arguments, but you get the point.
As we know, one of them is not active any more, while two of them are currently competing and in a strange place within the field. In the context of 2025 Melee, Hungrybox is the one who just won the biggest tournament of the year and is a contender for No. 1, while Mang0’s had a series of not-bad-not-good to straight up terrible showings. However, in 2024 Melee, Mang0 was the one who briefly entered No. 1 consideration when he won back-to-back majors, while Hungrybox essentially became a punching bag for most of the actual contenders. There’s an interesting undercurrent here; over the last 18 months or so, they’ve essentially taken turns experiencing a brief revival in prominence, yet never at the same time.
Keeping that in mind though, and as I previously wrote about, Hungrybox’s Genesis win has made up a lot of ground for him in the GOAT race. Although I’d personally put him at number three, it is really close between him, Armada, and Mang0. More supermajor wins, and a possible number one year-end finish would give him a stronger argument. I don’t think Hungrybox will ever surpass Armada’s consistency and head-to-heads, but he already has him beat on longevity and hardware; it’s the meaningfulness of said hardware (and being No. 1 again) that keeps it from being a lock.
Will The Big Three Soon Become a Mt. Rushmore?
As of today, and counting just offline events for now, Zain has 18 Liquipedia-certified major victories.That puts him four beneath Armada, a much larger 15 under Mang0 and an even more tough-to-match 20 beneath Hungrybox. When we change the criteria to just supermajors (once again using Liquipedia’s definition as our basis), the gap is a bit smaller, yet also similarly difficult to close. Zain sits at five supermajor wins, three behind Hungrybox, six behind Armada, and seven behind Mang0.
These statistics have a few stipulations. Although I love Liquipedia and think the team mostly gets it right with regards to major classifications, I’m more skeptical of how the members classify supermajors; for instance, events like Smash Summit and Battle of Five Gods are not categorized as such, which, to me, feels wrong. I would also say that the supermajor classifications also don’t quite accurately capture the most prestigious events of the MLG era. I am not trying to be mean here; just constructive at the margins. I understand that most of the volunteer work done here is more geared toward the modern era rather than spending time litigating events from when the Iraq War was ongoing. And at the very least, it gives us a “mostly accurate” picture of one metric that goes into determining GOAThood.
Another one is rankings, everyone’s favorite topic. Within the SSBMRank and MPGR era, Zain has been officially No. 1 twice, tying Armada (two times), and just one beneath Mang0 and Hungrybox (three times). Counting RetroSSBMRank years (2004 to 2012), though I’d encourage you to take these with a grain of salt, each of our Big Three from before would have four years at the top spot, twice as much as Zain now. All in all, based on what I believe most reasonable people would take into account – and not opening the can of worms that constitutes legacy vs. modern biases – Zain still has a way to go before convincingly crossing any of these three. For the sake of argument though, I’m going to open another can of worms.
What if RetroSSBMRank existed for another year? More specifically, what if it was a “period” in which a player were to hypothetically dominate a format of the game that the community transitioned to during a time in which it could not have people attending LAN tournaments? In fact, what if we were to officially count large events won during this era? This would give Zain nine additional “major” first places to his major count, bringing his total to 27 majors, above Armada. Granted, that’s not necessarily accounting for supermajor status of some events (or the obvious single-elimination format of SCL) within this period, and even if it did, Zain would still be far beneath Armada by that standard. Meanwhile, Mang0 would have four more overall first places, bringing his major count to 37, and one “online supermajor” in LACS 3.
Were we to do this, we have to give Zain an “unofficial, community recognized No. 1” for this same time span for the format of the game. Some of you reading this are going to roll your eyes and express frustration at it. I understand this is one of those things you’ll hear all the time: “Zain was basically No. 1 in 2020.” It’s technically not true. But come on, my friends. You know exactly what people are trying to do when they say this; they’re trying to briefly, even if loosely, articulate Zain’s achievements in that period of time. Assuming we take that for granted here, this roughly would give Zain three years “as the best player in the competitive scene,” just one beneath each of the Big Three, who then receive additional years from RetroSSBMRank as notches in their belt.
With that said, I’m pumping the brakes even were we to grant Zain the online era. For Zain to pass any of them, he needs multiple, community-recognized “official” supermajor wins or number one ranking finishes from here on out. For now, it seems reasonable enough to give Zain the edge over Ken and everyone else, putting him in his own ‘tier’ of achievements right beneath the Big Three, even if he’s getting closer. Beneath him, however, we get into a peer of his who I find quite intriguing.
The GOAT Fox and His Future
Years ago, I wrote a column assessing the state of the “GOAT Fox” debate, boiling it down to Mang0 (for longevity and achievements) vs. Leffen (for peak achievements), but briefly acknowledging the outsider role that Cody Schwab had as a solo Fox. Since then though, I think basically nobody would pick anyone other than Cody for this title. Better yet, I actually believe Cody is in a neat spot for his all-time legacy in a variety of ways.
Though it’s admittedly not relevant to his overall standing, I think Cody has to be considered the greatest losers run player of all-time. I started wondering if this was true after The Big House 11, but upon his later majors that he won after entering top eight from the losers side, it doesn’t even seem like a question any more. He’s the only player who could possibly win an event like Nouns Bowl and have absolutely nobody talk about the sheer depth of opponents he beat. Obviously, it’s better for your legacy to win majors without dropping a set than not; I only mention this element of Cody’s competitive achievements because it’s cool.
The other element to Cody’s career is that as of today, he’s tied Leffen for all-time major wins with 13, putting him three below Ken for fifth of all-time. More interestingly though, he’s only one beneath Ken for supermajor victories. Again, I would take Liquipedia’s specific definitions somewhat with a grain of salt for classifying supermajors; in Ken’s case, it excludes his MLG New York 2004 win, his 2005 MLG National Championships win, and his Game Over win. But in fairness to Cody, Liquipedia’s supermajor definitions exclude either of his two Smash Summit wins. Either way, the gap between them in terms of hardware is not as big as you’d think. It’s “time at the top” where Cody has ways to go. Remember: Ken was essentially the best player in the world for anywhere from three to four years, depending on how you count RetroSSBMRank. It seems like Cody would need to officially finish at No. 1 multiple times or eclipse Ken by a comical number of majors. I’d need to see it first to believe it.
But what about Cody vs. Leffen and Mew2King? It’s a little tricky. On the surface, they boast longevity, which Cody doesn’t quite have in the same way. They also have different advantages vs. Cody. Leffen technically has him beat by official supermajor count (four to three). Mew2King has more community recognized years at No. 1. Simultaneously though, there’s drawbacks to these arguments. One of Mew2King’s top years comes in a period where I don’t think it’s really accurate to treat it as a high value No. 1. In fact, I actively regret the decision to give him the spot in the first place. Meanwhile for Leffen, I think the difference in supermajor count is a similar technicality; if we treated Cody’s Summit victories as supermajors, and, in exchange, gave GOML 2016 the supermajor treatment, it’s basically a wash. Mind you, that’s vs. a historical peer who has essentially matched him in hardware in less time at the top. Unlike Leffen, Cody can claim to be the official best player in the world, and unlike Mew2King, Cody isn’t a choker when it comes to the supermajors.
Before Full House 2025, I was pretty sold on Cody vs. Mew2King, even if he wasn’t himself. I not only remain convinced that he’s a greater all-time player than him; I think I’d give Cody the nod over Leffen also.
The New Major Dark Horses Pt. 1 (The Foxes)
Beneath the tier of GOAT contenders, Top 10 all-time players, and other major contenders in the scene today (like Jmook and moky), we have a slew of players who have either nearly had miracle runs to win majors themselves or are in an interesting position to make history in a variety of different ways. I now want to acknowledge each of them in a few segments.
I’ll begin with the most obvious one: which of the rising Fox players is going to win a major first between Aklo, Joshman, and Soonsay? In late 2024, and due to a series of wins over Zain, Jmook, and Hungrybox, the leading contender was Aklo, who had not one, not two, but three consecutive major second places, with one of them even coming through the winners side, thanks to the efforts of his Link; another wild bit of history involved, by the way, in the character he played.
Since then though, it seems like Joshman has taken the top position among this group, as he came within a game of outright winning Nouns Bowl. If he succeeds, he’ll be the first Oceanic player to ever win a major. Something similar could be said about Soonsay, though more specifically from Alberta. As a matter of fact, Soonsay was the first of the three to make a major winners finals thanks to his run at GOML X. Any instance of these three players breaking through probably looks like a slightly better version of what has already happened.
The New Major Dark Horses Pt. 2 (The Wacky Characters)
We then get into an even more obvious, though more outrageous hypothetical that became dangerously close to reality at Supernova 2024 in a first ever Donkey Kong major victory. Although Junebug ended up having an underwhelming performance by results at Full House, I’m really not deterred about his potential, as he’s shown that he can defeat even his toughest prospective opponents. It’s not necessarily likely to happen because the field tends to be a bit trickier for him than his peers, but I think there’s a greater chance for Junebug to do it now than aMSa before The Big House 10. We know what happened then.
On a less ridiculous (though still honestly crazy) note comes the chance for Trif to win a major. We don’t need to repeat every specifics of how he nearly did it outright at Genesis X2, but I do want to mention the fact that he only fell short by a game against what reasonable people would consider his most difficult opponent possible. I’d also add that while Trif benefitted from dodging Zain, it’s not as if defeating Zain is a prerequisite for winning a major, as we learned from moky’s major victory. I have some doubts about Trif’s tendency to get style-countered by specific players (like n0ne, Salt, or Rikzz, apparently), but these instances honestly feel so random compared to the overwhelmingly brutal nature of how Trif tends to skill-gap most of the field. Mind you, this is while he remains competitive with major contenders.
There’s a fun irony in putting Axe in this category, as he is very much an ‘old’ major dark horse. This is a guy who has broken losing streaks vs. each of Mang0 and Zain in recent times and has made multiple major top eights, typically through beating a bunch of Top 25 players. Hungrybox and the Fox players seem to be big issues, but he’s made a lot of progress by the eye test in his sets against the latter group, especially since he’s started implementing more modern Pikachu tactics like zoning with back air, reaction tech chasing on platforms, and updating his combo flowchart. Breaking a ten-set losing streak vs. Mang0 (even if it’s Falco and not Fox) gives me a lot of faith in Axe’s ability to snap his cold stretch vs. Cody Schwab and moky, though I have to be honest and say that him vs. Hungrybox feels pretty hopeless right now.
Close your eyes and imagine a double-elimination bracket with every top-level Melee player. None of them DQ, none of them bitch or moan, and they all try their hardest to win. If you did this 1000 times and counted the number of times that each non-major winner finally broke through, Nicki would probably be the player with the largest number. Were it to happen in real life, he would become the first Ice Climbers main to win a major since ChuDat did it at Pound 2, and it probably would just look like his Nouns Bowl run, except he beats Joshman and Cody at the very end. Literally the only hesitation I have with Nicki comes in two general ways. The first is difficulty in attending many majors. As a result of being European and having a full-time job (very soon at least), he’s not likely to go to a lot of events if they aren’t paid for or premier tournaments. The second is some specific head-to-heads within the field that I believe could be tricky, like Trif, lloD, Salt, and a few other long-time Ice Climbers-killers beneath the highest echelon. At the same time though, I thought Nicki would be roadkill against each of aMSa and Hungrybox; he ended up taking them extremely close in his first sets as an Ice Climbers main.
The New Major Dark Horses Pt. 3 (The Ladies)
It’s here where we get into a lowkey race to become the first woman to win a major. Following a year in which we had the highest number of women on the Top 100, we’ve seen each of Salt and MOF trade places as the highest-placing woman of all-time at a major. That’s not to forget Magi’s place in this discussion either. While she’s yet to make a major top eight over the last nine months or so, she’s certainly not that far away and has done it before.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention a fourth wild card here in Zamu. While I don’t think her chances of winning a major is quite comparable to the other three, I do think that she has a “path.” It’s just a very specific one: give her a bunch of Fox players. Earlier this year, I called her the greatest player that’s never made a top eight, but I wasn’t trying to be back-handed; Zamu’s an incredible player that just hasn’t had that big breakout performance yet. Spark was in a similar position to her, and he’s now done it multiple times. All Zamu needs is one good day. She’s currently taken a bit of a lowkey break from seriously competing, as well as experimenting with Peach; I wouldn’t be surprised to see her eventually come back in a big way afterward.
What’s really cool is each of the ‘twists’ the women have in their prospective journeys to make history here. Salt would be the first Texan to ever do it, as well as the first Captain Falcon other than Wizzrobe. Depending on how the other Ice Climbers do, MOF could also become the first Ice Climbers to win. With Magi, there’s a neat symmetry of sorts to her rise to prominence, which began in the eyes of casual Melee fans when she beat Mang0 and could neatly conclude with becoming the first non-Mang0 Falco to win a major. Lowkey, if you talked to Falco players, they might think that’s crazier than even Junebug winning a major. And of course, with Zamu, there’s her long history of success and heartbreak alike, but achieving this unprecedented high would make her the greatest Midwest player ever. Hear me out: what if her first major top eight is the one she wins? Off the top of my head, I don’t think that’s ever happened; not since ‘majors’ became a thing (so basically since Ken).
Ludwig’s Gambit To Have The Biggest Melee Event Ever
I didn’t get a chance to talk about it last week, but as was announced earlier this month, the Supernova series and Ludwig are partnered in an attempt to make Supernova the highest attended Melee event of all-time (and Smash, as well as Rivals of Aether, but for our purposes, Melee is the only thing I’m interested in). This is an extraordinary gambit, especially when you consider the fact that Ludwig is offering to cover every single Melee player’s registration, as well as assist in flying out top level talent to the event itself.
The overarching strategy is very intriguing to me. As of right now, Evo 2016 is the most attended in-person Melee tournament ever (2,372). The most attended event we’ve had this decade is Genesis 8, which had 1,552 registered players (though several DQs); to imagine the Supernova series exceeding this without extreme shenanigans like hundreds of people signing up and then not attending is admittedly very funny. But would that plus a combination of actually committed attendees really be enough to break 2,000? Would that be enough to break Evo?
If these efforts were assisted by any other group of people, I would be deeply skeptical. However, it’s Ludwig, and when he enters the room, we all pay attention. He has already given a lot to Melee, has no obligation to continue doing so, and certainly doesn’t need anyone else to sell him. Keeping that in mind, a large part of my curiosity here is how much he’s paying for here in his ideal scenario. I don’t know whether or not he’s preemptively paid Supernova upfront with the record-shattering money or whether it’s a per-registrant deal, but I’m guessing that, bare minimum, only accounting for the bracket fees, Ludwig will pay $24,000.
This dream scenario of Ludwig spending roughly $24,000 is scratching the surface for total expenses. Speaking from personal experience of covered player expenses before, I can’t imagine that whatever top-level players Ludwig is additionally flying out wouldn’t significantly add more. If he’s flying out ten people, that’s probably another $6,000. Twenty would make it another $12,000. Is it something like the LSI in 2022? Then it could be even north of that for player expenses. I’m not even getting into if he has any role in helping Supernova cover the venue either, in which case it skyrockets even further.
I don’t know the specifics of any revenue share deal he or the event may have, because that information isn’t available to me. Honestly, while I’ve done my best to guess expenses, I think I’m still a long way off. But what I will say is that based on whatever little experience I have with Ludwig, that the profit from this event is not really relevant. The more pressing issue is if he achieves his goal of running the biggest Smash tournament of all-time. With that metric taking priority, I think that even a slight loss in revenues and expenses is fine trade-off for that. Right now, there are 982 Melee entrants per Liquipedia, already ahead of last year’s 905. Are there truly 1,400 or so sleeper agents in Melee waiting for Ludwig’s signal to attend Supernova? What do they look like? Are they The Yard listeners? Ludwig fans? Kids? Doc kids who have long been retired and are coming back once they see the signal from Ludwig? Ultimate players whom Ludwig is bribing for no-cost entries?
As an unfortunate, but undeniably juicy aside, I could see this leading to a clash with The Grim Reaper AKA Nintendo. While they’ve certainly messed with tournaments behind-the-scenes, some of which has gone public, it’s been a while we’ve really been at active war with them. Personally, I’m down with the endgame of our community being Ludwig vs. Nintendo. Well, at least as long as Ludwig wants it. He has no real obligation to us and could easily kowtow, admittedly making for another very funny ending.
Otherwise, what else will change? Nothing, really. We’ll still be playing, hanging out with our friends, and finding new and interesting things to talk about.