After aeons of waiting, we finally have goddamn Castlevania characters in a Nintendo Smash Bros fighting game, and the last boss from the Donkey Kong Country games.

According to the latest Nintendo Direct video an hour ago, Simon and Richter Belmont are now playable characters in the upcoming Super Smash Bros. Ultimate for Nintendo Switch. They have their trademark Vampire Killer whips for footsies and zoning, their patented Axe, Holy Water, and Cross Boomerang attacks, and their whip uppercuts and dash slides.

Their Final Smash attack is a move where Simon/Richter shoves you in a coffin and blasts you with pillars of light shaped like crosses. And yes, you can do that move where you hold down the attack button and you flick the d-pad around to flick the whip like it’s on a spazz attack.

In case you couldn’t tell, Richter is Simon’s echo character; basically in Smash Bros. terms it means that they have the exact same moveset but have different character animations.

Next, we have King K.Rool, the giant crocodile who acts as the main antagonist to Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong. He’s a big bruiser like Bowser, he has his pirate cannon gun, boxing gloves, and gyrocopter pack from his previous final boss stints, and he can parry attacks with his belly and dish out a good counter.

He can also throw his crown like a slow-moving hard-hitting boomerang. Sounds like he’s boss material like Bowser; big on heft and weight, but slow on his feet.

In other news, two echo fighters were announced: Chrom from Fire Emblem: Awakening and Dark Samus from Metroid Prime 3. One’s an echo character for Ike while the other is the echo character for, you guessed it, Samus.

New Donk City Hall is a stage. Players fight each other while on a moving elevator going up and down and all around with Pauline and her band playing that damn catchy “Jump Up, Superstar” theme.

We’ve listed down the other tidbits that piqued my interest from the latest Nintendo Direct:

• Stages can morph by picking Random and then any two stages. Speaking of which, there are now 103 selectable stages in this Smash Bros. game.
• You can turn off Stage Hazards.
• You can tune up the frequency of stage music tracks.
• There are more than 800 tracks in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and you can make a playlist out of it. Guess I’ll have to feature this on our yearly SoundScape Best Of video, eh?
• Squad Battle is a new mode where you can have two teams of 5 battle it out in best of 3 matches.
• New Training Mode stage that shows trajectory when you’re at x% damage and factors in weight. Very cool!
• Monster Hunter’s Rathalos is a boss and an Assist Trophy. He’s the first to be both. He flies around, shoots out fireballs, and kicks you with its feet.

You can watch the full Nintendo Direct video below. I have to confess; after seeing this recent video, I might need to look at Super Smash Bros. Ultimate in a whole new light now.

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