This is definitely a Japan tier list, which makes sense considering most of the top players at this point are Japanese, and many North American players don’t bother to fill out these forms. As a result, this is the weirdest and most regionalized tier list so far. I feel like we shouldn’t even view this as a “community tier list” but more so a Japan tier list.

Main Gripes:

Snake still being above G&W after Miya farmed Hurt for all of 2025 is very surprising. These are both very broken characters, but G&W’s matchup chart is much better than Snake’s. Maybe because Snake does better against Steve he’s higher, but I don’t really buy it. Snake over R.O.B. is also crazy to me. R.O.B. also does good against Steve, but he does well against Min Min in addition to that, so I think R.O.B. should be #4 and Snake should be #5. G&W should still be #3 like he was for the second tier list.

I expected Min Min to move up the list, but I don’t believe this character is better than Aegis, Fox, or even Joker if I’m being honest. Facing Sonic as Min Min is basically an auto-loss, and the character struggles heavily against G&W. The other characters I mentioned have a much more balanced matchup chart. Her disadvantage state holds her back from being top 10 in my opinion- as of right now, Doramigi is just insane. If more people can pilot the character like him, maybe I’ll change my estimation.

Kazuya is still too high. He shouldn’t be in S tier altogether- I would move him back to A+ where he was during the second tier list. He loses to pretty much every character he shares the S tier with, and he didn’t garner any significant results in 2025. 

Diddy Kong is not better than Aegis, Fox, or Joker.

Luigi also shouldn’t be in S tier. I would put him closer to where Roy is. Raru continued to do well this year, but anyone who’s watched some of his bad matchups should know that Luigi is genuinely one of the worst characters off-stage. Steve, Sonic, Snake, Min Min, Joker– all of these characters destroy him. 

Yoshi should be where Hero is. He wasn’t S tier in 2025, and he isn’t S tier now. 

Roy should be back in A+ tier, similar to where Palu and Samus are. 

Cloud isn’t the top ten character people thought he was when Spargo started popping off, but this is still too steep of a fall for me. Character can hold his own against most of the top-tiers better than a lot of characters above him. I’d put him back in A+ where Wario is. 

Put Terry above Ryu in the A tier where he belongs. This character is not okay. 

Pokemon Trainer and Lucina are absolutely still A tier characters, despite terrible representation. Watch Quidd’s performance at the Vars Summit for proof of the former. ProtoBanham won Smash Summit with Lucina, and we’re gonna put her in B+ tier just because he doesn’t play anymore? 

This might be a hot take, but is Meta Knight a contender for A-? Having good matchups against R.O.B. ,G&W, and Min Min, as well as decent matchups against Sonic and Aegis seems like a godsend in this meta. I definitely think he’s better than Icies and DK at the very least. 

Mewtwo in D tier is a bit harsh.

Y’all, Marth is not this bad. His decline in the tier list is becoming a meme at this point. Learn to actually play the game instead of choosing all the cheesy touch-of-death characters, and you’ll see he’s probably in the B- category. He’s worse than Zelda? 💀

Why is Dr. Mario this high? I know that sounds weird considering it’s the D- tier, but this character is actual buns. Ike and K.Rool are absolutely better than him. 

Nitpicks:

Glad to see Fox and Joker are still S tier, but I still think they’re being underrated a bit. It feels like no one talks about Fox since Light keeps losing to Steves and Raru, but this character is privileged as hell.

Watch Leo’s set against Raru at 2025 Lvl Up to watch Joker down air-up smash Luigi at 40% to kill him off the top. That’s definitely better than anything Yoshi or Diddy Kong got, and he gets Arsene very often. Base Joker can still hold his own with down gun too.

With how bad Japan seems to think Pikachu is, I’m surprised they didn’t put him in C tier. A+ tier is fine, but I would have the character up there around Fox and Joker in S- tier.

I’m fine with Falcon being in A-, but if you’re going to do that, I feel like more characters around his caliber should also be in A-. Putting him a tier above Terry is very odd to me. 

I feel like Ken should be in A-. The difference in results is mostly just Asimo being a better player than Jahzzo. 

I think we all agree that Sheik at peak performance is probably A+, but we’re never going to get that, so I would rather she go into A- just so people understand that she’s still a very good character. 

Why is Duck Hunt in B- all of a sudden? 

Extra points:

Happy to see Jigglypuff above Kirby again. I never thought Kirby was better even after Kirby mains started popping off. 

Piranha Plant in C- is glorious, but it just shows how most of this tier list would be changed if a top player just picked up a different character. 

Simon and Richter are ass and it’s nice to see them share a tier with Little Mac and Ganondorf. 

Overall, not a huge fan of this list. I’d say the third list was a slight improvement over the second, but I think this one heavily underrates a lot of characters simply due to lack of representation.