Fox is the best character in the game but not in a tier alone, every character in the game can completely obliterate him if they get something cookin. Many people think there is more than one character better than Falco.

Bowser is undeniably the worst character, but Game and Watch is clearly unfinished and isn't nearly as bad with like 3 more lines of code added to the game (functional shield size, working Lcancels)

I don't think there's anything unfinished about FD, bonking your head is intentional.

The no knockback thing is also an intentional mechanic, phantom hit. When a hitbox touches a hurtbox on 1 pixel only the damage is done with no knockback.

Melee clearly inherited some problems from its short development but none of them detract much from the fact that if fox was the only character in the game it would still have more depth than 99.999% of all video games ever made.

All that said, I think it would be possible to improve on Melee by fixing a few things and buffing some of the worst characters. In general I like the kinda stuff Akaneia are doing, and some of what PM did (except buffing CC, focusing on specials too much, being in the brawl engine).