Smash Bros Pro Receives Death Threat for Playing as Minecraft Steve in Tournament
One Smash Bros pro was recently threatened with death after using Minecraft Steve in a tournament.
Super Smash Bros is unarguably one of the largest competitive scenes in all of gaming and can become extremely heated during tournaments held since its initial introduction on Nintendo 64 in 1995. Since then there have been various tournaments featuring all games within its franchise such as Melee for GameCube and Ultimate for Nintendo Switch as popular entries.
Character selection is of utmost importance during competitive matches, requiring players to understand both their main’s moveset and how best to employ evasive moves in order to remain in the match for as long as possible. While nearly any character is viable for competitive play if played skillfully enough, some are definitely more efficient or even impossible to play than others – some even downright impossible!
One such DLC character in Smash Bros Ultimate DLC called Steve from Minecraft has proven too powerful for even many high-level players to handle in competitive gameplay, which many consider overpowered. Steve can use blocks as defense while simultaneously minimising space available to his opponent to move around freely on stage; additionally he can enhance attacks via mining materials while possessing good stage recovery moves and stage recovery moves of his own to increase attacks further still. A professional Steve player can make for difficult fighting conditions – hence why many are calling for his removal from competitive play
Steve is such an unpopular character that Angel ‘Onin’ Mireles received death threats after playing him during Crown the Third super major tournament. Though Onin only placed fourth overall in competition, playing as his main still upset many members of the Smash community with whom Onin made waves with this move.
Onin sent out an earlier, now-deleted tweet addressing his followers with this announcement of hatred toward himself: “And so it begins…” and included examples of abusive comments directed towards his account. Things soon escalated so badly that Onin temporarily closed off direct messages until finally shrugging it all off: “Weirdos will always exist…Thank you to my friends who tell me I’m amazing I promise plz learn how to differentiate player to character hate…”
No matter how unfavorable an opponent might seem in-game, threats of death and violence have no place within competitive environments like Smash. Luckily most Smash players saw through these hypocritical statements by condemning those making hateful statements while offering Onin their support and standing alongside her as she attempted to return.
“Why are people acting this way? While I dislike Steve personally, these individuals are simply trying to optimize a video game strategy in exchange for money – don’t take everything so personally!”
“People need to realize it’s just a videogame – death threats or hurting other players over characters in video games is detrimental for everyone involved and should never occur in such instances.”
“Never before have I witnessed one character win tournaments with so much animus.
