Rayman (Super Smash Flash 2)

Rayman is a newcomer unlockable character in Super Smash Flash 2. His reveal was shown during the livestream of the third day at Super Smash Con 2018. His appearance is based on his design in the game Rayman Origins. His moveset consists of moves from throughout many games in the Rayman series.

Rayman is currently placed at 38th of C tier on the current tier list. Rayman has strong KO moves in his long-ranged smash attacks and many of his aerial attacks, as well as his potentially strong Plum and Vortex, along with his tether grab, LockJaw. Due to his high air speed and slow falling speed, he has an amazing air game, along with fast and high priority aerial attacks that provide good spacing and edgeguarding tools, with his able meteor smash if landed on the initial hitbox on opponents at higher damages. His relatively slow falling speed allows him to break out of juggles, and combined with Helicopter, he has one of the best horizontal recoveries in the game, along with Plum, one of the best vertical and horizontial recoveries in the game.

Attributes
Rayman is a speedy, yet floaty medium-lightweighted and combo-oriented character who possesses a moveset of long-ranged attacks all around. He has a fast dashing speed and air speed, while his falling and walking speeds are slow to compensate.

Rayman, in terms of his playstyle, is a fairly unorthodox character focused on horizontal and vertical combos. Rayman is a very unusual character with his limbs and head levitating around his body. Due to having a limbless trait, Rayman's hitboxes among many of his attacks are fairly disjointed, in a similar vein to and. This trait gives Rayman his staple asset: an extremely long melee range both in the ground and in the air. His jab's range, for example, is arguably one of the longest in the game, even outspacing Luffy's infinite hit finisher. He also has very fast frame data with his tilts, jab, up special, and aerials. His sends a flurry of punches to knock opponents downward, with the last hit being a meteor smash, making it a very frustrating combo move for opponents to deal with. These traits grant him a naturally strong combo game and strong spacing abilities.

Rayman has a decent grab and throw game, with a combo throw in his up throw, and back throw, and his forward and back throws setting up edgeguards (with forward throw having slight combo potential at low percents.) However, he has no KO throw, with forward throw, his strongest throw, not KOing well beyond 200%, however, his down throw and up throw are among his strongest KO throws, being able to kill most characters at around 120%, and while his grab does have a long range, is also laggy.

Rayman has good KO power in his smash attacks and aerials, with his aerials also fast for their decent power. Rayman also has a great neutral game, with his down special, the plum, and his side special, Vortex, a tornado projectile, being able to trap opponents in, allowing Rayman followup potential and punish with one of his powerful smash attacks. Noticeably, if his up smash and forward smash are charged up, Rayman's fist grows bigger and the range massively increases, which will cause more damage.

Rayman's edgeguarding game is among the best in the game. Due to his sheer melee range, long-ranged smash attacks, all his aerials, tilts, and even his jab combo can all be used to safely edgeguard the opponent on-stage or off-stage. His neutral air, forward air, back air, and down air are notable for having lingering hitboxes, which makes him have long-lasting aerials, while also being somewhat powerful. Furthermore, his neutral special and side special, though laggy, can be used to set traps or launch an aerial throw to follow up with any aerial move. Rayman's down aerial is notorious for quickly launching a flurry of punches downwards, dragging opponents down with him as well. This move, when used for edgeguarding, is very difficult to punish and can be used to score early KOs.

One of his unique moves is his down special, Plum, which grants him a giant plum. The giant plum acts as both a platform and a projectile that moves when attacked a projectile and a platform, allowing Rayman to move the plum while stand on it by attacking with tilts or smash attacks. Additionally, if the plum gets hit when the opponents are around the plum's range, the plum will hit the opponents. These properties make the giant plum a very useful tool in a number of situations. The plum can act as a stage control tool and an advanced combo tool. Furthermore, the plum can be an incredible recovery tool, theoretically granting a lot of vertical height if used properly. It can also simply be used for an emergency platform off-stage, which grants Rayman back his midair jump. Rayman is almost never at a disadvantage off-stage, as helicopter and especially plum will most likely KO opponents off-stage, making him more dangerous off-stage.

Rayman does, however, have some noticeable weaknesses. The first weakness is that many of his moves have blindspots, as they stretch out his hands with no hitboxes in between the hands and body. This leads to situations where his hitboxes have awkward placements. For example, his up tilt will miss if Rayman tries to use it on a small opponent too close to him.

Rayman's other notable weakness is his lack of disjointed hitboxes. Because most of his moves involve stretching his limbs and levitating them away from his body, in a similar vein to, this means, with a few exceptions, that every time Rayman attacks, his hurtboxes also extend. This makes him very vulnerable to characters with projectile-heavy playstyles, such as Falco,, and , and somewhat vulnerable to characters with disjointed hitboxes like , , and.

Rayman's third weakness is his recovery. In theory, he has a strong vertical and horizontal recovery due to his plum. However, should Rayman lose his Plum, his recovery options are limited to his midair jump and his up special, which grant negligible vertical height; such traits make his recovery very easy to gimp. Additionally, the plum can be used against him. Similarly to how a projectile is reflected, the plum can attack Rayman when hit by an opponent, which subsequently can knock him off and away from the stage if he is standing on it. As such, Rayman players need to take precautions in order to maximize his recovery.

Overall, Rayman is a very unusual and a most likely unorthodox character in terms of playstyle with great potential against much of the cast. Players must be mindful of his spacing game, his blindspots, (particularly when dealing with projectile campers), and his exploitable recovery in order to mitigate his weaknesses and maximize his potential. Rayman is described as a powerful all-rounder, a character who has reliable KO moves and long-ranged attacks, as well as not having major weaknesses, and can do very well in both offensive and defensive play.

Trivia

 * Rayman's artwork is based on this pose he makes in the opening cutscene of Rayman Origins.
 * Rayman's Ball version is a reference to the bubble form he enters if he dies in Rayman Origins and Rayman Legends.
 * Rayman, along with, Yoshi, , , , , and , are the only characters so far who do not go into a helpless state under normal circumstances.

External link

 * Rayman's reveal video