We’re back! Over the past 3 years since the previous
Project+ tier list, the competitive landscape has changed drastically. New, dominating forces have taken over the tournament scene, a major new balance patch released in the form of
Project+ v3.0, and despite any efforts to stop us, there have been tons of new tournaments and players entering the game from all over the world.
This tier list, led by the team at Plus Side, aims to reflect these new shifts in the community, and we took a slightly different approach than before to ensure more members of the scene shared their voice. But without further ado, here is the list!
Text Version + Placement Shifts:
S+:
+11,
-1
S:
+4,
+5
A+
+6,
-3,
+1,
+6,
-3,
+5,
+7,
-10,
-9,
+2
A:
+2,
View attachment 399834 -6,
-12,
+20,
+5,
+8,
+13
B+:
-2,
+12,
+2,
-2,
-5,
+6,
-9
B:
0,
-5,
-4,
-19,
+4,
-12,
-3
C+:
+5,
+2,
-8,
-8
C:
-4,
-1,
0
Methodology:
Inspired by the great community efforts put together by the most recent Melee and Ultimate tier lists, we opted to invite every ranked player from the most recent PMRank to submit a ballot. This includes the international players from last year’s PMRank: EU and PMRank: AUS. Keen-eyed followers of the
Project+ scene will remember there was also a planned PMRank: Japan that year as well, which unfortunately was not able to be fully completed. Not wanting to leave their scene behind, we invited 10
Project+ players from Japan, selected by their community members, to participate as well. Every application needed to be a fully completed tier list for the most recent version of P+, 3.0.5.
Of the 90 players contacted, 44 players submitted a completed tier list. 2 players submitted tier lists for Project M version 3.6, which unfortunately could not be used, resulting in 42 lists used in our dataset.
Every list was then weighed evenly against each other, with the top and bottom 15% outliers removed for each character. This amount of outliers being removed was selected due to the much larger and more diverse dataset we’ve collected compared to previous lists, and less resources to more accurately handle biases from all the regions represented.
The Data:
9 different characters were chosen as #1 by at least one ballot, with Mewtwo being the lowest ranked character to do so.
The characters that were voted #1 were:
Lucario
MK
Sheik
Falcon
Marth
Fox
Ike
ZSS
Sonic
Mewtwo
Also, 11 characters were voted the worst character in the game by at least one ballot, with Ivysaur being the highest ranked character to do so.
All the characters ranked #42 were:
Ivysaur
Squirtle
Ness
Ice Climbers
Bowser
King Dedede
Zelda
Toon Link
Peach
Samus
Luigi
Jigglypuff
Diddy Kong, Ice Climbers, and Zelda all had the widest range of votes, with a range of 38 placements. That means that there was at least one ballot that had each of those characters as top 4, and one ballot at bottom 4.
Yoshi had the largest standard deviation of any character, meaning its placement was the least consistent across the whole cast.
Lucario
A fourth unique #1 has been crowned in
Project+: Lucario. While always considered as a strong character, other characters were either more prevalent in the metagame and/or easier to succeed with. However, with many of his peers being brought down a peg by
Project+ v3.0, and Lucario not receiving as many changes by comparison, the public perception of Lucario has increased significantly. A whopping 20 players who submitted ballots placed Lucario as the best character in the game, with even more slotting him in at #2. This view isn’t misguided, either - being the only character in the game with his unique magic series, on top of very good frame data, disjointed moves, and exceptional kill power, Lucario is a force to be reckoned with. While most of his representation comes in a spot of #1 player SipMastah’s character lineup, the national breakout of TRai and essy’s recent usage of the character indicates we’re going to see more of the aura dog in the near future.
Yoshi
Yoshi has had occasional representatives since being added to the game in Project M 3.0 ranging from Burntsocks, Eyeheartlovetap and Juanpi in the early days to more modern threats like Triforce Trampstamp and Moist. Despite having semi-consistent representation, it wasn’t until New Jersey’s Shiny Zubat put his full effort into the game, leading to a 2024 resume packed with enough wins to get him ranked #2 on PMRank 2024, that people started respecting what Yoshi brings to the table. Up until now, Yoshi was often overlooked in the meta with previous tier placements often in the bottom 15 characters on every list he’s been ranked on, with his most recent placement being 38th on the 2022 official tier list. Outside of a massive buff to dash grab, as well as some functionality added to egg roll, a lot of what makes Yoshi so intimidating has largely been present for the entirety of his lifespan. His double jump armor allows him to power through moves and deliver unsuspecting reversals, often resulting in players sending themselves into the blastzone with poor DI. His smash attacks hit hard, sending at angles that make recovering quite difficult for some characters, while also occasionally shifting his hurtbox to provide defensive utility. His shield is uniquely immune to shield pokes, while retaining the ability to be jumped out of, a major weakness of his in Melee. Eggs are one of the most lethal projectiles in the game, staying active until they hit the ground or a target, and “exploding” on hit, which makes clanking them extremely difficult or even impossible for some characters. The buff to his dash grab he got in
P+ 2.0 expanded the potency of his grab game, which empowered his devastating upthrow and downthrow combos to blow up opponents unfortunate enough to get caught. Yoshi’s meteoric rise up the tier list to 18th, his highest placement to date, may be a sign of things to come, as everyone’s favorite green dinosaur still has plenty left to prove.
Snake
Towards the end of the 3.6 meta, it was widely known that Snake was one of the best characters in that game, placing 12th on the final “official” 3.6 tier list. When
Project+ toned down some of the more egregious aspects of Snake’s kit, such as removing the reverse hit of down tilt, decreasing the power of grenade and C4, shrinking up special’s hitboxes, and toning down his down air as a whole, many in the early days of
Project+’s meta were quick to write off Snake as a low tier. The absence of Flipp and FlashingFire in the greater
Project+ scene didn’t do much to help Snake’s case, and so Snake ended up placing 34th on the last tier list, a drop of 22 spots overall. Recently, however, Snake has been seeing increasingly higher placements on the mainstage again, with SoulOfficer leading the charge of the new wave of Snakes, placing 34th on PMRank 2024. Others, such as ilikepizza107 and the old-school Snakes MVZY and Dank have also demonstrated at events since the last tier list that Snake is still more than capable of taking names from the best of the best. While the dominant grip that Snake had on the 3.6 meta might not happen again, the character’s placement in this recent community tier list is reflective of the work SoulOfficer and others have put in to show his relevance in the meta.
Kirby
Historically, Kirby has not had many high level representatives outside of a few reclusive players like Yador, SSK, and Eon who did not attend a high number of events even when active. This lack of exposure, paired with being the second lightest character in the game, and having unimpressive attributes, led many to regard Kirby among the bottom of the barrel for most of Project M’s lifespace.
P+ 2.0, however, saw a number of major changes to Kirby’s kit including an increase to his run speed, throw game potency (particularly the way forward throw combos now), and combo game with buffs to forward air, upsmash, nair, uptilt, and down b’s new functionality giving Kirby all new tools to push advantage with. These changes all seemed to be an effective way to make Kirby more meta relevant, but these improvements did not immediately yield results. A lack of representatives continued to be the major obstacle preventing Kirby from seeing sustained success, but nonetheless, Kirby climbed to 35th on the 2022 official
P+ tier list, up from 41st on the last official 3.6 tier list. Perception around the character shifted when PMRank 2024’s #17 player Av committed fully to the character, dropping Lucas entirely, as well as when PMRank 2024’s #36 player Shenanigans left Tennessee to make appearances at multiple PMRank events. Using Kirby to take down established dominant players using throw mixups, hard read punishes, carefully placed backairs, and a whole lot of crouching, these players showed off what Kirby is capable of when pushed to his limits. His new placement solidly in the mid tier at 22nd is reflective of the work they’ve put in to get Kirby into the spotlight and hopefully an indication of future upward trajectory.
Ice Climbers
The Ice Climbers were a staple of high level play at the end of 3.6’s metagame, a trend which continued through
P+ 2.0, featuring 2 players in the top 10 of 2023 PMRank. Ice Climbers were ranked 13th on the last official tier list, published in 2022, but by the end of 2023, many players were arguing that Ice Climbers may be top 5, or even top 1. This meteoric rise would come to a screeching halt when
P+ 3.0 delivered a handful of nerfs to the character to rein in their more egregious options. The most significant of these changes was forward air being converted from a spike to a meteor. Now, instead of losing a stock at 30% to any grab near the ledge, players who can meteor cancel effectively find themselves reliably surviving much longer. Another nerf, occurring in tandem with the forward air change, is the reduction in the distance at which Nana begins forward throwing instead of up throwing while on stage. This effectively halves the distance at which the Ice Climbers can execute a handoff, which reduces their total guaranteed damage off a grab, and forces them to explore more traditional punish trees instead. An additional change was made to their down throw, which has led to a reduction in the efficacy of certain matchup-defining chaingrabs on characters like Lucas, Sonic, Meta Knight, and others. Additionally, this change also led to a slight downgrade in their punish game across the board, as the increased knockback growth allows opponents to get out of combos sooner with proper DI. While 32nd is the lowest Ice Climbers have been since the 2014 tier list, as players begin experimenting and rethinking their approach to the character and begin reinventing the Ice Climber metagame, they will hopefully be able to climb their way out of the dregs of the low tiers.
Mewtwo
First added in Project M 3.0, Mewtwo was instantly meta-defining with his game-breaking tools and obscene kill power. In these early years, he found his home with the best of the best in Mew2King, Emukiller, and Frozen, and would go on to be labeled a god-tier character at the end of 3.02. While his most ignorant option in hover-out-of-teleport was removed in 3.5, Mewtwo’s representation stayed strong through the 3.6 era with Frozen, the two-time top-10 Violet, and later CasinoWolf and Wfycat. However, the Covid years saw both a slew of nerfs from his 3.6 iteration and a dramatic dropoff in representation. Since our return from quarantine, Mewtwo’s sole appearances on the top 50 have been as one of Pikmon’s perennial tertiary characters. Time and time again, we have seen a lack of representation coincide with declining opinions of a character’s strength and, in this regard, it appears as though Mewtwo’s drought is finally catching up to him. After yet another top 5 placement on the 2022 community tier list, the playerbase is beginning to question his historical precedent of top-tier strength. Ask around, and most will tell you that he still has strong tools. Hover cancel aerials and an omnidirectional, actionable teleport are nothing to scoff at. But a new prevailing sentiment is taking shape – a view that takes into account his big hurtbox, slow ground speed, and staggering technical difficulty – concluding that he might not be the dominant force that he once was. Perhaps this new vision is correct, or perhaps Mewtwo is a sleeping giant primed for a resurgence. Only time will tell.
Zero Suit Samus
Zero Suit Samus has long occupied a strange place in the Project M metagame. Historically considered somewhere between mid- and high-tier, she has nonetheless had consistent high-level representation in Jason Waterfalls, Aidan, and Blank. That was until a stark dropoff in 2019, when she was left off of PMRank entirely. Despite this quiet spell for the character, many took notice of the fact that she had escaped the brunt of the nerf hammer coming into
P+. During quarantine, she saw a shadowy rise in popularity among the reticent lords of NY/NJ, spearheaded by the all-time great Malachi and newcomer Stango. Upon the lifting of quarantine, these two utilized her top-tier attributes to great success, and she quickly became one of the most prevalent meta-characters of the 2.x era, being placed top-two on the 2022 edition of the community tier list. This momentum rolled over into 2023, when she peaked at six representatives on PMRank, with many players picking her up as a secondary. Then, in 2024, that number dropped all the way to zero. All at once, her strongest reps either quit the game or dropped her as a secondary. This coincided with
P+ 3.0, which delivered unto her a bevy of hard-hitting nerfs. Her hurtbox size was increased, her weight took a hefty hit, and her most powerful options in bair, upair, and down smash were all toned down. But, in some ways, we’ve seen this story before. In 2019, ZSS had no players and only nerfs to show for it. 2024 looked much the same. Back then, all she needed was the backing of the game’s premier talents. It certainly feels as though she doesn’t have that same motion today, but who’s to say? Maybe her next transformative player is right around the corner.
Sonic
For the first time in Project M history, Sonic has fallen down the tier list. His peak at #4 on 2022’s iteration came at a time where the character was both very strong despite his nerfs in
P+ v2.0, as well as one of his strongest periods of results throughout the game’s history. The two players leading the charge on modern Sonic, SipMastah and Motobug, haven’t deviated much from then; they both hit their all time highs on PMRank at #1 and #26 respectively, still placing highly and running circles around their competition. The shift in this list comes more from the perceived character strength outside of purely results with his additional nerfs in
Project+ v3.0. With a change to his up throw that makes it still a strong, but not as consistent combo tool, the lack of stacked stun preventing up throw > down air loops, and a huge hit to his recovery, Sonic is the weakest he’s ever been. Only falling to #12 speaks volumes about his previous strength, though. As the fastest character in the game with some amazing moves and devastating punish game, there’s no doubt Sonic is still very powerful - he’s just toned down a little more than he used to be.
Thank you to the individuals that submitted a ballot!
~CP9~
Amph
Blitz
Comb
Ellipsis
Erg
essy
evil lesbian
Flarp
harrow
Imogen Heat
Jagz$
Jet
Kemphaan
metroid
Moist
Motobug
Mulldrifter
Neyroe
Nido
Ripple
Rise
Ryzuul
Serb
sfy bees
Shadowhawke
Shenanigans
Shiny Zubat
SipMastah
Smash_Falco3
Sneez
SoulOfficer
Star (USA)
Star (AUS)
Stude
tomo
TRai
Twisty
Tyler (AUS)
Veka
Xtreme
Zushi
And while we could not use their data, we also would like to thank Fout NL and IuDKing for submitting lists for PM 3.6.
Project Lead: Tuck
Graphic Design: Motobug
Writers & Editors: essy, ilikepizza107, Motobug, Serb, Tuck, wren
