'Super Smash Bros. Ultimate' Stats Show King K. Rool Was Never Overpowered

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate players found King K. Rool to be a tricky fighter to deal with at launch, but even though the Kremling king still has his strengths, he was never quite as overpowered as some might've thought.

With powerful zoning tools along with speed and a vertical recovery unseen in a character his size, it's easy to see why people thought King K. Rool was imbalanced at launch. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate game director Masahiro Sakurai wrote about different characters' winrates in his latest Famitsu column, however, and revealed that King K. Rool actually has a winrate that's almost perfectly balanced in both normal games and in Elite Smash.

In the Famitsu column which was translated by Nintendo Everything, Sakurai said he received permission from Nintendo to publish some stats from the week of December 30th to January 5th, a time not far away from the game's launch. Sakurai said a survey from Japanese video sharing service Niconico indicated that players thought King K. Rool was overly powerful, but the stats show a different story.

"Something that ended up being a little troubling to me were fighters like King K. Rool," Sakurai said. "According to a survey on Dwango's Niconico, the consensus seemed to be that King K. Rool was a strong character – that ended up not being the case. Overall his victory rate was 51.9%, and in Elite Smash it was 48.9%."

Sakurai acknowledged some of the concerns that King K. Rool was and is overpowered, but he also suggested that players feeling unfairly beaten by King K. Rool might have something to do with that.

"The general consensus seems to be that King K. Rool is strong, but I imagine that there are also people that think 'no fair!' when they lose to him," Sakurai said. "Looking at our records, though, I don't really see any need to adjust him. Though, I think there'll still be people that'll continue to be stressed out about fighting him if I don't mess with him any – so I think I'll wait to hear what the adjustment team has to say."

It is worth noting though that even though Sakurai said he didn't feel King K. Rool needed much adjusting, King K. Rool was nerfed in three separate ways in the game's latest patch. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Version 2.0.0 update provided a detailed list of patch notes that saw three of King K. Rool's abilities made weaker than before.