Regional Differences

This is a sub-page of Super Smash Bros..

To do: Add French and German voice clips for the announcer and Jigglypuff in the PAL version of the game as well as Jigglypuff in the iQue Chinese version of the game. More differences. Source

Names#

• Purin is referred to as Jigglypuff, its English, Spanish and Italian name. However, Purin can still be seen written on the map used as the background in 1P Game's "VS. screen."
• Donkey Kong's name is abbreviated as "D. Kong" in the credits and character selection screen, but it was changed to "DK" for the international release.
• "Dummy Corps" was renamed to "Fighting Polygon Team".
• "Battle Royal" was renamed to "Free-for-all".
• The "New Comers" option in the Backup Clear section of the Option menu was changed to "Newcomers".
• The name of the bonuses are slightly different:

• Some terms in the VS Mode player settings, Item Switch menu, and Training Mode are different:

If the first three look familiar, it's because these are the terms used by the games' battle debug menu documented here.

• English translations of the original names of the stages can be seen on the stage select screen in the Japanese version, though some stages gain additional subtitles or have a different translation than those used in international versions:

As a programming oversight, the first line in the Japanese translation for Peach's Castle is not centered.

Menus#

Japan	International

• The title screen was given more colors, and the title itself was changed too. It was titled Nintendo All-Star! Dairantou Smash Brothers (ニンテンドウオールスター! 大乱闘スマッシュブラザーズ), which was reduced to Super Smash Bros.. Additionally, "Inc." is "inc." in the last row of credits below the logo.

Japan	International

• Since the menus are in English in all versions, the Japanese version has a text box at the bottom providing the translation for the currently highlighted option. The European version also has this feature if the language is set to French or German.

Japan	International

• The "Characters" section of the Data menu mentioned the year and month a game was released in the "Works" section, like in future games, but this was removed; also, the last bracket after the name of a game was thinner in some biographies than it was in others, though they are always thin internationally.
  • Additionally, Luigi's biography mentioned Super Mario USA in that section, but this was changed to Mario Kart 64.
  • Mario's biography mentioned Super Mario 64, but this was ALSO changed to Mario Kart 64.

Japan	International

• The background used in the main menu and the screen shown after unlocking a feature was changed to reflect the title used, along with some other cosmetic changes.

Japan	International

• The Nintendo 64 controller shown in the screen which appears when the game starts without any controller connected is slightly darker in the Japanese version. It also uses a pink tone in shaded areas, such as the circle around the D-Pad, that was changed to gray. A small pink circle on top of the A button was removed.

Japan	International

• The Training Mode menu does not have spacing between the letters in the meaning of the options, and the options themselves are closer to their meanings; the red arrows between the option have much less spacing. This was changed probably to better accommodate the red line below the highlighted option. Translations of both the highlighted meaning and selected option are shown below the EXIT option.

Sounds#

Narrator#

• To accompany the changed title, the announcement is changed, obviously. It's worth noting that the sequence file used in the international versions has some silence to compensate for the shortened title while also syncing with the animation; this is not part of the sample itself, and is thus not present here.

• Some of the narrator announcements change depending on the version of the game. These changes were made to reflect the different names Free-for-All, Fighting Polygon Team, and Race to the Finish have.

• "Fox" is said less quietly.

• "Break the Targets" and "Board the Platforms" are, similarly to "Fox", said with more enthusiasm. Also, "target" and "platform" were changed to plural.

Crowd#

Name changes aside, the crowd cheering noises were changed to more accurate pronunciation of the character names. Japanese uses a gairaigo system that alters several consonants and vowels in otherwise-normal English words. This can be heard in several voice clips, where erroneous vowels were originally voiced at the end of the names. To keep the length, several clips now start with "Go, (character)!".

Fox#

Fox has two instances of Japanese speech which were removed in international versions; both can be heard in the Japanese version's debug sound test as FGM no. 351 and 358.

• It is unknown where this particular clip is used, as it does not appear as a taunt or a victory quote. It may actually be unused entirely.

• This audio piece, on the other hand, is used during one of Fox's post-match victory animations, specifically the one where he points his blaster side to side before facing the camera straight on.

Jigglypuff#

• Pokémon who have regionally different names, have different voices and speech as well. Because of that, all sounds used by Jigglypuff were changed. For some weird reason, its three unused sounds were changed too, and it has one extra sound for smash attacks in the Japanese version.

• Jigglypuff's Pound uses an original sound effect, but it was changed to the sound used when hitting someone with a Fan.

Pokémon#

Some Pokémon who can be summoned from a PokéBall, as well as those who emerges from the door in the Silph Co. building in Saffron City have different voices due to their regionally different names, like Jigglypuff. Every other Pokémon's cry was left alone, either because they didn't actually make a noise resembling their name, because their Japanese name was the same as their English one, or because they didn't have an English anime voice yet.

Attack Sounds#

• The sounds for attacks that hit someone sound like high-pitched punches and slaps. These have been changed to small explosion sounds, and deeper "punch" sounds. The sounds of the Japanese version are still present in the other two versions, available in the game's system debug menu as FGM no. 142 to 147.

• Luigi's Super Jump Punch when sweetspotted and Jigglypuff's Rest use a normal strong attack sound, but it was changed to the sound used in Ness' side smash and Home-Run Bat if they hit someone. Every Smash Bros. game after this uses the "PING!" sound in all releases.

Beam Sword#

The Beam Sword has totally different sounds. It sounded very similar to a lightsaber from the Star Wars trilogy which were changed, probably due to copyright. The same happened in Super Smash Bros. Melee.

Character Appearances#

• Mario and Luigi's heads were made smaller, though their size multiplier attributes increased. (1.0 → 1.12) Metal Mario was not altered. Also, the texture for Mario's overalls was edited.

Japan	International

• Kirby's size multiplier attribute was slightly decreased. (0.94 → 0.91)

• The texture for Link's sword was brightened up.

1P Game#

• In Stage 1, in any difficulty settings except for Hard, Link would stand and not attack (excluding floor attacks) if his damage was below 21%. This was changed so that he moves and attacks immediately after the match has started.
• Congratulatory screens shown after completing the mode were added, perhaps to include a "reward" for doing so.

Point Yield#

The point yield for most of the bonuses was altered between the Japanese and international versions.

Saffron City#

Japan	International

• The banner in the background which says "Got a Catch 'em All!" is missing the second T and has a space there instead, which was fixed. The font also appears to have been rewritten to accommodate this.

Japan	International

• "Silf" on the main building was changed to "Silph". Both are acceptable romanizations, but "Silph" is consistent with the English Red and Blue.

Link's Break the Targets#

Japan	International

• The top-center area and two of the targets were shifted down 300 units in international versions.

Miscellaneous#

• "(Color) Team Win!" was corrected to "(Color) Team Wins!" in the after-match results screen, though it is spelled correctly if the match was a Team Battle.

• Above the results of the match, the name of the selected mode of the match is displayed along with "Mode" at the end ("Battle Royal Mode", for example), but it was removed, leaving only the name of the mode.
• The character selection screen in VS Mode, similarly to the change mentioned above, displays the name of the selected mode in the upper-left corner of the screen accompanied with "Mode" at the end, but it was also removed.
• The "PRESS START BUTTON" alert shown after selecting the character(s) in the selection screen is "PRESS START".
• A glitch known as "momentum slide" was removed.

How to Play#

To do: Shorten the videos to only show the "How to Play" section.

The "How to Play" tutorial video is slightly different in the Japanese version. The on-screen movements are less refined than in international versions and are often performed slightly out of sync with the controls shown directly below, resulting in a rather crummy tutorial. International versions made the gameplay sync up more smoothly with the instructions as a result.

Some of the differences in the "How to Play" tutorial video include:

• Luigi does not fast-fall after jumping in the Japanese version.
• Luigi fights back more in the Japanese version.
• Luigi does not taunt after Mario grabs the ledge in the Japanese version.
• The Fire Flower does not fall off in the Japanese version.
• Luigi hits Mario by throwing the Fire Flower when they are showing off how to use items in the Japanese version.
• Mario and Luigi do not face each other when they are showing off how to jump in the Japanese version.
• Mario and Luigi dash sooner when they are showing off how to move in the Japanese version.
• Luigi techs while Mario is showing off the power moves in the Japanese version.

Changed Attributes#

Along with Mario, Luigi and Kirby having different sizes, the game also has various changes applied to the playable characters, some being very drastic. Among the changes, moving the control stick in any direction after taking damage during "hit stop," a brief period where characters are frozen after an attack, is 40% more effective, thus allowing the attacked character to alter his or her position more easily.

iQue Player Differences#

In 2005, the game was released in China for the iQue Player. This version of the game is based on the international version, but has a few minor differences (mostly to reflect the change in language).

Logo#

Nintendo 64 (Except Japan)	iQue Player

• The Nintendo 64 logo was replaced with the iQue logo.

Title Screen#

International	China

• The copyright info text on the title screen was updated with a larger, more smooth font.

Menu#

• The menu icons for the N64 controller and console were replaced with icons of the iQue player controller and multitap.

International	China

• The works section in the characters menu was removed possibly due to the fact that many of the games referenced were never officially localized in China.

International	China

• In Training Mode, the CPU layout was red instead of grey.

Credits#

• iQue Engineering was added as the game's localizers.
• Surprisingly, the NOA staff is still credited, but 4Kids TV was replaced with TOP-INSIGHT International, a Taiwan-based company whose Mandarin dub had been airing in the PRC at the time, for providing the Pokémon voices.
• A line of text was added at the end of the credits: "This staff credits are based on the original N64."

No Controller#

Nintendo 64	iQue Player

• Oddly, the "No Controller" screen was updated and translated despite it being impossible to see since the iQue Player console is built in to the controller and is thus always plugged in.

Stages#

Sector Z#

International	China

• The "Star Fox" logo on the Great Fox was changed, which was the same thing on the iQue version of Star Fox 64.

Saffron City#

International	China

• The banner in the background was changed to "Catch, catch, catch!!!".

Congratulations Screen#

All of the character congratulation screens (except for Link and Fox, which had no text to begin with), had the English text changed to Chinese. Most of these look fine and seamless until examined more closely. Either iQue didn't directly have the original resources for these screens, or the English text was already baked in, so they had to draw over/cover up all of the English text to the best of their abilities, though each has their own hiccups and slight discrepancies.