Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl dev asks people to stop calling it a “Smash Killer”

“[Blank] Killer” is often times either used erroneously, or a tired meme

The “Nickelodeon Smash Killer” meme has been running rampant ever since Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl was announced (comparing All-Star Brawl to Super Smash Bros.), but one developer has asked the fanbase to calm down a bit.

Character designer and programmer Thaddeus Crews took to Twitter to share the following statement:

“Some videos/comments/etc are doing the “Smash killer” shtick again…I’d really rather you not…I’d really, REALLY prefer any other joke or punching bag or whatever that doesn’t have the kind of proven track-record of instigating conflict as a result of this branding. I can’t stop anyone from making those jokes & I’m not personally bothered by them. It’s clearly all in good fun by the overwhelming majority of people & is “clickbaity” to a absurd degree; I get that, and in a vacuum it’s absolutely hilarious…But ramifications aren’t in a vacuum. There’s no real way to not come off as a buzzkill in addressing this, but the image this kind of message creates has been so thoroughly harmful to a degree that I can’t just sit back and watch it happen again…I strongly encourage finding hyperbolic absurdist statements elsewhere.”

In short, they don’t like all of the conflict that’s been derived from this fan-imposed “Nickelodeon Smash Killer” comparison (joking or otherwise), often times propagated by fighting game content creators: who admit as much in the Twitter replies. So far the plea has gone over surprisingly well, with many content creators responding in kind, noting that they will refrain from using the phrase/meme going forward as it relates to this particular project (it for sure won’t be the last we see of it!).

Point blank, the “killer” moniker has been a tired phrase as long as I can remember. Having played World of Warcraft since its pre-launch phase, I’ve seen so many MMOs come and go, with fans ardently attaching the “WoW Killer” title to them in a bid to help them succeed and take down the established industry titan: with no accounting for a world where they can co-exist. These sorts of nuance-less campaigns are really easy to suss out, and lost their luster sometime in the early 2010s, but they persist to this day.

It’s refreshing to see a developer take it on headfirst, as some in the past have unfortunately leaned into that hubris: which didn’t age particularly well.

Chris Carter

Reviews Director, Co-EIC – Chris has been enjoying Destructoid avidly since 2008. He finally decided to take the next step, make an account, and start blogging in January of 2009. Now, he’s staff!