by Nicholas Stitt

Created on: July 30, 2008   Last Updated: March 02, 2012

If you're the gamer who enters a firefight loaded with infinite ammo and invulnerability cheat codes, then you're in for a surprise: Super Smash Brothers Brawl doesn't have any traditional cheat codes. There's not a single controller input for infinite health or extra power, no way to warp to stages or start with many more lives than your opponent.

But that still doesn't mean you can't cheat.

Brawl is all about epic multiplayer battling, and every character is armed with a kit and kaboodle of ugly tricks for winning like a damned crook. Some call it underhanded, but I say mercy is for the weak. Manly smash players adapt and improvise even through the toughest of battles, and only true warriors will win with the odds against them. Master these dastardly tactics, and you'll be serving up knock-outs like hamburgers at the county fair.

TACTIC UNO: Master the Arena

Every Smash Brothers map is dripping with unique hazards. While all characters are equally prone to being tossed off the ledge and beaten into off-screen oblivion, knowing the topography of the arena makes your job a lot easier. Throwing (or outright beating) foes into damaging lava waves, spikes, or riptides makes their recovery a bigger chore, allowing you more opportunity to finish the job. Most maps have nonplayer hazards anyone manipulate, like the damned catapult-flinger on the Wind Waker ship, the waves of rising acid on Brinstar, and the Koopas or Crabs on the Super Mario Brothers level, which provide terrific horizontal knock back in an perfectly limited vertical environment. And tossing a baddie into an angry Donkey Kong on 72m is sure end with violent hilarity.

Since these hazards cycle during the matchand can hurt you as well as they hurt the other guyget to know every arena and the perfect times to abuse these tricks. If you know that ten seconds from now a good opportunity for an assisted asskicking will present itself, set up and use it.

TACTIC DOS: Long Range Softening.

Each Brawl fighter has a wide variety of attacks, and there are few characters without some sort of projectile. While they vary in situational effectiveness, they're dynamite on a proper set up, or just causing confusion or harassment. Plenty of these make your opponent "flinch" when hit, stopping their movement animation in a hurry and with faster projectiles you can continue the relentless assault nearly un-phased. Some projectiles, such as Fox's laser blaster, are very fast, weak, and don't flinch your foe at all but

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