New Steve ‘CRUD’ combo makes him even more broken in Smash Ultimate

Minecraft Steve has faced a lot of scrutiny in the competitive Smash Bros. scene for his campy playstyle, spammable minecarts, and unfairly long and punishing combos. But that’s not the end of it; a new combo has surfaced, further demonstrating the sheer brokenness of Steve’s design.

Introducing ‘CRUD.’ Yeah, you read that right. Smash Ultimate labber WhyDo posted a clip on Sept. 27 explaining how this movement mechanic drastically expands Steve’s punish game.

The new CRUD combo stands for “C-stick Reverse Uptilt after Dash,” and the broken move allows Steve to perform devastating 80 percent combos on nearly the entire Smash cast off just a single down throw.

The name may sound technical, but performing it is quite simple. Following a down throw, you immediately initiate a dash. Then, you reverse your direction with your C-stick and begin your bread and butter combo with up-tilt.

You can hit this consistently in training mode with a little practice. Since this can follow up from down-throw, you can easily implement it into your gameplay.

The implications for this new tech are huge. Dealing 80 percent combos is deadly enough, but coming from a defensive monolith like Steve is annoyingly difficult. If he’s up in stocks, this gives him a way to punish desperate, unsafe approaches. And if Steve is behind, this gives him a comeback mechanic that allows him to quickly destroy defensive players using their shields. In essence, it forces players to play perfectly against Steve, treating him like a grappler due to the beatdown they’ll face if they get grabbed even once.

This development is definitely not going to sit well with the competitive Smash scene.

Steve has faced scrutiny for a long time now. Not too long ago, Phantom MLG was discovered in mid-February–a technique unique to Steve in which he could cancel knockback and hitstun to tank hits and counterattack with his own punishing combos. That alone began a campaign to ban Steve at major tournaments and events like Let’s Make Moves Miami 2023 and Coinbox made the move.

Other tournaments opted for the more conservative approach, allowing Steve to remain tournament-legal but urging players not to intentionally use Phantom MLG. The downside is that this relies on good faith, and ignores the many other aspects of Steve’s design that make him a menace in competitive play.

It’s no surprise Steve is even more broken than we already gave him credit for. While his blocklaying and crafting mechanics are unique and make for a fun casual experience, his overwhelming strengths in competitive play offset that “fun” factor. He has way too many combos for a character who’s supposed to be defensive, especially since he can walk while using several of his combo-starters. If his offense was tweaked to be not so powerful, it may be pretty fun to find openings in his fortress and try to rush him down while he’s mining.

But, as it stands, one mistake from Steve’s opponent allows the Steve player to put their enemies at kill percent, forcing many games to take minutes longer and even go to timeouts.

While the fate of Steve is not officially decided yet, it’s pretty likely the Smash community will be pushing for more events to ban him in the near future.