One of the four Arms characters that eagle-eyed fans spotted in a recent Nintendo Direct has now been officially unveiled. It’s called Helix and it’s not a robot as once thought, but a gelatinous humanoid with a retro pixel display for eyes and a funky, ’90s color scheme hairdo.
Arms has a variety of wacky characters set to be playable at the game’s launch in June, but while we’ve seen a number of them already, there are still some yet to be unveiled. One of them was Helix, who has its own thematic arena, as well as a unique playstyle.
Being made of a Flubber-like material, Helix is capable of stretching itself tall or plopping itself down into a blob on the floor to stay out of harm’s way. According to the description on its debut video, Helix was created in an Arms laboratory, with those mad scientists looking to create the ultimate Arms combatant. A stretchy body certainly has its uses.
Along with its interesting body type, Helix comes with some unique abilities, ranging from its dragon-themed super punches to the Splatoony-way its water-balloon fists explode during its special attack. Even Helix’s movement is different from its contemporaries, flopping and flowing around the arena rather than boosting and dodging.
It’s not obvious from the video, but it seems likely that Helix will stray more toward the speedier end of the character spectrum, in contrast to some of the heavies which are more focused on doing outright damage than on being maneuverable.
Still, as different as Helix is from the other brawlers in Arms, it shares the same slinky arms, the same outrageously rad color scheme for its hair and arms, and the same silly feel, which should mean it fits right in with the rest of the Arms crew.
Helix will debut alongside the likes of Minmin and Spring Man when Arms launches on June 16.
