Franchise representation vs. sales

[Erimir]

I didn't really see a compilation of these stats anywhere, but I thought it would be a useful reference to people.

While sales aren't everything, I'm sure that Sakurai and Nintendo consider them. Beyond the polls of Smash fans, sales are also an indicator of who is popular, recognized and so forth among fans, including the less hardcore. I'd guess that they're more important when a series still has major cast members left out (as with DKC or Metroid). Zelda has its most important characters included, other possibilities would mostly be characters that only appeared in one or two games or are quite minor, so I think the sales is less important at this point. But if Ganon wasn't in, we'd understandly be thinking "Zelda is so big, why isn't its main villain included?"

Obviously, Nintendo would want to include the revenue and popularity from TV shows, merchandise and so forth as well. That would push Pokemon up because of the anime and movies, for example. Analysts suggest the Mario franchise is worth $10 billion!

But the EarthBound and retro series clearly show that's not the only thing that matters. And I think Nintendo/Sakurai understand it shouldn't be the Mario and Pokemon show, so those two mega-series are going to end up "underrepresented" no matter what.

Sales are taken from vgchartz.com, Wikipedia or what I can find on Google if I can't find them in those places. Virtual Console sales are not included as Nintendo doesn't release them.

These figures represent sales as of now, which is what Nintendo would be considering.

Representation by video game sales, Brawl:

KEY: Sales/# of characters - franchise (# reps, total sales)

Average Brawl:
61.3 million - average sales of the 17 Nintendo franchises/universes included in the game
31.6 million - 33 1st party select screen slots totaling 1.04 billion in video game sales
28.2 million - looking at it as 37 move sets instead

Median Brawl:
17.8 million - Legend of Zelda has the median Nintendo character slot
17.6 million - Metroid is the median Nintendo franchise (9th best selling)
14.2 million - Legend of Zelda is also the median move set

126.6 million - Mario including spin-offs [1] (4 reps, 506.3 million sales)
84.4 million - Mario universe, including Wario and Yoshi (6 reps)
68.9 million - Super Mario main series only (4 reps, 275.7 million sales)
54.8 million - Pokemon, PT is one character (4 reps, 219.3 million sales)
43.4 million - Game & Watch handhelds (1 rep)
43.2 million - Wii Fit (0 reps)
36.6 million - Pokemon, PT is three characters (6 reps)
34.6 million - Donkey Kong [2] (2 reps, 69.3 million sales)
23.4 million - Animal Crossing (0 reps)
22.6 million - Wario [3] (1 rep)
19.1 million - Yoshi [3] (1 rep)
17.8 million - Legend of Zelda, Zelda is one character (4 reps, 71.0 million sales)
17.6 million - Metroid, Samus is one character (1 rep, 17.6 million sales)
14.2 million - Legend of Zelda, Zelda/Sheik are two characters (5 reps)
11.2 million - Kirby (3 reps, 33.5 million sales)
8.8 million - Metroid, Samus and ZSS are two characters (2 reps)
5.8 million - F-Zero (1 rep)
4.1 million - Game & Watch collections (1 rep)
4.0 million - Fire Emblem [4] (2 reps, ~8 million sales)
3.8 million - Star Fox (3 reps, 11.5 million sales)
3.8 million - Pikmin (1 rep)
2.8 million - Kid Icarus [5] (1 rep)
1.8 million - Ice Climber (1 rep)
1.3 million - R.O.B., Gyromite sales only (1 rep)
1.0 million - EarthBound/Mother (2 reps, ~2 million sales)

[1] Mario Kart, Mario Party, Paper Mario, Mario RPGs, Mario & Sonic, etc.

[2] Includes Diddy Kong Racing

[3] Wario/Yoshi in the title

[4] Can't find figures for the first two Fire Emblem games, so I guessed they sold around as well as the SNES games (0.6 million each?). This carries over into their numbers below since those were NES games.

[5] Can't find figures for Kid Icarus: Of Myths and Monsters

Compare Melee representation at the time when Brawl was being developed:

Average Melee:
57.3 million - average sales of the 13 Nintendo franchises/universes included in the game
29.8 million - 25 character slots for 745.5 million in video game sales
28.7 million - 26 move sets

Median Melee:
19.1 million - Yoshi has the median character slot and the median included franchise
16.6 million - the median move set is between Yoshi and The Legend of Zelda

66.9 million - Mario including spin-offs (5 reps, 334.6 million sales)
62.3 million - Mario universe, including spin-offs, Yoshi and Wario (6 reps, 373.9 million sales)
59.1 million - Donkey Kong (1 rep)
53.0 million - Super Mario main series only (4 reps, 211.8 million sales)
43.4 million - Game & Watch handhelds (1 rep)
41.4 million - Pokemon (4 reps, 165.6 million sales)
25.5 million - Kirby (1 rep)
20.2 million - Wario (0 reps)
19.1 million - Yoshi (1 rep)
15.0 million - Animal Crossing (0 reps)
14.0 million - Legend of Zelda, Zelda is one character (4 reps, 56.1 million sales)
14.0 million - Metroid (1 rep)
11.5 million - Dr. Mario (1 rep)
11.2 million - Legend of Zelda, Zelda/Sheik are two characters (5 reps)
5.8 million - F-Zero (1 rep)
5.3 million - Star Fox (2 reps, 10.5 million sales)
4.1 million - Game & Watch collections (1 rep)
2.8 million - Fire Emblem (2 reps, 5.5 million sales)
2.7 million - Pikmin (0 reps)
1.8 million - Kid Icarus (0 reps)
1.8 million - Ice Climber (1 rep)
1.6 million - EarthBound/Mother (1 reps)
1.3 million - R.O.B., Gyromite sales only (0 reps)
0 - Wii Fit didn't exist yet

Compare Smash 64 representation during Melee's development:

Average Smash 64:
52.0 million - average sales of the 10 Nintendo franchises/universes included
43.3 million - 12 characters for 520 million in video game sales

Median Smash 64:
25.0 million - median Smash 64 lies between Legend of Zelda and Kirby
14.5 million - median Smash 64 franchise lies between Kirby and Yoshi

103.6 million - Mario including spin-offs (2 reps, 207.3 million sales)
77.2 million - Super Mario main series only (2 reps, 154.4 million sales)
76.2 million - Mario universe, including spin-offs, Yoshi and Wario (3 reps, 228.5 million sales)
69.4 million - Pokemon (2 reps, 138.8 million sales)
46.9 million - Donkey Kong (1 rep)
43.4 million - Game & Watch handhelds (0 reps)
32.5 million - Legend of Zelda (1 rep)
17.4 million - Kirby (1 rep)
11.5 million - Yoshi (1 rep)
10.2 million - Dr. Mario (0 reps)
9.7 million - Wario (0 reps)
7.0 million - Star Fox (1 rep)
5.9 million - Metroid (1 rep)
4.0 million - F-Zero (1 rep)
4.1 million - Game & Watch collections (0 reps)
2.7 million - Fire Emblem (0 reps)
1.8 million - Kid Icarus (0 reps)
1.8 million - Ice Climber (0 reps)
1.3 million - R.O.B., Gyromite sales only (0 reps)
1.2 million - EarthBound/Mother (1 reps)
0 - Animal Crossing had not been released yet
0 - Pikmin did not exist yet
0 - Wii Fit did not exist yet

So, considering what could be added, let's think about who's in now and what series aren't in yet.

Smash 4 addendum:
43.2 million - Wii Fit (1 rep)
23.4 million - Animal Crossing (1 rep)

Unrepresented franchise sales:
177.7 million - Mario Kart/Sports/Party combined*
149.6 million - Wii/Mii games (Wii Sports, Wii Play, etc.)
95.4 million - Mario Kart
70.0 million - Wii/Mii games excluding Wii Sports since it was bundled
47.3 million - Mario Sports
35.3 million - Brain Age
35.0 million - Mario Party
28.3 million - Duck Hunt (was part of a bundle though)
24.3 million - Smash Bros
21.7 million - Nintendogs
11.5 million - Dr. Mario
8.7 million - Paper Mario
7.1 million - Mario & Luigi
6.2 million - Excite racing games
5.9 million - Luigi's Mansion**
>4.2 million - Rhythm Heaven
>4.0 million - (Advance) Wars
3.6 million - Golden Sun
3.6 million - Wave Race
3.1 million - Punch-Out!!
3.1 million - Pilotwings
2.1 million - Nintendo Land
2.1 million - Starfy
2.1 million - Super Mario RPG
>2.0 million - 1080 Snowboarding
1.8 million - Fossil Fighters
>1.2 million - Custom Robo
1 million - Balloon Fight
0.8 million - Xenoblade Chronicles (note: limited supplies, not demand!)
0.9 million - Chibi-Robo
0.7 million - Elite Beat Agents/Ouendan
0.5 million - Sin & Punishment
0.5 million - The Last Story

??? - Pushmo, Dillon's Rolling Western (digital sales figures unavailable)

*Combined sales relevant for consideration of characters like Waluigi who only has appeared in such games, and Daisy who primarily appears in such games

**Luigi's Mansion did get a level, but there's no LM-specific character and Luigi has no moves specific to it. The level of sales makes me think Luigi needs to use his Poltergust for something.

Not that this matters, but...

3rd party addendum, sales on Nintendo consoles:
>37 million - Sonic, >100 million total all platforms
~18 million - Mega Man, ~26 million total all platforms
~2 million - Metal Gear, ~35 million total

One of these is not like the others... Snake is very lucky his creator really wanted him in, because there's not really much reason to think he should be. Contrast: Castlevania is also by Konami, and a large portion of that series' sales are on Nintendo platforms (around 7.6 of 12 million shown on vgchartz, but games are missing. Wikipedia says the series has 20 million sales).

You can also see why Mega Man is a great fit - Mega Man has lots of sales on NES, SNES and Nintendo handhelds.

 

[Neanderthal]

Great thread Ermir. Offers alot of insight.
Really makes DK look hard done by. Going by sales figures it wouldn't be so ridiculous to include both Dixie and K.Rool. Having said that I'm sure most of the money they made form this series was further in the past.

Also, you need to say that the lists you did are sales PER CHARACTER in Brawl. It took me forever to work out WTF the numbers meant till I realised they were the total sales figure divided by the # of characters per game. I don't think you said this anywhere.

 

[Erimir]

True. Only about 20 million of DK's sales have been since 2000, with 46 million being before Melee came out.

Of course, that also points to perhaps characters from earlier games being a higher priority for DK - K Rool might not have been in a lot of recent games, but the games in which he appeared account for most of the highest selling Donkey Kong games. Games in which K Rool appeared were 38 million of the DK series' sales.

 

[Starcutter]

I like this idea, it makes series like yoshi, wario and DK need more reps.

although I do think you might have missed yoshi's island DS when you did this, since the yoshi series are the same for melee and brawl.

 

[Homelessvagrant]

Great thread bro, I've been looking for sales info like this for a couple of days now.

 

[3Bismyname]

this kind of makes me think that Wario could warrant a second character.

 

[Erimir]

I like this idea, it makes series like yoshi, wario and DK need more reps.

although I do think you might have missed yoshi's island DS when you did this, since the yoshi series are the same for melee and brawl.

I was counting sales at the time equivalent to now. Since Brawl was revealed at E3 in 2006, I counted Yoshi's Island DS for it. They might have already finalized the roster at that point, I don't know.

Keep in mind that "Melee representation" means the franchise's sales vs. representation in Melee at the time Brawl was being developed. Not when Melee was released. I figured that made the most sense for what would affect their roster decisions, rather than the representation at time of release since they made their decisions on characters earlier in the process.

this kind of makes me think that Wario could warrant a second character.

Possibly.

I think sales interacts with the other factors Sakurai is considering. It's not just the franchise's raw sales. I think that goes into the "popularity" factor though, and that's one of the most important factors.

But other factors are how popular particular characters are, how important they are to the series, how many appearances they make, as well as the uniqueness and technical considerations. I think the raw count of characters matters as well. I personally feel that having more than 4-6 characters is approaching saturation if they don't have some standalone appeal (as Yoshi and Wario do).

The problem with say, giving Yoshi or Wario additional reps is that while they have decent sales, they're pretty much one-man shows. Wario has a bunch of minor characters and none of them have the level of recognition that Wario does. I'd guess that Waluigi would be grouped with Wario, represents a series with a lot of sales (Mario Kart/Sports/etc.) and has more recognition than pretty much any of the characters originating in the Wario series. Personally, I think Waluigi is more likely than a true second Wario rep. I think someone like Ashley would be more of a WTF character rather than representing fan desires or Nintendo marketing.

Yoshi has a lot of overlap with Mario, so Baby Mario would seem like more of a Mario rep, for example, and Kamek is more known for being an enemy/Bowser's aide than a main villain.

On the other hand, a series like Fire Emblem feels well-represented relative to sales, and has a plethora of characters, most of which don't recur. I'd be a little surprised if they got a third rep, and shocked if they got four. But Sakurai doesn't like to cut characters, so it's possible that Ike stays and they get one new rep.

 

[Xenigma]

The main thing I get out of this list is that sales aren't a terribly useful metric. Strictly going by these, Mii would be an auto-include, G&W would have another rep, and we'd be drowning in Mario reps to cover both the main series and all the spin-offs.

The one comforting thing I'll take out of this? Even if it's pretty far down on the list of unrepresented franchises, Golden Sun is one of the best selling franchises with a clear choice for a representative, only really beaten out by Mii and Paper Mario IMO (or a possible surprise Smash rep like Sandbag). If sales are truly considered, that could definitely help Isaac's case.

 

[Erimir]

I still think it's useful to consider because obviously sales aren't the ONLY thing, I think they interact with the others. One of the main things they interact is with the cast of characters in the series. Mario's main cast is already in, additional characters are either much more minor or have only had a couple appearances.

Yeah but G&W doesn't have much relevancy and who the hell could even be the second rep anyway? He's already a composite of all the games because there wasn't enough there in any one game.

Also, who knows, maybe Mii was an auto-include. I guess we'll have to find out. But I wouldn't be surprised if Miis were in the game. I'd be worried if I were big into Waluigi on that count, since the move set potential for Miis and Waluigi overlaps quite a bit.

We do have 4 or 6 Mario reps (Yoshi and Wario are at least Mario-adjacent). And I wouldn't be surprised at getting another Mario rep of some sort. We had 5 Mario reps in Melee anyway.

I do think Sakurai wants to include more franchises though, and character uniqueness plays a role of course. My feeling is that sales have more of an effect on getting additional reps than it does on getting the first one, since their best-selling franchises are already all represented (aside from Mii).

On that count, I'd be pretty surprised if DK doesn't get another rep.

 

[Swamp Sensei]

This just proves that sales don't really matter and that they never have!

 

[jaytalks]

Thanks for the thread! This is great.
Sales are the easiest and most universal popularity poll for Nintendo. If a game sells well, that means its characters have a large audience who identifies with the character. I think many people look at the Smash Franchise wrong in how sales impact the series. Many assume that characters are put in the game to sell their series. Aside from a few exceptions (Roy), the characters are supposed to sell Smash. But the sales is just one factor in a multitude of factors. It appears to me to factor into series representation more than character representation.

I am of the belief that no franchise gets more than four reps. Even with Dr. Mario in Melee, he was chosen to represent puzzle series, so that makes it four for Mario again.

The unrepresented franchise list is the most interesting one to me. It make Golden Sun look really well, and makes you think why there aren't more Fossil Fighter fans arguing for the series. The next few characters I want (Little Mac, Sami) also do fairly well. Shulk looks lower, but you have to consider that they made a limited amount of copies with his games.

Older franchises have had more games and therefore more sales. And certain franchises have too many Japan only releases that also limits their sales. But this is very cool. Fire Emblem does look overrepresented, but that's where other factors play a role.

The problem with many of the franchises in Nintendo is that they appear to be one-hero shows. Wario, Yoshi, Metroid, F-Zero. Hopefully this means more series newcomers.

 

[Deleted member]

@Erimir: First thing, NEVER use vgchartz as a source of sales. That site makes up numbers so it really shouldn't be trusted.

Another thing is that overall sales don't correlate with playable reps. Notice that in Brawl, Pokémon and Zelda had more characters than Mario did (think move sets like Sakurai, not slots). It also doesn't explain why Star Fox got more reps in Melee and Brawl than Donkey Kong did. Finally, Sakurai has never mentions sales as something he considers.

I can understand the effort, but sales don't really mean anything.

 

[jaytalks]

@Erimir: First thing, NEVER use vgchartz as a source of sales. That site makes up numbers so it really shouldn't be trusted.

Another thing is that overall sales don't correlate with playable reps. Notice that in Brawl, Pokémon and Zelda had more characters than Mario did (think move sets like Sakurai, not slots). It also doesn't explain why Star Fox got more reps in Melee and Brawl than Donkey Kong did. Finally, Sakurai has never mentions sales as something he considers.

I can understand the effort, but sales don't really mean anything.

Sales correspond more with series representation rather than character or rep numbers. And that Pokemon and Zelda thing doesn't really make sense because those were obviously creative decisions. Sakurai uses movesets because the amount of programming and design that has to go into making individual characters. That's why he always states that when talking about Brawl, because it would not represent the amount of work that his team did for the game without including different transformations.

It appears to me that Sakurai and company have a maximum of four characters per franchise. Dr. Mario represented the Dr. Mario series, and Yoshi, DK, and Wario represent their own series.

Erimir clearly stated that their other factors to consider, sales are just one factor. Some series don't have more reps because they don't have viable characters other than the main hero. Ice Climbers got in to represent the retro series.

And sales matter. Sakurai has mentioned that when he considers adding characters, he adds characters that will get people to buy the game. The easiest way to determine that would be to look at the sales of a game. If a game sells well, there is a potential audience who have not tried Smash that could buy the game because it has a character from that game.

 

[Xenigma]

If sales didn't matter at all, than Wii Fit Trainer would be an even stranger inclusion than she already is. It's debatable whether it's an important factor, but I'd be surprised if they aren't at least considered when deciding on characters to include.

 

[FlareHabanero]

Wii Fit Trainer was chosen because the character was literally something nobody anticipated at all and her movements were good for a "dancing" based combat.

 

[TheTuninator]

Wii Fit Trainer was chosen because the character was literally something nobody anticipated at all and her movements were good for a "dancing" based combat.

She's also got great pull for the casual audience, though, and I would be surprised if making the game more accessible and desirable for casuals did not cross Sakurai's mind while selecting her. That said, I doubt that the financial benefits were a priority in her inclusion.

 

[1983parrothead]

G&W was added, because it was very influential during its release. Companies like Bandai, Epoch, Tomy and Tiger Electronics cashed in on the genre. But G&W, the franchise that started it all, had millions of units sold according to the G&W Gallery series. It was also added in memory of Gunpei Yokoi shortly after his death.

 

[Erimir]

I made some adjustments:

-added in more info for Animal Crossing
-added in Mother 1's NES sales for Earthbound which I had accidentally not included
-added in a comparison of the overall Mario universe representation, if you count Yoshi and Wario as Mario characters. Considering their origins and strong association with the series, you could argue they are kinda Mario reps as well. Both appear in basically all the Kart/Sports/Party games, and Yoshi continues to appear in main series Mario games. In addition to his debut in Super Mario Land 2, Wario has also been in Super Mario 64 DS and Yoshi's Island DS as a playable character.
-added in Luigi's Mansion. Not that I expect a character from it, but it might be of interest when considering how likely the Poltergust is to be incorporated into Luigi's moves and so forth

By the way, if you think you know more accurate numbers for any of these, please let me know.

 

[jaytalks]

if I were to give the best selling first party unrepresented franchises a rep, they would be:
3.6 million - Golden Sun - Isaac
3.6 million - Wave Race and >2.0 million - 1080 Snowboarding - Akari Hayami
3.1 million - Punch-Out!! - Little Mac
3.1 million - Pilotwings - Goose
2.3 million - Advance Wars - Sami
2.1 million - Nintendo Land - ? Takamaru?
1.8 million - Fossil Fighters - Hunter
>1.2 million - Custom Robo - Ray Mk III
>1 million - Starfy - Starfy
1 million - Balloon Fight - Balloon Fighter
0.8 million - Xenoblade Chronicles (note: limited supplies, not demand!) - Shulk
0.9 million - Chibi-Robo - Chibi-Robo
0.7 million - Elite Beat Agents/Ouendan - Agent Jay
0.5 million - Sin & Punishment - Saki
0.5 million - The Last Story - Zael

Characters appear to be closer to third party ownership:
2.1 million - Super Mario RPG - Geno

So let's say about five new franchise characters were make it in and just based on sales:
Isaac, Akari Hayami, Little Mac, Goose. Sami

I would be satisfied if these were the newcomers from new franchises in Smash 4.

Edit: Left out excite series.
6.2 million - Excite racing games - Excite Bot

 

[Dark Phazon]

The worse of the worsw of debates.....franchise vs sales.....Ugh......

 

[Erimir]

I also just added information about the average and median (1st party) character and franchise in each game.

You can notice that the medians have generally been moving down, which makes sense as they added in more characters from series that have lower sales and fleshed out some of the higher selling series.

At the same time, the average franchise sales have been going up. Obviously lifetime sales are going to increase over time. The ratio between the growth in the average character sales and the overall total sales has not matched though. Total sales have almost doubled from during Melee development to now, during Smash 4 development. Yet average franchise sales have only increased by around 20%.

if I were to give the best selling first party unrepresented franchises a rep, they would be:
2.1 million - Nintendo Land - ? Takamaru?

Nintendo Land's only unique character is Monita, I believe.

Takamaru may be boosted by his reference in the game though.

 

[YoshiandToad]

Yoshi's series sold better than Legend of Zelda in the Brawl section? R-really? Even as a Yoshi fan I'm surprised.

Certainly an interesting read.

Edit; NVM; just realised that's because Zelda is divided between it's four reps. Derp..

 

[Erimir]

Added Rhythm Heaven, which has at least 4.2 million in sales (mostly in Japan).

 

[Erimir]

I can understand the effort, but sales don't really mean anything.

So I've seen this around. I thought that there was some clear evidence in the post I made, but I guess it wasn't easy to see.

So, I'll say that I ran a linear regression using only two variables:

• Total sales. Technically, I used the logarithm of the total sales, since the relationship did not appear to be linear
• Number of slots or move sets that the franchise had in the previous iteration of Smash

The data is every franchise that existed before a Smash iteration and its sales up until 2 years before the release of that Smash game.

The result?

R^2 = .7546

Now of course, this doesn't explain everything. But that's a pretty good result for using just two variables. And it makes it pretty clear that franchise sales DO matter. Significantly. But other things matter too. Like what happened in the previous iteration. And plenty of intangibles I'm sure. And sales and previous slots are probably correlated with some of the other factors that matter.

 

[Guybrush20X6]

I think the most important determining factor for characters is Sakurai's gut feeling. And since none of us have endoscopy equipment we may never know.

 

[Capybara Gaming]

Kirby says.......

This is a great thread!

 

[Erimir]

Cross-posting from the Rate Their Chances thread:

As a fan of your ratings, I must express I am at a loss now that instead of pure commentary you're talking about some statistical model that I admit I find tremendously confusing.

Mostly because Sakurai doesn't follow math. We're talking about a chaotic being, so given that I miss your less math-y commentary.

If Sakurai didn't "follow math", then you wouldn't be able to get an 81% correlation by plugging these numbers into the model. Now, obviously I don't think he plugs information into a calculator to decide who gets in. But he knows which series are the money makers. Sales are also quite strongly correlated with "popularity" as well. If people like Mario, they'll buy his games, and vice versa, to some extent (I don't think people loving Zelda games has helped Tingle that much). And I'm sure he gets at least some pressure from Nintendo to promote popular/money-making characters. So, his behavior is not going to be random with respect to sales figures.

There's also the matter that I do not have access to WiiWare and Virtual Console sales figures, which means I may be significantly underestimating the appeal of some retro characters. It might be that VC sales have helped Earthbound's stature relative to some of the larger series. I also do not have access to sales figures in money, rather than copies sold, nor their profit margins. Nor do I know about money made from other merchandise (which probably helps Pokemon a large amount). So the series may be ranked differently in terms of their overall profitability and popularity (and fanbase strength rather than just size may matter as well) than the numbers I have.

Nonetheless, the correlation is pretty robust and although I haven't used the most rigorous methodology, 81%-83% correlation is far too strong of a performance to be dismissed as "chance", to say that Sakurai is a "chaotic being" and thus cannot be predicted on the basis of more objective figures. Of course, he does have some freedom to pick characters he just likes, and he may respond to characters that are more popular than their sales would suggest. Then there's the matter of the cast of characters in a series - it doesn't matter how much sales Game & Watch or Wii Sports/Mii games get, it's very safe to assume they won't get more than one character. Other series, like Pokemon, have no shortage of characters.

I also don't think that the clones in Melee followed these rules as much, and in fact, I get slightly better results if I pretend the Melee clones didn't exist.

I can break down what I said a little bit more though...


I said "Using sales (logarithm of total sales since the relation is not linear), previous slots and movesets, whether the game is a typical genre (so Zelda, Mario, Golden Sun = typical, Wii Fit, Nintendogs = atypical), or has any playable characters (in Duck Hunt and Wii Fit there isn't really any playable character), I can get about an 81% correlation with a 10-fold cross validation on slots and 83% for move sets."

• I ran predictions for both slots and move sets. Some of the models I tried performed better on move sets than slots, which is not surprising given Sakurai's comments about how he thinks of it more in those terms. More move sets are more work for that series, so a series should "merit" that additional work. But the performance is pretty similar.
• 10-fold cross validation means that the model is run 10 times, each time training the model on 90% of the data. Then that model makes predictions for the remaining 10%. The performance of the model is then based on those predictions. This is meant to approximate how well the model will perform on new data. If you train the data on all of the data and test on that, then you would tend to perform worse than expected on new data due to overfitting.
• 81% correlation means that about 81% of the variation is explained by the model.
• So, I took total sales (in millions). You can see a clear relation between a franchise's sales and the number of slots/movesets they get if you plot it on a graph. It is, however, not linear. It appears to be approximately logarithmic. This explains why the Mario and Pokemon series do not have many, many, many times more representatives than say, Fire Emblem, despite having ~60x or ~25x as many sales, respectively. A logarithmic scale instead predicts the influence of Mario's/Pokemon's sales relative to Fire Emblem's sales to only be a factor of 2.5-3x as many slots. Obviously this is still a bit off, which is why I incorporated other factors.
• Previous slots and move sets are just that. For Brawl, these numbers would be how many slots and move sets the Mario series had in Melee. For Smash 64, this is 0 for all franchises since there was no previous iteration. This decision could be criticized. I do get slightly better performance if I only consider Melee and Brawl, but it may be slightly less robust due to fewer data points.
• Typical genre deals with Sakurai's comments about what sorts of characters are considered. Obviously being from an atypical genre is not a total barrier, as seen with Animal Crossing and Wii Fit. I took this to mean series that do not involve fighting, destroying things, platforming, etc. AND which do not have plots that involve such things. This means that F-Zero, which would otherwise be atypical as a racing game, is considered "typical" since the story line involves bounty hunters and such. Meanwhile, Wave Race and Excite as pure racers are atypical. I also counted Game & Watch due to how individual Game & Watch games would mostly not qualify as typical. Brain Age is obviously atypical.
• Playable character means that there is a visible playable character in the game or in its story. F-Zero has no visible player character, but we know Captain Falcon and Goose and Samurai Goroh are "in the cars". Duck Hunt, on the other hand, is first-person. There is no hunter ever seen or anything. This is why Duck Hunt fans always suggest the dog, who is not playable. Same goes for Wii Fit, Brain Age, etc.

How much each individual factor matters depends somewhat. Running the same data through but leaving out features can tell you this. You can note that some features are correlated with each other. Since franchise sales are an influence in how many slots a series got in the previous iteration, they are correlated. But it does seem that inertia does have a strong effect, and so Earthbound continues to get slots despite not keeping up with other represented series, and most series do not have a change of more than 1 slot from one game to the next.
Correlation in various configurations:

• Removing previous slots/move sets: 73% for slots (8% decline), 72% for move sets (11% decline)
• Removing sales: 78% for slots (3% decline), 79% for move sets (4% decline)
• Previous slots/move sets and sales only: 79% for slots (2% decline), 80% for move sets (3% decline)
• Previous slots/move sets only: 76% for slots (5% decline), 79% for move sets (4% decline)
• Sales variables only (including previous sales figures): 66% for slots, 66% for move sets

So you can notice that sales and previous slots do pretty well on their own, but previous slots does quite a bit better. So, series inertia seems to be the dominant factor. Nevertheless, adding you can get a significant improvement by incorporating sales into it.
But like I said, while this explains a lot of the variation, it obviously doesn't explain all of it. But I think it is a good guideline from which to start. So when I look at, say, Fire Emblem, I can see that it doesn't have the most amazing sales, so the model doesn't predict slots to increase much, predicting about 2.16 slots and 2.43 move sets. But I can also know some other things about the series, like that it has rotating protagonists (so plenty of good candidates), that they're very well-suited for being in the game, that it had one of its best selling iterations lately, but that the series almost ended due to previous games selling poorly. These are all going to effect how I'd rate them.
But since roster inertia is the largest factor, it's pretty safe to assume that Fire Emblem will not lose slots. That already gets you pretty close to the right answer for Fire Emblem - I'm pretty willing to predict that there will be at least 2 slots for FE. So there's quite a bit of wiggle room around that final slot. But it also tells you that expecting four slots for Fire Emblem is probably going to result in disappointment, as the model only made errors that large three times (they were underestimating how many slots Mario, Zelda and Fire Emblem would get in Melee... perhaps not coincidentally, those series all got clones).
Bottom line: sales and roster inertia explain a lot of what we see.
Series with less than 1.3 million in sales have never gotten a representative. No series has gotten 2 representatives with less than 2 million in sales. No series has gotten 2 unique representatives with less than 5.5 million in sales (Lucas and Roy both being at least semi-clones). No series with less than 10 million in sales has gotten 3 representatives. No series has gotten 3 unique representatives with less than 25 million in sales. No series with less than 30 million in sales has gotten 4 representatives. No series has gotten 4 reasonably unique representatives with less than 55 million in sales. This doesn't make those things happening impossible by any means, but it certainly doesn't look like Sakurai doesn't take sales into account in some fashion (although clearly not a linear fashion).
So looking at some of the franchises under consideration for Smash 4:

• Custom Robo has 1.3 million in sales, so it would be on the low end for a rep. Chibi-Robo, Xenoblade, Ouendan/Elite Beat Agents, Sin & Punishment and The Last Story all are less than a million in sales, so them getting slots would be unusual. Of those, only Xenoblade has an announced sequel, and it looks relatively high-profile and big budget, so if one was going to buck that trend, I'd guess it would be Xenoblade.
• Kid Icarus has 3 million in sales, and Pikmin has 3.8 million. Additional representatives would seem nowhere near guaranteed, but certainly possible.
• Earthbound still only has about 2 million in sales. Thinking that Ness and Lucas will stay but that Claus or Porky will get added seems a bit delusional, considering that it took 10 million to get Star Fox a couple clones, and Kirby had 25 million for actual unique characters. Fire Emblem with 8 million in sales would be on the low side, but looks a lot more plausible.
• A fourth rep for Star Fox, with only 11.5 million in sales seems pretty unlikely. Kirby, at 33.5 million, might be able to do it... maybe. But Kirby already has its major characters. Donkey Kong doesn't even have 3 reps, but yet has almost 70 million in sales and a high-profile DKC game on the way. It has by far the most sales of any series with less than four reps. Not only could they justify giving it a third rep, but they could even give it a fourth. DK getting a 3rd rep seems very likely.
• Zelda is also at about 70 million in sales, Pokemon at 220 million and Mario at 500 million. Mario and Pokemon can easily justify getting additional reps. Zelda maybe not.

 

[Zhadgon]

Can I ask you if the Kid Icarus series will have a new playable character for the new Smash (counting your chart), is Uprising considered?
.n_n.

 

[Erimir]

Can I ask you if the Kid Icarus series will have a new playable character for the new Smash (counting your chart), is Uprising considered?
.n_n.

Yes, Uprising's sales are included. I used the figures from VGChartz and wherever else I could find them. I think I explained before, but yeah, I prefer figures direct from Nintendo. I used VGChartz, but I also checked individual games against other gaming sites and Wikipedia and so forth. VGChartz is definitely missing a lot of relevant information. Sales from Japan-only games and from the pre-N64 era can be a bit spotty. I generally went with the higher figures, if they had an industry source for them. Sales only up through this summer are considered. The fact that Pokemon X & Y was on the way and sure to be high-selling was surely known to Sakurai, but I'm trying to model the early roster planning stages.

Anyway, I used the model I talk about above to make predictions for Smash 4, so I guess I'll give the model output, and some light commentary.

The commentary is necessary to demonstrate to people that I don't think the model knows all, and that I do, in fact, think other factors will come into play.

I would note that there's nothing built into the model to understand the relationship between slots and move sets (i.e. move sets ≥ slots). They get similar performance (slightly better for move sets) so I'll take the two of them together as a range, but incorporating knowledge of whether there's a plausible transformation character.

The model also doesn't know anything about Sakurai's plans. He says he plans on representing series more, so I'd expect a little bit more focus on new or underrepresented series. Three slots also seems like the most slots I'd expect to be likely for any series but the big three (Mario, Pokemon, Zelda). A smaller series could get four... maybe. I doubt it though.

Not every possible rep is covered since I couldn't get figures for Takamaru, eShop series (Pushmo, Dillon), etc. I don't think their chances are negligible. That makes me feel better about downgrading the model's predictions more often than not, since those series have some chance too.

One final thing is that third-parties are not included. The incentives for third-party characters would be different, the number of potential series is way higher, getting their sales figures for Nintendo consoles specifically is much harder.

Overall ____ Confirmed slots: 16 ____ Predicted slots: 44 ____ Predicted move sets: 50
There are 18 confirmed characters if you include Sonic and Megaman of course.
Anyway, this doesn't look far off from where I'd guess. Mid-40s for character slots. If Pokemon Trainer, Sheik and ZSS all stay, that gets us up to 48. 50 is around the maximum I'd expect for slots. 11-13 Nintendo newcomers would be an average amount given Melee and Brawl. But given Sakurai's comments that he's not going to emphasize adding new characters as much, so I'd expect fewer than we got in Brawl or Melee, so this might be a little high.

And third-parties are in there too, so they should exert some downward pressure on these. Each third-party adds the same amount of work, so probably takes away a slot that could've gone to a Nintendo character. So these estimates are also probably a little high because of that too.

Mario series ____ Confirmed slots: 4 ____ Predicted slots: 4.60 ____ Predicted move sets: 5.20
Total sales: 506 million
Mario is the only series to have lost a rep. The model overestimates how many slots the series will get because its sales are so ridiculously high. That said, we know that Mario's main cast is included, and it has been confirmed pretty early on. There are some decent candidates for additional Mario reps, like Bowser Jr, Waluigi, Toad and Rosalina, but they pale in comparison to the main four. Still, the early confirmation for the Mario cast is suggestive. All in all, I think the model is not far off, but overestimating a little bit.

Pokemon ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 4.39 ____ Predicted move sets: 5.78
Total sales: 219 million
Pokemon had 4 slots and 6 move sets last time. The model doesn't think that's likely to change much. Knowing that Pokemon Trainer is one of the veterans, it's hard to predict how many move sets there will be. If PT is cut, it will probably equal the number of slots. We might get 4 and 4. But if he's not cut, I'd say 4-5 and 6-7 is possible. I doubt we'd see 5 and 5, the scenario where PT is cut and there are two Pokemon newcomers (or one newcomer and Mewtwo). The model doesn't really tell us anything we don't already know.

Keep in mind that the model is more like an average over scenarios. If we thought those three scenarios (PT cut and replaced, no net change, or no cuts and another Pokemon added) were equally likely, we'd get 4.33 and 5.67.

Legend of Zelda ____ Confirmed slots: 2 ____ Predicted slots: 4.11 ____ Predicted move sets: 5.07
Total sales: 71 million
Again, it doesn't think much will change. Zelda has its main cast represented and is not really underrepresented relative to sales. I think it's practically guaranteed we'll get 4 slots, and almost as much so for 5 move sets though. Zelda and Ganondorf and most likely Sheik will return. But the model doesn't know that. And Zelda is a proven system seller. So I think it's underestimating the chance of a newcomer a little bit. But yeah, Zelda newcomers seem on the whole unlikely.

Kirby series ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 3.22 ____ Predicted move sets: 3.64
Total sales: 33.5 million
Kirby has its main cast represented and some problems with potential newcomers. I think the model is overestimating here. While Kirby has a chance to get, say, Bandana Dee, the fact that Waddle Dees are part of Dedede's move set hurts him a lot.

Star Fox ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 2.95 ____ Predicted move sets: 3.34
Total sales: 11.5 million
This is a case where I think the model is overestimating due to the power of roster inertia. I agree that cuts are less likely than not, but Star Fox is overrepresented as it is. So a Star Fox cut is more likely than newcomers.

Donkey Kong ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 2.70 ____ Predicted move sets: 3.02
Total sales: 69.3 million
Here I think it's underestimating, but not far off. Donkey Kong is one of the most underrepresented series. It has over twice as many sales as Kirby, 7x as many as Star Fox, but yet has fewer reps. It has 9x as many sales as Fire Emblem, 35x as much as Earthbound, but the same amount of reps. DKCR and DKC:TF have raised DK's profile again. DK not getting a third rep would be a travesty. The model mostly agrees.

Fire Emblem ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 2.16 ____ Predicted move sets: 2.43
Total sales: ~8 million (early game sales not all available)
This is around where I'd put it. A third rep for Fire Emblem is possible, but it's not really that big of a series. It has some rabid fans, but two reps is about right for it, IMO.

Earthbound ____ Predicted slots: 1.82 ____ Predicted move sets: 2.05
Total sales: ~2 million
The model seems to agree with most people: Earthbound is in danger of losing a slot. Earthbound has fairly low sales among all Smash series, but having two reps? That said, roster inertia suggests we shouldn't overestimate the chance of a cut. But for anyone hoping for Claus or Porky, I'd say they're quite unlikely to get their wish.

Wario series ____ Predicted slots: 1.72 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.90
Total sales: 22.6 million
Wario's sales would seem to justify another character. But what the model doesn't know is that Wario does not have a strong supporting cast. He has some quirky characters, but no real stand out sidekick that would have a strong argument for being included. Maybe if you count Waluigi as a Wario rep (which Sakurai might well do if he adds Waluigi), but if we're not doing that, I'm going to say the model is overestimating a lot here. The Wario series is a one-man show.

Yoshi series ____ Predicted slots: 1.68 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.85
Total sales: 19.1 million
The same notes apply mostly to Yoshi. Kamek is a stronger figure, but still not that more interesting than the generic Magikoopas. Baby Bowser could be "represented" sort of by Bowser Jr, but eh. The model is overestimating.

Metroid ____ Predicted slots: 1.68 ____ Predicted move sets: 2.23
Total sales: 17.6 million
I'd agree with the model approximately for slots. ZSS seems pretty much confirmed though, so I'd probably bump the predicted move sets accordingly.

Game & Watch ____ Predicted slots: 1.42 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.57
Total sales: 47.5 million
What I would take away from this is that Mr. G&W is very unlikely to be cut. He definitely deserves to be in. He's also easier to implement than any other character as far as modeling and so forth. But obviously the model doesn't know that there can only be one.

F-Zero ____ Predicted slots: 1.38 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.53
Total sales: 5.8 million
F-Zero had a decent run, and got a decent amount of sales. They could certainly justify adding another character. Samurai Goroh and Black Shadow aren't that well-known, but they could happen. Unfortunately, F-Zero isn't getting a sequel for the foreseeable future, which hurts them. So I'd downgrade them relative to the model.

Pikmin ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 1.28 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.41
Total sales: 3.8 million
Again, another Pikmin rep is possible, but... The model doesn't know that there's not a whole lot of variety to be found in potential Pikmin reps. They'd have to be a semi-clone of Olimar and he's a bit complicated and has a difficult learning curve. I'd put the chances of a new rep as pretty minimal.

Kid Icarus ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 1.22 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.34
Total sales: ~3 million (figures for Of Myths and Monsters not available)
Here's one where I think it's underestimating a little bit. Uprising gave its characters a lot more personality, raising Palutena's profile considerably. She's one of the most wanted characters out there. That said, KI's sales are still relatively low, and there's no sequel on the horizon right now, and Sakurai may not want to show favoritism. But all in all, I'd give it pretty good chances, more in the 45% range.

Ice Climber ____ Predicted slots: 1.09 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.20
Total sales: 1.8 million
Like with Mr. Game & Watch... I think there can only be one. But they're quite likely to return assuming the 3DS can run them fine.

Stack Up/Gyromite (R.O.B.) ____ Predicted slots: 1.01 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.12
Total sales: 1.3 million
Again with the retros. There can only be one. He's in a little bit more danger than G&W or Ice Climbers though, IMO.

Wii Sports/Mii games ____ Predicted slots: 1.00 ____ Predicted move sets: 1.07
Total sales: 150 million
On the one hand, it seems pretty inevitable that the Mii would appear. The sales are huge! It's integrated into the Wii U and the 3DS, they're well-known to all. But being a pack-in game inflates the sales quite a bit though. And they do have some concern about how they're used, and I don't know that Sakurai likes them that much or would find them that interesting to add. WFT might be fulfilling the same role as well. So here I think the model is overestimating a fair amount - but there's still quite a good chance for a playable Mii IMO.

Punch-Out!! ____ Predicted slots: 0.61 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.63
Total sales: ~4.3 million (figures not available for SNES games)
Here I think it's slightly underestimating. Mostly because of the boxing ring stage. Punch-Out has had a revival, but it wasn't triumphant. It sold fine, but not amazingly. Unlike some other series though, Little Mac would fit in just fine.

Wars series ____ Predicted slots: 0.59 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.61
Total sales: ~4 million (figures not available for all games)
I think it's overestimating. Mostly because a move set is a bit harder to come up with, and it hasn't really been doing much lately.

Golden Sun ____ Predicted slots: 0.56 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.58
Total sales: 3.6 million
A bit high I think. Golden Sun is a great candidate, and its characters would fit great. But the last game was a little disappointing in sales (I liked it better than the original personally). I'd give Isaac decent chances, but more likely not to be in than to be.

Animal Crossing ____ Confirmed slots: 1 ____ Predicted slots: 0.54 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.56
Total sales: 23.4 million
Well we know this is wrong. The model took Sakurai to heart when he said it would be weird for the Villager to fight. It gave a decent chance, but I think we can agree that a lot of people were surprised to see him in the trailer. They thought he was ruled out. But the model gave AC pretty good chances on the basis of the strong sales. But I wouldn't hold my breath for Tom Nook. AC's blockbuster sales might get him in, but I doubt it. Maybe in Smash 5.

Duck Hunt ____ Predicted slots: 0.53 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.57
Total sales: 28.3 million
Duck Hunt was part of a bundle, so its sales are deceptively high. Duck Hunt Dog is possible, but not really known for anything but laughing. There's no player character to add. I don't think more NES retro reps are guaranteed - at some point Sakurai will decide he's drained that well. So I'd rate this quite a bit lower.

Legend of Starfy ____ Predicted slots: 0.43 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.43
Total sales: ~2.1 million
Starfy is a bit unconventional as a character. And his AT wasn't exactly inspiring. His mostly Japan-only status probably doesn't help either. I'd rate him lower.

Fossil Fighters ____ Predicted slots: 0.39 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.39
Total sales: 1.8 million
Fossil Fighters is a bit low on sales for a non-retro series. They don't really have a breakout star either. And the audience is a bit younger than Smash, I'm guessing. Maybe I'm downgrading it due to unfamiliarity.

Custom Robo ____ Predicted slots: 0.31 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.30
Total sales: 1.3 million
Custom Robo is on the low end of sales for a series to get a rep. Only Earthbound has made that achievement while not being a retro rep. That said, Ray would fit in well. The series hasn't been doing much lately though.

Balloon Fight ____ Predicted slots: 0.24 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.23
Total sales: 1 million
Balloon Fight is a classic. It gets references in Nintendo Land and so forth. But his trademark is part of the Villager's move set. And he doesn't really have a whole lot else going on. I'd rate him much lower because of that.

Chibi-Robo ____ Predicted slots: 0.22 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.20
Total sales: 0.9 million
Chibi-Robo is cute and all, and could work. But the sales are quite low. I would rate him even lower personally.

Xenoblade ____ Predicted slots: 0.19 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.17
Total sales: 0.84 million
There are a few reasons I'd bump these chances a bit, and one I'd bump them down. The first is hat Xenoblade Chronicles sold out, and the sales would be higher if supply had been higher. The second is that the game got phenomenal reviews. The third is that there's a high-profile, big budget (looking) sequel coming to the Wii U and Smash would be a good way to market it. The reason I'd bump it down is that we don't really know the connection between the two games, or if Shulk or anyone would appear in it. That said, of all the series with less than 1 million in sales, this is the one I'd rate the highest.

1080/Wave Race ____ Predicted slots: 0.18 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.17
Total sales: ~5.6 million
I combined these since I figured if they got a rep, Sakurai might pick one of the characters that appears in both, and this would also increase the move set possibilities. That said, there's not really any fighting going on in the game, the series are defunct (unfortunately! I loved them on the N64) and no character is really well-known. I'd rate them lower.

Wii Fit ____ Predicted slots: 0.14 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.16
Total sales: 43.2 million
Wii Fit has some blockbuster sales. And with the Balance Board, it was probably even more profitable. The model is surprised though, because Wii Fit is, well, not a conventional choice and the trainer is not a playable character. If not for the genre and such, it would've predicted more like 1.2 slots. That said, from what I can tell, this is higher than most people would've rated Wii Fit, so I don't feel too bad about the model being wrong if it was less wrong than most.

Rhythm Heaven ____ Predicted slots: 0.11 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.09
Total sales: 4.2 million
It's not a typical type of game, and it doesn't have high enough sales to overcome that. There's also not a super obvious choice for which character. A move set based around being rhythmic would be annoying IMO. I'd probably rate it slightly lower.

Brain Age ____ Predicted slots: 0.09 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.10
Total sales: 35.3 million
Again, huge sales. Problem: Dr. Kawashima is a real person. I think he's more like 0.001% chance.

Sin & Punishment ____ Predicted slots: 0.07 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.04
Total sales: 0.5 million
Low sales, low chance. The AT and Sakurai's praise for Saki help a little bit, but I don't think they outweigh his fundamental obscureness. Not far off from where I'd put it.

The Last Story ____ Predicted slots: 0.07 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.04
Total sales: 0.5 million
Similar story. If it were getting a sequel and had as good reviews as Xenoblade, it would have better chances.

Pilotwings ____ Predicted slots: 0.04 ____ Predicted move sets: 0.01
Total sales: 3.1 million
Pilotwings is a flight simulator. It does have some characters, but no stand outs. It's almost retro. Maybe a tick or two higher, but its chances are pretty low. The stage is a pretty cool way of incorporating it though.

Nintendogs ____ Predicted slots: -0.03 ____ Predicted move sets: -0.03
Total sales: 24.5 million
Well, obviously they can't get negative slots. But yeah, not going to happen. There's no player character, and playful puppies don't make great fighters. The stage is, again, a good way of incorporating it.

Ouendan/Elite Beat Agents ____ Predicted slots: -0.34 ____ Predicted move sets: -0.40
Total sales: 0.7 million
Low sales, unconventional characters. Not likely to happen. The Elite Beat Agents have a cool image, could make a quirky character and could finally put a Western-only character in. So I would rate them above zero but not by a lot.

Excite racing ____ Predicted slots: -0.35 ____ Predicted move sets: -0.38
Total sales: 6.2 million
Not a lot going on with the series, and no real character to put in in the first place. Close to zero is right for this one.

Other series:

I don't have sales figures for these, but the model can be applied leaving that variable out...

Mach Rider, Takamaru, Dillion's Rolling Western:
Slots = 0.2435 + .576*log(millions of sales)
Move sets: 0.2273 + 0.6305*log(sales)

Pushmo is lower since it doesn't involve any fighting.
Slots = .576*log(millions of sales) - 0.2483
Move sets: 0.6305*log(sales) - 0.3006

From this you can calculate how much sales they'd need to have predicted 1 slot. It's about 20 million for Takamaru, Mach Rider and Dillon, and even more for Pushmo. Doubtful they have that much. If, on the other hand, they were each around 1 or 2 million, their predictions would be around 0.24 to 0.4 (matching games like Chibi-Robo and Fossil Fighters). Pushmo would get maybe a 0.17 if it had around 2 million in sales.

So yeah...

 

[Zhadgon]

Thank so much for writing all of this, it give me a better idea of what you wrote in the first post, so in reality the Wii Fit Trainer and the DK character are some of exceptions to your system, still great can you improve your system in so form or is does it have a limit?
.n_n.

 

[jaytalks]

I think the model as it stands is very strong. Any model is going to have some variability because at the end of the day, it really is a singular individual making many decisions within the game, regardless of whether or not he has consultation.

Punch Out! And Golden Sun's predicted slots are usually about the same as my prediction levels, so that's cool. I like the strength that Wars shows; it just shows the series longevity.

If Sakurai didn't "follow math", then you wouldn't be able to get an 81% correlation by plugging these numbers into the model. Now, obviously I don't think he plugs information into a calculator to decide who gets in. But he knows which series are the money makers. Sales are also quite strongly correlated with "popularity" as well. If people like Mario, they'll buy his games, and vice versa, to some extent (I don't think people loving Zelda games has helped Tingle that much). And I'm sure he gets at least some pressure from Nintendo to promote popular/money-making characters. So, his behavior is not going to be random with respect to sales figures.

I think it's ridiculous to suggest that Sakurai doesn't follow math, especially with 81% correlation. Sales are likes the biggest popularity poll. Mario is the most popular video game character in the world because his games have the most sales. He has had the most buying power of any character over the history of gaming.

I think it's a good idea not to apply this model to third party characters, especially since the original third party character's inclusion was based on low sales on Nintendo consoles:
“My child likes Super Smash Bros., so we play it a lot together. And he told me that there’s no character that you made in that game,” Kojima said.
“As you know, we did make Twin Snakes, but generally speaking, there hasn’t been a lot of Metal Gear on Nintendo platforms. So from that perspective, I thought it was a good way to expose younger people to this character, Snake.”
http://www.vg247.com/2012/03/20/kojima-snake-included-in-smash-bros-brawl-thanks-to-son/

I really am impressed with your analysis Erimir. It provides a strong data basis for your RTC predictions. Just wondering, which statistical program do you use? Microsoft Excel?

 

[Erimir]

I've been using the Weka machine learning toolkit.

I took a machine learning class last year, so...

 

[TheTuninator]

Very in-depth and interesting analysis, thanks. I do have to object to the unfortunately common misconception that creating a moveset for an Advance Wars character is somewhat difficult, though. Interesting movesets can easily be crafted for any member of the AW trio, and indeed most members of the cast as a whole.

Sales certainly aren't the be-all, end-all of representation, but as other posters have observed they serve as an excellent metric of popularity, and popularity does matter.

 

[Pacack]

I'm surprised that this model doesn't predict a third FE character. Did you include FE:A's sales?

 

[Guybrush20X6]

I wouldn't discount a game not having combat. Both the Nintendo newcomers are from series where you don't attack anything. Unless you like hitting villagers with butterfly nets or tickling relatives trying a tricky yoga pose.

Regardless, that's some good work.

 

[Pacack]

Question: Are you considering the Wii series an "unconventional" series? Because I really don't think it is at its core. Miis fight in boxing and swordplay minigames, so why not Smash?

 

[XenothiumX]

Oh hey, it looks like you already made a graph. Now, things make more sense about what you were saying.