Official Newcomer/DLC Speculation Discussion

[Door Key Pig]

I don't want to get greedy with my expectations, so I'm only expecting one character to be revealed, said character being Erdrick.

Is it boring? Yeah, but I don't want to get my hopes too high up for anything more, just in case.

We're almost halfway through the period between the Fighters Pass's birth and death, is it that greedy to want to know three of the five characters by now? They could space it out more to keep the cycle up, but E3's a prime source of attention for whatever one or two fighters they could show

 

[GoodGrief741]

My expectation for E3 is two characters. As for who, Erdrick and Banjo is who I'm feeling.

 

[Captain Shades]

but I swear Microsoft discussion drowns out pretty much every other 3rd party except Square and Erdrick even though nothing concrete really points to any Microsoft being involved with Smash.

What about the Bethesda rep and Doom Slayer, we all know Bethesda spoke to Nintendo about Smash.

I think you misunderstood. People state Steve is inevitable because look at how much Minecraft sells, I’d say that has more to do with the actual game, than Steve the character. My evidence the game’s community manager.

Not to beat a dead horse, but do you play Pac-Man for the character. What about Ryu in Street Fighter, or how about Mega Man or Simon Belmont. Point is, we have tons of non-existent personalities in Smash, why should Steve have to adhere to some personality rule when some of the most loved picks don’t. Most love Street Fighter for the mechanics not bland Ryu, Castlevania and Mega Man are perfect platformers but lack any personality in the early titles they are known for. People want and like Steve because they like Minecraft. If you like a game, you are bound to like the main character regardless of the minimal personality depth.

 

[SimonferSmash]

Kinda hoping that if we do get two reveals, both will be of the first fully western created third parties to join the series as full fledged fighters.

That's a big if however, since I wanna try to keep my expectations in check.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

What about the Bethesda rep and Doom Slayer, we all know Bethesda spoke to Nintendo about Smash.


Not to beat a dead horse, but do you play Pac-Man for the character. What about Ryu in Street Fighter, or how about Mega Man or Simon Belmont. Point is, we have tons of non-existent personalities in Smash, why should Steve have to adhere to some personality rule when some of the most loved picks don’t. Most love Street Fighter for the mechanics not bland Ryu, Castlevania and Mega Man are perfect platformers but lack any personality in the early titles they are known for. People want and like Steve because they like Minecraft. If you like a game, you are bound to like the main character regardless of the minimal personality depth.

I’d disagree with the characters you picked because yes, they are fun memorable characters. You leave those games remembering them, you leave Minecraft thinking about that awesome thing you just built.

 

[CyberHyperPhoenix]

We're almost halfway through the period between the Fighters Pass's birth and death, is it that greedy to want to know three of the five characters by now? They could space it out more to keep the cycle up, but E3's a prime source of attention for whatever one or two fighters they could show

No, it's not cause I never said it was.

I personally don't want expect two characters in the event we only get one, is all.

 

[Deathcarter]

I’d disagree with the characters you picked because yes, they are fun memorable characters. You leave those games remembering them, you leave Minecraft thinking about that awesome thing you just built.

We're talking about Steve in Smash though. Steve would automatically stand out immensely from the rest of the cast just by aesthetic alone. Whether he'd stand out in a good way is subjective but he'd stand out. Also your point about Minecraft memorability and fun being about "that awesome thing you just build", that very experience would be exactly what Sakurai would be focused on bringing to Smash as best as he could through Steve.

 

[Captain Shades]

I’d disagree with the characters you picked because yes, they are fun memorable characters. You leave those games remembering them, you leave Minecraft thinking about that awesome thing you just built.

I guess what I’m saying was, are they really memorable due to the personality or the gameplay. At least to me, I don’t care for Pac-Man as a character due to the personality being fantastic, it’s the fun game that he happens to star in that makes him memorable. I remember the platforming challenges I had fun with in Mega Man, not so much Mega Man himself.

Minecraft works in the same way as these games. You become attached to this player character you build and survive with. Steve may not have any personality, but that allows players to really become him, which is why he’s become such an icon. Kids wouldn’t be dressing up in Steve heads if he really wasn’t someone a player could grasp onto. Steve is sort of a modern Link in a sense, everyone knows the character as in a way, Steve is you. Zelda has used this tactic for years, and I’d argue MC does the same. It doesn’t dampen Steve as a character, but rather makes him a more personalized character that you build experiences off of.

I see what you’re getting at, but I don’t think it hurts him. The idea of remembering the thing you built is sort of the memory Steve brings back. It’s kinda like how many will see BOTW Link as that character they used to explore X thing with. The world and activities make the character memorable.

 

[RileyXY1]

What about the Bethesda rep and Doom Slayer, we all know Bethesda spoke to Nintendo about Smash.

I don't think that we will be getting a Bethesda character, but I think that if we're getting one than it will absolutely be the Dragonborn from Skyrim.

 

[Captain Shades]

I don't think that we will be getting a Bethesda character, but I think that if we're getting one than it will absolutely be the Dragonborn from Skyrim.

They did talk to Nintendo about Smash Bros. We know this as an interviewer asked them about Smash and they replied “Oh Yeah”
http://www.nintendolife.com/news/20..._bros_future_nintendo_exclusives_are_possible
They seem to want to partner up with Nintendo more often, so don’t count them out yet.

As for why Doom, well, it’s Doom. The series has the biggest legacy of all their franchises being the father of the modern FPS. Doom was also the big hardware pusher of the Switch and was certainly the most important port of the Switch’s first year. Other factors include Sakurai speaking positively of the franchise and the fact that there is a new title coming out later this year.

Sakurai lists Doom’s creator as one of the greats during his interview about Cloud
“Yes (laughs). If you pull up a list of game designers born in 1970, there’s quite a few big names: Hideki Kamiya (Bayonetta), Fumito Ueda (ICO), Yoko Taro (NieR series), Jin Fujisawa and Yosuke Saito (Dragon Quest X), Chiyomaru Shikura (Steins;Gate), and the late Kenji Eno (D and others). Internationally, you have John Carmack, the father of FPS’s, as well. As a generation, a lot of us were directly impacted by the dawn of the PC and the home gaming console. For me personally, it was the year 1986, when games like The Legend of Zelda and Castlevania were released, and I experienced physically interactive games. They had a big impact on me. What about you, Mr. Nomura?”

https://www.sourcegaming.info/2016/01/21/sakuraixnomuraparttwo/

Apparently he is also a huge Fallout fan (He apparently played 4 on a stream), so I believe he’d choose to have Doom Slayer or Vault Boy way before any Skyrim character.

 

[RileyXY1]

They did talk to Nintendo about Smash Bros. We know this as an interviewer asked them about Smash and they replied “Oh Yeah”
http://www.nintendolife.com/news/20..._bros_future_nintendo_exclusives_are_possible
They seem to want to partner up with Nintendo more often, so don’t count them out yet.

As for why Doom, well, it’s Doom. The series has the biggest legacy of all their franchises being the father of the modern FPS. Doom was also the big hardware pusher of the Switch and was certainly the most important port of the Switch’s first year. Other factors include Sakurai speaking positively of the franchise and the fact that there is a new title coming out later this year.

Sakurai lists Doom’s creator as one of the greats during his interview about Cloud
“Yes (laughs). If you pull up a list of game designers born in 1970, there’s quite a few big names: Hideki Kamiya (Bayonetta), Fumito Ueda (ICO), Yoko Taro (NieR series), Jin Fujisawa and Yosuke Saito (Dragon Quest X), Chiyomaru Shikura (Steins;Gate), and the late Kenji Eno (D and others). Internationally, you have John Carmack, the father of FPS’s, as well. As a generation, a lot of us were directly impacted by the dawn of the PC and the home gaming console. For me personally, it was the year 1986, when games like The Legend of Zelda and Castlevania were released, and I experienced physically interactive games. They had a big impact on me. What about you, Mr. Nomura?”

https://www.sourcegaming.info/2016/01/21/sakuraixnomuraparttwo/

Apparently he is also a huge Fallout fan (He apparently played 4 on a stream), so I believe he’d choose to have Doom Slayer or Vault Boy way before any Skyrim character.

Doom is extremely unpopular in Japan and Fallout has 0 presence on Nintendo systems. It's Skyrim or nothing, in my opinion. Actually, Doom isn't even the father of the modern FPS. That honor actually goes to Wolfenstein 3D, which I don't think will ever get Smash representation because I don't think that the dev team wants to have Nazi imagery in the game. Doom essentially gets the credit for everything that Wolfenstein 3D did.

 

[Nquoid]

Is the reason a lot of people don't view Steve as having a personality because its default perspective is first person?

We do obviously have a lot of avatar characters, Villager and Miis being the best example because they operate in their franchises identitically to Steve. But I do think a key difference between them and Steve is when you play Wii Sports and Animal Crossing, the avatar is always on screen. It has animations which help immensely to create a "personality" even when they have no dialogue and are literally blank slate characters.

It's a problem I personally have with a lot of who's bandied around as a Western rep. So many Western games are default FP games. And even though Skyrim and Minecraft allow third person, the animations are mostly serviceable. Because the player character is secondary in importance to the scope and scale of the gameplay.

None of this means Steve can't or likely won't be in the game. Sakurai literally made up most of what we think of in Captain Falcon. But when we talk "personality" that's how I define it. I know how a lot of these characters react or move in situations, even if they've literally spoken a word or made a sound.

 

[TheCJBrine]

Is the reason a lot of people don't view Steve as having a personality because its default perspective is first person?

We do obviously have a lot of avatar characters, Villager and Miis being the best example because they operate in their franchises identitically to Steve. But I do think a key difference between them and Steve is when you play Wii Sports and Animal Crossing, the avatar is always on screen. It has animations which help immensely to create a "personality" even when they have no dialogue and are literally blank slate characters.

It's a problem I personally have with a lot of who's bandied around as a Western rep. So many Western games are default FP games. And even in Skyrim and Minecraft allow third person, the animations are mostly serviceable, because the player character is second to the scope and scale of the gameplay.

None of this means Steve can't or likely won't be in the game. Sakurai literally made up most of what we think of in Captain Falcon. But when we talk "personality" that's how I define it. I know how a lot of these characters react or move in situations, even if they've literally spoken a word or made a sound.

The thing is that nearly everyone knows what Steve's animations are, though, due to seeing other players, watching videos, playing in third-person for some stuff, or whatever (plus you always see your character when you open your inventory, though they just stand and turn to face and look at the cursor). And I'm sure Sakurai and his team would give him some new ones (I personally hope they'd keep his stiff limbs, though) just like they do for every other character, and possibly make him more-expressive through certain movements and maybe using the new facial-expression-style from Minecraft: Dungeons if they don't just change pixels on his face or something.

Heck he even has a hurt sound from older Minecraft versions:

 

[Opossum]

How do the people who say "people play Minecraft for the gameplay, not the character" view the Mario games, I wonder?

People don't exactly play Mario games for the characters.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

But they do.......

 

[Captain Shades]

Doom is extremely unpopular in Japan and Fallout has 0 presence on Nintendo systems. It's Skyrim or nothing, in my opinion. Actually, Doom isn't even the father of the modern FPS. That honor actually goes to Wolfenstein 3D, which I don't think will ever get Smash representation because I don't think that the dev team wants to have Nazi imagery in the game. Doom essentially gets the credit for everything that Wolfenstein 3D did.

Many believe Doom will be the western pick. Dragon Quest will likely get in as the big Japanese pick. It wouldn’t be that strange to have a more western based character seeing as most of Ultimate is just that (Ridley, K Rool). Also looking at sales for a few versions (PS4 and Switch), the Skyrim definitely sold more, but is still relatively small. Skyrim had sales of like 0.8 while Doom had 0.4. The Switch version sold even less with Doom still being about half the sales (which to be fair, Doom Switch took a hit in all territories due to its literal 1 year to late release). Bethesda doesn’t really get that many sales in Japan in general, but I’m sure Nintendo would still work something out with them if they are interested in Smash as they clearly bring in a large Western Audience.

I believe Doom would take the spot because Smash would be huge promotion for Eternal coming out this year. Skyrim hasn’t really done much outside of ports for pretty much this entire decade and 6 is said to start development after another game with no release date comes out. Smash would be a huge push for Doom and one that may bring in many new players who will pick up the second installment to the reboot in December, advancing Nintendo’s relationship with Bethesda. Nintendo seems more dedicated to helping western developers this decade, just look at Shovel Knight or the big partnership with Ubisoft, that to relegate everything to Japan and Japan popularity only seems odd. In a way I kind of expect a lot more western material in Smash DLC with Ubisoft, Microsoft, and Bethesda jumping on board.

Also, when has not having a presence on Nintendo consoles been an issue, I thought Joker would have broken that fan rule by now. If Sakurai really does like Fall Out, then he could probably ask for the rights to put it in.

Finally to address the point about father of the modern FPS, Doom is still considered as it advanced the genre to the point it is at now. Wolfenstein was a pretty archaic game and served as more of a beta to Doom. Doom introduced many things to advance the genre past walking in flat and square designed rooms. The addition of elevation platforms, stairs, elevators and more circular rooms really advanced the entire design behind FPSs. The graphics and sound design also impacted the future of the genre as Doom pushed them. Other big additions include it being open source, a practice many pc games would follow in the future and also created the term “Death Match”. In a way, yes Wolfenstein did pioneer the genre, but Doom took things to the next level, so I believe either could be considered the father.

My source
http://blogs.iac.gatech.edu/juwillknowshing2/2015/10/23/doom-the-fps-of-fps/

The thing is that nearly everyone knows what Steve's animations are, though, due to seeing other players, watching videos, playing in third-person for some stuff, or whatever (plus you always see your character when you open your inventory, though they just stand and turn to face and look at the cursor). And I'm sure Sakurai and his team would give him some new ones (I personally hope they'd keep his stiff limbs, though) just like they do for every other character, and possibly make him more-expressive through certain movements and maybe using the new facial-expression-style from Minecraft: Dungeons if they don't just change pixels on his face or something.

Heck he even has a hurt sound from older Minecraft versions:

Is it wrong to hope that Steve’s hurt (getting hit) animation is just him jumping back and turning red.

I also hope that him slamming the ground is just the death animation where he starts to fade into the ground as items go everywhere. It’d really add some charm to him in Stamina Battles.

 

[Opossum]

But they do.......

Not in the slightest. The platforming has always come first in Super Mario games. Mario isn't some complicated character that people grow attached to. If anything they grow attached to him because he's less of a character and more of a personified Seal of Quality. You know a Mario platformer will be a quality platformer. Mario himself just acts as a brand, the window-dressing and coat of paint on the actual product.

Basically when most people say "I want to buy a Mario game," it's less of "I want to buy a game that stars Mario" and more of "I want to buy a platformer I know will be worth the money."

 

[King Sonnn DeDeDoo]

Not in the slightest. The platforming has always come first in Super Mario games. Mario isn't some complicated character that people grow attached to. If anything they grow attached to him because he's less of a character and more of a personified Seal of Quality. You know a Mario platformer will be a quality platformer. Mario himself just acts as a brand, the window-dressing and coat of paint on the actual product.

Basically when most people say "I want to buy a Mario game," it's less of "I want to buy a game that stars Mario" and more of "I want to buy a platformer I know will be worth the money."

I think it’s fair to say that people have grown attached to the character and world of Super Mario, as simple as it may be. People would really be upset if you got Mario’s characterization wrong.

I love playing Mario golf/tennis/baseball etc., sure there might be other sports games with more in depth gameplay (I’m actually not sure, I don’t really play other sports games) but I like to play them since they’re in Mario universe and give off a lot of character instead of something generic.

I agree that you Don’t need to be a compelling character to be in smash, but at the same time I think at this point people do care about characters like Mario despite being very simple.

 

[Curious Villager]

I don't want to get greedy with my expectations, so I'm only expecting one character to be revealed, said character being Erdrick.

Is it boring? Yeah, but I don't want to get my hopes too high up for anything more, just in case.

Thinking about it, we've had sort of only gotten one unique character revealed at E3 since Ryu. Roy was an easy to develop semi clone. Likewise with Daisy where Ridley was also the only unique newcomer revealed, While Inkling was revealed a lot earlier in the year, but only showcased at E3.

Not that it means much, but I could very well see them wanting to spread out their reveals a bit and give every fighters pass character their own moment in the sun and not have as much of an info drought between each of them. Whereas if they revealed and released both fighter 2 and 3 now. there will probably be a large waiting gap for character 4 and 5, especially since they plan to drag this whole thing to February 2020.

They could reveal fighter 3 along with fighter 2 but have fighter 3 released a couple month's later I guess though so people can still have something to look forward to while they wait for the rest of the DLC.

That's just speculation on my part.

 

[SchAlternate]

It's a bit silly to say people only buy Mario games for the gameplay and not the characters when you take the spin offs in mind. I assure you barely anyone would've bought the likes of Mario Golf or Mario Tennis if it didn't have the Mario cast in it. Hell, people are so attatched to the characters, they get upset if certain characters get excluded; if that wasn't the case, there wouldn't have been backlash on MK7 because Waluigi was excluded.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

It's a bit silly to say people only buy Mario games for the gameplay and not the characters when you take the spin offs in mind. I assure you barely anyone would've bought the likes of Mario Golf or Mario Tennis if it didn't have the Mario cast in it. Hell, people are so attatched to the characters, they get upset if certain characters get excluded; if that wasn't the case, there wouldn't have been backlash on MK7 because Waluigi was excluded.

Except he was clearly talking about Mario platformers. If he didn't make it clear in the first post, he did in the second.

So that's not at all what his argument is.

 

[UserKev]

It's a bit silly to say people only buy Mario games for the gameplay and not the characters when you take the spin offs in mind. I assure you barely anyone would've bought the likes of Mario Golf or Mario Tennis if it didn't have the Mario cast in it. Hell, people are so attatched to the characters, they get upset if certain characters get excluded; if that wasn't the case, there wouldn't have been backlash on MK7 because Waluigi was excluded.

Wholeheartedly agree. Mario actually has a ton of personality. The audience buy Mario platforms for both, Mario and the Mario platformer. Opossum is incredibly wrong.

Verde Coeden Scalesworth , Mario's personality is already established regardless of which Mario game you play.

 

[Pokelego999]

Wholeheartedly agree. Mario actually has a ton of personality. The audience buy Mario platforms for both, Mario and the Mario platformer. Opossum is incredibly wrong.

Verde Coeden Scalesworth , Mario's personality is already established regardless of which Mario game you play.

Didn't he grind luigi's foot in one of the Mario tennis games

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

Verde Coeden Scalesworth , Mario's personality is already established regardless of which Mario game you play.

Yeah. Once the 3D games hit. He had no real personality(he honestly barely has much of one now) before that. It's spin-off material(instead of the core platformers) that gave him remotely anything. His various personalities from the non-games aren't even reflected much at all among the games. Closest is being determined like in the RPG games, but... that's kind of it.

He didn't start off as more than a blank slate. Didn't change his immense popularity or who knew him. He was just your player character, literally as blank as Steve is. And that's the point. People get attached to the design if they don't start off with an actual personality, which is why Mario has immense recognition in the first place. It definitely wasn't about personality that made him such an icon quite fast, that's for sure. It was an amazing game that took the world by storm and a simple design that worked wonders.

 

[Cap'n Jack]

Not in the slightest. The platforming has always come first in Super Mario games. Mario isn't some complicated character that people grow attached to. If anything they grow attached to him because he's less of a character and more of a personified Seal of Quality. You know a Mario platformer will be a quality platformer. Mario himself just acts as a brand, the window-dressing and coat of paint on the actual product.

Basically when most people say "I want to buy a Mario game," it's less of "I want to buy a game that stars Mario" and more of "I want to buy a platformer I know will be worth the money."

Sorry I disagree with your opinion.

I mean you don’t need to be a complicated character to be memorable. He wouldn’t be parodied to death if he wasn’t memorable. I mean he’s an iconic character.

The avatar from Minecraft is not. The gameplay is. We can keep talking in circles, but it doesn’t really matter anyways.

 

[KirbyWorshipper2465]

It may not be much, but Mario can be seen as "reckless" compared to Luigi, seeing how the guy had to be saved by his brother twice.

Also, is this still the Banjo thread 2.0? Feels like that recently.

It's a bit silly to say people only buy Mario games for the gameplay and not the characters when you take the spin offs in mind. I assure you barely anyone would've bought the likes of Mario Golf or Mario Tennis if it didn't have the Mario cast in it. Hell, people are so attatched to the characters, they get upset if certain characters get excluded; if that wasn't the case, there wouldn't have been backlash on MK7 because Waluigi was excluded.

Heck, you even have some people having developed a fondness for Plum from the aforementioned Mario Golf, and was sorely missed by the time Mario sports games exclusively stuck to the Mario cast.

 

[BluePikmin11]

Thought: I think that being certain that Western characters will be in Smash one day is not a good idea. Personally, I like to think that Sakurai keeps adding Japanese game series because most of the Western game industry hogs the attention away those kinds of games from the mainstream. It is kinda like an underdog thing, where Sakurai is motivated to give Japanese franchises the attention they deserve through Smash Bros, of which Smash is probably one of the few major Nintendo franchises that would be able to give Japanese series special mainstream attention.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

Sorry I disagree with your opinion.

I mean you don’t need to be a complicated character to be memorable. He wouldn’t be parodied to death if he wasn’t memorable. I mean he’s an iconic character.

The avatar from Minecraft is not. The gameplay is. We can keep talking in circles, but it doesn’t really matter anyways.

Steve is immensely recognizable by people. He's a gaming icon. Just what are you talking about here? Of course he's iconic. The gameplay is just more important than the character here. It was the same with the Zelda series too. People didn't even know who Link was, for that matter. They thought he was Zelda. They still recognized the character, a gaming icon, as is. No different from how they recognize Steve. The main advantage Mario had was his name on the title, as well as making it clear it was "Mario" you were playing as via the game text. Not every Nintendo game bothered to do this, or had misleading names between the playable character and the actual game series.

He sells merchandise to a huge degree on design alone, not just by name. He's absolutely memorable. He's also "pandered to death", as you put it. People know who he is. It's pretty hard not to when he's everywhere.

 

[Door Key Pig]

They could reveal fighter 3 along with fighter 2 but have fighter 3 released a couple month's later I guess though so people can still have something to look forward to while they wait for the rest of the DLC.

That's just speculation on my part.

Maybe only one fighter could be ready by E3 anyway, with them picking E3 as the most attended point of interest the general public would have in Smash so that they reveal two of the fighters, if they were going to release one of them a couple months or so later anyway. Fighter 2 & 3 were apparently worked on w/ Joker after all. Maybe we might see little extra mode updates as well to help bide the time like the existing Stage Builder and VR mode.

Though the whole "releasing 3.1.0 a week or two before E3" might have me doubting an immediate release character at E3, or even announcing two there. Though it may have been a "sudden, quick jump to the next update" when 3.0.0 was announced.

 

[Opossum]

Thought: I think that being certain that Western characters will be in Smash one day is not a good idea. Personally, I like to think that Sakurai keeps adding Japanese game series because most of the Western game industry hogs the attention away those kinds of games from the mainstream. It is kinda like an underdog thing, where Sakurai is motivated to give Japanese franchises the attention they deserve through Smash Bros, of which Smash is probably one of the few major Nintendo franchises that would be able to give Japanese series special mainstream attention.

I'd like to think that Sakurai isn't the type to go "gaijin characters bad" or anything like that. If you're attempting to make the game representative of video games but explicitly exclude Western game characters from being playable, you're doing a bad job at best, and possibly being xenophobic at worst.

 

[BluePikmin11]

Well in Sakurai's case, it's more of a game representative of Japanese gaming, just like he said in a few Smash interviews.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

Well in Sakurai's case, it's more of a game representative of Japanese gaming, just like he said in a few Smash interviews.

We still have Western stuff like Rayman jumping in to the overall series. He's not ignoring Western gaming at all. Even if you made the argument that all the playable characters were overall from Japanese games... it doesn't change we have content from pure Western series.

Japanese gaming is the focus, not unlike how Nintendo is the main focus. It's not all that matters. He's more than well enough aware of important Western characters and franchises. Again, the fact he went to a fully Western studio for characters is important here. You could argue it was already the case with Capcom USA, but that's at least tied to a Japanese company.

I also agree with Opossum here; Sakurai is vastly unlikely to ignore Western gaming altogether. He isn't ignoring it right now. We might not get a Western character, but that's probably more due to having issues communicating properly with the company to properly represent the playable character than anything else. Negotiations are definitely not an issue(again, Rayman shows this) at all.

 

[BlueMonk]

I'd like to think that Sakurai isn't the type to go "gaijin characters bad" or anything like that. If you're attempting to make the game representative of video games but explicitly exclude Western game characters from being playable, you're doing a bad job at best, and possibly being xenophobic at worst.

Not entirely related and a little outdated, but Sakurai has written about Western games before and it might be worth a read

 

[BluePikmin11]

We still have Western stuff like Rayman jumping in to the overall series. He's not ignoring Western gaming at all. Even if you made the argument that all the playable characters were overall from Japanese games... it doesn't change we have content from pure Western series.

Japanese gaming is the focus, not unlike how Nintendo is the main focus. It's not all that matters. He's more than well enough aware of important Western characters and franchises. Again, the fact he went to a fully Western studio for characters is important here. You could argue it was already the case with Capcom USA, but that's at least tied to a Japanese company.

I also agree with Opossum here; Sakurai is vastly unlikely to ignore Western gaming altogether. He isn't ignoring it right now. We might not get a Western character, but that's probably more due to having issues communicating properly with the company to properly represent the playable character than anything else. Negotiations are definitely not an issue(again, Rayman shows this) at all.

I agree that it is very unlikely he would ignore Western gaming at least with non-character content, though that was not my primary reason of sharing my recent thought.

 

[shinhed-echi]

Steve has merchandise that I recall. My nephew had a bunch of MC figures, and Steve was pretty much the one he played most with. Both my nephews had a Steve, actually.

So this tells me it is possible to like Steve as a character.

 

[Icedragonadam]

Getting a western playable character would be more difficult than getting one in back in Nintendo's homeland of Japan. Because of the whole language barrier thing and Sakurai having to travel to meet with the company's CEO.

While there are Western characters like Shovel Knight as an Assist Trophy, negotiating for rights to use a 3rd party character as a spirit, trophy, cameo etc is far easier than a playable character(they also need to pay for music, DLC spirits, and the stage as well for that).

So there's still a chance that there won't be any western characters in the Fighter's Pass.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

If we're not getting a western character I highly doubt it will be because negotiations are "more difficult". It will probably be because they simply weren't picked.

 

[SchAlternate]

Except he was clearly talking about Mario platformers. If he didn't make it clear in the first post, he did in the second.

So that's not at all what his argument is.

How is it not? The argument was "people don't buy Mario games for the characters, they buy it for the gameplay", which doesn't hold water when the spin offs exist, and sell well. And even if we specifically refer to the mainline games, and while it is true that people care about those mostly for the gameplay, you cannot deny the Mario cast isn't at least a big contributor that leads people to buying those games to begin with.

Yeah. Once the 3D games hit. He had no real personality(he honestly barely has much of one now) before that. It's spin-off material(instead of the core platformers) that gave him remotely anything. His various personalities from the non-games aren't even reflected much at all among the games. Closest is being determined like in the RPG games, but... that's kind of it.

He didn't start off as more than a blank slate. Didn't change his immense popularity or who knew him. He was just your player character, literally as blank as Steve is. And that's the point. People get attached to the design if they don't start off with an actual personality, which is why Mario has immense recognition in the first place. It definitely wasn't about personality that made him such an icon quite fast, that's for sure. It was an amazing game that took the world by storm and a simple design that worked wonders.

Why does it matter that he wasn't remembered for being a character then if he's remembered for being one now?

Plus, what did you expect? He hails from an era when making iconic, timeless characters was far from a priority. Developers didn't really care about that until the 16 bit era, thanks to likes of Sonic. It would not be until later when his personality and character would be much more solidified and established and... well that takes full circle. He's a character now, even if he really wasn't one then, as opposed to Steve, who, while recognizable, isn't himself an icon now.

 

[BlueMonk]

I don't think the reason why we don't have Western characters is because of issues negotiating. I think, quite frankly, that it's simply because Sakurai and his team are more inclined towards characters and franchises they are familiar with, which would mostly be Japanese franchises. Now, Sakurai has played thousands of games and even goes out of his way to play games he doesn't think he'll like, so he's likely familiar with all the western characters we want in smash. But, like he said in the article I linked earlier, there's a disparity in what Japanese gamers want and what Western gamers want. Naturally, Japanese games are going to appeal more to Sakurai and his team and they're going to pick them more.

 

[Captain Shades]

Thought: I think that being certain that Western characters will be in Smash one day is not a good idea. Personally, I like to think that Sakurai keeps adding Japanese game series because most of the Western game industry hogs the attention away those kinds of games from the mainstream. It is kinda like an underdog thing, where Sakurai is motivated to give Japanese franchises the attention they deserve through Smash Bros, of which Smash is probably one of the few major Nintendo franchises that would be able to give Japanese series special mainstream attention.

What kind of attention are they hogging. Usually Western developers are hated as they are either money grabbers or indies that don’t know when to stop talking. If anything, Japan is the one given all the good press outside of a few western devs.

If this was an underdog thing, then why not open the flood gates to the good western devs that get overlooked in all territories. Just because COD is beaten into the ground and full of poor business practices, doesn’t mean that Doom 2016 should be labeled as bad. Sakurai should throw a bone to the diamonds in the rough if he deems them worthy.

Also in many cases, Sakurai seems to love western titles. Dead Space was a big game he enjoyed, Doom’s creator is one that he sees as influential, he loves the Minecraft’s creativity, and he is a huge fan of Fall Out believe it or not.

I see Smash as a coming together of gaming, not a region specific thing. I think the west has done plenty to earn spots on the roster with titles like Skyrim, Doom, Fall Out, Wolfenstein, Minecraft, the Rabbids, Halo, Mortal Kombat, etc.. Why not bring everyone together?

Getting a western playable character would be more difficult than getting one in back in Nintendo's homeland of Japan. Because of the whole language barrier thing.

While there are Western characters like Shovel Knight as an Assist Trophy, negotiating for rights to use a 3rd party character as a spirit, trophy, cameo etc is far easier than a playable character(they also need to pay for music, DLC spirits, and the stage as well for that).

So there's still a chance that there won't be any western characters in the Fighter's Pass.

I feel like this is more dependent on the size of a company. I’m sure Microsoft would be easy as it is a global company that most likely has a Japanese division to sort out some negotiations. Nintendo is also no stranger to working with Western devs now and the company has significantly streamlined the Japan and Western divisions which should make things easier.

If we were to get a western character, now is the time as Nintendo clearly holds good relations with Bethesda, Ubisoft, and Microsoft regardless of the overseas barrier. If they are working with them now, that tells me that Nintendo has put more emphasis on the west than ever before, so this should make things easier.

I don't think the reason why we don't have Western characters is because of issues negotiating. I think, quite frankly, that it's simply because Sakurai and his team are more inclined towards characters and franchises they are familiar with, which would mostly be Japanese franchises. Now, Sakurai has played thousands of games and even goes out of his way to play games he doesn't think he'll like, so he's likely familiar with all the western characters we want in smash. But, like he said in the article I linked earlier, there's a disparity in what Japanese gamers want and what Western gamers want. Naturally, Japanese games are going to appeal more to Sakurai and his team and they're going to pick them more.

He plays western games guys....

He spoke at length about MC and has streamed Fall Out, I doubt he hasn’t put in a character because he’s not familiar with western series.