Uhh WTF I think I just got some info...

[memememe]

So don't kill me if this doesn't turn out to be true. Buddy of mine is interning at a company that is involved with the next Smash (can't say which one or else he'd totally get fired for this.) Now, this particular company is based stateside, so it's not directly involved in the development of SSB4. HOWEVER, he was invited to sit in on a conference call with the development team so he could take care of some administrative stuff for them. Basically, here's what he got out of it:

-There's no way in hell this game is getting delayed. Brawl got delayed twice and they're doing whatever they can do avoid that. Q3/Q4 2014.
-The roster is actually not 100% finalized. The way they're doing it this time is the development team has a list of characters they would like to include in the game prioritized from most wanted to least wanted. They have a hard deadline in which there are no more characters to be added and however many are in the game at that point, they keep it that number. Supposedly that deadline is approaching pretty soon.
-Someone made a passing joke about "rights issues," which my friend interpreted as a Namco character being in Smash Bros.....

The rest is pretty business-y stuff he says. Again, if any of this is untrue, really sorry about this--I hated prophets and trolls for the hype leading up to Brawl. Thought I'd share it though--very interesting stuff.

 

[Deleted member]

Thanks for posting this nonetheless. If it's true and there is a character deadline soon, I think my hopes of DLC chars have just been punted out the window.

 

[Artsy Omni]

Any source that claims that a delay is impossible raises giant red flags. A developer would be absolute stupid to make a claim like that.

 

[Luigi player]

I think you are a troll.
And the info doesn't really reveal anything.

And yeah delays could always happen and are obviously not planned when they say it'll be released in 2014 not too long ago, lol.

 

[Artsy Omni]

I think you are a troll.
And the info doesn't really reveal anything.

And yeah delays could always happen and are obviously not planned when they say it'll be released in 2014 not too long ago, lol.

Judging by the rest of his post history, I was inclined to say the same, but I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt...

 

[Mr. Mumbles]

EDIT: Just looked at his post history. He's a troll.

I don't think the no delays info was their wording; I think it is the posters. Basically his claim seems to be that they are putting extra effort into making sure that doesn't happen, since it did last time. As for being a troll, it's hard to tell. The lack of earth shattering information makes me almost inclined to believe it, yet I find it odd is that a lowly intern would know anything. In my experience iterns usually have a very specific role, that generally doesn't require them to know much about what is going on as a whole I would think this would be doubly true of a company developing a game, who really doesn't want its secrets leaked.

 

[TewnLeenk]

MY BROTHER WORKS AT NINTENDO OMG GUYS HE SAYS LANKY KONG IS THE NEXT CONFIRMED CHARACTER AND SO IS OPTIMUS PRIME

Ehh but seriously, take any info that doesn't have a source with a grain of salt.

 

[IsmaR]

We lowly Smash folk appreciate you/your friend taking the risk to share this with us.

 

[Neanderthal]

I think it's a clever troll.
You're saying things that are extremely likely and easy to believe.
Aside from shooting yourself in the foot about having a group conference call between two countries who speak different languages with the actual Japanese developers involved(wtf?) who we know most of which do not speak English anyway. That part is just not very believable at all.

 

[Gingerbread Man]

Even if this was true, it tells us nothing.

 

[memememe]

Even if this was true, it tells us nothing.

AND WHAT DID WE LEARN TODAY ABOUT TROLLING??

Even if it's true, it tells us nothing.
Because we don't genuinely know or accept it as fact until it is true.

Boom.
Mods, lock this. Case closed.

 

[Neanderthal]

 

[memememe]

<3

 

[DakotaBonez]

Thank god he was just trollin. I don't think I could wait for Q3 2014. Gonna hold hope for no later than February. I won't make it through another school year without some Smash... then again I wouldn't get sh$# done in school if I was playin smash.

 

[Chauzu]

If you think Sm4sh will be released by february you're in for big dissapointments, this one thinks.

 

[Banjodorf]

Buddy of mine is interning at a company that is involved with the next Smash (can't say which one or else he'd totally get fired for this.)

Just stop right there. Where do you think you are? Gamefaqs? You must...

 

[FalKoopa]

Another rumour? Execpt that it gives no info at all.

C'mon. Make it better and give it some shock value. That'll make it interesting to read.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Um, if this is real and Nintendo were really stressing this, you know you just got your buddy fired, right? It may be more accurate to say he got himself fired by telling you anything, but that's aside the point. I'm sure they record all their conference calls. It wouldn't be hard to find one that happened recently involving a "rights issue" joke, and ones that have interns present are also probably pretty limited. It's not like they have tons of calls like this anyway; it's not hard to narrow down which one had the intern present. Not giving the name of the company will make them do a bit more work, but it's easily within Nintendo's ability.

Honestly everything said in this topic is so plausible that it may all be true even if the OP is lying. The second we pretty much got confirmed by Sakurai the other day when he said they're working hard to include as many characters as possible. Does that not suggest that they are still uncertain of how many will be in? Q3/Q4 2014 covers half of the window in which Nintendo suggested the game might come out and probably the more plausible half at that, and one might assume a partnership with another company and a year-long release window mean that they're serious about avoiding a delay (bringing in extra resources, giving themselves tons of wiggle room for a release date not to be a "delay"). In general, who plans on a delay when there's a year and a half until the end of your release window? A lot of full games get made in that time! They've coyly hinted at a Namco character before, and given the partnership, it would almost be odd if there weren't one. The "rights issue" joke makes that point vague anyway; the inclusion of any third party character makes that point "true", and Mega Man is confirmed.

I'm laying out this logic now for two reasons. One is that everyone should understand that we really are being told precisely nothing here so it's unimportant to discover anything relating to whether this guy is lying or not. The second point is, on the off-chance he's not lying and someone from Nintendo is about to do the honestly not very hard work to get his intern buddy fired, I'd ask them to consider mercy given that no harm was actually done and that the punishment he'll face for his minor indiscretion will far exceed his crime.

 

[Mr. Mumbles]

This guy already admitted this was a lie. He did so in the rumors compilation thread. Case closed.

 

[SmashShadow]

Meh, expected more.

 

[Norm]

MY BROTHER WORKS AT NINTENDO OMG GUYS HE SAYS LANKY KONG IS THE NEXT CONFIRMED CHARACTER AND SO IS OPTIMUS PRIME

PRIME SWEET LOVE THAT GUY!

 

[TheTuninator]

This guy already admitted this was a lie. He did so in the rumors compilation thread. Case closed.

I'd expected that it was rubbish, but that's good to know. A fine example of why we need to take each new rumor with the closest possible scrutiny.

 

[phate]

Why does a troll troll? I just don't understand how spreading rumors that have a 3% chance of being true helps anyone in any way. And I wouldn't imagine it's fun either. Is there a VSauce episode on this concept?

 

[Artsy Omni]

Why does a troll troll? I just don't understand how spreading rumors that have a 3% chance of being true helps anyone in any way. And I wouldn't imagine it's fun either. Is there a VSauce episode on this concept?

They think it's funny.