MartianSnake

• Darkwing Duck - He is the terror that flaps in the night! He is the Yellow Devil that interrupts your fight! He is Darkwing Duck! ahem. A fairly obvious choice, I feel. If you had to pick just one television original character for the game I feel the choice would quickly narrow down to Darkwing and a certain egg-laying mammal of action. His moveset wouldn't be too out there outside of various moves utilizing different types of gas from his Gas Gun. Most applying some sort of status or effect on the opponent.
• Negaduck - Here's a fun pick. I'm growing rather fond of discussing "parallel characters" for this project, so here's another. Negaduck shares his physical attacks with Darkwing, but most gadget-using moves would be swapped with guns, chainsaws, stuff of that sort. Negaduck's a fun choice for a Roster if you're looking for a slightly deeper cut for the Disney Afternoon, but you don't wanna get too deep or use too much dev time.
• Goliath (Gargoyles) - So Gargoyles is a popular show, I see it brought up a decent amount in disney platform fighter discussions. Goliath wouldn't be a complicated character gameplay-wise. He's a big heavy hitter with wings and sometimes that's all you need.
• Baloo (TaleSpin) - Earlier I passed on repping Jungle Book with a character, fully intent on going with the Talespin side of things instead. Baloo would have a few moves/taunts/alts based on jungle book, but the large majority is based around Talespin. A lot of his moveset would revolve around throwing and placing propellers around. These would create windboxs able to push around opponents and recover yourself and allies. I'm rather fond of essentially casting Baloo as some kind of wind elemental for this.
• Wildwing Flashblade (Mighty Ducks: the Animated Series) - Yep, I'm doing it. This bulky character would bring a hockey inspired moveset to the table, along with some much needed EXTREME 90s aesthetic. Mighty Ducks isn't a show with a particularly strong nostalgic following, but look. It's funny. I think it'd be a welcome surprise if presented correctly.
• And finally, the moment you've been waiting for...
• Doug (Disney's Doug) - Ah yes, the Cloud of disney platform fighter. I just think it's really really funny to put Doug in a disney game. Disney owns Doug, they gave him a second show, they gave him a movie, they gave him a play in the disney parks. But everyone and their mom associates Doug more with nick, Disney included, probably! I'm gonna be real. I don't have a single gameplay idea for him. I just couldn't resist adding Doug regardless.

And there you have it! Gizmoduck was considered for the longest time, but I just wasn't feeling it in the end. Hope you like my ideas! If you have any thoughts, let me know! Thoughts motivate me.

First off, let's begin with probably the most obvious choice, if only because he's got a passing resemblance to another character...

Robin Hood - A character I see in a lot of disney platform fighter fan rosters, usually because he's got some similarities to Link. But despite that I do think he is a good choice. He really is the most obvious choice for a Dark Age rep. He'd make use of his sword and bow to make for a rather well rounded character. I'd also like to implement disguises in some fashion, though I'm not too sure how.

Next up, the world's greatest criminal mind!

Ratigan (The Great Mouse Detective) - My personal choice for best Dark Age villain, sorry Prince John, sorry Horned King. For the longest time I hesitated to include him, purely due to his SIZE. Which is about the size of a real rat-errr mouse. Then I remembered that doesn't matter. Smash sized up Olimar and Ratigan has always been BIG and IMPOSING for Mouse standards. Ratigan's Moveset would be full of cunning traps and sophisticated setups, complex evil plots with big payout. Until he's losing... if Ratigan is at a high percentage, he'll lose his Composure, changing his animation and bits of his moveset to be a bit more feral. This form is less focused about big brain schemes and more on KO-ing the opponent as quickly as possible. He'll regain his Composure after KO-ing a single foe, satisfied for the time being. unless he's on his last stock or one minute remains on the timer, then he's like that until the match ends.

Now, I'd end here, but there's one more film that I feel NEEDS recognition, a franchise that deserves to be in the game. You might know what I'm talking about, but maybe not the exact character...

Pooh Bear (Winnie-the-Pooh) - Winnie the Pooh is often either left out of disney platform fighters, or they'll pick Tigger and call it a day. Now, I love Tigger. But there's a really obvious choice that's consistently ignored. A lot of people struggle imagining Pooh as a character that can work in a fighting game, plenty of people struggle imagining anything related to Pooh being near violence. I dunno about these ideas, Animal Crossing is a remarkably similar case and they got two fighters in Smash. A history of punching dudes has never been a requirement in platform fighters. Now I do admit having Pooh wavedash and uppercut Maleficant would feel off for his character, which is why I'm proposing a support style character. His playstyle would focus more on assisting his teammate(s) more than damaging foes, gifting boosts that'll encourage his friends to protect the small bear.

A lot of his moveset would involve spreading Hunny around the stage, something that heals allies and slows down opponents. He'd also be able to stick balloons to his allies to boost recovery. He does have offensive attacks of course, but most'll be animated to resemble silly little accidents rather than anything with harm meant behind it. His most offensive attack is probably throwing out a beehive, which summons bees to attack whoever is currently standing in Hunny.

That's all I've personally selected from the dark age, sorry that it's so small. Tigger, Basil, and Horned King were considered, but rejected for varying reasons. Love them all though

• Disney Castle - The obvious first pick for a stage, this would take inspiration from Prism Tower. A traveling stage that stops on and around at various points around the iconic castle.
• Fantasyland - A simple battlefield clone that hovers above Fantasyland, you can see a lot of the iconic rides down below.
• Adventureland - This is your standard hazardless Pokemon Stadium clone, floating above the jungles of Adventureland.

Alright, you can probably guess what's going on with the lands, so i'll spill the beans. Tomorrowland and Frontierland are also stages, and also use classic competitive friendly layouts. Tomorrowland has a single moving platform, Frontierland has a single static platform. I figure it best to get these out of the way quickly, and it's a thematic set.

The next few stages are gonna be based on individual rides from the lands mentioned above. Although I'm counting Disney Castle as a Fantasyland attraction.

• Jungle Cruise - One of the big classic disney rides. Jungle Cruise would be a simple slow-paced moving stage, occasionally a hippo or crocodile would rise out of the water to act as a smaller platform. But most of the action would be on the boat itself.
• Big Thunder Mountain - I knew I wanted one of the disney mountains to be a stage, and this strikes me as the best choice. It would have a main platform resting diagonally, with two or three semi-solids above. The train would occasionally speed through as a powerful stage hazard.
• Alien Encounter - I struggled for a long time coming up with a good Tomorrowland stage, but I finally settled on this iconic defunct attraction. The main stage would be simple enough with a few moving semi-solids. And you'd watch the events of the "show" play out behind you. Including the alien's escape. After this point lights would flicker and platforms would electrify, among other things.
• Haunted Mansion - This stage doesn't have a counterpart for the land it's typically found in. And I don't have many ideas for layout or anything like that, but c'mon. It's the Haunted Mansion! It's incredibly iconic and beloved by fans of all ages. And I do genuinely believe if a disney platform fighter were to only have 10 stages, Haunted Mansion would NEED to be one of them.

So there you have it folks, there's really not too much else to add here. There's not really any cuts present here.

• Cinderella - I feel like representing one of the classic three Disney princesses is a must, most people go for Snow White, which I'm not against. But there's other options for that film (and an upcoming film) aside from the princess, which I feel isn't really the case for Cinderella. If I want to represent the original three disney princess films, I'll need to play things smart like that. Anyways, enough about background, let's talk how she'd play. Of course, she'd use her animal friends for some moves, and she'd have some sort of spiking down air involving her slippers. I'm also imagining she'd take a page out of Ness' book and borrow some abilities from her Fairy Godmother, which could lead to some fun moves.
• Alice - Now, I don't think Alice is too surprising of a character, but it might surprise you to learn that she's the only wonderland character I'd add. While it's true wonderland has a ton of wacky characters that would be fun to play as, those characters all revolve around messing with Alice and introducing her to weird things. My logic here is why split up wonderland into 3 or 4 reps when you can condense that all into one wild moveset. Alice would make use of all the weird things she's discovered to fill the screen with a flurry of weirdness. She can grow herself, shrink others, swing a flamingo around, paint opponents red, throw teacups, etc, etc.
• Peter Pan - Here's a character that wouldn't be too crazy, he'd be a speedy and floaty character with not a lot of range, considering his main weapon is a little knife. I do think it'd be interesting if he could share Pixie Dust with his teammates in Team Battles, giving them a peach style float.
• Captain Hook - Here's a character I briefly hesitated to include due to the inevitable inclusion of another pirate, but I think there's a lot to set Hook apart from that future inclusion, not to mention he's one of my favorite Disney Villains. His manner of swordfighting is much more fencerly than other characters. Less focus is put on slashes in favor of stabs, maybe a tipper mechanic would work for him? Bombs and guns could also be something he could reasonably use, something to pressure his rivals into getting close to him, as his ranged options are more explosive. Obviously Tick Tock Croc would be included in some way, but I can't make up my mind as to how.
• Maleficant - Now here's a character that's on everyone's roster unless they deliberately want to challenge themselves. If a disney platform fighter only had 10 slots, she'd be there. I don't have much to say that hasn't already been said. Fire magic. Teleportation. Sleep spell. Thorn creation, dragon super. Obvious moves.
• Merlin - I've passed over previous Big Blue Magic Mentors like Yen Sid and Fairy Godmother before, but I'd be a fool not to include Merlin. There's a lot of charm in just including a classic wizard in the game, and he'd make use of simple magical blasts and levitation and all that. He'd also of course have plenty of moves utilizing his shape-shifting.
• Madam Mim - A surprising pick that'd act as a parallel to Merlin, sharing some moves and having others deliberately designed to be the exact opposite to Merlin. So she's somewhat of a clone, a bit of loose one, though.

So that's who I'd pick! For me, the two most tragic cuts have got to be Prince Phillip, a character I've got a weird attachment to, and think would be fun, but there's better options out there for swordfighters, and he doesn't have much else outside of that. And Cruella De Vil, a beloved villain who's hugely popular. It's just a shame that her two biggest traits, smoking and skinning puppies, probably wouldn't fly in a roster like this. And without that you're mostly just left with her vehicular madness, which I feel works best for Mr. Toad.

I did not forget about the Jungle Book, you'll see something from it eventually.