Smashboards

Think of it like Disney is making the biggest crossover in animation history, on par with and beyond Roger Rabbit, an MCU level budget, and goes to Warner Brothers for the rights to have cameos of Right Now Kapow characters instead of Batman. Sure, they also have Bugs Bunny like Roger Rabbit before it, but they still passed up Batman for Right Now Kapow, just because Disney fans are more likely to have an attachment to a show that aired on a Disney channel. Even if I was a diehard Batman hater and Kapow lover that'd sting and just reek of missed potential - that would still apply if this hypothetical scenario had Kapow and Disney fans alike unanimously crying tears of joy seeing Moon; Diamond; and Candy "come home" to the Magic Kingdom, and that would still apply if Disney never made it out to be more than a Disney crossover with some guests.

TBH I feel Banjo's sole saving grace is that he was the most unambiguous scrimblo in the fighter passes.

Banjo having the most boring and yet terrible moveset in the game so he could get in, and 99% of his fan base don’t even play him.

While I want Master chief, Smash irreversibly changes the perception of any character forever. For better or for worse. So I would rather have Banjo just so that my image of Master Chief doesn’t get spoiled

I should clarify: I don't care for Halo, or FPSes in general, I do care for wacky scrimbly bimbly platformers - however even if Smash wasn't doing its all-important "celebration of gaming" schtick, I feel passing over an unoverstatable icon like Master Chief for a duo from a short-lived franchise that's only really known to a very specific sub-age group, and only serves their IP holders by being used as a scapegoat against their consoles and development teams, in a crossover of this magnitude, is just embarassing at best. I love me some obscure and out of left field picks, and I don't mind giving the fans a bone for their support, but you also need to represent a company well with the characters they bring to the table. I feel the MS scapegoat element in particular is what makes Banjo sting the most for me, not just being less popular/important than Chief alone.

While I’m not upset with Banjo’s inclusion, I’m fairly certain that it was a fanservice pick and not much else. Probably good for getting the attention of Nintendo fans and news outlets, but the Chief probably would have looked better in hindsight given the eventual “celebration of gaming” push when Byleth came around.

Smash starts as a Nintendo-focused game, then tries to go into the "Celebration of Gaming History" thing when Third Parties start getting added and they can get more and more people on board...so, during, say, Brawl days, Banjo & Kazooie is considered a fitting, cool, but for now, impossible choice by the Nintendo-focused fanbase, while Master Chief is considered just totally ridiculous at that time, being made fun of as a choice in somewhat popular fan animations (some of which celebrate Geno as a choice, which is...a whole other thing). Smash tries to be both at the same time, and fulfill a long-running request from like 11 to 18 years ago, but it looks weird now that you can get Minecraft, Final Fantasy VII, Persona 5, and sort of Fallout, Undertale, and others together in this game.

This is a long and rambling way to say Smash did get a bit confused on what it was and some roster choices that weren't as odd then (Jigglypuff, Sheik, Ganon as a clone of a racing game character from another series, how Fire Emblem ultimately shook out with too many or not, etc.) or are even odd now at this current time (like, well, Corrin, Banjo, or Min-Min and Pyra/Mythra instead or without the main protagonists) stick around or pile-up. I get the appeal of "Everyone is Here", but I would genuinely prefer something heavily reworked. Even if I am somehow one of the few people who actually finds Banjo & Kazooie fun to play as and haven't really played their games.

"I love democracy"

I know you're kinda stubborn on this, but Banjo & Kazooie were literally by far the most popular requests from Microsoft and were at the top of the ballot with Sora, there was no way anyone besides maybe Steve (cuz its Minecraft) from MS were gonna get in before them lol. Especially when you consider that Halo kinda has the two problems in that it's relatively unpopular in Japan and also due to its Xbox exclusive nature, has literally no presence on Nintendo hardware (not counting skins in Minecraft and Fortnite). Whereas Banjo obviously debuted as a Nintendo IP and was at the very least, a cult classic there (BK1 at least managed to sell 400k on a platform that sold less than the Sega Saturn)

I do think Chief would make for a good third Microsoft character (though now the competition has gotten a bit more fierce after MS's recent acquisitions) in Smash but realistically, there was no way he was gonna get in before Banjo and Steve.