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Arle Nadja, Puyo Popper Extraordinaire pops into Smash Bros.! (New Management!)

Which Puyo protagonist would you prefer for Smash?


  • Total voters
    231

meleebrawler

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Yes, they certainly do cover their bases in terms of dimension-watching. "Frenemies" is probably not a great term, true, but I more just meant them joining the conga line of "We fought each other in our game, now we work together all the time" characters... Puyo Puyo does that a lot.

If it did, I certainly didn't remember them when waking up... I just remember seeing the announcement and a very cute image of her. I assume she'd use fire magic, but it's not like there is a shortage of that in Puyo Puyo already.
If you really think back to all the Puyo Puyo games once Sega started handling the franchise... then it's possible that the concept of the "Will of The Worlds", and by extension Marle, has existed since all the way back the Fever times, or at least when they started introducing the Compile era characters to the Primp dimension and the concept of travel between worlds. Specifically, the way things work that, unless the characters meet and visit regularly, they tend to forget each other (Ally in this game does not remember Arle at all, a textbook example), unless they are powerful like the Dark Prince & Ecolo, and to a lesser extent Ringo who has an unusual (ie. meta) mind. But it is only somewhat recently that this force gained a mind and body of it's own (at least sometime before the first Puyo Tetris), and now it has forged a personal connection with the majority of the cast. Meaning what used to just be an inevitable part of existence in this series now has the capacity to bend or even change the rules of dimensional travel to favor our heroes... or punish them. It's a prospect that is exciting and terrifying in equal measure. Marle created life like it was nothing, to give some perspective on how outrageously powerful she can be.

Not a bad evolution for something that was probably only initially written in to make creating new plots and re-introducing characters easier.
 

amageish

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If you really think back to all the Puyo Puyo games once Sega started handling the franchise... then it's possible that the concept of the "Will of The Worlds", and by extension Marle, has existed since all the way back the Fever times, or at least when they started introducing the Compile era characters to the Primp dimension and the concept of travel between worlds. Specifically, the way things work that, unless the characters meet and visit regularly, they tend to forget each other (Ally in this game does not remember Arle at all, a textbook example), unless they are powerful like the Dark Prince & Ecolo, and to a lesser extent Ringo who has an unusual (ie. meta) mind. But it is only somewhat recently that this force gained a mind and body of it's own (at least sometime before the first Puyo Tetris), and now it has forged a personal connection with the majority of the cast. Meaning what used to just be an inevitable part of existence in this series now has the capacity to bend or even change the rules of dimensional travel to favor our heroes... or punish them. It's a prospect that is exciting and terrifying in equal measure. Marle created life like it was nothing, to give some perspective on how outrageously powerful she can be.

Not a bad evolution for something that was probably only initially written in to make creating new plots and re-introducing characters easier.
Rewatching some key scenes, they do definitely play up the "I've been watching you this entire time" thing quite a few times, so that does seem like their intention, even if I doubt they were expecting to have a "Will of the Worlds" when they first began jumping wordlines. I could see Marle continuing to mess with stuff - I mean, I do find it interesting that when her and Squares talk about how they're going to watch over people and they will meet again, it's mostly to the Puyo half of the cast and before Ringo/Tee have the formula goodbye. Now, as for the power evolution it could bring... uh... yeah, they really gloss over the "Lol, I created life as I was lonely" thing. They, um, definitely are breaking the precedent for the power meter wide open. But, hey, that could provide some interesting new villains who aren't just variants on the heroes, but evil this time (in spite of Marle's name sounding a lot like Arle).

That said, if there is a 30th Anniversary game, then I imagine it'd have to have been made alongside PPT2... so it's hard to say if that game, at least, would have had the ability to build off of PPT2's lore pragmatically, unless they just shared a (very-overworked) writing team...
 
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meleebrawler

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Rewatching some key scenes, they do definitely play up the "I've been watching you this entire time" thing quite a few times, so that does seem like their intention, even if I doubt they were expecting to have a "Will of the Worlds" when they first began jumping wordlines. I could see Marle continuing to mess with stuff - I mean, I do find it interesting that when her and Squares talk about how they're going to watch over people and they will meet again, it's mostly to the Puyo half of the cast and before Ringo/Tee have the formula goodbye. Now, as for the power evolution it could bring... uh... yeah, they really gloss over the "Lol, I created life as I was lonely" thing. They, um, definitely are breaking the precedent for the power meter wide open. But, hey, that could provide some interesting new villains who aren't just variants on the heroes, but evil this time (in spite of Marle's name sounding a lot like Arle).

That said, if there is a 30th Anniversary game, then I imagine it'd have to have been made alongside PPT2... so it's hard to say if that game, at least, would have had the ability to build off of PPT2's lore pragmatically, unless they just shared a (very-overworked) writing team...
Marle is probably too nice to just alter things on a whim, she's more reactionary (and the events she's witnessed have certainly shown her what can happen if she oversteps). But, say, in the event a multidimensional threat were to emerge, she would certainly have no trouble in arranging things to help gather the heroes necessary to combat it... and if one of them were to threaten the balance of the worlds for any reason (hey Ecolo), if a simple mind-wipe isn't enough, nor does she have the heart to erase the offender from existence, she could enact any form of creative punishment or torture she desires.
 

amageish

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Marle is probably too nice to just alter things on a whim, she's more reactionary (and the events she's witnessed have certainly shown her what can happen if she oversteps). But, say, in the event a multidimensional threat were to emerge, she would certainly have no trouble in arranging things to help gather the heroes necessary to combat it... and if one of them were to threaten the balance of the worlds for any reason (hey Ecolo), if a simple mind-wipe isn't enough, nor does she have the heart to erase the offender from existence, she could enact any form of creative punishment or torture she desires.
I definitely could see her inclusion being justified in a "Help me save the universe!" story where she actively brings worlds together as a sort of inter-dimensional Puyo Nick Fury forming the Avengers to stop the big bad.

And oh goodness, Marle definitely could deliver some cute horror if she got angry... I definitely wouldn't want to piss her off.

I main you Marle! I'm having fun! Please don't change my state of existence!

Also... I want to talk PPT2 future roster stuff, so here's another spoiler tab because of datamines.

So, we've got 12 characters datamined... which is already a lot and more then I expected in total.

In spite of this, I'm wondering if there is more? As it is kind of surprising to me that the characters are not only datamineable, but modders have been able to make them run (before having their videos removed by Sega ninja lawyers). On-disk DLC is common for games that are using updates to try and keep their audience engaged, like Splatoon and Mario Tennis Aces, but they usually don't have all of the updates on-disk? And basically finished?

So, I wonder if we're getting even more... somehow. In particular, I'm wondering about the Quest OCs who appeared in Champions, as they aren't in this datamine despite having reusable art/voices...
 

Schonberg

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I’m a bit of a stranger to the Puyo series, but I love it’s design and gameplay when I started trying it out. A classic puzzle series in an underrepped genre with a ton of history, of course I’d be on board with that!

However, I popped into this thread because I was playing PPT and started thinking about movesets. While I’m definitely not about to write a whole moveset on a character and series I don’t know a ton about, I got to thinking about mechanics already in the game.

Specifically, how Steve already made a grid overlay on EVERY stage that allows for block placement.

Well, that was a massive undertaking in every sense of the word for one character, and while yes, Minecraft is big enough to warrant that kind of effort... what if they wanted to get more bang for their buck and utilize the grid for another character too?

Something something placing Puyos around the stage that slowly drop along the grid squares and set up chain pops that explode and deal damage.
 

meleebrawler

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I’m a bit of a stranger to the Puyo series, but I love it’s design and gameplay when I started trying it out. A classic puzzle series in an underrepped genre with a ton of history, of course I’d be on board with that!

However, I popped into this thread because I was playing PPT and started thinking about movesets. While I’m definitely not about to write a whole moveset on a character and series I don’t know a ton about, I got to thinking about mechanics already in the game.

Specifically, how Steve already made a grid overlay on EVERY stage that allows for block placement.

Well, that was a massive undertaking in every sense of the word for one character, and while yes, Minecraft is big enough to warrant that kind of effort... what if they wanted to get more bang for their buck and utilize the grid for another character too?

Something something placing Puyos around the stage that slowly drop along the grid squares and set up chain pops that explode and deal damage.
Asking fighting game players to spontaneously learn how to set up Puyo chains is probably too much to ask. In-universe the act of popping is not what causes damage, but it fuels attack power, usually in the form of magic, or by raining garbage puyo. It would be easier and simpler to have a board with preset configurations for chains pop up on demand to power up your moves.
 

Schonberg

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Asking fighting game players to spontaneously learn how to set up Puyo chains is probably too much to ask. In-universe the act of popping is not what causes damage, but it fuels attack power, usually in the form of magic, or by raining garbage puyo. It would be easier and simpler to have a board with preset configurations for chains pop up on demand to power up your moves.
Well, it’s not like gameplay has to be 1 to 1 when translating a character (Gyromites weren't projectiles, Mario’s cape can’t reflect projectiles, the Monado can’t damage non-mechanical enemies, etc), but even if they didn’t do damage the idea of it using the same grid programming to set up simple chains that would power you up is still possible.

As to asking players to learn things like Puyo chains... well, you have plenty of characters with non traditional playstyles that are tougher to learn. Resource management characters like Steve; Min Min and the quirks of her basic attack, side smash. two specials, and two aerials being almost the same move; fighting game input characters like Terry sneaking pretzel motions into a smash... Sometimes a higher learning curve is acceptable for an interesting playstyle.

And that’s just if they wanted to use this purely hypothetical basis of a Moveset. They could do a completely standard moveset that has nothing to do with placing Puyos and just have Arle smack people in the face with a garbage Puyo and we’d have to accept that.
 
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amageish

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Smash Bros has liked its weird movesets lately, so I honestly think anything would be possible...

That said, the "simplest" way to have actual Puyo-popping gameplay would probably be to have something like the Big Bang mode from PPT where you just have to properly place a puyo to set-off a combo they already set you up for in some sort of box sub-menu, thereby boosting your powers...

Puyos all over the stage would be impressive and... can't be denied as possible, at least. I believe SourceGaming's moveset was based on placing Puyo physically on the stage and popping them through attacks to boost your power.
 

YopAlonso

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Smash Bros has liked its weird movesets lately, so I honestly think anything would be possible...

That said, the "simplest" way to have actual Puyo-popping gameplay would probably be to have something like the Big Bang mode from PPT where you just have to properly place a puyo to set-off a combo they already set you up for in some sort of box sub-menu, thereby boosting your powers...

Puyos all over the stage would be impressive and... can't be denied as possible, at least. I believe SourceGaming's moveset was based on placing Puyo physically on the stage and popping them through attacks to boost your power.
I'm more on the fence about replicating the mechanic of Puyo and more on board on referencing her actual attacks throughout the series. After all, her history encompasses more than just popping colored jelly for nearly 30 years straight, going as back as 1989 with the Sorcery Saga series, and even starring in smaller spin-offs like Nazo Puyo, or Arle's Adventure: Magical Jewels. Her gimmick could revolve around what Puyo is most known for, which is chaining: the longer the chain, the stronger your attacks become.
 

meleebrawler

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Smash Bros has liked its weird movesets lately, so I honestly think anything would be possible...

That said, the "simplest" way to have actual Puyo-popping gameplay would probably be to have something like the Big Bang mode from PPT where you just have to properly place a puyo to set-off a combo they already set you up for in some sort of box sub-menu, thereby boosting your powers...

Puyos all over the stage would be impressive and... can't be denied as possible, at least. I believe SourceGaming's moveset was based on placing Puyo physically on the stage and popping them through attacks to boost your power.
Dropping Puyos may be tied to the stage itself instead of the character.
 

Ridrool64

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I actually think attempting to put Puyo into Smash in a literal sense would be an extremely bad idea. It overcomplicates her, makes playing as Arle unless you're a dedicated main a massive chore/extremely unreasonable, and would stifle the ease of access. It also makes for something brutally difficult to balance: one wrong step, and Arle is either better or worse than everybody else by a significant degree. I think she should be a character who would be better in the hands of experts than newbies, but anything involving placing Puyo for an attack is something I generally don't vibe with.

Just take the core mechanics and idea (like chaining, All Clears, and the offense/defense mix) and there you go. For attacks that reference stuff you do, she has a long list of magical spells that appear often in the Puyo games, let alone the stuff she can do in Sorcery Saga. At least, that's my take. And I dunno which route Sakurai would take, but I definitely think trying to incorporate a Puyo drop move, for instance, would be an overall risky task.

Besides, Puyo are a very obvious stage hazard for whatever Arle comes with. I think that would suit them even better.
 

amageish

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I'm more on the fence about replicating the mechanic of Puyo and more on board on referencing her actual attacks throughout the series. After all, her history encompasses more than just popping colored jelly for nearly 30 years straight, going as back as 1989 with the Sorcery Saga series, and even starring in smaller spin-offs like Nazo Puyo, or Arle's Adventure: Magical Jewels. Her gimmick could revolve around what Puyo is most known for, which is chaining: the longer the chain, the stronger your attacks become.
That is all true and some sort of indirect/more-fighting-game-y way of representing chaining would be great too. That said, I would want her to somehow feel puzzley... I mean, we haven't had a pure JRPG sorceress and that is a kit I would love to see in general, but I think it'd be a bit primarily highlight her dungeon-crawling roots?

Granted, we just got a JRPG character based primarily off of their appearance in a different fighting game, so... who knows what they'd draw from haha.

Dropping Puyos may be tied to the stage itself instead of the character.
Puyos as stage hazards does sound obligatory, but it's not like Steve isn't already placing blocks when his stage also contains destructible blocks. Not that I exactly love the idea of physically placing Puyos on the stage either.
 

Louie G.

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Honestly, I'd be pretty shocked if Arle got in and didn't implement the series' namesake into her moveset at all. Fact of the matter is, even though Arle's spells would help supplement her moveset, creating a moveset that celebrates Puyo to the best of its ability would have to represent the gooey little guys. I understand where you guys are coming from, but I don't think it needs to be as elaborate as literally letting you play Puyo onstage.

Like for example, Garbage / Nusiance Puyo. I've thought of a lot of ways this can be incorporated, be it a means of stage control and dropping a heavy, disruptive projectile to just sit onstage or simply an attack like Villager's bowling ball... probably a bit of both, but there are definitely fun ways to have Arle drop Puyo onto the stage that don't involve the actual process of "Puyo, but in Smash". Even though at this rate I wouldn't even be surprised if Sakurai went that far.

At its simplest, Puyo can just be a set range projectile (not unlike say, Explosive Flame) that drops a Puyo right on your opponent's head. Nothing crazy but at least in my eyes, Puyo themselves have to be in Arle's moveset somewhere for it to feel like a proper representation of the series. Her magic spells and, ideally, Carbuncle lasers could make up a lot of her kit but would not be without its most iconic element.

Because the way I see it Arle is not only representing herself, but serves to reflect what Puyo is all about, and is effectively carrying the puzzle game genre on her back at that. Dropping some funny looking blobs / tiles is key to conveying that this is in fact a puzzle game character. That's a big part of what makes her special.
 
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Peripuff

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I can imagine some sort of Puyo mechanic that is more similar to how Big Bang operates, but, as much as I wish we could just build a board from scratch in Smash, that would definitely be too complicated. I’m sure Sakurai could come up with something but I feel as though Arle would and should largely be a setup character, because that is how Puyo gameplay works. There are countless possibilities as to what form that could take but I can’t imagine her solely being a magic based character or anything without utilizing the core of Puyo gameplay at all in this manner.
 

Munchi

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I kinda liked the idea that the guy who made the rivals moveset did, where puyos are her aerials while also impacting her specials. Something along those lines is what I'm hoping for.
Could you put the link to see that moveset? I'm curious.
 

Munchi

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Joker and Byleth's trailers both feature Cassandra Lee Morris voicing an NPC character.
Think Arle could be the third with Ringo?
If Ringo appears I suppose that although for some reason I have always imagined her trailer having some kind of rivalry with Dr Mario
 

Mushroomguy12

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First free update delivery!

\ Additional characters /

Liddell

Mr. Accor

Fish prince

"Sonic" is specially released from the Sonic series! New mode "Boss Battle with Everyone", BGM, and My Icon have also been added! Stay tuned for the next update ♪ http://puyo.sega.jp/puyopuyotetris2/

 

meleebrawler

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First free update delivery!

\ Additional characters /

Liddell

Mr. Accor

Fish prince

"Sonic" is specially released from the Sonic series! New mode "Boss Battle with Everyone", BGM, and My Icon have also been added! Stay tuned for the next update ♪ http://puyo.sega.jp/puyopuyotetris2/

...That's a lot more characters than the datamines suggested. Makes me wonder if it's because of mini story arcs they'll be getting.
 

Neosonic97

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Gotta admit, of all the characters they could've been, I didn't see that fourth one coming. I might actually have to get a new PFP now because that image for Sonic looks good.

I know he's already been in the series via Quest, but hey.
 
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Sari

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Arle is currently being rated in the RTC thread (along with Lloyd and Rayman):


Make sure to follow the rules on the front page (specifically with giving each character at least two sentences for both chance and want) for your ratings to count.
 

amageish

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...That's a lot more characters than the datamines suggested. Makes me wonder if it's because of mini story arcs they'll be getting.
Is it? I mean, they're all characters from the datamine... I'm glad they're doing them all at once as opposed to, like, one a month though...

Weirdly, the English Puyo account still hasn't posted a trailer for this update, in spite of it being out already.

But you know who has been teasing something...

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Do you think SEGA is still unaware of the fact that we know how to read Japanese news updates that tomorrow they will "reveal" an update that is already out?
 

Golden Icarus

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Alright after lurking on this thread for the past few days, I think I'm sold on Arle.

I was introduced to Puyo Puyo with Sonic Mega Collection, where this was my favorite game on the entire collection:
Yeah this was genuinely one of my most played games as a kid.

I've always been a huge fan of puzzle games like Dr. Mario and Tetris, so getting more characters to represent that genre sounds great to me! The reason I never understood the Arle hype was because I didn't really feel that the characters in the game really mattered. When I played through Puyo Puyo Tetris, I skipped every cutscene and never learned a thing about any of the characters.

But after learning more about Arle and seeing all of the support, fanart, and moveset proposals I've really warmed up to the idea. I'd love to see Arle in Smash! Count me in as a supporter!
 

Adrianette Bromide

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Steve has set the precent of placing down physical objects on the battlefield and I've been amused of the thought of a high level Arle player needing to both pay attention to their Smash game while also placing down Puyos and initiating chains at the same time. Maybe when you perform a chain, some damage is dealt to the opponent via garbage and the longer the chain is the more powerful the garbage attack is.

Imagine trying to recover offstage but getting gimped by an Arle main without her even getting close haha.
 

smashkirby

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Alright after lurking on this thread for the past few days, I think I'm sold on Arle.

I was introduced to Puyo Puyo with Sonic Mega Collection, where this was my favorite game on the entire collection:
Yeah this was genuinely one of my most played games as a kid.

I've always been a huge fan of puzzle games like Dr. Mario and Tetris, so getting more characters to represent that genre sounds great to me! The reason I never understood the Arle hype was because I didn't really feel that the characters in the game really mattered. When I played through Puyo Puyo Tetris, I skipped every cutscene and never learned a thing about any of the characters.

But after learning more about Arle and seeing all of the support, fanart, and moveset proposals I've really warmed up to the idea. I'd love to see Arle in Smash! Count me in as a supporter!
And you're officially a member of the Puyo-popping experience, Golden Icarus Golden Icarus ! Congrats!
 

Captain Shwampy

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3D Dillon

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This is the week when Puy Day 2021 takes place, yet still no Puyo Puyo content in SSBU. No Puyo Spirit Event, nothing.
 

Dr. Jojo Phantasma

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You know, I have been wanting a Monokuma deluxe Mii outfit. It would be cool if one gets paired with Arle if she is playable. :p
 

Sari

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The fact that Puyo Puyo is getting a collab event with Danganronpa should hopefully shut down the argument that Sega wouldn't want Arle in Smash because it'd be too violent/inappropriate for her (which I sometimes still see people say because of that one old article about a Puyo Puyo fighting game).
 

Mushroomguy12

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Translated:

Congratulations on the 30th anniversary of Puyo Day! When I first started entering Puyo 7, I didn't think it would be so swampy. However, if I noticed that I was collecting goods and going to an anime goods store, I could find the word "Puyo" somewhere in my heart. I'm still addicted to searching for it. I will continue to support you!

 
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