Challenger Pack 11: A Retrospective On Final Characters

[GolisoPower]

With the odd single reveal at E3 this year with Kazuya Mishima from the Tekken series, we only have one final character in this entire run of DLC. Who it is we don't know, but we could probably narrow it down by looking at the previous entries' final characters:

Super Smash Bros. (Nintendo 64):
The game that started it all, Smash had 4 characters to unlock. Curiously, while Jigglypuff was by far the easiest character to unlock (Complete Classic Mode at any difficulty), she's listed as the final character going by Fighter Numbers, as she's #12. If we're going by unlocking difficulty, it was Ness who was normally the final character to unlock, which required Classic Mode at normal or higher without any continues.

Super Smash Bros. Melee:
The game people seem to think to be crafted by the Lord and Savior himself, Super Smash Bros. Melee had more characters and more unlockables than its predecessor. Going by fighter numbers, ITS final character was Mr. Game and Watch, who kicked off the tradition of extremely unorthodox characters. Game & Watch was by and far the most difficult character to unlock, and for good reason: you needed to either beat Classic Mode, Adventure Mode, and Target Mode with all 24 characters, or fight 1000 battles. That sure takes a lot of time.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl:
The game perceived by many as the worst competitive Smash game in the franchise, Brawl was the first in the series to shave characters from its roster, and the first to unlock characters through a Story Mode. Brawl's final character to unlock is Wolf O'Donnell, who required playing 400 matches, clearing Boss Battles with Fox or Falco, or defeating him in a secret room in the Ruins in Subspace Emissary.

Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U Base Game:
The game where I was invested enough to share laughs, joy, and sorrows with everyone here, Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS, which we'll call Smash 4 from now on, is the first game to have DLC. For this, we'll split this game in two: Base Game, and DLC. For Smash 4's Base Game, the last newcomer we ever received was Duck Hunt, which not a lot of people were a fan of at first, mainly because that dog was a symbol of Schadenfreude for a lot of 80's Nintendo gamers. Duck Hunt was unlocked by either clearing Classic Mode with 8 or more characters or fight 110 battles in the 3DS version, or and beat Classic Mode at 2.0 or higher with 5 or more characters, or fight 90 battles in the Wii U version. Duck Hunt, as mentioned before, was considered underwhelming at first, but what carried him was a moveset that embodied the entirety of games that used the NES Zapper.

Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U DLC:
Now for this, people like to focus on Corrin, whose franchise caused countless triggered fans to shriek out to the heavens above. But the actual final character in this DLC run was Bayonetta, who not only became infamous for being the literal embodiment of ladder characters and being attributed to that one Smash tourney where people walked out during the finals but also because she got in because of the one room-splitting factor that even to this day seems to be debated: the Smash Fighter Ballot. While today it seems evident that the ballot was mainly for Ultimate and not for Smash 4, at the time people considered it controversial, some claiming that it was rigged in her favor while others claimed it was a fair vote. Ultimately, however, Bayonetta was the one that got in. What happened, happened.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Base Game:
This one here was very interesting: by technicality, Incineroar should be the final character for Base Game, but considering various hints surrounding the character after him, Piranha Plant was supposed to be the final character in the base game. The character looked very much complete and was considered a bonus character first-attained as an early-purchase bonus character, who would then become purchasable some time afterward. But if we're going for the actual launch, Incineroar was the final character due to being the most recent character to actually make it into the final package.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Fighters Pass 1:
We all know who it is. Byleth was the final fighter in Pass 1 and debuted to mostly great vengeance and furious anger. Though, in comparison to Corrin, the backlash was much more subdued thanks to the fact that Three Houses was considered one of the greatest entries to date, even winning an award at the 2019 Game Awards, and due to that fact that even more DLC was coming.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

This leads us to today. We have only one character left to be revealed, and it's still up in the air for who or what it could be. I personally believe that, in between the two Passes, it would be a sort of mirror parallel to Smash 4. That game's DLC ended with the final characters being Corrin and Bayonetta. The FE character and the low-profile 3rd party. We already got our FE character in the form of Byleth, which leads us to Fighters Pass 2 possibly ending with our low-profile 3rd party. On the other hand, we still don't know who or what our final fighter will be.

It's been ages, but we're about to begin our home stretch once Kazuya releases.

 

[Sean Wheeler]

Whoever the final character is, it's probably not any of the highly speculated characters.

 

[Gorgonzales]

Whoever the final character is, it's probably not any of the highly speculated characters.

This. I know it'll probably be a character people don't really ask for like Rillaboom or another Pokemon, but deep down I'm hoping it's a more out-there pick like Cranky Kong who still technically fits that criteria but is a solid addition in their own right.

 

[Sean Wheeler]

I highly doubt it would be a Pokémon either. Those are too heavily speculated. It's probably something nobody has thought of. I can't even say a name without hurting that character's chances of getting in.

 

[Perkilator]

Whoever it is, I can guaruntee one thing: salt. Lots and lots of salt.

 

[Handy Man]

I’m pretty surprised that Capcom still has no DLC characters in Ultimate, I wouldn’t be surprised if CP11 was a character like Phoenix Wright, Dante, or Chun-Li.

 

[MattX20]

My personal opinion regarding FP11 is the character will likely be from a new IP that never had a playable character in Ultimate before. When you look at the music test menu, there are currently 2 empty spots in there (one of which will be filled by Kazuya and Tekken's inclusion). When taking that into account, the implication either is from an IP already in Ultimate that never had a playable rep before or a brand new IP altogether. And if we go by low-key 1st party or 3rd party candidates, Shantae, Phoenix Wright, Professor Layton, and Ayumi Tachibana fall into this category.

 

[Gorgonzales]

My personal opinion regarding FP11 is the character will likely be from a new IP that never had a playable character in Ultimate before. When you look at the music test menu, there are currently 2 empty spots in there (one of which will be filled by Kazuya and Tekken's inclusion). When taking that into account, the implication either is from an IP already in Ultimate that never had a playable rep before or a brand new IP altogether. And if we go by low-key 1st party or 3rd party candidates, Shantae, Phoenix Wright, Professor Layton, and Ayumi Tachibana fall into this category.

I doubt something as insignificant as an empty space in the music test menu could be used as evidence that a character from a new IP is joining Smash.

Also

 

[MattX20]

I doubt something as insignificant as an empty space in the music test menu could be used as evidence that a character from a new IP is joining Smash.

Also

View attachment 320262

Smash tends to be better organized than that. Until the reveal proves otherwise, don't toss it in the trash. It's not good speculation to throw potential points out

 

[Guynamednelson]

Smash tends to be better organized than that. Until the reveal proves otherwise, don't toss it in the trash. It's not good speculation to throw potential points out

You have to delete all your Miis in order for the Smash 4 CSS to be a perfect rectangle after buying all the DLC, and the stage select screen will still have gaps after FP2 is complete.

 

[Starry.]

I just hope that the final character is surprising and exciting! I'd find it underwhelming, personally, if the final character was someone that had been heavily speculated and expected. Not to say that it wouldn't be cool for everyone that wanted those characters in but I just really like surprises!

 

[Rie Sonomura]

My personal opinion regarding FP11 is the character will likely be from a new IP that never had a playable character in Ultimate before. When you look at the music test menu, there are currently 2 empty spots in there (one of which will be filled by Kazuya and Tekken's inclusion). When taking that into account, the implication either is from an IP already in Ultimate that never had a playable rep before or a brand new IP altogether. And if we go by low-key 1st party or 3rd party candidates, Shantae, Phoenix Wright, Professor Layton, and Ayumi Tachibana fall into this category.

Would Octoling count as a low key 1st party?

 

[GolisoPower]

Would Octoling count as a low key 1st party?

On that, I'm not exactly sure. On the one hand, Splatoon's a breakout megatitan getting a 3rd game, but on the other hand, Octoling does seem to be glossed over as far as Smash speculation goes. And we do have Min Min, Pyra and Mythra, so I'd say don't overlook them just yet.

 

[MattX20]

Would Octoling count as a low key 1st party?

No, Splatoon is not really low-key. Ayumi Tachibana from the Famicom Detective Club would be more along the lines of low-key, that or Rhythm Heaven since there hasn't been a new game in quite some time.

 

[pupNapoleon]

With the odd single reveal at E3 this year with Kazuya Mishima from the Tekken series, we only have one final character in this entire run of DLC. Who it is we don't know, but we could probably narrow it down by looking at the previous entries' final characters:

Super Smash Bros. (Nintendo 64):
The game that started it all, Smash had 4 characters to unlock. Curiously, while Jigglypuff was by far the easiest character to unlock (Complete Classic Mode at any difficulty), she's listed as the final character going by Fighter Numbers, as she's #12. If we're going by unlocking difficulty, it was Ness who was normally the final character to unlock, which required Classic Mode at normal or higher without any continues.

Super Smash Bros. Melee:
The game people seem to think to be crafted by the Lord and Savior himself, Super Smash Bros. Melee had more characters and more unlockables than its predecessor. Going by fighter numbers, ITS final character was Mr. Game and Watch, who kicked off the tradition of extremely unorthodox characters. Game & Watch was by and far the most difficult character to unlock, and for good reason: you needed to either beat Classic Mode, Adventure Mode, and Target Mode with all 24 characters, or fight 1000 battles. That sure takes a lot of time.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl:
The game perceived by many as the worst competitive Smash game in the franchise, Brawl was the first in the series to shave characters from its roster, and the first to unlock characters through a Story Mode. Brawl's final character to unlock is Wolf O'Donnell, who required playing 400 matches, clearing Boss Battles with Fox or Falco, or defeating him in a secret room in the Ruins in Subspace Emissary.

Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U Base Game:
The game where I was invested enough to share laughs, joy, and sorrows with everyone here, Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS, which we'll call Smash 4 from now on, is the first game to have DLC. For this, we'll split this game in two: Base Game, and DLC. For Smash 4's Base Game, the last newcomer we ever received was Duck Hunt, which not a lot of people were a fan of at first, mainly because that dog was a symbol of Schadenfreude for a lot of 80's Nintendo gamers. Duck Hunt was unlocked by either clearing Classic Mode with 8 or more characters or fight 110 battles in the 3DS version, or and beat Classic Mode at 2.0 or higher with 5 or more characters, or fight 90 battles in the Wii U version. Duck Hunt, as mentioned before, was considered underwhelming at first, but what carried him was a moveset that embodied the entirety of games that used the NES Zapper.

Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U DLC:
Now for this, people like to focus on Corrin, whose franchise caused countless triggered fans to shriek out to the heavens above. But the actual final character in this DLC run was Bayonetta, who not only became infamous for being the literal embodiment of ladder characters and being attributed to that one Smash tourney where people walked out during the finals but also because she got in because of the one room-splitting factor that even to this day seems to be debated: the Smash Fighter Ballot. While today it seems evident that the ballot was mainly for Ultimate and not for Smash 4, at the time people considered it controversial, some claiming that it was rigged in her favor while others claimed it was a fair vote. Ultimately, however, Bayonetta was the one that got in. What happened, happened.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Base Game:
This one here was very interesting: by technicality, Incineroar should be the final character for Base Game, but considering various hints surrounding the character after him, Piranha Plant was supposed to be the final character in the base game. The character looked very much complete and was considered a bonus character first-attained as an early-purchase bonus character, who would then become purchasable some time afterward. But if we're going for the actual launch, Incineroar was the final character due to being the most recent character to actually make it into the final package.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Fighters Pass 1:
We all know who it is. Byleth was the final fighter in Pass 1 and debuted to mostly great vengeance and furious anger. Though, in comparison to Corrin, the backlash was much more subdued thanks to the fact that Three Houses was considered one of the greatest entries to date, even winning an award at the 2019 Game Awards, and due to that fact that even more DLC was coming.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

This leads us to today. We have only one character left to be revealed, and it's still up in the air for who or what it could be. I personally believe that, in between the two Passes, it would be a sort of mirror parallel to Smash 4. That game's DLC ended with the final characters being Corrin and Bayonetta. The FE character and the low-profile 3rd party. We already got our FE character in the form of Byleth, which leads us to Fighters Pass 2 possibly ending with our low-profile 3rd party. On the other hand, we still don't know who or what our final fighter will be.

It's been ages, but we're about to begin our home stretch once Kazuya releases.

Interesting concept- but I think there are some statements here that aren't parallel.
If we are going by last character, it is not accurate to refer to characters based on another character- aka, echo characters. Jigglypuff was considered one in the first game, Toon Link and ROB both were in the third game. If we are going off of the last characters, then it would be:
64- Ness (Falcon and Jigglypuff were both based on prior models)
Melee- Mr. Game and Watch
Brawl- R.O.B (Toon Link and Wolf are both based on prior characters)
Sm4sh- Duck Hunt
-DLC- Bayonetta
Ultimate- Incineroar
Pack 1- Byleth

The other, more difficult point we have to consider, is that many of these characters were not intended to be the final characters. You mentioned this with Incineroar, that Piranha Plant seems to have been intended to be the final fighter. However, we know with great confidence that other games absolutely had characters cut who didn't quite make it- Bowser in 64, Dixie in Brawl... we don't actually know who was supposed to be the last fighter in most cases. Do to this, looking at intended final characters is nearly obsoleted, except for the two rounds of DLC we have gotten from Sm4sh and Ultimate Pass 1.


All of this considered, I think the next character is going to either be:

• Dixie
• Dragaux (which is actually where I'm leaning, because all the Nintendo characters in DLC have been from current gen games- Ring Fit made a HUGE mark on this).
• A cartoony third party (Rayman, Crash, Frogger)

 

[DrifloonEmpire]

A low-key rising star first party that a lot of people are sleeping on:

 

[Minik]

Gonna pray for rhythm heaven as both a lowkey 1st party pick (it was the last series in the logos of smash 4 data mining) and as a scrapped idea. It's also the 15th anniversary this year if wanna have an excuse to celebrate it years after it having a game.

 

[Gorgonzales]

A low-key rising star first party that a lot of people are sleeping on:

View attachment 320278

As much as I love Pikmin and want Louie to be playable, I'm not holding my breath. It'd be cool tho

 

[DrifloonEmpire]

As much as I love Pikmin and want Louie to be playable, I'm not holding my breath. It'd be cool tho

Neither am I, but at the same time people don't give him enough credit! He's a possibility!

 

[Phoenix Douchebag]

I’m pretty surprised that Capcom still has no DLC characters in Ultimate, I wouldn’t be surprised if CP11 was a character like Phoenix Wright, Dante, or Chun-Li.

Im actually thinking of another character from Capcom:

Mega Man Zero.

-Zero in general is a really popular character in gaming, appearing in almost anything Mega Man related, mostly as a playable character, and was playable once in his MMZ state in SVC Chaos. (which was actually his first Fighting Game appereance, he would later be a Capcom Crossover regular)
-He technically doesn't have to worry about being an AT and Mii Costume, since MMZ Zero and MMX Zero are usually treated as separate entities (IE: MMXDive has both playable) and Mega Man Zero is just a spirit, so they can bring him with the GBA design.
-There's more than enough MMZero content to bring: Spirits like Ciel, the Four Guardians, and Copy X are example of spirits he could bring, and maybe he could bring more Mega Man content in general, as most series outside of the Classic saga are scarce (characters like Iris, Alia and Vile from the MMX series are all absent, plus the music in Smash is almost all classic, and the only MMZ song is a remix of a MMX1 song)
-Zero's playstyle would be easy to figure out due to his sidescrolling nature, so he probably would not suffer from development hurdles that took a toll on Steve and a Tekken character.
-The series is over, but it came back to relevance thanks to it being re-released on Modern Platforms for the first time since the DS.

The other one i was thinking was a RE character, since post release content is no longer a death sentence, they might as well just put a RE protag that isn't a spirit (Claire)

 

[Inferno7]

Capcom is indeed the third party frontrunner alongside Sega atm (since the spirit event likely means nothing). My guess is a Resident Evil character, since it flew straight under people's radar akin to Tekken, due to very similar circumstances while also having similar merits. Not to mention all 3rd party franchises in FP2 have been bigger than those in FP1 (bar maybe DQ but FF is certainly bigger).
My pipedream would be either Dante or Zero but none of them are happening at this point, especially the latter.

Speaking about Zero though, it's either MMX or bust. It would be dumb if Nintendo gatekeeped themselves from bringing in his coolest and most iconic design just because he has a role as a glorified snow globe, meanwhile Chrom is chilling in the back while having 3 roles at once.

 

[Michael the Spikester]

Expecting a 1st party character or low-to-mid-tier 3rd party character.

 

[pupNapoleon]

Im actually thinking of another character from Capcom:

Mega Man Zero.

-Zero in general is a really popular character in gaming, appearing in almost anything Mega Man related, mostly as a playable character, and was playable once in his MMZ state in SVC Chaos. (which was actually his first Fighting Game appereance, he would later be a Capcom Crossover regular)
-He technically doesn't have to worry about being an AT and Mii Costume, since MMZ Zero and MMX Zero are usually treated as separate entities (IE: MMXDive has both playable) and Mega Man Zero is just a spirit, so they can bring him with the GBA design.
-There's more than enough MMZero content to bring: Spirits like Ciel, the Four Guardians, and Copy X are example of spirits he could bring, and maybe he could bring more Mega Man content in general, as most series outside of the Classic saga are scarce (characters like Iris, Alia and Vile from the MMX series are all absent, plus the music in Smash is almost all classic, and the only MMZ song is a remix of a MMX1 song)
-Zero's playstyle would be easy to figure out due to his sidescrolling nature, so he probably would not suffer from development hurdles that took a toll on Steve and a Tekken character.
-The series is over, but it came back to relevance thanks to it being re-released on Modern Platforms for the first time since the DS.

The other one i was thinking was a RE character, since post release content is no longer a death sentence, they might as well just put a RE protag that isn't a spirit (Claire)

Jeez... I would love Zero or Protoman, but another Megaman, no matter how different, would definitely disappoint. So it seems likely.

Speaking about Zero though, it's either MMX or bust. It would be dumb if Nintendo gatekeeped themselves from bringing in his coolest and most iconic design just because he has a role as a glorified snow globe, meanwhile Chrom is chilling in the back while having 3 roles at once.

TBF, Fire Emblem plays by its own rules in almost all other aspects.

Gonna pray for rhythm heaven as both a lowkey 1st party pick (it was the last series in the logos of smash 4 data mining) and as a scrapped idea. It's also the 15th anniversary this year if wanna have an excuse to celebrate it years after it having a game.

I don't see it happening, since the Nintendo picks for DLC (not including potential basegame PP) seem to be all Switch characters- I'd like it, but I think Dragaux would come first.

 

[QQS]

I do expect a fan favorite as #82 like Geno, Sora, Crash, Rayman, Isaac, a Zelda rep or a Sonic rep.

I even believe in a Bonus Fighter or a Mini Bonus Pass of 2 or 3 characters, probably First Party only. Here Dixie, Bandana, Porky or Waluigi. If there’s only one Bonus, it could be like “this is free for the people who bought both FP; and after a while it’s paid”, probably for Waluigi.

I can’t conceive no Crash, Rayman or Geno in this game, due to how iconic or how demanded they are. Though, I can’t complain also, this game is already perfect, even just with base-game.

Thanks Sakurai!

 

[Gorgonzales]

I do expect a fan favorite as #82 like Geno, Sora, Crash, Rayman, Isaac, a Zelda rep or a Sonic rep.

I even believe in a Bonus Fighter or a Mini Bonus Pass of 2 or 3 characters, probably First Party only. Here Dixie, Bandana, Porky or Waluigi. If there’s only one Bonus, it could be like “this is free for the people who bought both FP; and after a while it’s paid”, probably for Waluigi.

I can’t conceive no Crash, Rayman or Geno in this game, due to how iconic or how demanded they are. Though, I can’t complain also, this game is already perfect, even just with base-game.

Thanks Sakurai!

I haven't really seen a take this optimistic regarding the last character of FP2. It's a nice change of pace.

Even though I expect someone lame to be revealed due to past precedent, I haven't really considered the last fighter being someone highly requested to end the game on a bang. It's unlikely, but it could happen. If it does happen, I'll be pleasantly surprised.

 

[pupNapoleon]

I do expect a fan favorite as #82 like Geno, Sora, Crash, Rayman, Isaac, a Zelda rep or a Sonic rep.

I even believe in a Bonus Fighter or a Mini Bonus Pass of 2 or 3 characters, probably First Party only. Here Dixie, Bandana, Porky or Waluigi. If there’s only one Bonus, it could be like “this is free for the people who bought both FP; and after a while it’s paid”, probably for Waluigi.

I can’t conceive no Crash, Rayman or Geno in this game, due to how iconic or how demanded they are. Though, I can’t complain also, this game is already perfect, even just with base-game.

Thanks Sakurai!

Given your avatar, I don't feel there is a realistic understanding of Geno. I don't mean to call names (because Geno is on my list, though excessively far down), but it is one example where outside audiences don't know him at all, and it is just continually put forward in Smash, at least half of whom having a negative connotation to him.

I do hope that our last character is a cartoony character. I actually think, if not Crash or Rayman, that the best third party character option would be Frogger. I know I have said it a lot, but that legend could be a truly unique player, known far beyond the gaming community. There aren't many characters left that are known to the greater masses of people.

 

[RileyXY1]

Jeez... I would love Zero or Protoman, but another Megaman, no matter how different, would definitely disappoint. So it seems likely.

TBF, Fire Emblem plays by its own rules in almost all other aspects.


I don't see it happening, since the Nintendo picks for DLC (not including potential basegame PP) seem to be all Switch characters- I'd like it, but I think Dragaux would come first.

That seems to be correct. Nearly all DLC characters so far have a presence on the Switch in some form outside of Smash, whether it be a new title, a port, a remake, or a spinoff. Banjo & Kazooie are the only Smash Ultimate DLC characters who so far have no presence on the Switch whatsoever outside of Smash.

 

[Minik]

I don't see it happening, since the Nintendo picks for DLC (not including potential basegame PP) seem to be all Switch characters- I'd like it, but I think Dragaux would come first.

Fair on the switch side of things, but I don't feel like Nintendo was super strict on the franchises chosen, xenoblade 2 didnt really have anything happen alongside it so it didnt feel like nintendo making sakurai promote it. And I'd love ring fit to get in but I think its too new for this planned dlc and outside of that, there aren't really any nintendo switch franchises to choose from.

 

[pupNapoleon]

Fair on the switch side of things, but I don't feel like Nintendo was super strict on the franchises chosen, xenoblade 2 didnt really have anything happen alongside it so it didnt feel like nintendo making sakurai promote it. And I'd love ring fit to get in but I think its too new for this planned dlc and outside of that, there aren't really any nintendo switch franchises to choose from.

There really aren't any Switch era games, I agree. We have some big games (and Odyssey, BotW, both, were left behind). ARMS and Ring Fit were the two big games of this new console so far (other than continuations of the series). I stand by how much more sense a Pokemon would have made than several of the chosen picks, though I'm not convinced we aren't about to get one. For me, if it isn't Rillaboom, Eevee, or Meowth/Team Rocket, I do expect to be disappointed.

 

[Phoenix Douchebag]

Jeez... I would love Zero or Protoman, but another Megaman, no matter how different, would definitely disappoint. So it seems likely.

I love how most people agree that if a character is a dissapointment to a large majority, it makes them likelier.

(Although Zero would be the only FP2 character i would buy, so i see him as super unlikely for that reason alone)

 

[pupNapoleon]

I love how most people agree that if a character is a dissapointment to a large majority, it makes them likelier.

(Although Zero would be the only FP2 character i would buy, so i see him as super unlikely for that reason alone)

Conditioning.
I don't actually feel I'm that hard to please- the only real let down was Byleth.
I would have preferred other characters- but I would like every one except Byleth if we did not have a limited set.

I'm team #MonsterHunterReplacement on the conspiracy of it. I do actually enjoy playing Byleth, and Corrin, both. Don't care.

 

[Perkilator]

Sakurai just clarified in his presentation that the next fighter is the last one.

 

[Minik]

Well now 2 of these have mii costumes and 1 has an assist
Diskun is finally joining smash brothers
Gonna hope at the very least we get a RH mii cosutme if nothing.

 

[Perkilator]

Whoever the last fighter is, I just want people on this site to be respectful to each other.

 

[GolisoPower]

So I've been doing some thinking about who our final challenger may be, and I saw a video where they said that MattX20 brought this up:

The DLC fighters seem to have mirrored colors. Like for example: If you go down starting from Piranha Plant to Banjo to Min Min to Pyra/Mythra, you'll notice that their colors are similar. Same if you do so with Joker and Hero. Except when you do it with Hero, you'll find the empty slot next to Kazuya and below Sephiroth. So I believe that whatever our final Fighter's gonna be, they're gonna have heavy ties with the color purple.

Another thing to bring up is Figure Theory: During Pyra/Mythra's presentation, Sakurai brought up that he owns figurines of upcoming fighters, including Kazuya, who hasn't been revealed at the time. And apparently, Kazuya does have a figurine.

Then this does bring up the parallels between Pass 1 & Pass 2:

• Unexpected First Party: Piranha Plant and Min Min
• Full-on WTF Third Party: Joker and Steve
• Popular Square-Enix character (Or popular JRPG character): Hero and Sephiroth
• Duo character: Banjo & Kazooie and Pyra & Mythra
• Fighting game character: Terry and Kazuya
• Controversial finale character: Byleth and ???

So this could help us narrow down our final fighter:

1) A potential candidate should line up with previous final reveals.
2) They should have heavy ties with the color purple.
3) They should have a figure for Sakurai to own.
4) They should parallel Byleth as a controversial reveal.

I say should because obviously these aren't ironclad. One of those might get thrown out the window when we get our final character. But it's something to bring up.

But say they fit all of those things. Who could it be? My money would be on Nihilego from Pokemon:

1) It lines up rather well with previous reveals
2) Ultra Wormhole energy is mainly different shades of purple, and the purple could also come from its Poison-typing.
3) It has a figure Sakurai could use for reference.
4) It would set off a lot of people who don't want another Pokemon rep, as well as Ultra Beast anti-fans.

That's just what I think, though. Anyone else?

 

[Minik]

Seems pretty flawed given it all is based on outside thinking rather than just doing what they'd want to do, like the idea of them choosing to do a character purely because they line up with being purple or the idea of a character just being contriversal, not a surprise but just contriversal. Sakurai loves to surprise people but he didn't choose Byleth to be like "This will need to be contriversal" he did it because adding fire emblem three houses to smash.

And of all things it'd be a pokemon thats only a 2 star spirit, was only relevent in the same game as incineroar and isn't clear on how it'd fight unlike all the other modern pokemon. The colour thing really doesn't hold much weight given characters like terry who everyone would expect to be red have a blue background, I imagine as to not blend much with joker of the same pass. If a characters WHOLE thing was about being one colour that was already on the current pass, I think they would probably save the colour for that character instead e.g. if pacman was on the pass along with min min, min min wouldve used orange, saving yellow for pacman.

And other things on that pass theory are flawed like pyra mythra representing a duo, when Sakurai made it clear he wanted them to be a trio with rex, counting piranha plant for pass 1 when its classic mode is all about base game along with having a palutena guidance, or using the broad branch of WTF as a comparison for both joker and steve. For this sorta thing I could say the last character is gonna be non-human because of banjo kazooie. Plus Sephiroth's colour isnt even on the first pass its straight up gray, I imagine as to be a dark version of clouds green which is a colour used in FF. The last character will probably have a unique colour from all others on the same pass, but that could be orange, purple, white, pink and it might not even make sense for the character, (Inkling has pink on her page despite being mostly orange)

 

[GolisoPower]

So, I wanna share another thing that I wanna share with you today. I shared this in the Reimu thread, but this could factor into anyone.

Okay, so tinfoil hat time/question:



Does Nintendo give Sakurai a set budget when making Smash Bros, or do they just trickle in money as they go? I'm mainly asking because of how it could point towards our final fighter.



Let's have a look-see through the Challenger Packs and the money they may have spent on them throughout the years:



Piranha Plant
Free bonus DLC character. $
Meant to be a part of the base roster after Incineroar, but schedule circumstances changed that. $
Because of how easy it is to make him and because of how he's a first-party, PP may have cost less money to develop than any other DLC character ever. $
Joker
Our first official DLC character. $
Sakurai loved Persona 5, the game was the main inspiration behind the menu.
Hero
Koichi Sugiyama was likely very miserly, was only able to provide MIDI tracks instead of the fully-orchestrated tracks. Even with that, it must've been expensive.
Has the highest number of distinct Specials of any Smash character thanks to Command Selection. $$$
Had to hire different voice actors for each of the 4 Heroes.
Banjo & Kazooie
Close ties with Nintendo thanks to B-K's history. $
Microsoft and Nintendo had been getting really chummy at the time. $
Terry
SNK was the most generous company out of everyone, beating out Konami prior. $
Due to Fatal Fury being a 4-button fighter as opposed to Street Fighter's 6-buttons, was generally easier to develop standard attacks for. $
Comes with GO! mechanic and unique inputs. $$
KoF Stadium possesses a bajillion stage cameos and has that wall mechanic. $$
Byleth
Was rumored to be initially a Monster Hunter rep, but didn't fall through. $$
Min Min
Direct request from Yabuki himself. $
Min Min has a unique control scheme in comparison to the rest of the fighters. $$$
Steve
Negotiations took 5 years to develop. Vergeben, love him or hate him, said Minecraft content was coming to Smash long before Steve's reveal. $$$
Required Sakurai to rewrite every single stage to accommodate Neutral Special. $$$
Was issued by a co-worker as a challenge for Sakurai. (Could be a joke, could be serious. I don't know) $$
Sephiroth
lods of emone probably went to music negotiations since we got 9 songs out of FF with this challenger pack. $$$
Only speaks Japanese for consistency with Cloud. $
Northern Cave background seems like a very intricate render, as opposed to other stages like Yggdrasil's Altar and Garreg Mach Monastery. $$$
Pyra/Mythra
Was initially going to be a trio character with Rex, but limitations led to the idea being scrapped, turning Pyra and Mythra into a Zelda/Sheik-type character. $$$
Required contacting Skye Bennett and Al Weaver, British voice actors. $$
Kazuya
Sakurai discussed how difficult it would be to put Tekken's movement into Smash when discussing Heihachi. $
Kazuya has 8 input directions to choose from for his tilts. $$
Tekken has 39 songs in Smash Bros. $$

Considering the usual "resource decay" that usually happens with Smash DLC, I think our final character would have to be light on cash for Nintendo. I mean, yes, Master Chief is heavily rumored right now, but putting it in the context of the big-business language that is money, I don't Master Chief will make it in because he sounds expensive, and Nintendo already spent a good chunk of their money on Microsoft content in Smash Bros already.

So, who do you guys think would be the most affordable character to serve as our finale character?

 

[Rie Sonomura]

So, I wanna share another thing that I wanna share with you today. I shared this in the Reimu thread, but this could factor into anyone.



Considering the usual "resource decay" that usually happens with Smash DLC, I think our final character would have to be light on cash for Nintendo. I mean, yes, Master Chief is heavily rumored right now, but putting it in the context of the big-business language that is money, I don't Master Chief will make it in because he sounds expensive, and Nintendo already spent a good chunk of their money on Microsoft content in Smash Bros already.

So, who do you guys think would be the most affordable character to serve as our finale character?

Would someone in house (aka Nintendo themselves) count?

Octoling or Off The Hook may be the most cost efficient option here IMO as you already got some Splatoon content and you can build off Inkling for Octoling even if Octoling only shares the up B and ink mechanic with Inkling

 

[GolisoPower]

Would someone in house (aka Nintendo themselves) count?

Octoling or Off The Hook may be the most cost efficient option here IMO as you already got some Splatoon content and you can build off Inkling for Octoling even if Octoling only shares the up B and ink mechanic with Inkling

Good point. They do seem to fall under the same umbrella as Fire Emblem and Xenoblade as far as already-represented 1st-parties go. They seem pretty damn affordable as a character.

 

[Minik]

I imagine a large part of the cost would be the insanely HD trailers they do, which the nintendo characters dont have and given we just had Kazuya with his, id say the next thing will be something less ambitious.