Character Discussion Thread

[Argos]

The best thing Rayman has going for him in my eyes is that he has -man in his name. Megaman, Pac-Man, Bomberman (RIP); I'm all for maximizing potential -man men.

 

[Kalimdori]

Rayman never revolutionized gaming like Pac-Man nor had the long-standing Rivalry as Sonic - Mario had.

The Rabbids series has almost nothing to do with Rayman as he became more of a cameo once you got about two, three games into it to the point of not appearing in the games. It is almost like saying that the Donkey Kong Country series has weight for Mario.

Rayman has had three games of actual Rayman from Wii onwards: Rayman 3DS (remake of 2), Origins, and Legends. Remember when Legends was meant to be a WiiU exclusive then Ubisoft stabbed Nintendo from that part of the deal and later refused to sell their hyped new title of Watch Dogs on the system? Pepperidge Farm Remembers.

I agree with you about revolutionizing, that's why I said Rayman wasn't on the same level as the others. He followed in the footsteps of other gaming genres, the only thing that I think he one ups the other represented third parties is his game's wonky art style, and that really isn't a credential to brag about in regards to Smash.

Rabbids I agree as well, if I remember correctly he only appears in three of the games. Still think it might help him out, as (Unfortunately) the Rabbids are heavily tied to Nintendo consoles in comparison to Sony and Microsoft, and if Rayman gets into Smash I'd imagine he'd bring some sort of reference to the Rabbids as well.

But it drives me nuts when people point at Ubisoft's relationship with Nintendo in regards to why Rayman wouldn't be included in Smash. Rayman has had only 2 new games on Nintendo consoles, yes. Still more then Megaman and Snake. And unlike the other 3rd party characters in this game, the games that Rayman was in were critically acclaimed. As to the exclusivity/Watch Dogs debacle, that wasn't Ubisoft's fault. That's all on Nintendo and their inability to properly market and sell the Wii U. Nintendo's a business, I would hope they wouldn't be so immature to turn their backs to Ubisoft, especially since, despite everything, Ubisoft is still one of the bigger 3rd party supporters of the Wii U, something Nintendo desperately needs.

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

Another Rayman discussion?

I'm really starting to think he has hope for next time since I true believe Sonic is going to be cut from Super Smash Bros as a whole, so he may be a good replacement for Sonic.

 

[Kalimdori]

Another Rayman discussion?

I'm really starting to think he has hope for next time since I true believe Sonic is going to be cut from Super Smash Bros as a whole, so he may be a good replacement for Sonic.

Huh? Sonic isn't going anywhere, he's a 2 time veteran now, and has the best relation with Nintendo out of all the 3rd party cast.

Hell I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo owned Sonic by the time the next Smash comes around.

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

Huh? Sonic isn't going anywhere, he's a 2 time veteran now, and has the best relation with Nintendo out of all the 3rd party cast.

Hell I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo owned Sonic by the time the next Smash comes around.

I wish I could be as optimistic about Nintendo buying the copyrights for Sonic as you are. SEGA would not be willing to sell the copyright of their beloved mascot to ANYONE. And more importantly, SEGA just announced that they're moving away from the console market. It's very clear (to me at least) that he's finished with Smash and Nintendo.

 

[PSIBoy]

Huh? Sonic isn't going anywhere, he's a 2 time veteran now, and has the best relation with Nintendo out of all the 3rd party cast.

Hell I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo owned Sonic by the time the next Smash comes around.

If Nintendo owned Sonic, do you reckon we'll see a second playable Sonic character whose name isn't Shadow? (Not that he's first in line, but still...)

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

If Nintendo owned Sonic, do you reckon we'll see a second playable Sonic character whose name isn't Shadow? (Not that he's first in line, but still...)

Shadow wouldn't be first in line at all. Probably sixth or seventh.

But I don't see why we're all talking about this since they're not going to buy Sonic.

 

[Substitution]

I'm confused. Before Cliff used to go on about how we'd get a second Sonic rep and never thought otherwise, now he's going on a tirade about how Sonic will be gone. What happened?

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

I'm confused, before Cliff used to go on about how we'd get a second Sonic rep and never thought otherwise, now he's going on a tirade about how Sonic will be gone. What happened?

I know I'm not who I used to be, but it's not entirely my fault. I just needed some way to play along with the Rayman discussion.

 

[Godzillathewonderdog]

So Sega wanting to put more focus on making PC and mobile games = they're not going to want Sonic to be in the next Smash Bros?

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

So Sega wanting to put more focus on making PC and mobile games = they're not going to want Sonic to be in the next Smash Bros?

They said they were completely moving to PC and mobile, so yes.

 

[False Sense]

I wish I could be as optimistic about Nintendo buying the copyrights for Sonic as you are. SEGA would not be willing to sell the copyright of their beloved mascot to ANYONE. And more importantly, SEGA just announced that they're moving away from the console market. It's very clear (to me at least) that he's finished with Smash and Nintendo.

Sonic's not going anywhere.

Sonic is still a massive gaming icon, and one of the most long awaited characters in Smash. Even if Sonic were to become less prominent/move away from consoles, that's no reason for him to just suddenly drop out of Smash. Both Sega and Nintendo benefit from his presence on the roster, after all.

 

[Deleted member]

While the future of the Sonic franchise overall is pretty bleak at this point, it should be noted that the last time Mega Man was on a Nintendo system was 5 years ago for a WiiWare title, and Mega Man still showed up in Smash.
The Sonic franchise going exclusively mobile as of now doesn't automatically mean Sonic will never be in Smash again.

 

[JaidynReiman]

While the future of the Sonic franchise overall is pretty bleak at this point, it should be noted that the last time Mega Man was on a Nintendo system was 5 years ago for a WiiWare title, and Mega Man still showed up in Smash.
The Sonic franchise going exclusively mobile as of now doesn't automatically mean Sonic will never be in Smash again.

Its not even exclusively Mobile. They're just focusing more on Mobile games.

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

While the future of the Sonic franchise overall is pretty bleak at this point, it should be noted that the last time Mega Man was on a Nintendo system was 5 years ago for a WiiWare title, and Mega Man still showed up in Smash.
The Sonic franchise going exclusively mobile as of now doesn't automatically mean Sonic will never be in Smash again.

Honestly, I think it does. Sonic would really have a hard time staying in Smash now that SEGA announced that they're moving away from the console market.

 

[Godzillathewonderdog]

Sega didn't say they were going to stop making console games. They're just putting more focus on PC and mobile games.

 

[BluePikmin11]

I currently don't have time to argue every point you made right now, right now I want to focus on uniqueness and the criteria itself as it is the biggest issue we've been discussing by far.

Could you please stop stating opinion as if it were the truth? Unless you're Sakurai, then you don't know what the criteria was for Smash 4. This is exactly what I told you, and something that so many people do, you think that you know why a character got in but you don't. There's so much hindsight bias that it's unreal. The only time Sakurai said anything about new games affecting the chance of a character was with the Ice Climbers, and that was only because he had technical difficulties with them and thought it would be better to give up on them to have more time to work on the rest of the game.

Now you're just blatantly and insultingly underestimating Sakurai as a designer. Hasn't he already made it clear that he does extensive research on a character to find what works and what doesn't work? This has to be the poorest excuse I've seen.

We keep making up our own terms for this too. There was never any "historical retro" characters, and the retro term itself has been used and abused by the speculative community to the point of breaking. The only thing Sakurai said about "retros" was that he added old, unused (which contradicts your first statement about characters with newer games) characters in the hopes that their franchises would come back. The Ice Climbers failed to come back completely, and Pit only came back because of Sakurai taking the responsibility himself. Duck Hunt is the same, he had a single game decades ago and it's about time for a reboot. Mr. Game & Watch and R.O.B. are completely different, they have no proper franchises to bring back. They are the only thing close to historical characters as you describe them, but they are more-so representatives of their respective hardware.

Again, you are not Sakurai. You think you know why a character got in, but you don't really know. Just the fact that you have to debate whether importance or uniqueness was more important shows this blatantly.

I believe myself that there hidden specifics to Sakurai's criteria doesn't tell about to the public, and you can tell just by the inclusions themselves. In some cases, especially when it comes to uniqueness, you just don't go with what Sakurai says officially and speculate from there, especially in game development and planning where specific decisions are done and especially with a director who's handling most of the decisions made for two new Smash Bros. games.

And I believe when Sakurai considers a newcomer, he first decides on if the character has appeared recently in a new game, then looks at the character in face value and then figures what the character offers for a moveset in general, and then considers the factors (such as importance, franchise popularity) before finalizing his decision. It probably explains why Sakurai took extra caution before considering Pac-Man for playability.

And again, you keep asking me "what Rayman does in his games to constitute uniqueness in Smash" while using Olimar and Rosalina as examples. When in a Mario game did Rosalina ever throw her babies at people as weapons? When did Luma's ever do anything, let alone attack or spit star bits? When has Olimar grabbed Pikmin and swung them like melee weapons? The most he's done is throw them, which is represented by a single special in Smash. The gameplay of Pikmin is mostly premised of collecting things and carrying them back to the ship, which brought nothing of value to Smash. If Olimar can take creative liberties and do things that he doesn't actually do in his game, then Rayman can too. And as I've said before, if you can't see anything unique at all about a character with floating body parts that aren't physically attached, then you need a better imagination.

You have points here. At this point, I realized I am thinking way too hard in terms of playstyle now and making this needlessly complex.
And I am capable of using imagination and I able to think of ideas if it is reasonable to certain extents that fit and translate the character well in Smash Bros. gameplay.

Where on earth did Sakurai say "most importantly"? Perfect example of people taking things way out of context.

If the Chorus Men can be made to work on the 3DS, then why can't the Ice Climbers? That is bias, plain and simple.

Sorry about that, I basically just copied the sentence from the CK thread, it was at the time the data dump was discovered and got very excited. Definitely not the most important reason.
Again you should probably go to the Chorus Kids support thread for that.
I'll tag @Jigglystep if I need to.

 

[BKupa666]

People are unrealistically skeptical of third party characters, including those already in Smash. It's often due to transparent biases, since the same people "evolve" their stances to account for all the times they're laughably wrong. . .from "Mega Man/Pac-Man have no chance and Sonic/Snake are getting cut because this is a Nintendo game" to "Pac-Man/Mega Man are getting cut, Sonic is at risk, and no more third parties are getting in because of diminishing returns," for example.

 

[SegaNintendoUbisoft]

Even though Sega is focusing on PC/mobile now, I get the feeling that Sonic will be the exception, I still believe new Sonic games will come to consoles, despite the recent dilemma.

 

[JaidynReiman]

People are blowing the whole SEGA thing way out of proportion, and Sonic is not going anywhere on consoles. He might get less console games, which is damn well fine by me. They need to focus more time into making good games instead of trying to shell out a new game every year.

 

[Argos]

I would think that Nintendo has a lot less to gain from promoting third party games rather than their own IPs, so I think on a strictly business sense those decisions are based more on what characters would move units rather than who has a new game out. Sonic has enough fans to make his future inclusion more of a no-brainier. They'd obviously be more skittish about directly advertising for their competitors, of course, but I think they'd see the other consoles as the bigger threat than some ftp endless runner mobile game.

(Personally, Shadow is among my least wanted characters who has any real chance of getting in, but my pessimistic nature meant that I was kind of worried about him showing up in this version. He's quite popular, and would have made a relatively easy-ish last minute clone. Luckily for me that didn't end up happening.)

 

[JaidynReiman]

I would think that Nintendo has a lot less to gain from promoting third party games rather than their own IPs, so I think on a strictly business sense those decisions are based more on what characters would move units rather than who has a new game out. Sonic has enough fans to make his future inclusion more of a no-brainier. They'd obviously be more skittish about directly advertising for their competitors, of course, but I think they'd see the other consoles as the bigger threat than some ftp endless runner mobile game.

(Personally, Shadow is among my least wanted characters who has any real chance of getting in, but my pessimistic nature meant that I was kind of worried about him showing up in this version. He's quite popular, and would have made a relatively easy-ish last minute clone. Luckily for me that didn't end up happening.)

Personally, I wouldn't mind Shadow. He's my favorite Sonic character, and Sonic is, or at least was, my favorite game franchise (its still high up there). I do not think he should be playable in Smash, and don't think he ever would, but I'd really love to see him in another fighting game again, he's got tons of potential.


But yeah, Sonic the Hedgehog is within the Top 10 selling franchises of all time, one of the few to have topped 100m sales. Pac-Man, Metal Gear, and Mega Man don't come anywhere close.

 

[Smashoperatingbuddy123]

Another Rayman discussion?

I'm really starting to think he has hope for next time since I true believe Sonic is going to be cut from Super Smash Bros as a whole, so he may be a good replacement for Sonic.

You think sonic is going to be kicked.

1# 2 time veteran

2# Sega and nintendo have ben working together for years

3# sonic and mario have ben in cross over games

4# the i e climbers arguement will not work due to being mechanic issues due to 3ds sonic had no trouble getting past that barrier

 

[Chandeelure]

So I made a list of the characters I think will be cut from the next title.



I'm not saying they're going to be cut, I'm just saying I think they'll be the most likely cuts from the roster.

CliffJumper confirmed as a GamesRadar guy.

 

[Kirby Dragons]

So I made a list of the characters I think will be cut from the next title.



I'm not saying they're going to be cut, I'm just saying I think they'll be the most likely cuts from the roster.

Whoa whoa whoa. Meta Knight? He has absolutely NO reason AT ALL to be cut. If anything, Kirby needs more reps, not less. MK's also been in multiple Smash games, so he pretty much can't get cut.
And I really do hate WFT, but she's not going anywhere. She may be obscure, but Ness and R.O.B. weren't cut, were they?
I could see Greninja getting cut, but to represent starters, I believe they should keep him, also adding Sceptile. One thing they could also do is replace the frog with the water starter of the next Gen.

 

[NonSpecificGuy]

Whoa whoa whoa. Meta Knight? He has absolutely NO reason AT ALL to be cut. If anything, Kirby needs more reps, not less. MK's also been in multiple Smash games, so he pretty much can't get cut.
And I really do hate WFT, but she's not going anywhere. She may be obscure, but Ness and R.O.B. weren't cut, were they?
I could see Greninja getting cut, but to represent starters, I believe they should keep him, also adding Sceptile. One thing they could also do is replace the frog with the water starter of the next Gen.

If I may be so bold, I don't see Dr. Mario going anywhere either. While he is a clone I understand peoples gripes about the lack of Mario Tornado, among others, which The Doc seems to fix. Plus, two time rep.

 

[Swamp Sensei]

Sega never said they were quitting the console market.

They just said they were shifting focus.

Ya'll need to learn to read.

 

[N3ON]

It doesn't matter. It's not Sega who makes Smash. Sonic isn't going anywhere.

People are unrealistically skeptical of third party characters, including those already in Smash. It's often due to transparent biases, since the same people "evolve" their stances to account for all the times they're laughably wrong. . .from "Mega Man/Pac-Man have no chance and Sonic/Snake are getting cut because this is a Nintendo game" to "Pac-Man/Mega Man are getting cut, Sonic is at risk, and no more third parties are getting in because of diminishing returns," for example.

To be fair for all those people there are others who think just appearing on a Nintendo system, having some semblance of popularity, or simply being a pretty well-known video game character is reasoning enough to be a likely candidate. It swings both ways really.

 

[Dinoman96]

I don't understand people who think WFT would be cut. She was put in for a reason, as in to represent the time when Nintendo was back on top of the console market after years of middling to poor console hardware sales. She's meant to be a relic of that era, like how Mr. Game & Watch is a relic of the G&W days. I don't see much reason for her removal.

 

[True Blue Warrior]

I don't understand people who think WFT would be cut. She was put in for a reason, as in to represent the time when Nintendo was back on top of the console market after years of middling to poor console hardware sales. She's meant to be a relic of that era, like how Mr. Game & Watch is a relic of the G&W days. I don't see much reason for her removal.

Personal bias. Just like the "geniuses" who thought R.O.B. was one of the most likeliest cuts despite being in the exact same situation that Mr. Game and Watch was.

 

[Burruni]

I agree with you about revolutionizing, that's why I said Rayman wasn't on the same level as the others. He followed in the footsteps of other gaming genres, the only thing that I think he one ups the other represented third parties is his game's wonky art style, and that really isn't a credential to brag about in regards to Smash.

Rabbids I agree as well, if I remember correctly he only appears in three of the games. Still think it might help him out, as (Unfortunately) the Rabbids are heavily tied to Nintendo consoles in comparison to Sony and Microsoft, and if Rayman gets into Smash I'd imagine he'd bring some sort of reference to the Rabbids as well.

But it drives me nuts when people point at Ubisoft's relationship with Nintendo in regards to why Rayman wouldn't be included in Smash. Rayman has had only 2 new games on Nintendo consoles, yes. Still more then Megaman and Snake. And unlike the other 3rd party characters in this game, the games that Rayman was in were critically acclaimed. As to the exclusivity/Watch Dogs debacle, that wasn't Ubisoft's fault. That's all on Nintendo and their inability to properly market and sell the Wii U. Nintendo's a business, I would hope they wouldn't be so immature to turn their backs to Ubisoft, especially since, despite everything, Ubisoft is still one of the bigger 3rd party supporters of the Wii U, something Nintendo desperately needs.

Snake, as I stated, was a special case of Kojima and Sakura, the "Kojima Clause."

"2 new games on Nintendo consoles... more than Megaman."

Megaman Star Force series - 7 games, 2006-2008.
Megaman Zero Collection - 2010
Megaman ZX & Advent - 2006, 2007.
Megaman 9 & 10 (Multi-Console, like Origins/Legends) - 2008, 2010.

Outside of the later X games and Legends 2, Megaman has existed almost exclusively on Nintendo.

 

[False Sense]

Why on earth would Meta Knight be cut?

Seriously? What's changed about his situation that suddenly makes him a likely cut after being a popular (and infamous) character in two installments of Smash?

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

Whoa whoa whoa. Meta Knight? He has absolutely NO reason AT ALL to be cut. If anything, Kirby needs more reps, not less. MK's also been in multiple Smash games, so he pretty much can't get cut.
And I really do hate WFT, but she's not going anywhere. She may be obscure, but Ness and R.O.B. weren't cut, were they?
I could see Greninja getting cut, but to represent starters, I believe they should keep him, also adding Sceptile. One thing they could also do is replace the frog with the water starter of the next Gen.

How did that end up here? I posted that in the social thread.

Again, I wasn't saying they will, I was saying it's my OPINION!

 

[Burruni]

Why on earth would Meta Knight be cut?

Seriously? What's changed about his situation that suddenly makes him a likely cut after being a popular (and infamous) character in two installments of Smash?

Let's see...
: One of the three most popular and dominant characters in the Kirby Franchise.
: One of the three most popular and dominant characters in the Kirby Franchise who was in a Smash game.
5mash: One of the three most popular and dominant characters in the Kirby Franchise who was in 2 Smash games.

Edit: And, y'know "Sakurai Bias."

 

[BluePikmin11]

What in specific made you think Meta-Knight will be cut exactly? @ Jason the Yoshi

 

[Burruni]

Let's look at what makes cuts, shall we?
: Clones with no value to the roster (since ).
: Barely differentiated clones that were put in due to the need for characters more than value.
: Time limitations above all else.

() + : System limitations. (No more transformations, no more Icies!)
: Partial clones. Popularity? Time? We don't know what quite kept them out.
: Kojima Clause

When we look to Sm4sh to 5mash, here are who we may see being cut.
: I don't think we would be shocked to see them delegated to Alts next game.... as many expected this from Doc originally.
/: Issues with the respective companies. Capcom in particular has had a history of killing off Megaman returns on Nintendo consoles people have been waiting for.....

The only other person of any threat, in my opinion would be but if he lasted Brawl->Sm4sh, I think he's staying.

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

What in specific made you think Meta-Knight will be cut exactly? @ Jason the Yoshi

I'll admit it's some bias, but since Sakurai won't be returning, I don't think Kirby representation would be that crazy. I do think representation of the kirby franchise as of now is just fine, but overall they'd cut Meta Knight before ever cutting King DeDeDe. That and he's just hard to master.

 

[pupNapoleon]

Honestly, I think it does. Sonic would really have a hard time staying in Smash now that SEGA announced that they're moving away from the console market.

I do not follow your logic.
Do you think Nintendo wouldn't want Sonic in, Sakurai, or Sega?
No one loses by Sonic being in the game; if he were cut, it would dismiss some of the Legend of Smash Bros (in regard to legendary characters, particularly 3rd party), and it would hinder Sega from marketing the character to a huge audience.

Sonic going to mobile is MORE of a reason he would return.

 

[Jason the Yoshi]

I do not follow your logic.
Do you think Nintendo wouldn't want Sonic in, Sakurai, or Sega?
No one loses by Sonic being in the game; if he were cut, it would dismiss some of the Legend of Smash Bros (in regard to legendary characters, particularly 3rd party), and it would hinder Sega from marketing the character to a huge audience.

Sonic going to mobile is MORE of a reason he would return.

That doesn't mean anything at all. Take Banjo for example. He was planned for 64 and Melee, but then Rare was bought out by Microsoft. SEGA leaving the console market is a similar case as Rare leaving Nintendo.

 

[Burruni]

That doesn't mean anything at all. Take Banjo for example. He was planned for 64 and Melee, but then Rare was bought out by Microsoft. SEGA leaving the console market is a similar case as Rare leaving Nintendo.

No... it's not. It's not similar at all. Rareware being bought by another company incredibly limited if not completely embargo'd any trade and offers between Nintendo and Rareware because it's actually Nintendo asking Microsoft for something to help the opposing company.

SEGA FOCUSING MORE ON MOBILE GAMES, not leaving the console market in no way, shape, or form stops them from funding occasional Sonic titles on consoles and ESPECIALLY doesn't stop them taking a royalty payment for Nintendo to use Sonic in Smash.