Social Disciples of Dark Samus

[Diem]

Weird...

I went to look at Dark Samus’s page on the Smash Website and blog and they refer Dark Samus as a “she” now.

So, is Dark Samus our first female villain?

Nice catch. Glad to see that it was an error that was noticed. I feared that the localization team might've just been completely oblivious to the mistake and would've continued the error into the actual game.

Perhaps Dark Samus is referred to in some gender-neutral pronoun in the Japanese localizations of Metroid Prime 2 and 3, so when translating the blog post from Japanese to English, someone kept that neutrality? Because I think I remember that Japanese and other languages have gender neutral pronouns besides equivalents of "it" that would be more appropriate if they wanted to refer to Dark Samus in that way. But since we only have "it" in English, when translated back, then the pronoun might've gotten mixed up.

 

[Seanp12]

Happy October everyone. Just a couple months away from launch day!

Here's some seasonal art from Cryophase to start off the month:




Yeah, having it be a multihit attack would be good, although it's unlikely that every bullet would hit the majority of the time, so that would have to be taken into account. It'd also be a pain in the *** to program, with all the individual hitboxes, so I can see why they might have gone the Echo Fighter route if they were pressed for time. Perhaps it would be more practical to have more generalized hitboxes than precise ones. Instead of each bullet having its own hitbox, maybe make it more like Bowser/Charizard's fire breath. This would also help it be more consistent,.

Ah, I didn't see your post in that thread. Great minds think alike, I guess! Your concept of it is a little more powerful and flexible than mine, but I like how it functions similarly to Fox's/Ridley's Up-B. Though if it was given that flexibility plus the shockwave effect, it might be a little too potent. I went with it only being able to angle downwards within a 90 degree scope, which would allow it to be a potent move, but not totally flexible and therefore it's able to be punished if misused.

I left out missiles because, while Dark Samus does possess that ability, I was choosing to focus on her more unique abilities, especially since Samus's missiles aren't a great move in the first place. Since this move was already demonstrated in Smash 4, it would seem odd to leave it out. The animation does resemble Samus's Up-Smash, but this move wouldn't really work as an Up-Smash or any other Up-Move, so retooling it into a Side-B would be better.

The animation resembles down-tilt, but the move functions more like some characters' Down-B. It's worth noting that the animation Dark Samus uses for this move in the Prime games is totally different than what's used in Smash. The reuse of Samus's animation was just a cut corner, since it's not important as an Assist Trophy. As a playable character, the move would have a different animation.

Perhaps the Z-air can be moved around like that weird glitch in Melee? This might allow it to tether to ledges better, making it a more useful recovery option. Though I don't know if the Joe Schmoe playing the demo at that event would be aware of that ability, so either he did it by accident or it is homing like you suggested.


Yep, kind of similar to how Link/Young Link and Pikachu/Pichu share the same bones, but one of the characters is just a scaled-down version of the original. The fundamental differences are in their movesets, movements, and weights. Otherwise, they'd basically just be differently-sized alt-skins, which is almost what Dark Pit and Lucina were.

It looks like Isabelle was going to be more work anyways, needing a much more custom model and boneset, so they went the extra mile to give her some unique moves as well. Guess that's how we ended up with a semi-clone this time around. It was less about working with time constraints and more that the character would just barely not work as an Echo Fighter, so might as well make the character more unique. And since Animal Crossing is one of Nintendo's most popular franchises--more popular than Metroid, Pikmin, Fire Emblem, Kid Icarus, etc.--they'd get more mileage out of that effort than they would for most other characters.

Which is why I'm still skeptical about Dark Samus being floatier than Samus. I'm hopeful, but I can only believe it when I see it. Giving her different weight and movement attributes would require more thought and work than just copying it over from Samus, which goes against what makes Echo Fighters easy to make in the first place. Granted, Dark Samus and Chrom have gotten some special treatment in that regard (Dark Samus's amazing animation work and Chrom's different Up-B and Final Smash), and broke some of the rules that Echo Fighters were said to follow, so it's entirely possible that Dark Samus has different movement. It's just more on the unlikely side.

Wait, Animal Crossing is more popular than Fire Emblem? I'm not sure about that. FEH blows Pocket Camp out of the water, though mobile is a more casual market.

 

[Aetheri]

Wait, Animal Crossing is more popular than Fire Emblem? I'm not sure about that. FEH blows Pocket Camp out of the water, though mobile is a more casual market.

Animal Crossing is far more popular than Fire Emblem by a long shot, which has only recently gained traction. New Leaf on it's own is one of the best selling games on the 3DS and has sold more than both Awakening and Fates combined a few times over.

Mobile is hardly a good point of reference since FEH is also doing a lot better than SMR on mobile. It's quite a stretch to say by that logic that Fire Emblem is more popular than Mario.

 

[Seanp12]

Animal Crossing is far more popular than Fire Emblem by a long shot, which has only recently gained traction. New Leaf on it's own is one of the best selling games on the 3DS and has sold more than both Awakening and Fates combined a few times over.

Mobile is hardly a good point of reference since FEH is also doing a lot better than SMR on mobile. It's quite a stretch to say by that logic that Fire Emblem is more popular than Mario.

Ok. I didn't know the comparison in sales for the actual games, but I also didn't want to look then up when I could just ask. Thanks for sparing my laziness.

 

[meleebrawler]

This doesn't get brought up much... could Dark Samus also have Omega Pirate DNA within her, and do you think this would affect her disposition in any way?

 

[ChronoBound]

Something very interesting for Dark Samus fans to look at is this pre-Brawl poll I recently uncovered from one of my old posts:

Poll #2: GameFAQs, first half of 2007

For some reason there are much less character results recorded for this poll. I don't know why. My theory is that its a separate page to record characters that got more than 1-3 votes (so as to record the higher ranking characters better since there were so many single vote characters in the GameFAQs poll). There is no character on the page that has below 15 votes, so I think this is most likely what this is.

Mario series:
- Geno: 27
- Bowser Jr.: 20

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 37
- K. Rool: 19

The Legend of Zelda series:
The page does not list any Zelda characters so I am assuming there were no Zelda characters that had received at least 15 votes.

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 36
- Dark Samus: 19

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 32

Star Fox series:
- Krystal: 30
- Wolf: 29

Pokemon series:
The page does not list any Pokemon characters so I am assuming there were no Pokemon characters that had received at least 15 votes.

F-Zero series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Mother/EarthBound series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 16
- Lyn: 15

Other series:
- Isaac: 22
- Tom Nook: 18

Retro:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 58
- Mega Man: 35
- Shadow: 15

Overall Top 10 for GameFAQs poll:
1. Sonic (58)
2. Diddy Kong (37)
3. Ridley (36)
4. Mega Man (35)
5. King Dedede (32)
6. Krystal (30)
7. Wolf (29)
8. Geno (27)
9. Isaac (22)
10. Bowser Jr. (20)

Pretty interesting.

As can be seen Geno was popularly requested, but he was never ever among the Top 5. The fact that requests for him crashed after Brawl's release, while deconfirmation did not damper the likes of Ridley, Mega Man, K. Rool, Little Mac, and Isaac might say quite a bit.

I find it amusing Dark Samus more or less was the equivalent of K. Rool during the pre-Brawl period (they had a similar amount of requests, and Dark Samus even had a massive support topic here on SmashBoards during the pre-Brawl period). I wonder if Dark Samus would have exploded in requests towards the twilight of pre-Brawl had Ridley been confirmed like what happened to K. Rool when Diddy Kong was confirmed (Ridley and Diddy Kong were pretty similar to each other in requests).

Keep in mind too that Dark Samus had a massive support topic here on SmashBoards during the pre-Brawl period. It easily could have been the case had Ridley been a newcomer for Brawl, that Dark Samus would have become a Top 10 most wanted character for the remainder of the pre-Brawl period and the first few years of pre-Smash 4, and then gradually declining (due to losing relevance and Metroid being a rather niche series). Metroid fans being denied Ridley for so long caused much of Dark Samus's own popularity to collapse more quickly than it would have otherwise (she still would have depreciated in requests regardless).

However, ironically, I think even if Ridley had been playable in Brawl, that the outcome in the end might still have been echo fighter status for Dark Samus. The reason I say this is because I surmise that she probably would have only ended up an Assist Trophy in Smash 4 (it was still very lucky that she gained that status at all in Smash 4 in our timeline). and then when Sakurai looked for suitable candidates for echo fighters, Dark Samus would be an extremely attractive candidate (possibly more so because she likely would have even more requests for her in this alternative history).

I am curious what Dark Samus fans here think. She was definitely at her peak in popularity during pre-Brawl, but she never truly got to flower because she was in Ridley's shadow (saying that phrase brings back some very unfortunate memories of pre-Smash 4 conspiracy theories). It would have been like if Diddy Kong had never made it into Brawl and instead only ended up getting added in Ultimate (similarly, both K. Rool and Dark Samus made their last appearance in their respective franchises in 2007). Would K. Rool even have a quarter of the requests he had during the pre-Smash 4 and during the ballot?

Very interesting things to ponder.

Regardless, this is simply yet another example of just how fortunate Dark Samus was to make it in, even if it was echo fighter status.

 

[Diem]

This doesn't get brought up much... could Dark Samus also have Omega Pirate DNA within her, and do you think this would affect her disposition in any way?

I don't think she does. The components we know are phazon and Samus's DNA (from scan logs) and the Phazon Suit and Metroid Prime (from the end of MP1). The Phazon Suit doesn't seem to have any connection to the Omega Pirate, as its description only refers to the phazon itself. So I'm pretty sure the Omega Pirate is not part of the equation.

Something very interesting for Dark Samus fans to look at is this pre-Brawl poll I recently uncovered from one of my old posts:

Poll #2: GameFAQs, first half of 2007

For some reason there are much less character results recorded for this poll. I don't know why. My theory is that its a separate page to record characters that got more than 1-3 votes (so as to record the higher ranking characters better since there were so many single vote characters in the GameFAQs poll). There is no character on the page that has below 15 votes, so I think this is most likely what this is.

Mario series:
- Geno: 27
- Bowser Jr.: 20

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 37
- K. Rool: 19

The Legend of Zelda series:
The page does not list any Zelda characters so I am assuming there were no Zelda characters that had received at least 15 votes.

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 36
- Dark Samus: 19

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 32

Star Fox series:
- Krystal: 30
- Wolf: 29

Pokemon series:
The page does not list any Pokemon characters so I am assuming there were no Pokemon characters that had received at least 15 votes.

F-Zero series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Mother/EarthBound series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 16
- Lyn: 15

Other series:
- Isaac: 22
- Tom Nook: 18

Retro:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 58
- Mega Man: 35
- Shadow: 15

Overall Top 10 for GameFAQs poll:
1. Sonic (58)
2. Diddy Kong (37)
3. Ridley (36)
4. Mega Man (35)
5. King Dedede (32)
6. Krystal (30)
7. Wolf (29)
8. Geno (27)
9. Isaac (22)
10. Bowser Jr. (20)

Pretty interesting.

As can be seen Geno was popularly requested, but he was never ever among the Top 5. The fact that requests for him crashed after Brawl's release, while deconfirmation did not damper the likes of Ridley, Mega Man, K. Rool, Little Mac, and Isaac might say quite a bit.

I find it amusing Dark Samus more or less was the equivalent of K. Rool during the pre-Brawl period (they had a similar amount of requests, and Dark Samus even had a massive support topic here on SmashBoards during the pre-Brawl period). I wonder if Dark Samus would have exploded in requests towards the twilight of pre-Brawl had Ridley been confirmed like what happened to K. Rool when Diddy Kong was confirmed (Ridley and Diddy Kong were pretty similar to each other in requests).

Keep in mind too that Dark Samus had a massive support topic here on SmashBoards during the pre-Brawl period. It easily could have been the case had Ridley been a newcomer for Brawl, that Dark Samus would have become a Top 10 most wanted character for the remainder of the pre-Brawl period and the first few years of pre-Smash 4, and then gradually declining (due to losing relevance and Metroid being a rather niche series). Metroid fans being denied Ridley for so long caused much of Dark Samus's own popularity to collapse more quickly than it would have otherwise (she still would have depreciated in requests regardless).

However, ironically, I think even if Ridley had been playable in Brawl, that the outcome in the end might still have been echo fighter status for Dark Samus. The reason I say this is because I surmise that she probably would have only ended up an Assist Trophy in Smash 4 (it was still very lucky that she gained that status at all in Smash 4 in our timeline). and then when Sakurai looked for suitable candidates for echo fighters, Dark Samus would be an extremely attractive candidate (possibly more so because she likely would have even more requests for her in this alternative history).

I am curious what Dark Samus fans here think. She was definitely at her peak in popularity during pre-Brawl, but she never truly got to flower because she was in Ridley's shadow (saying that phrase brings back some very unfortunate memories of pre-Smash 4 conspiracy theories). It would have been like if Diddy Kong had never made it into Brawl and instead only ended up getting added in Ultimate (similarly, both K. Rool and Dark Samus made their last appearance in their respective franchises in 2007). Would K. Rool even have a quarter of the requests he had during the pre-Smash 4 and during the ballot?

Very interesting things to ponder.

Regardless, this is simply yet another example of just how fortunate Dark Samus was to make it in, even if it was echo fighter status.

Oh yeah, Dark Samus's prime time (heh) would have been Brawl. It'd be right on the heels of Metroid Prime 3, her second (and final) appearance. It'd also make for a good addition to the Metroid representation, since she wouldn't have had the complications that kept Ridley from becoming a character. I never understood why she wasn't added in Brawl. Instead, we got Zero Suit Samus, which is from a game that came out around the same time.

Then sometime earlier this year I investigated a little into that issue, and it turns out that Metroid Prime 3 didn't release in Japan until over a month after Brawl released in Japan. And since that game was being developed in Texas, not Japan, the logistics of working on that are obviously complicated. Hence, all we got is a Dark Samus trophy based on her MP2 appearance. Come Smash 4, she got her updated appearance, but for some reason wasn't chosen to be a character, despite Metroid needing a new rep, while Bowser Jr. was.

Doesn't help that Dark Samus didn't have a significant appearance in Prime 3 until the very end of the game (as opposed to Prime 2, where there's the cutscene in the beginning and the first boss fight less than a quarter of the way into the game), and right after that she dies for good. Then after that, she and the prime series just faded into the background while we got Other M and nothing else for years. By the time Smash 4 was announced, it'd been almost 6 years since the character had any relevance at all, compared to 2007 when she had as much relevance as Ridley.

It's also telling that Samus still has her Super Metroid appearance in Brawl, and her Other M appearance in Smash 4/Ultimate, but never got her Prime design or even her Samus Returns design. Not even as alt costumes. That still makes me upset. All the more surprising that Dark Samus showed up at all, in that case.

That's why, between Dark Samus and Chibi-Robo, the two characters I wanted most, I always considered Chibi-Robo more likely. He's in some ways more relevant than Dark Samus, since Dark Samus's "life" was from 2004-2007 and she wasn't very prominent in her two appearances (well, she was prominent for a Metroid game), but Chibi-Robo is 2006-2015 and is the star of his games, even if those games are lower-profile. He's also much more unique in terms of aesthetics and moveset potential. After Smash 4, it felt like any franchise but Metroid had a chance at getting a new character, especially since the only thing to exist between 2010-2017 was Federation Force in 2016. Meanwhile, Chibi-Robo had a relatively high-profile game coming out on the 3DS in 2015.

In the end, though, I believe it worked out for the best. Dark Samus's incredible model and animations would not have been the same if she was added to Brawl or Smash 4. All the characters added in Ultimate were worth the wait due to how amazingly they've been rendered. Even if Dark Samus is just an Echo Fighter, the amount of work they put into her visuals make it a decent trade in my opinion. Compared to the Brawl mod that looks like trash, I'll take the Dark Samus we got in Ultimate over that any day.

 

[TheKingOfEvil2014]

I believe Dark Samus has no gender. The female pronoun is likely used because it's a female name. Just look at her final form in Echoes.
Also, are we sure that Dark Samus has a faster roll than Ultimate Samus? I've heard that it's just as long, and I watched a good comparison video.

 

[GunBlaze]

I believe Dark Samus has no gender. The female pronoun is likely used because it's a female name. Just look at her final form in Echoes.

As mentioned earlier in this thread, Dark Samus' DNA is comprised of Samus' and the Metroid Prime's DNA. The former alone makes Dark Samus to be genetically female, a fact explicitly stated within the game.

Also, are we sure that Dark Samus has a faster roll than Ultimate Samus? I've heard that it's just as long, and I watched a good comparison video.

We have no conclusive evidence as to whether her roll is actually faster, or if it's merely a cosmetic difference.

 

[Deleted member]

I believe Dark Samus has no gender. The female pronoun is likely used because it's a female name. Just look at her final form in Echoes.
Also, are we sure that Dark Samus has a faster roll than Ultimate Samus? I've heard that it's just as long, and I watched a good comparison video.

There was an amusing Japanese comic I found where a nervous Toon Link asked Dark Samus to remove its helmet, wondering if she'll be as pretty as Samus, only to react in shock as a puddle of Phazon drips out.

Dunno why I'm mentioning this, but for all the talks people want to make a Dark ZSS, the problem is that Dark Samus is an amorphous being that just so happens to be wearing a Power Suit.

 

[Diem]

There was an amusing Japanese comic I found where a nervous Toon Link asked Dark Samus to remove its helmet, wondering if she'll be as pretty as Samus, only to react in shock as a puddle of Phazon drips out.

Dunno why I'm mentioning this, but for all the talks people want to make a Dark ZSS, the problem is that Dark Samus is an amorphous being that just so happens to be wearing a Power Suit.

I think it's a popular misconception that she's an amorphous being. Perhaps it's because she's considered to be Metroid Prime, which is basically a jellyfish of sorts, inside of a suit, but in actuality she has a skeleton and veins and a heart. I imagine if the technology was there at the time, and it wouldn't risk an M rating, Retro would've gone all-out and showed as much viscera as they could.

My favorite detail are the veins that go into the big shoulder pads. It shows how her shoulders store Phazon, and that Phazon is redistributed throughout her system by her veins.

So it's more that Dark Samus's exterior is an exoskeleton or skin, but her insides still have human traits. She's not amorphous, but rather has a very defined form. That's part of why I love the character. She's not a human in a suit, but she's not just a puddle in a shell, either. She's a unique creature that defies conventional biology.

 

[ChronoBound]

Another user wrote this:

Also, I can vouch for ChronoBound's statement: K. Rool fans are exhausted. Spending ten years hoping for a character - one that was not only not in Smash but not even in his own series anymore - will do that for you, especially after an aggressive ballot campaign. Metroid fans should be so lucky Dark Samus fell into their lap right after Ridley.

According to leaks (Ken if you only subscribe to the box theory, Ken and Shadow if you subscribe to the "mural), there are only one or two echoes left to be unveiled. Dark Samus's echo slot easily could have gone to Impa, Funky Kong, Octoling, or Jeanne (all of which are characters that have had major roles recently). Metroid fans are very fortunate to just to have gotten Ridley alone (who Sakurai felt was too big as recently as 2014). Metroid fans had been fighting for over 17 years just to get the most important and popular Metroid character after Samus in. Dark Samus unfortunately did not continue to be an integral character after the Prime trilogy finished (meaning she had to get in Brawl).

I really wonder if Metroid fans would have rallied for Dark Samus if Ridley was confirmed for Brawl like Diddy Kong fans did for K. Rool after Diddy was confirmed. Both K. Rool and Dark Samus were pretty similar in requests for most of pre-Brawl (K. Rool did not take off until after Diddy Kong was confirmed). Also, like K. Rool, Dark Samus's last appearance in her own series was 2007 (K. Rool did make an appearance in Mario Super Sluggers which released in 2008 though).

Ridley getting most of the Metroid fanbase's attention for the last ten years meant Dark Samus's own dedicated fanbase gradually shriveled up. Many (or perhaps most) Ridley fans like Dark Samus too, but there are few fans left that like Dark Samus more. An exhibit of this is the poll in the Smash Ultimate Discussion thread, Dark Samus has the least votes for the character that people are looking forward to the most. However, in polls where people are asked which echo they are looking forward to the most (from what I seen on GameFAQs), its usually Dark Samus leading those (with Richter a bit behind). I imagine a lot of people who like Ridley and K. Rool, also like Dark Samus.

Metroid fans got really lucky that they ended up with Samus's arch-nemesis as well as the chief antagonist of the Prime trilogy. Earlier this year, who could have guessed that out of Metroid, Kirby, Star Fox, and Donkey Kong that Metroid would actually be the first one to reach four playable characters? Dark Samus seemed to have a smaller fanbase that the likely fourth playable character for all of those series (Bandanna Dee, Dixie Kong, Krystal), as well as the fact that Sakurai had personally said that he believed Ridley did not fit as a playable character a few years prior.

With Brawl, Metroid fans thought they had missed out on Dark Samus forever, and with Smash 4, Metroid fans believed the same fate had fallen with Ridley (due to Sakurai's statements). Its incredible that we managed to get both of these characters for Ultimate, especially considering there have only been nine newcomers unveiled so far.

There is also another perk of Dark Samus getting in as a fighter for her fans. She will have her first (and perhaps only) piece of merchandise dedicated to the character (an amiibo).

Metroid fans in general ended up having all the critical characters to the series getting notable roles. Samus, Ridley, and Dark Samus (the three most important characters) are playable. Mother Brain and Metroid (the most critical enemies after Ridley and Dark Samus) are Assist Trophies. Kraid (the most iconic enemy after Mother Brain and Metroid) has a stage that literally and figuratively revolves around him.

There is only a month and a half left until the game's release, and likely a month or less until we get the final pre-release Ultimate direct. Regardless of what happens with whom the remaining playable characters are (whether there are only two more or another seven more), the Metroid fans can actually enjoy a privilege that few other series fans can enjoy, that all of your series integral characters are now in. It will be interesting to see if Sylux takes off a character due to Prime 4 or not, but for now, Metroid is "complete".

 

[ChronoBound]

I do not mean to make a second post in a row. However, with us knowing the final roster, and Sakurai saying there will not be any echoes as DLC, this just further cements just how lucky Dark Samus was to make it. Not even Shadow, Impa, or Octoling were able to make it as echo fighters. Daisy, Chrom, and Ken all had major appearances in recent years (Daisy in Super Mario Run and almost every Mario spinoff, Chrom in Fire Emblem Warriors where he even got an amiibo, Ken in Street Fighter V). Richter got in through being the character whom much of Simon's moves were taken from (as well as being the Belmont from arguably the most popular Castlevania title, Symphony of the Night). Dark Samus by comparison made her last appearance 11 years ago, and hails from a franchise where it took 17 years of high volume requests just to get the most iconic and popular character after Samus in (Ridley).

Out of 11 newcomers and only five echo slots, Dark Samus managed to make it in.

 

[meleebrawler]

I do not mean to make a second post in a row. However, with us knowing the final roster, and Sakurai saying there will not be any echoes as DLC, this just further cements just how lucky Dark Samus was to make it. Not even Shadow, Impa, or Octoling were able to make it as echo fighters. Daisy, Chrom, and Ken all had major appearances in recent years (Daisy in Super Mario Run and almost every Mario spinoff, Chrom in Fire Emblem Warriors where he even got an amiibo, Ken in Street Fighter V). Richter got in through being the character whom much of Simon's moves were taken from (as well as being the Belmont from arguably the most popular Castlevania title, Symphony of the Night). Dark Samus by comparison made her last appearance 11 years ago, and hails from a franchise where it took 17 years of high volume requests just to get the most iconic and popular character after Samus in (Ridley).

Out of 11 newcomers and only five echo slots, Dark Samus managed to make it in.

Speaking of Ken, he just broke another "rule" of echoes in that he has different attributes from Ryu (moves faster).

 

[TheKingOfEvil2014]

Huh. If Ken has different attributes, I wonder if some of the other Echoes have different attributes.

 

[ChronoBound]

Another thing to consider is that Dark Samus is the only character aside from Isabelle and Little Mac to be promoted from an Assist Trophy. Isabelle is an icon for one of Nintendo's most popular franchises (she is probably the most popular Animal Crossing character at this point), and Little Mac was the face of one of Nintendo's long running franchises (older than every franchise except Mario, DK, and Game & Watch) that had a very successful Wii installment. Not even Shadow (who seemed like an easy echo) made the jump. Dark Samus's promotion was a fortunate anomaly.

 

[Aetheri]

There's a bit more Dark Samus gameplay in the Treehouse after the direct and we see another one of her victory poses...kind of a bit of a step down to her echoes victory pose but she raises her fist then drops it to her side. Near the end of the video. Most likely a reference to her Corruption artwork.

 

[Izanagi97]

I think that fully charged Charge shot did about 29-30 damage (regular Samus seems to do about 26-28 or so)

 

[Diem]

I do not mean to make a second post in a row. However, with us knowing the final roster, and Sakurai saying there will not be any echoes as DLC, this just further cements just how lucky Dark Samus was to make it. Not even Shadow, Impa, or Octoling were able to make it as echo fighters. Daisy, Chrom, and Ken all had major appearances in recent years (Daisy in Super Mario Run and almost every Mario spinoff, Chrom in Fire Emblem Warriors where he even got an amiibo, Ken in Street Fighter V). Richter got in through being the character whom much of Simon's moves were taken from (as well as being the Belmont from arguably the most popular Castlevania title, Symphony of the Night). Dark Samus by comparison made her last appearance 11 years ago, and hails from a franchise where it took 17 years of high volume requests just to get the most iconic and popular character after Samus in (Ridley).

Out of 11 newcomers and only five echo slots, Dark Samus managed to make it in.

Another thing to consider is that Dark Samus is the only character aside from Isabelle and Little Mac to be promoted from an Assist Trophy. Isabelle is an icon for one of Nintendo's most popular franchises (she is probably the most popular Animal Crossing character at this point), and Little Mac was the face of one of Nintendo's long running franchises (older than every franchise except Mario, DK, and Game & Watch) that had a very successful Wii installment. Not even Shadow (who seemed like an easy echo) made the jump. Dark Samus's promotion was a fortunate anomaly.

Yeah, that Direct was a bloodbath. One we should've seen coming, really, but... Shadow? Shadow didn't make it as an Echo Fighter? But Dark Samus did? What world am I living in? Was there a glitch with my ballot entry where it somehow split into thousands of dark echo entries and tricked Sakurai into thinking there's greater demand for the character than there actually is?

I managed to take a screengrab of the "Who are you most excited for?" poll in the huge general discussion thread right before they changed it:

Dark Samus is in dead last. Shadow would probably be way more popular than Chrom or Daisy. Yet somehow he's still an Assist Trophy. AND we got Ridley, too.

But also, I got Chibi-Robo. As a Mii costume. He was my other most-wanted character. Definitely not as glamorous or as fulfilling as being a full character but... I never would have seen that coming. Either of them. But I got them both, at least a little bit.

Even if the rest of the Direct was for the mostpart a bit of a letdown (except for the end trailer that took my breath away), I'll be playing this game for the rest of my life.

Speaking of Ken, he just broke another "rule" of echoes in that he has different attributes from Ryu (moves faster).

Huh. If Ken has different attributes, I wonder if some of the other Echoes have different attributes.

Hm... so Dark Samus could potentially be floatier. Well, only about a month before we'll know for sure. But this is good news.

Though it's possible that special attention was given to Ken because, well, he's Ken. One of the most iconic Street Fighter characters. Dark Samus was lucky to get in at all, let alone get such amazing work done on her aesthetics. If her gameplay isn't too distinct, I won't lose sleep.

There's a bit more Dark Samus gameplay in the Treehouse after the direct and we see another one of her victory poses...kind of a bit of a step down to her echoes victory pose but she raises her fist then drops it to her side. Near the end of the video. Most likely a reference to her Corruption artwork.

I skipped the Treehouse stream because I was still recovering from all the mixed feelings from the Direct. The first thing they showed was the Smash Switch bundle, which I'm getting tomorrow anyways (GameStop has a promotion for about another week where you trade in your old Switch for $200 towards a new one, so I'll just be paying $160 difference), so I tuned out.

Didn't expect them to demo the characters we've been missing. When I found out there was Simon/Richter gameplay, I was like "Ah crap, gotta go find Dark Samus." So I go into the first video I find that's like 50 minutes long, no Dark Samus. Now I'm thinking "Oh don't tell me these scumbags demoed every character EXCEPT Dark Samus." But, I found the other video, and now I know we have some footage, at least.

Shame they didn't take 15 seconds to tell us anything about the character, but I guess only Nate cared. He wrote the logbooks in the first Metroid Prime, after all, and worked on other localizations for Metroid, so of course he has some affinity for the character. Glad he was able to win, too.

That win pose actually looks like a combination of her MP2 render and other MP3 render:

I like it. It's a bit more subtle. And weirdos like me can point to the exact images it was probably drawn from.

 

[slamallama]

I can't quite hear over the players talking, but it sounds like she (or it, depending on what kind of person you are) has a different victory fanfare than Samus, and I also checked around and so does Ridley. Do all the characters have their own distinct fanfares now, or is this just Metroid getting an awesome amount of work put into it all of a sudden?

 

[Metallinatus]

I can't quite hear over the players talking, but it sounds like she (or it, depending on what kind of person you are) has a different victory fanfare than Samus, and I also checked around and so does Ridley. Do all the characters have their own distinct fanfares now, or is this just Metroid getting an awesome amount of work put into it all of a sudden?

I'm sure Samus and ZSS have different fanfares in Sm4sh already.

 

[Garo]

I can't quite hear over the players talking, but it sounds like she (or it, depending on what kind of person you are) has a different victory fanfare than Samus, and I also checked around and so does Ridley. Do all the characters have their own distinct fanfares now, or is this just Metroid getting an awesome amount of work put into it all of a sudden?

Many baddies and edgelords have had unique victory themes. Bowser, Bowser Jr, Meta Knight and Dark Pit for example.

 

[MasterOfKnees]

I'm sure Samus and ZSS have different fanfares in Sm4sh already.

Nope, Samus and ZSS have the same. Ridley and Dark Samus share a darker version of the original Metroid fanfare.

 

[Garo]

A video with alternate costumes for all characters, including Dark Samus. Her's are shown during the second "set":

E: Seems the video was taken down.

Can anyone place them all? I'm seeing SA-X and one very reminiscent of a Prime 2 concept art piece where a white Dark Samus with orange visor is flying away from Aether. Some others seem very familiar, but I can't instantly place them.

 

[meleebrawler]

A video with alternate costumes for all characters, including Dark Samus. Her's are shown during the second "set":

Can anyone place them all? I'm seeing SA-X and one very reminiscent of a Prime 2 concept art piece where a white Dark Samus with orange visor is flying away from Aether. Some others seem very familiar, but I can't instantly place them.

One of them actually looks like Ultron.

 

[Metallinatus]

Nope, Samus and ZSS have the same. Ridley and Dark Samus share a darker version of the original Metroid fanfare.

I should have checked it before, damn, I could swear they were different.... I think I am starting to mix fanfares of different games up.

 

[Shog]

GAH why hasn't anyone posted alternative colors yet? I want to see SA-X or a sick Blue-Orange color scheme :<

EDIT: Nevermind found them and made this:

 

[Garo]

GAH why hasn't anyone posted alternative colors yet? I want to see SA-X or a sick Blue-Orange color scheme :<

Someone reuploaded the video that got taken down:

I think Dark Samus has some of the best alts in the game. I can see myself using them all depending on my mood, which I previously only did with Roy.

 

[Shog]

Yeah I just made a picture but thanks for this video haha. I really only dislike the yellow color scheme for some reason, but maybe it improves for me while playing with it

 

[Aetheri]

GAH why hasn't anyone posted alternative colors yet? I want to see SA-X or a sick Blue-Orange color scheme :<

EDIT: Nevermind found them and made this:

The Phazon Suit alt tho! White suit is sick too...

Blue-green may be a reference to Sylux? Only because of the glowing green as the blueisn't quite the same.

Pink/purple is possibly Gandrayda

Red one's possibly a reference to Trace

 

[TheKingOfEvil2014]

These alts are so sick! One of them seems like a Red Phazon reference.

 

[slamallama]

GAH why hasn't anyone posted alternative colors yet? I want to see SA-X or a sick Blue-Orange color scheme :<

EDIT: Nevermind found them and made this:

So here's what it looks like these are supposed to be, to me at least:
1) Dark Samus
2) Rhundas
3) Noxus OR the Copied Power Suit from Subspace Emissary
4) Dark Suit? Phazon Suit? Trace?
5) Reminds me of something but I can't put my finger on it
6) Final Form Dark Samus from Echoes :EDIT: Nah, it's from concept art
7) Metroid Prime Exoskeleton
8) Gandrayda

 

[Izanagi97]

So here's what it looks like these are supposed to be, to me at least:
1) Dark Samus
2) Rhundas
3) Noxus OR the Copied Power Suit from Subspace Emissary
4) Dark Suit? Phazon Suit? Trace?
5) Reminds me of something but I can't put my finger on it
6) Final Form Dark Samus from Echoes
7) Metroid Prime Exoskeleton
8) Gandrayda

So basically the alts represent either different forms of Metroid Prime or powerful enemies Samus fought

 

[meleebrawler]

So here's what it looks like these are supposed to be, to me at least:
1) Dark Samus
2) Rhundas
3) Noxus OR the Copied Power Suit from Subspace Emissary
4) Dark Suit? Phazon Suit? Trace?
5) Reminds me of something but I can't put my finger on it
6) Final Form Dark Samus from Echoes
7) Metroid Prime Exoskeleton
8) Gandrayda

I think the grey and red one is actually Ghor, now that I think about it.

 

[IsmaR]

The stock icon leads me to believe the grey/red is a reference to concept art Dark Samus.

It may be a mix or updated version with elements from other things. Hard to tell until we see it in game/not from a blurry screenshot.

 

[Diem]

I'm not too hot on most of these alt colors, actually. I was holding out for a black and red one because that makes the most sense, given that Dark Samus comes from the Phazon Suit. I kind of like the yellow one because it's gold, and also the silver and red one because that's the closest it gets to what I want. But I'll need to see them both in game before I can tell if I truly like them or not.

Regardless, I'll never not be satisfied with the way things turned out. Even if I don't like the alt colors, I'll just rock the default. I have 0 problem with that.

Plus, alt colors are the easiest thing to mod, so I'm sure someone will do it once that gets rolling.

The stock icon leads me to believe the grey/red is a reference to concept art Dark Samus.

It may be a mix or updated version with elements from other things. Hard to tell until we see it in game/not from a blurry screenshot.

Ah, that actually makes sense. Alt colors come from stuff like that all the time, can't believe I didn't think of this concept art.

Definitely glad we didn't get that design. It looks really goofy, and definitely wouldn't look very good with Gamecube graphics.

 

[slamallama]

Actually now that I think about it, the 4th one looks kinda like AU 313 (aka the most anticlimactic final boss ever), which makes a lot of sense

 

[Sirfishe]

why do you guys call dark samus a her? I mean, its a parasite. Its an genderless alien.

 

[Diem]

why do you guys call dark samus a her? I mean, its a parasite. Its an genderless alien.

Because both the games and Smash refer to Dark Samus as she/her. And she isn't a parasite.

Where are you getting your information from?

 

[Sirfishe]

Because both the games and Smash refer to Dark Samus as she/her. And she isn't a parasite.

Where are you getting your information from?

but she's not human either. There isn't a woman inside that armor