Official DLC Speculation Discussion Volume II

[WeirdChillFever]

They wouldn't have announced that there would be 6 fighters unless they had already secured rights to all those characters; if negotiations fell through and they said "oops, it's actually 5 characters" they'd be in pretty hot water. So the latest this character was finalized is, like, right before FP2 was announced. I'd be surprised if that was short enough to cause delays, but I don't claim to know how long this stuff takes.

Yeah, the scenario would be more like, say, Disney calling in November (or at least before the Byleth presentation was recorded) with “Oh yeah that Sora thing, you can have it.” or at least negotiating being finalized before the announcement and them needing a little extra time to conceptualize, but as I said, if that causes delays I’m wondering when Min Min’s, Steve‘s, Aegis‘ and Kazuya’s playstyles were fully finalized because only one of them (Min Min) seemingly caused any delays.

While I agree with your point, it's not like they can't easily find another character. They have multiple 1st party options to promote(Pokemon alone).

I don't think they would announce 6 are coming unless they're locked on, though. More of a business practice to be accurate and know what's going on, instead of a case where they need to worry about falling back on someone(it's no worry).

That would be a funny option, like okay, say, Sora is a maybe but our fallback guy is Paper Mario but then Paper Mario’s, I dunno, Copy mechanic turns out to not be as much as a slam dunk as they pencilled in

 

[Inferno7]

I don't think there's necessarily any weird shenanigans for the last character because of timing - they could very well be revealed in September, it would still be "a while" and follow the pattern we've seen thus far. If it does stretch to December, then I think there may be a reason for the delay.

I can, however, see that the last character may be one with negotiations occurring very last minute or decided later than normal for FP2, thus the sixth slot.

I share this reasoning, people are reading WAAYYYY too deep into the "a little while" comment. Sakurai just knows how impatient Smash fans are, it's that simple.

I can see negotations going through at last minute, which could explain the extra slot. Even if the Sonic situation isn't 100% true, keep in mind Snake almost got in Melee.

 

[The Rhythm Theif]

Is it a Action game character based around weapon switching?

Mega Man Zero comes to mind.

 

[Quick Gaming (QG)]

I'm not trying to be forceful with the idea of FP11 being an Undertale rep but it's seriously red flag raising to me that there's a good possibility the sixth fighter was added on last minute, and the easiest answer to why I see is the reception to Sans' mii costume being bigger than most of the first fighter passes fighters. Unlike someone like Crash or Sora, it'd also be really easy to negotiate with just Toby Fox instead of Activison/Blizzard or Square Enix/Disney, especially since him and Sakurai seem to be friends

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

I'm not trying to be forceful with the idea of FP11 being an Undertale rep but it's seriously red flag raising to me that there's a good possibility the sixth fighter was added on last minute, and the easiest answer to why I see is the reception to Sans' mii costume being bigger than most of the first fighter passes fighters. Unlike someone like Crash or Sora, it'd also be really easy to negotiate with just Toby Fox instead of Activison/Blizzard or Square Enix/Disney, especially since him and Sakurai seem to be friends

What evidence is there to suggest that the 6th fighter was a last minute addition?

 

[Technomage]

I'm not trying to be forceful with the idea of FP11 being an Undertale rep but it's seriously red flag raising to me that there's a good possibility the sixth fighter was added on last minute, and the easiest answer to why I see is the reception to Sans' mii costume being bigger than most of the first fighter passes fighters. Unlike someone like Crash or Sora, it'd also be really easy to negotiate with just Toby Fox instead of Activison/Blizzard or Square Enix/Disney, especially since him and Sakurai seem to be friends

Interesting. Now as for a potential UT fighter, would Kris, the main character of Deltarune, be a possible pick?

 

[SpectreJordan]

Yeah, I'm of the belief that we're looking too deeply into this. "A little while longer" can range from a month to half a year and everything in between, Smash has always had some sort of presence at a mainline Nintendo Direct, and Nintendo almost always has a September Direct. Chances are we're ending it there.

There’s a decent chance you’re right. But at the same time, Sakurai hasn’t done this before AFAIK. He definitely didn’t warn us of the hellish wait between Min-Min & Steve, even though I assume they had settled on Steve at Minecon by then.

But maybe it’s just weird wording from him since it’s the final fighter? I guess we’ll just have to wait & see.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

That would be a funny option, like okay, say, Sora is a maybe but our fallback guy is Paper Mario but then Paper Mario’s, I dunno, Copy mechanic turns out to not be as much as a slam dunk as they pencilled in

If for some odd reason they kept up negotiations and didn't have everyone confirmed when saying 6 fighters... yeah, I could see some interesting fallback options. Paper Mario would be awesome on its own anyway.

I'm not really entertaining it as realistic, but it's a fun hypothetical~

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

There’s a decent chance you’re right. But at the same time, Sakurai hasn’t done this before AFAIK. He definitely didn’t warn us of the hellish wait between Min-Min & Steve, even though I assume they had settled on Steve at Minecon by then.

But maybe it’s just weird wording from him since it’s the final fighter? I guess we’ll just have to wait & see.

Not outright, but he has implied it before by stating that the reveals were probably done a little too fast...right before Isabelle's reveal. Ken, Incineroar, and Piranha Plant's reveals were about a month and a half to two months later. It did indicate a slowdown in reveals since they weren't rapid firing them anymore, but there was never an especially long wait around that time.

 

[Slime Master]

While I agree with your point, it's not like they can't easily find another character. They have multiple 1st party options to promote(Pokemon alone).

I don't think they would announce 6 are coming unless they're locked on, though. More of a business practice to be accurate and know what's going on, instead of a case where they need to worry about falling back on someone(it's no worry).

I'm not entirely confident that even first parties are 0 effort on that front though. There's probably some discussion with the creators still. Also as mentioned there's some conceptualization going on. Might still be possible to have a fallback, but I imagine it'd be a waste of resources.

 

[Cosmic77]

Not outright, but he has implied it before by stating that the reveals were probably done a little too fast...right before Isabelle's reveal. Ken, Incineroar, and Piranha Plant's reveals were about a month and a half to two months later. It did indicate a slowdown in reveals since they weren't rapid firing them anymore, but there was never an especially long wait around that time.

I believe Sakurai said something along the lines of, "The reveals have been pretty rapid-fire up until now. Expect them to slow down."

That's more of a comment on the number of characters that were revealed during that time rather than the wait between them. Besides, after the August 2018 Direct, there were three and a half months until Ultimate would launch. There weren't a lot of scenarios where we wouldn't get these character announcements close together.

 

[Twilord]

Imagine if Sakurai just said "the last Smash Bros character will be announced at an event that otherwise has no Nintendo presence" and effectively caused Smash fans to descend on every event from every other publisher for the next five months.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

I'm not entirely confident that even first parties are 0 effort on that front though. There's probably some discussion with the creators still. Also as mentioned there's some conceptualization going on. Might still be possible to have a fallback, but I imagine it'd be a waste of resources.

Of course everyone takes effort. But First Parties are easier to get than 3rd parties, so if they somehow had a fallback plan, it's most likely 1st party.

It'd be a waste of resources for the Proof of Concept, but that's it. They often are wasted resources anyway, since it doesn't often get the go ahead. But they won't know if it'll work without something to try, so it still in a way is useful. There's tons of scrapped content.

 

[Shroob]

I believe Sakurai said something along the lines of, "The reveals have been pretty rapid-fire up until now. Expect them to slow down."

That's more of a comment on the number of characters that were revealed during that time rather than the wait between them. Besides, after the August 2018 Direct, there were three and a half months until Ultimate would launch. There weren't a lot of scenarios where we wouldn't get these character announcements close together.

To add to this, his exact quote was:

"We announced Isabelle in the Nintendo Direct… however, it would be a mistake to think that the new character announcements will keep going [at this pace] until Smash Bros. [Ultimate] releases. We may have been a little trigger-happy so we’ll be living modestly from here on out.”

 

[Quick Gaming (QG)]

What evidence is there to suggest that the 6th fighter was a last minute addition?

mainly the wait a little while longer combined with the fact that we didn't know how many characters would be in the second fighter pass until after Byleth, but they chose to announce one was coming after Terry's reveal? Can't speak for others but it makes me think perhaps they were waiting to confirm negotiations before they settled on the number of characters. I can't imagine why else they wouldn't say outright how many characters unless they were waiting for confirmation. Combine this with the fact that the first one was five and this one was six, it makes me think maybe they found out about a certain request and then wanted to add them in at the end. I only say an UT rep because the Sans mii costume was announced the same day as the second fighter pass and got a bigger reaction than some fighters. I don't believe any other mii costumes in Banjo or Terry's update got a similar reaction, so I personally think they could've reached out to Toby to add in one more fighter.

Fun Fact: Remember when Sakurai made a post in English stating to please not bombard them with requests? It was actually because France was pestering and spamming non-stop requests for Undertale content or Sans in Smash. And that was around when the first fighter pass was announced

 

[Geno Boost]

I'm not trying to be forceful with the idea of FP11 being an Undertale rep but it's seriously red flag raising to me that there's a good possibility the sixth fighter was added on last minute, and the easiest answer to why I see is the reception to Sans' mii costume being bigger than most of the first fighter passes fighters. Unlike someone like Crash or Sora, it'd also be really easy to negotiate with just Toby Fox instead of Activison/Blizzard or Square Enix/Disney, especially since him and Sakurai seem to be friends

Sakurai has been friends with a lot of developers over the years Toby fox is simply the latest one.
I don’t think it’s good to assume that a fighter gets in based on Sakurai friendship with a developer because the reality is there are many developers that have been friends with Sakurai long before Toby fox and they are probably waiting for the smash invitation before undertale was even a thing.

 

[Guynamednelson]

What evidence is there to suggest that the 6th fighter was a last minute addition?

"I don't want a lowkey finale so licensing for someone I want was done later"

 

[Diddy Kong]

On Reddit's Daily Discussion Thread for Smash, some users were discussing how the last characters in Ultimate for both base game and FP1 were a fighting game character and then a character from an overrepresented franchise. The other franchise that's overrepresented aside from Pokemon and Fire Emblem is Mario, and going on your fanservice pick, this means Waluigi would be the last fighter.

Though I think Mario has the perfect amount of representation considering it's Nintendo's biggest IP.

Mario already had it's DLC newcomer with Piranha Plant. I doubt it's gonna be a Mario character. Pokemon is more likely, but still, not too likely in my opinion. However, since Xenoblade Chronicles 2 got Pyra and Mythra, it's still possible. I also think a Zelda newcomer is really overlooked.

 

[Quick Gaming (QG)]

Mario already had it's DLC newcomer with Piranha Plant. I doubt it's gonna be a Mario character. Pokemon is more likely, but still, not too likely in my opinion. However, since Xenoblade Chronicles 2 got Pyra and Mythra, it's still possible. I also think a Zelda newcomer is really overlooked.

I'd be down with Impa, plus Age of Calamity gives her a fun new design they could use

Geno Boost All I'm saying is that I don't think they expected the reaction to Sans to be quite as big as it was and that could be grounds to put in an Undertale rep last minute. Heck, it doesn't even have to be an Undertale rep, I still think it's odd they announced a DLC wave without saying how many characters would be in it. It makes me think they were waiting for confirmation on how many, which could probably stem from working out deals and such

 

[Diddy Kong]

I'd be down with Impa, plus Age of Calamity gives her a fun new design they could use

Exactly what I'd want. However, I'm not expecting it to happen unfortunately. She's the most logical pick, sure. But so was Rex, so was Hiachi, so was Spring Man, we only really got the "expected" choice with Byleth.

I do suspect that they'd choose a Champion instead of Impa. Probably cause there are lots of revisited ideas with the DLC characters, as Hero, Min Min, Pyra and Mythra, Steve... I don't think it's too out of question that they'd consider a BotW Champion as a newcomer.

My absolute last suspect for a first party newcomer is Isaac, from Golden Sun. My suspicion grew with Advance Wars getting a remake, something that was often requested, same with Golden Sun. I do suspect that a Golden Sun game is in the making, and Isaac could therefore be a sort of promotional character.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

mainly the wait a little while longer combined with the fact that we didn't know how many characters would be in the second fighter pass until after Byleth, but they chose to announce one was coming after Terry's reveal? Can't speak for others but it makes me think perhaps they were waiting to confirm negotiations before they settled on the number of characters. I can't imagine why else they wouldn't say outright how many characters unless they were waiting for confirmation. Combine this with the fact that the first one was five and this one was six, it makes me think maybe they found out about a certain request and then wanted to add them in at the end. I only say an UT rep because the Sans mii costume was announced the same day as the second fighter pass and got a bigger reaction than some fighters. I don't believe any other mii costumes in Banjo or Terry's update got a similar reaction, so I personally think they could've reached out to Toby to add in one more fighter.

That's an impossible scenario unfortunately. If they were waiting for negotiations to go through before saying how many fighters there'd be, then the decision to add an Undertale character could not have been influenced by the reaction to Sans's costume because the character they picked was already under negotiations. They would have had to not know how many fighters they wanted, and then jumped on Undertale after Sans's costume's reveal, which is at best, an indeterminable scenario.

 

[Perkilator]

It’s a shame Smash Ultimate didn’t make Palutena Guidance interactions for DLC

The stuff they could’ve done for Steve, Sephiroth, and Kazuya would’ve been great pic.twitter.com/TP0uqQ9BLf

— TheNCSmaster (@TheNCSmaster) July 3, 2021

Unlikely, but I hope we get an update circa the last fighter's release that adds Guidances for the Fighters Pass characters.
(Thank the lord for the people behind the fan made versions, at least)

 

[Quick Gaming (QG)]

That's an impossible scenario unfortunately. If they were waiting for negotiations to go through before saying how many fighters there'd be, then the decision to add an Undertale character could not have been influenced by the reaction to Sans's costume because the character they picked was already under negotiations. They would have had to not know how many fighters they wanted, and then jumped on Undertale after Sans's costume's reveal, which is at best, an indeterminable scenario.

true, though it's also possible they planned 5 but were waiting for those to go through and then threw in a sixth after the reception

I know it's reaching at this point but it's a possibility

 

[Guynamednelson]

maybe the sixth is because

you know

they weren't doing as many third-parties this time and first-parties are cheaper

 

[Eldrake]

Imagine if Sakurai just said "the last Smash Bros character will be announced at an event that otherwise has no Nintendo presence" and effectively caused Smash fans to descend on every event from every other publisher for the next five months.

The year is-wait a second it's just the same year, uhhh... let me rephrase that.
The month is August.
The International 10 is well underway in Stockholm-wait a second Sweden told Valve to get lost, uhhh...
The International 10 is well underway.
Valve as well as the on-site staff and community personalities is confused and wondering why Twitch chat is overwhelmed with demands for Smash news,

 

[RoboFist]

What do you want for the last “premium” mii costume ?? (Costume + song). So far, its been indie characters (sans, cuphead and shantae) so I don’t think they will move from there. IMO, we need a hollow knight Mii Costume, its on of the best indie games of past decade.

In a dream world?

BRAWLER:

(The wig alone would make it count as a "deluxe", and Skullgirls music in Smash sounds downright heavenly)

SWORDFIGHTER:

(Easily in my top 3 favorite indie games and a 3DS eshop classic)

GUNNER:

(This very well could be one of the most important indie games of all time and it's tragically ignored these days)

 

[Cutie Gwen]

Yeah nah this idea that we have another Sonic scenario makes no goddamn sense as it means actively changing something that was already locked in, especially with how easy most companies have been to work with

In a dream world?

BRAWLER:
View attachment 321565
(The wig alone would make it count as a "deluxe", and Skullgirls music in Smash sounds downright heavenly)

SWORDFIGHTER:
View attachment 321566
(Easily in my top 3 favorite indie games and a 3DS eshop classic)

GUNNER:
View attachment 321568
(This very well could be one of the most important indie games of all time and it's tragically ignored these days)

I like Alien Hominid as it's a pretty damn fun Metal Slug clone but what makes it so important beyond putting Behemoth on the map before they made Castle Crashers and Battleblock Theater?

 

[SKX31]

Yeah I've looked through that book people were talking about with the five year plan and it makes no mention of this at all.

Page 96-97: https://issuu.com/maxpublishing/docs/lsb_spring_2018



In fact this whole thing had nothing to do with Crash Bandicoot. It had to do with posters and merchandise so I'm guessing the "spanish leaker" the redditor linked just mistranslated what was said.

Boy do I feel stupid.

TBF, it's one of those things where it sounds credible on the surface because A-B are infamous for their medium / long term plans. That's something that's not just present in how they handle franchises like CoD but also in how they talk about their franchises in general.

Then again, A-B is also the kind of corp to do complete 180s if they wind up facing intense PR disasters. So the fact that the five year plan wound up false is not really surprising in retrospect.

The year is-wait a second it's just the same year, uhhh... let me rephrase that.
The month is August.
The International 10 is well underway in Stockholm-wait a second Sweden told Valve to get lost, uhhh...
The International 10 is well underway.
Valve as well as the on-site staff and community personalities is confused and wondering why Twitch chat is overwhelmed with demands for Smash news,

If this is how DK wins, I'll... accept it. Despite the sudden mass confusion between Dota 2 and Smash fans - the inevitable "DK vs. DK" and "Dragon Kong" memes would be worth it though.

I mean, the anime alone gave him a leg up:

Hope y'all are ready for a Dragon form whose attacks both slow, deal AoE damage and act as a poison debuff a la Eiha. Oh and the Dragon can fly around freely (for a limited time, but still) because he happens to have Aghanim's Sceptre - and that Sceptre is OP-pls-nerf.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

TBF, it's one of those things where it sounds credible on the surface because A-B are infamous for their medium / long term plans. That's something that's not just present in how they handle franchises like CoD but also in how they talk about their franchises in general.

Then again, A-B is also the kind of corp to do complete 180s if they wind up facing intense PR disasters. So the fact that the five year plan wound up false is not really surprising in retrospect.



If this is how DK wins, I'll... accept it. Despite the sudden mass confusion between Dota 2 and Smash fans - the inevitable "DK vs. DK" and "Dragon Kong" memes would be worth it though.

I mean, the anime alone gave him a leg up:

Hope y'all are ready for a Dragon form whose attacks both slow, deal AoE damage and act as a poison debuff a la Eiha. Oh and the Dragon can fly around freely (for a limited time, but still) because he happens to have Aghanim's Sceptre - and that Sceptre is OP-pls-nerf.

Hey man if it finally gives us a ****ing install I'm down

 

[Evil Trapezium]

TBF, it's one of those things where it sounds credible on the surface because A-B are infamous for their medium / long term plans. That's something that's not just present in how they handle franchises like CoD but also in how they talk about their franchises in general.

Then again, A-B is also the kind of corp to do complete 180s if they wind up facing intense PR disasters. So the fact that the five year plan wound up false is not really surprising in retrospect.

We assume it happened and it made an ass out of u and me.

 

[Eldrake]

If this is how DK wins, I'll... accept it. Despite the sudden mass confusion between Dota 2 and Smash fans - the inevitable "DK vs. DK" and "Dragon Kong" memes would be worth it though.

I mean, the anime alone gave him a leg up:

Hope y'all are ready for a Dragon form whose attacks both slow, deal AoE damage and act as a poison debuff a la Eiha. Oh and the Dragon can fly around freely (for a limited time, but still) because he happens to have Aghanim's Sceptre - and that Sceptre is OP-pls-nerf.

The funny thing is that Sakurai could get away with including an Anime Dragon Knight alt because there's actually an Anime Dragon Knight persona in the game right now, which would then give Smash fans an excuse to call Dragon Knight an anime swordsman.

Which also means that DK would double up as technically a Netflix rep, which would probably spawn hilarious memes.

 

[RouffWestie]

What do you want for the last “premium” mii costume ?? (Costume + song). So far, its been indie characters (sans, cuphead and shantae) so I don’t think they will move from there. IMO, we need a hollow knight Mii Costume, its on of the best indie games of past decade.

ps: a rhythm game fighter mechanic should be about pressing the attacks buttons in certain rhythms or patrons.

I 100% want Cadence from Crypt of the Necrodancer, especially after she managed to get a crossover with Zelda.

 

[cashregister9]

Dragon Knight? Not technically a game franchise?

 

[RoboFist]

I like Alien Hominid as it's a pretty damn fun Metal Slug clone but what makes it so important beyond putting Behemoth on the map before they made Castle Crashers and Battleblock Theater?

It was among (if not the first) notable Flash game that exploded in popularity to the point where it eventually became a complete fleshed-out console game. This was in 2002, back before everyone was making incredible level-based games in Flash. Flash helped create an entire generation of game developers and really deserves some kind of recognition in a "video game museum" like Smash.

I was just turning 11 when the original game dropped on Newgrounds and I remember my mind being blown when it was announced it was going to be ported to consoles. I imagine it's how people felt in the 90s when they watched indie movies that completely changed how society viewed the filmmaking process.

Plus, c'mon, his proportions would fit really well. Imagine 3-stocking Sephiroth with this little s**t.

I 100% want Cadence from Crypt of the Necrodancer, especially after she managed to get a crossover with Zelda.

CotN music in Smash would be incredible.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Hey man if it finally gives us a ****ing install I'm down

But we already have installs.

1. 
2. 
3. 
4. 
5. 

 

[CapitaineCrash]

About the last fighter discussion, I don't think that the "it will take a while" comment is about negotiation. It doesn't make sense that this late in the pass negotiation wouldn't be 100% over. I think that the last fighter is taking longer either because it has again a more complex moveset (like Steve, Kazuya and Min min who was hard to balance), or maybe just because Nintendo want to drag the pass for the end of the year so they're taking their time.

I also don't really see the last fighter as a bonus or a late addition. They just decided to do 1 more, simple as that.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

Dragon Knight? Not technically a game franchise?

You joke but from what I remember playing, the DS version had a very cool way of utilizing meter and the Advent Decks so hell yeah

It was among (if not the first) notable Flash game that exploded in popularity to the point where it eventually became a complete fleshed-out console game. This was in 2002, back before everyone was making incredible level-based games in Flash. Flash helped create an entire generation of game developers and really deserves some kind of recognition in a "video game museum" like Smash.

I was just turning 11 when the original game dropped on Newgrounds and I remember my mind being blown when it was announced it was going to be ported to consoles. I imagine it's how people felt in the 90s when they watched indie movies that completely changed how society viewed the filmmaking process.

Plus, c'mon, his proportions would fit really well. Imagine 3-stocking Sephiroth with this little s**t.



CotN music in Smash would be incredible.

I already agree that Flash games have more influence than their lack of popularity seemed to suggest but this is a solid case, I knew the console version first so that's probably why I didn't realize it. I remember the hame always booting me out of playing beyond the first stage for using the baby mode difficulty even when I had selected the hardest difficulty before realizing that 2P somehow had it's own difficulty settings which hit the checkbox for the roadblock despite how I only had 1 controller plugged in lmao

But we already have installs.

1. 
2. 
3. 
4. 
5. 

Cloud and Joker have significantly less control over their install usage as their meter systems have no depth nor is there any real decision making, with Cloud's Limit moreso functioning as EX moves. Sephiroth for that matter is a comeback mechanic the player can't actively choose when to activate. WFT comes close as there's more decisionmaking put it's relegated to a button press and how long it's been since you last tried using it which is still different from what I want

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Cloud and Joker have significantly less control over their install usage as their meter systems have no depth nor is there any real decision making, with Cloud's Limit moreso functioning as EX moves. Sephiroth for that matter is a comeback mechanic the player can't actively choose when to activate. WFT comes close as there's more decisionmaking put it's relegated to a button press and how long it's been since you last tried using it which is still different from what I want

...I didn't see you deny how much fun PAC-Man's Install is.

---
​

Sol players vs. People who don't want to hear Ride the Fire! in every match:

 

[Cutie Gwen]

...I didn't see you deny how much fun PAC-Man's Install is.

---
​

Sol players vs. People who don't want to hear Ride the Fire! in every match:
View attachment 321582

Nah bro that's players who use Birthday Train against Sol players who don't want to DI and die for it

 

[Mushroomguy12]

But we already have installs.

1. 
2. 
3. 
4. 
5. 

I feel sorry for Pac-Man’s Ult icon, the Smash 4 one has become such an ingrained part of Smashboards culture it has transcended games and replaced it’s successor.