Official DLC Speculation Discussion Volume II

[Rie Sonomura]

“One Winged Angel? That should be easy, I have two wings!”

Can I get an F in the chat for Pit?

 

[Cutie Gwen]

Fixed.


Is the Ninja more iconic to the game than the Thief? Seems kinda random that it'd be the only promoted class involved.

Idk about that but FF Ninjas' gimmick is throwing items. Sounds like it'd fit in perfectly tbh

 

[SvartWolf]

I'm still pissed they didn't alter Young Link's moveset to incorporate his transformation masks in any way shape or form. Even the fact that Fierce Deity Link isn't his Final Smash seems like one huge missed opportunity.

But anyway, you know who would suit that 3-in-1 gimmick really well besides Pokémon Trainer? A KOF character... wait a minute.

Iori incomingggggg

Cynthia with Garchomp, Spiritomb, and Milotic.

I would love this combo.

Do Nightmare’s stances count? Because that’d be a 4 in 1

I see nightmare stance more as mini characters rather than full characters... there are stances where you cant move or jump.

Anyways.. while i would love another pokemon trainer or another 3 in 1 character.. that still would be development for 3 character instead of 1

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

Fixed.

Thank you. I can’t speak weebanese.

 

[CureParfait]

Can anyone think of any potential 3 in 1 characters similar to Pokemon Trainer? I can think of three on the top of my head.

Erik, Baleog and Olaf from Lost Vikings
Heavy, Pyro and Scout from Team Fortress 2
Deku Link, Goron Link and Zora Link from Majora's Mask

Maybe Team Rocket with Meowth, Wheezing, and Arbok.

 

[Mushroomguy12]

Is the Ninja more iconic to the game than the Thief? Seems kinda random that it'd be the only promoted class involved.

I was basing off their appearances from Mario Sports Mix and Mario Hoops 3 on 3, where Ninja was the only promoted class in those games.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Thank you. I can’t speak weebanese.

Me either. I used Google Translate.

Also weebanese? Really?

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

I see nightmare stance more as mini characters rather than full characters... there are stances where you cant move or jump.

You can still move in your stances, iirc.

But yeah, that makes sense.

Anyways.. while i would love another pokemon trainer or another 3 in 1 character.. that still would be development for 3 character instead of 1

And this is why either a stance character or something like Agumon (can digivolve mid-match, but moveset is more or less the same) makes more sense for a DLC than something like Pokemon Trainer.

It’s either multiple movesets with the same model or one moveset shared between multiple models, either option being far faster than completely different characters with completely different movesets.

 

[osby]

Thank you. I can’t speak weebanese.

Who's gonna tell them that they're playing a game made by what's apparently a weeb company?

 

[SKX31]

Can anyone think of any potential 3 in 1 characters similar to Pokemon Trainer? I can think of three on the top of my head.

Erik, Baleog and Olaf from Lost Vikings
Heavy, Pyro and Scout from Team Fortress 2
Deku Link, Goron Link and Zora Link from Majora's Mask

To name something that will likely never get in just for fun:

Squee, Spleen and Spoon - otherwise known as the Techies - one of the most hated / memetically beloved heroes in Dota 2. Basically Dota 2's .

Nothing gets the blood of others boiling more than a hero whose entire schtick is setting up (mostly) invisible mines / C4s all over the map and using a Kamikaze every time they're close to dieing (as long as that's not on CD). It's one of those heroes that either gets the enemy team raging - especially as they have to buy invis detection constantly - or gets the allies to turn on the Techies player because "you couldve picked something else noob" when things go bad. This trolly design extends even to their minefield sign - which can be upgraded to make any mines placed directly underneath the sign immune to invis detection.

But they're often fun to play as, so it balances out. And they'd be a perfect April Fools character article.

I was basing off their appearances from Mario Sports Mix and Mario Hoops 3 on 3, where Ninja was the only promoted class in those games.

Now I kinda want their moveset to be exclusively Sports Mix / Hoops so we can have Final Fantasy characters throwing around basketballs everywhere. Also to set a new meaning to "crossover" characters.

 

[chocolatejr9]

Can I get an F in the chat for Pit?

insert appropriate TF2 meme here

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

3 in 1 characters?

Amingo, Ruby Heart, and Son Son.

 

[3BitSaurus]

Basically Dota 2's .

You had me with just this line.

Also, glad to see more love for the MvC2 trio. Technically it was just two people posting about them, but hey, I'm glad it happened twice.

 

[PeridotGX]

Can anyone think of any potential 3 in 1 characters similar to Pokemon Trainer? I can think of three on the top of my head.

Erik, Baleog and Olaf from Lost Vikings
Heavy, Pyro and Scout from Team Fortress 2
Deku Link, Goron Link and Zora Link from Majora's Mask

Kris, Susie, and Ralsei.

 

[Rie Sonomura]

3 in 1 characters?

Amingo, Ruby Heart, and Son Son.

I think someone else suggested the same thing earlier lul
This guy here:

Amingo, Ruby Heart, and Son Son from Marvel vs Capcom 2

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

You got any team option from Final Fantasy VIII. Though it's hard to say who should be with Squall at that point. I tend to like adding in Zell and Irvine, but.

And for my latest plug, Brian, Leonardo, and Flora(who are a team... just only one fights cause they didn't want to change up the gameplay. Considering A.I. sucks in general, they aren't that off about the balance issues).

 

[SNEKeater]

I think X getting ported is an inevitability, though I don't think the timing will line up for a Smash character tie in. If Nintendo has a major JPRG coming this year (beyond Bravely Default) XCX getting the major push for a 2022 release would make complete sense.

Well, there's also a certain JRPG series with long history with Nintendo that will finally get a new game this year, and as far as we know, exclusively for Nintendo Switch.

 

[Rie Sonomura]

Anyone in here do pass 2 mock-ups? There is a mock-up I’d like to see

 

[SpectreJordan]

Given that we're now in the latter half of the pass if there were characters that were more likely to be newly chosen/negotiated fighters rather than ones initially passed over it would be these as opposed to Min Min, Steve, and Sephiroth. Doesn't necessarily mean that they are, just the timing would allow for it more.

I actually think that Min-Min was one of the additional characters. She just happened first because she’s a Nintendo character & could get worked on as soon as she was decided.

It doesn’t seem like there were any serious plans for an Arms character during base unlike Steve & Sephiroth. So she was probably added when they decided to turn Steve/Sephiroth into a full pass.

I have a lot of confidence in that 5chan rumor. So I also think there’s a good chance that a Tales character was part of the Steve/Sephiroth group before it turned into FP2. So it makes sense that they had 3 characters planned post FP1 & decided to turn into a full blown pass.

I’m not really confident in Chun-Li though. It seems like they just straight up replaced her with Ken. I don’t think they’d revisit her for Ultimate. She’d be cool though.

 

[DarthEnderX]

If we got a Monster Hunter, what would their home stage be? I can only assume it wouldn't be Ancestral Steppe because Rathalos already uses it

Eh, the Dracula boss fight just uses a flat version of the Castelvania Stage. So Boss stages can definitely get reused as character stages.

 

[UltimateCyborgOverlord]

So going back a few pages to the whole "your 3 characters" or whatever, I've got mine... in Stupid Image form!

First up, the original "Kicking Fiend", Chun-Li!


Second, that crazed maniac who lights sheep on fire and destroys barnyards for funsies, Spyro!


And third, the talk of the town, Hayabusa!




And last but not least... The Attack of the Unserious Picks! (you KNOW these are the only picks Smash Bros will ever pick, and you KNOW that any alternative answer is inherently wrong and considered heresy by scarecrow law)



I mainly did this for funsies so... ya know. Stupid Images are about as fun as Smash itself! Though, Chun-Li, Spyro and Hayabusa (not necessarily in that order) is an outcome that... yeah I think it's possible.

 

[LiveStudioAudience]

Well, there's also a certain JRPG series with long history with Nintendo that will finally get a new game this year, and as far as we know, exclusively for Nintendo Switch.

It was my assumption that SMT V would likely be the really big third party this year, with a small chance of Nintendo doing one of their own towards the end of the year (maybe an XCX port or something else) not unlike Three Houses and DQ XI coming out the same year in 2019.

 

[SpecterFlower]

It was my assumption that SMT V would likely be the really big third party this year, with a small chance of Nintendo doing one of their own towards the end of the year (maybe an XCX port or something else) not unlike Three Houses and DQ XI coming out the same year in 2019.

Monster Hunter Rise?

 

[SharkLord]

I’m trying my best to catch up on recent leaks and speculation, but I’m still curious about Chun-Li.

From what I can gather, people are anticipating her because of certain rumors implying that she was planned (or at least considered) for the base game. Is there anything else beyond that that is making people so confident in her inclusion? Don’t get me wrong, I think Chun-Li would be awesome and I can see the logic behind why she might be chosen. But why is she brought up more than say, Alucard, who we know for a fact was considered for the base game and is similar in terms of being a popular secondary character from a third party series. I’m just curious.

Before the rumor got brought up, Sephiroth had opened the doors to extra content from third-parties we already have representation from, so people started talking about guys like Doctor Eggman and Chun-Li. The rumor got dredged up at just the right time, and it propelled Chun-Li into one of the big boys and girls of speculation.

Aside from that, there's the fact that everyone's confident in a Capcom fighter and not many are confident in a Bandai-Namco fighter, so even though Lloyd and Yuri were mentioned as having been planned but dropped, they were mostly ignored initially and the 5chan rumor became the Chun-Leak.

I've been under the impression that this fighters pass was probably comprised of characters that simply didn't make the cut earlier in development for whatever reason.

I mean, a character from ARMS simply came too late for consideration at launch. Plus, the rumors of Minecraft appearing in Ultimate at launch were very prevalent two years ago, and the official mention that the idea was at least being discussed 5 years ago seemed to add credit to the idea.

I feel Sephiroth only helped solidify the concept in my head, since we've been hearing apparent rumors that he was also in conversation awhile back too.
- - -
With that mindset, and if the rumors of Chun-Li are true, I don't see why that wouldn't be possible. I would be very happy to see her specifically designed after her appearance in SFIII: Third Strike. Even if that gives precedent for her to be very annoying to fight in 1v1s lol. I'd just love to see the music from that game make the jump, if not tracks for SFIV, SFV, or even the Alpha series.

We don't actually know what characters were really considered for the game, so we don't have a real list to look at to gauge if they really were picking characters from an existing pile they already thought up. IMO, the only character we might be able to guess with officially released information is just Rex, but I'm not really expecting them either.

I believe you mentioned you didn't want to be spoiled just in case, so I'll hid it under a spoiler so you can choose if you want to read it.

Spoiler

The main thing was that according to the rumor, she was replaced by Ken. This would put her in the same place as Decidueye and Alucard; Someone who was considered but ended up dropped in favor of someone else. I don't think it's an intentional theme of second chances so much as Nintendo being pragmatic and using the deals they have left while they still can, so if Chun-Li's negotiation actually went somewhere-In this case, Ken-It wouldn't still be floating around, so Nintendo wouldn't be able to easily bring it back.
Erdrick and Steve, who the rumor also mentioned, weren't replaced; They just didn't show up. They weren't ditched in favor of a Slime or something like Chun-Li was, so they're in a different situation.

 

[Digital Hazard]

she was replaced by Ken.

How would the unique fighter be replaced by a clone.

 

[Louie G.]

I’m trying my best to catch up on recent leaks and speculation, but I’m still curious about Chun-Li.

Ignoring the "leak" entirely, I can give a few bits about why I think Chun-Li is worth considering.

- First lady of fighting games, yadda yadda. One of the single most iconic characters absent from the game, probably THE most important female character left. This puts her right on top of Capcom's totem pole imo, now that the assumption of needing to add new series is null and void.

- And yeah, expanding on that, Sephiroth's addition shows that sometimes the value of the character themselves trumps the need for new series. Someone like Sephiroth or Chun-Li would be here because they're... Sephiroth and Chun-Li, they're representing themselves. Would be a great way to expand on gaming's biggest crossover and create more "dream matchups" etc. Character is more important than anything else.

- Chun-Li rarely misses a crossover with Ryu. They usually appear alongside one another - probably on account of Chun-Li being just as viable a mascot of the series as the man himself. They kinda work hand in hand, so while her omission is understandable given the previous third party situation it has become more glaring.

- Street Fighter's content is deceivingly limited. A heavy majority is from Street Fighter 2 with little regard to Alpha or SF3 outside of spirits, giving Chun-Li plenty to work with when putting together a satisfying challenger pack.

- Also, she's Chun freaking Li.

As for Alucard, it sounds dismissive but... he's an Assist Trophy. I think we'd certainly here a lot more discussion about him had Sakurai released that information and he DIDN'T have a pre-established role. That being said Chun-Li doesn't really just lie on the idea of having more characters for previous represented third parties... it's moreso that Chun-Li is a massive enough character to justify herself in spite of it. Which I feel also applied to Sephiroth - as much as I understand how badly FF in particular needed more content, I doubt that was even among the top 3 reasons they added him.

 

[UltimateCyborgOverlord]

How would the unique fighter be replaced by a clone.

SUPPOSEDLY, the story goes that it was due to them not being able to settle upon a moveset in time or something to that effect and release day was coming and they had to have a character so they went "Ken as a Ryu echo" and there he went. Or something to that effect. We can argue and violently crumple and spit on each other's Double Stuf Oreos all day about how legit that is or what a Chun-li moveset would look like/what was so hard about it that it took too much time and of course, the big bad question; Is there a possibility that they picked up work on her again for Pass 2 as part of this whole "let's use unused ideas for DLC Season 2" angle, or did Ken straight up punch Chun-li out of the office and now she's just gone?

PERSONALLY, I'd like to think that, with Chun-li being one of THE marquee female characters of all gaming, that they'd at least consider going back to Chun-li and trying it.

 

[cashregister9]

This whole Chun-Li/Tales rumor kinda bothers me.

-Hero was perhaps the worst kept secret in Smash history
-Steve was a haha funny character that people were speculating about around base game and beyond because Minecraft
-Sephiroth is not nearly as obscure as people were saying before he was revealed so someone Guessing Sephiroth is not unfound.
-You'd think if someone was able to leak information that was that high up/secret, they'd also know about Terry, Banjo and Byleth at least?

Nothing this leak did was that game changing aside from Chun-Li and Sephiroth being mentioned in the same post. (at least this rumor gives us something to talk about so I'm not that bothered by it)

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

How would the unique fighter be replaced by a clone.

The only way I see it happening is during the conceptual stages. Perhaps they originally wanted Chun-Li, but then realized they didn't have the time to add her and swapped in Ken.

It's really just conjecture though.

 

[Eldrake]

To name something that will likely never get in just for fun:

Squee, Spleen and Spoon - otherwise known as the Techies - one of the most hated / memetically beloved heroes in Dota 2. Basically Dota 2's .

Nothing gets the blood of others boiling more than a hero whose entire schtick is setting up (mostly) invisible mines / C4s all over the map and using a Kamikaze every time they're close to dieing (as long as that's not on CD). It's one of those heroes that either gets the enemy team raging - especially as they have to buy invis detection constantly - or gets the allies to turn on the Techies player because "you couldve picked something else noob" when things go bad. This trolly design extends even to their minefield sign - which can be upgraded to make any mines placed directly underneath the sign immune to invis detection.

But they're often fun to play as, so it balances out. And they'd be a perfect April Fools character article.

The Final Smash is a Giant Tiny rushing into the stage and tossing everyone into a massive pile of mines.

 

[Louie G.]

For what it's worth, even if the "Chun-Li leak" is correct to some degree I don't believe all of it.

I don't think Chun-Li was "replaced" by Ken. If there was any legitimate information here I believe they both would have been planned and this would have been a misunderstanding / botched game of telephone. Them having so much insight on Geno's situation is also suspicious, I feel this may just be an assumption on the poster's part rather than something they would have heard from the inside.

Also, Lloyd and Yuri both being on the project plan and getting ditched entirely? I dunno. I think a lot of this rumor actually does hold weight, but that doesn't disqualify it from having duds among the legitimate information. Not every leak needs to be 100% true and 100% false, and for how much information is there it's highly possible it comes from multiple sources.

And even if this is all completely true, there's nothing that guarantees they revisit Chun-Li OR the Tales characters. They could remain scrapped just as many other characters have. So at the end of the day it's just something fun to think about, and I'm pretty glad it popped up to get people thinking about how most of these characters probably were negotiated or discussed well before FP2 was announced, and probably right alongside FP1.

 

[Digital Hazard]

SUPPOSEDLY, the story goes that it was due to them not being able to settle upon a moveset in time or something to that effect and release day was coming and they had to have a character so they went "Ken as a Ryu echo" and there he went. Or something to that effect. We can argue and violently crumple and spit on each other's Double Stuf Oreos all day about how legit that is or what a Chun-li moveset would look like/what was so hard about it that it took too much time and of course, the big bad question; Is there a possibility that they picked up work on her again for Pass 2 as part of this whole "let's use unused ideas for DLC Season 2" angle, or did Ken straight up punch Chun-li out of the office and now she's just gone?

PERSONALLY, I'd like to think that, with Chun-li being one of THE marquee female characters of all gaming, that they'd at least consider going back to Chun-li and trying it.

Pardon me on my lack of knowledge on Street Fighter, but there are some things that makes this impossible to believe for me:

1. Aren't Ken and Ryu directly inspired by how they are in SFII and a move from SFIV? If so... Why not translate that? Why not translate any of Chun-Li's movesets from any game? I am not saying it would be easy, but the translation of a traditional fighting game character to Smash has been done fairly faithfully to how they are in their games, so I don't buy this "couldn't settle down on a moveset"
2. Kencineroar's trailer. The fact that Ken had to receive a high res model to appear in an animated trailer makes this theory reeaaally sketchy since it means he had to be planned either from the game's early stages or very close to them.
3. Ken has been longer in the Smash devs minds than Chun-Li; back when Ryu was Smash 4 DLC, the only things he brought besides himself and his stage, were a trophy of Ken, and three versions of his and Ken's themes.
4. The concepts of Echo Fighters as a whole; how to pass on the original fighting game clone character in a game where that's an advertised feature and you got the license for their series?

I'm not saying Chun-Li is impossible, but at most I see her as a passing thought during the base game's development while the resources were prioritized to the newcomers, all but Incineroar being highly requested since long, and even Incineroar being the most advertised final stage evolution of its gen.

EDIT: Richter wasn't highly requested either, but had the Echo Fighter advantage and being popular with fans of his series

 

[SharkLord]

How would the unique fighter be replaced by a clone.

I think that the reason why, honestly. SSBU's base game was seriously limited with new content due to the focus on "EVERYONE IS HERE;" Only six original characters, one of which was a pseudo-clone, and a measly four new stages, two of which were allocated to system-sellers Super Mario Odyssey and Breath of the Wild. They may not have had time to add in another completely original fighter, especially one with the special command inputs.
Based on the note about Lloyd and Yuri, it seems like the rumors from the planning stages. I think Chun-Li was part of the original pitch, but at some point they realized "Aw nuts we don't have time" and went for Ken, fellow member of the Street Fighter trifecta and the moveset clone, who would've been recognizable as well and would take less effort to make.

Granted, this is all just theorizing. Chun-Li and the Tales reps got like a single sentence each so I can't really say for sure.

-You'd think if someone was able to leak information that was that high up/secret, they'd also know about Terry, Banjo and Byleth at least?

Perhaps, but this is all seemingly from the planning stages. Perhaps they had someone secretly fill them in really early on, but the source got caught or something, or maybe they were just given outdated information. Just spitballing here, but it seems to me that their info came before FP1 was conceptualized.

 

[UltimateCyborgOverlord]

I'm a bit of an outsider when it comes to Tales of... the only one I played was Tales of Symphonia, and even then, I only played the first bit of it, you were Lloyd aka a guy with rooster hair and suspenders and he wields two swords and has the voice of Robin from Teen Titans. He's friends with a guy named Genis and after battles you eat SO. MANY. SANDWICHES! Robin from Teen Titans yells a bunch while swinging his swords around. I didn't get very far in it.

So I'm not very... versed? In Tales of...

But the thing that bugs me regarding it right now in Pass 2 is... are there that many Tales of Mii costume possibilities? Because if not, why would they drop Heihachi and Gil Mii costumes if there was gonna be a Bandai Namco pack later? Like I can get that yeah, Heihachi was a fighting game character coming with a fighting game character, but Gil throws me off. You'd think sword dude would come with sword dude if theming was the case, yeah?

For what it's worth, even if the "Chun-Li leak" is correct to some degree I don't believe all of it.

I don't think Chun-Li was "replaced" by Ken. If there was any legitimate information here I believe they both would have been planned and this would have been a misunderstanding / botched game of telephone. Them having so much insight on Geno's situation is also suspicious, I feel this may just be an assumption on the poster's part rather than something they would have heard from the inside.

Also, Lloyd and Yuri both being on the project plan and getting ditched entirely? I dunno. I think a lot of this rumor actually does hold weight, but that doesn't disqualify it from having duds among the legitimate information. Not every leak needs to be 100% true and 100% false, and for how much information is there it's highly possible it comes from multiple sources.

And even if this is all completely true, there's nothing that guarantees they revisit Chun-Li OR the Tales characters. They could remain scrapped just as many other characters have. So at the end of the day it's just something fun to think about, and I'm pretty glad it popped up to get people thinking about how most of these characters probably were negotiated or discussed well before FP2 was announced, and probably right alongside FP1.

King Louie here, OWNING the thread! Completely agree! In multiple areas, I've seen leaks come that had stuff wrong but were mostly right and yeah, that can be a game of telephone/someone inserting their OPINION into what was otherwise facts and that getting mixed up.

Have your crown, King Louie! You've earned it!

Pardon me on my lack of knowledge on Street Fighter, but there are some things that makes this impossible to believe for me:

1. Aren't Ken and Ryu directly inspired by how they are in SFII and a move from SFIV? If so... Why not translate that? Why not translate any of Chun-Li's movesets from any game? I am not saying it would be easy, but the translation of a traditional fighting game character to Smash has been done fairly faithfully to how they are in their games, so I don't buy this "couldn't settle down on a moveset"
2. Kencineroar's trailer. The fact that Ken had to receive a high res model to appear in an animated trailer makes this theory reeaaally sketchy since it means he had to be planned either from the game's early stages or very close to them.
3. Ken has been longer in the Smash devs minds than Chun-Li; back when Ryu was Smash 4 DLC, the only things he brought besides himself and his stage, were a trophy of Ken, and three versions of his and Ken's themes.
4. The concepts of Echo Fighters as a whole; how to pass on on the original fighting game clone character in a game where that's an advertised feature and you got the license for their series?

I'm not saying Chun-Li is impossible, but at most I see her as a passing thought during the base game's development while the resources were prioritized to the newcomers, all but Incineroar being highly requested since long, and even Incineroar being the most advertised final stage evolution of its gen.

Kencineroar trailer does throw a big bad monkey wrench into that entire situation. I'd love to believe that Ryu, Ken, and Chun-li were all in the game at once... I'd love to believe they might still be



I'd love all three of these chuckle-heads in Smash! We've got two, just waitin on Chunners.


Regarding MOVESET issues... I refer you to captain Sharklord here

I think that the reason why, honestly. SSBU's base game was seriously limited with new content due to the focus on "EVERYONE IS HERE;" Only six original characters, one of which was a pseudo-clone, and a measly four new stages, two of which were allocated to system-sellers Super Mario Odyssey and Breath of the Wild. They may not have had time to add in another completely original fighter, especially one with the special command inputs.
Based on the note about Lloyd and Yuri, it seems like the rumors from the planning stages. I think Chun-Li was part of the original pitch, but at some point they realized "Aw nuts we don't have time" and went for Ken, fellow member of the Street Fighter trifecta and the moveset clone, who would've been recognizable as well and would take less effort to make.

Granted, this is all just theorizing. Chun-Li and the Tales reps got like a single sentence each so I can't really say for sure.

Perhaps, but this is all seemingly from the planning stages. Perhaps they had someone secretly fill them in really early on, but the source got caught or something, or maybe they were just given outdated information. Just spitballing here, but it seems to me that their info came before FP1 was even considered.

It may very well have just been time issues. MOVESET is what was said, but it could very well have just been time. PERHAPS it's easier said than done to implement the Street Fighter "charge character" mechanics into Smash, but I'm honestly just spitting at the wall while eating pizza rolls in regards to that. I'm personally leaning more towards "they didn't have MOVESET issues so much as they just didn't have TIME in base game to implement them"

 

[cothero]

I think that the reason why, honestly. SSBU's base game was seriously limited with new content due to the focus on "EVERYONE IS HERE;" Only six original characters, one of which was a pseudo-clone, and a measly four new stages, two of which were allocated to system-sellers Super Mario Odyssey and Breath of the Wild. They may not have had time to add in another completely original fighter, especially one with the special command inputs.
Based on the note about Lloyd and Yuri, it seems like the rumors from the planning stages. I think Chun-Li was part of the original pitch, but at some point they realized "Aw nuts we don't have time" and went for Ken, fellow member of the Street Fighter trifecta and the moveset clone, who would've been recognizable as well and would take less effort to make.

Granted, this is all just theorizing. Chun-Li and the Tales reps got like a single sentence each so I can't really say for sure.

Perhaps, but this is all seemingly from the planning stages. Perhaps they had someone secretly fill them in really early on, but the source got caught or something, or maybe they were just given outdated information. Just spitballing here, but it seems to me that their info came before FP1 was conceptualized.

Also, your theory could support the fact that they're still holding MH (Capcom) and Lloyd's (Bamco) costume. Of course, i doesn't necessarily mean that a mii costume has to come along with a same company character, but it's something interesting to note nonetheless.

I was also thinking about Vergeben's Koei Tecmo character rumors. Maybe Nintendo meet Koei to negotiate Yuri's (Fatal Frame) inclusion as an AT, not necessarily a character (possibly Hayabusa). But yeah, according to rumours, Chun-Li and a Tales rep are the safest bet by now. They could even add a first or second party character to FP2, so who knows.

 

[Rie Sonomura]

Also, your theory could support the fact that they're still holding MH (Capcom) and Lloyd's (Bamco) costume. Of course, i doesn't necessarily mean that a mii costume has to come along with a same company character, but it's something interesting to note nonetheless.

I was also thinking about Vergeben's Koei Tecmo character rumors. Maybe Nintendo meet Koei to negotiate Yuri's (Fatal Frame) inclusion as an AT, not necessarily a character (possibly Hayabusa). But yeah, Chun-Li and a Tales rep are the safest bet by now. They could even add a first or second party character to FP2, so who knows.

it could also be for the Age of Calamity Spirit Event as SharkLord suggested

OR it's for Hayabusa... as a Mii.

 

[Scoliosis Jones]

From what I can remember, it seems to me that the mentioning of Chun-Li and Tales was similar to that of Steve and Sephiroth.

Essentially, “I heard they were in the mix, but I don’t know what happened to them”.

It comes down to this: if they are revisiting old ideas, then that raises the potential for those characters to be added. That’s basically it. Any other thought process of “they replaced Chun-Li with Ken” to my knowledge has no evidence to support it. Speculation-wise, it’s possible. But I don’t think it’s crazy to suspect she’s a sleeper pick considering the fact that she’s essentially equal to Ryu in terms of crossover power and being a gaming legend.

Also, miss me with the, “When you think about it, Sephiroth was obvious all along!” Narrative to shoot the rumor down. That’s revisionist in terms of how the fanbase has reacted. I’d actually argue that if “Sephiroth was an easy guess all along!” Then it should also apply to Chun-Li and actually help her case. Otherwise it’s just selective, as usual.

I think it’s entirely plausible that the remaining parts of that leak COULD turn into something. There’s circumstantial information included, such as the missing Lloyd costume and Monster Hunter costumes, but those are also inconclusive given the fact that previous Namco and Capcom costumes have already appeared.

Basically, to invest entirely into the rumor is foolish...but so is tossing it aside because it doesn’t have characters you want in it. It could go either way, and I think that should be kept in mind.

 

[N3ON]

Pardon me on my lack of knowledge on Street Fighter, but there are some things that makes this impossible to believe for me:

1. Aren't Ken and Ryu directly inspired by how they are in SFII and a move from SFIV? If so... Why not translate that? Why not translate any of Chun-Li's movesets from any game? I am not saying it would be easy, but the translation of a traditional fighting game character to Smash has been done fairly faithfully to how they are in their games, so I don't buy this "couldn't settle down on a moveset"
2. Kencineroar's trailer. The fact that Ken had to receive a high res model to appear in an animated trailer makes this theory reeaaally sketchy since it means he had to be planned either from the game's early stages or very close to them.
3. Ken has been longer in the Smash devs minds than Chun-Li; back when Ryu was Smash 4 DLC, the only things he brought besides himself and his stage, were a trophy of Ken, and three versions of his and Ken's themes.
4. The concepts of Echo Fighters as a whole; how to pass on the original fighting game clone character in a game where that's an advertised feature and you got the license for their series?

I'm not saying Chun-Li is impossible, but at most I see her as a passing thought during the base game's development while the resources were prioritized to the newcomers, all but Incineroar being highly requested since long, and even Incineroar being the most advertised final stage evolution of its gen.

EDIT: Richter wasn't highly requested either, but had the Echo Fighter advantage and being popular with fans of his series

1. I doubt it was them "not being able to settle on a moveset in time", that sounds like misreporting the "leak". The claim was probably that they eventually opted against a second unique character as that development is more time consuming.
2. The trailers aren't made in the very earliest stages of development, because things can still change then and characters can be scrapped. The "leak" comes from the period when the roster was still being decided, which would predate the period of trailer creation.
3. But if the intention was to include an original character, they wouldn't have gone for Ken.
4. They passed on several characters that would've been feasible echoes. If they had added a second original SF character, that would've put it far ahead of the next closest third-party series at the time. Perhaps at that point they would've chosen to devote resources elsewhere instead of giving the series a third character. Which no third-party series has to date.

I'm not saying the claim is true, but I don't think these points debunk it.

 

[SharkLord]

I'm a bit of an outsider when it comes to Tales of... the only one I played was Tales of Symphonia, and even then, I only played the first bit of it, you were Lloyd aka a guy with rooster hair and suspenders and he wields two swords and has the voice of Robin from Teen Titans. He's friends with a guy named Genis and after battles you eat SO. MANY. SANDWICHES! Robin from Teen Titans yells a bunch while swinging his swords around. I didn't get very far in it.

So I'm not very... versed? In Tales of...

But the thing that bugs me regarding it right now in Pass 2 is... are there that many Tales of Mii costume possibilities? Because if not, why would they drop Heihachi and Gil Mii costumes if there was gonna be a Bandai Namco pack later? Like I can get that yeah, Heihachi was a fighting game character coming with a fighting game character, but Gil throws me off. You'd think sword dude would come with sword dude if theming was the case, yeah?

Generally JRPGs like Tales are going to have a pretty big cast unless stated otherwise. Symphonia specifically has ten party members including Lloyd, and as of current we have 16 mainline titles, the most recent being Tales of Berseries. Assuming every Tales game has a cast around the size of Symphonia's that would be about 160 party members to draw from.

...Yeah. I don't think it's that exact number, but there's a %$#@huge amount of Tales characters we could slaughter and skin use for Mii Costumes.

 

[Mushroomguy12]

EDIT: Richter wasn't highly requested either, but had the Echo Fighter advantage and being popular with fans of his series

I'll give you the echo fighter advantage point, but Chun-Li is pretty popular with fans of her series too? In fact moreso than both Ryu and Ken.