To pass the time with a random talking point, would you say
is the best designed Smash 4 newcomer character from a moveset and gameplay perspective?
Difficult to say honestly.
I like that his moveset is atypical - it gives him quite a lot of versatility through those atypical moves and serve as good references to his games. Someone tries to play the distance game? Metal Blade and Crash Bomber help to cover those opponents. Someone tries to jump at the Mega Man player? Flame Sword and Mega Upper got that covered. Someone's threatening Megaman's shield? Pellets, Leaf Shield and Spark Shock are very useful "Get off me!" attacks. The attacks also come from a wide variety of Megaman games which is great to see - the only game not covered up until Megaman's inclusion IIRC is 10. I'm not gonna lose sleep over that, but it'd be cool to see a RM weapon from that game and / or 11 in future Smash appearances.
However, those atypical moves give him that polarization that
SMAASH! Puppy talked about, which can be a blessing and a curse depending on the exact situation. A
gets Bounce? ****, now Megaman has no choice but to go in as long as Bounce lasts - which plays into Hero's hands since he doesn't lack stuff that outranges Mega Man. Other reflectors can give him quite a lot of trouble too, as do characters who don't care about his projectiles or his lack of truly safe KO attacks (
certainly doesn't, that's free Aura in a lot of situations). OTOH, Air Shooter can juggle people - especially big characters - for seemingly ever and Mega Man's attacks do a great job at discombobulating opponents.
is a really good example, since most of Mega Man's projectiles can blow up his explosives and Snake has to get in close more often as a result. Floaty characters can also have trouble vs. Mega Man's assortment of attacks for those reasons.
In the end, I lean towards "Yes from a canon perspective, no from a gameplay perspective". I still like how Mega Man's designed, though.
If you want my opinion on the best designed from a gameplay perspective... kinda leaning towards
right now. A very atypical "Wall" character that isn't too daunting for newcomers (if unassuming at first glance), she and Luma nevertheless have the ability to play a honest defensive game and switch it up with surprisingly strong punishes. The main issue is that the learning curve beyond the casual level can be rather steep with her, but she's still a great example of what I look for with defensive characters.
I was kinda considering the biased answer:
, but he's very straightforward gameplaywise.
At this point, I'm just hoping for a few bonus stages (perhaps a few of the ones from the old titles that haven't come back?) just as a nice final gift to finish out Smash.
I'd particularily favor bringing back
Poke Floats. Its jank was a lot of its charm, although it could use some fine tuning (specifically so that people don't phase through the floats on ocassion, as happened in the linked video).
Same goes for quite a few past stages, but it's specifically applicable to Floats.
Give me Legacy Battlefields and FDs, please.
Honestly wouldn't mind those as "Skins" for Battlefield / FD. My only issues were how bright Smash 4's FD could be at points. Oh and I'd like to avoid Melee Battlefield's / Brawl FD's edge jank.