And looky here, yet another new wave of ridiculous hate on something for absolutely no reason other than being consumed by our own bias and feeling extra entitled. Man, you guys are actually making me sick with all this stupid hatred that is unnecessary. I'm half-tempted to put myself in even more debt just to pick up a Switch with Smash and buy Piranha Plant, plug 100 hours into learning his potential and his match-up knowledge, and then walking up to each and every one of you with a white gloves and slapping you across the face with it so we can duel...JUST so I can wipe the floor with you with one of the goofiest and most beautiful characters we've ever been blessed with by Sakurai.
I was only semi-serious in the post above, but I'm dead serious here: you guys make me sick with the vitriol and rabid foam gushing from your mouths and dribbling down your chin like you are Ol' Yeller in the last 15 mins of the movie. It's disgusting! It doesn't matter how you try to justify it, your responses to hate Piranha Plant that much just because YOU think another character should be there is PROOF of how ridiculous the Smash community really is.
You want to know why this bothers me so much?
Because if you think Piranha Plant shouldn't be there and that [insert X character] is a better choice, than you are actively against Sakurai's creativity and sanity. You value your own desires over Sakurai trying to maintain some sort of passion and love for the series he birthed. Allow me to explain.
Sakurai has basically been threatened into working on Smash multiple times, and every time he accepts because he is likely afraid of what might happen if he doesn't, and each time he does he loses a little bit of his original design and dream of the title. In Ultimate, Sakurai pretty much just went through a list of characters WE all wanted and said "Okay, I'm only allowed to pick from this list and do a couple others that Nintendo told me to" and then his solace to have some creative spirit and passion shine through was to create Piranha Plant.
Let me try to work an analogy here, since using Sakurai's actual lore seems to put people off since 'he's rich, he should have no complaints' and 'well, he doesn't have to keep working on Smash!', let me use a beautiful duck queen we all know and love...
Let us imagine for a moment that
Ovaltine
was hired by a big art buff/company to make a beautiful collage-esq drawing of multiple themes and elements because she's ****ing badass and awesome like that and probably should have this happen soon anyway because she deserves it. She works her butt (and fingers and brain) off on it, and it's a masterpiece (because of course it would be, this is Ovaltine we are talking about here!). It gets displayed in art shows around the world and reaches critical acclaim by even the most hard-pressed of critics and Ovaltine's name is praised throughout the world. She is very impressed by both how her art turned out and all the clamor about it, but she is okay with working on a different project.
Just then, the same art buff/company busts through her door and exclaims that her art work was AMAZING, but it's been a while and now is her time to re-emerge. She needs to re-create the collage-esq artwork, but now it has to be bigger...BETTER! It needs to encompass more themes, it needs to be absolutely flawless, it needs to master ebb and flow...and she has very little time to do so! Swallowed up in the tide that is everything that her previous work was and has led to, she eagerly agrees, but notes that afterwards she plans to explore new avenues. The plan is set, and Her Majesty of Ducks pours every fiber of her being into this work. She's up for days and nights, she isn't taking care of herself properly but she doesn't care, her new masterpiece is more important than herself AND time is of the essence! She even calls in assistance from some of her colleagues, all to meet that deadline. Somehow, through all the struggle and craziness, it is achieved: a new collage piece that dwarfs the other in comparison, like comparing Earth to Jupiter! Everyone is taken aback at how glorious it is and it is praised even more than her original work could have dreamed of...but something is amiss.
Duck Queen is tired. Duck Queen is drained of creativity. Duck Queen could almost care less about the praise that is being garnered, but she does notice something: people are getting a different impression than the one she desired. Some folks find the art to be of a certain expression that she never intended it to be, nay, the antithesis of the sole purpose of her art and they are spouting it off to others as if THEY know it's true meaning and now many believe it and also share this line of thought. Tired, drained, and miffed at how the public treated this work of hers, Duck Queen parts ways with this art buff/company and pursues other avenues of art.
Years go by, Duck Queen has been enjoying her new avenues for the most part, and on a whim she decides to reserve a spot for herself at the biggest art show in the nation (arguably, the world!) for her to peruse the works of others. Perhaps for entertainment or perhaps for inspiration, either way she ends up there and is amusing herself when a couple comes up to her and shakes her and and says that they absolutely cannot wait for her next work. Duck Queen is puzzled: she hasn't made really any officially released art work in a while, mostly painting for herself and inspiring other artists and assisting friends of hers, though she did find herself inspired to return to an old classic of hers from her early days. Still though, she had nothing planned any time soon, for sure. She thought it was odd but she thanked them and moved on. Then she was approached by another couple, and then another, and then some art buffs and some more art buffs until she found herself almost surrounded and overwhelmed. They all kept saying the same thing: they couldn't wait for her next work! What was going on here? When she finally manages to ask one of them what they mean, the response is clear: "It was announced that there would be a new work of art from your amazing collage series coming out soon, and we are all excited for it! We can't wait!!"
Duck Queen is struck dumbfounded: she never planned to make an edition to the art series ever again, yet here the public was, clamoring for excitement for a new work of art in the series. She never made any claims, yet there was some sort of official announcement? Off-kilter, she returned to her hotel. Later that week, she received a phone call: the old art buff/company. They wanted to speak with her, and Duck Queen dreaded this, for she had a bad feeling about it. She met with them and sat down to speak with them, and they made it clear to her: she would either work with them to create an even greater art piece in the collage series, or they would simply re-feature her previous work in the series with some very minor touch-ups to it so it would look presentable.
Duck Queen was intimidated and in disbelief: this art buff/company she had worked with years ago and though she knew so well was THREATENING her to return and continue her work in this series. The public at large was already promised a new work, so she was screwed no matter what she did: on one wing, if she did agree, she would have to dedicate herself once again to an art style she wanted to leave behind and the hours and sleepless nights and lack of proper self-care to meet the inevitably rough deadline they would give her would tear her apart all over again; on the other wing, if she declined, they would tarnish the reputation of not only her amazing collage series that still had a place in her heart, but it would also tarnish HER reputation should she ever try to officially release any artwork in the future. And the worst of it all was that the art buff/company was so big now and had so many other talented artists behind them that they could easily recover from such a tactic while she could be ruined forever!
The choice was clear...she agreed.
But by golly SHE DIDN'T TAKE IT STANDING DOWN! Sure, she worked on the game night and day; sure, she suffered mentally and physically from the drain and strain; SURE, she did what she was asked to do, but they WOULDN'T CONTROL EVERYTHING she did!
They wanted it to be more grandiose than the last one? OH IT WOULD BE MORE GRANDIOSE! The STORY within the artwork would speak louder, MUCH louder than it ever had, so much so it could easily be a breathing, living, moving picture! IT WOULD BE CINEMA-WORTHY! More colors, more detail, more technique, MORE OF EVERYTHING! More, MORE,
MORE!!! Until it felt like both her and her art would EXPLODE! And the best part was, NO ONE would mistake her expression THIS time! NO one would be able to be mislead and to think the opposite of her intentions, she would make sure of that! This was HER work of art, and she would be DAMNED if they tried to control her creative expression!
And when it was released it was a goddamn MURAL that sprawled on for what seemed like infinity and both the art buff/company and the public were taken aback by the sheer volume and magnitude of the piece. For the most part, almost no one viewed it as anything other than it was meant to be, but many who thought they had the right idea of the previous work's expression were upset. They even went on to make their own versions of her newest work because, to them, it was somehow wrong or incorrect. Duck Queen didn't care though: she had done it and made peace with both herself and her series.
Sadly, she would get roped into doing it thrice more: once for a mobile app in which she was limited in what kind of tools she could use, once for making the exact same work of art for display but with less limitations, and most recently one final time in which both her art buff/company pressure her to both make adjustments based on what they thought it needed and by what the fans of her previous works thought it needed. For both first two, she had a little bit of creative freedom, adding a little bit of zaniness and using some retro techniques, but for the last and most recent she was all but forced to cave into the demands of those around her. Each time she came back, afraid of what would happen if she didn't, and each time she had more and more creative freedom taken from her and her own art series. However, there was a small ounce of freedom she had: she was able to make a last-minute addition that didn't really fit what anyone around her had said, but it was all her and it gave her a small amount of relief and a small moment of freedom and control that she had long since lost before being told to make more alterations based on corporate and fan demand.
She would hear shortly after though that everyone dislike or even downright hated that addition to her art work. The reasoning? It wasn't what THEY thought it should be, and they would rather have it gone and replaced with what THEY think is better. Because it's no longer about the creator of their work, but about the consumer and what they want alone.
With the end of this sad tale/very long analogy, I'm going to go all in on this problem.
