Geno (♥♪!?): Return of the Starsend Savior

[valkiriforce]

JUST.
DO.
IT.

Watch Geno walk on-screen wearing Nike's.

 

[Rohanx17]

Probably Bayonetta and Simon Belmont since Sakurai said they were highly requested in the Smash Ballot and both didn't have that big of a demand in the "Smash bubble" online.

yeah see this is the thing I never really understood, While I used smashboards on and off since 4's launch for stuff like character guides and what not I didn't follow speculation at all until I started lurking this thread back last year after august. I can remember getting all my friends together to watch the direct between classes that day to see who would be the last dlc. We didn't follow really anything at all so we thought cloud was in because of the smash ballot and it seemed like anything was possible after that. Then we got someone named corrin and spent a good while trying to google what they were even from, and then suddenly they announced the winner of the ballot was someone named bayonetta, we just sort of looked at each other with confused expressions and the rest of our free time was spent trying to find who she was and where this support had come from. On the flip side simon and the other belmonts was a name I had been hearing float around most of my life like paper mario or ridley even though I had only played the igarashi stuff myself. I was making a late breakfast while watching the direct that morning as seeing ridley show up at e3 completely blew me away as I had always assumed that was a closed case because of the too big meme. Of course I wasn't following speculation so I didn't know about the leaks that went out the day before so it took me completely by surprise and really got my attention that ridley had raised, seeing it followed one by one with characters that I either knew were things I heard talked about by people over the internet alot or found out later like chrom, then finished with k rool and it totally blew me away. I didn't know just how big k rool support was at the time but I knew he was from hearing his name go around the internet. It really made me think this could be the time they really go all in on all the big items fans have speculated over for years now instead of just checking off names as it felt like they've been doing up to this point. In fact I might even say that k rool reveal and the subsequent reaction by the internet might just be why I ended up here in the first place.

I guess the point of this textwall is that the chatter of not only smash but the nintendo fanbase in general has an enormous amount of broadcast power and largely holds similar interests to the rest of the installbase if not in their desire then their mutual support. Now geno is a special case and I never knew there was any fan push at all until I saw what was going on here but these days I see geno all over the place. Youtube, social media, even people I meet in real life all seem to suddenly know who this 23 year old puppet man is and frankly it's just surreal. The marketing power of the internet these days especially since the inception of social media spreads Ideas better than just about anything in human history, and it still finds ways to amaze me like that random poll by a canadian walmart account.

 

[ZelDan]

Watch Geno walk on-screen wearing Nike's.

"DON'T JUST LET YOUR DREAMS BE DREAMS!"

".....No seriously, don't, making dreams a reality is my whole job."

 

[EricTheGamerman]

This feels like a huge stretch. All fans try to make their favorites look good on polls. You don't think Sora fans name search to like and contribute to conversations about Sora getting into Smash and voting on any poll they can? And do you really think the maybe 20 people from this thread that voted on the poll out of the over 1000 that voted last time I checked was enough to pull Geno into a decisive lead? Because I really don't think so. Encouraging people to vote for a poll in this thread isn't any different from people from different fandoms on twitter getting clued into it happening because someone they followed liked or commented on it. If anything it gives it more validity. A bigger sample size is always better. I don't understand moving goalposts in order to somehow paint the results as less valid.

Also I don't understand the mentality that we're not representative of the "actual Smash population". It's such a weird criticism when by all accounts the things that are favored by the "Smash Bubble" do line up with what people want outside of it. People within the community wanted Banjo, Ridley, and K. Rool for years and they've been the biggest announcements by far in terms of reception. Why? Because people in general liked them. Not just the "Smash bubble".

Also what blindspots are there really? What has the community been "shocked" by?

That's the point of my post though, that because we as communities insert ourselves into a myriad of public polls and call for support of the character, the polls themselves become subject to excessive voluntary response bias and also often end up polling the same groups of people who brigade in favor of their character for polls (which already has natural crossover because Smash fans tend to be active on more than one site, and many times fans have campaigns on social media platforms to push their characters). I'm calling out all the fan favorites by saying this, but I specifically bring it up in Geno's case because we have the most to gain from his promotion in such things. Any chance for Geno in Smash lives and dies by fan support, so it is in our self-serving interest to vote and vote heavily in polls for his inclusion, whereas the other three characters on the Walmart poll for example, have tons of reasons to get into Smash besides just fan support and are active characters that more easily market themselves to the public at large. Smaller characters (I.E. the ones that have commonly polled well in Smash) have to inherently push harder and receive more support to have a chance in hell of being added to Smash. This creates the situation in which voluntary response bias is also bred as the more niche character fans will likely flock to forums where they can find like-minded individuals to share their love of a character, whereas bigger characters don't have to seek out approval and may be more mainstream where they can share opinions elsewhere.

No, 20 out of a 1000 isn't enough to sway a vote, but it's also indicative of the problems with treating polling as an all important tool to listen to (I realize you specifically aren't claiming this, but people do treat polling with exceptional respect when it works in their favor quite often). It's extremely flawed and only made more flawed by our active attempts to insert ourselves into the poll's sample size through response bias. A bigger sample size is better because as you approach the reality of the population as you increase the size... but through voluntary response bias in this case you get data that skews towards certain options as opposed to others and thus allows for the development of blind spots and false positives essentially. The methodology of your poll and statistics matters as much as your numbers do.

The criticism I take on "we're not representative of the Smash Population" is based in the numbers of our specific populations, how the Smash community interacts with polls, and the way the community treats things not relating to specifically targeted towards them. We're a subgroup of the larger Smash population and we're marketed to on specific instances like others subgroups, but we don't compromise the majority as people would like to believe either. We're just the loudest and the ones who force down certain ideas on to the more impressionable parts of our own population. Like I've brought up before, Smash fans are fickle at the best of times and jump ships with a fair amount of regularity, so not many characters have this inherent built in support base as we'd like to think (I'm not calling any specific ones out here to be absolutely clear, and I generally think Geno has one of the more solid ones). The reception you speak of? Is just the already vocal Smash Bubble being even louder than usual, because most of those reaction videos? Are from people overwhelmingly within the Smash Bubble. If you're aware of the community requesting certain characters, for example, you're already in the bubble. There's 15 million people who own Ultimate and we comprise maybe around a 1/15th of that overall population. We're a group that can wield some amount of influence through our loudness, that's for certain, and Sakurai and Nintendo do want to keep us happy because we're the best free advertising ever in how absurdly loud we can get about things that can impact a game's perception. But there's still the rest of the fan base to cater to, and obscure characters are not going to fair as well once you get removed from our surroundings. Some nostalgia will get some people, and those that we convert into the Bubble will also push them further and as the Bubble expands, there's a more legitimate argument to be made about it representing the population more correctly, sure. But we also see the limits of our actual power as a subgroup through the fact only 1 of the 4 DLC fighters in Ultimate is a request or even popular with this group of people.

Are you kidding me on blind spots? Bayonetta, Simon Belmont, Isabelle, Joker, Hero and Dragon Quest in general, and Terry have all completely shocked sections of the community and brought about on onslaught of moaning from people on these characters and how they got in. It's not just that people are surprised, it's the "But they didn't have fan support" or "This character/series has no actual fans" or whatever have you. You have people responding poorly to Pac-Man in Smash 4, and that's exactly the type of insane blind spot that can be created in the context of the "Smash bubble."



I'm not trying to specifically represent this poll in any manner as I said earlier, I just think it's a good way to reiterate the point about the "Smash Bubble" and fan polls I have been making for some time. Geno appearing on a Walmart poll or in a Wendey's Tweet is a sign of how far this bubble has managed to push a character, and that's great. I can't take that away and I'm not trying to. But the specific mention of "Go Vote for Geno" in a fan poll is exactly the sort of thing that I'm criticizing as an element that disrupts someone's ability to draw more meaningful conclusions from the data about the population. Lots of fan bases do this, and that's even more emblematic of the problem of holding polls to much of any standard.

 

[ErenJager]

I'd love to have Geno playable, I severely doubt his chances.
I think with the emphasis on bringing in as many new game worlds to smash, other new characters will get priority.
(Geno's game world is already represented with his spirit, so I doubt they would double up, when they could get an entirely new game world.)
Plus with the other missing Mii costumes from Smash 4 slowly returning and trickling in, it's only a matter of time until the Mii costume shows up.
Hopefully the Geno can still be playable meme will die soon, this dead horse has been beat to a pulp!

 

[catsforlife1]

I'd love to have Geno playable, I severely doubt his chances.
I think with the emphasis on bringing in as many new game worlds to smash, other new characters will get priority.
(Geno's game world is already represented with his spirit, so I doubt they would double up, when they could get an entirely new game world.)
Plus with the other missing Mii costumes from Smash 4 slowly returning and trickling in, it's only a matter of time until the Mii costume shows up.
Hopefully the Geno can still be playable meme will die soon, this dead horse has been beat to a pulp!

That was actually a mistranslation. Pushdution confirmed this. Sakurai actually said expand THE world of smash. Not add more worlds.

 

[ErenJager]

That was actually a mistranslation. Pushdution confirmed this. Sakurai actually said expand THE world of smash. Not add more worlds.

Now if they could only translate the intent and purpose of those phrases.

 

[Sour Supreme]

When they're showing off Geno gameplay we better see him on stage with Wario's red color-swap and blue Yoshi.

 

[TheCJBrine]

Hopefully the Geno can still be playable meme will die soon, this dead horse has been beat to a pulp!

I hope people will stop using “meme” incorrectly.

The characters you say are meme picks are genuinely popular among many for more than just memes they get; you just don’t like them, and that’s fine. No need to make up stuff and pretend it’s definite fact and coming into the characters’ support threads to say it.

 

[Isaac: Venus Adept]

That was actually a mistranslation. Pushdution confirmed this. Sakurai actually said expand THE world of smash. Not add more worlds.

Honestly nothing Sakurai said confirmed that future fighters are only from third party or from new third party party franchises. I hate how people keep spreading this misinformation

 

[Polan]

Also what blindspots are there really? What has the community been "shocked" by?

uh terry? the fact that the smash community was shocked and angered by an snk character showing up despite their relationship with nintendo and support for the switch, their history and influence and their prevalence in crossovers should be a wake-up call that there are serious blindspots in speculation.

 

[Evil Trapezium]

Just for fun, I decided to use OffBi 's fighters pass template and make a fighters pass of who I think could make it to DLC. The characters are in no particular order. I've put the Happy, jovial characters (And Doom Guy) bunched together and then you have the serious boys on the bottom.

I know I've said that "Spirits deconfirm characters" but I think there is enough evidence to support him as the exception with the music take downs being the biggest boon to his name, however that could also mean he could be a Mii costume once again which I hope won't happen.

Anyway here is the image below.

Spoiler: Big image

 

[Deleted member]

A division of a major consumer corporation refers to several famous well known gaming characters for DLC and includes a 20+ year character from one game as a hopeful for a major massive series like Smash.

We could assume the social media manager for Walmart Canada Gaming is a Geno fan, maybe lurking in your favorite Geno thread. It's a safe assumption.

Or we could go absolutely bonkers and assume that something strange is going on here. But what?

 

[YsDisciple]

Just for fun, I decided to use OffBi 's fighters pass template and make a fighters pass of who I think could make it to DLC. The characters are in no particular order. I've put the Happy, jovial characters (And Doom Guy) bunched together and then you have the serious boys on the bottom.

I know I've said that "Spirits deconfirm characters" but I think there is enough evidence to support him as the exception with the music take downs being the biggest boon to his name, however that could also mean he could be a Mii costume once again which I hope won't happen.

Anyway here is the image below.

Spoiler: Big image

View attachment 239294

Bruh. These Passes would be FIRE. You know what, I'm ashamed to be asking for more but, I'd like these to be the next two Fighters Pass.

 

[FalconFire93]

Just for fun, I decided to use OffBi 's fighters pass template and make a fighters pass of who I think could make it to DLC. The characters are in no particular order. I've put the Happy, jovial characters (And Doom Guy) bunched together and then you have the serious boys on the bottom.

I know I've said that "Spirits deconfirm characters" but I think there is enough evidence to support him as the exception with the music take downs being the biggest boon to his name, however that could also mean he could be a Mii costume once again which I hope won't happen.

Anyway here is the image below.

Spoiler: Big image

View attachment 239294

I’d definitely be on board for those to be the remaining characters.

 

[egaddmario]

I really don't think Geno is going to be in the fighters pass. Mainly because Square likes money. I highly doubt they'd agree to Hero and Geno in the pass when they could make that fighters pass money AND individual DLC money. Obviously none of us know who FP#5 is, but when it's not Geno, I'm not going to get worried. I think they'll reveal him as individual DLC #2 (behind plant).

 

[Deleted member]

That's the point of my post though, that because we as communities insert ourselves into a myriad of public polls and call for support of the character, the polls themselves become subject to excessive voluntary response bias and also often end up polling the same groups of people who brigade in favor of their character for polls (which already has natural crossover because Smash fans tend to be active on more than one site, and many times fans have campaigns on social media platforms to push their characters).

So the only true poll is one that no one votes on out of their own self interest? I legitimately don't get your point here because you're basically saying a poll is tainted the second someone votes on it. The very nature of a poll is to put options up that might not agree with everyone, but by the nature of society one option is going to float to the top, even if it isn't by a wide margin.

I'm calling out all the fan favorites by saying this, but I specifically bring it up in Geno's case because we have the most to gain from his promotion in such things.

Coming from the same guy who has repeatedly, in this very thread, policed the tone of discussion to try and sway people away from treating Geno like he's above other characters, yet Geno has the most to gain from beating out other characters, It's kind of funny.

Any chance for Geno in Smash lives and dies by fan support

Considering that at the first mention of DLC, Sakurai essentially tweeted "don't @ me" tells me that this is objectively false. Any DLC already planned for this game was not created with current fan input in mind. I don't know what the future holds, but any post Fighters Pass DLC character on a drawing board right now either comes from the official Smash polls from the past, or Sakurai pulls the picks from his a- a hat.

so it is in our self-serving interest to vote and vote heavily in polls for his inclusion, whereas the other three characters on the Walmart poll for example, have tons of reasons to get into Smash besides just fan support and are active characters that more easily market themselves to the public at large.

Again, all poll results are the aggregate of the self serving interests of all voters. That's the nature of a poll. I'll push the question even harder this time because clearly this polling bias is important to you: is the only true poll one where we all vote for each other's interests in some sort of democratic communism? Should the poll results be skewed to Master Chief or Sora because they "deserve it"?

As for the other characters having tons of reason to get into Smash, the bottom line from what we "know" (and I use know in quotes here because of the nature of "knowing" when it comes to Smash speculation), Sakurai gets suggestions from Nintendo in some form, and then ultimately can still say "no". The most important video game character in the world could still not be in Super Smash Bros, and if Sakurai comes up with an arbitrary reason for why he doesn't want to make a fighter out of them, he just doesn't. And sure, "active characters"? That's why our current DLC is made up of niche picks, one off RPG protagonists and a cereal mascot from a knockoff Mario 64?

Smaller characters (I.E. the ones that have commonly polled well in Smash) have to inherently push harder and receive more support to have a chance in hell of being added to Smash. This creates the situation in which voluntary response bias is also bred as the more niche character fans will likely flock to forums where they can find like-minded individuals to share their love of a character, whereas bigger characters don't have to seek out approval and may be more mainstream where they can share opinions elsewhere.

"Smaller characters" and "polled well" is a paradox. If you're winning an open to the public poll, you're not a small. You're well known, and even if you're not "popular", you're a name that will get a vote. No character has to push hard to get into the game, except maybe Ridley, since Sakurai stated multiple times he just didn't think he would work, but Sakurai said the same about Villager and Miis. The only difference is that there were tons of fans pushing for Ridley while most people would have been indifferent if Villager or Miis ever made it into the game. The reaction to Ridley was huge because there are loads and loads of fans that they were essentially ignoring, the struggle was in their heads because they were ignored.

No, 20 out of a 1000 isn't enough to sway a vote, but it's also indicative of the problems with treating polling as an all important tool to listen to (I realize you specifically aren't claiming this, but people do treat polling with exceptional respect when it works in their favor quite often). It's extremely flawed and only made more flawed by our active attempts to insert ourselves into the poll's sample size through response bias. A bigger sample size is better because as you approach the reality of the population as you increase the size... but through voluntary response bias in this case you get data that skews towards certain options as opposed to others and thus allows for the development of blind spots and false positives essentially. The methodology of your poll and statistics matters as much as your numbers do.

I feel like Bill Murray. I've seen this feeble argument over and over... People treat polling with respect regardless of whether it works in their favor. I'm quickly understanding that by your logic, no vote in the history of the United States or any other representative democracy has ever been a valid indicator of policy action because people move as a group, or... a party to vote for their collective self interest. Is the Smash Ballot valid to you because it doesn't limit the options and therefore it is immune to party actions? Even though that's certifiably false? In fact, I really hope that you treat the Smash Ballot as an even less valid poll, because it had no safeguard in place to ensure one vote per person.

I know this will fall on deaf ears because numbers isn't what you want to hear especially given the next block I quoted out, but let's take this poll as just a small example of why there is no inorganic polling here:
As of my writing this, there are 2827 votes on the poll, with Geno leading at 41% of the popular vote, meaning he has 1159 votes. It's already been brought up, but the 10 to 15 faces I see here every time I come to this thread cannot have possibly swayed this that much. So there's some assumption by your claims that there are 1139 other inorganic Geno voters out there who are simply bandwagoning to make Geno win a pointless poll because we have "something to gain". So, the biggest den of Geno activity I can think of on Twitter would be Operation Starfall, that has 797 followers. So let's assume that every person following Operation Starfall voted on that poll (which is improbable, by the way), Geno has like 812 votes or something. But wait, there's that "overlap" you were talking about, where all of us in this thread go hang out in shady places where we can find like minded Geno fans because all we want to do is hear positivity about Geno, so by your logic, everyone in here is already following operation starfall, so Geno has exactly 797 invalid votes because Operation Starfall raided the poll and the average consumer doesn't give a damn about Geno.

I'll admit, 797 is a decent chunk of 1159. More than half, for sure. Walmart Canada Gaming, who I did not know even existed before the link was shared here, also happens to have a similar amount of followers, at 710. I guess by your logic only followers of Walmart Canada Gaming are organic, so is the whole poll just invalid now that there are more voters than there are "citizens" in terms of followers of an obscure Canadian branch of Walmart's social media department?

But hang on! What's this, 1159 leaves 1667 votes for people who are not Geno, which means that the other characters are sampled from outside of the citizenry of Walmart Canada Gaming, as well. The poll is fair again because it wasn't locked to following Walmart Canada. The poll is more fair than the Smash ballot because Twitter actually prevents users from voting more than once, barring odd circumstances where you may have more than one Twitter account. The poll even remains fair because the other fanbases can tell their fans to go vote, too. They probably already have. Which leads into your next point:

The criticism I take on "we're not representative of the Smash Population" is based in the numbers of our specific populations, how the Smash community interacts with polls, and the way the community treats things not relating to specifically targeted towards them. We're a subgroup of the larger Smash population and we're marketed to on specific instances like others subgroups, but we don't compromise the majority as people would like to believe either. We're just the loudest and the ones who force down certain ideas on to the more impressionable parts of our own population. Like I've brought up before, Smash fans are fickle at the best of times and jump ships with a fair amount of regularity, so not many characters have this inherent built in support base as we'd like to think (I'm not calling any specific ones out here to be absolutely clear, and I generally think Geno has one of the more solid ones). The reception you speak of? Is just the already vocal Smash Bubble being even louder than usual, because most of those reaction videos? Are from people overwhelmingly within the Smash Bubble. If you're aware of the community requesting certain characters, for example, you're already in the bubble. There's 15 million people who own Ultimate and we comprise maybe around a 1/15th of that overall population. We're a group that can wield some amount of influence through our loudness, that's for certain, and Sakurai and Nintendo do want to keep us happy because we're the best free advertising ever in how absurdly loud we can get about things that can impact a game's perception.

But there's still the rest of the fan base to cater to, and obscure characters are not going to fair as well once you get removed from our surroundings. Some nostalgia will get some people, and those that we convert into the Bubble will also push them further and as the Bubble expands, there's a more legitimate argument to be made about it representing the population more correctly, sure. But we also see the limits of our actual power as a subgroup through the fact only 1 of the 4 DLC fighters in Ultimate is a request or even popular with this group of people.

Are you kidding me on blind spots? Bayonetta, Simon Belmont, Isabelle, Joker, Hero and Dragon Quest in general, and Terry have all completely shocked sections of the community and brought about on onslaught of moaning from people on these characters and how they got in. It's not just that people are surprised, it's the "But they didn't have fan support" or "This character/series has no actual fans" or whatever have you. You have people responding poorly to Pac-Man in Smash 4, and that's exactly the type of insane blind spot that can be created in the context of the "Smash bubble."



I'm not trying to specifically represent this poll in any manner as I said earlier, I just think it's a good way to reiterate the point about the "Smash Bubble" and fan polls I have been making for some time. Geno appearing on a Walmart poll or in a Wendey's Tweet is a sign of how far this bubble has managed to push a character, and that's great. I can't take that away and I'm not trying to. But the specific mention of "Go Vote for Geno" in a fan poll is exactly the sort of thing that I'm criticizing as an element that disrupts someone's ability to draw more meaningful conclusions from the data about the population. Lots of fan bases do this, and that's even more emblematic of the problem of holding polls to much of any standard.

The rest of your post is chasing your own tail in my opinion so I just quoted the rest of it out. Watch this, I'm about to make you mad:

None of the people outside of the "Smash Bubble" matter.

You said it yourself, the Smash fan is the biggest source of free advertising Nintendo could ever ask for. We host tournaments, upload videos, flood social media, everything. Absolutely free. Your argument hinges on the fact that Smash fans only see who they want to see as viable picks for Smash and that's incorrect. So far the only blind spot characters have been Joker and Terry. There's no one who didn't think Pac Man wasn't a viable pick, there's only people who didn't want him. It's the same for Bayonetta, and after Bayonetta 2 cemented Bayonetta as a nearly exclusive franchise for Nintendo, she was on everyone's radar for Smash. You'll always get someone complaining about a pick for Smash, that's the nature of the beast, but if you're unhappy with a character, you must have some kind of stake in Smash. If you're an indifferent commoner, every character in the game is a good choice, if not a little strange or maybe you don't know who they are. That's why those people don't matter in the field of character speculation and they don't really matter in Nintendo's world of character choice. You can go back to whatever quote from whatever business type you want to dig up, and I agree there are picks that "expand the market" or whatever, but every pick in the game is for the Smash fan and has at one point or another been on the radar of the Smash fan.

Do picks shock "sections" of the community? Certainly. Something great about the Smash community, though, is the diverse background of games that we come from. I get frustrated with commentators who can't correctly name Mega Man's moves because I've been playing Mega Man my entire life, but I'm super impressed when a commentator can ramble off the names of Hero's charge spells like they're nothing. There's the people who have no idea that Ness never used PK Fire in his own game and the people who think he and Lucas should have been represented differently. The people who are shocked by some picks or decisions are completely unfazed by others.

To put this on friendlier terms than the blatant bait I put out ealier: the "Smash Bubble" is bigger than you think. Some of us are like Sakurai - our knowledge of games is deep and wide. No video game character is off the table barring some really obvious legal complications and even those might not be completely off the table. Again, where you see people who are angry about a character's inclusion, it isn't because they think the character doesn't deserve it or are "literal whos" or whatever /v/-tier argument you want to throw around. Something that we've come to terms with many times in this very thread is that all arguments against a character boil down to "I don't want him", rather than ignorance of the character. Smash is huge. The community is in places you'd never expect.

 

[Firox]

I'm not saying Geno support isn't real or anything of the sort. But I am saying that this exactly the thing that myself and others have brought up with how the Smash Bubble works to not give as complete of a picture of the actual Smash population and people's feelings. The minute you post something like, "Go vote X or Y," you're actively decreasing the statistical validity of the test by pushing a population with a specific response bias (and the most to gain from responding in that particular way) into your experimental group (which is comprised of the total population of voluntary respondents) that's trying to gauge popularity of characters. And all kinds of fans will do this for different characters, which overall pushes the data into more specific directions and allows for the creation of blindspots that the "Smash Bubble" gets completely shocked by.

I get what you're saying here, and I admit that campaigning for ANYTHING in an election can skew what would otherwise be a more accurate response, but isn't that how elections/polls work in the first place? You talk about the "smash bubble" not representing the majority of the smash fanbase, and while I agree that's true, one could argue the validity of the majority's will if they choose not to vote. For example, if you have an election where 100 people are eligible to vote, but only 10 of them actually do, some could say, "Hey, those ten don't represent us, the majority!" True as that may be, if the majority doesn't vote or make their intentions known in any way, shape or form, what good are their opinions anyway? What kind of voting process would you propose that captures a statistically valid and unbiased result?

I'm not disagreeing with your assessment. The "smash bubble" can often be it's own echo chamber, but I'm honestly curious whether there's such a thing as a completely unbiased, statistically perfect method of getting a public census of pretty much anything. Then again, one could wonder whether if it even matters who those outside the "smash bubble" even think will get in since I would say the majority likes pretty much anyone that Sakurai chooses anyway.

 

[EricTheGamerman]

I get what you're saying here, and I admit that campaigning for ANYTHING in an election can skew what would otherwise be a more accurate response, but isn't that how elections/polls work in the first place? You talk about the "smash bubble" not representing the majority of the smash fanbase, and while I agree that's true, one could argue the validity of the majority's will if they choose not to vote. For example, if you have an election where 100 people are eligible to vote, but only 10 of them actually do, some could say, "Hey, those ten don't represent us, the majority!" True as that may be, if the majority doesn't vote or make their intentions known in any way, shape or form, what good are their opinions anyway? What kind of voting process would you propose that captures a statistically valid and unbiased result?

I'm not disagreeing with your assessment. The "smash bubble" can often be it's own echo chamber, but I'm honestly curious whether there's such a thing as a completely unbiased, statistically perfect method of getting a public census of pretty much anything. Then again, one could wonder whether if it even matters who those outside the "smash bubble" even think will get in since I would say the majority likes pretty much anyone that Sakurai chooses anyway.

No, there isn't an unbiased, statistically perfect method of getting a public consensus. The only real way to achieve that would be to poll the entire population of the group with a census like assessment, and even that can have issues of reporting and biases that overlook certain elements. My issue with the Smash Bubble is just how much bias gets inserted into the equation and how little Smash fans seem to recognize that fact/downplay its effects on polling data so that they can continue to hold up their presumptions about the community. Simply put, many of the Smash polls that are posted online end up polling the same groups of people with little variation in the subjects of that polling. Why? Because fans of characters push for support in polls and often times naturally overlap to a large degree. And this is something that has been happening for well over a decade in which a positive feedback loop has been established that has allowed for more specific characters to grow in popularity due to pre-existing response bias from the early days. There's nothing inherently wrong with that and it's good for the fan bases to expand in certain directions. I think people keep assuming this is some large attack on *insert Smash Bubble fan pick here* to de-legitimize all of their support, and it's not that. What I'm saying is that the validity of these polls is an issue because they aren't really repeated trials that in repetition get closer to the population's true value, but rather, they are repeated trials of the same group of people over and over again which does increase the validity of such polls as a study of a specific subgroup, but not the entire population.

Smash isn't an election with real world effects and never has been outside of the ballot itself. The incentive in voting in every fan made poll is a personal sense of satisfaction, promotion of a character you really like, or both. Which is to say, it's not much and some people don't really value polls in the community for a variety of reasons including some of the issues I've brought up. The people who are most likely to vote in these polls are going to be your most heavily opinionated individuals (oftentimes with an inherent interest in promoting their pick because they need fan support as their angle "in"). This is generally true of elections, but there's actual weight to other democratic processes that compels people to vote. This creates the insular bubble at the end of the day, and that bubble is just one subgroup to market to. And that's where I argue Nintendo and Sakurai are going to spend a great deal of their time and resources, as seen with this Fighter's Pass and even Smash 4's DLC newcomers. A lot of people will be happy with whatever they get... but that also includes a sizable portion of Smash fans (as in they'll buy it anyway, internet opinions don't matter for **** to the company when you just keep buying it). Not to mention we're easily placated for a time with picks such as a Banjo & Kazooie thrown in a Fighter's Pass that more heavily favors outside the typical bubble picks.

Because the Smash Ballot had 1.8 million votes, it's a much better representation of the public's will, especially because there was actual incentive to vote on the parts of fan bases as a strong enough candidate could get into Smash through voting and it shows with how many more votes showed up. It still has many of the same issues that regular polling has, but it's the best data we'll never ever see. Again, I think people tend to mistake me when I say this stuff and assume I'm trying to completely de-legitimize characters and the Bubble's ability to get characters into Smash and I'm not. The Smash Bubble has power as a subgroup, as do other subgroups and its important to recognize both of those facts. We have seen this in play already many times... but we've also seen the opposite with how Simon Belmont got in because of polling data that we were blind to. Other pockets of fandom exist that will not be apparent to us and must also be catered towards. Sakurai has specifically spoken to wanting to listen to unheard fans before in his book, so this is something we've specifically seen him do as well. There's all kinds of Smash fans to market to as a corporation, and your overall view as a company with a product is continued customer retention/engagement and expansion into new markets, and that shows pretty well with the Fighter's Pass I think. These are not niche fighters that have been included, they're more specific inclusions to satisfy different groups of people and fans with only one really appealing to the sensibilities of the Smash Bubble.

I'm asking people to stop assigning so much validity to our own internal polling based upon these factors and stop treating everything in terms of "what the fan base truly wants as known by polling data." It's not useless data by any stretch of the imagination because it's valuable data about the bubble, and as I've mentioned before, you will market to these individuals at different points. And that Bubble can expand in certain ways and bleed into other subgroups depending on how contact is established between them. I think some people are getting too bogged down in the specifics of this one poll I used as reference material. I want people to acknowledge that the Smash Bubble is a very real thing that causes certain biases to be perpetrated (both for and against characters) and to stop being as arrogant as to demand that they be the only subgroup catered to in Ultimate despite the validity of appealing to other groups not within the more insular parts of the bubble.

 

[Heoj]

Okay, so I was bored so I did this small thing I totally don't regret, basically i went to the Walmart Canada twitter replies and counted how many times someone replied with either Sora Geno Crash or Master Chief.

This is the first one:
Dream Scenario: Sakurai lets you pick a character to be added to #SmashBrosUltimate as DLC, but you can only choose ONE of the following.
Which new challenger is approaching?

56 were in support of Geno
66 people were in support of Sora
32 were in support of Crash
And 14 were in support of Master Chief

Then for the replies to the poll:
We're glad that you've been enjoying this hypothetical. Let's keep the #SmashBrosUltimate discussions going with a poll! Vote for the ONE character you'd choose as DLC.

28 people were in support of Geno
1 person was in support of Sora
4 were in support of Crash
And 1 person was in support of Master Chief

This really doesn't mean anything at all as all I did was count how many people were supporting which character in the twitter replies. It was just for fun.

 

[Dynamic Worlok]

It's a Twitter poll. I don't see why anybody is treating it like such a big deal. I do think it's pretty cool to have a corporate Twitter account acknowledge geno, though.

 

[StarLight42]

It's a Twitter poll. I don't see why anybody is treating it like such a big deal. I do think it's pretty cool to have a corporate Twitter account acknowledge geno, though.

I mean, i’d say it’s more than just cool. It’s a corporate Twitter account acknowledging three extremely relevant characters who have had or are getting games recently... and then a side character from a game that’s over 20 years old which casual gamers might not even know about.

I will admit the poll results being biased in favor of Geno is probably due to the Geno fans’ shock at Walmart’s acknowledgement of the character. I’d say Sora is probably more desirable among the mainstream.

 

[SpiritOfRuin]

I get what you're saying here, and I admit that campaigning for ANYTHING in an election can skew what would otherwise be a more accurate response, but isn't that how elections/polls work in the first place? You talk about the "smash bubble" not representing the majority of the smash fanbase, and while I agree that's true, one could argue the validity of the majority's will if they choose not to vote. For example, if you have an election where 100 people are eligible to vote, but only 10 of them actually do, some could say, "Hey, those ten don't represent us, the majority!" True as that may be, if the majority doesn't vote or make their intentions known in any way, shape or form, what good are their opinions anyway? What kind of voting process would you propose that captures a statistically valid and unbiased result?

I'm not disagreeing with your assessment. The "smash bubble" can often be it's own echo chamber, but I'm honestly curious whether there's such a thing as a completely unbiased, statistically perfect method of getting a public census of pretty much anything. Then again, one could wonder whether if it even matters who those outside the "smash bubble" even think will get in since I would say the majority likes pretty much anyone that Sakurai chooses anyway.

I totally agree with you and I also definitely see where ericthegamerman is coming from. It's hard for us to know just how big the smash bubble really is and why such a massive portion of the overall smash fanbase doesn't participate in polls and the like. Sure I know that some copies may go to kids who don't have regular access to the internet or social media to participate in such things, some may be the result of people who bought the base game but are against DLC, some may be because people enjoy the game but simply aren't aware of sites and polls related to the game or are uninterested in social media or online communities (this is really the only place that I participate in such a community myself and I refuse to get on Twitter even to support Geno in a poll).

The point is, there are certainly people who have opinions but no way to voice them. Maybe if the poll was on the game itself it'd be more accessible and accurate, but I don't know. I'm sure there are fans who don't vote because they don't think their vote matters or because they would simply be happy with any additions to the game or the opposite and have no interest in more content. I do think it matters what those outside of the smash bubble think it's just a matter of actually reaching those people on their terms and there just doesn't seem to be a good way to do so.

And I also think it's important to keep surprises that many within the smash bubble weren't expecting because they're fun. Do I think that all additions should be surprises? No. But I also don't think what the smash bubble wants is always reasonable or should be the be all end all of additional content. Ericthegamerman seems to be trying to point out that the smash bubble can get very narrowsighted, be fickle, and not always accurately represent the wider playerbase that enjoys the game and that seems to be an accurate description. I also don't want to unintentionally put words in anyone's mouths though or continue this rambling response that is intended to agree with many of the things others have pointed out and add onto the conversation.

 

[Firox]

No, there isn't an unbiased, statistically perfect method of getting a public consensus. The only real way to achieve that would be to poll the entire population of the group with a census like assessment, and even that can have issues of reporting and biases that overlook certain elements. My issue with the Smash Bubble is just how much bias gets inserted into the equation and how little Smash fans seem to recognize that fact/downplay its effects on polling data so that they can continue to hold up their presumptions about the community. Simply put, many of the Smash polls that are posted online end up polling the same groups of people with little variation in the subjects of that polling. Why? Because fans of characters push for support in polls and often times naturally overlap to a large degree. And this is something that has been happening for well over a decade in which a positive feedback loop has been established that has allowed for more specific characters to grow in popularity due to pre-existing response bias from the early days. There's nothing inherently wrong with that and it's good for the fan bases to expand in certain directions. I think people keep assuming this is some large attack on *insert Smash Bubble fan pick here* to de-legitimize all of their support, and it's not that. What I'm saying is that the validity of these polls is an issue because they aren't really repeated trials that in repetition get closer to the population's true value, but rather, they are repeated trials of the same group of people over and over again which does increase the validity of such polls as a study of a specific subgroup, but not the entire population.

Smash isn't an election with real world effects and never has been outside of the ballot itself. The incentive in voting in every fan made poll is a personal sense of satisfaction, promotion of a character you really like, or both. Which is to say, it's not much and some people don't really value polls in the community for a variety of reasons including some of the issues I've brought up. The people who are most likely to vote in these polls are going to be your most heavily opinionated individuals (oftentimes with an inherent interest in promoting their pick because they need fan support as their angle "in"). This is generally true of elections, but there's actual weight to other democratic processes that compels people to vote. This creates the insular bubble at the end of the day, and that bubble is just one subgroup to market to. And that's where I argue Nintendo and Sakurai are going to spend a great deal of their time and resources, as seen with this Fighter's Pass and even Smash 4's DLC newcomers. A lot of people will be happy with whatever they get... but that also includes a sizable portion of Smash fans (as in they'll buy it anyway, internet opinions don't matter for **** to the company when you just keep buying it). Not to mention we're easily placated for a time with picks such as a Banjo & Kazooie thrown in a Fighter's Pass that more heavily favors outside the typical bubble picks.

Because the Smash Ballot had 1.8 million votes, it's a much better representation of the public's will, especially because there was actual incentive to vote on the parts of fan bases as a strong enough candidate could get into Smash through voting and it shows with how many more votes showed up. It still has many of the same issues that regular polling has, but it's the best data we'll never ever see. Again, I think people tend to mistake me when I say this stuff and assume I'm trying to completely de-legitimize characters and the Bubble's ability to get characters into Smash and I'm not. The Smash Bubble has power as a subgroup, as do other subgroups and its important to recognize both of those facts. We have seen this in play already many times... but we've also seen the opposite with how Simon Belmont got in because of polling data that we were blind to. Other pockets of fandom exist that will not be apparent to us and must also be catered towards. Sakurai has specifically spoken to wanting to listen to unheard fans before in his book, so this is something we've specifically seen him do as well. There's all kinds of Smash fans to market to as a corporation, and your overall view as a company with a product is continued customer retention/engagement and expansion into new markets, and that shows pretty well with the Fighter's Pass I think. These are not niche fighters that have been included, they're more specific inclusions to satisfy different groups of people and fans with only one really appealing to the sensibilities of the Smash Bubble.

I'm asking people to stop assigning so much validity to our own internal polling based upon these factors and stop treating everything in terms of "what the fan base truly wants as known by polling data." It's not useless data by any stretch of the imagination because it's valuable data about the bubble, and as I've mentioned before, you will market to these individuals at different points. And that Bubble can expand in certain ways and bleed into other subgroups depending on how contact is established between them. I think some people are getting too bogged down in the specifics of this one poll I used as reference material. I want people to acknowledge that the Smash Bubble is a very real thing that causes certain biases to be perpetrated (both for and against characters) and to stop being as arrogant as to demand that they be the only subgroup catered to in Ultimate despite the validity of appealing to other groups not within the more insular parts of the bubble.

Ah, I see. So your beef is more about whether the "smash bubble" is projecting itself as the majority or feeling overly entitled about newcomer picks. Fair enough. I suppose the greater question here is whether the Smash team SHOULD cater more to the hardcore fans/Smash bubble or whether their attempts to reach OUTSIDE the current fanbase is best for the game as a whole. From a Nintendo perspective, they obviously want to sell as many units as possible, which obviously means bringing in people that haven't already found interest in the game. From that perspective, it makes sense that they would sometimes ignore the core fans in favor of the gaming community at large (ie. Joker and Hero for JRPG enthusiasts, Terry for SNK/Traditional Fighting game fans, etc.). On the flip side, I would say the vast majority of casuals (more often than not, the very demographic Nintendo is trying to reach) regard Smash bros exclusively as a party game, and it's highly debatable whether the addition of one or two characters could incentivize them to buy a Switch and/or the game. Even if they did, many of them would follow the typical model of play-the-game-for-a-few-days/weeks-then-get-bored-and-move-on. Nintendo gets their money, so either way, Nintendo wins.

From the perspective of long-time fans, however, I can understand why some might feel betrayed in the sense that their votes essentially didn't matter. Many have spent years, if not decades, begging and campaigning only to have seemingly random picks in place of what they would think is obvious. I'm not saying that should entitle anyone, but I can see where that would feel like your best friend passing you over on Christmas just to give your gift to a total stranger. They don't see why their loyalty to the franchise should be cast aside for those that thus far haven't given a crap either way. Mind you, this isn't MY position, I'm simply explaining the mindsets at play here.

I suppose more exposure in the market could only be good for the franchise, but considering how few slots are left to be filled, I can totally understand why competition is so fierce among the fanbases for their favorites to get in. We can only hope that Nintendo and Sakurai's biases align with our own.

 

[kiteinthesky]

I suppose the greater question here is whether the Smash team SHOULD cater more to the hardcore fans/Smash bubble or whether their attempts to reach OUTSIDE the current fanbase is best for the game as a whole.

Why do people assume that the opinions of people outside of the Smash speculation community is all that different than those within? If anything, that Twitter poll should show we all have similar opinions and feelings on the matter. Way too many people voted on that thing for it to arguably just be us. Just because there's an outspoken speculation community doesn't mean its feelings are different from anybody else's; we're just the ones willing to speak out about it.

 

[RetrogamerMax]

When they're showing off Geno gameplay we better see him on stage with Wario's red color-swap and blue Yoshi.

Let's hope it's even better and Geno comes along with a Boshi Echo.

 

[Deleted member]

Why do people assume that the opinions of people outside of the Smash speculation community is all that different than those within? If anything, that Twitter poll should show we all have similar opinions and feelings on the matter. Way too many people voted on that thing for it to arguably just be us. Just because there's an outspoken speculation community doesn't mean its feelings are different from anybody else's; we're just the ones willing to speak out about it.

nooo the fact that there's an outspoken speculation community taints the impressionable mind of the normie, and thanks to our dedication we'll never know what the true desires of the casual smash player really were! Surely if we had just kept our mouths shut and never voted in any poll ever, Fortnite default skin would be in Smash.

[/scarcasm]

 

[TheCJBrine]

Why do people assume that the opinions of people outside of the Smash speculation community is all that different than those within? If anything, that Twitter poll should show we all have similar opinions and feelings on the matter. Way too many people voted on that thing for it to arguably just be us. Just because there's an outspoken speculation community doesn't mean its feelings are different from anybody else's; we're just the ones willing to speak out about it.

I think it’s because of cases such as where Steve scores high on polls and has evidence of a lot of support elsewhere while some trolls in the hardcore fanbase bash you for simply mentioning Steve and spam 4chan’s grotesque render just to make Steve fans look bad (seriously some jerks raided the SteveForSmash discord with Grotesque Steve spam, real Steve fans don’t like that render these days if they even did in the first place (when they would’ve only liked it as a throwaway joke)).

Although I guess based on Twitter and stuff, Steve has become a core fan pick as well as a top pick otherwise whether trolls like it or not.

Of course Geno is also considerably popular for a “20-year old puppet man”, I believe; YouTube videos centered around him, him for Smash, SMRPG, Beware the Forest’s Mushrooms, etc. can get thousands of likes and of course he scores highly on polls, too. Some BtFM remixes get over a thousand likes with at least one I’ve seen getting almost 7k. The Project M Geno mod video, for another example, has at least 4.5k likes.

Heck, Rawest Forest has plenty more, having at least 17k likes. Smooth McGroove’s acapella for BtFM has at least 35k. Maybe some of these people don’t like Geno specifically but I’d be surprised if the people who dislike him aren’t a small minority.

edit: and then there’s TerminalMontage and his Geno videos with even more likes, the one about Geno in Ultimate having 40k. Okay I’m done.

 

[RetrogamerMax]

nooo the fact that there's an outspoken speculation community taints the impressionable mind of the normie, and thanks to our dedication we'll never know what the true desires of the casual smash player really were! Surely if we had just kept our mouths shut and never voted in any poll ever, Fortnite default skin would be in Smash.

[/scarcasm]

I think if it wasn't for fanbases dominanting the community, more iconic 3rd party characters more specifically co-protagonist and antagonist characters would dominant the polls like Tails, Knuckles, Shadow, Dr. Eggman, Chun-Li, M. Bison, Sephiroth, ect.

It would make perfect sense if most of the quiet crowd were cheering for the most iconic/popular video game characters in history not yet in Smash. Of course there is iconic mascots like Crash and Doom Slayer dominanting the polls, but if not for us, more Sonic and Street Fighter characters would probably be dominanting the polls because of how iconic/popular they are.

 

[Deleted member]

Why do people assume that the opinions of people outside of the Smash speculation community is all that different than those within? If anything, that Twitter poll should show we all have similar opinions and feelings on the matter. Way too many people voted on that thing for it to arguably just be us. Just because there's an outspoken speculation community doesn't mean its feelings are different from anybody else's; we're just the ones willing to speak out about it.

Because we literally have characters in the game that were popular in the polls (The Belmonts and Bayonetta), and yet barely got discussed in the Bubble besides one of them being leaked (Simon).

 

[EricTheGamerman]

Ah, I see. So your beef is more about whether the "smash bubble" is projecting itself as the majority or feeling overly entitled about newcomer picks. Fair enough. I suppose the greater question here is whether the Smash team SHOULD cater more to the hardcore fans/Smash bubble or whether their attempts to reach OUTSIDE the current fanbase is best for the game as a whole. From a Nintendo perspective, they obviously want to sell as many units as possible, which obviously means bringing in people that haven't already found interest in the game. From that perspective, it makes sense that they would sometimes ignore the core fans in favor of the gaming community at large (ie. Joker and Hero for JRPG enthusiasts, Terry for SNK/Traditional Fighting game fans, etc.). On the flip side, I would say the vast majority of casuals (more often than not, the very demographic Nintendo is trying to reach) regard Smash bros exclusively as a party game, and it's highly debatable whether the addition of one or two characters could incentivize them to buy a Switch and/or the game. Even if they did, many of them would follow the typical model of play-the-game-for-a-few-days/weeks-then-get-bored-and-move-on. Nintendo gets their money, so either way, Nintendo wins.

From the perspective of long-time fans, however, I can understand why some might feel betrayed in the sense that their votes essentially didn't matter. Many have spent years, if not decades, begging and campaigning only to have seemingly random picks in place of what they would think is obvious. I'm not saying that should entitle anyone, but I can see where that would feel like your best friend passing you over on Christmas just to give your gift to a total stranger. They don't see why their loyalty to the franchise should be cast aside for those that thus far haven't given a crap either way. Mind you, this isn't MY position, I'm simply explaining the mindsets at play here.

I suppose more exposure in the market could only be good for the franchise, but considering how few slots are left to be filled, I can totally understand why competition is so fierce among the fanbases for their favorites to get in. We can only hope that Nintendo and Sakurai's biases align with our own.

Here's the thing, everything about the base game with the exceptions of Isabelle, Incineroar, and maybe Ken seems designed for the more hardcore Smash fans and the Smash Bubble. All these characters were included to please fans, including all the returning veterans, Inkling, Ridley, King K. Rool, Daisy, Chrom, and Dark Samus in addition to the loads of specifically made in response to fan critique stuff like Stage Hazards, an Adventure mode, better Classic Modes, etc.

You're analogy brings up the point of us being the clingy friend who demands that our other friend Smash Bros. spend all of its time with us and gets insecure when our friend Smash makes other friends and likes to spend time with them. Our friend Smash still makes sure to really come by and spend some quality time with us (Banjo & Kazooie) and cares about us deeply, but they spend less than they used to be because they have changed while we haven't. Especially when our friend Smash also worked really, really damn hard to spend a whole bunch of time with us before and crossed off a whole bunch of stuff off of the list of doing things together that we'd had for years before spending time with others (I'm just having a bit of fun with this analogy at this point). At what point does this "loyalty" become clingy behavior that actively hinders what Smash is trying to be at this point? Sakurai already went well out of his way in multiple facets of the game to reward loyalty of longtime fans, yet some act like betrayed little children in response to other characters showing up and other groups being catered to.

Again, I'm not calling out people here specifically, just the mindset I've seen in parts of the community.

nooo the fact that there's an outspoken speculation community taints the impressionable mind of the normie, and thanks to our dedication we'll never know what the true desires of the casual smash player really were! Surely if we had just kept our mouths shut and never voted in any poll ever, Fortnite default skin would be in Smash.

[/scarcasm]

You're still missing the points I've been making by so much. I literally said the data was valuable in its own right.

 

[Firox]

You're analogy brings up the point of us being the clingy friend who demands that our other friends Smash Bros. spend all of its time with us and gets insecure when our friend Smash makes other friends and likes to spend time with them. Our friend Smash still makes sure to really come by and spend some quality time with us (Banjo & Kazooie) and cares about us deeply, but they spend less than they used to be because they have changed while we haven't. Especially when our friend Smash also worked really, really damn hard to spend a whole bunch of time with us before and crossed off a whole bunch of stuff off of the list of doing things together that we'd had for years before spending time with others (I'm just having a bit of fun with this analogy at this point). At what point does this "loyalty" become clingy behavior that actively hinders what Smash is trying to be at this point? Sakurai already went well out of his way in multiple facets of the game to reward loyalty of longtime fans, yet some act like betrayed little children in response to other characters showing up and other groups being catered to.

LOL That's a pretty good expansion of my analogy. It is kinda funny/sad to see the disconnect between Sakurai's vision of the game and everyone else's. We have a dedicated fanbase that insists that Smash is a highly competitive fighting game while Sakurai often times seems to be doing everything in his power to undermine that. "Give us a ranked mode!" (Gives us GSP, a weak, half-way point with a positive feel) "Give us Nintendo sponsored tournaments!" (Holds FFA tourneys with items and hazards) "Give us online 1v1 tournaments!" (Drops the stock to 1) "Balance the roster!" (Nerfs Greninja....sorry, not really true in Ultimate but couldn't resist lol)

I'm just saying that even if we don't like it, Sakurai's vision may not always align with what the fanbase thinks it is. To your point though, I think the fact that B-K and all the veterans got in is still a SUPER positive sign. It means that Sakurai DOES hear our wishes. They CAN come true. We just have to keep hoping they will.

 

[xpnc]

I'd love to have Geno playable, I severely doubt his chances.
I think with the emphasis on bringing in as many new game worlds to smash, other new characters will get priority.
(Geno's game world is already represented with his spirit, so I doubt they would double up, when they could get an entirely new game world.)
Plus with the other missing Mii costumes from Smash 4 slowly returning and trickling in, it's only a matter of time until the Mii costume shows up.
Hopefully the Geno can still be playable meme will die soon, this dead horse has been beat to a pulp!

"Hm, what will I do today...I know! I'm going to go into the Geno support thread and tell them all I hope the stop 'beating the dead horse'!"

 

[StarLight42]

I love this. I need my bois in Smash so this ages well. reminds me of the Smash Kingdom videos from the Brawl days

Raskin’s Geno voice has dropped in quality a lot, though

 

[JarBear]

"Hm, what will I do today...I know! I'm going to go into the Geno support thread and tell them all I hope the stop 'beating the dead horse'!"

What it feels like some times going to the Geno support thread:

 

[EricTheGamerman]

LOL That's a pretty good expansion of my analogy. It is kinda funny/sad to see the disconnect between Sakurai's vision of the game and everyone else's. We have a dedicated fanbase that insists that Smash is a highly competitive fighting game while Sakurai often times seems to be doing everything in his power to undermine that. "Give us a ranked mode!" (Gives us GSP, a weak, half-way point with a positive feel) "Give us Nintendo sponsored tournaments!" (Holds FFA tourneys with items and hazards) "Give us online 1v1 tournaments!" (Drops the stock to 1) "Balance the roster!" (Nerfs Greninja....sorry, not really true in Ultimate but couldn't resist lol)

I'm just saying that even if we don't like it, Sakurai's vision may not always align with what the fanbase thinks it is. To your point though, I think the fact that B-K and all the veterans got in is still a SUPER positive sign. It means that Sakurai DOES hear our wishes. They CAN come true. We just have to keep hoping they will.

I think we do tend to not value Sakurai enough as his own creator with his own interests. Yes, Smash is a product, but it's also a creation that a man has devoted years of his life to and he has his own vision for that project.

Yes, it's a positive sign that Sakurai is willing to listen to us and cater to our interests at different points. Like I've said many times, we're one subgroup that will be catered to when Nintendo and Sakurai decides appropriate, and then that data from our limited polls becomes more important. They will keep listening to our wishes, but we're not the only group they're interested in/going to be listening to.

 

[Deleted member]

"Hm, what will I do today...I know! I'm going to go into the Geno support thread and tell them all I hope the stop 'beating the dead horse'!"

Everyone did a great job ignoring this guy and you should join in.

 

[StarLight42]

"Hm, what will I do today...I know! I'm going to go into the Geno support thread and tell them all I hope the stop 'beating the dead horse'!"

Tbh, that guy doesn’t even sound like a Geno fan at all. I feel like a genuine fan would say something like “I don’t think he will be in, but i’m still rooting for you guys”

Saying something like “Let’s put this meme to bed” just sounds sketchy as hell and something you’d find on a GameFAQS post, to be honest.

 

[Deleted member]

Tbh, that guy doesn’t even sound like a Geno fan at all. I feel like a genuine fan would say something like “I don’t think he will be in, but i’m still rooting for you guys”

Saying something like “Let’s put this meme to bed” just sounds sketchy as hell and something you’d find on a GameFAQS post, to be honest.

No way, a true fan would definitely want to put Geno to bed.

In a comfy bed up in the Smash mansion where the rest of the playable fighters sleep.

 

[Dynamic Worlok]

Hopefully the "geno can't still be playable" meme dies out soon. This dead horse has been beaten to a pulp