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Since it's almost over, I wanted to think everybody (way too many people to quote LOL) for wishing me a Happy Birthday! Thank you all! I'm hoping Geno gets in by my next Birthday.
Anyway, to add on to my predictions:
I'm doubting a Bandai Namco character at this point. It just doesn't make sense to me why Heihachi and Gil would come back with Min Min and Steve respectively when they could come with a Bandai Namco character, unless a Bandai Namco character could come with 5 new costumes like the rumored Ms. Pac-Man hat. I'm mixed on Capcom right now. The Monster Hunter costumes are still missing, and that's about it. Maybe Dante could come with the 2 Monster Hunter costumes, the rumored Elecman costume, and 2 extra? Koei Tecmo could get a character (probably Hayabusa), as they haven't really had anything in Ultimate's DLC yet. I'm mixed on Ubisoft at this point. Sure, we got the Rabbids and Altair...but why not a deluxe Rayman? We saw with the Pig and Creeper costumes that unattached limbs are possible on Mii costumes. If Rayman doesn't get in, I'm pretty sure he'll at least get a deluxe Mii costume.
Lastly, I want to talk about Square Enix. Geno is in a very good position right now. His main competitors are 2B, Neku, and another Final Fantasy character. 2B is rumored to be a Mii costume and another Final Fantasy character seems unlikely. I think a new The World Ends with You is being rumored, but I'm pretty unsure if that helps Neku all that much. I don't really consider Sora a competitor to Geno, as he is technically owned by Disney.
In terms of my other predictions:
Crash - Pretty self-explanatory.
Isaac - Golden Sun is rumored to be getting a BIG comeback, and he would fit pretty well as the last character (64 was Jigglypuff, Melee was Mr. Game & Watch, Brawl was Wolf, 4 was Duck Hunt and Bowser Jr., 4's DLC was Corrin and Bayonetta, and Fighter's Pass 1 was Byleth; my main point is Nintendo tends to end with older first-party characters).
Porky - His absence is weird. He's the only boss from Brawl (and from any Smash) to not physically appear in Ultimate. I guess the Absolutely Safe Capsule spirit could be a whole joke on how even Galeem couldn't get him out of it. I don't known, he's in a weird spot.
This turned out a lot longer than I expected. I think I like Smash Bros. speculation too much LOL.
My current predictions for FPV2.
The last slot has 4 characters battling it out, all of these characters have stuff going for them, so really, it can be any of them.
I haven't posted here in awhile, but your predictions are exactly the same as mine. I feel pretty confident in Geno and Ryu making it in, and Crash is another solid bet that I'm getting behind. If not Crash, then maybe Master Chief or (hopefully) Doomguy, but Crash feels most likely to me.
As for the fourth spot, I really think we'll be getting one more first party character. I have no idea who, but I imagine it's likely a promotional character. BotW2 comes to mind, but it could be anyone at this point.
There is a guy who leaked Banjo’s Mii costumes, FE Three Houses content, and Terry’s Spirit Board predicting that Ms. Pac Man will be a Mii hat. One thing to note that he gave a list of names with no explanation so people assumed if anything she might be a Mii hat.
With Ryu Hayabusa, it's perplexing to me. Steve proved that insider talks can eventually pan out even if it takes 5 grinding years. But has anyone considered that Ryu could've been Byleth bait? The only noteworthy Ryu thing to come out recently is the Ninja Gaiden collection rating.
It's been talked about it but Steve added a plot twist we weren't expecting. As I've said, two Microsoft ambassadors told Sabi that Steve was leakbait for Banjo back in the spring of 2019 so for that to be proven wrong a year and a half later is a hell of a revelation. As I've said, it adds a whole other level of intrigue to the other four characters that have been heard since 2018: Geno, Lloyd, Waluigi, and, of course, Ryu. There's also been an interesting development in the past couple of weeks because some people have opened up in private and have suggested that people got in a lot more serious trouble than originally thought for making Ryu public and it definitely echoes what all went down with Steve.
I was on the train that Ryu was leakbait for most of this year but I've changed my mind with recent developments:
-Hyrule Warriors 2 happening
-Ninja Gaiden Trilogy being leaked
-The Steve and Minecraft rumors from 2018 actually being real
-Certain insiders being not so subtle about Ryu's probable inclusion in the past month
Like I said last December, one of my guys told me to outright dismiss Travis and Ryu but I feel like I can't with Ryu anymore despite what happened with Travis. Ryu is definitely an interesting case but I don't want to make the same mistakes I made with Hero and Steve in assuming old info is inherently bad info. Too many reputable people have heard him for him to be absolutely nothing so I'm err on the side of caution to not get burnt again.
My current predictions for FPV2.
The last slot has 4 characters battling it out, all of these characters have stuff going for them, so really, it can be any of them.
As things are now, I’m going to stand by these as my 4 picks for the remaining roster.
Geno
Ryu Hayabusa
Crash
Impa(Age of Calamity)
I don’t see the the rest being all 3rd party. And there has to be at least one Nintendo pick. If they go with another Zelda character, hopefully it will be someone whom we don’t already have. I think Impa would be the best choice, and she could have all of those Sheikah BOTW powers. But bottom line, and what I’ve been saying since Brawl speculation, as long as Geno makes it, everybody else is gravy.
Oh we're explaining ourselves with our predictions. "Explain yourself, you two bit chump! Nyarrrrrr", that kinda thing, huh? Well, here we go. Hopefully I don't get shot for doing this.
Geno or Crono
Hayabusa or some other Nintendo character
Crash or Spyro
Porky or Capcom (Monster Hunter, Phoenix Wrong being the two that stand out to me, would LOVE Chun-li).
If I HAD to pick based on WANT:
Geno, Hayabusa, Spyro and Porky.
My predictions are Geno/Crono, Hayabusa/Nintendo character, Crash/Spyro, Porky/Capcom
Now to explain my filthy cybernetic self.
Geno/Crono: The Geno evidence has been talked about in CIRCLES, so I'll let someone else explain all that. Plus he fits into that King K. Rool/Ridley/Banjo mold where he's this super mega wanted fighter for a very long time. NOW... I am of course trying to prepare for "the Mii future" so to speak. We've been there before: thinking Isaac was for sure there because that one picture looked like a Golden Sun battle scene or Shadow the Hedgehog because KNUCKLES was promoted to Assist Trophy and Shadow was nowhere to be seen. Grinch leak preyed upon both of those characters' hype before reality kicked in and their assist trophies were revealed. I'm preparing for Geno to be that: all this evidence and theories suggests he's on the way and then he's a deluxe Mii Gunner. If it's any other Square fighter, I'm thinking Crono... honestly, I don't actually have much reason to think that... to quote Hot Rod from Transformers 1986 "I JUST HAVE THIS FEELING". Cue Leonard Nimoy and his band of robots attacking us to the tunes of Vince DiCola as soon as I finish saying that.
Hayabusa/Other Nintendo character: Hayabusa is being talked about now once again and like has been said: There's been too many notable people saying him for it to be NOTHING. I was hesitant to think Hayabusa before, I had heard they had some kind of beef with Capcom. BUT... given this recent development and the whole "Steve took years" thing... my mind is wont to change. Plus Nintendo and Koei Tecmo they've got quite a fling going on... perhaps that fling leads to the baby showing up in Smash. The other option is just "some other Nintendo character", and that could be ANYBODY. BotW2 Zelda, Melia, a Pokemon maybe... that list goes on and on and on. Not even gonna throw a dart at that wall (save for one of my later predictions). But "another Nintendo character" showing up in this pass wouldn't surprise me.
Crash/Spyro: Crash has been talked about quite a bit, most notably this supposed document. He's also been wanted for quite a while. In my heart of hearts, it would make total sense that Crash is the one that's on the way. THEN MY MR HYDE KICKS IN! Crash... isn't SO different from other characters, like you could have a Crash Bandicoot spirit battle where there's crates everywhere and orange Luigi loves using Down B and that's about what Crash most commonly does. SPYRO on the other hand... well, you can just LOOK at him and tell that he's gonna fight very differently from all 70+ other characters. To quote Sakurai himself: "it's more important that a character is fun to play, not just recognizable." SPYRO... would have a VERY different play style than ALL those other characters, being a quadropedal dragon with little wings. I'm open to Spyro swooping in for the surprise reveal (and would love it).
Plus Crash COULD wind up as a Mii Brawler costume that looks like this and that would be just as good (if not secretly better)
Porky/Capcom: SECRETLY this is actually more of a "Porky/MONSTER HUNTER" prediction more than Capcom as a whole, but Phoenix Wrong could well show up. BASICALLY... both Porky and Monster Hunter have... a weird absence with their only presence in Smash basically being a "yeah that's good enough" kinda thing (Monster Hunter boss and Absolutely Safe Capsule spirit). But I still can't shake it. Monster Hunter in particular is not only one of the biggest Japanese games, but also... those Mii costumes: Why didn't they come back with Minecraft, the game about crafting armor and things? Either they'd come back with another sword character (Crono or Hayabusa according to my predictions), they'd come back with an unrelated character, they'd not come back at ALL, or... they got upgraded to playable, which would make sense for one of Japan's biggest games. We haven't gotten any Capcom Miis in Fighter Pass 2 I believe, so they could be holding them off for a Capcom FIGHTER. This is also why I DON'T think there's a Bandai Namco fighter: Why sprinkle those Miis across the pass if there's gonna be a Bandai Namco PACK? Either that Pack has LOTS of new Bandai Namco costumes aka no room for the old ones or there is no Bandai Namco pack iffin you ask me. Porky on the other end... Earthbound has been the subject of some rumory stuff here and there. He's ALSO a weirdly absent character. It's very possible that Porky IS "the Nintendo shill character", especially if there is indeed a new Earthbound something that Nintendo would promote via Smash aka the only thing Earthbound has consistently got since Mother 3.
And that's my song and dance. Hopefully I don't get shot by one of Pantera's Cowboys from Hell.
It's been talked about it but Steve added a plot twist we weren't expecting. As I've said, two Microsoft ambassadors told Sabi that Steve was leakbait for Banjo back in the spring of 2019 so for that to be proven wrong a year and a half later is a hell of a revelation. As I've said, it adds a whole other level of intrigue to the other four characters that have been heard since 2018: Geno, Lloyd, Waluigi, and, of course, Ryu. There's also been an interesting development in the past couple of weeks because some people have opened up in private and have suggested that people got in a lot more serious trouble than originally thought for making Ryu public and it definitely echoes what all went down with Steve.
I was on the train that Ryu was leakbait for most of this year but I've changed my mind with recent developments:
-Hyrule Warriors 2 happening
-Ninja Gaiden Trilogy being leaked
-The Steve and Minecraft rumors from 2018 actually being real
-Certain insiders being not so subtle about Ryu's probable inclusion in the past month
Like I said last December, one of my guys told me to outright dismiss Travis and Ryu but I feel like I can't with Ryu anymore despite what happened with Travis. Ryu is definitely an interesting case but I don't want to make the same mistakes I made with Hero and Steve in assuming old info is inherently bad info. Too many reputable people have heard him for him to be absolutely nothing so I'm err on the side of caution to not get burnt again.
Theoretically, this COULD happen, but I think this possibility is incredibly unlikely. This may be personal bias given Crash is another one of my most wanted characters, but I feel like Crash is one of those rare examples of a character that if he were to get something in Smash, I feel like it would HAVE to be as a playable character. I just feel like Crash is too big of an icon to just be a mere Mii Outfit.
Theoretically, this COULD happen, but I think this possibility is incredibly unlikely. This may be personal bias given Crash is another one of my most wanted characters, but I feel like Crash is one of those rare examples of a character that if he were to get something in Smash, I feel like it would HAVE to be as a playable character. I just feel like Crash is too big of an icon to just be a mere Mii Outfit.
I think it depends it just depends on Both Nintendo and Activision
If The Asking price for Crash's Character Likeiness isn't too High, I could See Nintendo going for it in regards to a Mii costume.
Keep in mind that Licenses for Playable characters are higher than Mii's or Spirits because for Characters you need to license more things. Stages, Music, Spirits of Other Characters, Stuff like that.
If for whatever Reason Nintendo wasn't interested in Crash as a Fighter, or There were 4 other characters (because it's not including Steve and Min-Min) that were given priorty over Crash due to many potential reasons, I could see Just a Mii.
I think it depends it just depends on Both Nintendo and Activision
If The Asking price for Crash's Character Likeiness isn't too High, I could See Nintendo going for it in regards to a Mii costume.
Keep in mind that Licenses for Playable characters are higher than Mii's or Spirits because for Characters you need to license more things. Stages, Music, Spirits of Other Characters, Stuff like that.
If for whatever Reason Nintendo wasn't interested in Crash as a Fighter, or There were 4 other characters (because it's not including Steve and Min-Min) that were given priorty over Crash due to many potential reasons, I could see Just a Mii.
Yeah I see what you mean. I did state that theoretically this COULD happen, but I do think he is far more likely to be a playable character then anything else.
You know what’s amazing? How many Geno videos there are on YouTube or topics. It’s mind blowing to think that all this stuff is out there, goes to show how much he’s wanted. And that’s not even touching the artwork and other stuff he has going. It’s been some journey all these years.
My current prediction list for Smash Ultimate after Steve is thus:
FP8: Geno
FP9: Lloyd or Ryu Hayabusa
FP10: Same as previous (I'm fairly certain we're getting a Bamco rep)
FP11: Dante or Phoenix Wright going off the information that Capcom was the last company negotiated with for the second pass
I accidentally clicked this thread and thought I was transported to the usual Newcomer thread lmao. Anyway, I'll bite while I'm here. Pretty typical prediction overall but this is where I'm currently at.
Ryu Hayabusa - Koei Tecmo not having anything is still suspicious as hell. Don't really need to explain this.
Geno / Square Enix Character - Both SE costumes missing while Capcom and Namco have been fizzled out raises an eyebrow. Feel like there's something more on the horizon. Geno has the edge IMO but I could see us getting something a little more out there too.
Monster Hunter - Stars are aligning similarly to Hero, MH is absolutely massive and Nintendo has every reason in the world to promote the upcoming titles. I really don't think the base game content means all that much if Nintendo wants to expand on it - I don't see Sakurai refusing.
Wildcard: Arle, Sol Badguy / Billy & Jimmy Lee? - Could be whoever, but I choose to have faith in Arle and I believe an ArcSys character is something people tend to sleep on. Both have a good amount of history to celebrate and classic titles available via eshop.
This is the kind of thing that I felt like would be best kept to discord as it is a subject of contention but the more I think and steam and stew, the more it feels like to me that not only is it necessary to get my thoughts out into a single cohesive post for the folks who may misinterpret them, but it's good to bring them to light in this thread so that the general public who may not be a part of our quaint discord community can ingest these ideas as well.
I will warn you, I am not a succinct person, I cannot summarize my thoughts eloquently into a few words. My thoughts on this matter are deep and complex and to attempt to present them in a way that is friendly to the lazy internet reader of 2020 makes them come across garbled and almost 100% of users who view those brief snips of this massive argument interpret them incorrectly. I'm sorry that you have to read all of this nonsense just to get a grasp for what's going through my head, but this is how it is. This post is going to be embarrassingly long, to the point that even now I honestly am already afraid to hit "post reply" simply because someone out there is going to look at this and say "this dude is taking this too seriously" or maybe even accuse me having some form of brain damage. To that, all I have to respond is "typing is fun" and "thinking is fun".
I'm spoilering nearly the whole post just to make sure that this doesn't blow up the page or something.
First, let me just start off by saying that I might exhibit some "opinions" in this post, which depending on my mood as I continue to write or the speed with which I chose to write, may even have some hyperbole mixed in. Some people call this "needless dooming" and they are probably right. Also, I know we've had trouble in the past with observations like this leading to or being part of some kind of thread derailing GameFAQs inspired raid, but please know that I am the very same Serenade who had extremely high hopes for Geno in this gamefirst DLC season second DLC season, and not some deep undercover troll or sleeper agent for those who would see this thread derailed.
I don't believe Geno's making it in anymore. I hope I get to eat my words and be pleasantly surprised at his inclusion, as I have always hoped, but I just don't believe it anymore. I think that a lot of "evidence" we've had to his inclusion has been coincidence at best. I want to thank Polarthief
for writing up his massive List™ for why Geno's in, but I will be using a fair bit of it today to explore the opposite.
So, why am I thinking this now? Some users may say that it's because I, like many others in this community, got psyched up to believe that without a doubt, Geno was Challenger 77, and I just can't deal with the reality that he was not. This is incorrect. Obviously, it would have been outstanding if Geno had been Fighter 77, first and foremost because I could stop worrying that he's not in, and in fact, stop giving a single **** about this whole nonsense. Obviously, we get the benefits of Seven stars, 77 all 7s jackpot etc etc fun memes good times, but really, it was just wishful thinking and I think deep down most people knew it was a situation too good to be true. I've pointed out (in my last few posts, no less) that Nintendo often fails to recognize what would be a good opportunity to any other company, either because their marketing team really is just that stupid, or they're playing such a high dimensional chess game that mortal minds could never comprehend it. To loosely quote myself from Discord not long ago, the part of me that is mad that Geno is not 77 is the same part of me that is mad that he's not 76 or even as far back as something like 22. I have made it clear as crystal that I have expected this character since Melee, a staggering number of years that amounts to the entire lifespan of many users on Smashboards as a whole and a good handful regular to this thread.
Naturally, the next logical conclusion is that it's because not only was 77 not Geno, but it was Steve, who I admit is probably the closest to a "least wanted" fighter I could have told you before his inclusion. I'm not like a lot of people who I guess want to save face or... something(?), I'm not going to change my tune just because Steve's in the game now. I never wanted him, he is still near bedrock in terms of characters I want to see in Smash if Ultimate ever gets a sequel. I hope this clown never returns. That said? I'm charmed by what they did with Steve and I think that, despite how unsightly he is, they managed to make a very cute character out of him. I love how he whips a bed out from nowhere to go to sleep, how his animations are just as ****ty as they can possibly be, how he mines ****ing wool on Magicant, Endermanlet - I could probably go on for a while about all the things I like about this cubic abomination. It's not Steve. It's not Steve being 77. **** 'em.
However, Steve brought with him quite a bit of baggage, and not all of it is his fault, but one of the major pieces of baggage is all on Steve:
It took 5 years of negotiations to bring Steve to Super Smash Bros.
Now, aside from the obvious frustrations I have with the idea that this somehow brings Vergeben back to relevancy (despite his claims being all over the place, proving that he had no knowledge of Steve at this time and was purely being contrarian because of fan demand for Banjo), this whole five year business puts Steve back in 2015... The beginning of Ultimate's development, maybe even late Smash 4 talk.
Theoretically speaking, this is evidence that we could have been one smooth business deal away from Minecraft Steve being in Smash Bros. before Banjo and ****ing Kazooie, Simon Belmont, Ridley, or King K. Rool. That's a horrifying timeline that even with as mind numbingly awful as this one has turned out to be I would not want to be part of.
All of that said, there's absolutely no proof that any rumor of Steve was based in the fact that he was being negotiated for 5 years. This is something that we learned from the kind of people who would have lost their damn jobs (in the best case scenario) for speaking a word of it before Steve's release, and there's little reason to believe this information fell into the hands of a two bit leaker like Vergeben or even anyone else who claimed to know that Minecraft Steve was coming to Smash, or even Minecraft. I think as far as provable information goes, it has always been a guess based on Minecraft's popularity and how quickly it came to Nintendo consoles despite being a Microsoft property as of 2014. For this reason, I think it's safe to say that Nintendo was able to keep negotiations for a character under wraps for half of a ****ing decade.
Let's take that information and look at some facts:
No popularly covered leaks managed to tell people about Joker, Banjo, Terry, or Byleth. Only Erdrick made it out (via Vergeben) and that too could have easily been a guess. Terry only started to get thrown around after Nintendo themselves leaked it, and Banjo was hinted maybe a day or two in advance. Fighter Pass 2 has been exactly the same, we have seen few leaks and hints get thrown around only a few days before the reveal... Except in Steve's case, we got a hint literally minutes before the reveal. The same as Byleth, if I remember correctly. There's a decent chance it would have been mere minutes for Min Min as well if Nintendo hadn't pissed around for three months "it's an ARMS fighter guys!", I mean hell, these folks had 12 characters to choose from so at some point you can leak whatever you want and call it an educated guess.
So, why then do we think that when these insiders brazenly speak Geno's name in public, they're doing so with any meat behind it? These people's asses would be a plaque in Doug Bowser's office for so shamelessly speaking the name of a Smash DLC fighter months before their official release.
Let's continue down the rabbit hole. The other baggage Steve brought that is not entirely his own is that according to my finest sources, Steve was heard. And ignored. Let that sink in. Does it sound familiar? It does to me, because in this very thread we heard about how Byleth was also heard, to the point that in this thread we were told about a Three Houses stage and Three Houses spirits but, due to some kind of dramatic oversight or absolute refusal to believe such a nightmare could happen, Byleth was ignored. I hope what I'm saying here makes sense - we have at least two instances of characters that had either been floated around among insiders or possibly outright known, but matters of personal bias or something similar made those names never seriously make it out to the public. Do we hear Geno from sources who don't have a dog in the Geno race? Imran sure seems like he kinda likes Geno, Jeff Grubb has the same air about him, supposedly having played Mario RPG recently and having become obsessed with it. This even applies to Jon Gamexplain Nintendolife and Andre Gamexplain, both of whom seem to have at least a passive care for Geno/SMRPG. We unfortunately look at these insiders, these industry people, and we see a sympathetic friend. Someone who, operating from the shadows, has our back and will deliver us the good news that some of us have waited nearly two decades for, but I think the sad reality is that these folks are just fans of a video game and maybe, get this, everything they say or joke about actually isn't a hint or a leak. I'll be the first to tell you that you can't trust them when they say they don't leak, but hanging on their every word is worthless.
I ask this and point this out because there's a very real chance that Geno rumors are circulated and live because people genuinely want it to be Geno. It's foolish of me to say that these guys are dunking on us because we're the Geno fanbase and dunking on us is socially acceptable (although it's true) - I really doubt that these professionals with "jobs" would stoop so low as to just **** with a vocal fanbase of a Mario character getting into Smash (but then again, Andre is... dare I say, "unhinged" enough to compare Grinch leak believers to Trump supporters), but if they know facts about a fan favorite, highly requested Mario character getting into the game, maybe someone who has a two decade long legacy who has been poorly represented in Smash for several iterations, who was in a somewhat popular Brawl mod that just recently got a Cease and Desist order, their fan brain tells them Geno but they miss the Waluigi for the trees.
Counterargument: It has been asserted, not only in this thread but on discord, that this 5 year negotiations cycle is good for Geno, as it validates every rumor that we've heard for the past two years, makes it likely that he was in some kind of extended negotiation dating back to 2018, and I will concede that it can be viewed that way. My primary point against this is that we have no concrete proof that we heard anything about the Minecraft negotiations and it is foolish to believe that we got breadcrumbs for Geno from what are no doubt very well secured talks. A secondary counter to this argument is a more general one: if this is good news for Geno, then it's good news for every other character we've ever heard even the faintest whisper of, and it's good for characters who the public has never heard of. I think there are some people who take this point seriously, as we have for better or for worse, seen Ryu Hayabusa join the pantheon of possibility once again.
I don't consider this "good news". We know for a fact that there are 4 slots left, and I'm sure there's a whole lot of hope getting tossed around out there that they'll do some kind of bonus, individual DLC... But I don't see it happening. Sakurai has posted over and over about how he's worked on Smash exclusively for a decade at this point and honestly, if the man's got some idea festering in his head that Nintendo won't let him realize because they're making him direct Smash constantly, I don't blame him for wanting to be done with it. Nothing in the world is worse than having someone stop you from executing your ideas. I think the chances are high, like, 95% high, that Sakurai is blowing this popsicle stand as soon as Challenger Pack 11 goes gold. We have four characters left until the reboot of Smash Bros under a new director on the Switch 2, and when you have "valid" rumors for characters like Ryu Hayabusa, Crash Bandicoot, Master Chief... Geno's chances don't look so great in comparison. The odds aren't 1 in 4, it's 1 in hundreds, if not thousands of characters, rolled 4 times. That's my message here, is all.
Now then, onto Polar's list, a running tally of everything Geno "has going for him". Some stuff is super easy to write off, lots of fan rules that we knew were bull**** to begin with. I've taken a snipe at several of the things on it already, but I do want to touch on one thing that exists at the forefront of my mind: the Mii Costume List, aka "Mii Costume Guy", a leaker who provided a list of Mii costumes that were assumed to be coming with Hero, but ended up coming with Banjo, minus Sans.
Everyone in this thread knows about it, and some may even realize that this same leaker provided the spirits list for Terry, although it was misworded through alleged translation error that these spirits were also Mii costumes.
What some may not realize is that this leaker did not directly contact any of the sources we know this leak from, but instead this information came from a confidant, and more damningly, possibly came from a confidant of a confidant. The idea of leaks being a "game of telephone" has been brought up before, but in this particular case, it's about as relevant as it can get. I do not trust this Mii list, but when I bring up why, I am often told that this source has no reason to lie. I do not doubt the source of the mii list, I doubt the stops on the railroad from him to us. I have drawn this picture to help literally illustrate my issue:
As you can see, I think that "Mii Costume Guy" had legitimate information that he passed off to a secondary source. This secondary source, then passed this information off to a handful of people he trusts... But one is a "bad actor", who simply wants to cause chaos. He gets something that he believes will be 100% real, adds things that are not real, and then passes them off to his own secondaries, and now here we are a full year later hinging on the final three costumes from an almost 100% correct list... Why doesn't this smell fishy to anyone else?
I hate to harp on this when our very own Fatmanonice has told me that Mii costume guy has multiple secondaries but I guess it's fair to say I'm not convinced. Maybe I'll never be convinced. Regardless of having multiple secondaries or even tertiaries, I've seen the evidence of one person down the pipes providing this particular list to a few other people and have not seen any evidence of these other proxies providing the same list. Compound this with the fact that I have good reason to believe I know who provided this list, which includes Mallow and Smithy, to the likes of Sabi and Papagenos, and the fact that Sabi (cursed be his name) said that this individual is a known troll, I really need one of these other proxies to come forward and say "yeah the list inclusive of Mallow and Smithy is as real as the day is long". This one individual isn't going to cut it for me because if there's anything I can agree with Sabi on, it's calling him a troll. I know a troll when I see one.
Next up, the GameStop video. This might be the most simplistic thing I have to say about anything on the list: I think the GameStop video was just a genuine poor choice of words. GameStop makes these videos for use in-store all the damn time and if you've spent any amount of time in a GameStop browsing their wears or waiting for a friend to get done with their shopping trip, you've heard them, and they are almost always full of some kind of misinformation or exaggeration, and this would be no exception. Upon being called out on it and finding out that this particular video had orders of magnitude more views on it than the rest of their in-store ads, whatever poor intern is in charge of GameStop's Youtube presence had to deal with this delicate situation, and they did so poorly. I don't blame them for the bad job, there's no way this was something they were trained to deal with, like I doubt social media manager orientation day had a whole section for "what happens if someone thinks we leaked something", and who knows, this person might have genuinely thought they had leaked something. All of the actions they took were textbook "this is above my paygrade but I'll try to do my job anyway", and as usual, we're reading just a bit too much into it.
Then we have my favorite contentious leak of all - Seven Squares. I basically touched on this already when I went on about what it means to only have four slots left, and these guys are constantly written off except for Geno.
First off, I understand where people are coming from. Crono feels pretty unlikely since the "Chrono" franchise seems to have died off a long while ago... But I need to turn our attention back to Cloud for this - Nomura insisted that Cloud was an old character and Sakurai wanted an icon. Sakurai got his icon. If Nintendo wanted to add Chrono Trigger to Smash, I think it's safe to say they would put Crono in regardless of his age or relevancy - this is one of the most popular SNES RPGs out there.
Then there's Sephiroth. There are only two arguments anyone has against him: No double dipping for the same third party franchise (total fan rule), and "muh sword too long", which according to actual Final Fantasy lore, Sephiroth's sword is like... Seven feet long. Cloud's is supposed to be six. Richter's whip is probably ten feet long and Min Min's arms are pushing fifteen, with the dragon laser I'd say she can cover 20 feet of space if not more. Let's also not forget that in canon, the Monado can project an absolutely massive beam and also doesn't hurt humans. Size does not matter in this instance, because if there's anything Ultimate has proven to us, Sakurai and his team are masters at game balance. The fact that we have a 77 character roster + echoes and they're all potentially tournament winners (take your comments about Little Mac somewhere else you heathen) is outstanding. Sephiroth could work with his sword even if it were as long as jokingly portrayed in popular media.
Then, finally, we have the list itself. There's little doubt anymore that it was a real list with real consequences, but it was cooked up in... Probably earlier than 2018. Who knows, it could stretch all the way back to 2015, but since it specifically listed Luminary, 2017 was probably a more likely time for it... So why would it still be relevant? We know for a fact that Square is working on Bravely Default 2 and very likely working on The World Ends With You 2... Do you think that these characters just don't stand a chance because they're not on a three year old list? Foolish. There are Square characters who stand a chance that aren't Geno is what I'm saying here, and it feels like this falls on deaf ears. I don't have to rely on some outlandish dog**** like Lara Croft or 2B, the threats to Geno are already on Nintendo consoles and getting sequels.
"But there aren't any rumors about them." And?
I'm leaving the spoiler here to just say that I'm not posting this because I want to watch everyone around me give up hope. You guys do whatever helps you make it through reality right now, and if that's shutting out evidence to the contrary, you do you... But what I do want to post this for is because the truth exists. Obviously, we can't claim the truth because it's a heavily guarded secret development build of Smash with fighters on the character select screen. The turth is a list of characters that Xander Moebus got and said their names about 5 different times for Nintendo's approval, before dousing that list in alcohol and setting it ablaze on a warm summer's night.
We can, however, get closer to the truth, and find a more true version of the lie we live by taking what we know and applying it to what we don't want to hear. When we look at it from the standpoint of how bad it might be for us, I believe we can trim the fat and find the things that actually do work for us - and who knows, with those few things made ironclad, I might even start believing again.
It's been talked about it but Steve added a plot twist we weren't expecting. As I've said, two Microsoft ambassadors told Sabi that Steve was leakbait for Banjo back in the spring of 2019 so for that to be proven wrong a year and a half later is a hell of a revelation. As I've said, it adds a whole other level of intrigue to the other four characters that have been heard since 2018: Geno, Lloyd, Waluigi, and, of course, Ryu. There's also been an interesting development in the past couple of weeks because some people have opened up in private and have suggested that people got in a lot more serious trouble than originally thought for making Ryu public and it definitely echoes what all went down with Steve.
I was on the train that Ryu was leakbait for most of this year but I've changed my mind with recent developments:
-Hyrule Warriors 2 happening
-Ninja Gaiden Trilogy being leaked
-The Steve and Minecraft rumors from 2018 actually being real
-Certain insiders being not so subtle about Ryu's probable inclusion in the past month
Like I said last December, one of my guys told me to outright dismiss Travis and Ryu but I feel like I can't with Ryu anymore despite what happened with Travis. Ryu is definitely an interesting case but I don't want to make the same mistakes I made with Hero and Steve in assuming old info is inherently bad info. Too many reputable people have heard him for him to be absolutely nothing so I'm err on the side of caution to not get burnt again.
This is the kind of thing that I felt like would be best kept to discord as it is a subject of contention but the more I think and steam and stew, the more it feels like to me that not only is it necessary to get my thoughts out into a single cohesive post for the folks who may misinterpret them, but it's good to bring them to light in this thread so that the general public who may not be a part of our quaint discord community can ingest these ideas as well.
I will warn you, I am not a succinct person, I cannot summarize my thoughts eloquently into a few words. My thoughts on this matter are deep and complex and to attempt to present them in a way that is friendly to the lazy internet reader of 2020 makes them come across garbled and almost 100% of users who view those brief snips of this massive argument interpret them incorrectly. I'm sorry that you have to read all of this nonsense just to get a grasp for what's going through my head, but this is how it is. This post is going to be embarrassingly long, to the point that even now I honestly am already afraid to hit "post reply" simply because someone out there is going to look at this and say "this dude is taking this too seriously" or maybe even accuse me having some form of brain damage. To that, all I have to respond is "typing is fun" and "thinking is fun".
I'm spoilering nearly the whole post just to make sure that this doesn't blow up the page or something.
First, let me just start off by saying that I might exhibit some "opinions" in this post, which depending on my mood as I continue to write or the speed with which I chose to write, may even have some hyperbole mixed in. Some people call this "needless dooming" and they are probably right. Also, I know we've had trouble in the past with observations like this leading to or being part of some kind of thread derailing GameFAQs inspired raid, but please know that I am the very same Serenade who had extremely high hopes for Geno in this gamefirst DLC season second DLC season, and not some deep undercover troll or sleeper agent for those who would see this thread derailed.
I don't believe Geno's making it in anymore. I hope I get to eat my words and be pleasantly surprised at his inclusion, as I have always hoped, but I just don't believe it anymore. I think that a lot of "evidence" we've had to his inclusion has been coincidence at best. I want to thank Polarthief
for writing up his massive List™ for why Geno's in, but I will be using a fair bit of it today to explore the opposite.
So, why am I thinking this now? Some users may say that it's because I, like many others in this community, got psyched up to believe that without a doubt, Geno was Challenger 77, and I just can't deal with the reality that he was not. This is incorrect. Obviously, it would have been outstanding if Geno had been Fighter 77, first and foremost because I could stop worrying that he's not in, and in fact, stop giving a single **** about this whole nonsense. Obviously, we get the benefits of Seven stars, 77 all 7s jackpot etc etc fun memes good times, but really, it was just wishful thinking and I think deep down most people knew it was a situation too good to be true. I've pointed out (in my last few posts, no less) that Nintendo often fails to recognize what would be a good opportunity to any other company, either because their marketing team really is just that stupid, or they're playing such a high dimensional chess game that mortal minds could never comprehend it. To loosely quote myself from Discord not long ago, the part of me that is mad that Geno is not 77 is the same part of me that is mad that he's not 76 or even as far back as something like 22. I have made it clear as crystal that I have expected this character since Melee, a staggering number of years that amounts to the entire lifespan of many users on Smashboards as a whole and a good handful regular to this thread.
Naturally, the next logical conclusion is that it's because not only was 77 not Geno, but it was Steve, who I admit is probably the closest to a "least wanted" fighter I could have told you before his inclusion. I'm not like a lot of people who I guess want to save face or... something(?), I'm not going to change my tune just because Steve's in the game now. I never wanted him, he is still near bedrock in terms of characters I want to see in Smash if Ultimate ever gets a sequel. I hope this clown never returns. That said? I'm charmed by what they did with Steve and I think that, despite how unsightly he is, they managed to make a very cute character out of him. I love how he whips a bed out from nowhere to go to sleep, how his animations are just as *ty as they can possibly be, how he mines ****ing wool on Magicant, Endermanlet - I could probably go on for a while about all the things I like about this cubic abomination. It's not Steve. It's not Steve being 77. * 'em.
However, Steve brought with him quite a bit of baggage, and not all of it is his fault, but one of the major pieces of baggage is all on Steve:
It took 5 years of negotiations to bring Steve to Super Smash Bros.
Now, aside from the obvious frustrations I have with the idea that this somehow brings Vergeben back to relevancy (despite his claims being all over the place, proving that he had no knowledge of Steve at this time and was purely being contrarian because of fan demand for Banjo), this whole five year business puts Steve back in 2015... The beginning of Ultimate's development, maybe even late Smash 4 talk.
Theoretically speaking, this is evidence that we could have been one smooth business deal away from Minecraft Steve being in Smash Bros. before Banjo and ****ing Kazooie, Simon Belmont, Ridley, or King K. Rool. That's a horrifying timeline that even with as mind numbingly awful as this one has turned out to be I would not want to be part of.
All of that said, there's absolutely no proof that any rumor of Steve was based in the fact that he was being negotiated for 5 years. This is something that we learned from the kind of people who would have lost their damn jobs (in the best case scenario) for speaking a word of it before Steve's release, and there's little reason to believe this information fell into the hands of a two bit leaker like Vergeben or even anyone else who claimed to know that Minecraft Steve was coming to Smash, or even Minecraft. I think as far as provable information goes, it has always been a guess based on Minecraft's popularity and how quickly it came to Nintendo consoles despite being a Microsoft property as of 2014. For this reason, I think it's safe to say that Nintendo was able to keep negotiations for a character under wraps for half of a ****ing decade.
Let's take that information and look at some facts:
No popularly covered leaks managed to tell people about Joker, Banjo, Terry, or Byleth. Only Erdrick made it out (via Vergeben) and that too could have easily been a guess. Terry only started to get thrown around after Nintendo themselves leaked it, and Banjo was hinted maybe a day or two in advance. Fighter Pass 2 has been exactly the same, we have seen few leaks and hints get thrown around only a few days before the reveal... Except in Steve's case, we got a hint literally minutes before the reveal. The same as Byleth, if I remember correctly. There's a decent chance it would have been mere minutes for Min Min as well if Nintendo hadn't pissed around for three months "it's an ARMS fighter guys!", I mean hell, these folks had 12 characters to choose from so at some point you can leak whatever you want and call it an educated guess.
So, why then do we think that when these insiders brazenly speak Geno's name in public, they're doing so with any meat behind it? These people's asses would be a plaque in Doug Bowser's office for so shamelessly speaking the name of a Smash DLC fighter months before their official release.
Let's continue down the rabbit hole. The other baggage Steve brought that is not entirely his own is that according to my finest sources, Steve was heard. And ignored. Let that sink in. Does it sound familiar? It does to me, because in this very thread we heard about how Byleth was also heard, to the point that in this thread we were told about a Three Houses stage and Three Houses spirits but, due to some kind of dramatic oversight or absolute refusal to believe such a nightmare could happen, Byleth was ignored. I hope what I'm saying here makes sense - we have at least two instances of characters that had either been floated around among insiders or possibly outright known, but matters of personal bias or something similar made those names never seriously make it out to the public. Do we hear Geno from sources who don't have a dog in the Geno race? Imran sure seems like he kinda likes Geno, Jeff Grubb has the same air about him, supposedly having played Mario RPG recently and having become obsessed with it. This even applies to Jon Gamexplain Nintendolife and Andre Gamexplain, both of whom seem to have at least a passive care for Geno/SMRPG. We unfortunately look at these insiders, these industry people, and we see a sympathetic friend. Someone who, operating from the shadows, has our back and will deliver us the good news that some of us have waited nearly two decades for, but I think the sad reality is that these folks are just fans of a video game and maybe, get this, everything they say or joke about actually isn't a hint or a leak. I'll be the first to tell you that you can't trust them when they say they don't leak, but hanging on their every word is worthless.
I ask this and point this out because there's a very real chance that Geno rumors are circulated and live because people genuinely want it to be Geno. It's foolish of me to say that these guys are dunking on us because we're the Geno fanbase and dunking on us is socially acceptable (although it's true) - I really doubt that these professionals with "jobs" would stoop so low as to just **** with a vocal fanbase of a Mario character getting into Smash (but then again, Andre is... dare I say, "unhinged" enough to compare Grinch leak believers to Trump supporters), but if they know facts about a fan favorite, highly requested Mario character getting into the game, maybe someone who has a two decade long legacy who has been poorly represented in Smash for several iterations, who was in a somewhat popular Brawl mod that just recently got a Cease and Desist order, their fan brain tells them Geno but they miss the Waluigi for the trees.
Counterargument: It has been asserted, not only in this thread but on discord, that this 5 year negotiations cycle is good for Geno, as it validates every rumor that we've heard for the past two years, makes it likely that he was in some kind of extended negotiation dating back to 2018, and I will concede that it can be viewed that way. My primary point against this is that we have no concrete proof that we heard anything about the Minecraft negotiations and it is foolish to believe that we got breadcrumbs for Geno from what are no doubt very well secured talks. A secondary counter to this argument is a more general one: if this is good news for Geno, then it's good news for every other character we've ever heard even the faintest whisper of, and it's good for characters who the public has never heard of. I think there are some people who take this point seriously, as we have for better or for worse, seen Ryu Hayabusa join the pantheon of possibility once again.
I don't consider this "good news". We know for a fact that there are 4 slots left, and I'm sure there's a whole lot of hope getting tossed around out there that they'll do some kind of bonus, individual DLC... But I don't see it happening. Sakurai has posted over and over about how he's worked on Smash exclusively for a decade at this point and honestly, if the man's got some idea festering in his head that Nintendo won't let him realize because they're making him direct Smash constantly, I don't blame him for wanting to be done with it. Nothing in the world is worse than having someone stop you from executing your ideas. I think the chances are high, like, 95% high, that Sakurai is blowing this popsicle stand as soon as Challenger Pack 11 goes gold. We have four characters left until the reboot of Smash Bros under a new director on the Switch 2, and when you have "valid" rumors for characters like Ryu Hayabusa, Crash Bandicoot, Master Chief... Geno's chances don't look so great in comparison. The odds aren't 1 in 4, it's 1 in hundreds, if not thousands of characters, rolled 4 times. That's my message here, is all.
Now then, onto Polar's list, a running tally of everything Geno "has going for him". Some stuff is super easy to write off, lots of fan rules that we knew were bull**** to begin with. I've taken a snipe at several of the things on it already, but I do want to touch on one thing that exists at the forefront of my mind: the Mii Costume List, aka "Mii Costume Guy", a leaker who provided a list of Mii costumes that were assumed to be coming with Hero, but ended up coming with Banjo, minus Sans.
Everyone in this thread knows about it, and some may even realize that this same leaker provided the spirits list for Terry, although it was misworded through alleged translation error that these spirits were also Mii costumes.
What some may not realize is that this leaker did not directly contact any of the sources we know this leak from, but instead this information came from a confidant, and more damningly, possibly came from a confidant of a confidant. The idea of leaks being a "game of telephone" has been brought up before, but in this particular case, it's about as relevant as it can get. I do not trust this Mii list, but when I bring up why, I am often told that this source has no reason to lie. I do not doubt the source of the mii list, I doubt the stops on the railroad from him to us. I have drawn this picture to help literally illustrate my issue: View attachment 289589
As you can see, I think that "Mii Costume Guy" had legitimate information that he passed off to a secondary source. This secondary source, then passed this information off to a handful of people he trusts... But one is a "bad actor", who simply wants to cause chaos. He gets something that he believes will be 100% real, adds things that are not real, and then passes them off to his own secondaries, and now here we are a full year later hinging on the final three costumes from an almost 100% correct list... Why doesn't this smell fishy to anyone else?
I hate to harp on this when our very own Fatmanonice has told me that Mii costume guy has multiple secondaries but I guess it's fair to say I'm not convinced. Maybe I'll never be convinced. Regardless of having multiple secondaries or even tertiaries, I've seen the evidence of one person down the pipes providing this particular list to a few other people and have not seen any evidence of these other proxies providing the same list. Compound this with the fact that I have good reason to believe I know who provided this list, which includes Mallow and Smithy, to the likes of Sabi and Papagenos, and the fact that Sabi (cursed be his name) said that this individual is a known troll, I really need one of these other proxies to come forward and say "yeah the list inclusive of Mallow and Smithy is as real as the day is long". This one individual isn't going to cut it for me because if there's anything I can agree with Sabi on, it's calling him a troll. I know a troll when I see one.
Next up, the GameStop video. This might be the most simplistic thing I have to say about anything on the list: I think the GameStop video was just a genuine poor choice of words. GameStop makes these videos for use in-store all the damn time and if you've spent any amount of time in a GameStop browsing their wears or waiting for a friend to get done with their shopping trip, you've heard them, and they are almost always full of some kind of misinformation or exaggeration, and this would be no exception. Upon being called out on it and finding out that this particular video had orders of magnitude more views on it than the rest of their in-store ads, whatever poor intern is in charge of GameStop's Youtube presence had to deal with this delicate situation, and they did so poorly. I don't blame them for the bad job, there's no way this was something they were trained to deal with, like I doubt social media manager orientation day had a whole section for "what happens if someone thinks we leaked something", and who knows, this person might have genuinely thought they had leaked something. All of the actions they took were textbook "this is above my paygrade but I'll try to do my job anyway", and as usual, we're reading just a bit too much into it.
Then we have my favorite contentious leak of all - Seven Squares. I basically touched on this already when I went on about what it means to only have four slots left, and these guys are constantly written off except for Geno.
First off, I understand where people are coming from. Crono feels pretty unlikely since the "Chrono" franchise seems to have died off a long while ago... But I need to turn our attention back to Cloud for this - Nomura insisted that Cloud was an old character and Sakurai wanted an icon. Sakurai got his icon. If Nintendo wanted to add Chrono Trigger to Smash, I think it's safe to say they would put Crono in regardless of his age or relevancy - this is one of the most popular SNES RPGs out there.
Then there's Sephiroth. There are only two arguments anyone has against him: No double dipping for the same third party franchise (total fan rule), and "muh sword too long", which according to actual Final Fantasy lore, Sephiroth's sword is like... Seven feet long. Cloud's is supposed to be six. Richter's whip is probably ten feet long and Min Min's arms are pushing fifteen, with the dragon laser I'd say she can cover 20 feet of space if not more. Let's also not forget that in canon, the Monado can project an absolutely massive beam and also doesn't hurt humans. Size does not matter in this instance, because if there's anything Ultimate has proven to us, Sakurai and his team are masters at game balance. The fact that we have a 77 character roster + echoes and they're all potentially tournament winners (take your comments about Little Mac somewhere else you heathen) is outstanding. Sephiroth could work with his sword even if it were as long as jokingly portrayed in popular media.
Then, finally, we have the list itself. There's little doubt anymore that it was a real list with real consequences, but it was cooked up in... Probably earlier than 2018. Who knows, it could stretch all the way back to 2015, but since it specifically listed Luminary, 2017 was probably a more likely time for it... So why would it still be relevant? We know for a fact that Square is working on Bravely Default 2 and very likely working on The World Ends With You 2... Do you think that these characters just don't stand a chance because they're not on a three year old list? Foolish. There are Square characters who stand a chance that aren't Geno is what I'm saying here, and it feels like this falls on deaf ears. I don't have to rely on some outlandish dog**** like Lara Croft or 2B, the threats to Geno are already on Nintendo consoles and getting sequels.
"But there aren't any rumors about them." And?
I'm leaving the spoiler here to just say that I'm not posting this because I want to watch everyone around me give up hope. You guys do whatever helps you make it through reality right now, and if that's shutting out evidence to the contrary, you do you... But what I do want to post this for is because the truth exists. Obviously, we can't claim the truth because it's a heavily guarded secret development build of Smash with fighters on the character select screen. The turth is a list of characters that Xander Moebus got and said their names about 5 different times for Nintendo's approval, before dousing that list in alcohol and setting it ablaze on a warm summer's night.
We can, however, get closer to the truth, and find a more true version of the lie we live by taking what we know and applying it to what we don't want to hear. When we look at it from the standpoint of how bad it might be for us, I believe we can trim the fat and find the things that actually do work for us - and who knows, with those few things made ironclad, I might even start believing again.
I read the whole thing, each and every woyd! Can I have MY thanks with a side of mac n cheese?
Jokes aside, it's good to see an open minded thinker. I like a good open minded thoughtpiece. I want Geno, I really do and would be happy to see him.... as I've said a couple times now, Crono is my "it might be him if it's not Geno" choice and... it's good for my cybernetic heart to see someone open minded to the possibility that yes, want him as we may, Geno may not come and all the evidence may well just be coincidence.
Haven't heard anything to suggest this. I kind of hard squinted my eyes when Zhuge started talking about Nintendo and Tecmo's relationship within the last hour before Steve was revealed but he's right about how close Nintendo is to them. They've let them develop Metroid, Zelda, and Fire Emblem games as well as let Nintendo flat out publish some of their games in some regions. Despite this, Nintendo having a close relationship doesn't necessarily mean anything when it comes to characters. For example, Brawl had a ton of Capcom and Namco co-created content but neither Megaman or Pac-Man showed up. Ultimate is definitely a different situation though because they've not so subtly implied that Ultimate will probably be the last Smash game for a good while so they're wanting to make sure that Ultimate's additions really count because they know people are going to be playing this game for years.
This is the kind of thing that I felt like would be best kept to discord as it is a subject of contention but the more I think and steam and stew, the more it feels like to me that not only is it necessary to get my thoughts out into a single cohesive post for the folks who may misinterpret them, but it's good to bring them to light in this thread so that the general public who may not be a part of our quaint discord community can ingest these ideas as well.
I will warn you, I am not a succinct person, I cannot summarize my thoughts eloquently into a few words. My thoughts on this matter are deep and complex and to attempt to present them in a way that is friendly to the lazy internet reader of 2020 makes them come across garbled and almost 100% of users who view those brief snips of this massive argument interpret them incorrectly. I'm sorry that you have to read all of this nonsense just to get a grasp for what's going through my head, but this is how it is. This post is going to be embarrassingly long, to the point that even now I honestly am already afraid to hit "post reply" simply because someone out there is going to look at this and say "this dude is taking this too seriously" or maybe even accuse me having some form of brain damage. To that, all I have to respond is "typing is fun" and "thinking is fun".
I'm spoilering nearly the whole post just to make sure that this doesn't blow up the page or something.
First, let me just start off by saying that I might exhibit some "opinions" in this post, which depending on my mood as I continue to write or the speed with which I chose to write, may even have some hyperbole mixed in. Some people call this "needless dooming" and they are probably right. Also, I know we've had trouble in the past with observations like this leading to or being part of some kind of thread derailing GameFAQs inspired raid, but please know that I am the very same Serenade who had extremely high hopes for Geno in this gamefirst DLC season second DLC season, and not some deep undercover troll or sleeper agent for those who would see this thread derailed.
I don't believe Geno's making it in anymore. I hope I get to eat my words and be pleasantly surprised at his inclusion, as I have always hoped, but I just don't believe it anymore. I think that a lot of "evidence" we've had to his inclusion has been coincidence at best. I want to thank Polarthief
for writing up his massive List™ for why Geno's in, but I will be using a fair bit of it today to explore the opposite.
So, why am I thinking this now? Some users may say that it's because I, like many others in this community, got psyched up to believe that without a doubt, Geno was Challenger 77, and I just can't deal with the reality that he was not. This is incorrect. Obviously, it would have been outstanding if Geno had been Fighter 77, first and foremost because I could stop worrying that he's not in, and in fact, stop giving a single **** about this whole nonsense. Obviously, we get the benefits of Seven stars, 77 all 7s jackpot etc etc fun memes good times, but really, it was just wishful thinking and I think deep down most people knew it was a situation too good to be true. I've pointed out (in my last few posts, no less) that Nintendo often fails to recognize what would be a good opportunity to any other company, either because their marketing team really is just that stupid, or they're playing such a high dimensional chess game that mortal minds could never comprehend it. To loosely quote myself from Discord not long ago, the part of me that is mad that Geno is not 77 is the same part of me that is mad that he's not 76 or even as far back as something like 22. I have made it clear as crystal that I have expected this character since Melee, a staggering number of years that amounts to the entire lifespan of many users on Smashboards as a whole and a good handful regular to this thread.
Naturally, the next logical conclusion is that it's because not only was 77 not Geno, but it was Steve, who I admit is probably the closest to a "least wanted" fighter I could have told you before his inclusion. I'm not like a lot of people who I guess want to save face or... something(?), I'm not going to change my tune just because Steve's in the game now. I never wanted him, he is still near bedrock in terms of characters I want to see in Smash if Ultimate ever gets a sequel. I hope this clown never returns. That said? I'm charmed by what they did with Steve and I think that, despite how unsightly he is, they managed to make a very cute character out of him. I love how he whips a bed out from nowhere to go to sleep, how his animations are just as *ty as they can possibly be, how he mines ****ing wool on Magicant, Endermanlet - I could probably go on for a while about all the things I like about this cubic abomination. It's not Steve. It's not Steve being 77. * 'em.
However, Steve brought with him quite a bit of baggage, and not all of it is his fault, but one of the major pieces of baggage is all on Steve:
It took 5 years of negotiations to bring Steve to Super Smash Bros.
Now, aside from the obvious frustrations I have with the idea that this somehow brings Vergeben back to relevancy (despite his claims being all over the place, proving that he had no knowledge of Steve at this time and was purely being contrarian because of fan demand for Banjo), this whole five year business puts Steve back in 2015... The beginning of Ultimate's development, maybe even late Smash 4 talk.
Theoretically speaking, this is evidence that we could have been one smooth business deal away from Minecraft Steve being in Smash Bros. before Banjo and ****ing Kazooie, Simon Belmont, Ridley, or King K. Rool. That's a horrifying timeline that even with as mind numbingly awful as this one has turned out to be I would not want to be part of.
All of that said, there's absolutely no proof that any rumor of Steve was based in the fact that he was being negotiated for 5 years. This is something that we learned from the kind of people who would have lost their damn jobs (in the best case scenario) for speaking a word of it before Steve's release, and there's little reason to believe this information fell into the hands of a two bit leaker like Vergeben or even anyone else who claimed to know that Minecraft Steve was coming to Smash, or even Minecraft. I think as far as provable information goes, it has always been a guess based on Minecraft's popularity and how quickly it came to Nintendo consoles despite being a Microsoft property as of 2014. For this reason, I think it's safe to say that Nintendo was able to keep negotiations for a character under wraps for half of a ****ing decade.
Let's take that information and look at some facts:
No popularly covered leaks managed to tell people about Joker, Banjo, Terry, or Byleth. Only Erdrick made it out (via Vergeben) and that too could have easily been a guess. Terry only started to get thrown around after Nintendo themselves leaked it, and Banjo was hinted maybe a day or two in advance. Fighter Pass 2 has been exactly the same, we have seen few leaks and hints get thrown around only a few days before the reveal... Except in Steve's case, we got a hint literally minutes before the reveal. The same as Byleth, if I remember correctly. There's a decent chance it would have been mere minutes for Min Min as well if Nintendo hadn't pissed around for three months "it's an ARMS fighter guys!", I mean hell, these folks had 12 characters to choose from so at some point you can leak whatever you want and call it an educated guess.
So, why then do we think that when these insiders brazenly speak Geno's name in public, they're doing so with any meat behind it? These people's asses would be a plaque in Doug Bowser's office for so shamelessly speaking the name of a Smash DLC fighter months before their official release.
Let's continue down the rabbit hole. The other baggage Steve brought that is not entirely his own is that according to my finest sources, Steve was heard. And ignored. Let that sink in. Does it sound familiar? It does to me, because in this very thread we heard about how Byleth was also heard, to the point that in this thread we were told about a Three Houses stage and Three Houses spirits but, due to some kind of dramatic oversight or absolute refusal to believe such a nightmare could happen, Byleth was ignored. I hope what I'm saying here makes sense - we have at least two instances of characters that had either been floated around among insiders or possibly outright known, but matters of personal bias or something similar made those names never seriously make it out to the public. Do we hear Geno from sources who don't have a dog in the Geno race? Imran sure seems like he kinda likes Geno, Jeff Grubb has the same air about him, supposedly having played Mario RPG recently and having become obsessed with it. This even applies to Jon Gamexplain Nintendolife and Andre Gamexplain, both of whom seem to have at least a passive care for Geno/SMRPG. We unfortunately look at these insiders, these industry people, and we see a sympathetic friend. Someone who, operating from the shadows, has our back and will deliver us the good news that some of us have waited nearly two decades for, but I think the sad reality is that these folks are just fans of a video game and maybe, get this, everything they say or joke about actually isn't a hint or a leak. I'll be the first to tell you that you can't trust them when they say they don't leak, but hanging on their every word is worthless.
I ask this and point this out because there's a very real chance that Geno rumors are circulated and live because people genuinely want it to be Geno. It's foolish of me to say that these guys are dunking on us because we're the Geno fanbase and dunking on us is socially acceptable (although it's true) - I really doubt that these professionals with "jobs" would stoop so low as to just **** with a vocal fanbase of a Mario character getting into Smash (but then again, Andre is... dare I say, "unhinged" enough to compare Grinch leak believers to Trump supporters), but if they know facts about a fan favorite, highly requested Mario character getting into the game, maybe someone who has a two decade long legacy who has been poorly represented in Smash for several iterations, who was in a somewhat popular Brawl mod that just recently got a Cease and Desist order, their fan brain tells them Geno but they miss the Waluigi for the trees.
Counterargument: It has been asserted, not only in this thread but on discord, that this 5 year negotiations cycle is good for Geno, as it validates every rumor that we've heard for the past two years, makes it likely that he was in some kind of extended negotiation dating back to 2018, and I will concede that it can be viewed that way. My primary point against this is that we have no concrete proof that we heard anything about the Minecraft negotiations and it is foolish to believe that we got breadcrumbs for Geno from what are no doubt very well secured talks. A secondary counter to this argument is a more general one: if this is good news for Geno, then it's good news for every other character we've ever heard even the faintest whisper of, and it's good for characters who the public has never heard of. I think there are some people who take this point seriously, as we have for better or for worse, seen Ryu Hayabusa join the pantheon of possibility once again.
I don't consider this "good news". We know for a fact that there are 4 slots left, and I'm sure there's a whole lot of hope getting tossed around out there that they'll do some kind of bonus, individual DLC... But I don't see it happening. Sakurai has posted over and over about how he's worked on Smash exclusively for a decade at this point and honestly, if the man's got some idea festering in his head that Nintendo won't let him realize because they're making him direct Smash constantly, I don't blame him for wanting to be done with it. Nothing in the world is worse than having someone stop you from executing your ideas. I think the chances are high, like, 95% high, that Sakurai is blowing this popsicle stand as soon as Challenger Pack 11 goes gold. We have four characters left until the reboot of Smash Bros under a new director on the Switch 2, and when you have "valid" rumors for characters like Ryu Hayabusa, Crash Bandicoot, Master Chief... Geno's chances don't look so great in comparison. The odds aren't 1 in 4, it's 1 in hundreds, if not thousands of characters, rolled 4 times. That's my message here, is all.
Now then, onto Polar's list, a running tally of everything Geno "has going for him". Some stuff is super easy to write off, lots of fan rules that we knew were bull**** to begin with. I've taken a snipe at several of the things on it already, but I do want to touch on one thing that exists at the forefront of my mind: the Mii Costume List, aka "Mii Costume Guy", a leaker who provided a list of Mii costumes that were assumed to be coming with Hero, but ended up coming with Banjo, minus Sans.
Everyone in this thread knows about it, and some may even realize that this same leaker provided the spirits list for Terry, although it was misworded through alleged translation error that these spirits were also Mii costumes.
What some may not realize is that this leaker did not directly contact any of the sources we know this leak from, but instead this information came from a confidant, and more damningly, possibly came from a confidant of a confidant. The idea of leaks being a "game of telephone" has been brought up before, but in this particular case, it's about as relevant as it can get. I do not trust this Mii list, but when I bring up why, I am often told that this source has no reason to lie. I do not doubt the source of the mii list, I doubt the stops on the railroad from him to us. I have drawn this picture to help literally illustrate my issue: View attachment 289589
As you can see, I think that "Mii Costume Guy" had legitimate information that he passed off to a secondary source. This secondary source, then passed this information off to a handful of people he trusts... But one is a "bad actor", who simply wants to cause chaos. He gets something that he believes will be 100% real, adds things that are not real, and then passes them off to his own secondaries, and now here we are a full year later hinging on the final three costumes from an almost 100% correct list... Why doesn't this smell fishy to anyone else?
I hate to harp on this when our very own Fatmanonice has told me that Mii costume guy has multiple secondaries but I guess it's fair to say I'm not convinced. Maybe I'll never be convinced. Regardless of having multiple secondaries or even tertiaries, I've seen the evidence of one person down the pipes providing this particular list to a few other people and have not seen any evidence of these other proxies providing the same list. Compound this with the fact that I have good reason to believe I know who provided this list, which includes Mallow and Smithy, to the likes of Sabi and Papagenos, and the fact that Sabi (cursed be his name) said that this individual is a known troll, I really need one of these other proxies to come forward and say "yeah the list inclusive of Mallow and Smithy is as real as the day is long". This one individual isn't going to cut it for me because if there's anything I can agree with Sabi on, it's calling him a troll. I know a troll when I see one.
Next up, the GameStop video. This might be the most simplistic thing I have to say about anything on the list: I think the GameStop video was just a genuine poor choice of words. GameStop makes these videos for use in-store all the damn time and if you've spent any amount of time in a GameStop browsing their wears or waiting for a friend to get done with their shopping trip, you've heard them, and they are almost always full of some kind of misinformation or exaggeration, and this would be no exception. Upon being called out on it and finding out that this particular video had orders of magnitude more views on it than the rest of their in-store ads, whatever poor intern is in charge of GameStop's Youtube presence had to deal with this delicate situation, and they did so poorly. I don't blame them for the bad job, there's no way this was something they were trained to deal with, like I doubt social media manager orientation day had a whole section for "what happens if someone thinks we leaked something", and who knows, this person might have genuinely thought they had leaked something. All of the actions they took were textbook "this is above my paygrade but I'll try to do my job anyway", and as usual, we're reading just a bit too much into it.
Then we have my favorite contentious leak of all - Seven Squares. I basically touched on this already when I went on about what it means to only have four slots left, and these guys are constantly written off except for Geno.
First off, I understand where people are coming from. Crono feels pretty unlikely since the "Chrono" franchise seems to have died off a long while ago... But I need to turn our attention back to Cloud for this - Nomura insisted that Cloud was an old character and Sakurai wanted an icon. Sakurai got his icon. If Nintendo wanted to add Chrono Trigger to Smash, I think it's safe to say they would put Crono in regardless of his age or relevancy - this is one of the most popular SNES RPGs out there.
Then there's Sephiroth. There are only two arguments anyone has against him: No double dipping for the same third party franchise (total fan rule), and "muh sword too long", which according to actual Final Fantasy lore, Sephiroth's sword is like... Seven feet long. Cloud's is supposed to be six. Richter's whip is probably ten feet long and Min Min's arms are pushing fifteen, with the dragon laser I'd say she can cover 20 feet of space if not more. Let's also not forget that in canon, the Monado can project an absolutely massive beam and also doesn't hurt humans. Size does not matter in this instance, because if there's anything Ultimate has proven to us, Sakurai and his team are masters at game balance. The fact that we have a 77 character roster + echoes and they're all potentially tournament winners (take your comments about Little Mac somewhere else you heathen) is outstanding. Sephiroth could work with his sword even if it were as long as jokingly portrayed in popular media.
Then, finally, we have the list itself. There's little doubt anymore that it was a real list with real consequences, but it was cooked up in... Probably earlier than 2018. Who knows, it could stretch all the way back to 2015, but since it specifically listed Luminary, 2017 was probably a more likely time for it... So why would it still be relevant? We know for a fact that Square is working on Bravely Default 2 and very likely working on The World Ends With You 2... Do you think that these characters just don't stand a chance because they're not on a three year old list? Foolish. There are Square characters who stand a chance that aren't Geno is what I'm saying here, and it feels like this falls on deaf ears. I don't have to rely on some outlandish dog**** like Lara Croft or 2B, the threats to Geno are already on Nintendo consoles and getting sequels.
"But there aren't any rumors about them." And?
I'm leaving the spoiler here to just say that I'm not posting this because I want to watch everyone around me give up hope. You guys do whatever helps you make it through reality right now, and if that's shutting out evidence to the contrary, you do you... But what I do want to post this for is because the truth exists. Obviously, we can't claim the truth because it's a heavily guarded secret development build of Smash with fighters on the character select screen. The turth is a list of characters that Xander Moebus got and said their names about 5 different times for Nintendo's approval, before dousing that list in alcohol and setting it ablaze on a warm summer's night.
We can, however, get closer to the truth, and find a more true version of the lie we live by taking what we know and applying it to what we don't want to hear. When we look at it from the standpoint of how bad it might be for us, I believe we can trim the fat and find the things that actually do work for us - and who knows, with those few things made ironclad, I might even start believing again.
I read what you said, and believe me man I feel you. It isn’t easy supporting Geno for this series. I’m 33 years old, I bought SMRPG when I was 9, and have been a fan of this game since and all it has to offer. I’ve been speculating for Geno since going into Brawl. I’ve always felt that Mallow and Geno belong back in a Mario game and or Smash Bros. And I’m fortunate that this discussion exists, because you guys feel the same way I do!
I’ve been on this rollercoaster for a long time, and I take it like this. We still have 4 more characters left, and there’s still a chance for us, probably the best they’ve ever been, because our passion for this character has kept him and his game in the public eye. Thanks to our passion, we received a Geno Mii costume for Wii U Smash and even spirits for Geno and Mallow in Ultimate. The creator has even acknowledged our fandom and has endorsed Geno, something not a lot of characters get.
Geno and his game is worth fighting for. And even if somehow Geno misses again, there’s always next time! Because if there’s a Smash Bros, game on the horizon, I know that the Geno fans will show up to support him! I know this because we all love Geno and SMRPG!
I read the whole thing, each and every woyd! Can I have MY thanks with a side of mac n cheese?
Jokes aside, it's good to see an open minded thinker. I like a good open minded thoughtpiece. I want Geno, I really do and would be happy to see him.... as I've said a couple times now, Crono is my "it might be him if it's not Geno" choice and... it's good for my cybernetic heart to see someone open minded to the possibility that yes, want him as we may, Geno may not come and all the evidence may well just be coincidence.
I wouldn't be saying that people who don't use the coincidences as 'proof' or those who feel that Geno could potentially not be a possibility would be considered as open-minded as that has the implication that those who do feel he has a chance are seen as being close minded. This thread has had issues with 'guests' popping in here to push 'open-mindedness,' with their definition of being open minded was 'accept Geno isn't happening.'
That said, I am getting burned out on all these coincidences as nothing feels concrete and at the end of the day they can run the risk of amounting to nothing in the grand scheme of things, which is the most frustrating part. It makes it look like things are moving in the right direction, only to find out that there was literally zero steps moving forward.
Basically, I'm getting tired of all these things falling into place and there's no payoff. And I'm getting pessimistic to his chances. It hasn't helped that with the proof that Steve was 5 years in the making that earlier names heard before that we thought we could move on from are now back into (lack of a better word) relevance. And there's only 4 spots left.
I think you guys are forgetting one important factor regarding negotiations for 5 years for Steve that can also tie Geno in: the Smash ballot. Back then, Steve had a pretty vocal fanbase and undeniably votes for him much like Geno. Plus, we've heard watercooler talk for Geno from a couple of years ago, so it's not worth giving up just yet. It's frustrating as hell, but it's not over until it's over
I wouldn't be saying that people who don't use the coincidences as 'proof' or those who feel that Geno could potentially not be a possibility would be considered as open-minded as that has the implication that those who do feel he has a chance are seen as being close minded. This thread has had issues with 'guests' popping in here to push 'open-mindedness,' with their definition of being open minded was 'accept Geno isn't happening.'
I just consider open mindedness being "considering all possibilities, not just the ones you want". You're not closed minded for thinking Geno has a shot. "Accept Geno isn't happening" is far more aggressive than what I mean to communicate.
Morale is hard to maintain because a lot of countries are currently going through their lowest point in recent human history. Geno just coincidentally got caught up in the mix so something that would have been done and over with almost 5 months ago is being dragged out to an excruciating degree. Of ****in' course Geno wasn't 77 because that would have been too convenient, wouldn't it? Of ****in' course this wait is happening during a year of global chaos. Of ****in' course all these highly respected and reputable insiders have to start talking him up in the same timeframe. It's really some Job **** and I don't blame people for getting discouraged or even depressed over it. Smash speculation is a type of escapism and recreation for many of us and COVID has managed to **** in that popcorn bowl too.
Are people giving up on Geno, now? Because Steve was 77, or something?
I mean, personally, I'm not at all happy that he got in.
...But he has nothing at all to do with Geno, though? It's not even a case of 'if one gets in, the other doesn't' because they have absolutely nothing in common. And the '#77 = 7 Stars' thing was really just more of a 'hey, that'd be cute if they did that' sort of thing. The Steve reveal effectively killed my hype for Smash, but it doesn't retroactively make all of the possible evidence for Geno definitively mean nothing.
They put in a character I hate, they could also put in a character I like.
Are people giving up on Geno, now? Because Steve was 77, or something?
I mean, personally, I'm not at all happy that he got in.
...But he has nothing at all to do with Geno, though? It's not even a case of 'if one gets in, the other doesn't' because they have absolutely nothing in common. And the '#77 = 7 Stars' thing was really just more of a 'hey, that'd be cute if they did that' sort of thing. The Steve reveal effectively killed my hype for Smash, but it doesn't retroactively make all of the possible evidence for Geno definitively mean nothing.
They put in a character I hate, they could also put in a character I like.
Imo, I think Geno right now is in a very similar situation to the one Banjo & Kazooie were leading up to E3 2019 (times x).
Sakurai has gone on record to state that he wanted to include Geno in Smash (I believe since Brawl)
Nintendo RANDOMLY tweeted about Super Mario RPG around the time of its Anniversary (I believe in 2018...)
Geno Mii Costume still missing in SSBU
Increased Geno "awareness" by some YouTubers and insiders (via tweets) (by awareness I mean Geno being brought up either presenting the character and the game he originated from, or detailing potential movesets for Geno in Smash)
Ranking among the top 10 most requested characters for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's DLC (notably ranking within the top 10s of Source Gaming's polls)
Steady flow of Square Enix content has been released onto the Nintendo Switch, and more is still to come in the form of Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory, and Bravely Default II
Really, it feels like when one as a kid knows what Mom and Dad are gonna get you for Christmas but are agonizingly waiting for them to confirm you that they'll be leaving said present under the Christmas tree (early).
I don't think the 77 thing is a valid reason as to why Geno could possibly not get in. The other numbers are literally meaningless for all the characters - it's just a way to organize them since doing it by series clearly wasn't worth doing anymore lol
As someone who has never played Super Mario RPG and has 0 connection to this character I think it's still very possible to happen. If it doesn't - well there's been a lot of unfortunate coincidences then (Mii costume list, Cacomallow, Gamestop vid, etc.) but as someone who passionately wanted K. Rool 4 years from the start of the Smash Ballot to his inclusion, I would just wait and see what happens. If he doesn't get in, it really sucks. But if he does that would be awesome. Unfortunately can't do much about it now tho
Anyways, regardless of what goes on with Smash Ultimate or whatever, there WILL be a Smash 6 (or just Smash Ultimate Plus or something idk Nintendo's not letting this series go lol) and that's what I kept in mind when K. Rool got Mii costume'd back in 2015. There's always a new chance, just keep respectfully making y'all's voice heard whenever ballots or discussions come up if he doesn't make it this time. I personally think he's in until they announce there's no more characters based on all the evidence lol
The main thing for the Geno fanbase right now is to never give up. Geno is in a great place right now with all the evidence we have, and it was just a few months ago Min Min showed us there are no barriers left in our way. It really is just like the old saying: patience is a virtue.
I read your sig as part of your actual post. Then noticed that you meant including Steve and not Walu. Not likely at all but getting 2 Mario characters in a row would be kind of nuts.
