I couldn't agree more with you.
I mean, look at J-Stars Victory Vs, for example. It treats support characters the same way it treats playable characters. Support characters appear on the box art and on promotional material, and they even have battle intros.
In Smash, as assist character is treated as a deconfirmed character, because in a way, that's what they really are.
I would LOVE if before a match you had a menu to choose a playable character and another to choose a support character. Imagine the possibilities. They could even implement tag team attacks for some combinations.
Unfortunately, ATs that don't help the player (Nintendog, Devil, Nightmare) would make that impossible.
Yeah, I think that's pretty underwhelming. It also makes me question the idea behind Assist Trophies. Granted, the "roster" of ATs in this game is definitely more filled with recognizable faces than mooks or NPCs from the games, but at the same time, they are always gonna be a side bonus and a poor way to cater on the fans of the Assists. Even more, if one were to see them first time, and get to know them enough to feel fond or bonded to them, it kinda makes them feel less worthy to invest on than the playable cast when they're Assists again.
Think for example, new fans of Lyn who got into her game through Brawl, and might want to see her as a playable. She might just turn into less interesting side material as a character compared to playable characters - and with her not receiving any new games, much like a lot of the ATs due them being C-listers or having one-shot games, that's quite major blow to their career.
What's the merit of being an Assist Trophy when you're a wanted character? A Pokeball-knockoff with lable of "honorary mention" at best, and to many, is seen as a easy way to brush away characters with even if, vocal minority fanbase, to a place where we have to appreciate they even got mentioned, even if in middle of getting millions of Nintendogs or Devils or whatelse unwanted characters as Assists. And lastly, the sad end of the tale for their popularity unless a new game rolls in visibility for them, which doesn't treat them as Pokemon, completely contrary to that.
I think this is what creates such big controversy with it's roster inclusions every time. Seeing how many recognizable characters we're seeing relocated to Assist-status and Sakurai even teasing about that to some people, it's what holds this series from truly becoming great, and void of negativity, bashing, whining, etc on the roster. Not to mention, Assists aren't very rewarding to be invested on when featured in Smash Bros-series. They're treated as items, which reflects on them in the fanbases and sometimes just in their popularity: people don't like them as Assists if being fans (most of the time,), and to majority of people they're easily nobodies.
And I think it's best for them to not invest on these characters, especially if wanting to see them in Smash as playable characters. More of just giving them exposure to their games- even if that can also lead to disappointment because the series they're from are easily in hiatus, or not even developed anymore in favour of more popular franchises featured in Smash.)
But goshers, it's really annoying me. These fellas are just merely brief fan-service items who have mostly brought in negative feelings to their supporters, depending on their popularity.
So yeah, it'd be much better if these characters could fight in our side rather than be just another element in free-for-all with items on-fights - they'd feel like actual characters with unearthed history and fanbase, rather than being itemized fanservice in form of Pokemon-esque summons.
Also, yea, having it avalible in modes other than VS in a form of a perk would be interesting, thought then screen manipulating AT's would become useless and have to be excluded from it.
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