I feel that this needs to be said...

[HiddenTiger]

There is no such thing as a WTF character.

For too long now I've been hearing people defend terrible character ideas under the blanket of the phrase "But he could be the new WTF character!" Conversely, I've seen too many people dismiss serious character ideas as being "just another stupid WTF character" to avoid having to back up their arguments. Well, I'm tired of hearing that, so I'm here to say to you: There is not, nor has there ever been, any such thing as a WTF character. There has never been a character that was ever added in Super Smash Bros. that was added for the sole reason that nobody would expect them. Just because most people didn't expect the Ice Climbers or Mr. Game & Watch to appear in Melee does not mean that that is the reason that they were added. The fact of the matter is that nobody knows the real reasoning behind why Sakurai and his team chooses who they choose to fill up the SSB roster. But I feel that it's safe to say that a conversation similar to the following never took place inside the walls of the HAL Labs studio.

Game Developer: "Hey, Sakurai-san, could we put this character into Smash Bros?"

Sakurai: "Who is he?"

Game Dev: "I dunno, but nobody's ever heard of them, so they'll all be like 'WTF?!'"

Sakurai: "They'll all be freaking out!"

Game Dev: "Yeah, I know!"

Sakurai: "Let's do it! We can call him the 'WTF character.'"

Game Dev: "This is gonna be so funny!"

Yeah, I don't think so. I don't know about all y'all, but I'd like to think that there's a little bit more of a thought process to the character selection in these games. So please, stop trying to hide behind the excuse of 'they could be a'/'just another' WTF character. WTF characters dont exist.

 

[RVD_fan]

Well, I do believe a character should not get in for the sole reason that no one would see it coming, but for someone who is well-known but no one would think he'd be in Brawl, I think that helps a bit. Say someone like Happy Mask Salesman. Zelda fans know him, but no one would expect to see him in brawl, so there would be other reasons he could be included. What shouldn't happen is someone who is a random protagonist from some old game no one remembers that was found searching around wikipedia.

 

[HiddenTiger]

That's kind of what I'm getting at. I'm not saying there shouldn't or won't be any surprises, I'm just tired of hearing 'WTF character' thrown around as a cure-all solution to badcharacteritis.

 

[Numa Dude]

This is kind of pointless for all we know they do consider WTF characters but for all we know they don't we don't know why they choose characters yes but how do we know they don't choose some characters to surprise us. But you are right it shouldn't be the main reason a crazy character gets in.

 

[SSJ4Kazuki]

^^666

YES!! Finally! Someone agrees! I believe this absolutely needed to be said.

 

[Deleted member]

Amen.

Which of you first thought WTF when you saw Marth, then realised he was cool?

 

[JesiahTEG]

Your right, Hal doesn't put in characters because of the unexpectedness.

But don't tell me when you saw Snake was gonna be in Brawl you didn't say...


WTF?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

 

[PrinnyFlute]

Well, yeah. But I never really thought of the term "WTF character" meaning a character that's in for sheerly shock factor. I think it more comes down to the fact that Sakurai really seems to like obscure and/or old characters (for their own sake and history,) so I usually think of it more as a character that would be surprising but still deserving of their own slot.

 

[W4veMantis]

I don't know about you guys but I know I said WTF when I saw Snake, and Zamus. But, that doesn't make them WTF characters. It does get kind of annoying that every character that isn't really "known" is a WTF character.

 

[Bowserlick]

There is no such thing as a WTF character.

There has never been a character that was ever added in Super Smash Bros. that was added for the sole reason that nobody would expect them. The fact of the matter is that nobody knows the real reasoning behind why Sakurai and his team chooses who they choose to fill up the SSB roster. .

Your argument is self defeating. You say that no one knows why Sakurai chooses a character to be in the roster, right after proclaiming that you know that Sakurai would never put in a character to be a suprise.

Pichu is labeled as a joke character in the game on his trophy I believe. So if Sakurai put Pichu in as a joke, maybe the main reason that propelled G&W to get in the game over other characters was the suprise factor.

 

[Croco]

When I think about the "WTF Character" I think of the last known character to unlock.
Ness was the last unexpected unlockable in SSB64 and Mr. G&W was the last unexpected unlockable in SSBM. So Brawl? It would be safe to say it would be a character like Dr. Wright, Mike Jones, or even a hanafuda card character if they want to go that far.

So.. The WTF character actually means.. The last super unlockable character.

It should be a character who is unexpected, nearly forgotten, or just unique.
It could also be a character that represents something from Nintendos history.

Ness fits as the super unlockable character because Earthbound was a cult-classic RPG and Ness was almost nearly forgotten as a nintendo character.

Mr. Game & Watch was choosen because he represented nintendo's game & watch game. He also is very very unique and he makes a great and interesting creative moveset. No one expected this character.. Sakurai from what I have heard loves to surprise his audience.

 

[RVD_fan]

^^^Ness isn't exactly the final unlockable character, since you can unlock Falcon and Luigi after if you wanna take that route. Ness is just the hardest to unlock.

 

[X_Meta_Knight_X]

WTF??? That is so stupid

 

[HiddenTiger]

Your argument is self defeating. You say that no one knows why Sakurai chooses a character to be in the roster, right after proclaiming that you know that Sakurai would never put in a character to be a suprise.

Well, I'll give you that I don't know for certain that he didn't add them just to mess with people, but I think it's safe to assume that Sakurai-san has both the maturity and mental capacity higher than that of your average drunken frat boy.

Pichu is labeled as a joke character in the game on his trophy I believe. So if Sakurai put Pichu in as a joke, maybe the main reason that propelled G&W to get in the game over other characters was the suprise factor.

Nope. Pichu is labeled as weak, and better off using items, but it doesn't say that he was only put in as a joke.

 

[RVD_fan]

^^^I dunno, did u see some of them drunken frat boy test scores?

 

[Eternal phoenix Fire]

WTF=Spontaneous and Suprising.

It's just another phrase for Random,even though I don't believe that G&W fits in the random category.

 

[Lord_Deathborne]

Wasn't this already covered in EPF's thread?

But at any rate, there are in fact such things as "WTF" characters - it's sort of a tradition in fighting games. However, they are not included on the grounds of such an initial shock/surprise factor alone... In fact, it only makes up a very small portion of the decision process with regard to such a character's selection, but it is there nonetheless...

 

[PwnYouBoomerangStyle]

I hope the last unlockable character is the Ninja, not because we'd be like, "WTF?!?!" But because it would just be pwnage.

With all the time you debate new characters, anybody that you didn't think of will be considered WTF characters since you've covered more 75% of Nintendo's pwnage chars in the forums, not to mention made up movesets and bleh bleh, it's like, if I were to read and actively be a part of these forums, I'd completely ruin Brawl for myself when it came out.

 

[Johnknight1]

WTF? characters in the SSB series IMO so far:

Ness (who saw him coming?)

Capt Falcon to some extent, he had never gotten out of the cockpit to fight hand on hand.

G&W: cmon who would expect this guy, who nvr had a name before ssbm?

IC: truely retro and out of nowhere! A classic as if from out of the sky!

Snake: if you didn't know the guy who made him was a huge SSB fan, and tried adding him into the SSBM roster but was too late

Pichu: Ahh evil! WTF, as in WTF? it hurts itself, this is weak!

Jigglypuff: wtf? It is another pokemon? wat is this doing here?

Sheik: woah wtf? Zelda can transform, woah!

Ganondorf: WTF? he shows off his sword and never uses it in combat! OMG this is stupid?

Marth: Never heard of this guy, wtf? why is this fool in here, and Wario and Diddy not in?

Roy: WTF? Another fool I don't know, this is wierd!

I don't think we'll get many of those WTF? characters in the future with SSB, but hey we'll definitely get some variety and some neat diffrences in characters, with even more originality.

The only "real" WTF? characters were the 3rd party charactersm but since that is old new 4th party characters would be beyond WTF? How wierd would a 4th Party Character be=??? That would be kinda creepy.....

 

[Thrillhouse-vh.]

I believe in the suprise and shock factor being put into the game, but there is no character that will make EVERYONE go "WTF, who/what is that thing?", unless they make a new character out of thin air.