All's good on that front, then.
Though I want to point out I'm not really a defender nor a detractor. I'm kind of in the middle.
Should Ganondorf be a clone? Not really. But he is what he is. And I can see the logic behind the initial decision.
If it were up to me though, I'd change him up to be less similar to Falcon in his moves while keeping the "destructive strength backed by darkness" motif. You can't tell me Ganondorf pulling
this off wouldn't be awesome.
You're still overlooking the fact that Sakurai could have
clearly cared less and not bothered to put in Ganondorf
at all. And not given a
damn about Ganondorf being highly requested (and bear in mind that the votes for Ganondorf and the votes for Ganon were combined on the tally).
You're also ignoring that the
only reason Young Link was added before Ganondorf was because he was an "obvious" choice for a clone when Sakurai was
specifically looking for clone options. It took noticing that Ganondorf had a similar build to Captain Falcon for Sakurai to consider him in that period. Being highly requested only brought justification for the concept in his eyes.
And the one to blame for Ganondorf not being "higher priority" in Melee is
Zelda (as well as her alter-ego Sheik) more than anyone else.
Ganon/Ganondorf was the most requested character of the franchise, yes, but it seems Sakurai felt it more of a priority to include the franchise's namesake than the franchise's villain. Zelda providing the potential gimmick to be a character that could switch styles at will with her Sheik persona may have also put her higher on the priority list.
Then after Zelda/Sheik, the one to blame is Wario if you try to argue that "he should have just added one unique character instead of 6 clones because quality > quantity".
If Sakurai decided to make one unique character in the time that he made the clones (since he could have only made
one), which was after all the pre-planned characters were finished, Sakurai has been on record saying that it would have been none other than Wario.
As in, the
3rd most requested character on Sakurai's poll (as opposed to Ganondorf's/Ganon's
5th) who was decided against in the initial roster draft because of Bowser and Peach already being planned as new additions.
And even then, after Wario, Dedede would have probably been next in line, given that he was the 4th most requested
and was planned to be in Smash 64 alongside Bowser and Mewtwo.
So yeah, being "higher priority" in Melee simply wasn't an option. And sure, if Ganondorf was held off until Brawl, he most likely wouldn't have the lingering similarities to Captain Falcon he has today (though he would most likely have the same weighted power style Brawl gave him). But instead, Sakurai saw an opportunity to include Ganondorf earlier and took it. Not because of some "quantity over quality" mindset, but because he felt doing it would be better than
not doing it.
![[Obnoxshush/Dasshizer]](/data/avatars/l/267/267037.jpg?1450250857){kind=avatar}
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