I have nothing against unexpected characters either - ROB is my main, after all - but I am thoroughly against reserving a spot for one during speculation.
These characters can be amazing but they're amazing because they work, they're well thought out, and they're not unexpected for the sake of being unexpected. They'd lose their charm otherwise.
As far as offering something different this is actually something I disliked about Smash 4 a lot - every newcomer had to have a gimmick. I don't want a character with bars and meters and durability for their belt buckle, I just want a standard character who is fun to play.
I'm actually fairly certain that unexpected characters are unlikely for Ultimate. With so few new characters to add, and with this being "Ultimate" and all, I'm pretty sure Sakurai knows that this is the time to give people what they want, and he has the ballot to go off of for some hard data, so he's not really guessing. Smash 4 had Wii Fit Trainer and Duck Hunt, but it also had Mega Man, Villager, Little Mac, Pac Man, and other fan favorites or high profile additions. But if we're getting only about half a dozen new characters, there's no way one of those is going to be the Brain Age guy or something.
Hence, Cloud, Daisy, Ridley, and hopefully others like K. Rool and Geno this time around. I'm not holding my breath for Chibi-Robo, one of my top two picks, or other characters people seem certain about, like Bandana Waddle Dee, who would be nice, but aren't going to wow enough people. When Wii Fit Trainer was announced, I don't think people were jumping out of their seats like they were for Mega Man or Ridley.
I was getting really tired of Sm4sh speculation being "what gimmick can this character bring?" I think that's one of the coolest things about Ridley as a newcomer - beyond the fact that it happened in the first place - is that he doesn't have a gimmick outside of the standard fighting game archetypes. I'd hope that we can get more standard characters. Not that I'm against gimmicks, but I also like characters I can just pick up and play.
The only thing Ridley has that's close to a gimmick is his weak spot, but that's not a playstyle gimmick, and otherwise he's totally normal. It's probably the tamest gimmick there is.
Ridley being a glorified pinata is not exactly a favor to his fans. "Character is in the game but not playable" is mostly the same thing as "not playable."
Sakurai going "lol actually he's playable now" makes all this song and dance even more baffling. Ridley could have been playable as early as Brawl. Thank God he's in the roster now, but acting like fans should be happy he was put in as a meatshield is kind of asinine. Projecting your frustration as an Isaac fan doesn't change that.
I think Ridley's appearance of being a "piñata" is a combination of him being such an unfamiliar character, so people don't know how to use him best, especially against smaller and faster opponents, as well as his balancing just needing some tweaks.
Sakurai's reservations about Ridley weren't just "he's too big" as the memes single out. It was more so "How do you capture the power and dangerousness of this huge boss character, but make him balanced?" And Ridley does have some really powerful moves that capture that essence, like his Down B that's 60% damage on sweetspot and immobilizes the player, as well as his command grab that throws the enemy off the stage guaranteed, while doing about 29% damage. That Down B in particular got people's attention early, and people thought it was super overpowered and would have to be nerfed... and then actual matches started occurring, where Ridley players were getting bodied pretty hard, and now no one seems worried. But once players get in the lab and learn how to maximize the potential of those and other moves, Ridley will be pretty dangerous.
But then he may also just be a little oddly balanced outside of that. On top of his weak spot, he also has that "piñata" quality that makes him easy to combo. Because with moves and damage like his, if he's also tough to kill, then how would he not be overpowered? He'd basically be an actual playable boss character, like in old fighting games, which is exactly what Sakurai has been afraid of for so long. That's why, up to now, he's made appearances as an actual boss character in Brawl and 4, because that's what the character would "truly" be like. So it's an incredibly tricky thing to balance, compared to balancing more average characters. It's also probably why he isn't so overtly powerful like most of the recent additions (Bayonetta, Cloud, and Inkling).
I'm not too worried about it, as I think the meta will be quite promising when the game launches. And even if it isn't, this seems like a game that Nintendo is going to support with balance patches for a while. They want it to be an eSport like Splatoon, so they're probably going to give it similar treatment.
