Official Newcomer/DLC Speculation Discussion

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Reimu is worth negative points.

Wassa matter? Scared of bullets?

 

[DarthEnderX]

I personally would swap Reimu for Ninja Gaiden and 2B for Geno but that’s just me

Now that would be a 4/6 pass!

May I ask why?

Cosmic forces have deemed it thus.

Wassa matter? Scared of bullets?

She sure would make a good Mii Gunner with music track.

 

[ChronoBound]

I do not think I commented on Byleth yet. I will say I was not expecting him as Fighter 5 for the Fighters Pass because of Sakurai's reasoning for not including characters like Spring Man and Rex. I was expecting a promotional Nintendo character to happen as DLC for the post-pass though and did single out Astral Chain and Fire Emblem Three Houses in particular being the most likely candidates due to the suspicious absence of a spirit event for those two titles.

As for Byleth as a choice, I was caught off guard over the timing of it (I was expecting a promotional Nintendo character to happen for the post-pass not the First one). It is odd to me they went through so many hoops to keep Byleth a secret though. However, it shows whatever they did worked, and they will probably utilize the same measures for future character unveils. It worked. People were caught by surprise, and Byleth did not leak before the direct, or at least a long period of time before it.

As for Byleth as a character choice, the fact is that a promotional Fire Emblem character has been a staple of Smash titles going back to Melee. More people should have been prepared for it happening. It is certainly disappointing that other series don't get the attention FE does, but every game designer or creator is always going to have their own personal biases no matter what. Sakurai himself also seems to be aware about the amount of Fire Emblem characters relative to other franchises as well, and I am sure he will probably go more into detail about Byleth's inclusion in the near future.

As for Byleth being the character choice for representing Three Houses. I think he was the best choice they could have chosen. A Three Houses fan I spoke to weeks ago lamented prior to his/her unveil that choosing one of the House leaders as the rep for the title would only serve to make the fans of those other Houses very bitter. This same fan lamented that Byleth was the only fair choice, but that he/she would be "boring".

It is safe to say, that Byleth might be the most unique Fire Emblem character included yet, and that Sakurai and his team have made Byleth as unique and interesting as they possibly could. The inclusion of him/her using the weapons to the other House leaders into his/her moveset and palette swaps referencing them was a fair compromise.

I think the bitterness over Byleth will subside once another one of the Smash Bubble character choices gets confirmed. I think unlike Corrin, there is the fact that Three Houses is not divisive among Fire Emblem and Nintendo fans like the Fates trilogy was, as well as the fact that there are still six more DLC characters to look forward to (while Corrin ended up concluding Smash 4 DLC alongside Bayonetta).

Still, I was not expecting a promotional Nintendo character in the First Fighters Pass. I do think the Second Fighters Pass has a decent chance for another promotional Nintendo character, but my Second Fighters Pass predictions are for another time.

Geno is getting in and that's a fact

Geno is the only character I am 90% confident that he is going to be be a playable character as DLC. As a matter of fact, I would be very surprised if he does not become playable in Ultimate. The only other "individual" character I can put to also having good prospects is Ryu Hayabusa, but even there I would put his chance as 70% (still high, but I can easily see him not being included).

With Geno, the Mii costume not coming back when there was an obvious opportunity to bring it back (Hero's update) is just one giant neon sign to me that Geno is going to be in (along with Sakurai's own praise for the character, and intentions to include him back during Brawl).

Geno was a pretty big request back in Brawl. His demand was almost as big (and potentially bigger) as the likes of Ridley and K. Rool. I wasn't active during Smash 4 speculation so I cannot speak to that but his presence during the speculation days in Brawl definately left a big footprint. He was one of the top requested characters in the polls for Brawl along with Ridley, K. Rool, Dedede, Diddy Kong and others.

@Fatmanonice wrote a brilliant essay which you can read here. He covers how Geno was even requested as far back as Melee and talks about the likelihood of his chances this time around. I recommend anyone who doesn't understand the push for Geno to read this essay. If you can forfeit the time, it's a fun and enlightening read.

I was around since pre-Melee, and the thing about Geno's popularity during pre-Brawl is that it is vastly overstated. He was within the Top 10 most wanted characters, but usually at the lower end of that (around 8-10). He was about on par with Isaac in terms of requests. The likes of Sonic, Ridley, Diddy Kong, Wolf, Krystal, Mega Man, and King Dedede were a tier above him.

Also, Geno was not "popularly" requested since Melee. Geno did not take off as a popularly requested character until the summer of 2006 when an animated video called "Rawest Forest" took off as a viral video, and when people misinterpreted the suggestion journal Sakurai launched for Brawl for Japanese fans as a poll (Geno came up four times over the course of it), which put him up near the top in terms of mentions, and thus believing him to be likely for Brawl.

During pre-Melee, he came up, but I saw much more requests for Wario, Toad, and Waluigi than him. Actually, the "Geno" in those days was Poo from EarthBound. I have no idea how that came about.

Geno's popularity as a character collapsed so much after Brawl's release that he was barely within the Top 50 after Smash 4's release. By comparison, other popularly requested characters during pre-Brawl (aside from Ridley), that had also failed to make it into Smash 4 managed to retain much more of their popularity throughout the pre-Smash 4 period. Isaac was still within the Top 10 most wanted characters, while Krystal fell down to the Top 15.

And the question of likeliness should not have been a factor for his requests to have collapsed as much as they did. Banjo-Kazooie was a character within the Top 15, despite basically being an impossible character choice at that point (this was before Phil Spencer spoke up about wanting BK in Smash).

The re-emergence of Geno as a popularly requested character was a perfect storm of factors.

One was the inclusion of the Mii costume as DLC. The other was Sakurai mentioning that he himself is a fan of Geno and wanted to include him as a character in Brawl in an inteview in 2016.

While these two events helped stoke interest in Geno again, Geno’s fanbase did not start to snowball again until K. Rool’s confirmation, of which it seemed like a confirmation that Sakurai and his team were going to include every single long time requested character in Ultimate (the character that particularly benefited the most from K. Rool’s confirmation was Isaac in particular).

The most critical event that brought Geno back to his pre-Brawl heights was the deconfirmation of nearly every other longtime requested character with November 2018 Direct. Both Isaac and Skull Kid (the two other characters that had their fanbases massively expand after K. Rool’s confirmation) were both deconfirmed as both Assist Trophies and Mii Costumes, seemingly consolation prizes. It also appeared that nearly every Nintendo costume returned in Ultimate’s base game.

However, many found it peculiar that Geno had an appearance as a spirit, but not a Mii costume. Also, at this time, there was a lot of speculation and rumors by Vergben (who had leaked most of Ultimate’s base roster), that a Square-Enix character was coming as DLC. Many thought that Geno was going to be this particular Square-Enix character.

Geno fanbase is the only character fanbase that did not implode about the November Direct due to those two things and actually continued to snowball, especially with the rampant speculation on the identity to the Square-Enix character.

The character took a temporary hit in prospects when Dragon Quest’s Hero was confirmed to be that particular Square-Enix character. However, a month later with Hero’s release. Many were speculating that Genos’ Mii costume would return with his release just like the Mii costumes for Tails and Knuckles returned with Joker’s release (Atlus is owned by Sega). However, this did not end up happening. Things just ballooned again from there.

Again, I fully expect Geno as a playable character, but I do not like that people color the past with the biases of the present.

 

[Cosmic77]

If we do get a starter Pokemon, I'm kinda conflicted on which one I'd want.

Cinderace is my favorite, but I know people will hate it for being another fire type.
Rillaboom would probably be received better, but that's only because it's a grass type; I think it's the one I want least.
Inteleon...exists I guess. Not bad, but not great.

Overall though, the starters are pretty meh.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

I wonder if people will ever realize Rex was NEVER on the table for DLC and that the too recent remark was for base game

 

[Troykv]

I do not think I commented on Byleth yet. I will say I was not expecting him as Fighter 5 for the Fighters Pass because of Sakurai's reasoning for not including characters like Spring Man and Rex. I was expecting a promotional Nintendo character to happen as DLC for the post-pass though and did single out Astral Chain and Fire Emblem Three Houses in particular being the most likely candidates due to the suspicious absence of a spirit event for those two titles.

As for Byleth as a choice, I was caught off guard over the timing of it (I was expecting a promotional Nintendo character to happen for the post-pass not the First one). It is odd to me they went through so many hoops to keep Byleth a secret though. However, it shows whatever they did worked, and they will probably utilize the same measures for future character unveils. It worked. People were caught by surprise, and Byleth did not leak before the direct, or at least a long period of time before it.

As for Byleth as a character choice, the fact is that a promotional Fire Emblem character has been a staple of Smash titles going back to Melee. More people should have been prepared for it happening. It is certainly disappointing that other series don't get the attention FE does, but every game designer or creator is always going to have their own personal biases no matter what. Sakurai himself also seems to be aware about the amount of Fire Emblem characters relative to other franchises as well, and I am sure he will probably go more into detail about Byleth's inclusion in the near future.

As for Byleth being the character choice for representing Three Houses. I think he was the best choice they could have chosen. A Three Houses fan I spoke to weeks ago lamented prior to his/her unveil that choosing one of the House leaders as the rep for the title would only serve to make the fans of those other Houses very bitter. This same fan lamented that Byleth was the only fair choice, but that he/she would be "boring".

It is safe to say, that Byleth might be the most unique Fire Emblem character included yet, and that Sakurai and his team have made Byleth as unique and interesting as they possibly could. The inclusion of him/her using the weapons to the other House leaders into his/her moveset and palette swaps referencing them was a fair compromise.

I think the bitterness over Byleth will subside once another one of the Smash Bubble character choices gets confirmed. I think unlike Corrin, there is the fact that Three Houses is not divisive among Fire Emblem and Nintendo fans like the Fates trilogy was, as well as the fact that there are still six more DLC characters to look forward to (while Corrin ended up concluding Smash 4 DLC alongside Bayonetta).

Still, I was not expecting a promotional Nintendo character in the First Fighters Pass. I do think the Second Fighters Pass has a decent chance for another promotional Nintendo character, but my Second Fighters Pass predictions are for another time.



Geno is the only character I am 90% confident that he is going to be be a playable character as DLC. As a matter of fact, I would be very surprised if he does not become playable in Ultimate. The only other "individual" character I can put to also having good prospects is Ryu Hayabusa, but even there I would put his chance as 70% (still high, but I can easily see him not being included).

With Geno, the Mii costume not coming back when there was an obvious opportunity to bring it back (Hero's update) is just one giant neon sign to me that Geno is going to be in (along with Sakurai's own praise for the character, and intentions to include him back during Brawl).



I was around since pre-Melee, and the thing about Geno's popularity during pre-Brawl is that it is vastly overstated. He was within the Top 10 most wanted characters, but usually at the lower end of that (around 8-10). He was about on par with Isaac in terms of requests. The likes of Sonic, Ridley, Diddy Kong, Wolf, Krystal, Mega Man, and King Dedede were a tier above him.

Also, Geno was not "popularly" requested since Melee. Geno did not take off as a popularly requested character until the summer of 2006 when an animated video called "Rawest Forest" took off as a viral video, and when people misinterpreted the suggestion journal Sakurai launched for Brawl for Japanese fans as a poll (Geno came up four times over the course of it), which put him up near the top in terms of mentions, and thus believing him to be likely for Brawl.

During pre-Melee, he came up, but I saw much more requests for Wario, Toad, and Waluigi than him. Actually, the "Geno" in those days was Poo from EarthBound. I have no idea how that came about.

Geno's popularity as a character collapsed so much after Brawl's release that he was barely within the Top 50 after Smash 4's release. By comparison, other popularly requested characters during pre-Brawl (aside from Ridley), that had also failed to make it into Smash 4 managed to retain much more of their popularity throughout the pre-Smash 4 period. Isaac was still within the Top 10 most wanted characters, while Krystal fell down to the Top 15.

And the question of likeliness should not have been a factor for his requests to have collapsed as much as they did. Banjo-Kazooie was a character within the Top 15, despite basically being an impossible character choice at that point (this was before Phil Spencer spoke up about wanting BK in Smash).

The re-emergence of Geno as a popularly requested character was a perfect storm of factors.

One was the inclusion of the Mii costume as DLC. The other was Sakurai mentioning that he himself is a fan of Geno and wanted to include him as a character in Brawl in an inteview in 2016.

While these two events helped stoke interest in Geno again, Geno’s fanbase did not start to snowball again until K. Rool’s confirmation, of which it seemed like a confirmation that Sakurai and his team were going to include every single long time requested character in Ultimate (the character that particularly benefited the most from K. Rool’s confirmation was Isaac in particular).

The most critical event that brought Geno back to his pre-Brawl heights was the deconfirmation of nearly every other longtime requested character with November 2018 Direct. Both Isaac and Skull Kid (the two other characters that had their fanbases massively expand after K. Rool’s confirmation) were both deconfirmed as both Assist Trophies and Mii Costumes, seemingly consolation prizes. It also appeared that nearly every Nintendo costume returned in Ultimate’s base game.

However, many found it peculiar that Geno had an appearance as a spirit, but not a Mii costume. Also, at this time, there was a lot of speculation and rumors by Vergben (who had leaked most of Ultimate’s base roster), that a Square-Enix character was coming as DLC. Many thought that Geno was going to be this particular Square-Enix character.

Geno fanbase is the only character fanbase that did not implode about the November Direct due to those two things and actually continued to snowball, especially with the rampant speculation on the identity to the Square-Enix character.

The character took a temporary hit in prospects when Dragon Quest’s Hero was confirmed to be that particular Square-Enix character. However, a month later with Hero’s release. Many were speculating that Genos’ Mii costume would return with his release just like the Mii costumes for Tails and Knuckles returned with Joker’s release (Atlus is owned by Sega). However, this did not end up happening. Things just ballooned again from there.

Again, I fully expect Geno as a playable character, but I do not like that people color the past with the biases of the present.

Heh... I hope people don't feel ashamed how one of the main reason they're wanting Geno is because of an idiot.

 

[UberMadman]

I wonder if people will ever realize Rex was NEVER on the table for DLC and that the too recent remark was for base game

Exactly. I’m just hoping he’s coming Season 2, though.

 

[Michael the Spikester]

Exactly. I’m just hoping he’s coming Season 2, though.

I have a hunch he will be. He's among my current predictions.

Too late for Base so what better way then to bring him through DLC?

As much as I'd prefer Elma.

 

[Deleted member]

-snip-

First off, I never made the claim that Geno was a popular choice pre-Brawl during the Melee era. I only said that his consideration existed even during the Melee era. Despite how minimal or small it may have been, it was there and that was all I was pointing out. If we're going to be honest, Geno ranked way lower on the poll than even Goomba for Melee. I was highlighting that he was a popular request for Brawl but not Melee so I'd appreciate it if you didn't put words in my mouth, sir.

Second, with the Brawl polls, Geno was definately one of the highest being tied with the likes of Ridley, Diddy and Ike while surpassing the likes of Isaac, K. Rool and Krystal as shown here.

 

[Deleted member]

I like how you designed it

It has a nice balance, and the aesthetic are nice too xD

Actually I didn’t design it

I said that I found it a couple pages back
https://smashboards.com/threads/newcomer-dlc-speculation-discussion.453424/post-23800160

 

[Goombaic]

If we do get a starter Pokemon, I'm kinda conflicted on which one I'd want.

Cinderace is my favorite, but I know people will hate it for being another fire type.
Rillaboom would probably be received better, but that's only because it's a grass type; I think it's the one I want least.
Inteleon...exists I guess. Not bad, but not great.

Overall though, the starters are pretty meh.

Same. Cinderace is pretty mobile and can do some fun things as a soccer player much like a wrestler we all know and love. Inteleon's my least favorite, but I could see it work as a fighter better than Rillaboom. Rillaboom, much like Decidueye, is only wanted for being a grass type and doesn't have many interesting things going on.

 

[ChronoBound]

Second, with the Brawl polls, Geno was definately one of the highest being tied with the likes of Ridley, Diddy and Ike while surpassing the likes of Isaac, K. Rool and Krystal as shown here.

That was not a poll. I already mentioned that in my post.

Also, my post was not a personal attack on you. I just wanted to elaborate on the past because there is a lot of misconceptions because there is now so few users from prior speculation epochs around anymore.

 

[CodakTheWarrior]

Same. Cinderace is pretty mobile and can do some fun things as a soccer player much like a wrestler we all know and love. Inteleon's my least favorite, but I could see it work as a fighter better than Rillaboom. Rillaboom, much like Decidueye, is only wanted for being a grass type and doesn't have many interesting things going on.

I personally would have to disagree, for example Delzethin’s Rillaboom concept shows how he could be a stage control heavyweight that uses large, slow hit boxes, something that would certainly be unique if you ask me

Though assuming we do get a gen 8 Id think it be the ‘breakout star’ of the gen, who I honestly don’t know who it is for this gen

 

[TheCJBrine]

If we get a new Pokémon, I’m personally hoping for Gengar, but I know it won’t happen.

Or maybe it will now that I’ve said it won’t

 

[Homelessvagrant]

I wonder if people will ever realize Rex was NEVER on the table for DLC and that the too recent remark was for base game

I don't think that was ever the concern. Its more of the logical conclusion that if Rex is too recent for base he should spill over to DLC. Of course this thought process doesn't take in consideration that Nintendo was responsible for the choices or that character considerations for the base game (where you buy everything as a whole) is vastly different then DLC considerations (marketing an individual character). Without considering the latter, it is easy to come to the conclusion that Sakurai would add Rex as DLC.

 

[CapitaineCrash]

The only gen 8 Pokémon starter that I could really imagine well in Smash is Intelleon. I don't really see what Cinderace would bring new aside from throwing soccer ball (which would probably just be a normal projectiles) and Rillaboom would probably looks awkward with his big drums. I think Intelleon have more potential than some realise, with his spy theme you could do a lot of things, just like Sakurai use Incineroar's wrestler theme to do something very original.

 

[Deleted member]

That was not a poll. I already mentioned that in my post.

Also, my post was not a personal attack on you. I just wanted to elaborate on the past because there is a lot of misconceptions because there is now so few users from prior speculation epochs around anymore.

Apologies. I know it wasn't a personal attack but it felt heavily implied that you got the understanding that I thought Geno was highly requested in Melee only because I mentioned it in passing so that's my bad. My point still stand though.

And the word "poll" is used so damn loosely but when people talk about the Brawl polls, they reference the Japanese recommendations that I linked so in a way I do agree however most people tend to know what we're talking about when we mention the Brawl polls. It's the closest evidence that we got though in regards to character recomendations and I'm not seeing any evidence of what your saying is true in regards to Krystal, Isaac pr Wolf ranking higher than Geno. Do you have a source for your claims? I'm just genuinely curious.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

Broke: The next character who would fit Smash best is a cartoony platformer character who uses punches and kicks!


Woke: The next character who would fit Smash best is from a SEGA IP that's rated 18+ as seen here

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Warning, some of the footage explains the rating

 

[Guynamednelson]

If we get a new Pokémon, I’m personally hoping for Gengar, but I know it won’t happen.

Or maybe it will now that I’ve said it won’t

Anything that's the anti-Incineroar is fine with me. I have some specific wants, but I also want to make sure Sakurai cares about more than just the newest batch of fully-evolved starters.

...or the Nintendo people picking DLC fighters know that Pokemon is too big to just stick to that stuff, especially post-Go.

 

[N3ON]

Also worth noting when talking about the Brawl era is that the character with by far the most exaggerated popularity is K. Rool. K. Rool was not that popular. Forget the top ten, he'd maybe crack the top twenty.

And the reason for that is because Diddy siphoned off almost all the demand for a new DK character. He was seen as next in line. I suppose the most contemporary example would be how Isabelle was seen as the obvious choice after Villager, even though there were other, potentially feasible options.

People really do seem to take characters included in entries prior to Ultimate for granted, but a good deal of them were, at one time, popular enough to displace choices which recently ranked highest.

K. Rool's rise didn't really begin until after Diddy got in, but at that point the expectation for another DK character in Brawl wasn't so rampant as to equate to demand that would place him in the highest ranks. That wouldn't happen until Smash 4.

So, really, his inclusion on lists of longstanding, super-popular omissions which date back to Brawl is anachronistic.

Second, with the Brawl polls, Geno was definately one of the highest being tied with the likes of Ridley, Diddy and Ike while surpassing the likes of Isaac, K. Rool and Krystal as shown here.

And the word "poll" is used so damn loosely but when people talk about the Brawl polls, they reference the Japanese recommendations that I linked so in a way I do agree however most people tend to know what we're talking about when we mention the Brawl polls. It's the closest evidence that we got though in regards to character recomendations and I'm not seeing any evidence of what your saying is true in regards to Krystal, Isaac pr Wolf ranking higher than Geno. Do you have a source for your claims? I'm just genuinely curious.

Those are the number of times a character was mentioned in the Japanese-only section of the DOJO wherein Sakurai replied to fan submissions. It's a longstanding misconception, and its viability to deduce the actual results is extremely dubious, considering the only results we do know are that Sonic was first, and he's not even mentioned there.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

I don't think that was ever the concern. Its more of the logical conclusion that if Rex is too recent for base he should spill over to DLC. Of course this thought process doesn't take in consideration that Nintendo was responsible for the choices or that character considerations for the base game (where you buy everything as a whole) is vastly different then DLC considerations (marketing an individual character). Without considering the latter, it is easy to come to the conclusion that Sakurai would add Rex as DLC.

At the same time XB2 got quite a few spirits, meaning Sakurai likely thought the game was, in some way, represented. You can say 'Spirits deconfirming is a fan rule', sure, but judging on how the only first party DLC characters had no spirits at all, there's evidence that it may not be a fan rule

 

[ChronoBound]

Do you have a source for your claims? I'm just genuinely curious.

Here are three different polls from the pre-Brawl period I tallied:

I tallied all the the votes as of 3:00A.M. last night, and here are the results for the top contenders: (characters with 25 votes or more)

Sonic: 69
Ridley: 61
Diddy Kong: 43
Wolf: 35
King Dedede: 34
Krystal: 32
Ike: 32
Mega Man: 31
Geno: 28
Lucario: 27
Midna: 25

(NOTE: Some may of these may be 1-4 votes more than they should be, because I think I may have counted the votes of people who kept re-posting their lists, but they're pretty accurate for the most part)

Two other pre-Brawl polls:

I was looking through some old folders of mine, and I discovered that I had recorded the results for two pre-Brawl polls. Unfortunately, there is no date given on any of the polls, but it ranges from when Brawl was first announced to when the first Dojo newcomers were confirmed.


Poll #1: Nsider first half of 2007

Mario series:
- Geno: 19
- Bowser Jr.: 7
- Toad: 6
- Waluigi: 4
- Daisy: 4
- Mallow: 3
- Paper Mario: 2

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 23
- K. Rool: 8
- Dixie Kong: 3

The Legend of Zelda series:
- Midna: 13
- Vaati: 10
- Fierce Diety Link: 6
- Tingle: 6
- Zant: 4

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 32
- Dark Samus: 2

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 16

Star Fox series:
- Wolf: 19
- Krystal: 16

Pokemon series:
- Lucario: 10
- Deoxys: 5
- Meowth: 4
- Plusle & Minun: 3
- Blaziken: 2

F-Zero:
- Samurai Goroh: 8

Mother/EarthBound series:
LOL

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 14
- Lyn: 14
- Sigurd: 5

Other series:
- Tom Nook: 12
- Isaac: 11
- Olimar: 10
- Mii: 5
- Ray: 4
- Starfy: 4
- Andy: 4

Retro:
- Little Mac: 8
- Balloon Fighter: 6
- Lip: 4
- Muddy Mole: 4
- Takamaru: 2
- Sukapon: 2

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 35
- Mega Man: 13
- Bomberman: 8
- Shadow: 7
- Sora: 6
- Simon Belmont: 5
- Rayman: 4
- Knuckles: 4
- Tails: 4
- Lloyd Irving: 3
- Pac-Man: 2

Top 10 for Nsider poll:
1. Sonic (35)
2. Ridley (32)
3. Diddy Kong (23)
4 Wolf, Geno (19)
5. King Dedede, Krystal (16)
6. Ike, Lyn (14)
7. Mega Man, Midna (13)
8. Tom Nook (12)
9. Isaac (11)
10. Olimar, Lucario, Vaati (10)


Poll #2: GameFAQs, first half of 2007

For some reason there are much less character results recorded for this poll. I don't know why. My theory is that its a separate page to record characters that got more than 1-3 votes (so as to record the higher ranking characters better since there were so many single vote characters in the GameFAQs poll). There is no character on the page that has below 15 votes, so I think this is most likely what this is.

Mario series:
- Geno: 27
- Bowser Jr.: 20

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 37
- K. Rool: 19

The Legend of Zelda series:
The page does not list any Zelda characters so I am assuming there were no Zelda characters that had received at least 15 votes.

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 36
- Dark Samus: 19

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 32

Star Fox series:
- Krystal: 30
- Wolf: 29

Pokemonseries:
The page does not list any Pokemon characters so I am assuming there were no Pokemon characters that had received at least 15 votes.

F-Zero series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Mother/EarthBound series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 16
- Lyn: 15

Other series:
- Isaac: 22
- Tom Nook: 18

Retro:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 58
- Mega Man: 35
- Shadow: 15

Overall Top 10 for GameFAQs poll:
1. Sonic (58)
2. Diddy Kong (37)
3. Ridley (36)
4. Mega Man (35)
5. King Dedede (32)
6. Krystal (30)
7. Wolf (29)
8. Geno (27)
9. Isaac (22)
10. Bowser Jr. (20)

Pretty interesting.

 

[Ben Holt]

Also worth noting when talking about the Brawl era is that the character with by far the most exaggerated popularity is K. Rool. K. Rool was not that popular. Forget the top ten, he'd maybe crack the top twenty.

And the reason for that is because Diddy siphoned off almost all the demand for a new DK character. He was seen as next in line. I suppose the most contemporary example would be how Isabelle was seen as the obvious choice after Villager, even though there were other, potentially feasible options.

People really do seem to take characters included in entries prior to Ultimate for granted, but a good deal of them were, at one time, popular enough to displace choices which recently ranked highest.

K. Rool's rise didn't really begin until after Diddy got in, but at that point the expectation for another DK character in Brawl wasn't so rampant as to equate to demand that would place him in the highest ranks. That wouldn't happen until Smash 4.

So, really, his inclusion on lists of longstanding, super-popular omissions which date back to Brawl is anachronistic.



Those are the number of times a character was mentioned in the Japanese-only section of the DOJO wherein Sakurai replied to fan submissions. It's a longstanding misconception, and its viability to deduce the actual results is extremely dubious, considering the only results we do know are that Sonic was first, and he's not even mentioned there.

True, but I vividly remember being a Ridley supporter during the Brawl days. I also really wanted Pac-Man. If I recall correctly, Ridley was very popular, and Pac-Man was meh at the time.
There's an old lost account somewhere of me during those days. But still, I was 12.

 

[Idon]

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 14
- Lyn: 14

A soul for a soul...

 

[Garteam]

Here are three different polls from the pre-Brawl period I tallied:

I tallied all the the votes as of 3:00A.M. last night, and here are the results for the top contenders: (characters with 25 votes or more)

Sonic: 69
Ridley: 61
Diddy Kong: 43
Wolf: 35
King Dedede: 34
Krystal: 32
Ike: 32
Mega Man: 31
Geno: 28
Lucario: 27
Midna: 25

(NOTE: Some may of these may be 1-4 votes more than they should be, because I think I may have counted the votes of people who kept re-posting their lists, but they're pretty accurate for the most part)

Two other pre-Brawl polls:

I was looking through some old folders of mine, and I discovered that I had recorded the results for two pre-Brawl polls. Unfortunately, there is no date given on any of the polls, but it ranges from when Brawl was first announced to when the first Dojo newcomers were confirmed.


Poll #1: Nsider first half of 2007

Mario series:
- Geno: 19
- Bowser Jr.: 7
- Toad: 6
- Waluigi: 4
- Daisy: 4
- Mallow: 3
- Paper Mario: 2

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 23
- K. Rool: 8
- Dixie Kong: 3

The Legend of Zelda series:
- Midna: 13
- Vaati: 10
- Fierce Diety Link: 6
- Tingle: 6
- Zant: 4

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 32
- Dark Samus: 2

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 16

Star Fox series:
- Wolf: 19
- Krystal: 16

Pokemon series:
- Lucario: 10
- Deoxys: 5
- Meowth: 4
- Plusle & Minun: 3
- Blaziken: 2

F-Zero:
- Samurai Goroh: 8

Mother/EarthBound series:
LOL

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 14
- Lyn: 14
- Sigurd: 5

Other series:
- Tom Nook: 12
- Isaac: 11
- Olimar: 10
- Mii: 5
- Ray: 4
- Starfy: 4
- Andy: 4

Retro:
- Little Mac: 8
- Balloon Fighter: 6
- Lip: 4
- Muddy Mole: 4
- Takamaru: 2
- Sukapon: 2

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 35
- Mega Man: 13
- Bomberman: 8
- Shadow: 7
- Sora: 6
- Simon Belmont: 5
- Rayman: 4
- Knuckles: 4
- Tails: 4
- Lloyd Irving: 3
- Pac-Man: 2

Top 10 for Nsider poll:
1. Sonic (35)
2. Ridley (32)
3. Diddy Kong (23)
4 Wolf, Geno (19)
5. King Dedede, Krystal (16)
6. Ike, Lyn (14)
7. Mega Man, Midna (13)
8. Tom Nook (12)
9. Isaac (11)
10. Olimar, Lucario, Vaati (10)


Poll #2: GameFAQs, first half of 2007

For some reason there are much less character results recorded for this poll. I don't know why. My theory is that its a separate page to record characters that got more than 1-3 votes (so as to record the higher ranking characters better since there were so many single vote characters in the GameFAQs poll). There is no character on the page that has below 15 votes, so I think this is most likely what this is.

Mario series:
- Geno: 27
- Bowser Jr.: 20

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 37
- K. Rool: 19

The Legend of Zelda series:
The page does not list any Zelda characters so I am assuming there were no Zelda characters that had received at least 15 votes.

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 36
- Dark Samus: 19

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 32

Star Fox series:
- Krystal: 30
- Wolf: 29

Pokemonseries:
The page does not list any Pokemon characters so I am assuming there were no Pokemon characters that had received at least 15 votes.

F-Zero series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Mother/EarthBound series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 16
- Lyn: 15

Other series:
- Isaac: 22
- Tom Nook: 18

Retro:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 58
- Mega Man: 35
- Shadow: 15

Overall Top 10 for GameFAQs poll:
1. Sonic (58)
2. Diddy Kong (37)
3. Ridley (36)
4. Mega Man (35)
5. King Dedede (32)
6. Krystal (30)
7. Wolf (29)
8. Geno (27)
9. Isaac (22)
10. Bowser Jr. (20)

Pretty interesting.

I didn't know Wolf was actually more popular then Krystal back then. I got into Smash speculation between Brawl and Smash 2014, so I remember every roster I saw had Krystal, so I kinda assumed she had unanimous popularity. Given how close Ike and Lyn are, I take it some people were probably less than happy at his reveal. Neat stuff.

Also,

- Sigurd: 5

This is woke as ****.

 

[Homelessvagrant]

At the same time XB2 got quite a few spirits, meaning Sakurai likely thought the game was, in some way, represented. You can say 'Spirits deconfirming is a fan rule', sure, but judging on how the only first party DLC characters had no spirits at all, there's evidence that it may not be a fan rule

Could be or not. I'm personally not interested in the spirit deconfirmation discussion because there are strong arguments for that topic on both sides. We know very little on when either DLC pack was decided or the situation for said decisions. So any claims made are presumptuous by nature. "Spirit deconfirming" is indeed a fan rule but it could be true; there's really no way of knowing until the DLC is complete. Therefore I don't see the point in concerning myself with it.

I didn't know Wolf was actually more popular then Krystal back then. I got into Smash speculation between Brawl and Smash 2014, so I remember every roster I saw had Krystal, so I kinda assumed she had unanimous popularity.

I wouldn't mind it much. From what I remember there were plenty of polls like this in the Brawl days and the results were as fickle as character support is now. From what I remember, both characters had strong fanbases though Krystal definitly was "in vogue" for a while. I think it had something to do with recency, the staff, and being a girl.

 

[Dinoman96]

In the end, Ridley was pretty much the only character that had constant vocal support until the very end.

K. Rool had to wait until Diddy got in to take off, Geno was popular during the Brawl era but more or less disappeared for Smash 4 until Sakurai basically bailed him out, and Banjo & Kazooie were just LOL until Phil Spencer gave his blessings on Twitter.

 

[N3ON]

True, but I vividly remember being a Ridley supporter during the Brawl days. I also really wanted Pac-Man. If I recall correctly, Ridley was very popular, and Pac-Man was meh at the time.
There's an old lost account somewhere of me during those days. But still, I was 12.

Pac-Man only got popular in the first place when Namco got announced as the developer for Smash 4. Beforehand he wasn't super requested. He's not exactly a standard example.

But I'm not sure what your point is. I didn't say Ridley wasn't popular. I didn't say his popularity was exaggerated. I didn't say Pac-Man was more popular than Ridley. I said those select few characters bandied around as longstanding omissions were, back in the day, outclassed by characters which already got in. And I stand by that.

Did you take that to mean every character received prior to these recent ones exceeded their popularity?

 

[SneakyLink]

A soul for a soul...
View attachment 258999

On that note, wasn't there this huge fandom war for a FE newcomer during the Brawl days?

Back to speculation, I'm gonna go on a limb and guess a newcomer will likely be... a Nintendo character. Who? Probably Pokémon, but it could be anyone.

 

[Goombaic]

I personally would have to disagree, for example Delzethin’s Rillaboom concept shows how he could be a stage control heavyweight that uses large, slow hit boxes, something that would certainly be unique if you ask me

Though assuming we do get a gen 8 Id think it be the ‘breakout star’ of the gen, who I honestly don’t know who it is for this gen

Woops that video never showed up in my feed. The concept still isn't too interesting to me, but at least it's better than DK with trees.

 

[Cosmic77]

Could be or not. I'm personally not interested in the spirit deconfirmation discussion because there are strong arguments for that topic on both sides. We know very little on when either DLC pack was decided or the situation for said decisions. So any claims made are presumptuous by nature. "Spirit deconfirming" is indeed a fan rule but it could be true; there's really no way of knowing until the DLC is complete. Therefore I don't see the point in concerning myself with it.

We probably won't get an answer until the very last character. For now, there's no clear answer. Some say Three Houses makes it clear that Spirits deconfirm, but then others say that it'd take people 5 seconds before they made a connection between Three Houses and other popular games not having Spirits. I could see Sakurai adding a few quick Spirits if it made certain characters seem less obvious.

Regardless, no one knows, and no one should bother acting like they know.

 

[Krankees]

Broke: The next character who would fit Smash best is a cartoony platformer character who uses punches and kicks!


Woke: The next character who would fit Smash best is from a SEGA IP that's rated 18+ as seen here

There was a problem fetching the tweet

Warning, some of the footage explains the rating

The headslam sync is so satisfying.

 

[Deleted member]

-snip-

Credit where credit is due. You put a lot of work into that and I can appreciate it but I have a hard time believing that polls you tallied up on a couple of different sites is evident to the actual demand of the greater population of the Smash fanbase. Especially considering when there were other Smash dedicated places on the net that also had fan polls that weren't GameFAQs, Nsider or even SmashBoards despite those 3 being the high trafficked areas for speculation. No offense. I mean, who knows? Maybe Geno's hype was just overblown the whole time but then again, maybe it wasn't.

I guess the question is in regards to the Brawl "polls" is: what do we take at a greater face value? The direct recommendations that Sakurai received on the Japanese DOJO or polls that were tallied by a fan from a small handful of websites where Smash speculation was practiced? All in all, it's not really relevant anymore I guess, but I'm happy to concede and at the end of the day, Geno still left a massive footprint back in Brawl and I think we can all agree that it's nothing to scoff at.

Excuse the contrarian in me.

 

[N3ON]

In the end, Ridley was pretty much the only character that had constant vocal support until the very end.

Well, it did begin to decline when Sakurai pretty much said he was too big.

On that note, wasn't there this huge fandom war for a FE newcomer during the Brawl days?

Ever since people found out what FE was, there has never not been a huge war as to who the FE character would be.

 

[lordvaati]

On that note, wasn't there this huge fandom war for a FE newcomer during the Brawl days?

Back to speculation, I'm gonna go on a limb and guess a newcomer will likely be... a Nintendo character. Who? Probably Pokémon, but it could be anyone.

Not huge per se, just only demands for a GBA character(usually Lyndis or Hector) and for Roy to come back.

And as an addendum I'm going to make a bold claim about Fighter Pack V2 meself: at least 3 of the characters in the Pass will be Nintendo characters.

 

[Homelessvagrant]

I don't know I remember there being around 10-15 semi popular fire emblem support forums alone in those days. A lot of proper represntation posts and threads too. Granted there was only three to four really big ones. I think it was Ike, Michaiah, Lyn, and Hector that got most of the attention. That and the hopefully Roy returning support forum.

 

[N3ON]

I guess the question is in regards to the Brawl "polls" is: what do we take at a greater face value? The direct recommendations that Sakurai received on the Japanese DOJO or polls that were tallied by a fan from a small handful of websites where Smash speculation was practiced? All in all, it's not really relevant anymore I guess, but I'm happy to concede and at the end of the day, Geno still left a massive footprint back in Brawl and I think we can all agree that it's nothing to scoff at.

Keep in mind those that got published are not inherently indicative of all that were submitted. It's possible many wherein Sakurai's answers would been similar to one he already gave were discarded in favour of him being able to talk about a character or feature he'd yet to discuss. Or that he passed over those which would've revealed things had he responded.

The polls may not be the most reliable given their small scale, but on the other hand, selective answers seem even less reliable.

 

[Ura]

At the same time XB2 got quite a few spirits, meaning Sakurai likely thought the game was, in some way, represented. You can say 'Spirits deconfirming is a fan rule', sure, but judging on how the only first party DLC characters had no spirits at all, there's evidence that it may not be a fan rule

I mean, Sakurai isn't going to add Spirits for a game that wasn't due to be out for another 7-8 months on the base roster so yeah lol. And given how that Pass was decided on in advance it makes sense.

Here are three different polls from the pre-Brawl period I tallied:

I tallied all the the votes as of 3:00A.M. last night, and here are the results for the top contenders: (characters with 25 votes or more)

Sonic: 69
Ridley: 61
Diddy Kong: 43
Wolf: 35
King Dedede: 34
Krystal: 32
Ike: 32
Mega Man: 31
Geno: 28
Lucario: 27
Midna: 25

(NOTE: Some may of these may be 1-4 votes more than they should be, because I think I may have counted the votes of people who kept re-posting their lists, but they're pretty accurate for the most part)

Two other pre-Brawl polls:

I was looking through some old folders of mine, and I discovered that I had recorded the results for two pre-Brawl polls. Unfortunately, there is no date given on any of the polls, but it ranges from when Brawl was first announced to when the first Dojo newcomers were confirmed.


Poll #1: Nsider first half of 2007

Mario series:
- Geno: 19
- Bowser Jr.: 7
- Toad: 6
- Waluigi: 4
- Daisy: 4
- Mallow: 3
- Paper Mario: 2

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 23
- K. Rool: 8
- Dixie Kong: 3

The Legend of Zelda series:
- Midna: 13
- Vaati: 10
- Fierce Diety Link: 6
- Tingle: 6
- Zant: 4

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 32
- Dark Samus: 2

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 16

Star Fox series:
- Wolf: 19
- Krystal: 16

Pokemon series:
- Lucario: 10
- Deoxys: 5
- Meowth: 4
- Plusle & Minun: 3
- Blaziken: 2

F-Zero:
- Samurai Goroh: 8

Mother/EarthBound series:
LOL

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 14
- Lyn: 14
- Sigurd: 5

Other series:
- Tom Nook: 12
- Isaac: 11
- Olimar: 10
- Mii: 5
- Ray: 4
- Starfy: 4
- Andy: 4

Retro:
- Little Mac: 8
- Balloon Fighter: 6
- Lip: 4
- Muddy Mole: 4
- Takamaru: 2
- Sukapon: 2

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 35
- Mega Man: 13
- Bomberman: 8
- Shadow: 7
- Sora: 6
- Simon Belmont: 5
- Rayman: 4
- Knuckles: 4
- Tails: 4
- Lloyd Irving: 3
- Pac-Man: 2

Top 10 for Nsider poll:
1. Sonic (35)
2. Ridley (32)
3. Diddy Kong (23)
4 Wolf, Geno (19)
5. King Dedede, Krystal (16)
6. Ike, Lyn (14)
7. Mega Man, Midna (13)
8. Tom Nook (12)
9. Isaac (11)
10. Olimar, Lucario, Vaati (10)


Poll #2: GameFAQs, first half of 2007

For some reason there are much less character results recorded for this poll. I don't know why. My theory is that its a separate page to record characters that got more than 1-3 votes (so as to record the higher ranking characters better since there were so many single vote characters in the GameFAQs poll). There is no character on the page that has below 15 votes, so I think this is most likely what this is.

Mario series:
- Geno: 27
- Bowser Jr.: 20

Donkey Kong series:
- Diddy Kong: 37
- K. Rool: 19

The Legend of Zelda series:
The page does not list any Zelda characters so I am assuming there were no Zelda characters that had received at least 15 votes.

Metroid series:
- Ridley: 36
- Dark Samus: 19

Kirby series:
- King Dedede: 32

Star Fox series:
- Krystal: 30
- Wolf: 29

Pokemonseries:
The page does not list any Pokemon characters so I am assuming there were no Pokemon characters that had received at least 15 votes.

F-Zero series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Mother/EarthBound series:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Fire Emblem series:
- Ike: 16
- Lyn: 15

Other series:
- Isaac: 22
- Tom Nook: 18

Retro:
No character received at least 15 votes.

Third-Party:
- Sonic: 58
- Mega Man: 35
- Shadow: 15

Overall Top 10 for GameFAQs poll:
1. Sonic (58)
2. Diddy Kong (37)
3. Ridley (36)
4. Mega Man (35)
5. King Dedede (32)
6. Krystal (30)
7. Wolf (29)
8. Geno (27)
9. Isaac (22)
10. Bowser Jr. (20)

Pretty interesting.

My boy has more votes than Dixie Kong & Dark Samus on the NSider poll. Noice.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Same. Cinderace is pretty mobile and can do some fun things as a soccer player much like a wrestler we all know and love. Inteleon's my least favorite, but I could see it work as a fighter better than Rillaboom. Rillaboom, much like Decidueye, is only wanted for being a grass type and doesn't have many interesting things going on.

Heavy disagree on that. First, Decidueye has a cool visual design and seems to be the favorite of the Alolan starters (with Incineroar being hated and Primarina...existing). It's also a ghost archer. You could come up with some pretty cool stuff with that. As for Rillaboom, its drum could be used as some sort of stage control thingamadoodle, or at least give him some unique attacks.

In my personal opinion, Rillaboom is the only Galarian starter that could add anything interesting to the table; All Cinderace has is some sort of aimed projectile or Mega Ball type weapon, and Inteleon would probably just be another "not Sheik". I also think Inteleon's visual design is meh and Cinderace looks like a generic anime protagonist but that's neither here nor there.

 

[Icewolff92]

I do not think I commented on Byleth yet. I will say I was not expecting him as Fighter 5 for the Fighters Pass because of Sakurai's reasoning for not including characters like Spring Man and Rex. I was expecting a promotional Nintendo character to happen as DLC for the post-pass though and did single out Astral Chain and Fire Emblem Three Houses in particular being the most likely candidates due to the suspicious absence of a spirit event for those two titles.

What both Arms and Astral Chain have against themself, unfortunately, is that they are rather young when it comes to IPs. Especially Astral Chain. Granted, that does not explain the late arrival of the Astral Chain spirits (put people off guard thinking Three Houses would come next?) and my guess about Rex is that they weren¨t included because of nothing to market compared to Three Houses that had the last wave of DLC getting a trailer the same day has Byleth were announced