Official Newcomer/DLC Speculation Discussion

[Rie Sonomura]

Could be simply because of PP on there. But yeah, it seems pretty clear they have the entire set of stuff planned entirely already by then. Including anything beyond the FP itself. Extra Echoes, or whatever, if any.

To be fair, PP was meant to be on the base roster but had to be pushed to DLC, which explains why it has a Palutena’s Guidance but (so far) no other DLC has one.

 

[Michael the Spikester]

Where was this confirmed thatwas intended for Base? Got a source?

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

To be fair, PP was meant to be on the base roster but had to be pushed to DLC, which explains why it has a Palutena’s Guidance but (so far) no other DLC has one.

That's not a "to be fair" thing. We don't actually know that.

Sakurai planned out all the characters immediately in 2015(that aren't members of the Fighter's Pass), and nobody was removed from his Project Plan. Obviously Incineroar was added later but was planned via a Pokemon slot. For PP, this means it might've been for base but pushed to DLC, or it means it was DLC intentionally as part of the Project Plan. PP was worked on since September. That's enough time for them to do multiple Palutena's Guidances for everyone. It was just in perfect timing for a Guidance. It doesn't prove anything beyond that. The DLC characters aren't getting unique Guidances, but we know that many were started way later on work-wise. Rehiring all those voice actors for characters is probably just not worth the money so some backup generic ones(like 4 had) was done instead. I forget the exact reason given by Sakurai when he outright said the FP characters weren't getting unique Guidances. Nipper Plant being removed from the Spirit list is obviously not evidence of anything. Sakurai went over the list before it was done. Of course it'd be removed from the list of Spirits his team came up with to come with PP, which is logical in itself.

We have mere coincidences but nothing making it clear if PP was base or DLC planned from the start. It's likely it was DLC by default.

 

[Door Key Pig]

Could be simply because of PP on there. But yeah, it seems pretty clear they have the entire set of stuff planned entirely already by then. Including anything beyond the FP itself. Extra Echoes, or whatever, if any.

.....Sooooooooooooooo there totally could have been futility in campaigning characters for Ultimate while we knew Ultimate was a thing, as Banjo was rumoured to be negotiated as far back as April last year or whatever?

Also, would vertically "shrinking" Sonic's limbs to fit Tails model and animation-wise for an Echo like, work? Or could it not at all? I remember Lucina being just a tad smaller than Marth in Smash 4.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

.....Sooooooooooooooo there totally could have been futility in campaigning characters for Ultimate while we knew Ultimate was a thing, as Banjo was rumoured to be negotiated as far back as April last year or whatever?

Also, would vertically "shrinking" Sonic's limbs to fit Tails model and animation-wise for an Echo like, work? Or could it not at all? I remember Lucina being just a tad smaller than Marth in Smash 4.

I'd say campaigning was futile since it looks more like he wasn't taking suggestions outside of the Ballot.

No. Tails has a pretty different body shape overall from Sonic in Smash itself. It's an Isabelle/Villager comparison. Different body types, enough similarities for a semi-clone/clone at best. Lucina is almost exactly the same size and they removed a few pixels at best. Same with every other Echo. The pixel's difference pretty much make them proportionally the same body type. If you want the same body type as Sonic, a lot of the other Hedgehogs(bar Amy maybe?) actually work fine. Metal Sonic would have to take some moveset liberties, but can do things like fully curl up into a ball in the first place(shown off in Adventure 1 when he was a skin for Sonic that fully worked). To say the least, Metal Sonic does things like slash more than punches, but is able to punch just as easily. The actual issue comes from, in this case, the skeleton being often different in the animations and his stances, so I'd guess he'd be a clone instead of an Echo. Shadow is the easiest one to fit Sonic's body of anyone. Silver probably could use him as an easy base, but he sounds more like semi-clone or "almost entirely unique" like Wolf material. It doesn't help many of them actually do exactly the same thing as Sonic in Sonic Rivals, so they treat a lot of these characters like they have interchangeable movesets.

 

[perfectchaos83]

That's not a "to be fair" thing. We don't actually know that.

Sakurai planned out all the characters immediately in 2015(that aren't members of the Fighter's Pass), and nobody was removed from his Project Plan. Obviously Incineroar was added later but was planned via a Pokemon slot. For PP, this means it might've been for base but pushed to DLC, or it means it was DLC intentionally as part of the Project Plan. PP was worked on since September. That's enough time for them to do multiple Palutena's Guidances for everyone. It was just in perfect timing for a Guidance. It doesn't prove anything beyond that. The DLC characters aren't getting unique Guidances, but we know that many were started way later on work-wise. Rehiring all those voice actors for characters is probably just not worth the money so some backup generic ones(like 4 had) was done instead. I forget the exact reason given by Sakurai when he outright said the FP characters weren't getting unique Guidances. Nipper Plant being removed from the Spirit list is obviously not evidence of anything. Sakurai went over the list before it was done. Of course it'd be removed from the list of Spirits his team came up with to come with PP, which is logical in itself.

We have mere coincidences but nothing making it clear if PP was base or DLC planned from the start. It's likely it was DLC by default.

PP's victory fanfare is #92. For reference, Isabelle is 90, Incineroar is 91, Inkling is 93, Ridley is 94 and K rool is 95.

That's more than enough to figure it into being planned for base.

 

[Dukefire]

For the characters being made on DLC wise, we do know they use some assets of current ones like:
Moves like Hero doing Link's dash attack
Voice actors: Joker as the Announcer and DQ XI hero is link's
Model

We do have to put some thought into it if seeing from the development team's view

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Also, would vertically "shrinking" Sonic's limbs to fit Tails model and animation-wise for an Echo like, work? Or could it not at all? I remember Lucina being just a tad smaller than Marth in Smash 4.

She was actually shorter than Marth, but this difference was removed in Ultimate.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

PP's victory fanfare is #92. For reference, Isabelle is 90, Incineroar is 91, Inkling is 93, Ridley is 94 and K rool is 95.

That's more than enough to figure it into being planned for base.

It actually isn't enough. We have no idea how the project plan went at all beyond Incineroar at best, and that's a guesstimate. Incineroar was clearly started around the halfway mark because it didn't exist yet. We also know PP had data as early as September. That doesn't tell us when it was started, just when data was put directly into the game(instead of being separately worked on but not being put into the test builds they're still using). This is circumstancial evidence and doesn't tell us the entire story very well. PP's victory fanfare only says one thing specifically; this is when the fanfares for all the characters were decided. That doesn't mean it wouldn't be DLC, but it's just when it was programmed in. There's no context surrounding that particular file.

Once I found a proper datamine text file, I can actually analyze better and give a better answer. But this isn't nearly as convincing when it doesn't have other data that points to the same thing as well. Or statements that imply it was base roster. It at best "suggests" it was base, but nothing more.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Once I found a proper datamine text file, I can actually analyze better and give a better answer. But this isn't nearly as convincing when it doesn't have other data that points to the same thing as well. Or statements that imply it was base roster. It at best "suggests" it was base, but nothing more.

Since Piranha Plant's gameplay looked pretty finished when it was shown off in the last pre-DLC direct, the fact that they knew that the fighter would be in the game far enough in advance that they didn't have to re-hire the voice actors for Pit, Palutena, and Viridi for a Palutena's Guidance, and the fact that it is an odd choice for DLC (It's not even a character; it's an enemy type that no one had their eye on), I think the idea that Piranha Plant was originally a base roster character is going to be one of those accepted "facts" that in reality can't be confirmed or debunked like the idea that Snake was supposed to be a much larger character in Brawl, but was scaled down.

That was...one heck of a sentence...I hope it's not a run on.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

Since Piranha Plant's gameplay looked pretty finished when it was shown off in the last pre-DLC direct, the fact that they knew that the fighter would be in the game far enough in advance that they didn't have to re-hire the voice actors for Pit, Palutena, and Viridi for a Palutena's Guidance, and the fact that it is an odd choice for DLC (It's not even a character; it's an enemy type that no one had their eye on), I think the idea that Piranha Plant was originally a base roster character is going to be one of those accepted "facts" that in reality can't be confirmed or debunked like the idea that Snake was supposed to be a much larger character in Brawl, but was scaled down.

That was...one heck of a sentence...I hope it's not a run on.

It was meant as a bonus character, so it's not that odd. It was more meant to make a statement that the roster is going to be unique and fun for multiple people. So if anything, DLC seemed like an excellent way to start off the idea to create unexpected results. Which so far has held true. All 3 characters are not atypical ones at all. Joker is not all that well known. Banjo-Kazooie is from a competing company. Dragon Quest is that well known in the West, and it especially subverted it by having a general Hero while Erdrick wasn't even the face(or the main choice).

So I'd say it worked out well. It was blatant it got started on(probably after all the other characters? No way to say) or at least had the most work done on, way later on. If we're going by how hard things are, Bowser Jr. might've taken the longest to finish due to having a very unique mechanic. On the other hand, clones/echoes might also be done later as last minute additions, but this game had them intended for base from the start, so they might've been done early. That's what I mean by a serious lack of context of the development cycle. We know so damn little. Of course, it is absolutely possible PP was moved to DLC to be a unique way to end of the hype and get more people interesting in the unexpected nature. Just as much as I noted above it could be one of the main reasons it was always DLC.

Also, remember, we see data of him being worked on in September. He was worked on heavily during the regular development schedule as is. This doesn't mean that much. He released well after the game finished, but keep in mind the game went gold a decent amount of time before it was properly on sale. So I do agree it does suggest he might've been pushed to DLC. But I still would call it circumstancial. But yeah, we may never know.

 

[AntagonisticGalaxyCetacea]

This never happened tho

L

 

[NonSpecificGuy]

Cristina Vee also mentioned that she worked on Three Houses and she ended up being canned & replaced soon after. So yeah, they were both fired for breaking their NDA contract.

Ehhh, not likely. Nintendo has a habit of kicking actors that are unionized. Laura Bailey as Lucina being a big one. Once she unionized, her name was removed from FEH and no new voice lines were recorded for her Smash incarnation. Same thing happened with Palutena and Viridi's voice actors and is likely why Cloud doesn't have an English voice since Steve Burton is unionized as well.

This isn't just Nintendo either though. Tecmo-Koei replaced Troy Baker as Ryu Hayabusa recently, likely because he unionized between DoA5 and DoA6. Bandai-Namco also didn't call him back as the voice of Yuri Lowell in the new Tales of Vesperia remakes. Nolan North, Matt Mercer, and Yuri Lowenthal are very high profile names that are not unionized as far as I know and as such aren't limited in what parts they can take. Basically, like with say Ray Chase, if you see a name in FEH then they're likely not unionized and if you're unionized... well it's much harder to work with Japanese companies. Often because of the outrageous demands unions tend to make.

Whodda saw it coming? The VA Unions have started doing more harm for their members than good.

Tl;dr Nintendo just doesn't really work with unions. Most American divisions of Japanese companies don't. Because it's just too damn expensive. Translation doesn't get the kind of budget that Unions demand.

 

[TheYungLink]

Ehhh, not likely. Nintendo has a habit of kicking actors that are unionized. Laura Bailey as Lucina being a big one. Once she unionized, her name was removed from FEH and no new voice lines were recorded for her Smash incarnation. Same thing happened with Palutena and Viridi's voice actors and is likely why Cloud doesn't have an English voice since Steve Burton is unionized as well.

This isn't just Nintendo either though. Tecmo-Koei replaced Troy Baker as Ryu Hayabusa recently, likely because he unionized between DoA5 and DoA6. Bandai-Namco also didn't call him back as the voice of Yuri Lowell in the new Tales of Vesperia remakes. Nolan North, Matt Mercer, and Yuri Lowenthal are very high profile names that are not unionized as far as I know and as such aren't limited in what parts they can take. Basically, like with say Ray Chase, if you see a name in FEH then they're likely not unionized and if you're unionized... well it's much harder to work with Japanese companies. Often because of the outrageous demands unions tend to make.

Whodda saw it coming? The VA Unions have started doing more harm for their members than good.

Tl;dr Nintendo just doesn't really work with unions. Most American divisions of Japanese companies don't. Because it's just too damn expensive. Translation doesn't get the kind of budget that Unions demand.

I don't think it's outrageous or demanding to get fair pay. And the unions are not doing more harm than good, it's the companies deciding that they won't fulfill the union VA's demands that are letting their characters become disorganized and chaotic in terms of voice casting.

That said I won't really blame the western branches of Japanese companies, they're likely working with whatever budget their Japanese side will allow, so in my eyes it's usually the latter's fault, except maybe in cases where both the Japanese and western branches of the same company are both pretty poor (which isn't the case for Nintendo).

 

[Nquoid]

Ehhh, not likely. Nintendo has a habit of kicking actors that are unionized. Laura Bailey as Lucina being a big one. Once she unionized, her name was removed from FEH and no new voice lines were recorded for her Smash incarnation. Same thing happened with Palutena and Viridi's voice actors and is likely why Cloud doesn't have an English voice since Steve Burton is unionized as well.

This isn't just Nintendo either though. Tecmo-Koei replaced Troy Baker as Ryu Hayabusa recently, likely because he unionized between DoA5 and DoA6. Bandai-Namco also didn't call him back as the voice of Yuri Lowell in the new Tales of Vesperia remakes. Nolan North, Matt Mercer, and Yuri Lowenthal are very high profile names that are not unionized as far as I know and as such aren't limited in what parts they can take. Basically, like with say Ray Chase, if you see a name in FEH then they're likely not unionized and if you're unionized... well it's much harder to work with Japanese companies. Often because of the outrageous demands unions tend to make.

Whodda saw it coming? The VA Unions have started doing more harm for their members than good.

Tl;dr Nintendo just doesn't really work with unions. Most American divisions of Japanese companies don't. Because it's just too damn expensive. Translation doesn't get the kind of budget that Unions demand.

This explains why so many Nintendo games have terrible voice work in them.

They're not willing to pay for the people who think their talents deserve representative compensation.

Still can't get over how terrible some of the voice work in Breath of the Wild and the Xenoblade games is.

 

[Izanagi97]

Just kinda sucks that all unionizing does for Voice Actors these days is put them on a bunch of companies' **** lists

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

So what I'm getting here is that voice actors either don't get paid enough or can't find work (at least within the AAA gaming industry). *sigh*

 

[N3ON]

Smash is not free of union VAs. Matthew Mercer, David Hayter, Roger Craig Smith, Yuri Lowenthal, even Xander Mobus. Some VAs opt against participating in projects that go outside the union, such as, iirc, Palutena's VA. But Smash clearly doesn't automatically reject union VAs.

It's possible that outside of Smash, VAs get replaced for non-union alternatives, but within Smash, they do seem to uphold the VA when possible, union or not. They certainly have the budget for it. Makes situations such as Cloud's very strange, since the VA expressed willingness. It's possible that, as most things FF-related, it comes down to an exorbitant licensing fee.

 

[NonSpecificGuy]

Unions are fine, and very good for you, if your line of work exists mostly in America because American businesses traditionally have unions and it's common practice. So finding work in American made games is quite easy. But when literally 50% or more of the business comes from overseas you start running into some SERIOUS problems.

 

[Brindor]

I absolutely no idea and I'm probably talking out of my ass here but I'm sure in Japan Unions must be either nonexistent or very useless in the grand scheme of things considering the slave labour/work culture over there.
Nintendo probably doesn't deal with Unions with the VA's of Smash in Japan, so the attitude towards them probably carries over from HQ to the American division and are probably like "**** THIS!" and just don't deal with them.

 

[ze9]

If you ask me, Doom Guy is a lock.
The only question is, who will character #5 be? Hayabusa? Dixie Kong? I hope it's Dixie Kong.

 

[Ridley64]

I think Crash will get in.

 

[Leotsune]

If you ask me, Doom Guy is a lock.
The only question is, who will character #5 be? Hayabusa? Dixie Kong? I hope it's Dixie Kong.

There is no such thing as locks.
The closest thing we've had to a lock was probably Ken since the introduction of echo fighters, and even I wasn't that sure of that.
Doom Slayer is possible but not a lock by any means.

 

[toonito]

There is no such thing as locks.
The closest thing we've had to a lock was probably Ken since the introduction of echo fighters, and even I wasn't that sure of that.
Doom Slayer is possible but not a lock by any means.

i agree
IMO the only things closest to "locks" in Smash are:
a current generation Pokemon every smash game
the following characters never being cut from Smash:

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

i agree
IMO the only things closest to "locks" in Smash are:
a current generation Pokemon every smash game
the following characters never being cut from Smash:

And even then the next Smash game director could easily say "The only reason Jigglypuff keeps being added is because it existed in the first game. This is not reason enough. Let's cut it".

 

[3BitSaurus]

And even then the next Smash game director could easily say "The only reason Jigglypuff keeps being added is because it existed in the first game. This is not reason enough. Let's cut it".

Jiggs was a last-minute addition in Brawl and Ness was almost cut for Lucas in Melee (it ended up not happening due to Mother 3's complications during production), so yeah. Even some of the 64 veterans aren't safe.

 

[osby]

I seriously refuse to believe Captain Falcon and Jigglypuff of all characters are bigger priorities than big names like Peach or Zelda just because they were added in the first game.

 

[Michael the Spikester]

Of all the N64 veterans I'd say the most likely to go would be

 

[ze9]

There is no such thing as locks.
The closest thing we've had to a lock was probably Ken since the introduction of echo fighters, and even I wasn't that sure of that.
Doom Slayer is possible but not a lock by any means.

I just feel it in my (blood-spilled) guts. I look at the stars and I see them getting aligned for Doom Guy to join Smash.
Of course it's just an opinion.

 

[TheCJBrine]

I feel they may keep Ness or Lucas if Smash gets another director, due to how much love Mother gets already + maybe some reasons regarding Itoi and Iwata.

 

[Michael the Spikester]

Who agrees that of the remaining two DLC fighters that these are the most likely?

Crash Bandicoot
Dark Souls rep (Sleeper pick)
Doom Slayer
Heihachi
Lloyd Irving
Resident Evil rep
Ryu Hayabusa
Phoenix Wright

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Of all the N64 veterans I'd say the most likely to go would be

I don't see them dropping Captain Falcon since his name seems to have become synonymous with Super Smash Bros. I also think there are enough EarthBound fans to warrant Ness's inclusion (but not Lucas's should they be taking an axe to the roster). I could see them cutting the StarFox characters since their series has been a zombie for at least 5 years now, though Fox and Falco have made such an impact on the Super Smash Bros. series that not having them would feel pretty weird.

Who agrees that of the remaining two DLC fighters that these are the most likely?

Crash Bandicoot
Dark Souls rep (Sleeper pick)
Doom Slayer
Heihachi
Lloyd Irving
Resident Evil rep
Ryu Hayabusa
Phoenix Wright

Considering these characters are pretty much all we talk about I'd say most people. I'd kinda like to talk about someone else for a change, but outside of maybe Spyro most people would agree that any given character's (outside of the ones you just listed) chances are either pretty low or negligible.

 

[HyruleHero]

Who agrees that of the remaining two DLC fighters that these are the most likely?

Crash Bandicoot
Dark Souls rep (Sleeper pick)
Doom Slayer
Heihachi
Lloyd Irving
Resident Evil rep
Ryu Hayabusa
Phoenix Wright

I low-key hope its none of these characters so we can all get the new character reveal hype and surprise.

 

[Playstation Guy 1000]

Who agrees that of the remaining two DLC fighters that these are the most likely?

Crash Bandicoot
Dark Souls rep (Sleeper pick)
Doom Slayer
Heihachi
Lloyd Irving
Resident Evil rep
Ryu Hayabusa
Phoenix Wright

they are the most likely ones to be picked for the final two but who knows maybe we get a character outside of the characters you just listed.

 

[Impa4Smash]

they are the most likely ones to be picked for the final two but who knows maybe we get a character outside of the characters you just listed.

Agreed. Though I hope Sakurai really throws us a curve ball. I’m talking Cool Spot from the 7-Up games curveball

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

I low-key hope its none of these characters so we can all get the new character reveal hype and surprise.

For me it's always a surprise. If we're wrong, the character is surprising. If we're right, then the character is still surprising because we're usually wrong.

 

[Michael the Spikester]

Still holding out for Nakoruru being a surprise/out there pick especially if the fighting game female character theory is true. Especially given her popularity alongside Mai Shiranui as SNK's most iconic female characters.

 

[toonito]

Who agrees that of the remaining two DLC fighters that these are the most likely?

Crash Bandicoot
Dark Souls rep (Sleeper pick)
Doom Slayer
Heihachi
Lloyd Irving
Resident Evil rep
Ryu Hayabusa
Phoenix Wright

I agree with your choices except for Phoenix Wright: If Capcom gets another character I don't see how he beats out Resident Evil, Monster Hunter, or Devil May Cry. 3rd Parties tend to bring some of or their biggest franchises to Smash so Ace Attorney is actually an underdog in this regard. I could be wrong.

 

[Michael the Spikester]

I agree with your choices except for Phoenix Wright: If Capcom gets another character I don't see how he beats out Resident Evil, Monster Hunter, or Devil May Cry. 3rd Parties tend to bring some of or their biggest franchises to Smash so Ace Attorney is actually an underdog in this regard. I could be wrong.

I think if we were to have gotten Monster Hunter he would had been revealed with Rathalos.

You also really underestimate Phoenix Wright's popularity.

Dante's creator also deconfirmed him.

 

[tenworldsguy]

Of all the N64 veterans I'd say the most likely to go would be

Personally I think Donkey Kong or more likely Yoshi would be cut as well. Both do have established series, but DK's is looking to be entering a new dormancy (the last game was early 2014 for DK and there is no work being done on DKR3) and Yoshi is having a bit of an identity crisis. DK I can easily see them keeping, but if they cut OG8 characters and not Yoshi I'd be super surprised. No offense to the Dino but the only thing he's really known for these days is being Mario's companion, not an independent series' star.
On that note...
Which Melee and Brawl characters do y'all think would be cut in the event of a reboot? My guesses are below.

Spoiler: melee/brawl cut vets, hypothetically

Melee:
Brawl:

That's just what I think- they'll either be cut for irrelevance, being in a weird copyright state (Snake), or being not as "needed" because of other characters. (I don't personally want many cuts but this is just what I think)