Official Newcomer/DLC Speculation Discussion

[Sysreq]

As someone who doesn't know much about Sakura Wars, does anyone know what Sakura can do for her moveset? My only exposure to the series is from that Segata Sanshiro commercial, so I'd like an idea of how she'd fight.

Also, I'd be down for weird Japan-only picks for DLC. I'd think Sega would wanna push someone like Kiryu or Arle before a series that was never released in the US, but I love being caught off-guard with unexpected **** like that.

In Project X Zone, all I really remember is her fighting with her sword and having some flashy and fast sword slashes.

 

[PlasmaBoy75]

As someone who doesn't know much about Sakura Wars, does anyone know what Sakura can do for her moveset? My only exposure to the series is from that Segata Sanshiro commercial, so I'd like an idea of how she'd fight.

Also, I'd be down for weird Japan-only picks for DLC. I'd think Sega would wanna push someone like Kiryu or Arle before a series that was never released in the US, but I love being caught off-guard with unexpected **** like that.

Just like everyone who bought the Lucas DLC in Smash 4!

 

[RileyXY1]

See, going for mainstream choices is both safe and boring. Don't limit the audiences' options only to what they know. Provide opportunities, mix things up, and most importantly, give lesser-known franchises some wiggle room. And no offense, but Doom Slayer and Hayabusa have been discussed to death. They have history going for 'em and that's about it. I'm certain they'll appear at some point, but we're gonna be getting "unknowns" as well whether you like it or not.

Then there's Crash...who's just an infinitely inferior Cereal Mascot and a dull version of Banjo's archetype. If Sakurai was to add any other platformer character in that league, I would much rather we get Ratchet & Clank as improbable as that duo is.

Doing this makes more sense from the perspective of a business, which is what Nintendo is. Going for characters that are more popular makes more business sense because they are more likely to sell well and generate revenue for the company.

 

[GoodGrief741]

Alrighty chief, noted. Although, I don't agree with your view point. Is there a likelihood-scale for certain franchises? Oh definitely, no doubts there, but it's highly recommended not to act like you know what goes on in Sakurai's mind. If it turns out you're wrong later on, it could bite you in the bum-bum. Hype and speculate with caution, amigo.

Oh no, getting bit in the bum-bum. Nothing can be worse than that! I guess I better speculate with caution otherwise there will be dire consequences: I'll have made a mistake. *gasp*

It's a weird time when saying that a series that is absolutely obscure outside of one country has low-to-nonexistent chances is apparently not speculating with caution.

 

[RileyXY1]

Oh no, getting bit in the bum-bum. Nothing can be worse than that! I guess I better speculate with caution otherwise there will be dire consequences: I'll have made a mistake. *gasp*

It's a weird time when saying that a series that is absolutely obscure outside of one country has low-to-nonexistent chances is apparently not speculating with caution.

Who is also an anime sword user, which would definitely cause derision from the fandom.

 

[Sysreq]

Doing this makes more sense from the perspective of a business, which is what Nintendo is. Going for characters that are more popular makes more business sense because they are more likely to sell well and generate revenue for the company.

I think in the case of Hayabusa, he's not actually that popular--he's just a pick everyone in the smash community thinks makes sense and was in some supposed leaks.

 

[Ayumi Tachibana]

Sakura Wars is known enough when you compared to real Japan onlys but has definitely certain demands since Brawl like Pawapuro-kun or Cybuster/Gespenst/Huckebein.

 

[Flyboy]

Smash fans: Please don't let there be another Fire Emblem character in the DLC.

Sakurai: Laughing maniacally as a finger on the monkey's paw curls

 

[RileyXY1]

Sakura Wars is known enough when you compared to real Japan onlys but has definitely certain demands since Brawl like Pawapuro-kun or Cybuster/Gespenst/Huckebein.

Except it has a lack of international recognition, and it doesn't even have the iconic status to balance it out like Dragon Quest does.

 

[GoodGrief741]

Who is also an anime sword user, which would definitely cause derision from the fandom.

To be fair that's not really a real reason to exclude a character. Yes, the fandom ******* about that, but they shut up when a swordfighter is unique and I don't think Sakurai would put in a character for DLC and not at least try and make them unique.

Sakura Wars is known enough when you compared to real Japan onlys but has definitely certain demands since Brawl like Pawapuro-kun or Cybuster/Gespenst/Huckebein.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DamnedByFaintPraise

 

[Roberk]

Smash fans: Please don't let there be another Fire Emblem character in the DLC.

Sakurai: Laughing maniacally as a finger on the monkey's paw curls

“Please, anything other than another FE character!”
“Oh, anything?”

 

[Sysreq]

Ninja Gaiden is a massively successful franchise and one that's been on Nintendo's side since the NES. Also, Koei Tecmo has a favorable relationship with Nintendo and even their other massively successful franchise, Fatal Frame, has representation in Ultimate with an Assist Trophy.

Okay, but I wasn't talking about Ninja Gaiden or Koei Tecmo.

 

[RileyXY1]

The artwork does look like it's a poor quality fake, so I'm leaning towards this being fake.

 

[DaybreakHorizon]

Smash fans: Please don't let there be another Fire Emblem character in the DLC.

Sakurai: Laughing maniacally as a finger on the monkey's paw curls

Sakura gets in

Smash fans:

Literally who is this and why isn't she Doomguy, Ryu, or Tracer?

Sakurai:

You guys said you didn't want another Fire Emblem character so I went with the next best thing. Have you ever made a game?

 

[KarneraMythos]

I'll say. With how Reggie and other people from Nintendo kept telling us that the Fighter's Pass would feature unexpected characters, people sure love expecting the expected kind of characters.

. . .That wording's not very good.

No worries, I understood what you meant to say. It was perfectly clear.

So do you think people would have guessed Terry even if he wasn't leaked by Nintendo themselves? Also Reggie is gone now. Rip.

From what I can tell you, there are certain characters who could go on without being leaked and the surprise factor would be trumped by the sheer relief that they were invited by Sakurai to begin with. Now that Terry's in, it gives me some hope that other fighting game icons could show up in the future.

Let's see now... Assume the floodgates are open and other 2D Fighters are considered. There's Sol Badguy.

"Another fire-using fighting game rep? Weren't Ken and Terry enough!?"

Okay okay, how about Ragna the Bloodedge?

"Ugh, but he's a Poor Man's Sol! Why add him when they can add Dante instead!?"

Still not convinced, eh? What's your opinion on Hyde? Y'know, that one protagonist whose lesser-known fighting game crossed over with Blazblue's recent fighter. He's another protagonist who comes from a fighter that has great music and crisp, smooth gameplay.

"Do we seriously need another school-goer when we already have Joker? What about 3D fighting game reps?"

Considering how often Heihachi appears in discussions, I'm giving other options a bit of the limelight. Point remains, Smash could definitely use more fighting game reps in general.

Doing this makes more sense from the perspective of a business, which is what Nintendo is. Going for characters that are more popular makes more business sense because they are more likely to sell well and generate revenue for the company.

And yet we got characters who many of the vocalists in the Smash community claim were poor choices for the same exact reasons you listed. Whoops?

Most of the big names are already in Smash. To quote myself from an older thread:

"If we only went purely on legacy, success, and recognizability with the entirety of the world populace, we wouldn't have the roster Ultimate has now. Normies have Mario and Pikachu already. That should be enough to entice them."

Oh no, getting bit in the bum-bum. Nothing can be worse than that! I guess I better speculate with caution otherwise there will be dire consequences: I'll have made a mistake. *gasp*

It's a weird time when saying that a series that is absolutely obscure outside of one country has low-to-nonexistent chances is apparently not speculating with caution.

Oh no no no, you got the wrong idea man. I never said be an opportunist. I'm just saying not to count her out just yet. And I didn't mean to respond in a passive-aggressive manner. Just giving you a warning in case she is playable. You never know who might post your comment in a wall of shame.

Besides, I am already playing "Pessimist Pete" here, to avoid disappointment myself. I'm used to seeing people call my Most-Wanteds "Never-Evers", and if by some miracle any do end up playable as DLC, I'd be too busy/happy with the prospect to care about gloating "I told you so, I told you so!". That's unsportsman-like and I can assure you I'm not that sort of person. I just think it's silly to act like certain characters are 100% impossible though, about as much as it's silly to shout, "OMG HE/SHE'S IN!"

 

[Flyboy]

The absolute irony of a website that unironically supports Ayumi Tachibana arguing over whether a character is too obscure or Japan-only for Smash.

i say this as an Ayumi supporter myself.

 

[DaybreakHorizon]

And here I thought we'd have a relative time of peace after we bitterly fought over Terry. But alas, peace is nothing more than a fleeting concept in these parts.

Speculation never changes...

 

[NintenZ]

If Sakura is in Smash that would be ****ing MINDBLOWING.

Sakura Wars is EXTREMELY culturally important in Japan despite being unknown worldwide, it would be quite literally Hero 2.0.

 

[Schnee117]

The absolute irony of a website that unironically supports Ayumi Tachibana arguing over whether a character is too obscure or Japan-only for Smash.

i say this as an Ayumi supporter myself.

No but see, that's totally different

 

[RileyXY1]

If Sakura is in Smash that would be ****ing MINDBLOWING.

Sakura Wars is EXTREMELY culturally important in Japan despite being unknown worldwide, it would be quite literally Hero 2.0.

They would also have to reveal a character who is more popular in the West at the same time to compensate, like when they revealed Hero and Banjo together at E3.

 

[DaybreakHorizon]

Ninja Gaiden is a massively successful franchise and one that's been on Nintendo's side since the NES. Also, Koei Tecmo has a favorable relationship with Nintendo and even their other massively successful franchise, Fatal Frame, has representation in Ultimate with an Assist Trophy.

>Ninja Gaiden & Fatal Frame
>Massively successful

If they're massively successful, then can you explain to me why Ninja Gaiden hasn't seen a new game since 2014, and why its most recent entry was rated #46 on Gameradar's Top 50 Worst Games of All Time? Or why Fatal Frame was released as a Digital Only release in the West?

Don't revise history.

They would also have to reveal a character who is more popular in the West at the same time to compensate, like when they revealed Hero and Banjo together at E3.

Nintendo doesn't have to do anything. They'll make buku-bucks anyways and strengthen their relationship with Sega even further for the inevitable buyout.

Just because you don't think it'll be successful doesn't mean it won't.

 

[Guynamednelson]

They would also have to reveal a character who is more popular in the West at the same time to compensate, like when they revealed Hero and Banjo together at E3.

They didn't reveal a character more popular in America alongside Terry.

 

[RileyXY1]

They didn't reveal a character more popular in America alongside Terry.

That's because Fighter 5 might not be a character who is only popular in the West.

 

[DaybreakHorizon]

That's because Fighter 5 might not be a character who is only popular in the West.

Are you saying that Terry is only popular in the West?

Didn't you argue that he wasn't literally less than a week ago?

 

[NintenZ]

Nintendo doesn't have to do anything. They'll make buku-bucks anyways and strengthen their relationship with Sega even further for the inevitable buyout.

Just because you don't think it'll be successful doesn't mean it won't.

This would quite literally be their fourth unique character lmao, more than any other third-party by a landslide.

I honestly really like the prospect of Sakura in Smash, with a new game coming out worldwide, her basically being one of SEGA’s mascots, and the series being a Japanese cultural phenomenon, she’s actually a pick that really surprisingly makes SENSE.

 

[RileyXY1]

Are you saying that Terry is only popular in the West?

Didn't you argue that he wasn't literally less than a week ago?

No. I have also changed my mind on everything I said about Sakura.

 

[KarneraMythos]

They would also have to reveal a character who is more popular in the West at the same time to compensate, like when they revealed Hero and Banjo together at E3.

An East and West duo announcement is always ideal since it tends to be the best of both worlds, but this odd obsession you have with West-catering is not healthy and far from the point of Smash.

A character is a character regardless of where they come from, and it doesn't matter if Fortnite Fred, Grandma Grace, Tiny Tim, Boomer Brad, and Soccer Mom Sandra know or don't know these characters. The target audience are people who play games, not people who owned a handful of cartridges in their adolescent years then grew out of the hobby.

 

[RileyXY1]

Now that we know all 5 characters in the Fighter Pass, how do you guys think about it?

 

[DaybreakHorizon]

No. I have also changed my mind on everything I said about Sakura.

Now that we know all 5 characters in the Fighter Pass, how do you guys think about it?

Nice try.

 

[Aetheri]

They didn't reveal a character more popular in America alongside Terry.

But they did reveal "More fighters are now in development"

 

[Sysreq]

Now that we know all 5 characters in the Fighter Pass, how do you guys think about it?

I mean...we don't know for certain, but if Sakura was the last fighter, I'm fine with her (as I've stated previously) as long as her moveset turns out to be cool. I'm a little skeptical, but Sakurai has done a good job so far.

 

[RileyXY1]

I feel like I'm genuinely being forced to support Sakura. This is just not healthy for me.

 

[Deleted member]

I would honestly be a little surprised the fourth SEGA character isn't Arle Nadja and I was rooting for her but hey a Sakura Wars rep could be cool I would need to do more research on the franchise and character before saying it'll 100% be cool but if anything was proven this DLC is that no matter the character we should have faith that Sakurai could make them interesting and fun even for characters you may not want.

So sure bring on a Sakura Wars rep if this leak is real that said, I don't believe it is.

 

[3BitSaurus]

I don't really think the render is real, but I'd be okay with Sakura Wars. Kinda sad it's not Puyo Puyo, but eh, what can you do.

What makes me more curious about that (entirely hypothetical) situation is that it would break the fanrule of "no two third party characters from the same company in the same DLC batch".

I'm not saying this because there are multiple Square characters I'd like or anything.

 

[KarneraMythos]

Now that we know all 5 characters in the Fighter Pass, how do you guys think about it?

"Karn! Stop! Why are you humoring him? It's clear he's in his own world right now!"

Patience, young padawan...

For the sake of what we do know so far, I can give you the abridged answer and say that I do not regret my purchase. Does it have characters I wanted? No, not at all. Did it provide characters I ended up using? Definitely! Joker is fun to play with. It's neat we got the closest thing to an SMT rep, and even cooler that Persona and Pokemon are in the same crossover. Hero is also a lot of fun to mess around with too.

I have no personal attachment to any of these fighters, but I am content with what they bring to the table. I am also looking forward to Terry. In fact, I learned to appreciate SNK way more than Capcom's fighting game cast. There's just more layers to them that makes them far more likable and fleshed out. As for Sakura, about time they added a female rep! This Pass was beginning to look like a sausage fest!

 

[DaybreakHorizon]

I feel like I'm genuinely being forced to support Sakura. This is just not healthy for me.

Except no one is telling you that?

It's just that you keep throwing out weak arguments against the series' inclusion in Smash and (obviously) get refuted. No one's forcing you to support it, but if you try to disprove anything you ought to have point other than "but not popular in America!" since that's barely even a point.

Regardless, if this place isn't healthy for you then you're free to take a break.

 

[DrifloonEmpire]

I wouldn't call Crash a poor man's cereal mascot, though. And don't encourage shaming, it is already toxic enough around here.

I don't care about Sakura myself, and while it is good to be exposed to new series people shouldn't be shamed if it doesn't appeal to them. It's also fair to say that her chances aren't huge, remember that Sakurai does care about a character being more internationally known. We nearly didn't get Lucas and it was his reasoning for not including Takamaru.

Either way, people need to be more respectful, and that goes for both sides

 

[NintenZ]

I feel like I'm genuinely being forced to support Sakura. This is just not healthy for me.

Except... No one is?

We’re just saying why she makes sense as a choice?

 

[Garteam]

Instead of linking the video, why not link the 4chan thread (obligatory content warning for possible offensive language/content) and image?


View attachment 239539

Let's not give LaxChris the views he so desperately wants. Only when he makes actually good content should anyone consider that.

Something about that render seems... off. I can't quite put my finger on it but I'm not convinced yet. It doesn't look bad per se, but it does feel like its missing something.

 

[Gentlepanda]

if there were any doubts that in-development renders can look rough

still very much in two minds about the leak, but i'll be damned if it isn't at least a very well put together model and i'd like to see the full thing if debunked