Geno - With the additions of long time fan requested fighters from Rids, to KKR, to Banjo in DLC. His Mii costume is still MIA. While he was a spirit, I pretty much still considered a character that has a solid chance at making it as one of the final 5. Sakurai's going all out with DLC adding characters he likes, the fans likes, the developers like, his cat likes, even a goddamn snappy plant boi that no one asked for. Geno is a rare case where we know Sakurai has considered him before and is fully aware of how popular he is within the fanbase. Plus Square isn't as stingie as we previously thought with Hero, plus Geno is already in the game...so I'm pretty confident that Geno's going to be making the transition as a DLC fighter.
Travis Touchdown - Travis has too many things in his favour for him not to be a favourite. Suda51 has not only been very vocal about adding Travis to Smash, but he's also friends with Sakurai. Now we have a few situations where developers are able to make special requests from Kojima with Snake and now Yabuki with Min Min. As well as Intelligent Systems convincing Sakurai to add Corrin despite Sakurai knowing the potential backlash they'd get. There's also the fact that Travis has made his return during the Switch's lifetime with NMH3 on the way as well as that indie side game, making him a very relevant pick for promotional purposes. He sort of fills the 'Bayonetta' niche for this DLC period.
Crash Bandicoot - Speaking of characters making their return. Not only has Crash been reignited with the remasters, but he's also made his way to the Switch with a new game on the way. Nintendo and Activision has already crossed over in Skylanders with Bowser and DK (and Diddy as well technically) adding one of their hotly requested fighters to Smash seems almost inevitable. There's two possible roadblocks he faces. Being a Western company may prove problematic compared to a Japanese owned character as Sakurai has stated it is a little bit more complicated, and the fact that Sakurai could possibly pick Spyro instead of Crash for similar reasons. However I believe Crash is the more likely of the two, he seems to have a slightly bigger legacy and is also more popular.
Personally Crash is one of my Top most wanted, Travis is cool so I'm fine with, Geno I don't care for but happy for his fans.
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As for other choices let's go over some other hopefuls before narrowing them down, starting with Xenoblade fighters. As this is a franchise that could benefit from having a bigger presence in Smash, and would draw enough interest as DLC.
Rex - I'm of the mind that Rex is kind of dead, as I mentioned earlier, his Mii costume was sort of this consolation prize and learning from my own past mistakes I'm pretty much going to go off of the assumption that Sakurai's going to look elsewhere. I don't see any other characters from XC2 coming be it Lora, or Morag or whoever. (I personally wouldn't mind Morag with Brighid but it's not happening) But personally the most likely Xenoblade character at this point would be...
Elma - The door has opened wide since Spirits now pretty much mean nothing and XCX in general has barely any content in Smash as is. Of course we have no idea if the game's being worked on to be ported to Switch and the best we got from Takahashi regarding that is 'We would like to' which is kind of a vague way of not saying anything concrete. I'm sure it's coming (hopefully next year) eventually as it is a game that needs some life. But otherwise the biggest problem for Elma is that she may just end up being forgotten overall. But she's also a character that represents a game that has very minimal representation, is also able to bring an amazing moveset potential with possible weapon switching and was a popular request during pre-launch of Smash along side Rex so it's possible she may have gotten some attention going forward. Takahashi has made a statement that he'd like her to join Smash (but he may have a similar view with Rex amoung other Xeno characters so that may not mean much, which developer wouldn't want their character in Smash afterall?) This is one of those 'could happen' shoulder shrug situations, but I feel like she may surprise some people. She would fit well as a DLC fighter IMO.
Other characters - Melia? Lora? Fiora? I just don't see it happening honestly. Very few of these cycle through characters in RPG's get a secondary character that isn't a clone (other than Pokemon). Fire Emblem Awakening is like the only exception but once again Chrom and Lucina are only here because they are a variation of an existing moveset) And I highly doubt we're getting any clone characters for DLC. If we're getting a Xenoblade character it would be Rex or Elma since they are from different games as Shulk. But there's no guarantee that Xenoblade will even get another character.
Now for some big name Third Parties
Sora - One of the hottest picks these days. Personally I don't think Disney will be a problem, maybe when it comes to incorporating Donald and Goofy but not for Sora himself. He could literally be like Cloud where it's literally just him, a couple music tracks and a stage and that's it. The bare minimum just to get him in the game. I do see him as being pretty likely but with just 5 spots remaining and still a lot of other big names out there that could sneak in instead of him (as well as smaller name characters we don't expect)
Doomguy - Vault Boy Mii Costume. Bethesda's got a little toe in the door of Smash. It was pretty much inevitable that we'd get something related to Bethesda eventually and for all we know this is it but as far as characters go. Doomguy is not only one that has a lot of history with Nintendo but is also gaining a ton of popularity with Smash fans. A pretty big deal in his genre which so far is only repped by Samus (who also is technically a platforming character in addition to an FPS character) But if there was another character that could fill this niche in arguably an even bigger way....
Master Chief - Banjo, Cuphead, Master Chief? Yeah sure wynaut? If there were any character that could nuke the internet in a similar way to Cloud in smash 4, it would be Goku but Chief is a close second. It would indeed be pretty surreal to have Master Chief and Samus in the same game. Nintendo keeps showing us they don't care for console wars and they've collaborated with Xbox multiple times so I don't think Spencer's going to really object to adding Chief. But whether Nintendo would even come up with the idea? Well they did put Joker in the game a PS only character so sure.
Lara Croft - The only character that could give Samus a run for her money as far as video game heroines goes. Tomb Raider is a big deal and the franchise that currently owns the rights already has a lot of content within the game. That said unlike most other Square hopefuls Lara Croft has the problem of being...somewhat unremarkable. Sure she could shoot guns and use her pickaxe and flip and jump and stuff but she lacks any real draw to add her as a Smash character unlike...
2B - Man, Square could make their own Smash game at this point, if they wanted. But Nier Automata is a pretty damn strong title that has proven to become an instant classic. 2B is pretty much one of the most popular female protagonists that we've seen in gaming in recent years and she could be another Joker situation in Smash. One problem she may have however has to do with her design. Sakurai has had the ESRB on his case regarding upskirts on characters and....this is something that 2B's kinda famous for. Perhaps they can figure a workaround without changing her too far from the source material. Regardless, I've also heard that Square was looking to a Nier character to Smash and 2B is currently the most popular character from that series so we'll what happens. But with 5 spots available and me having 3 of them already filled, it's a lot less likely, but she may be a surprise pick so who knows at this point. They worked around Bayo and Palutena's designs for similar issues so maybe.
Rayman - Another spirit. But Rayman's a character that could prove to be a rather interesting addition as a Smash fighter. Having some of the wonkiest disjoints in the game with a deceptively small hurtbox. Ubisoft has a decent amount of content for a Western company. Problem is Rayman's popularity has sort of dwindled over the years but perhaps he's still big enough to be noticed by Nintendo and Sakurai.
Personally I don't think anyone else is on the table (I could be wrong which should be an obvious disclaimer with what pretty much everyone ever says ever) But if I were to narrow down the absolute remaining Top 5 for this Fighter's Pass as a TL;DR
-Geno
-Travis Touchdown
-Crash Bandicoot
-Sora
-Master Chief
All that text just to predict pretty much what everyone else is predicting, but going off of precendence and logic, which is pretty much all we can do cuz I don't work at Nintendo, nor do I have any uncles that do...this is the best we've got really.
I really do hope to see Elma though, as mentioned I feel like she may surprise us but at the same time. Who the hell even knows. (at least bring X to the Switch Nintendo plz TT)
Min Min have one.
