Official Next Smash - Speculation & Discussion Thread

[NintenRob]

Actually, barring the likes of Pit and R.O.B., Brawl did the same exact thing.
It's just less obvious because a lot of the more relevant stuff happened to be characters that have existed for longer.

More times than not, rosters are majority contemporary.

Hmm, how would you count Diddy Kong in Brawl?

I mean, yes Diddy was still around in Spinoffs and such. But DKC had kinda dropped in that era, the last mainline title to feature Diddy was DK64. (Unless those obscure handheld titles count as mainline? I honestly don't know when it comes to Donkey Kong)

 

[Idon]

I find it very humorous that Lucas is glossed over when people talk about recency bias picks with how beloved the Mother series is when in reality he was a promo pick for Mother 3 that dropped just 2 years before his smash debut with Sakurai going "Oh ****, I didn't think his game wouldn't release worldwide, if I had known that, I wouldn't have put him in." or something to that effect.

 

[GoldenYuiitusin]

Hmm, how would you count Diddy Kong in Brawl?

I mean, yes Diddy was still around in Spinoffs and such. But DKC had kinda dropped in that era, the last mainline title to feature Diddy was DK64. (Unless those obscure handheld titles count as mainline? I honestly don't know when it comes to Donkey Kong)

Mainline doesn't matter. Diddy was still making a good amount of appearances in spin-offs and remakes.

 

[RileyXY1]

I find it very humorous that Lucas is glossed over when people talk about recency bias picks with how beloved the Mother series is when in reality he was a promo pick for Mother 3 that dropped just 2 years before his smash debut with Sakurai going "Oh ****, I didn't think his game wouldn't release worldwide, if I had known that, I wouldn't have put him in." or something to that effect.

Sakurai had wanted Lucas in Smash since Melee. He even wanted to outright cut Ness and replace him with Lucas, but Mother 3's incredibly protracted development prevented this. This, along with a very poorly worded comment, led people to incorrectly believe that this would happen in Brawl.

 

[Louie G.]

Actually, barring the likes of Pit and R.O.B., Brawl did the same exact thing.
It's just less obvious because a lot of the more relevant stuff happened to be characters that have existed for longer.

More times than not, rosters are majority contemporary.

Disclaimer and sorry in advance but I ended up typing out more than I expected here, kind of just an assessment of why people see it this way.

I think Brawl landed at a sweet spot where many of the most glaring omissions were still on the table and those series were actively getting games. When we look back at that roster we think of Wario, Diddy Kong, King Dedede, Meta Knight, Pokemon Trainer... all pretty evergreen picks. A lot of the characters who fill that role in their series have had plenty of opportunity to be added by now, outside of some series that were added to Smash a bit later and are either still in their relative infancy or playing catch-up. Now we've got Ridley and Isabelle who are right on par with these other characters. But the bottom line is nobody would ever deny the continued significance of most of these Brawl adds.

But then we had Ike, Lucario, Olimar, Lucas... three out of four of these have aged tremendously well, but were brand spanking new at the time. Ike and Lucario are some of the most popular characters in their respective series to this day and Pikmin has established itself much more confidently. Lucas is beloved but well... I guess that's one instance of a character who really would have had no shot in any other game. One of the only examples of that in Brawl. I harped on this the other day so I won't get too deep into it but I suppose Zero Suit Samus has aged kinda poorly relatively speaking.

Nowadays it's pretty controversial to suggest that even major series like Animal Crossing or Splatoon deserve more than the bare minimum. I don't think some of these series will ever shake the "new Nintendo" stigma when the fans are getting older and still holding onto picks from a handful of longstanding series instead, or older unrepresented IPs. So later rosters are gonna feel heavy on the new stuff, something Smash 4 is often criticized for, but it's really just a combination of the earlier games laying the necessary framework already and many veteran community members having trouble keeping up with or accepting where Nintendo is today. Surely the likes of Tom Nook or Squid Sisters fare about as well as many of the persistently relevant characters from Brawl.

In the grand scheme of things, I think the community has become unnecessarily jaded or their expectations warped to believe a roster is just going to pile on a bunch of characters who debuted in a few Switch games and have like one appearance to their name. The ""Fire Emblem Situation"" has certainly contributed to this as well as the pattern of Pokemon and this growing boogeyman / agenda of the same thing happening with Xenoblade. I think we need to take a step back and recognize that Smash has always juggled the contemporary with the evergreen. Villager, Shulk, Miis, Bowser Jr and Greninja have all aged pretty gracefully too. And no reason to even touch on Ultimate's roster really, it was hardly a problem there and I hesitate to factor DLC in too heavily.

 

[Verde Coeden Scalesworth]

Mother 64's shown data was actually Ness/Ninten in 3D, not Lucas. It might've been in a later build going into Mother 3 Development, though.

https://www.unseen64.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/earthbound9.jpg

...For some reason I can't hard post the image. But anyway, yeah, that was clearly not Lucas yet.

https://www.unseen64.net/2008/04/04/mother-3-earthbound-64-n64-cancelled/ It is worth noting they had multiple protagonists designs, so that might've purely been a part of the beta test.

 

[GoldenYuiitusin]

Realtalk, we should have had Flint instead of Lucas.
Anyone remember that old hand drawn animation?

 

[Laniv]

Realtalk, we should have had Flint instead of Lucas.
Anyone remember that old hand drawn animation?

"Stupid cowman" is part of my vocabulary thanks to that video

 

[DarthEnderX]

I see Adol as another Terry situation; a character that gets brought up but whose chances were often underestimated, despite how important his series is in video games.

He'd make an interesting character for Smash.

Visually though, he's just SUCH another Marth.

Estelle is such a better Falcom pick.

The only Mii Costumes I bought were the ones that came with music, if all them came with songs, I would be a poorer man

I only bought the ones with music, and the ones for characters I want in Smash.

 

[Scrimblo Bimblo]

If Brawl also had a focus on recent characters, it certainly hid it better. Smash 4 characters were really mostly just Wii and 3DS with some NES/arcade throwbacks mixed in. I think Bowser Jr. and Villager were the only characters to not have debuted on one of those consoles.
Brawl newcomers at least came from NES, SNES, GC, GB, GBA, N64, DS, sure in part due to the characters being more evergreen, but the overall selection just felt more all-encompassing anyways.
Not to mention Smash 4 skipped on Ridley and anything DK/Zelda/Kirby, something that could have easily happened and that a ton of fans still regret to this day.
I wouldn't point the finger at any particular character but overall Smash 4 just felt extremely focused on recent and recent-ish stuff you could still buy; the character pages having links to the websites of the games kinda reinforced that feeling.

Ultimate had some Smash 4 style picks, but the Ballot characters, the Echo fighters and the many 3rd party characters covering basically every era of gaming did a lot to mitigate that. Ultimate actually found a pretty good balance between old, new and in-between imo. But I doubt something like that will happen again without another ballot.

 

[HyperSomari64]

Realtalk, we should have had Flint instead of Lucas.
Anyone remember that old hand drawn animation?

I'm too young to remember that one. DM the link and censor it with a spoiler tag.

 

[GoldenYuiitusin]

I'm too young to remember that one. DM the link and censor it with a spoiler tag.

Can't even find it anymore.

 

[RileyXY1]

Smash 4 also put a greater emphasis on adding new franchises over giving old franchises new reps. The only veteran franchises to even get new characters in Smash 4 were Mario, Pokémon, Fire Emblem, and Kid Icarus.

 

[DarthEnderX]

would you want this reboot to have more of a focus on promoting recent stuff and keeping up with the current Nintendo in a lot of ways, but at the cost of some older stuff that's deemed less relevant, or would you want to have it have more of a focus on "representing" each series' history through the content it includes with a more "COGH"ish (or, well, "CONH") vibe?

Hmmm...

...I wonder...

...which of those...

...I'd...pick.

 

[Noipoi]

Hmmm...
View attachment 385872
...I wonder...
View attachment 385873
...which of those...
View attachment 385874
...I'd...pick.
View attachment 385875

This post is completely legible and not broken at all

 

[DarthEnderX]

This post is completely legible and not broken at all

Lol, thank you, fixed.

 

[superprincess]

People seem to talk about recent Nintendo content with some sort of disdain when it comes to SSB. I'm not a huge fan of most of the recency-based picks, since they don't always age the best (looking at Roy, Lucas, Corrin, and Min Min). However, Smash fans seem to forget that the amount of classic characters who are popular enough to use is finite. Most of the classic/"evergreen" fighters are already in the game. Sure, there's a couple missing and they could always reach for some deep cuts, but new characters are always being created and the appeal of a fresh new face, that is recent in fans' memories, will have a bigger and more fruitful impact.

 

[NintenRob]

People seem to talk about recent Nintendo content with some sort of disdain when it comes to SSB. I'm not a huge fan of most of the recency-based picks, since they don't always age the best (looking at Roy, Lucas, Corrin, and Min Min). However, Smash fans seem to forget that the amount of classic characters who are popular enough to use is finite. Most of the classic/"evergreen" fighters are already in the game. Sure, there's a couple missing and they could always reach for some deep cuts, but new characters are always being created and the appeal of a fresh new face, that is recent in fans' memories, will have a bigger and more fruitful impact.

This is a fair point, in terms of classic Nintendo characters, in order to keep pulling from older stuff, and have to start choosing more niche and obscure faces (with a few exceptions, obviously)

Of course, it should be acknowledged, that some people would love that. People love their obscure history

 

[Swamp Sensei]

This is a fair point, in terms of classic Nintendo characters, in order to keep pulling from older stuff, and have to start choosing more niche and obscure faces (with a few exceptions, obviously)

Of course, it should be acknowledged, that some people would love that. People love their obscure history

My issue with that is that if that all old things were once new. And that without celebrating the new, we can help it transition to the old.

 

[Noipoi]

People seem to talk about recent Nintendo content with some sort of disdain when it comes to SSB. I'm not a huge fan of most of the recency-based picks, since they don't always age the best (looking at Roy, Lucas, Corrin, and Min Min). However, Smash fans seem to forget that the amount of classic characters who are popular enough to use is finite. Most of the classic/"evergreen" fighters are already in the game. Sure, there's a couple missing and they could always reach for some deep cuts, but new characters are always being created and the appeal of a fresh new face, that is recent in fans' memories, will have a bigger and more fruitful impact.

A lot of people associate recent characters with “obligatory Fire Emblem” and nothing else, so there’s some animosity there. However unjustified it may be.

 

[DarthEnderX]

However, Smash fans seem to forget that the amount of classic characters who are popular enough to use is finite.

But so is the amount of recent characters who are popular enough.

In fact, they're even less common, because they've had less time to develop popularity.

 

[kylexv]

Since others do it, I'm gonna share my own video here

Smash Bros has a Kirby problem, all the major content Kirby receives in Smash Bros all comes from the same 4 games, specifically the games Sakurai has worked on. And just how widespread this bias from Sakurai is.

Thing is, I used to not believe in Kirby bias, at least during the Smash 4 days.
Then I realized: Every character, stage, assist trophy, and item from Kirby is from one of the four Kirby games Sakurai directed.

 

[GoldenYuiitusin]

At this point, I'm sick of hearing about the "Kirby bias" that I hope some random thing like Mr. Dooter gets added as a fighter just so people stop.

 

[LiveStudioAudience]

Even beyond BWD, the later Kirby titles have introduced so many cool little elements and settings that getting the same recurring stuff from the 90s releases does feel a bit old at this point.

Planet Robobot alone has so many things that could be incorporated into Smash that it's a real pity that not much of it has made it in.

 

[SPEN18]

Of course there is much more that can be said on how much weight to give to old vs. new, but to be relatively brief here, one thing that I think could make this upcoming roster really strong is that we actually have a pretty respectable number of possible newcomers who both represent and promote modern Nintendo quite well but also have been around for quite a while. Mario characters like Toad or Waluigi, or Animal Crossing reps like Tom Nook, for starters. Even some that people mostly associate with more modern Nintendo like Bandana Dee and Octoling...have also been around a long time (shoot, Splatoon will be over a decade old by the time the next Smash comes out). There's always a deep well of evergreen Pokemon to pull from should they opt for that route like they did with Trainer in Brawl (your stance on the possible influence of FRLG notwithstanding). And then there's some like Dixie who are not very relevant characters right now, but could very easily be thrust back into the spotlight should their series get a new release early in the Switch 2 cycle.

 

[Scrimblo Bimblo]

People seem to talk about recent Nintendo content with some sort of disdain when it comes to SSB. I'm not a huge fan of most of the recency-based picks, since they don't always age the best (looking at Roy, Lucas, Corrin, and Min Min). However, Smash fans seem to forget that the amount of classic characters who are popular enough to use is finite.

I'm actually half sure that's a fairly significant reason for the rise of the 3rd party characters. Plenty of classic stuff that can still be used there, even after Ultimate added so many.

 

[superprincess]

Thing is, I used to not believe in Kirby bias, at least during the Smash 4 days.
Then I realized: Every character, stage, assist trophy, and item from Kirby is from one of the four Kirby games Sakurai directed.

That's because those games spawned the most iconic characters, locales, and items that are also recurring in the modern games. With the exception of maybe Great Cave Offensive, none of the "Kirby bias" examples are really, well, offensive.

And we know why GCO was added anyway. 1) focus on huge stages 2) Epic Yarn stage was replaced by Wolly World.

 

[LiveStudioAudience]

Honestly the Kirby issue is a bit of microcosm of Smash tending to focus on first stages (and often very select games) to the detriment of including more interesting locales and/or items.

It's the same thinking that got Smash constant Jungle stages from DKC when it's a series defined by much more varied and distinct levels if they're actually played past the first worlds.

 

[Louie G.]

Then I realized: Every character, stage, assist trophy, and item from Kirby is from one of the four Kirby games Sakurai directed.

Small thing, but it always itches at me a little bit when people lump “character” into this, to be honest. Like yeah, the main characters in the series are the ones who have been here since the near beginning. If we started getting Marx, Nightmare and Kawasaki as playable characters maybe this would be egregious but all in all the three characters we have are still as prominent as ever and not particularly outdated in their movesets either.

But like, would it be better if we had Magolor here instead of Meta Knight? Obviously not, and I know that isn’t something anyone is advocating for but when I hear the argument “all the characters are from Sakurai games” that’s the presumed alternative. As a Kirby fan though I’m rooting for and would gladly accept a fourth character, and in that instance I’d love someone from the later titles.

 

[Gorgonzales]

still wish they gave him hypernova for his final smash

 

[GoldenYuiitusin]

Small thing, but it always itches at me a little bit when people lump “character” into this, to be honest. Like yeah, the main characters in the series are the ones who have been here since the near beginning. If we started getting Marx, Nightmare and Kawasaki as playable characters maybe this would be egregious but all in all the three characters we have are still as prominent as ever and not particularly outdated in their movesets either.

But like, would it be better if we had Magolor here instead of Meta Knight? Obviously not, and I know that isn’t something anyone is advocating for but when I hear the argument “all the characters are from Sakurai games” that’s the presumed alternative. As a Kirby fan though I’m rooting for and would gladly accept a fourth character, and in that instance I’d love someone from the later titles.

And then they champion Bandana Dee, who Sakurai created. Just because he didn't give him the spear or the roles doesn't change he's still a Sakurai product.

He's ironically even the one who came up with the concept of spear wielding Waddle Dees since they were prominent in the anime.

 

[superprincess]

Oh right, I totally forgot Kirby's Final Smash. Ultra Sword is from a modern Kirby game that was super recent back then. Between that and the planned Epic Yarn stage, it's evident that modern Kirby isn't totally outside Sakurai's radar, but also isn't a priority.

 

[Among Waddle Dees]

Small thing, but it always itches at me a little bit when people lump “character” into this, to be honest. Like yeah, the main characters in the series are the ones who have been here since the near beginning. If we started getting Marx, Nightmare and Kawasaki as playable characters maybe this would be egregious but all in all the three characters we have are still as prominent as ever and not particularly outdated in their movesets either.

Nightmare I would go on a limb to say was not in the green when he was added, as Smash 4 was nowhere near the anime or Nightmare in Dream Land's prime. I guess the others got relatively lucky, although the Marx boss was enough of an eyebrow raiser presentation-wise.

 

[NintenRob]

Even beyond BWD, the later Kirby titles have introduced so many cool little elements and settings that getting the same recurring stuff from the 90s releases does feel a bit old at this point.

Planet Robobot alone has so many things that could be incorporated into Smash that it's a real pity that not much of it has made it in.

This, people wouldn't be talking about it if we actually got stuff. If we had just gotten a stage and a couple remixes in Smash Wii U, I don't think anyone would be talking about this. Of course you'd still have Bandana Dee fans, he's a popular character. But he's overall largely divorced from the Kirby problem. He's a solution, not a cause.

 

[SPEN18]

Ok, I should say another thing here. Disregarding their chances of actually getting in, we are not running out of legacy characters that are popular enough to use. And you don't have to reach for choices any more niche or any less popular than several of the characters we already have that people are so desperate not to cut. We also have several unrepped franchises which were just as successful in their heydays as several of the series already on the roster.

 

[Louie G.]

Nightmare I would go on a limb to say was not in the green when he was added, as Smash 4 was nowhere near the anime or Nightmare in Dream Land's prime. I guess the others got relatively lucky, although the Marx boss was enough of an eyebrow raiser presentation-wise.

Yeah maybe those were confusing examples because they have a presence in the game, I just meant that the bias doesn’t explicitly show within the playable roster being the core three Kirby characters. Rather if any of those characters I mentioned were outright playable, then you could argue the same neglect that is apparent through stage selection.

Also disagree with the Marx boss being an eyebrow raiser, he’s an iconic fight from the series’ most influential game. There are other fights that could have worked but I’d argue none as effectively as Marx, and NintenRob even made a good point in his video about how choosing Marx allowed more creative freedom to build on the old fight. I’m a little biased because Marx is a favorite of mine, but I don’t really think Dark Matter or CROWNED Magolor would have been all that more effective… especially since Marx has influenced so many other fights through the course of the series, to this day.

The main issue, IMO, lies in stage selection and AT selection which is a very straightforward fix. Music choices could be tweaked and added to as well, at least building a little further outside the obligatory first level picks… Robobot is especially disappointing here. Obviously would welcome BWD or Magolor as a playable character but I think a simple addition of a non-Sakurai AT and a couple stages already go a long way.

 

[Scrimblo Bimblo]

Ok, I should say another thing here. Disregarding their chances of actually getting in, we are not running out of legacy characters that are popular enough to use. And you don't have to reach for choices any more niche or any less popular than several of the characters we already have that people are so desperate not to cut. We also have several unrepped franchises which were just as successful in their heydays as several of the series already on the roster.

This.
Like, all the main DKC games are very popular and all the main DKC characters could have been in since Melee/Brawl. It's not like the fans that wanted them stop existing just because the series stopped getting games.
K. Rool is a throwback character now but he wasn't one when people were waiting for him in Brawl, and I bet Dixie has more fans than the still-unnamed Fire Emblem lord from the next game that's going to have more chances of getting in than her anyways!

 

[LiveStudioAudience]

This.
Like, all the main DKC games are very popular and all the main DKC characters could have been in since Melee/Brawl. It's not like the fans that wanted them stop existing just because the series stopped getting games.
K. Rool is a throwback character now but he wasn't one when people were waiting for him in Brawl, and I bet Dixie has more fans than the still-unnamed Fire Emblem lord from the next game that's going to have more chances of getting in than her anyways!

I mean I don't think we need to necessarily make it a competition between DKC and another series. FE really isn't guilty of anything except being fortunate enough to have a regular developer making its games (unlike Donkey Kong) and new sets of characters to work with every generation for stuff like Smash. Fire Emblem has a passionate fanbase that I'm glad get fighters and the likes of Dixie could easily co-exist as an exciting newcomer alongside whoever the next FE rep will be.

 

[SPEN18]

I'm gonna add that it also seems really weird to me to see people constantly propping up the more niche "legacy" veterans like Lucas, Falco, Ness, Ice Climbers, Ike, Sheik, Jigglypuff, etc. as "Smash icons" and then go on to say that we're running out of good legacy reps. Because a lot of the legacy reps we could get compare pretty favorably with at least most of those in terms of popularity within their series and long-term impact. Of course I definitely don't mean to lump all those characters together, and it's perfectly valid to be higher or lower on some of those than others (I certainly am), but you gotta give everybody a fair shake.

 

[DarthEnderX]

Honestly the Kirby issue is a bit of microcosm of Smash tending to focus on first stages (and often very select games) to the detriment of including more interesting locales and/or items.

It's the same thinking that got Smash constant Jungle stages from DKC when it's a series defined by much more varied and distinct levels if they're actually played past the first worlds.

Counterpoint: Fountain of Dreams

One of Smash's best stages, and best stage songs.