Official Next Smash - Speculation & Discussion Thread

[Nabbitfan730]

Speaking of visual style of games that feature fighting, this video from Sakurai couldn't dropped at a better time:

It does beg the question, do you prefer Smash style of art where each fighter designed to be consistent between all fighters in design or should each fighter should distinct and have own unique visual style?

Should they be Smash fighter first and the character second or vice versa? Like how in Brawl, everyone was made gritty and realistic no matter where they originated from aesthetically

 

[Perkilator]

Speaking of visual style of games that feature fighting, this video from Sakurai couldn't dropped at a better time:

It does beg the question, do you prefer Smash style of art where each fighter designed to be consistent between all fighters in design or should each fighter should distinct and have own unique visual style?

Should they be Smash fighter first and the character second or vice versa? Like how in Brawl, everyone was made gritty and realistic no matter where they originated from aesthetically

A bit of both. In my opinion, a Smash character can be visually true to their original game while keeping consistent with Smash’s style.

 

[chocolatejr9]

Sega has finished their acquisition of Rovio.

From here on out feel free to include Rovio characters (such as Angry Birds) in your Sega wishlists.

Weird question: when was the last time we had a Sega crossover game? I don't know why, but ever since this acquisition was announced, it got me thinking of a hypothetical Sega Heroes 2. Then again, the original Sega Heroes apparently wasn't even that good, so the chances of that are pretty slim...

Also, I can confirm that some people would be quite a bit upset if we got Angry Birds in Smash before insert notable Sega IP here.

 

[HyperSomari64]

Then again, the original Sega Heroes apparently wasn't even that good, so the chances of that are pretty slim...

That game used a modified version of the Puyo Puyo Quest code. I'm not sure if Sega confirmed this, but I'm sure that's the reason why characters from that franchise weren't present.

 

[Gengar84]

Speaking of visual style of games that feature fighting, this video from Sakurai couldn't dropped at a better time:

It does beg the question, do you prefer Smash style of art where each fighter designed to be consistent between all fighters in design or should each fighter should distinct and have own unique visual style?

Should they be Smash fighter first and the character second or vice versa? Like how in Brawl, everyone was made gritty and realistic no matter where they originated from aesthetically

I have no complaints with the way Ultimate currently looks but it might be fun to try a different style for the next game to make it stand out. One potentially fun idea is to make the characters look like drawings with some kind of cel shader. It could either be a universal shader or vary from character to character. For example, Mario’s style could be based on the early art by Yoichi Kotabe while Cloud could be based on the original Tetsuya Nomura character art from FFVII. I think this could work well with lots of other characters like Pikachu, Sonic, and Mega Man with their respective artists.

Here are some examples that people have made as mods for Ultimate:

 

[chocolatejr9]

That game used a modified version of the Puyo Puyo Quest code. I'm not sure if Sega confirmed this, but I'm sure that's the reason why characters from that franchise weren't present.

No, that game just made a lot of weird omissions. It didn't get any Yakuza characters until shortly before shutdown, for example.

 

[Hadokeyblade]

Weird question: when was the last time we had a Sega crossover game? I don't know why, but ever since this acquisition was announced, it got me thinking of a hypothetical Sega Heroes 2. Then again, the original Sega Heroes apparently wasn't even that good, so the chances of that are pretty slim...

Also, I can confirm that some people would be quite a bit upset if we got Angry Birds in Smash before insert notable Sega IP here.

Does Project X Zone 2 count?

 

[osby]

I have no complaints with the way Ultimate currently looks but it might be fun to try a different style for the next game to make it stand out. One potentially fun idea is to make the characters look like drawings with some kind of cel shader. It could either be a universal shader or vary from character to character. For example, Mario’s style could be based on the early art by Yoichi Kotabe while Cloud could be based on the original Tetsuya Nomura character art from FFVII. I think this could work well with lots of other characters like Pikachu, Sonic, and Mega Man with their respective artists.

Here are some examples that people have made as mods for Ultimate:

I think this is a really cute idea but wouldn't really work in an expansive roster. Not only you have characters such as Wii Fit Trainer who don't have traditional art from their series, but it also would go against any visual cohesion Smash has - something it's consistently good at.

On the topic of cel-shading, let's not forget that one reason modern ArcSys games look so good is that character models don't actually interact with each other as they do in Smash. Instead, they're used similarly to 2D sprites and devs can make sure each individual pose looks smooth. Compare that to Smash, where models are frequently bent and stretched to be animated more strikingly.

 

[Gengar84]

I think this is a really cute idea but wouldn't really work in an expansive roster. Not only you have characters such as Wii Fit Trainer who don't have traditional art from their series, but it also would go against any visual cohesion Smash has - something it's consistently good at.

On the topic of cel-shading, let's not forget that one reason modern ArcSys games look so good is that character models don't actually interact with each other as they do in Smash. Instead, they're used similarly to 2D sprites and devs can make sure each individual pose looks smooth. Compare that to Smash, where models are frequently bent and stretched to be animated more strikingly.

Yeah, you might have a point there. Like I said, I’m perfectly happy with the way Ultimate looks so I don’t really feel a change is needed, just that it could be an interesting way to differentiate the next game from Ultimate. Brawl went with a very realistic style with duller colors that I don’t feel has aged as well where games like Wind Waker have held up a lot better visually so I figured it could help the next game look great no matter how much time passes.

 

[chocolatejr9]

Does Project X Zone 2 count?

I... don't know, actually. It WAS a Sega crossover, but it also had three other companies involved, so it wasn't PURELY a Sega crossover. Now I'm confused...

 

[osby]

Yeah, you might have a point there. Like I said, I’m perfectly happy with the way Ultimate looks so I don’t really feel a change is needed, just that it could be an interesting way to differentiate the next game from Ultimate. Brawl went with a very realistic style with duller colors that I don’t feel has aged as well where games like Wind Waker have held up a lot better visually so I figured it could help the next game look great no matter how much time passes.

Ultimate also has a pretty realistic style if you look at the character textures. It just uses a much more saturated color palette compared to Brawl. It also (visually) tries to do a lot with a portable console so I feel like its imperfections will begin to stick out more once a more powerful Nintendo console shows up.

Not that it's a bad thing. I never saw a problem with games showing their age, personally. As long as people make games that use their console's full potential it's inevitable that next-gen hardware will surpass that. I think it's detrimental to have future proofing in mind to such a degree when making a game - a good piece of art can reflect the era it's made and still resonate with people long after.

 

[Oracle Link]

While no one can agree if the next smash should have a large or small Roster we can probably all agree that something new would be cool!
I think stuff They could add is:
Playable/ Fightable bosses and weak Enemies in a casual Mode
Level/ target test builder
A revamped chraracter creator/ Mii Maker
Some Custom Moves For Important Characters like Link or Mario
Unfair Smash which allows you to in essence make spirit Battles or be a spirit
More Costumes (Maybe make some of them DLC?)
A colour Picker to make your own Alts (limited to characters were its okay tro do that)

 

[Wonder Smash]

Funny how lately, I've been thinking about Sega crossovers myself.

It's really too bad they never followed up on Fighters Megamix or expanded on the multiplayer combat features from any of the Sonic games and made crossovers out of them.

I look at the Shooting feature in Sonic Adventure 2 and think that could made for a good Sega arena fighter.

 

[Nabbitfan730]

I have no complaints with the way Ultimate currently looks but it might be fun to try a different style for the next game to make it stand out. One potentially fun idea is to make the characters look like drawings with some kind of cel shader. It could either be a universal shader or vary from character to character. For example, Mario’s style could be based on the early art by Yoichi Kotabe while Cloud could be based on the original Tetsuya Nomura character art from FFVII. I think this could work well with lots of other characters like Pikachu, Sonic, and Mega Man with their respective artists.

Here are some examples that people have made as mods for Ultimate:

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These look sick though. I seen Mega Man's but Pikachu and Sonic look quite good.

They are as if drawings that came to life. If Smash 6 continues the trend of using different visual style of each game, i wouldn't it looking like this. I agree it does make things look timeless compared to the rest.

 

[Wonder Smash]

I have no complaints with the way Ultimate currently looks but it might be fun to try a different style for the next game to make it stand out. One potentially fun idea is to make the characters look like drawings with some kind of cel shader. It could either be a universal shader or vary from character to character. For example, Mario’s style could be based on the early art by Yoichi Kotabe while Cloud could be based on the original Tetsuya Nomura character art from FFVII. I think this could work well with lots of other characters like Pikachu, Sonic, and Mega Man with their respective artists.

Here are some examples that people have made as mods for Ultimate:

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Personally, I think this should be used for certain stages. Like the Punch-Out!! stage for example. The game used cel shade for the characters, so all the Smash characters will be cel shaded whenever they're in that stage.

Although they kinda did do something like this in Ultimate, it wasn't like in these pictures, which I think would be MUCH better. Maybe they could also use this for Wind Waker stages.

 

[Speed Weed]

Weird question: when was the last time we had a Sega crossover game? I don't know why, but ever since this acquisition was announced, it got me thinking of a hypothetical Sega Heroes 2. Then again, the original Sega Heroes apparently wasn't even that good, so the chances of that are pretty slim...

Also, I can confirm that some people would be quite a bit upset if we got Angry Birds in Smash before insert notable Sega IP here.

There's actually a SEGA crossover game going on right now, it's a mobile game called 404GAMERE:SET. It has involvement from Yoko Taro and its premise revolves around anime girls based on not just SEGA games, but games from other arcade companies as well, such as Taito and Namco - though SEGA is the main focus.

But yeah I'd enjoy something that more directly involves SEGA characters coming together. I played SEGA Heroes back in the day if only because I was starved for new SEGA crossover material, but in retrospect it was kind of, uh, Bad. Unappealing artstyle, very generic presentation, and a character selection that had some serious holes and could oftentimes be quite biased towards certain demographics (namely that sect of like, Western Genesis boomers). Credit where it's due, it did have stuff like Phantasy Star, VF and Valkyria Chronicles, but then you look at what they had in store before the game shut down and you realize that while things like Puyo, Sakura Wars, NiGHTS and Space Harrier/Fantasy Zone were still MIA, they were already gearing up to add ****in' ToeJam and Earl. Not my kind of SEGA crossover, I gotta say.

 

[chocolatejr9]

There's actually a SEGA crossover game going on right now, it's a mobile game called 404GAMERE:SET. It has involvement from Yoko Taro and its premise revolves around anime girls based on not just SEGA games, but games from other arcade companies as well, such as Taito and Namco - though SEGA is the main focus.

But yeah I'd enjoy something that more directly involves SEGA characters coming together. I played SEGA Heroes back in the day if only because I was starved for new SEGA crossover material, but in retrospect it was kind of, uh, Bad. Unappealing artstyle, very generic presentation, and a character selection that had some serious holes and could oftentimes be quite biased towards certain demographics (namely that sect of like, Western Genesis boomers). Credit where it's due, it did have stuff like Phantasy Star, VF and Valkyria Chronicles, but then you look at what they had in store before the game shut down and you realize that while things like Puyo, Sakura Wars, NiGHTS and Space Harrier/Fantasy Zone were still MIA, they were already gearing up to add ****in' ToeJam and Earl. Not my kind of SEGA crossover, I gotta say.

sees Yoko Taro's name

Somehow, I was expecting something a LOT weirder...

I remember they had a form thing where players could suggest characters they wanted to see get added. You don't suppose that had any influence over the choices, do you?

 

[Oracle Link]

Has Anyone noticed that the 2 Other green alts on toon link are based on NES Link and ALTTP, Oracle and LA Link?

The NExt Game Should Change those two alts into the LA Remake Model (recolored for nes Link)
Also this is the only T Link Alt without a reffrence so make that one into Outset or conductor link:

 

[DarthEnderX]

To be honest, I do find the incessant ArcSys hype to be kind of annoying.

Like, yeah, they make good games with great visuals, but I'm tired of people acting like they're the only good fighting game developer ever and suggesting every single hypothetical fighting game either be made by them or have their artstyle. Just because they make games with pretty visuals doesn't mean they should monopolize the genre.

No, but it does mean other companies should recognize that ArcSys is nailing it, and should learn to use those graphical techniques.

Which should be easy, given that ArcSys gave an entire GDC presentation describing exactly how they did it.

Do you really want a scene where every single game looks the same?

You're aware that not all anime has the same art style, right? Like, Dragon Ball looks different from Berserk looks different from One Piece looks different from Chainsaw Man.

The point is not for every game to use Guilty Gears art style. The point is to use ArcSys's TECHNIQUES to make a 2D artstyle that looks as good or better than an actual anime. Like ArcSys themselves did Guilty Gear Xrd and Dragon Ball FighterZ. Same techniques, completely different art designs. Because the issue of making a 2D art style is now a solved issue from a technical standpoint, and is now purely a matter of art design.

Like, I LOVE Street Fighter 6, but I don't care for it's attempts at a realistic art style, impressive though they may be. Street Fighter characters should not look the same as Resident Evil characters! I'd have been infinitely more excited if they'd made a game that looks just like the SF2 anime movie.

Capcom should let Arc system works use the Darkstalkers IP, i think their signature asthetic would be the only way the Darkstalkers characters would look good in a modern fighter.

Or, like I said, just do the same thing themselves. But yes, I completely agree.

The thought of a new Dark Stalkers game coming out and just looking like every other RE Engine game makes me queasy to even think about.

 

[TheLamerGamer]

I feel like having a cohesive artstyle is important, but characters can still easily have their own unique flair within that.

For example, an old SMT character could easily keep the iconic Kaneko facial design while still fitting in the generic art style.

Just give them black top lips, and those eyelashes, and they're stylistically distinct without clashing with other art styles. They could do that for a variety of art styles (and already do for the more cartoony characters in the game).

 

[Schnee117]

The thing with ArcSys' style is that it lends itself horribly to making costumes.
Capcom are not gonna go for a more expensive style that also means they can't easily sell you 20+ horny Chun-Li, Cammy and Juri costumes.
It's a matter of business for them.

And SF6 looks great anyway so they're really not missing out.

 

[Perkilator]

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This game seriously needed another year to cook. If it did, I’d personally replace Dr. Mario, Young Link, Pichu and Roy with Wario, Diddy Kong, Scizor and Ayumi Tachibana.

 

[DarthEnderX]

The thing with ArcSys' style is that it lends itself horribly to making costumes.
Capcom are not gonna go for a more expensive style that also means they can't easily sell you 20+ horny Chun-Li, Cammy and Juri costumes.

This...I cannot argue with. Part of the ArcSys style is that things like hair and clothes have to be hand animated instead of physics engine animated. Which means animating an alt costume is almost as much work as animating a new character.

And since SF's entire business model revolves around hocking costumes, my dream of getting an Alpha 4 is pretty much a non-starter for Capcom.


That said, I think it would be perfect for something like KoF, which always looked anime-esque, was built on reusing sprites for decades, and has few alt costumes even in the modern 3D games.

If they made the switch over to ArcSys style celshading, they could keep reusing the same models for the next 3-4 games, and even 10-15 years later, they'd still look good.

 

[Gengar84]

On the subject of Street Fighter costumes, I find it completely ridiculous that they are charging $100 for four TMNT costumes. That’s something that would have made me hyped enough to buy the game but I can’t justify it at that price even as a massive TMNT fan. It probably actually has the opposite effect in that I’m more hesitant to pick the game up now if these prices are a trend. The best I can hope for is that someone rips the models so we can use them in Smash. It’s a shame because I think they’re the best models TMNT has ever had.

 

[Nabbitfan730]

And SF6 looks great anyway so they're really not missing out.

Idk about great. From what i have seen, the game already looks dated personally

On the subject of Street Fighter costumes, I find it completely ridiculous that they are charging $100 for four TMNT costumes. That’s something that would have made me hyped enough to buy the game but I can’t justify it at that price even as a massive TMNT fan. The best I can hope for is that someone rips the models so we can use them in Smash. I think they’re the best models TMNT has ever had in my opinion.

Fighting games can be quite money-grabby when it comes to additional content almost to gacha-level sometimes. Which why i'm kinda glad that additional alts and skins are only reglated to Mii costumes when it comes to Smash because when those can-of-worms open for original characters....oh lord.

 

[Gengar84]

I don’t personally care for the realistic style they went with in Street Fighter VI. I preferred the more animated look of the previous games. I like Cammy’s new outfit though.

 

[CapitaineCrash]

Speaking of visual style of games that feature fighting, this video from Sakurai couldn't dropped at a better time:

It does beg the question, do you prefer Smash style of art where each fighter designed to be consistent between all fighters in design or should each fighter should distinct and have own unique visual style?

Should they be Smash fighter first and the character second or vice versa? Like how in Brawl, everyone was made gritty and realistic no matter where they originated from aesthetically

I think a more consistent artstyle is better, but I like when some characters are closer to the frachise like Steve. If some day we do have a Rhythm heaven character, I hope that this is a case where they would keep the 2d artstyle of the franchise.

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This game seriously needed another year to cook. If it did, I’d personally replace Dr. Mario, Young Link, Pichu and Roy with Wario, Diddy Kong, Scizor and Ayumi Tachibana.

Tbh I really doubt that in 1 year they could have add this many characters. But even assuming they could, why would they go with Scizor of all thing?

 

[Hadokeyblade]

Idk about great. From what i have seen, the game already looks dated personally



Fighting games can be quite money-grabby when it comes to additional content almost to gacha-level sometimes. Which why i'm kinda glad that additional alts and skins are only reglated to Mii costumes when it comes to Smash because when those can-of-worms open for original characters....oh lord.

I do think it would be cool if we got more alts for the smash cast.


Shiny alts for Pokemon, a Classic Sonic or Sonic boom alt for Sonic, tons of Megaman colors, Vampire Sora, Evil Ryu, Violent ken. Etc, etc

 

[Guynamednelson]

But even assuming they could, why would they go with Scizor of all thing?

Smash fans don't wanna get that just because Pichu is depicted in Smash as a clone that hurts itself doesn't mean Pichu wasn't heavily marketed. Hell Sakurai probably wouldn't get the idea in the first place to make Pichu a Pikachu clone if it wasn't.

 

[Sucumbio]

VF4 Evo Arcade looked so damn sexy. Now that's a game that stands the test of time. Sega did such a nice job.

I've never played a guilty gear game and I suck at SF lol.

 

[Perkilator]

Tbh I really doubt that in 1 year they could have add this many characters. But even assuming they could, why would they go with Scizor of all thing?

I just picked Scizor because I think it’s cool and a natural fit for something like Smash.

 

[SPEN18]

But even assuming they could, why would they go with Scizor of all thing?

To its credit, Scizor has always been pretty popular and gets appearances in the crossovers like Pokken and such. It would translate pretty well to Smash also, so I see why people like it. It doesn't look too much like a nobody pick compared at least to other popular Johto mons like Ttar, Lugia, Typhlosion, or Espeon/Umbreon.

In my opinion, though, there are plenty of mons that would rank well above it. Especially if we're talking a "Melee do-over" roster which would still have stuff like Charizard left on the board. I agree Scizor would be an odd choice in that context.

 

[fogbadge]

Thing about pichu is that while everyone seems to agree he’s a likely cut his inclusion does make sense. be it from a Nintendo all stars perspective or a celebration of gaming one. He does fit the general criteria we apply to Pokemon we think are likely

 

[HyperSomari64]

I'm still waiting the day Nintendo makes an Injustice-style premium costume of Bluster Kong for DK (with all and his Voice Actor from the cartoon reprising his role). But that day will never come.

 

[RodNutTakin]

I feel like if Melee had one more full year of development, the most in terms of additional characters you would see would've been Wario, Diddy Kong and King Dedede. And maybe Wolf (who'd be to the right of Fox like how Luigi is to the right of Mario on the roster.)

 

[Hadokeyblade]

Thing about pichu is that while everyone seems to agree he’s a likely cut his inclusion does make sense. be it from a Nintendo all stars perspective or a celebration of gaming one. He does fit the general criteria we apply to Pokemon we think are likely

Membah the Pichu bros?

I membah.

I feel like if Melee had one more full year of development, the most in terms of additional characters you would see would've been Wario, Diddy Kong and King Dedede. And maybe Wolf (who'd be to the right of Fox like how Luigi is to the right of Mario on the roster.)

Dont forget Snake, since Konami pitched him to Nintendo for Melee but the game was too far along in development for him to be added.

 

[RodNutTakin]

Dont forget Snake, since Konami pitched him to Nintendo for Melee but the game was too far along in development for him to be added.

I'd imagine this would probably still be the case even with one more year added, since even if Kojima personally requested it, that's still negotations that would be streneous mid-development when the team is focusing on putting in the characters that they already own with no legal work. Remember, the project plan regarding who's planned to be added is one of the first things done with a Smash game's development, and Sonic delaying Brawl is the kind of thing that's probably never going to be repeated in the future.

 

[SPEN18]

Assuming they would have known from the start that they would have had an extra year of dev time, I don't think all the clones that made it into the project plan would've necessarily still been there. Which would have potentially freed up even more space for characters, though how many more we wouldn't exactly know.

Regardless of what "could have been" with Melee's roster, we can still observe and criticize how shorthanded the actual roster is. Diddy, Wario, Dedede, and Zard are glaring omissions. Technically Ridley, too, as seeing him work in Ultimate convinces me further that the "technical issues" holding him back were kind of rubbish to begin with, but at least there was some kind of real reasoning for him not being there. Edit: add potential issues with Rare as a reasoning for Diddy not being there.

Pit, Little Mac, and Duck Hunt are also picks I would've preferred in the retro slot(s) over what we got, though again there could have been perceived feasibility issues with DH at the time.

Obviously a lot of the above is steered by the benefit of hindsight, but Melee's roster always seemed like a big whiff to me even for its time.

 

[fogbadge]

Dont forget Snake, since Konami pitched him to Nintendo for Melee but the game was too far along in development for him to be added.

you mean he begged sakurai to include him

 

[Stratos]

Since the release of the first Super Smash Bros. game, there have been rumors that Meowth would be one of the characters along with others who eventually came to future Super Smash Bros. games as fighters. It's been so many years and they still didn't put Meowth as a newcomer. If they put him in it would make two players one with Pikachu and the other with Meowth imagine Ash's Pikachu and Team Rocket's Meowth fighting each other a lot more and I'm writing this for those who wanted to see more rivalry between these two. So what I hope at least is that they bring Meowth as a newcomer in the next Super Smash Bros. game.