Official Next Smash - Speculation & Discussion Thread

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Monster Hunter talks are so weird.

"Given how popular Monster Hunter is, especially on Nintendo systems, they're the most likely Capcom character."
"But they don't like putting the hunter in crossovers."
"But they're in MVCI so clearly it's not a rock solid thing."
"But that might have been against their wishes, which Sakurai would respect."
"...OK so what about Rathelos?"
"Too big."


At least we've moved on from the "Monster Hunter = Byleth" idea.

 

[CapitaineCrash]

https://x.com/Wario64/status/1906598840133628105

You know what, I'm gonna scratch my previous "unlikely" post. You know what's actually unlikely at this point? The next Capcom rep being anything but Monster Hunter.

I still think Resident evil got the slight edge before Monster hunter, but I do agree that it feels like it could go either way. Even if today Monster hunter seems to sell more than Resident evil, I think it's hard to ignore the huge cultural impact Resident evil has, not just on gaming but on horror culture as a whole. Also Resident evil was stacked with very good releases in the past few years, we got 2 remake, 3 remake, Village and 4 remake.

 

[Gengar84]

Monster Hunter talks are so weird.

"Given how popular Monster Hunter is, especially on Nintendo systems, they're the most likely Capcom character."
"But they don't like putting the hunter in crossovers."
"But they're in MVCI so clearly it's not a rock solid thing."
"But that might have been against their wishes, which Sakurai would respect."
"...OK so what about Rathelos?"
"Too big."


At least we've moved on from the "Monster Hunter = Byleth" idea.

I agree with some here that the best solution is to add the rider from Monster Hunter stories on baby Rathalos. That would give them a really unique gimmick and solve the whole “Rathalos is too big” argument at once. I really enjoyed Monster Hunter Stories 2 and it’s the only game in the series I’ve played so maybe I’m biased. I think it could be cool though.

My only slight issue with Resident Evil is that the playable characters aren’t really what make the game interesting to me. I do really like some like Leon but he doesn’t really have many exciting attacks that make me say “wow, I’d love to see that in Smash!”. I think part of the cool factor of the series for me are the monsters they fight against. The player characters aren’t more average people but the zombies like Nemesis are what makes the game special to me. It’s all just a personal opinion though and I’m sure you can easily make a fun moveset for the player characters but I feel something would be lost without the monsters. That’s one reason I feel that Nemesis would be the most exciting choice.

 

[BuckleyTim]

I'm have never played a second of MH but I feel like the fanbase would find it really darn weird if they repped monster hunter in the roster through the monster catching spinoff in some weird attempt to compromise the "best of both worlds". This reeks of when people thought we should cram multiple arms characters into a single slot to get the most bang for our buck, or maybe more if like someone said DQ should be repped character wise by Dragon Quest Monsters because then you could have an iconic spinoff character that sends out slime.

And as far as the mvci rumours go, they're just that: rumors. I'll believe it when I see it, but the sheer fact that they're fine with the hunter being the primary rep in stuff that came out afterwards like teppen and Astro Bot say otherwise to me about how they think MH can be represented in crossovers.

 

[Will]

Mii Fighters shouldn’t return unless they also rework their vocals to match the Tomadachi Life text-to-speech settings. Furthermore, they should also add a customizable quote to be gloriously butchered on the victory screen.

There’s zero reasons to be against this if you’re a true Mii fan.

 

[Perkilator]

I'm have never played a second of MH but I feel like the fanbase would find it really darn weird if they repped monster hunter in the roster through the monster catching spinoff in some weird attempt to compromise the "best of both worlds". This reeks of when people thought we should cram multiple arms characters into a single slot to get the most bang for our buck

Not really the best comparison IMO. The thing back then with trying to cram multiple ARMS characters into a single slot was mainly because most people thought that every character in ARMS plays exactly the same. Trying to represent MH through the Rider isn't that ridiculous.

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

At least we've moved on from the "Monster Hunter = Byleth" idea.

But now that you spoke of it, it will inevitably return.

Still makes more sense than the people who claimed Byleth replaced TRACER though

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

I'll believe it when I see it, but the sheer fact that they're fine with the hunter being the primary rep in stuff that came out afterwards like teppen

They're not in Teppen at all actually. The primary rep there was Rathelos.

There was another monster that was added later but I don't know what it is. I wanna say Deviljo but I dunno.

 

[ninjahmos]

Mii Fighters shouldn’t return unless they also rework their vocals to match the Tomadachi Life text-to-speech settings. Furthermore, they should also add a customizable quote to be gloriously butchered on the victory screen.

There’s zero reasons to be against this if you’re a true Mii fan.

That would actually be hilarious.

 

[Gengar84]

To be fair, I still don’t think multiple Arms characters as alts is any worse of an idea than Dark Samus, Impa, or Dixie as echoes or the Koopa Kids as alts. All of them could have had very unique movesets of their own but they still fit the general idea of the base character so some sacrifices in accuracy had to be made to make them work. I feel like the Arms alt characters would be in line with other echoes that could have been unique.

 

[cashregister9]

They're not in Teppen at all actually. The primary rep there was Rathelos.

There was another monster that was added later but I don't know what it is. I wanna say Deviljo but I dunno.

I just checked Monster Hunter has 3 characters

Rathalos, Nergigante and A Felyne Palico

And honestly, from all this Smash discussion, I think they may go with a Felyne, it was the Astro Bot rep and it is a marketable mascot and it almost is the middle ground between a monster and a hunter (almost)

 

[ninjahmos]

To be fair, I still don’t think multiple arms characters as alts is any worse of an idea than Dark Samus, Impa, or Dixie as echoes or the Koopa Kids as alts. All of them could have had very unique movesets of their own but they still fit the general idea of the base character so some sacrifices in accuracy had to be made to make them work. I feel like the Arms alt characters would be in line with other echoes that could have been unique.

If not Spring Man or Ribbon Girl, I could see Twintelle getting in as a semi-clone at least.

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

To be fair, I still don’t think multiple arms characters as alts is any worse of an idea than Dark Samus, Impa, or Dixie as echoes or the Koopa Kids as alts. All of them could have had very unique movesets of their own but they still fit the general idea of the base character so some sacrifices in accuracy had to be made to make them work. I feel like the Arms alt characters would be in line with other echoes that could have been unique.

Are we really bringing back the "composite ARMS character"? Really?

They have enough differences that making them specifically Min Min's alts feels wrong, whether it's smaller things like Spring Man's comeback mechanic and Ribbon Girl's multiple jumps or blatantly obvious ones like Max Brass making his muscles grow, Twintelle's ARMS being her hair, Kid Cobra's more unusual body proportions and Dr. Coyle's... everything. And those are just a few examples. ARMS's cast is very diverse despite the simplicity of its gameplay.

Echo Fighters make sense for a good chunk of them, but straight up alts never will.

 

[Ivander]

Mii Fighters shouldn’t return unless they also rework their vocals to match the Tomadachi Life text-to-speech settings. Furthermore, they should also add a customizable quote to be gloriously butchered on the victory screen.

As well as memorable butchered quotes like, "You just got-a Sans Undertale'd." and "All They Fear is Expand Dong."

 

[Gengar84]

Are we really bringing back the "composite ARMS character"? Really?

They have enough differences that making them specifically Min Min's alts feels wrong, whether it's smaller things like Spring Man lacking his comeback mechanic and Ribbon Girl lacking her multiple jumps or blatantly obvious ones like Max Brass being unable to make his muscles grow, Twintelle's ARMS being her hair, Kid Cobra's more unusual body proportions and Dr. Coyle's... everything.

Echo Fighters make sense for them, but straight up alts never will.

I’m not saying I want a composite ARMS character. I couldn’t care less about the series or the characters in it. I just think that other characters have already sacrificed potential accuracy that would have made them stand out as unique just so they could make it in as an echo. Dark Samus had a ton of unique attacks they could have built a fully original moveset from but she fits the general concept of Samus so they stretched it to make it work. People want Dixie as a Diddy echo despite the fact that her whole gameplay gimmick comes from using her hair, which Diddy doesn’t have. People want Impa as a Sheik echo despite Impa having three completely unique movesets and none of them are remotely similar to Smash’s Sheik. ARMS characters all have the stretch arm Dhalsim/Luffy gimmick so they make sense in the same way. Also, I’m not the one that brought the topic up.

 

[BuckleyTim]

Ok I messed up on Teppen because I misread a previous comment mentioning it, but even if I was wrong on every account I still think the best option for representing Monster Hunter is through the character you're playing in the games (which is why I want to circle back to the DQM comparsion; if you willingly went with, say, psarro over any of the Hero conglomerate we now know of today the response from dq fans would be "you don't have to cast the widest net possible if DQ3 Hero is literally on the table".

 

[ninjahmos]

Imagine having Tomodachi text to speech voices for Mii Fighters and having them in a Guile costume saying "Go home and be a family man!"

 

[DemifiendEnjoyer]

I still think they can compromise with a playable MH character by choosing Rider & Ratha as one. It's still having you play as a monster in at least some fashion.

I feel like if it got a character it would be a Palico.

 

[BackseatSakurai]

ARMS is annoying because I feel like the lame "ARMS doesn't have a main character" quote is disingenuous. I feel like they just jumped the gun putting Spring Man as an assist and then somewhere along the line plans changed or ARMS sold better than expected so they just went with a different character and said "well, it's the creator's favorite character". Spring Man is clearly the mascot - on the box, used prominently in all marketing material, I mean..to the extent that a fighting game can have a main character, Spring Man is that.

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

I’m not saying I want a composite ARMS character. I couldn’t care less about the series or the characters in it. I just think that other characters have already sacrificed potential accuracy that would have made them stand out as unique just so they could make it in as an echo.

And for most of them, I agree with them being Echoes. The difference between Min Min and a lot of other fighters is small enough to make them Echoes while still feeling faithful.

Dark Samus had a ton of unique attacks they could have built a fully original moveset from but she fits the general concept of Samus so they stretched it to make it work.

Which was most likely due to timing issues and deadlines. They probably didn't have the time to give her something more unique alongside the few unique newcomers and bringing back every cut character ever, which might be speculative but given how much content was sacrificed at launch, isn't an unreasonable assumption.

But if Ultimate were a normal Smash game instead, she would've gotten jack**** since the only reason she's in is the Ballot.

Dark Samus is very much doomed to forever be Samus 2 in Smash

People want Dixie as a Diddy echo despite the fact that her whole gameplay gimmick comes from using her hair, which Diddy doesn’t have. People want Impa as a Sheik echo despite Impa having three completely unique movesets and none of them are remotely similar to Smash’s Sheik.

It's less a want and more an agreement to take the Echo status as a compromise.

No one actually wants to see someone they want be nothing more than an Echo. They're just willing to take it as a W because it's better than nothing.

ARMS characters all have the stretch arm Dhalsim/Luffy gimmick so they make sense in the same way. Also, I’m not the one that brought the topic up.

Which is fair. And also, yours is the first post I saw so it's the one I quoted lmao

 

[Dukefire]

ARMS is annoying because I feel like the lame "ARMS doesn't have a main character" quote is disingenuous. I feel like they just jumped the gun putting Spring Man as an assist and then somewhere along the line plans changed or ARMS sold better than expected so they just went with a different character and said "well, it's the creator's favorite character". Spring Man is clearly the mascot - on the box, used prominently in all marketing material, I mean..to the extent that a fighting game can have a main character, Spring Man is that.

Hence why the teaser didn't EXACTLY tell who was the selected fighter out until the official reveal with Min-Min.

 

[DemifiendEnjoyer]

ARMS is annoying because I feel like the lame "ARMS doesn't have a main character" quote is disingenuous. I feel like they just jumped the gun putting Spring Man as an assist and then somewhere along the line plans changed or ARMS sold better than expected so they just went with a different character and said "well, it's the creator's favorite character". Spring Man is clearly the mascot - on the box, used prominently in all marketing material, I mean..to the extent that a fighting game can have a main character, Spring Man is that.

I think part of why it wasn’t him is also that he shares a name with the character from Kinnikuman.
And I think the team knew Springman was the most prevalent in the marketing. But in the actual game he’s pretty much got the same standing as everyone else.

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

ARMS is annoying because I feel like the lame "ARMS doesn't have a main character" quote is disingenuous. I feel like they just jumped the gun putting Spring Man as an assist and then somewhere along the line plans changed or ARMS sold better than expected so they just went with a different character and said "well, it's the creator's favorite character". Spring Man is clearly the mascot - on the box, used prominently in all marketing material, I mean..to the extent that a fighting game can have a main character, Spring Man is that.

You're absolutely right because the graphic novel really hyped up Spring Man as the main guy before it was canceled. Not to mention he's the one with a doppelganger which isn't something fighting games do unless they know their character is a major part of the game.

I'd argue Min Min was likely more interesting simply because they could do something more unique than a comeback mechanic with her.

 

[Gengar84]

Okay, the ARMS discussion is making me curious about something. What is your cutoff point as far as sacrificing accuracy so the character can make it in as an echo? Dixie and Impa are popular suggestions for echoes despite having very different gameplay but almost everyone says an ARMS composite character is a terrible idea. So clearly, there is some acceptable level of accuracy sacrifice for people. I’m just not sure where you’d draw the line where it becomes a terrible idea.

While I’d rather have as many unique movesets as I can, especially for characters that are among my most wanted, I’d still rather take them as echoes than not get them at all. I use model swap fan mods all the time so I’m used to characters not being completely accurate. As long as they generally feel natural, I’m cool with it. There’s always going to be some level of sacrifice in accuracy to make most characters work as alts or echoes.

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

Okay, the ARMS discussion is making me curious about something. What is your cutoff point as far as sacrificing accuracy so the character can make it in as an echo? Dixie and Impa are popular suggestions for echoes despite having very different gameplay but almost everyone says an ARMS composite character is a terrible idea. So clearly, there is some acceptable level of accuracy sacrifice for people. I’m just not sure where you’d draw the line where it becomes a terrible idea. While I’d rather have as many unique movesets as I can, especially for characters that are among my most wanted, I’d still rather take them as echoes than not get them at all. I use model swap fan mods all the time so I’m used to characters not being completely accurate. As long as they generally feel natural, I’m cool with it.

The Echoes can at least allow for small differences.

Dixie could still have her hair stuff even as an Echo, it'll simply be less than if she were a full character, with things like carrying heavy items, potentially grabs and throws, maybe one special, etc. while the vast majority of her moveset would still remain Diddy's.

But as a Diddy alt, she would be forced to adhere to Diddy's moveset in its entirety, with no wiggle room for any of her more unique aspects.

There's a fundamental difference between Echo and alt and that's why people generally disagree with ARMS characters as alts but are fine with them as Echoes. Well, they aren't but that's because of how annoying it is to fight Min Min rather than any sense of game accuracy

 

[ninjahmos]

I think some of the things Sakurai says should be taken with a grain of salt.

 

[CapitaineCrash]

Not really the best comparison IMO. The thing back then with trying to cram multiple ARMS characters into a single slot was mainly because most people thought that every character in ARMS plays exactly the same. Trying to represent MH through the Rider isn't that ridiculous.

I do agree that the comparaison with Arms doesn't really make sense here, but I do agree with the main idea that character being solely represented by a spin off is really weird to me, specifically because people always say how Monster hunter deserve to be in the game because of sales, but Stories sales are very far from the main game sales.

Imo having the Monster hunter stories guy as the Monster hunter rep would be if the Pokémon trainer was the sole representation of Pokémon in Smash and his moveset was based on Pokémon ranger. Like sure, it could make a cool moveset, but it just doesn't really make sense to go that direction.

 

[GoldenYuiitusin]

But now that you spoke of it, it will inevitably return.

Still makes more sense than the people who claimed Byleth replaced TRACER though

We've been over this.

The idea is that controversy with Blizzard at the time forced a last minute removal and Byleth was added instead because filler Nintendo character.

Not that they had connections to each other.

Only Monster Hunter was ever claimed to have been replaced by Byleth in concept.


Not that either case is true on Byleth taking the place of anybody; be it Monster Hunter, Tracer, Ryu Hayabusa (who people claimed was the last character in the Pass but swapped places with Byleth who was supposed to be in Vol. 2, simply to counter how he had been "leaked"), or whoever.

I'm just sick of the misunderstanding that the Tracer part had ANYTHING to do with moveset or concept when the idea is strictly Byleth being "filler" for an open slot.

 

[DemifiendEnjoyer]

I think some of the things Sakurai says should be taken with a grain of salt.

What? Really?
I thought everything Sakurai does is secretly hinting at future characters?
You can’t shatter my world like this!
Noooooooooo!

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

or maybe more if like someone said DQ should be repped character wise by Dragon Quest Monsters

Sakurai was planning on Slime if he couldn't get Hero.

Not the best example here, buddy,

 

[BuckleyTim]

Sakurai was planning on Slime if he couldn't get Hero.

Not the best example here, buddy,

But it wasn't the first choice, it was a backup plan if the rights issues didn't work out.

 

[BackseatSakurai]

Sakurai was planning on Slime if he couldn't get Hero.

Not the best example here, buddy,

Slime isn't exclusively from the Monsters subseries of games. He meant proper noun Dragon Quest Monsters lol.

 

[The Stoopid Unikorn]

But it wasn't the first choice, it was a backup plan if the rights issues didn't work out.

Yeah but the fact that it was a plan at all shows Nintendo and Sakurai were fine with it.

If they didn't want DQ to be represented with a monster and Square said no for Hero, they wouldn't compromise with something they didn't agree with, we'd just not have gotten any DQ character whatsoever.

Slime isn't exclusively from the Monsters subseries of games. He meant proper noun Dragon Quest Monsters lol.

.....oh... my bad lmao

 

[DemifiendEnjoyer]

Sakurai was planning on Slime if he couldn't get Hero.

Not the best example here, buddy,

Dragon Quest Monsters is a spin-off series of Dragon Quest.

 

[CapitaineCrash]

Sakurai was planning on Slime if he couldn't get Hero.

Not the best example here, buddy,

There's a big difference with Slime, which is the mascot of the franchise, and the Monster scout from Dragon quest monsters.

The comparaison with Slime would be more Palico, which would actually make sense imo.

 

[HyperSomari64]

So just for fun, What are some characters you think are particularly unlikely? No fourth parties.

someone from Senran Kagura (don't ask)

 

[SharkLord]

I still think they can compromise with a playable MH character by choosing Rider & Ratha as one. It's still having you play as a monster in at least some fashion.

Guys. They're not doing Monster Hunter Stories as our fighter. That's ridiculous.

I don't want to be the insufferable curmudgeon today, but I keep seeing a Rider with a Monstie tossed around because of the assumption that you need a monster as a fighter somehow and it kinda irks me. Monster Hunter Stories is a spinoff with two games. The second game sold about one and a half million copies, maybe a bit more. Monster Hunter Rise, which released around the same time, has sold ten times that. The Sunbreak DLC alone sold 8 million copies. I'm sure the Stories games are good, but they are in no way series-defining, and the mainline games are far and away the defining image of the series. They're not tossing that away and going for a spinoff title specifically just because we need a monster.

I'm have never played a second of MH but I feel like the fanbase would find it really darn weird if they repped monster hunter in the roster through the monster catching spinoff in some weird attempt to compromise the "best of both worlds". This reeks of when people thought we should cram multiple arms characters into a single slot to get the most bang for our buck, or maybe more if like someone said DQ should be repped character wise by Dragon Quest Monsters because then you could have an iconic spinoff character that sends out slime.

And as far as the mvci rumours go, they're just that: rumors. I'll believe it when I see it, but the sheer fact that they're fine with the hunter being the primary rep in stuff that came out afterwards like teppen and Astro Bot say otherwise to me about how they think MH can be represented in crossovers.

^^^
Aside from the strangeness of going for a spinoff just for a monster rep, the whole idea of "but Hunters can't be in crossovers!" falls apart when we have a Hunter in a fighting games already. And like you mentioned, the claim that it was against the MH devs' wishes is nothing but rumors. To this day, I have never seen a source for that claim.

That said, while it's true that there's no Hunter in Teppen, I will mention Astro Bot as a weird case. We only have a Palico Bot in Astro Bot proper, but we do have a group of Bots with giant weapons around a campfire in Astro's Playroom, with no Palico in sight. I don't know why that's the case - Maybe the armor was giving the modeling team grief? - But it's worth noting.

Either way, Smah has a strong bias towards the player character when choosing the primary rep of the series, to the point they managed to break the longstanding traditions of not putting the DQ Heroes in crossover events or letting them meet. And we already have Rathalos as a boss, so the monsters can be represented pretty well that way. Logically speaking, I don't think the fandom's weird aversion to the Hunters holds much water.

 

[BrawlX10]

I mean unless we're talking DLC for this one, I don't see why they'd need to "break" this one.

Like if Isaac is on the project plan for next Smash, they'd just remove the Assist Trophy, wouldn't they?

Couldn't they just remove the upgraded AT character from the game's AT list if the character becomes playable as DLC?
I don't know about programing, asking if it would be possible.

 

[DemifiendEnjoyer]

I’d love it if Slime was in Smash but it would probably be preferable if it wasn’t the only Dragon Quest representative, Cause it just wouldn’t represent the series very well.
Like your not going to be getting a great representation of the series gameplay from the Slime, It doesn’t use weapons, It doesn’t use magic.
It seems weird to represent a series all about those kinds of fantasy concepts with a character who’s moveset would probably revolve around being made of goo.
And it also has like zero importance to the series story wise.
I think it could be a really cool character though, It could be similar to Piranha Plant and change into different types of Slime, And then the aforementioned taking advantage of being made of goo.
Generally I’m kind of adverse to giving third party series more than one character, But come on, It’s Dragon Quest.

 

[SMAASH! Puppy]

Couldn't they just remove the upgraded AT character from the game's AT list if the character becomes playable as DLC?
I don't know about programing, asking if it would be possible.

I wouldn't do that since it'd be kind of a waste, but turning off that Assist Trophy while someone was playing the character in question would be pretty easy since stages already do this, and we've also seen similar things with background elements.