I agree that Fire Emblem deserves two reps. That's why I included Miciaiah in my (not implausible) 40 character roster. I do, however, think that some characters are more worthy. Just as Diddy Kong or Wario should have (idealy) gotten in Melee over Roy, so too should characters like Ridley and Olimar get in over Marth/Miciaiah.
The problem is that Micaiah (stop mispelling her name) shouldn't get in over Marth. Marth is much more important to the FE series and if they got a second rep, Marth would get in regardless of what Takamaru's status is. Heck, he could even be a Marth clone for all I care, but there's no way that he would be included
over Marth.
I think this is where we disagree. While I agree that it would suck, I would rank it as slightly less unthinkable than removing Ganondorf or including Fox solo. If this were a wish list, you can bet I would include a second Fire Emblem PC in my first list, but I was trying (perhaps unsucessfully) to consider how Sakurai would balance the demands of his audience in a worst-case scenario of 36 characters.
Did you not read the part about FE having 11 games in total, 5 of which are international. Marth is possibly the most popular FE character world wide, if not just in Japan. He's also the most reoccuring FE lord. Why should Micaiah get in over him?
I agree there is a big difference. With Lucas, they were clearly creating an obvious Ness replacement. With Ike, they were clearly trying something different. But I wouldn't say it's
preposterous to say that he was originally based on Marth, just unfounded (at the moment). It's a theory without evidence, not an impossibility.
Unfounded is an understatement. It's been proven wrong! Ike only has 2 moves in common with Marth, both of which are generic swordsmen moves (a counter for down B and a sword swipe for a fair, and a slow one at that.). We know Ike's entire moveset by now, and it would be more likely that Ike's moveset was based off of Link's rather than Marth's. If a characters moves were to be based off another character's, then they'd share the same animations on the majority of there moves and just have different stats. This is not the case with Marth and Ike.
I was looking at it from the perspective of pure gameplay, but you do raise a valid point. Removing Marth would disappoint some fans. However, one could argue that the inclusion of Takamaru would be a nice conselation prize for Japanese gamers (perhaps he's not quite as popular as Marth in the country, but he still has his fans it seems) and that there are fans of Radiant Dawn (both in Japan and abroad) who would prefer Miciaiah as a second rep.
First, what would American Fans get? A character from a 20 year old dead series that nobody knows. It's not like FE because FE is a continuing series that had 6 games in it
and was going international.
Second, Micaiah's game isn't selling so well and she has few fans even in her own game. Marth on the other hand has two very well recieved FE games and is more popular world wide. Sure, there would be
some fans that would prefer Micaiah, but the majority of fans wouldn't even consider her if it meant getting rid of Marth.
But, obviously, the popularity front is the clear downside to this theory. The upside, I would argue, is a more diverse roster of fighters.
Diversity over character importance? And then you put an unimportant character from the same series?
If you beleive that Marth is the best possible FE rep, then you're entirely right.
Those are your words, not mine.
I completely agree
However, the fact is that not everyone believes that. Before Ike's confirmation, there was a Ike vs. Marth poll thread on Smashboards which showed Ike to be the clearly more popular choice. It all comes down to where Sakurai and his crew stand on the issue.
And english poll in which one of the characters is not international. That poll would definately be the other way around in Japan. And they have access to
both characters.
Well, there is a difference. Fire Emblem has one representative for sure, while the Pikmin series still needs a playable rep. Also, Olimar is the only character I can think of who is so unique, he's guanteed to make Brawl a better game.
See Numa Dude's post.
2) A decades old Japanese only swordfighter, eh? Sounds quite a bit like Marth to me. Noone outside Japan knew who he was at the time -but his inclusion in Melee resulted in Fire Emblem getting brought to our shores. How awesome wuld it be if Takamaru's inclusion in Brawl resulted in a new Nintendo character franchise?
It would be more awesome if his series was actually continuing. His series is dead and I don't think we'll be getting any new games, even if he were included in Brawl.
As for Pit and Meta being agile swordsmen - I would agree with that. Sort of. They are more of their own subgroup: flying swordsman (great spped, great recovery, weak knockback). I think some players would still prefer a pure swordfighter who isn't slower than Bowser.
Told you we needed Marth.
In fact, much of the roster is made up of characters from new franchises like Takamaru.
Who is a dead character from a dead series.
Looking at it differently, let's say a character's series of origin didn't matter at all. Let's judge the characters based solely on their own merits.
Which Marth has quite a lot of.