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This may not be perfect, but I'll try to explain as well as I can for all of the characters on here that haven't been revealed yet
Veterans:
Wario, it doesn't seem right to leave him out of smash bros and he was decently popular in brawl
Ganondorf, I think Ganondorf will stay in, but he will keep the same, or at least a similar moveset, so sadly, he is still a falcon clone
Jiggs, it's one of the original 12 so it deserves a spot, and let's hope it is as good as it was in melee cause it's awful in brawl!
Meta: Of course they'll leave him in, just try to tone him down a bit this time Hal
Ness, once again, he was in the original game, so it makes sense to leave him in
Lucas, Lucas seems sort of in Limbo right now, if you asked me before the Ike reveal, I would have definitely said no way, he's getting cut, but I would have said the same for Ike, and he got back in (Also Ike was my main so I rejoiced after I heard that) so Lucas doesn't seem out of the question anymore, but I would say the chances are 70% yes and 30% no
Falco, you may as well call this Falco/Wolf, but not both of them. I feel that one of them will get cut and the way I see it Falco is a much more popular character than wolf but who knows, wolf may make a return
G&W, Ever since the teaser in the PacMan trailer, it's a near guarantee
Captain Falcon, Now if Captian Falcon gets cut, the Wii U will die, DIE, nobody will buy the game if Falcon gets cut and there will be petitions all over the Internet, Riots outside of Nintendo's HQ, and other awful things if falcon gets removed, besides, if you need more reasonable evidence, he is part of the N64 12 so I guess that makes him an obvious pick
That wraps up the veterans now it's time for the newcomers
Dixie Kong, in all honesty, I would rather see K Rool get in, but he has been ignored for quite a while by retro, and Dixie recently came back for the new DKC game, so I think Dixie will get in, and no, she won't be a Diddy clone
Shulk, ever since Xenoblade Chronicles was released and became a hugely popular game globally, Shulk almost seems like a shoe in for SSB4, and with Xenoblade Chronicles X coming out in 2015, this would be a good way to make the Xenoblade series even more well known, so I think he'll get in
Lucina, everyone and their mother is worshiping the gematsu leak as if it is the new helix fossil and saying it is confirmed true, and before nintendo's e3 event, I would say I was one of those people, however when Reggie was talking about Amibos (The NFC figures) there was a screenshot of a lot of Nintendo characters that would show how many Amibos there would be, and one of those characters was NOT Chrom, instead one of those was Lucina from fire emblem, and all of the other characters, at least to my knowledge, were announced for ssb4 except for Lucina and G&W (Which gives more evidence for G&W) so who knows, maybe I'm overreacting, but I think that Lucina is more likely than Chrom
Isaac, Isaac, to me, seems like a character that fits smash very well, he was already in brawl, but only was an assist trophy, but little mac was also an assist trophy and he became a character, also the first golden sun GBA game was released on wii u virtual console so the series probably grew in popularity when that happened, and there is one more GBA golden sun game so I think that putting him in smash would be a good way to promote releasing the second GBA game on Wii U
Chorus Kids, in all honesty, out of all of the characters on this roster I made, the chorus kids are the ones I think are the least likely to get into the game, the only reason I put them on is the gematsu leak but even I have doubts on that
Captain Rainbow, If I remeber correctly one time Sakurai said that Wii Fit Trainer wouldn't be either the unexpected character in the roster, or the joke character, but either way, I think that sakurai, and the mad man that he is, would do something like this, seeing that we have seen characters like Ness in 64, Game and watch and the fire emblem characters in Melee, Pit and Rob in brawl, these were all characters we never would have expected to see, and their appearance in smash boosted global popularity and in some situations moved those franchises over seas, so I think that if Sakurai put him in, it would be a good way to boost global interest in his games
Rayman, to be honest, back when Rayman legends came out, he seemed like the perfect character for smash, but now he seems kind of less likely, I think that if Rayman Legends stayed as a Wii U exclusive title, then he would easily be in, but now it seems like he has a 50/50 chance and honestly the only reason I put him in is because I needed to fill up one more empty slot in the roster
So that is my list, feel free to tear it to shreds if you really want to!
I've seen some stupidly big rosters, with so much effort going towards custom moves and other fighters I think people are just getting their hopes up. If you count Mii Fighters separately then I expect 46, 44 if you don't
Wii U: /Random
3DS:
..../random
Substitute dolls are the gematsu characters, The 3DS roster goes from oldeset to youngest series (with some exceptions) and characters are in the same order as the demo.
I've gone for a 4x13 size roster (Although I acknowledge that 4x12 is a very real possibility) as it seems the other most likely outcome. The characters are, for the most part, arranged to correspond with the layout in the Wii U demo roster; towards the end there is no particular order though.
Characters:
- Shulk, Chrom, Chorus Men - Gematsu mostly, although from what I have read (Not personally played these games myself) Shulk and Chrom at least have good chances even if you ignore it.
- King K. Rool/Dixie Kong/(Ridley) - K.Rool is one of the characters I support and seems to have potentially the most going for him as a newcomer character to be included. Then, so as to start the new line with Zelda characters, I feel another character goes in this line, so another Mario/DK/Metroid character. I do not personally think Ridley will be playable (And would be very happy to be wrong) so I feel Dixie Kong is the choice here. If you are a Ridley supporter, the layout still works nicely with Ridley instead of Dixie.
- Falco/Wolf - Sakurai stated there would be cuts and I am not sure that Star Fox is safe from them; this layout works out nicely as well. If I were to choose one to be removed it would be Falco (Because he could to some extent be replaced by custom movesets for Fox, whereas Wolf distinguishes himself more) and because I prefer Wolf for more villain representation.
- Mewtwo - I could see Mewtwo coming back, especially due to his renewed relevance and popularity in Pokemon. 6 Pokemon is nice for obvious reasons, and I don't think any other Pokemon have more reason to be in.
- Lucas - I don't personally believe he'll be back.
- Mii - I think, both for simplicity of character selection and the promotional artwork that has Mii occupying the equivalent of three slots that Mii will be split in some way similar to this.
EDIT: The post above mine includes a layout which makes a lot of sense as to why the Pikachu/Greninja icons switch round between the Wii U and 3DS demo, so I feel Pikachu being at the end of the row on Wii U could very well be the case. This can still be achieved with the roster I posted by re-arranging some icons whilst leaving the franchises etc. intact.
That's 45 characters if you don't count the variations of Mii, I'm not sure how they're going to show up on the roster, so I'm guessing you can have 3 different Miis on the roster, making the roster a total of 47.
My cuts are ROB, Lucas and Falco.
I don't think ROB is coming back, I don't know he just seems like one of the characters who's getting cut, I'm not a big ROB fan myself, but I do know there is a few ROB fans, he'll be missed, he could at least appear in Smash Run as ROB Sentry since that was a Subspace enemy, that's all I'm asking to include ROB if he's to be cut.
I think we might lose a Starfox character and tbh, I don't know about this one, I went with Wolf on returning basically cause he's a bad guy and we could use another bad guy on the roster, but tbh, I don't know, I had to pick one, would be nice to keep both, but unfortunately 3 Starfox characters does sound like one too many, personally I feel Starfox should have equal amount of characters to Metroid, which is two.
I think we might lose Lucas, Ness will probably return because he's like the face of Earthbound and therefore represents the entire series and is known more world wide than Lucas, although Lucas should at least appear as a Assist Trophy.
Mewtwo > Jigglypuff, I still think Mewtwo might make it, either one would be great, but I want Mewtwo slightly more, but Jigglypuff wouldn't be bad either, just replace Rest with Dazzeling Gleam and she's ready to go.
Ganondorf > Ghirahim, c'mon, he's Ganon, nuff said, why would they replace him with the likes of Ghirahim if Ganon is like the main villain of the entire Zelda series, its like if they replaced Bowser with some other Mario villian, plus I feel confident with his move set this time cause Namco, these are the guys who made DBZ Budokai Tenkaichi 3, and there is a character in that game, King Cold, they made his moveset work with a combination of death beam, kicks and sword attacks, they can do the same for Ganondorf.
My New character predictions are Isaac, Shulk and Chrom.
54 (57 with Miis)
Organization is beautiful imo.
This is the best possible outcome imo.
Ganon or Vaati. Or none.
Chrom or Robin.
Isaac and/or Ray or neither.
Medusa or Pittoo. Or Hades. Or none.
Sceptile > Mewtwo > Jigglypuff. Probably the other way around.
55 might be pushing it, especially with the 3DS version but I feel like they'll go all out with this game. We'll see!.
I've compared this size of Namco's Tekken Tag Tournament 2 of 55 characters and I feel a bit positive about this one.
I feel like a majority of of Brawl's Roster will return, Minus Squirtle and Ivysaur.
I also put characters from the Gematsu leak along with my personal choices.
-Dixie Kong
-Sukapon
-Issac
-Takamaru
-Ridley
-Mewtwo
Ok, so I’ve been there will most likely be about forty-five to fifty character slots for Super Smash Bros for Wii U/3DS. I think 50 is a bit much for the 3DS, but I’m not saying I completely just don’t believe it, as I can with the rest of this prediction. This is my list of predicted characters and why I think they’d make a return (f I can think of a reason for each);
Shulk (Xenoblade) – I just hear a ton of speculation about it, I think it could be probable.
Chrom (Fire Emblem) – Same as Shulk, plus, he’s a fan favorite in the Fire Emblem series now.
Jigglypuff (Pokémon) – it’s not yet once not made an appearance as of yet.
Captain Falcon (F-Zero) – Same as Jigglypuff, plus, his Falcon Punch has become a staple in and out of the Super Smash Bros. series because of Super Smash Bros..
Ness (Earth Bound) – Again, another of the original twelve.
Wario (Warioware) – It just seems wrong not to bring Wario back, he was so unique, it was amazing.
Mr. Game &Watch (Game & Watch) – Hate to say it but… Pac Man trailer, nuff said.
And here are my iffy ones.
Ganondorf (The Legend of Zelda) – He’s the third part of the triforce and the main villain in TLoZ, sure his move set should be changed, but I’m hoping he stays in, he could easily have been cut though… sadly.
Falco or Wolf, but not both (Star Fox) – Why don’t I think both? Well, I know Wolf isn’t an exact clone, and that’s why I think he should stay. But Falco kind of is a clone, but he’s also a fan favorite. I honestly hope they include both, but I doubt it.
R.O.B. (R.O.B.) – I don’t know what to say about him… except I hope he doesn’t return.
Character I don’t think are coming back.
Ice Climbers (Ice Climbers) – Yes I know, they’ve been in since Melee, but they’re kind of blah. They completely depend on each other for their recovery and other things and that sucks. I’m aware that there is Rosalina and Luma but Rosalina isn’t utterly dependent on Luma, though she loses a bit of her flare, Rosalina can handle being a standalone character. Honestly hoping they don’t return.
Metaknight (Kirby) – Don’t get mad at me, because I’m honestly hoping Metaknight makes a return… but something is making me doubt it… they’d have to nerf him definitely.
Mew Two (Pokémon) – Despite his new mega-evolutions… nope… although his fighting mega would be a good edition.
In addition, I believe the starting Roster will consist of fourteen characters; Link, Mario, Pit, Pikachu, Villager, Samus, Marth, Rosalina, Kirby, Yoshi, Little Mac, Wii Fit Trainer, Peach, Donkey Kong. Why? That's all of the characters on both covers combined. With the exception of Pokémon Trainer in Brawl, they usually put the whole starting roster on the cover, am I wrong? Of course they’ll most likely have more than that starting since fourteen out of fifty—hell, even forty sounds like a lot of unlocking and of course I’m aware I’m missing some (Fox, etc.) but like I said… pretty sure this won’t be all the starting roster, but we shall see.
What I believe will be Super Smash Bros. 4's final roster, give or take a couple characters. 52 characters total, with three cuts (Lucas, Ivysaur and Squirtle), Mewtwo returning from Melee, and 15 newcomers. Explanations;
-K. Rool. I'll be pretty shocked we didn't get a third DK character, the slot may go to Dixie or Cranky, but Sakurai seems to be giving the Kremlings some love with Smash Run and I feel he'd make K. Rool playable, he's still a very popular and requested character, despite his absence from recent games.
-Ghirahim, if the Trophy Theory is true (which it could be, it wouldn't surprise if Sakurai had set it up, knowing he's such a troll), then Ghirahim would be pretty much confirmed, being the only choice for a popular Zelda newcomer left who hasn't been confirmed in a non-playable role. I do doubt his chances, but he's got a shot.
-Ridley. I could talk about his chances a lot, but I won't go into too much detail. Sakurai teased him in the Direct - implying him to be a boss - but it's because of Sakurai's teasing that I think he's in as a playable character. Sakurai's also teased other characters, namely Palutena, and they've been revealed as newcomers. I don't see why that wouldn't be the case for Ridley.
-The cuts. With Gemastu at 8/11, and the third part's comment about Lucas likely going to get the cut, it seems unlikely that he'll be with us for this instalment. Ivysaur and Squirtle I highly doubt are making it back, especially with Jigglypuff and Mewtwo still to be revealed.
-Keeping Snake. I believe Snake will be playable in Smash 4. Four third-party characters isn't impossible and in the event that we lose Snake, then we would lose an entire series as well, and I don't think Sakurai would want that to be the case. It all boils down to whether Kojami and Sakurai agreed to have Snake return, which I personally hope they did.
This Is my best prediction currently. Red means less than likely, Green is a newcomer, Yellow for Mewtwo (returning from Melee), and Blue for Brawl Veterans
July 14th Trailer
Same thing with the borders, added Robin and Lucina, Removed Chrom, and The Chorus Men now that Gematsu was just some lucky guesses. I suppose now that we have Robin that Isaac is less likely and honestly that spot goes to either Isaac or a Rhythm Heaven Rep
Also Gonna throw a 56 slot roster on here just to show how it could work.
Moved the mii's to a separate area added marshal as a rhythm heaven rep and removed lucas, not sure about his return with or without gematsu but if he does return he'd probably take Bandanna Dee's spot. Same as before Blue for brawl vet, red for less than likely, yellow for Mewtwo, and Green for newcomer.
EDIT: Didn't mean to put jigglypuff as red meant for her to be blue.
Another change because I have nothing to do in the mornings
Put Lucas Back, and moved some things around. Fixed Jigglypuff and put him back to blue, two random slots to balance out the look.
New Prediction, Added Impa because she's a recurring Zelda character, and Duck Hunt Dog as a retro rep, changed Marshal to Karate Joe because I feel he would fit better, removed Geno because he doesn't seem likely. Black Shadow is another possibility just to take Ganondorf's old moveset and revamp Ganondorf with his new Hyrule Warriors appearance. This roster seems it would be perfect in my opinion and if there is DLC i think these will be the DLC Fighters
Snake, Squirtle and Ivysaur are the only cut from Brawl most likely so if people enjoyed playing as them here they are back. If K. Rool does make it in over Dixie Kong than she would be a great DLC character. Without DLC 2 F-Zero Characters and 3 Mother Characters may seem like a lot so Black Shadow and The Masked Man would be great additions. Bandanna Dee may still make it in but in case he doesn't he fits as a DLC fighter. Geno is still very unlikely and another Wario rep may seem weird but they would definitely be interesting. Lastly Bowser Jr. would be a really nice addition to the roster along with being somewhat highly requested.
This is honestly what I foresee the Sm4sh Roster to look like (in the Wii U layout).... if anything, just move Fox and Falco to the end of Row 3, and place Villager and WFT between Marshal & Little Mac.
With the 33 characters we know, here's how I fill out the rest for the 4x12 (47 + Random)
3 Veterans from 64: Jigglypuff, Ness, and Captain Falcon. (I can't see any of them being cut due to seniority and originality).
4 Veterans from Melee: Falco, Ganondorf, Ice Climbers, Mr Game&Watch (The two Retros are iconic, beloved parts of the roster for joke reasons, creativity, and Wobbling. Falco and Ganondorf are clones that have been separating out each game, and will likely being Luigi-tier by Sm4sh. Both are incredibly popular fan wise).
3 Veterans from Brawl: Wario, Meta Knight, R.O.B. (Wario's just too damn iconic to dare be cut, Meta Knight's stage is back.... but R.O.B. I'm solely putting in here because while fans have had mixed feeling about him, I don't think Sakurai will drop him).
4 Newcomers: Chrom, Shulk, and Marshal (In place of Chorus Boys) are all based upon Gematsu leak speculations and all of them I personally feel should be in for various reasons. Sceptile completes the Starter Trinity to replace Ivysaur, gives Gen III its first and only representative, and coincides with Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire coming this fall.
All characters from Melee cut from Brawl are kept cut.
Dropping Ivysaur and Squirtle (basically deconfirmed), Snake (didn't blend in well with Smash for Brawl), Wolf (while less of a clone than Falco, never had close to the fan love), Lucas (Gematsu 3rd leak hints towards it, same reasons as Wolf).
Popular characters omitted
Ridley: As someone who has played all but Prime: Hunters... I feel that Ridley is best kept as a boss so he can have his intimidation factor as this giant beast in tact.
Dixie Kong: ...I just don't see it without combining aspects of Tiny Kong and such into her moves.
King K. Rool: Even with the combining pool of King, Kaptain, and Baron K. Rool, I feel that he would not be an impressive fighter despite being a very good choice as a character.
Mewtwo: He was subpar in Melee. I grew up with Pokemon and it is quite possibly my favorite game series... but he just isn't one to return in my eyes, especially if it means 7 slots of Pokemon.
Isaac: The first person I'd put in realistically if I had another slot.
Krystal: God no. Star Fox doesn't need a third/fourth slot. Especially not for the character which represents the games that most fans despise.
If the roster is 4x13 instead of 4x12, my other 4 choices would be Isaac from Golden Sun, Bowser Jr., Mewtwo, and just for personal bias and a "Left Field" option, Geno from Super Mario RPG due to the song in Brawl and Square Enix promising to "Think more about the fans" in company decisions after FF 14's terrible original launch... though Takamaru is more likely in that 4th slot because Sakurai has expressed interest in the series, as he did with Kid Icarus.
Going through the Wii U/3DS demo rosters and taking some notes from Brawl's roster, this is what I think the final roster will look like (not including DLC).
I think Ridley will be our final newcomer (and before you judge me, I am not a Ridley fan. I will explain my logic in a bit), and the DLC characters will be Dixie Kong, Lucas, Mewtwo and one other (one for each row). Dixie would sit next to Diddy, Lucas next to Ness, Mewtwo next to Lucario and the final character somewhere on the bottom row. I'm probably off on where the characters will sit column-wise, but I am very confident that each character is sitting in the correct row.
You may also notice that Mii Fighters are missing. This is because I do not believe they will be on the roster in the same way as other characters. Mii Fighters are heavily focused on their customization. Every detail about them can be customized: The way they look, their size, their combat style and their outfit/colour choice. Since there's too much variation in character design, I do not think Mii Fighters will use the official artwork. Backing up this theory is amiibos, in which Mii Fighter amiibos are the only amiibos that will not be sold on the market despite having an "official" design. I believe this is because the purpose of the Mii Fighter is meant to represent the person playing as the mii, and using default characters takes away from that illusion. Another piece of evidence towards this theory is that Mii Fighters are the only characters banned from online play, despite Palutena also having varying custom moves as well.
As such I think Miis will be tied to the customization system (where one sets up their attacks and all that), and I think that will be tied into the name you select for your character - for example, how in melee and brawl you could name yourself "Poop" and it would display above your character's head throughout the match. From this, once you select your "name" (think of it as a save file in this game, it could be your NNID) that has all of your custom attacks and mii, and you can select a separate icon in order to fight as that character. I imagine it will just say "mii" or have a silhouette of your character in the screen selection menu once you do so in order to identify your character.
SO, with all of that said, that is why I do not believe miis will be on the roster in the traditional sense. Taking in the most likely rumours and returning vets into account, we have 46 characters and one random space. I tried playing around with the bottom row a bit, trying to fill up that gap, and only Captain Falcon seemed to fit in the top right corner (taking into account that was his original position in Smash 64). But the issue for me then becomes "who would fill up the missing slot on the bottom row?" Of course it could be just about anyone, and it's way too difficult to speculate. As much as I'd love to see Isaac, if I take into account character popularity on Smashboards the most likely person to fill up that missing slot is either Ridley or King K Rool, both of whom would go on the top row anyways.
So that's why it was either against K. Rool or Ridley. They both have evidence leading to each one, however I do think Ridley trumps King K Rool for the simple fact that he has appeared in some capacity in every Smash game since Smash 64 (background in 64, video trailer in Melee, and as TWO boss characters in Brawl). The other reason I think it's Ridley is because Dixie is more likely to get in over K Rool since she was planned for Brawl, as well as my belief that the DLC characters will either be cut characters or clones in some capacity (Dixie being a clone of Diddy) in order to make balancing easier.
SO there's my logic. I clearly spent way too much time trying to figure this out, but I'm really confident in my thought process. Again I am not a huge Ridley fan, I've never really seen his appeal. I just think putting the pieces together leads to him being the final newcomer. There's also the chance we get Mii Fighters on the roster, but visually I just don't see how that will look good if they are banned from online play (they'll either be darkened, X'd out or disappear from the roster, none of which will look appealing). To me, it logically makes more sense for them to have their own selection process away from the roster.
Also I made images for what the roster would look like with DLC, along with 3DS (+DLC) variations but unfortunately only the 3DS+DLC one saved properly, so there's no real point in posting it. Basically I reordered the characters nicely, but it's not very similar to the Wii U's order at all, and honestly it's just pure speculation anyways.
Number of characters: 50(Not counting transformations)
Newcomers: 17 counting Roy and Mewtwo returning
Cuts: 2 (Toon Link and Lucario)
6/17/2014
My updated 50 character roster. It assumes that the Gematsu leak is real(including Lucas being cut), that Snake is cut(along with Ivysaur and Squirtle), but also adds a few characters that weren't on the leak(similar to how Rosalina wasn't on it). Those being Mewtwo, Ridley, and King K. Rool. Since Gematsu never really mentioned veterans, that could explain Mewtwo not being on it. Ridley and King K. Rool are added due to their popularity and to have a nice even 50 characters.
7/14/2014
Replaced Chrom and Chorus Men with Lucina and Robin since the Gematsu leak is now dead. Odd thing is, if the roster ends up like this, then there would only be 3 more newcomers. Ridley, King K. Rool, and Shulk. And that's with having 50 characters and Snake and Lucas being cut.
Roster with Sal leak, Trophy quiz theory and teased characters. 54. Rhythm Heaven Girls is Marshall/ Chorus kids.
7/14/2014
54, because of the capacity of the official site.
Shulk and Chorus Kids: Still likely.
Isaac: Suddenly all Golden sun content desapeared. I means something.
Ridley and K. Roll: popular picks.
Sceptile, Mewtwo and Jigglypuff: FE has 4 then why pokémon can't have 7?
Snake: Rayman got me to believe.
8/1/2014
You can also call Dark Pit as Chorus Men or Lucas.
Bowser Jr: Has soooo much potential! Adds a lightweight villain for variety, too!
Paper Mario: Represents his own series - so much potential for a largely ignored sub-series.
Dixie/K. Rool: Kirby got 2 newcomers in Brawl, it's DK's turn
Ridley: That shadow in the April direct still seems so conspicuous - especially because it's almost August and it still hasn't been cleared up
Mewtwo: 6 Pokemon reps seems perfect. No reason to drop Jiggs.
Shulk/RH Rep (Chorus Kids for placement): My personal hopes. Spooky Spirit is in Smash Run, so hopefully that means something.
GW & R.O.B. are with the Mario characters because both of them have appeared in Mario titles (or rather the Mario characters have appeared in Game and Watch games), and they're more like "Hardware" characters than Retros. Tingle is the only logical Zelda newcomer. Jigglypuff and Mewtwo are probabl both coming back. Anna would be a good way to incorporate a fresher kind of Fire Emblem character while representing both Awakening and the entire series. Takamaru and Lip are very solid retro picks, and their placement with Little Mac is due to all three characters appearing in Captain Rainbow together.
Separated into starters and Unlockables:
My far more pessimistic prediction if the Sal Ramano and RosalinaX Leaks are true:
The reality will probably be somewhere in between.
7/15/2014
Honestly? Takamaru, Shulk, and Chorus Kids are all pretty iffy. I can take or leave Shulk, there's literally nothing but a now dead leak to suggest he's in, and as someone who's never played Xenoblade, all he is to me is literally the most generic looking jrpg protagonist possible, but I've kind of warmed up to Chorus Kids/Marshal now, and they have a Smash Run enemy. I'd like to see Takamaru just because he seems to belong here, but Greninja and the Miis seem to have already taken everything that would make him unique. Yet it would be odd if we didn't get a new retro at all, not only because there are so many good choices, but also because the last two games have included two new retros each. I think there's plenty of retro characters we could see instead of Takamaur, so we'll have to wait and see. Everything else I'm fairly confident about, even Snake. But if yesterday taught me anything, it's expect the unexpected, so I really can't see this roster being exactly right because then there are no more surprises.
This roster is based on the idea that the roster shown at E3 is going to be the same pattern used in the full game. While we all know that hasn't been true in the past, I think the roster fits well within that sense of reason.
I guessed Ridley and Mewtwo as other yet to be revealed characters, though I'm sure there could be more, I figured they fit the best in the way the roster shaped up and based on the trolling of Sakurai with Ridley. I believe either Mewtwo will return or Wolf, probably not both.
You may notice an open spot on the bottom row, I believe that will be taken by another new character. Could be Shulk or something, but I'm not willing to put all my chips on Gematsu now that Chrom isn't in the game as playable.
All that being said, Sakurai said we were nearing the end of new characters, but I have a feeling we're going to get more than just 2 or 3 more yet to be revealed characters, so another group of 4 could still fit into these rows.
If I had to make a wager on who those 4 would be, the top I'd assume a DK rep, 2nd row a Zelda rep, 3rd row would be Wolf (or Crystal, but doubtful), and 4th would be another 3rd party or random.
It's also possible that Captain Falcon could fit in Ridley's place, Ice Climbers could fit on the bottom row, and Mewtwo could not be in it altogether, bringing my roster down a set of 4 spots, but I'm fairly confident that it'll be as large (or larger than my prediction).
Can't wait to see what characters are revealed next month in the magazine release, maybe then we'll get a better idea of positioning of character portraits?
This is my prediction. Shulk and Chorus Men are on shaky ground, but I couldn't think of anyone to fill their spots. Other than possibly those two, I'm pretty confident in this.
So. Chrom's out. Lucina and Robin are in. With this point, I feel the need to expand out for another column into the 4x13 theory.
I am basically just going to group up the characters in my reasonings.
36 Slots known, 38 Characters
Veterans
Ness & Jigglypuff: Original 12
Falco, Ganondorf, Ice Climbers, Mr. Game & Watch: Iconic, loved Melee vets (Ice Climbers referenced in the work for the 3DS title, and Mr.G&W was teased at the end of Pac-Man's reveal.)
Wario & Metaknight: Inarguable Brawl veterans.
R.O.B.: Mixed fan reception, original moveset, no real reason to cut.
Wolf & Lucas: Debatable but possible clones to return, likely to become more semi-clone based.
Snake: Cut because he didn't really blend with the world of Smash back in Brawl.
Mewtwo: I'm a giant pokemon fan... but I don't have a want or belief he will return.
4 Cut Melee Clones: Staying dead.
8 "Sure" Veterans, 3 debated, 47 and 49. With 4x13 leaves 4 slots for newcomers.
Newcomers
Sceptile: Grass Starter, OR/AS on the horizon. Gen 3 has yet to have a playable representative.
Marshal: Sneaky Spirit in Smash run, I can see him being an awesome Mr. Game & watch like character.
Shulk: HUGE in Japan, and the sheer work that people did to have Xenoblade westernized gives him a place in Nintendo history and has a part in Sm4sh. I watched a full LP of the game and currently playing the game to get a proper feel for the character... about 23 hours in.
Geno: Entirely my wishful thinking. After Final Fantasy 14, Square Enix swore to think of the fans in their decisions... this could be a big way how. More realistically, replace him with none other than Bandanna Dee.
All in all, 51 slots, 53 characters. 4x13 (With Random)
Here's my dream roster but, I'll call it a prediction roster so we're on-topic.
It's a WIP btw, I'll add 4 more slots if the actual roster surpasses 50+
Order:
1st row: Mario, Luigi, Princess Peach, Bowser, Toad, Wario, Yoshi, Kamek, Little Mac, Sonic, Mega Man, Pac Man, Yoshimitsu
2nd row: Link, Princess Zelda, Impa, Ganondorf, Skull Kid, Samus Aran, Ridley, Anthony Higgs, Kirby, King Dedede, Meta Knight, Marx, ROB
3rd row: Fox McCloud, Wolf O'Donnell, Donkey Kong, Diddy Kong, King K. Rool, Marth, Ike, Chrom, Aversa, Pit, Palutena, Hades, Alexandra Roivas
4th row: Pikachu, Jigglypuff, Mewtwo, Feraligatr, Charizard, Ness, Masked Man, Captain Falcon, Captain Olimar, Mr. Game & Watch, Tom Nook and Aged Snake
Rationale on newcomers:
Toad: I feel is more relevant than Rosalina
Kamek: Another Yoshi rep, spellcasting.
Yoshimitsu: Represents 2 franchises for Namco, very awesome personality too.
Impa: Represents more females and Hyrule Warriors, long history with LoZ too since NES.
Skull Kid: Represents the second LoZ N64 villain next to Ganondorf, also a spellcaster to make it more fun. Cool personality too.
Ridley: No explanation needed.
Anthony Higgs: I thought Metroid was underrepresented and he seemed fit cause the Other M theme they have, he's also got moveset potential to be heavy artillery.
Marx: A TRUE Kirby villain, also represents Superstar Saga.
King K. Rool: No explanation needed.
Chrom: Main protagonist of Awakening, I don't like Avatar characters so I decided not on Robin.
Aversa: Female antagonist of Awakening, also a spellcaster. Also... waifu.
Hades: KI villain rep
Alexandra Roivas: Well, this one is interesting. I loved Eternal Darkness and I thought this game needed a horror rep, also a female.
Feraligatr: I like him more than Greninja, just a bias.
Masked Man: Villain and another rep for Mother.
Tom Nook: Decided against villager cause again... I hate avatar/customizable characters (no depth imo)
Why I cut a lot of characters:
Most of them that I cut were clones.
Others I thought didn't add much depth cause they're ambiguous avatar characters (Robin, Mii, Wii Fit Trainer and Villager)
The roster if both RosalinaX and Gematsu leak is true, Both of which I have no problem being true because this looks like a really solid roster if you ask me.
If someone could update it with better icons, I would really appreciate it.
5/23/2014
Now including Ike, Also ignoring RosalinaX since that is pretty much fake.
Hidden:
Luigi
King K Rool
Ganondorf
Shulk
Falco
Wolf
Capt. Falcon
Jigglypuff
Ness
Chorus Men
R.O.B.
Mr Game & Watch
Sonic
Megaman
Pac Man
thoughts?
5/29/2014
Minor layout update. Now better organized.
5/30/2014
Now you might think its a bit large and I know, but with there being far more evidence in Gematsu favour then there is against it, along with Ridleys size being discovered as either smaller or a bit larger then Bowser, K Rool looking likely with Kremlings in Smash Run, along with a DK newcomer being likely in general and Melee and Brawl both introducing a retro character and Takamaru being very relevant at the moment despite still being a retro character seems like the best bet. And Sakurai already stated he wants to avoid as many cuts as possible makes me think the roster might be larger then I first thought.
Notes
Roster organization was based on past games
Kirby is in the middle
Mario > DK > Link > Samus > Kirby > Fox > Pikachu have always been ordered like this and is even how they appear on the official site.
Toon Link is above Link and Shiek is above Zelda.
The bottom row is a mirror. Third Party character > Third Party character > Single rep newcomer > Single rep strange newcomer > retro > Console rep > Mii < console rep < retro < Single rep strange newcomer < Single rep newcomer < Third Party character < Third Party character.
Third Row has all rpg characters up to Palutena and uprising has an adventure feel to it.
Olimar simply had no where else to go but I guess he fits at the end of the Mario characters (Pikmin were in Mario Golf)
Second row is also a bit of a mirror (minus Capt. Falcon)
Why I kept Snake
Anything that applied to him now also applied to him in Brawl and Kojima said he doesn't know if Snake is in which I find very hard to believe (you either know or you don't know) and followed that up with asking Sakurai once again to put Snake in (maybe to make it look like Sakurai quickly re-added him?) and we also have the Raiden interview which is very suspicious.
6/1/2014
Layout update
Starting Character:
Mario
Peach
Bowser
Rosalina
DK
Diddy
Yoshi
Wario
Olimar
Link
Zelda
Sheik
Toon Link
Samus
Zero Suit Samus
Ridley
Kirby
King Dedede
Meta Knight
Fox
Pikachu
Charizard
Greninja
Lucario
Marth
Ike
Lucas
Pit
Palutena
Little Mac
Ice Climbers
Takamaru
Wii Fit Trainer
Villager
That should be 35 starting characters while the rest are hidden. More organized with characters while still following past Smash traditions.
What do you think?
6/12/2014
Update
Cuts: Squirtle, Ivysaur, Lucas & Snake.
Why?: Lucas was mentioned probably gone in the leak and Snake hasn't been revealed yet and I consider E3 his last chance, I hope I'm wrong but 4 third party characters also seem like a bit much as well.
Total: 51
Why?: Looking at the demo character select screen, we can work out where some characters will go. And with Marth and Greninja are next to each other, we work out all Rpg characters will be together so unless Wolf, Falco, Ness or Jigglypuff are cut, that means we are getting 4 x 13.
Newcomers:
Chrom: Leak
Shulk: Leak
Chorus Men: Leak
K Rool: With 4 x 13 roster, there are room for two characters on the top row and with Kremlings in Smash run, I chose K Rool.
Ridley: He is about the same size as Bowser when his shadow was in the direct so that tells me he is most likely playable
Bandana Dee: It was either him or Chibi Robo to go with the laid back characters and with King Dededes move change and R.O.B. proving enemies don't matter, I think he has a good shot
Takamaru: Retro character for this game, has appeared in a lot of games lately and his game was even released on the Pal region EShops.
I predict the last newcomers are Marshal, Shulk, King K Rool, and Ridley. I also think at this point, Squirtle, Ivysaur, and Snake are the only Brawl veterans not returning.
The reason I chose the Rabbid instead of Rayman is because the Rabbids seem to be more relevant than Rayman himself lately. Plus, Sakurai already has already shown Rayman as a trophy, but not a fighter, so I think his spin-off series' characters, the Raving Rabbids, are much more likely.
I know I said I won't change it, but I'm bored, people! I'm at home today, I have nothing to do! I made a starting and final roster. So, 48 slots, 51 characters, with the following newcomers:
Rosalina
Dixie Kong
Ridley
Palutena
Little Mac
Shulk
Chrom
Mega Man
Villager
Wii Fit Trainer
Takamaru
All of Brawl returns, as well as the return of Mewtwo. As I said, there are 51 characters: ZSS, Sheik, and the three Pokemon for the Trainer are still there.
EDIT: Updated certain character arts. Diddy Kong confirmed!!
5/23/2014
I will be posting my roster regularly. It pretty much stays the same and consistent.
Roster 7/16
I still like to believe the Gematsu Leak holds some ground, so I do not consider Shulk and especially the Chorus Kids out of the running. Other than that, not much has changed, it's still my same old roster. You can switch Dixie out with K. Rool, either one can get in. Hell, Sakurai can pull another FE and we can get both of them.
Hello, I'm new around here. Here's my prediction roster. It assumes that no one from Brawl has been cut and that the "leaks" from E3 are true. I also based my roster on the appeal of the Mario, Zelda, and Pokemon Series having 5 representatives each.
Character Slots from Brawl: 35
Newcomers: 13
Total: 48 (53 playable characters including transformations)
Some notes:
1. Toad- I haven't given up on him yet. Sakurai's caption for Peach's reveal is just vague enough to not disconfirm Toad. He is the most iconic Mario character not yet playable, he has been playable in main Mario games before and especially after the release of Brawl, he is immensely popular in Japan, and he has achieved the highest honor of being playable in a 3D Mario game.
2. Dixie Kong- She's playable in 2 titles in the original Donkey Kong Country trilogy and is also playable in Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze. This new game has revived her relevancy to the Donkey Kong series, and even gave her a new bubble gum pop gun move. While she may play similarly to Diddy Kong, nothing has stopped semi-clones from being on the roster before. King K. Rool is a runner up for this spot, but unless he is the secret fourth playable character in Tropical Freeze, or appears in Tropical Freeze in some fashion, I believe his relevancy to the series has been greatly diminished.
3. Ganon- With Toon Link confirmed, perhaps we can hope for more variations of the Triforce trio. One thing I do notice about other rosters is that they avoid a 5th Zelda rep entirely or add characters from Skyward Sword or the Wind Waker, but characters from the classic Zelda games like A Link to the Past are routinely ignored. Predicting a third Link based on ALttP or A Link Between Worlds may be pushing it, but Classic Ganon may very well be the biggest missing piece in Zelda's representation of all. Toon Ganondorf would also be interesting, but Ganon has appeared in the franchise more frequently.
4. Ridley- I don't play Metroid and I don't care about his inclusion or exclusion. However, I do get where Metroid fans are coming from, and he fits nicely in my prediction roster.
5. Palutena- Perhaps Kid Icarus does not deserve another rep, but Palutena is popular and can fight with a staff too. Uniqueness is a great asset for her. If she were to use the weapons that Pit doesn't end up using in his own move set, she would be even more appealing. I hope she makes it in.
6. Little Mac- Sakurai should throw the Western audience a bone and give us our favorite video game boxing champion already. We can only hope that the leak is true. Similar to Ness and Lucas, parts of his moveset could be based on moves his opponents use. He needs the move set potential to make the final cut.
7. The Pokemon Franchise- Thanks to X and Y, Lucario's relevance to the franchise has become solidified in the main video game series. This makes the Pokemon series very easy to work with now. Jigglypuff can remain due to tradition and for having new Fairy type moves. The Pokemon Trainer can remain due to being a great concept, although it is possible Squirtle and Ivysaur may be replaced with something else. Charizard is probably safe. Finally, Mewtwo is heavily requested all over the world, and is has a special place in the hearts of GameFreak and The Pokemon Company. His return to Smash is so close you can almost taste it.
8. Chrom- First off, Fire Emblem deserves a third representative. The Fire Emblem series is one of the oldest series in Nintendo history and has regained new strength thanks to Fire Emblem: Awakening. I would prefer Robin, the Avatar, to represent Awakening, but Chrom is moreso the poster boy of the game. Chrom should not replace Ike. It is hard to imagine Chrom's Falchion, which is the same sword as Marth's only reforged after many years, to behave like Ike's heavy Ragnell in the game. Ike as the Heavy Swordsman worked well for me and I'd hate to see him go. Chrom may not be the most exciting Lord, but his uniqueness compared to the other Fire Emblem characters is his bond with his heroic army, the Shepherds. I imagine Chrom's moveset to be based somewhat off of the Pair Up system from Awakening. Perhaps he will summon characters like Lucina, Robin, Tharja, and Lissa to assist him for a short period of time. Or perhaps one of the Shepherds will stand along side him as an AI like the Ice Climbers. There is a lot of potential here if you can think a bit outside the box. But yes, this is a contentious issue.
9. Mii and Pac-Man- If the leak is true, then Mii and Pac-Man have to be in the roster as well. Mii's inclusion in the roster can be easily justified for being the most iconic entity of the Wii hardware family. Pac-Man's inclusion can be justified due to being an legendary video game icon from Namco, who is helping to work on the game. I think they are a bit boring, but that's ok.
10. Snake- I would prefer Simon Belmont, as he is definitely the most appropriate Konami representative for a Nintendo crossover game, but Snake was very unique and I'd hate to disappoint his fans. And even though the Wii U may never get a new Metal Gear Solid game, there's still a chance that the 3DS will. Who knows?
2/11/2014
Time for a new attempt before any craziness happens with the DKCTF Pic of the Day and the hypothetical February Nintendo Direct.
49 Character slots, 54 playable characters including transformations, and 14 newcomers (including Mewtwo).
Included because they are popular:
Ridley
King K. Rool
Palutena (I also like her character in Kid Icarus Uprising)
Little Mac
Mewtwo (I'm a Pokemon fan. Few Pokemon fans would dare exclude Mewtwo from a Smash roster)
Included because I believe in the E3 "leak":
Mii
Little Mac
Pac-Man
Others:
Classic Ganon - A whole bunch of Zelda games, the classic top-down ones, currently have next to no representation in Super Smash Bros. Rather than asking for another rendition of Link based on ALttP and ALBW, I figure Ganon, the antagonist who has appeared the most in the Zelda series would be cooler.
Robin - Fire Emblem Awakening is one of the most popular games in the franchise. Its success has also kept the Fire Emblem franchise alive for future installments. Choosing a rep from Fire Emblem Awakening is difficult, but Robin has more move set options thanks to the Tactician's ability to use magic, and the story of the game is more focused on him/her than on Chrom. The only downside to Robin is that he/she is not the poster character of the game, nor is he/she more popular than Lucina.
Lip - Nintendo has a rich history in making good puzzle games. Now that Dr. Mario is out of the picture and isn't in consideration anymore, there is no representative of any of Nintendo's puzzle games. Luckily, Lip from Panel de Pon (known as Tetris Attack or Puzzle League in the West), is perfect for the role. In Panel de Pon's story mode, she uses her magic to defeat various opponents by creating puzzle combos that spawn garbage blocks on the opponent's side. If you are uncertain about her, I suggest you check out her support thread on this board.
4/13/2014
Given that transformations are separate characters and that Greninja complicates matters with Pokemon representation, I am now predicting a 54 character roster. My previous roster with 49 characters had over 50 characters anyway due to playable transformations. Other than Ivysaur and Squirtle, I predict there will be no further cuts from Brawl.
Included because they are popular:
Dixie Kong
King K. Rool
Ridley
Mewtwo
Included because I believe the Gematsu leaks are real:
Palutena
Shulk
Chrom
Mii
Chorus Men (or some other Rhythm Heaven character)
Pac-Man
Notes:
Four DK reps- In a 54 character roster, I believe Donkey Kong would receive two new characters. K. Rool is hinted at through Kritters being shown in Smash Run, and due to popularity. I also include Dixie Kong because she is going to be represented in the game somehow, and hasn't been disconfirmed yet.
Ganon as the 6th Zelda rep- If Pokemon is getting more representation than expected, I anticipate the Mario and Zelda series to match it. Ganon, as the most prevalent villain in the Zelda series originating in the classic top-down games, is the perfect pick for a sixth slot.
Ridley- I don't really care whether he gets in or not, but the circumstances of his deconfirmation are very suspicious. Implying that Ridley's clone from Other M is a stage hazard through a shadow? Why not just make the deconfirmation quick and to the point? To be honest, the space Ridley takes up could be used for Bandana Dee as a fourth Kirby character, but Sakurai is teasing Ridley way, way, way too much.
Mewtwo- Greninja, nor Lucario, does not suggest that Mewtwo won't be in the game. In fact, I am even more convinced that Mewtwo is in the game. Sakurai is taking a lot of advice from The Pokemon Company as to which characters to make playable, and they are all based on trends that can be seen in other forms of media. Charizard as a solo character is one of them. For evidence, look no further than Ash finishing the Black & White anime with Charizard in his party, or Red using Charizard in Pokemon the Origin, or Alan using Charizard in the Mega Evolution special. Greninja is based on a trendiness as well. There is a perception among fans of Pokemon X and Y that Greninja is the most popular starter of the three, even though The Pokemon Company has not used Greninja as some sort of promotional character until just recently. When it comes down to it, Mewtwo is one of the most popular pokemon ever to this day, and The Pokemon Company loves the guy. His appearance is Smash Bros. is very, very well supported. It will just take a 6th Pokemon slot (and Brawl already had 6 playable pokemon) assuming Jigglypuff doesn't get cut.
7/16/2014
54 characters at best, I firmly believe.
I'm going to give the Gematsu leaker the benefit of the doubt and assume he wasn't involved with the game for very long, and when he was involved, he was there near the very beginning. That would explain why the leaker assumed Chrom was playable and why the leaker didn't know Greninja's name, and didn't know every new character. I also believe that Sakurai revealed the new Fire Emblem characters before Shulk despite there being hints that Shulk would be revealed before them just to throw everyone off.
Notes:
Behold this lovely layout! We have the "Mario Universe" taking up the top row, then Miyamoto's other series below it, then other notable Nintendo series, then the three important RPG series, then misc./retro/third party last.
Lucas is cut: I believe he is a casualty according to the Gematsu leak. Mother 3 is not released world wide, wasn't as popular as Mother 2/Earthbound in Japan, and he was a clone, albeit one with a lot of good moves. Sorry, Lucas fans.
Snake lives on: I could be very wrong, but it's not too late. Honestly, I have trouble thinking of a character really important that could go on that bottom row. That's why Snake is there.
Ganon: See my previous roster comments. Now that Fire Emblem can get 4 reps, and perhaps was always intended to have four reps, perhaps Zelda deserves 6.
Marshal: I think the Gematsu leaker is simply mistaking Marshal from Rhythm Heaven Fever for the similar looking Chorus men. Why go with Chorus Men when you can have a character with a name?
Dixie Kong: Semi-clones are likely due to Lucina's inclusion, and DK deserves 4 reps thanks to recent releases. Tropical Freeze in particular.
Total: 51 (Mii Fighters = 1 slot)
Females: 11/50 (Not Counting Mii's)
Villains: 9/50 (Counting Wario, DeDeDe, and Dark Pit)
Newcomers:
Dixie Kong
Ridley
Dark Pit
Isaac
Ghirahim
Placeholder Character*
Unannounced Characters:
Wario
Game annd Watch
R.O.B.
Ganondorf
Ness
Mewtwo
Jigglypuff
Wolf
*Saving for a character that Sakurai will throw at us thats not on here
Explanation:
Newcomers:
Dixie Kong: New Donkey Kong Country game with her in it. Why not? She adds another female character and could have a unique moveset.
Ridley: SIZE DOES NOT MATTER IN SMASH! Sakurai has even stated this himself. Just because he's a boss, doesn't mean he can't be playable. You can have 4 Mario's on screen, why not 5 Ridleys. And plus, Alfonzo can take his place on Pyrosphere.
Dark Pit (Pitoo): Sakurai's own character from Kid Icarus (Duh). He's been hinted at multiple times like in Palutena's trailer and during the Smash Direct - specifically when his theme played in the 3DS stage montage.
Isaac: He was an assist trophy in brawl, but hasn't been talk about by Sakurai. People are speculating that because of his absence in the assist trophy trailer in the direct that he is playable. Currently at the 3nd to last character on my list.
Ghirahim: A really requested character that can't be a clone to anyone. He was speculated to be a newcomer before and after the Trophy Quizzes. Would be an amazing edition. Although, I replace Ganondorf with him in my old roster, but I decided to include both of them this time.
Placeholder Character: Just a reserved unannounced character slot. Not an actual character.
I used a spreadsheet to try to see how many characters would be in Smash bros 4. As you can see, I found the announcement date for each character, compiled them to create the amount of days from e3 2013 and compared it to the amount of revealed characters since e3 2013.
I'm quite pleased with this, actually. R² is really close to 1. It also turns out I was correct back when the game was first announced in thinking that the frequency of smash characters would increase with time, but this is irrelevant.
So anyways, there are 460 days between e3 2013 and the release date for Smash bros in Japan. It's pretty obvious that by that date we would have all the characters announced except for the possible secret ones. Extrapolate the trendline out to x=460 days, and you get y=44.83 characters. Round to 45, unless we're looking at 8/10 of a character! (I guess that could be Little Mac =P). Add in your preference for the amount of secret characters. Personally, I see it being 3 only based on how I think there was supposed to be 2 back in Brawl before they got leaked or something. I think I read this somewhere a while ago, but idk, it's just a guess.
The equation is 11.7522786583exp(.0029106077x) so that if you want to test it out yourself you may do so without having to type it out. (google can do this if you just paste it in)
And here's my data for the characters, when they got revealed, and the amount of days between their announcement dates. The characters fall under the date they got announced and then the time elapsed between the next character announcement is below that.
June 11
Mario, Donkey Kong, Link, Samus, Kirby, Fox, Pikachu, Bowser, Pit, Villager, Mega Man, Wii Fit Trainer
31 days
July 12
Olimar
26 days
August 7
Luigi
36 days
September 12
Peach
14 days
September 26
Toon Link
5 days
October 1
Sonic
37 days
November 7
Marth
31 days
December 18
Rosalina
8 days
December 26
Zelda
15 days
January 10
King Dedede
21 days
January 31
Lucario
13 days
February 13
Little Mac
8 days
February 21
Diddy Kong
46 days
April 8
Zero Suit Samus, Sheik, Yoshi, Charizard, Greninja
45 days
May 23
Ike
18 days
June 10
Miis, Palutena, Pac-Man
34 days
July 14
Captain Falcon, Robin, Lucina
... and that's what the math suggests! It's nothing complex, really. I've double checked all of the data, but still, if anyone find a mistake feel free to let me know and I can make adjustments. As more characters get announced, I can update this, but it probably won't change much unless troll Sakurai REALLY throws a curveball.
Feel free to use the data I gathered if you want to try doing it a different way. It took a while to find all of that.
It predicts 45 characters +x hidden characters. I'm going with 3 characters will not be revealed before the release date. I also think the graph is low by one, as this is a reasonable error that the graph can make. This leads to 49, which as it turns out, works out great visually.
I was surprised at how easily the characters fell into place. Placements are based off of a mixture of patterns from the SSB4 demo and Brawl. The thing is, they just fall into place too perfectly (yay confidence!).
I found myself needing a couple of newcomers.
Shulk - I've written a post with 10 points on why Shulk is probably in.
There's a lot of people saying Shulk's still likely but not really explaining why, so I'll do the favor of posting some of these reasons (and I'm sorry if I miss one or two)This is a long post, feel free to skim the headlines of each argument. That kind of serves as your tl;dr.
1) Gematsu isn't 'dead'
Before I stop mentioning Gematsu altogether, I would like to say that it's not necessarily dead. The Gematsu leak predicted a ton of characters, and we still have that sneaky spirit from Rythm Heaven that was spotted in Smash Run. It's possible that the leaker sending Sal Romano the emails could have mistaken seeing a completed model of Chrom for him being a character. The point is that we just don't know. It's probably best we hear an explanation from the leaker before we make our final conclusions on this. It could be that Shulk was planned for today but then moved to a later date for some reason, and the monolith developer who retweeted the character reveal today could have been mistaken in the same way the leaker was. The credibility of the leaker needs to be more stabalized for this point to have any weight, however.
That's all I'm saying about Gematsu
2) Sakurai's tweet of a real life Monado. 8/30/2013 http://operationrainfall.com/2013/08/30/sakurai-tweets-xenoblade-press-start/
Sakurai tweeted a picture of a monado that was at the press-start concert. It seems to have just been on the concert floor, by the players, for some reason. Perhaps Xenoblade music was being played? Nobody knows. Also, nobody knows the true intentions behind Sakurai's tweet. He could be a huge fan of the series or could have just found it neat. However you want to take it, there's only positives that can be taken from this as far is Shulk's inclusion in Smash 4.
3) Shulk is a commonly demanded character
Out west, as seen by this thread, vgtribune's Smash Poll 2012, and "Shulk for Super Smash Bros 4" fb page, Shulk is a hugely requested character. However, out in Sakurai's habitat, Japan, Shulk seems even more popular than he is here.
Sakurai is paying attention to the people's requests which is seen by how he wanted vgtribune to send him the top few winners from the poll back in 2012. Many of our top requested characters have made it into the game, whether characters, assist trophies, or stage hazards.
4) Shulk can be easily translated into Smash 4
This may seem obvious to people but it's nonetheless important. The main argument people had against Ridley before that Nintendo Direct was that he is too big, implying he would not easily translate into Smash. The opposite can be used as an argument for Shulk. It's easy to make and implement a unique moveset for him. His auto attacks, arts, and monado arts lay out the potential moves he can have. When making the moveset for my ssbb mod, I didn't have to be very creative at all; although, I could have been had I had the resources Sakurai does.
5) "But I am no ordinary swordsman!"
Robin said this in the announcement today, and the truth of the matter is, this is important to people. The "no similar swordsmen" argument derived from the "no clones" argument, and it's valid for characters like Chrom or Lucina but not for Shulk. Shulk isn't just another swordsman, he is the wielder of the Monado, a powerful and unique weapon. For those who haven't played Xenoblade, the Monado opens up like a banana (Bonado ) and a beam of energy comes out. This beam can vary in length, so it's not like it would have to be just like a sword with shock flags. More importantly, the Monado has a number of Monado Arts that could acts as B attacks, such as Monado Purge, Monado Cyclone, Monado Eater, Monado Speed, Monado Armor, and Monado Shield.
6) Voice actor of Shulk stated he's Voice acting in new game(s)
"I have been working on a new game recently. I can't say what it is yet but I was very pleased to see it trending on Twitter when it was announced. It's very satisfying to know there's a buzz and anticipation for a project you're involved in." http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2013/03/ninterview_meet_adam_howden_voice_actor_for_shulk
"Done some VO on several very exciting games so far this year. I'll tell you what they are when I know my balls won't be cut off for telling." https://twitter.com/A_HOWDZ
7) Monolith Soft is the maker of Xenoblade
Monolith Software used to be third party but came to be owned by Nintendo and so 1st party before Xenoblade was released. This means Nintendo is free to use Shulk if they want, without special permissions. This also makes Monolith the only 1st party developer company without a representation in the Smash bros series. Furthermore, Monolith Soft also worked on Smash bros brawl, which puts into place even further connections to Sakurai.
8) Xenoblade's sequel
The sequel to Xenoblade, Xenoblade Chronicles X, has an unknown amount of connection to Xenoblade. We know some guy at Nintendo treehouse said, "It's more of a spiritual sequel" when roughly asked how much the game relates to Xenoblade. We know there's a girl with two monado hairpins. We know that there's a nopon with the Satata's Japanese name (also sports similar glasses to Satata). I have my own arguments about the game, but I won't go into them. Anyways, connections to Shulk raise his relevance by lowering his obscurity and raising his foot print in Nintendo's timeline of gaming.
The sequel also improves the '7) Monolith Soft argument' because it means Monolith plays an even larger role in Nintendo.
9) Xenoblade is a masterpiece
Some awards (only the ones where Xenoblade got first place):
IGN [US] - 2012 Best Wii U / Wii Game
IGN [US] - 2012 People's Choice Best Wii U / Wii Game
Nintendo Life - Staff Award for Wii Retail Game of 2012
Nintendo Life - Community Award for Wii Retail Game of 2012
TechTudo [Brazil] - Best Wii-exclusive game of 2012 (in Portuguese).
Gamespot [UK] - Editor's Choice Best Wii Game of 2011
MMGN - 2011 Best RPG
RPG Fan - Best Sound of 2012, Best RPG of 2012
RPGamer - Best Music, Best Console RPG, Best Story, Best Overall RPG of the Year
Slant Magazine - #1 in Top 25 Best Games of 2012
PixlBit - Game of the Year 2012
The reason why you might find that Shulk supporters want him so bad is because of how great of a game Xenoblade is. It's seen as the game that turned around the JRPG genre. It has great story, astounding music, fun combat, and the best graphics that a wii game can have (this game tried to be hd on a non-hd platform!).
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That being said, these are just the least subjective arguments that I can think of at the moment. As I said at the start, sorry if I missed some.
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EDIT: (thanks Spazzy_D for reminding me of this)
10) Japanese voice actor of Shulk, Asanuma Shintaro, tweeted that she is hoping she can fill us in with some good news soon with #Xenoblade https://twitter.com/sogorukyo/status/476017276584333313
Google translate does a poor job on this.
Chorus kids - The sneaky spirit being in smash run (and the obscurity of that reference if chorus kids were not to be in smash bros) lead me to use chorus kids.
K Rool - After some reading of the k rool support thread, I came to understand the big deal with K Rool and I think he's better than any other newcomers that have not been >>deconfirmed<<.
Then I had one slot left
I put G&W back in. I originally had him cut but decided against it.
Now let's see how things play out. With any luck I've just posted the final roster.
The guy posted this on reddit as how the Menu may look like will all of the newcomers + brawl vets - Squirtle Snake and Ivysaur.
I can say with certainty that there will be at least 4 more characters, as Sakurai said Robin is our not our last Newcomer obviously.
So I'm pretty sure a roster of 51 is nearly guaranteed.
This is my predicted roster:
Roster of 51, I believe that is the number of characters we will get.
Cuts: Snake, Squirtle, and Ivyaur are the only cuts.
Newcomers:
Bandana Dee: Kirby can have a 4th rep if Fire Emblem can have 4. Bandana Dee is the perfect choice for a 4th Kirby Character. He has been more relevant to the series with each entry. In the new game, "Kirby and the Rainbow Curse" Bandana Dee appears will 3 recolors! So he must be a huge character now!
Ridley: He just deserves it.
King K. Rool and Shulk:
Padding personally, they can be replaced by anyone and I wouldn't care. So add MewTwo and Krystal if that's your thing instead of them.
7/17/2014
I updated the Icons for Bandana Dee and Falcon. I still beleive this is the final roster. However you can replace Shulk, King K. Rool, or whoever else for your favorite character. All I really care about is Bandana Dee.
Badish quality cause I made in paintbrush. Also, sorry for the odd design, kinda forgot about Rosalina...
Each color talks about my discusion on different serieseses.
So I decided that BJR would be a great addition especially with Shadow Mario and that paintbrush, he fits nicely with this game.I took an odd approach with LoZ, Ghiraham is added as the main villian, and Ganondorf was changed into the toon version... why? Here's why.Ok and I know DIddy and Dixie won't be a duo character, but I put it anyways because it would've been perfect. Still haven't decided if I want her in the game as a separate person so meh. KIngK is just beast, so there. Yoshi got the Babeh Bros. I always thought they fit nicely into the game, and would make a great duo character. Pikman was given Louie, I know he's kind of a clone but I sill love Louie :3 So that's pretty much my entire professional reason for him. I still think the three 3rd party characters are enough and no more should be added. Isaac is a character that finally needs recognition. He was too late for melee, and too early for brawl. So add him now. Shulk is a character 've never personally played as, but I see all positive things about him so there he is. I've decided to go with Dark Samus instead of Ridley, I just think he's too big. I know, size doesn't matter and whatnot but just my opinion. I added Hades to the Kid Icarus series. He just seems like the best smash character from that. Mother series was given Porky, I want him with his giant robot stuff, not normal fat kid. Well, maybe not giant, but yaknow. Ray from Custom Robo series is defiantly not a popular choice, but I think he would fit very nicely and I personally love the game myself. I added Waddle Dee, he could have more variety than just a harder hitting Kirby Clone without the specials (Knuckle Jo). Oh yea, and he's cuter :3 Added Krystal to Star Fox. Defiantly the best option for the series. Aaaand, Sceptile over Mewtwo AND Jigglypuff. The pokemon series is just too big to keep adding old people back. Have some variety! I would like to see Jiggs and/or Mew2 in a DLC though c:
My Roster, I believe we are still getting Shulk but are getting Marshal instead of Chorus Men
Wii U, note, because I'm start I noticed that characters always appear in the same order on the roster so based on that, I got.
Wii U
/Random
Substitutes are unconfirmed newcomers, in order they appear, they are
Daisy (Clone but oh well and OH YEAH)
K Rool (I love royalty)
Ridley (Have you seen that second post in the Ridley thread?)
LORD Ghirahim (Trophy theory please)
Marshal (An Enemy in Smash Run so yeah)
Dark Pit (Like Daisy and Lucina, planed as costume but upgraded)
Shulk (Pretty cute)
Louie (Daisy, Lucina, Dark Pit)
Oh but theres MORE!
3DS Roster Time!
/Random
Substitute newcomers in order.
Daisy
K Rool
Ghirahim
Ridley
Dark Pit
Shulk
Louie
Marshal
Pretty Sweet and pretty realistic imo. OH YEAH!
7/18/2014
@NintenRob
, I like your roster, I've become very optimistic now! I'm thinking we might get a fusion of the two!
3DS
Wii U
....
....
Newcomers
Clones: Daisy, Alph, Dark Pit.
Unique: K Rool, Ridley, Ghirahim, Marshal, Bandana Dee, Shulk, Satebo & Parabo guys 8-bit man has (Feel free to use this roster for your next rate that roster!)
What I expect at this point. I do not believe in the "Mario Theory." Gematsu's vague wording leads me to think Lucas will be in the game. Boxes probably wouldn't be this square or ugly on the actual CSS. CSS is sorted similar to the demo's layout, but with Olimar moved next to the Kirby cast instead of the Pokemon cast to make room for Mewtwo. I could probably add Snake and a Metroid/Donkey Kong/F-Zero newcomer to the bottom and top respectively, but I don't expect a roster above 50 personally. I would love to be wrong about this though.
7/14/2014
Revised prediction. King K. Rool could also be Dixie, but I think K. Rool is more likely. Chorus Kids are filler for a Rhythm Heaven character. My opinions toward Shulk and Lucas's playability have not been altered by today. Only thing that has really been effected is how large I think the roster will be.
7/18/2014
Redid my prediction based on the icons in my sig:
Organization is based on the demo's character select, with similar franchises put next to each other:
Falcon is next to the DK characters as a reference to Melee's character select screen.
Chorus Kids (RH Character) are next to Villager due to them both being more casual-ish franchises. Conveniently enough, this places them right underneath Wario!
Ice Climbers are next to Kid Icarus characters as a reference to Brawl's character select.
Shulk is between Fire Emblem and EarthBound/MOTHER characters as they were all formally Japan only game(s)/franchises.
"Why are Chorus Kids here if the second leak is fake?" I feel like we're getting a Rhythm Heaven character regardless. Having not played any Rhythm Heaven game, I just used the kids to represent that. Dixie Kong could also be seen as a filler for King K. Rool, but I'm just sick of seeing that same piece of K. Rool artwork over and over
i predict these newcomers/ veterans are the only ones left on the roster
another mario character
ridley or/and king k rool
shulk
captain falcon
decloned gannon
wario not wario ware suit
meta knight
falco
wolf/krystal
rob
ness
game and watch
mewtwo
jigglypuff/gen 3 character
another random character your choice
and of coarse the leak characters
7/18/2014
my roster prediction
the current roster plus gannondork mewtwo ice climbers mr.gameandwatch ridley king k rool isaac/shulk plus new retro rep (duck hunt dog) and new random rep
Here's my prediction; I'm hoping we still get a RH rep (perhaps swapping out Chorus Kids for Marshal like how Chrom was swapped out for Lucina during development), as well as Shulk, plus maybe two more Xenoblade reps (since we have 2 Awakening reps). And even without the Gematsu leak, I still think DLC may happen.
I'm also going off the assumption that Random becomes Mii (Fighters) when customization is enabled, and that third party assist trophies (ergo, standalone without a playable rep from said third party) are a possibility since Rayman is a third party trophy (may actually be an assist like possibly Phosphora?)
*EDIT* I added Jigglypuff (forgot her the first time) to the main roster and added Aeron (Pandora's Tower) and Kalas (Baten Kaitos; it was either him or KOS-MOS assuming Shulk/Fiora/Melia is in so that both Namco and Monolith Soft are involved. I settled on Kalas) to the Assist Trophy Lineup. Use the old chart for a reference as to what's what.
Also, assume that Gray Fox returns as an AT when Snake is downloaded; which is why you don't see him in the AT roster.
UPDATE 8/9/2014. Same reference guide as before. Swapped out Kalas for KOS-MOS on the AT roster after much thought, and made Melia an AT along with Derek Stiles (3rd party AT from Atlus's Trauma Center)
, Black Shadow, 
) and a beam of energy comes out. This beam can vary in length, so it's not like it would have to be just like a sword with shock flags. More importantly, the Monado has a number of Monado Arts that could acts as B attacks, such as Monado Purge, Monado Cyclone, Monado Eater, Monado Speed, Monado Armor, and Monado Shield.
