With the dry spell in-between Smash games, it gets hard to gauge how excited people are for a character and how likely people think a character is. It's not unheard of for a character’s fanbase and hype for a character to fizzle out or grow out between Smash games. I’ve created the Smash Community Character Corral to help remedy this.
The Character Corral works like this: Polltakers are asked to rate how much they want a character, and how likely they think a character will get in on a scale from 1 to 10. For probability, a 1 means the polltaker doesn’t think they will be playable, while a 10 chance means they’re a lock. A 1 want for that person means they would hate their inclusion, while a 10 means they would love it.
The first volume contains characters from the Mario series.With 111 votes [Thanks everyone!] from SmashBoards and various Discord servers, we hope the next few polls will prove just as (or even more) fruitful. The next volume will focus on Zelda, Metroid, Kirby, and Star Fox, and can be found here.
Personal Thoughts
Some of this article will contain my own thoughts, so I wanted to dive a little deeper. Keep in mind that these will play into my ratings in future articles in this series.
First, I doubt we will get a full on reboot of the series where the roster is Thanos snapped in half. I know some people want some older veterans to get a moveset overhaul, but I believe the majority of them are in a good spot given how few radical revamps we got in Ultimate. I think we’ll see less unique newcomers than Smash 4’s base game (15), but more than Smash Ultimate’s (6). Many of the newcomers will focus on newer games again. People tend to conveniently forget that the Wii U era was a dark age for Nintendo: there wasn't a ton of stuff to push based on relevancy. I do not think that fan demand is a moot point either given how Sakurai and Nintendo seemed to have their finger on the pulse for pleasing the crowd. The roster will probably not be catering to the fans as much as Ultimate did, but I think that we could easily see a couple of popular requests make it in. While I think first party characters will hold priority on-disc, I could see 2-4 third-party characters added.
There’s two other topics: DLC and Echo Fighters. I think we will probably see around the same number of Echo Fighters as we did in Ultimate (5), if not more.. For DLC, every DLC fighter in Ultimate, bar Piranha Plant, fits into one of two categories: Games Nintendo can promote via Smash (Byleth, Min-Min, Pyra), or Third Party characters, so I think that trend is very likely to continue. While we could see a fan favorite slip in, history does trend against that.
Section 1 - The Mario Franchise
Mario is one of the few series that has a shot at getting more than one unique newcomer in my opinion. The series already has eight non echo characters in the game. Mario even has a track record of getting more than one unique newcomer in Smash: it happened in both Melee and Smash 4.The only series that has more? Pokemon. Plus, Mario is Nintendo’s flagship franchise. Few things are certain: Grass grows, water is wet, and there will be a new Mario game each year. As a result, I am more optimistic with some of these characters than I will be for future series.
Author’s Note: This article was finalized and all poll responses were collected before the first trailer for The Super Mario Bros. Movie. While it is still too close to the ball dropping to use the new movie as decisive evidence, it is still something worth noting.
1) Waluigi
The elephant in the room: Waluigi. I struggle to think of a first party character with more outcry than Waluigi had. At first, I dismissed it, but I’ve realized Waluigi has transformed. He’s gone from a weird loser that everyone makes fun of, to a weird loser that everyone makes fun of and loves. The outcry was so big that it got its own Washington Post article, although Nintendo’s response could easily be interpreted as a blanket PR response. I do think in terms of fan favorite pulls you could go for, Waluigi has to be towards the top of the list.
While his fan love pulls him up on the radar, I do have a slight bit of pause. The first is that we don’t have any idea what Sakurai truly thinks of the character unlike, say, K. Rool’s costume in Ultimate or Sakurai’s interview comments on Ridley. The other factor is that Waluigi is kept to the Mario spin-offs. That’s not a deal-breaker, since both Daisy and Doctor Mario, characters highly associated with Mario spin-offs, are playable. The issue is that both of these characters originated as last minute clones, whereas Waluigi does not have that luxury. The rest of the Mario characters all got their first appearance in a mainline game rather than a spin-off. This will also apply to almost everyone later, but there is strong competition within his own series. While Mario probably is not as much of a victim of this as other franchises, it is still a factor.
I would give him an even 5/10 chance and 5/10 want. He’s a big fan favorite pick, but there are other first and third party fan favorites that can fill that niche. I think Waluigi would be a fun addition, but there’s other Mario characters I’d be more enthusiastic to see. The community gave Waluigi a 7.07/10 chance, making him the top scoring character for chance so far, and a 6.21/10 want, which is still a respectable fifth place. It definitely surprised me that he under performed in want.
2) Geno
The other elephant in the room: Geno. To me, Geno is a relic of the Brawl speculation era more than anything. On paper, he’s a character that makes almost no sense to appear. He’s a character who appeared in one game and a few cameos, and that one game did not even release in Europe and is owned by Square Enix. All of those factors would make you think Geno would be dead on arrival, but the longstanding demand for the character has lasted for over 15 years. I still think there was a time and place to add him: In Brawl. Speculation has evolved so much since then, where Geno’s last respite is his status as a legacy fan demand pick.
Geno is extremely niche. Super Mario RPG, while a well respected game, only sold a little over 2 million units worldwide and did not even release in Europe. I know some people will bring up Banjo as a comparison, but the two are pretty distinct in that regard. Banjo Tooie alone sold better than Super Mario RPG, both N64 Banjo games released globally, and Banjo and Kazooie are the stars of their games. Geno is a side character in Super Mario RPG. Geno since SMRPG has had appearances including Smash that you could count on one hand: a minor cameo in Superstar Saga that was edited out of the remake, his Mii Costume in Smash 4 and Ultimate, and a brief appearance in the Super Mario Kun manga when they covered Super Mario RPG. If Geno did not have the loud vocal fan demand he does, I think he would be outright the least likely pick in this batch by a lot.
I would give Geno a 2/10 chance and a 4/10 want. The only way I can see him added is as a fan request. While my preferences for Mario characters lay elsewhere, I do respect the fans for holding out as long as they have. The community gave Geno a 3.00/10 in chance, and a 5.80/10 with many 5’s for want. While many were indifferent on Geno, there were both a lot of 10s and 1s thrown in the mix as well. Despite this, it does seem that people are not optimistic on his odds going forward.
3) Pauline
If I had to bet on one Mario newcomer to make the jump to playable in the next game, I would go with Pauline. Rosalinia and Bowser Jr. both ended up as prominent characters in the Mario universe between Brawl and Smash 4 after their debut games: Pauline’s jump to the forefront with Super Mario Odyssey and Mario spin-offs feels eerily similar. It is still a bit early to say if she’ll stick around, but with her appearances in Mario Tennis Aces, Mario Golf Super Rush, Mario Strikers: Battle League, and Mario Kart Tour, she appears to be a spin-off regular at this point.If you buy into the pattern that Rosalina and Boswer Jr. followed, I’d say her chances are looking pretty likely. She even has the bonus of having historical relevance, with her role in the original Donkey Kong arcade game.
There’s only three counter arguments I could find in the wild, but all of them feel flimsy. For starters, she does make a cameo on the New Donk City Hall, but she could be easily removed or the stage could not return. The second is people saying she has no moveset potential. The team has made movesets for characters like Wii Fit Trainer, ROB, and a literal potted plant. I think the work around is obvious: give her Cappy. Smash is no stranger to giving characters abilities from other characters. Zelda in Melee uses Link’s magic from Ocarina of Time, Ness and Lucas both take spells from their other party members, and Rosalina uses Mario’s moves from Super Mario Galaxy. If that is a bridge to far, there are always the minis from Mario vs Donkey Kong, where she prominently appears as well. The last? How many possibilities for Mario newcomers, but that’s an argument for all of them. I also think that with Mario, there is room for two unique newcomers.
I give Pauline a 7/10 chance and a 7/10 for want. If we get a single Mario newcomer, I think she’s it. I really loved Super Mario Odyssey, and seeing a pure Cappy moveset would be cool. Even outside that, she has a solid legacy so seeing that represented would be neat. The community was also pretty optimistic on Pauline. They gave her a 5.36/10 in chance and 6.24/10 in want, placing fourth in both categories.
4) Captain Toad (Toad)
Prior to the release of Ultimate, there was hooplah centered around Toad. Speaking frankly, I think he, and Toad broadly, have missed their shot. While Captain Toad has been a recurring character since Super Mario Galaxy, he is stuck in his cameo appearances and his spin-off. In terms of the broader spin-offs, he appears to have as much difficulty participating in those as he does jumping. Toad and Captain Toad have historically had a strong following for Smash. His demand can be seen as far back as the Smash 2 Poll predating MeleeFour games later, and he’s still stuck to Peach’s moveset, where his presence has only grown. I just feel like maybe he missed his shot. Maybe if Ultimate focused on Wii U era titles he could have made it in, but that never came to be. If the next Smash game is going to be Switch centric, having only bit parts like in Super Mario Odyssey and a port of Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker might not cut it.
He is sadly getting 2/10 chance and a 3/10 want from me. I don’t hate the idea of Captain Toad in the game, but there are plenty of other Mario characters I would prefer to get in.The community was kinder than I, with a 5.90/10 in chance, netting him third so far overall. Captain Toad also dug up a 6.45/10 in want, netting him at second.
5) King Boo
I think King Boo’s a sleeper pick. King Boos and Boos are Mario spin-off regulars with mainstay appearances. Luigi’s Mansion 3 sold over 11 million copies, which puts it on the shortlist for big Switch releases. While E. Gadd is also a possibility, I think King Boo has a higher chance for his sheer number of appearances. E. Gadd tends to be stuck in the lab: he does not get to go karting or play tennis. Plus, he’s a villain, and who doesn’t love a good villain choice?
I’d say he has a 5/10 chance and a 10/10 want from me. While he’s a sleeper choice, I don’t think he’s as likely as Pauline. That isn’t too much of an obstacle, because Mario could easily get two unique newcomers.I’m still a sucker for this idea: a floaty heavyweight that defines major conventions of the archetype alone. Combine that with a cool ghost themed moveset? That's a slam dunk in my book. The community was slightly less optimistic than me, but not by much. They gave him a 4.83/10 in chance, and a 6.35/10 in want. I’m a little surprised at the spike in want, as he managed to surpass long-time requests like Waluigi, Geno, and Paper Mario and snag himself third.
6) Paper Mario
This one brings back memories. When Smash 4 speculation was in full force, Paper Mario was my dream pick. I loved The Thousand Year Door and Super Paper Mario, and wanted the series to return to that style and charm after the disappointment that was Sticker Star. I even made my first character moveset for him. The Paper Mario series did at least get a stage to represent it in Smash and had a recent release with The Origami King, which is also a huge boon for it. If they do look at the Mario sub series and its spin offs, perhaps they will finally give Paper Mario the nod. In the back of my head though, I have this nagging feeling that it is not going to happen though. I feel like if they were going to tackle doing Paper Mario they would have done so already.
I’d say he has a 3/10 for chance and a 10/10 want. I think the ship has sailed for him as playable, but I would love to see him as playable, even with my gripes of the modern Paper Mario games.The community was a lot more confident than Paper Mario, placing him 5.03/10 chance at 5th overall, and 5.75/10 for want.
7) Fawful
Remember when Nintendo let Alpha Dream, the studio that made the Mario and Luigi games, die instead of buying it out? That alone is grounds to be skeptical of Fawful. While he is a fun character from the series and is the main antagonist of the most beloved and popular game in the series, his series seems to be on permanent hiatus. After dying in Bowser’s Inside Story, the Mario and Luigi series moved past him without really any cameos or nods.
I’d give him a 1/10 chance and a 2/10 want. Should we get Fawful that would mean we would probably not get another Mario character from the RPGs, where there are other charactersI would prefer. I like Bowser’s Inside Story, but to me it’s no The Thousand Year Door. Fawful received a 2.06/10 chance, making him the lowest ranked character by the community. He fared better in want, where he received a respectable 4.6/10.
8) Birdo
I can’t think of any reason for her to be playable. There is pretty much no world where we get Birdo before almost everyone discussed above. While Birdo did debut in an actual mainline game, at this point she is more or less spinoff fodder. I’d give her a 1/10 chance, and a 1/10 want. I just have no desire to see her playable, and her appearance in Mushroom Kingdom II will be the best she gets.
The community wasn’t over the moon on Birdo either. She got a 3.08/10 chance, which put her slightly higher than Geno surprisingly. She ranked 4.34/10 as the second least wanted character on the poll.
9) Dry Bowser
If they keep expanding on the echo concept, I think he’s worth considering. Dry Bowser honestly seems like almost the perfect kind of character to implement as a last minute echo. I’d give him a 3/10 chance and a 6/10 want as a result. Maybe he could have some blue flames and the Koopa Claw from Melee.
The community gave him a 3.60/10 for his chances slightly higher than my own score. They were also not nearly as accepting of Dry Bowser as I was, with a 4.54/10 in want and the third lowest score for this batch.
Section 2 - Donkey Kong
Ever since the port of Tropical Freeze, we’ve had a dry spell of Donkey Kong content. There are a few reasons I think this could end soon. The first? The second gate for Nintendo World will be themed around Donkey Kong. It would have been easy to theme the second gate around another series like Zelda or Pokemon, but at their huge theme park they chose to push Donkey Kong. The second? The rumors of a new Donkey Kong game to end this drought. I do think DK could get a unique newcomer, but we will have to see. If this dry spell continues, the odds of us getting a lot of Donkey Kong content will obviously decrease.
1) Dixie Kong
Dixie is the most requested character from Donkey Kong and one of the most requested first-parties. The polltakers gave her a 6.59/10 in chance, making her the community's second most likely newcomer out of the batch. She also scored a 6.86/10 in want, making her the community’s most wanted character of this batch. What’s more? Almost 25% of polltakers gave her a 10 for want, while only 14 total respondents went below 5.
Dixie is easily a fan favorite, but I do have reservations about her becoming playable. For one, I already stressed above the state of the DK series. I’m also worried that she may have missed the boat. Smash Ultimate proved a perfect time to add her as an echo. I know some Dixie fans would protest that she deserves better, but that could be said for many other Echo choices. She feels like she made so much sense to appear in Ultimate, but she just didn’t. Still, she has a lot going for her. She was once considered for Brawl. Few characters have the luxury of having at one point been considered or worked on for Smash. She also could be a Diddy semi clone, echo, or even just share some properties with Diddy. She would be a considerably easy character to add.
Personally, I think she has a 6/10 in chance and a 7/10 want.I may not be as high on Dixie as most of the community, but I adore Donkey Kong Country 2 and would like to see her in the game.
2) Cranky Kong
I give Cranky a 3/10 chance and a 10/10 want. I don’t have much positive to say for his chances as I think he’s overshadowed by Dixie. She is also very relevant to the DK series and bottlenecks the demand for a unique newcomer. This might be heretical to say, but I actually prefer Cranky Kong to Dixie Kong. I dunno, the thought of a disgruntled old monkey beating up some of gaming’s most iconic characters sounds hilarious. Throw in that this is probably the closest thing we would ever get to a Scrooge McDuck from the NES Ducktales in Smash and I am 100% on board. You even have the fact he was the original Donkey Kong from the arcade games, which is just icing on the cake.
The community was more open to Cranky, giving his chances a 4.52/10. Surprisingly, there was noticeably less desire for him than the other Kongs, giving him a 5.19/10 there.
3) Funky Kong
Much like Dry Bowser, Funky could could easily be an Echo Fighter. Give Donkey Kong some stylish clothes, a few different animations, and Funky’s hilarious screams from Mario Kart Wii and you’ve got yourself a solid Echo.
I would give Funky Kong a 4/10 chance and a 6/10 want. Grading how badly I want echos is a little hard since there isn’t the same sense of competition. I would not have bitter feelings if Funky appeared instead of a unique Donkey Kong newcomer than I would if we got for example Birdo over Pauline. The more echoes the merrier. The community fared about the same with a 4.78/10 chance and a 6.21/10 want. Rounding up, he would have tied Waluigi, although Waluigi did have higher want score by a hair.
Section 3 - Yoshi
I don’t think a new Yoshicharacter is likely to happen and I don’t think that surprises anyone. The series has huge identity ties to Mario, especially since almost every character is shared. Smash even lumps in the Super Mario World stage in as a Yoshi stage. The only reason I can muster for us to get a Yoshi newcomer? If Sakurai and the team decide, for some reason, to give all the original twelve series, including Yoshi and F-Zero, one more character. The most I think we will see is a Crafted World stage and maybe Wooly World returning.
1) Kamek
I highly doubt Kamek would be added, even if I do think he’s the most likely Yoshi pick. He is a decently recurring character in both the Yoshi and Mario series, yes, but he pales in comparison compared to the other Mario candidates. The two series share so much DNA, Kamek has to compete in both fields where he just doesn’t have the chops. He also has a pretty core appearance in the Mushroom Kingdom U stage, should it return.
I am going to be generous andgive him a 2/10 chance and a 5/10 want. While another Yoshicharacter would be cool, I don’t think we’ll get one. If we do, it’ll probably be him.The community was a little more optimistic than me but not by much with a 3.50/10 in chance and a 5.17/10 in want.
2) Baby Mario
Baby Mario was the community’s least wanted character of this batch with a score of 2.73/10. Only six people even gave him above a 5/10 in want; without those outliers, his want score would have dipped even lower to a 2.48/10. In terms of his odds also did extremely poorly, with a 2.31/10 netting himself the second lowest chance score of this lot. The only nice thing I have to say is that he appears as a character in the Mario Kart series. 1/10 for my chance and want.
Section 4 - Wario
Wario has two spin off series under its belt - WarioWare and Wario Land. I only have stock in one of them getting in the next game. The other… well…
1) Captain Syrup
If we did get a Wario Land character, it would be Captain Syrup. It has received a few nods over the years in Smash with Wario’s shoulder bash attack and his victory theme, but WarioWare overwhelmingly comes first. Not to mention that Wario Land has gone almost 15 years without a new entry.
I’d give a 1/10 chance and 2/10 want. Seeing Captain Syrup in Smash would at least give me a sliver of hope for more Wario Land. I still would prefer plenty of other characters and even other WarioWare characters at the end of the day. The community wasn’t much kinder on her chances, with a 2.39/10 in chance and a 5.95/10 in want. I was shocked to see her out perform Geno in want. Guess people just miss Wario Land.
2) Mona
I think most people can agree that WarioWareis far more likely to get a character than Wario Land. The series has the majority of Wario’s content in Smash, it is still active, and perhaps most importantly, it had a successful switch release. WarioWare: Get it Together! sold over a million copies. While Mona is one of the most recurring WarioWare characters, I do think there’s a certain girl next door living in a haunted mansion that she is overshadowed by..
Despite that, I would give her a 3/10 chance and a 6/10 want. If we do get a WarioWare newcomer that I did not write a paragraph about right below this one, it would probably be Mona. The community shared a similar view on Mona as I did in terms of her scores, with a 3.30/10 in chance and a 5.61/10 in want.
3) Ashley
And here we have the fan favorite popular WarioWare pick. Ever since Smash 4, she was far and away in the lead. Before Smash Ultimate, Ashley was shown off in the Badge Arcade, and WarioWare Gold was well on its way. All signs point to her as the most popular WarioWare character, both for Smash and in her franchise. WarioWare: Get it Together! was also a huge success for the series that in my opinion further boosts the argument for a second WarioWare rep. Not only was it a successful Switch title, but it continued the trend from WarioWare Gold of putting more of a focus on the series’ characters. WarioWare: Get it Together! has an even greater focus on Wario’s... friends? Co-Workers? Suckers? Chumps. I am going with chumps.
All things considered, I would not be surprised if they did go with Ashley at the end of the day.I would give her a 6/10 in chance and a 10/10 in want. The only WarioWare character I’d prefer is Jimmy T since he’d be hilarious. The community was slightly less optimistic, with a 4.98/10 chance and a 6.15/10 want, just barely missing out on the top 5 of both categories.
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It was surprising to see how the results shook out. Going in, I expected I would have to fight for some ideas. I expected a lot of pushback on characters like Pauline or King Boo, but the community seemed to be on the same page as I was in terms of their chances. A few of the big characters I expected to top the charts for want under performed what I was envisioning. The only conventional fan favorites that performed as well as I expected were Dixie Kong and Captain Toad. Waluigi, Geno, and Ashley all scored lower than I anticipated.
Here are the top five for chance and want respectively. For future top lists, we will do it by section and/or do it overall including the previous sections.
Thanks again to everyone who participated in Part 1 of the Smash Community Character Corral. Here is the link to Part 2!
Credits:
Writing:
TCT~Phantom
Editing: @Zerp @Thirdkoopa @Sari
Thumbnail and Chance/Want Graphics: @Zerp
Social Media: @Zerp
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