Official Smash Ultimate Discussion

[Paperchampion23]

We had like 14 newcomers for Smash 4. We're 4 months away from launch and have 4 unique newcomers. Echoes are cool and all, but they don't equal 1 unique newcomer. He wasn't lying.

Except thats how you view it now. The fact is, games increase their promotions the closer they get to release. We have ~4 months left till Ultimate. In 2 months, Sakurai revealed 4 unique characters. Following this trend, Sakurai could reveal upwards of 4-8 more unique newcomers depending on how optimistic you are out the games reveals.

I just personally believe Sakurai is subverting expectations on purpose to surprise more us more. I definitely expect 3-6 more characters (Echoes+Unique) but I wouldn't be shocked if it was a surprisingly larger number than that (Around 8-14 more altogether)

 

[vaanrose]

1-2 days. A week at most, but that's if only a very low amount of the development team are working on said echo

Triple A stuff has to move around very quickly, and even game development in general. A week sounds like little time, but when you have anywhere between 500-1000 people all touching their hands on the game, and you only have less than 100 weeks, stuff is bound to happen, and it's bound to happen very quickly. During the Melee era, it's been stated that 7 clones were easier to do than just 1 newcomer, and while the tools have definitely improved for adding a newcomer, by that logic, they've also improved for adding echo's/glorified alt costumes as I like to call them.

source: hi I'm a game dev

Hi, I'm a character modeler, and it doesn't matter how many people are on-staff, only one person is working on a model at any given time. You're looking at at least a week for that alone, depending on the bureaucracy. Two weeks is the standard for non-player character models.

Usually day one you get a blockout out to the rigging team. Then by day two the rigging team has a wip they can give to the animation team. Then they'll be working simultaneously with the modeler, but they can't actually finalize the animations until they receive the final rigged asset, which the rigger can't get to them until they receive the finished model. The rigger will get at least two days to build their rig, minimum, if they're using a pre-built rig system, which a game like this will be using. Then the animation team will have another two weeks to finalize their rough animations, this is probably where the echo process saves the most time, as the animations are mostly already done. There's also the look-dev team, but they can do their work at the same time as the animation team, so they don't add anything to the clock.

The only thing more people on staff really accomplishes is that you can be building more characters simultaneously. There's still a hard limit to how fast the work can be done on any individual character.

In fact, while the tools for building a character have improved with time, the expected quality level has outpaced the tools. It takes longer to do the "same" work that it did two decades ago, because now everything is in HD.

What actually makes the echoes so much faster to produce is that you already know everything "works." The attacks are tested, balanced, de-bugged already. You're just duplicating and tweaking a bit. This is a significant time-save. But I still can't see an echo being fully implemented in anything short of three weeks, and that's only if absolutely everything goes right the first time and there's no need to change anything.

 

[Pakky]

What is Bayonetta exactly a star of? Beat 'em ups?

Platinum

 

[Deleted member]

I mean… we thought so about EVO and here we are… also, the closer we get to the game release, the more characters have to be revealed until they have revealed them all. After all Sakurai said they would be all shown before release. Two things can happen… there will be a reveal not so distantly from the last one from here and on… or they are all gonna be saved for one smash focused direct around october or november… i doubt the latter, as they will want to keep this game hyped every month considering it's going to be one of those that sells like crazy, so i think constant reveals (like one or two per month) is not far from reality. Of course, it depends on how many newcomers are left to be revealed… if many, then constant reveals, if not many… then very distant reveals. Those are the two ways i think it can go. And let's remember… just 3 months now

Yeah, but....how many characters can possibly be left? When Sakurai said not to expect too many, I kinda read it as "Don't expect as many newcomers Wii U had because we brought back all the veterans". We've had 8 brand new so far, right? 4 unique and 4 echo?

How many new characters were introduced in the Wii U smash? 17 right? (Bowser Jr, Rosalina & Luma, Palutena, Dark Pitt, Greninja, Lucina, Robin, Shulk, Little mac, Wii Fit Trainer, Villager, Duck Hunt Dog, Mega Man, Pac-Man, and the Mii Fighters (which according to the numbering count as 3 characters). We actually had 20 if Charizard, Zero Suit Samus, and Sheik were considered 'new' since they were separated from their original counterpart.

With that in mind, and the fact we've had 8 Newcomers so far, I'm guessing, according to Sakurai's statement (assuming he wasn't trolling), we're either matching or getting less than the number introduced for wii U. That means 9 or less. And with all characters to be revealed before the release (and since the release is the 1st week of December), I'm guessing we'll know everybody by November's end. If its 9 characters left, We may get them in threes (3 in September, 3 in October, final 3 in November). Of course, if Charizard and Co. were considered separate, then we may have a max of 12 to expect and if Sakurai wants to blow our minds with another 50 fact Extravaganza and reveal a ton, they could always do 2 in September, 3 in October, 6 in November for a mind-blowing extravaganza, and 1 final on, or right before, release day as a surprise.

Just spitballing, but I hadn't really expected a large amount of added characters due to all veterans returning anyway, so I've always taken his statement to mean "Don't expect more Newcomers than you got last game".

 

[PsychoIncarnate]

with GUEST STARS

Geno confirmed

 

[ReeseBalaski]

On the whole, "Don't expect too many new challengers" thing, what if Sakurai meant that as the dev team doesn't really see Echo Fighters as new challengers. I mean, they don't have their own number, and there's an option to stack them on the same slot of their counterparts, so they've made it a point to make their overall significance compared to newcomers like Inkling or Simon not as great.

If that were the case (as in, they only see the non Echo Fighters as true newcomers), then from the dev teams perspective we haven't gotten too many new challengers, just like Sakurai said. This could also fit into why the Echo Fighter brand exists in the first place, as having a category for easy-to-make clone characters means they're probably putting in a lot of them; more than we expect, that is.

Anyway, that's just my two cents.

 

[Will]

Platinum

mmmmmmm no thank you i'll order a Wonder Red instead please

 

[Idon]

What is Bayonetta exactly a star of? Beat 'em ups?

The cool term nowadays is "character-action game"
which basically amounts to "action" game made by Platinum.

 

[XenoWarriorX]

Naruto! Naruto!
Believe it! Believe it!
Here I am with my Ninja Clan!
Ninja Clan, here we stand!
Naruto, I'm on my way,
Naruto, I'll be okay!
Getting ready to fight on set!
Come on best friends by my side!
Sasuke, is really cool!
Sakura, the beautiful!
Kowagaruna Naruto
Saoto mamore~

Spoiler: Naruto

...Kowagaruna Naruto
Saoto mamore~

There. posted the remaining lyrics.

 

[Guybrush20X6]

Or maybe they'll be shown separately like all the other Echoes because they aren't clones for newcomers.

Well all we have to go off is Richter and it could go either way.

I have a feeling 3rd parties will get special treatment personally.

 

[Scoliosis Jones]

All i'm going to say is this. I've been toying with saying this or not, but I'm just gonna say it for the reality check.

Prior to Smash Ultimate being revealed, this website said:

- Ashley was one of the most likely newcomers
- Mimikyu was a better and more obvious choice than Decidueye and Incineroar
- There would be cuts
- There'd only be a few reveals of veterans AND newcomers
- Snake had no chance of coming back
- Waluigi was the most likely Mario "rep"

Very few people, disagreed with at least a few of these things. Every single one of them turned out to be wrong. This website, and several others, were taken aback because they were wrong about just about everything.

In between E3 and August 8th:

- Echo Fighters aren't going to be a huge thing/focus
- The Ballot is only going to be for a few characters, not most
- 3rd Party franchises might not get Echo Fighters
- Mimikyu wouldn't be a Pokeball
- Ashley couldn't possibly be an Assist Trophy

Once again, major websites and the Smash character speculation community were proven very wrong.

Folks, my point is this. Smash after Smash, Direct after Direct, we get stuff wrong. After the August Direct, 2 characters that I know for a fact had a MASSIVE fan-following on sites like 4chan, Smashboards, GameFAQS, or Resetera got disconfirmed.

I thought they were likely? Guess they weren't. There is nothing...NOTHING different about what everyone keeps saying about Bandanna Waddle Dee. Yeah he's got fans. He can do stuff with a spear. Ashley had fans and could do stuff with magic because she was a witch. Mimikyu was popular and could do stuff because he's a Pokemon. Sure enough, the speculation community at large was wrong.

This is certainly not to say that I think Bandanna Waddle Dee is impossible, as I can see him happening. I'm impressed that fans are sticking to their guns, and I think that's a good thing to be honest.

I think what we need to realize though, is that the wants of the Smash fanbase on sites like this one and others is not necessarily similar to that of the casual crowd or fans who don’t use this site but love Smash.

This game isn’t just for Smashboards. It’s catered to everybody. I’m already noticing past mistakes repeating themselves in that supporters of various characters quickly become condescending toward people who disagree on either likelihood or interest of characters like Ashley and Bandanna Waddle Dee.

I don’t really care if BWD is in, granted i’m not really a fan of the idea. But the reaction of some people here has been...surprising. But, if you wanted an example of an echo chamber, that’s how they work. If you surround yourself with like-opinions, you won’t see differing ones as often, giving an inaccurate representation of popularity/reality of a given situation. When we see something we don’t agree with in a situation like this, we may consider it ridiculous. It’s not just Smash that this happens with, it’s everywhere.

Just like Smash 4 in which fans were over the moon expecting Ridley, K.Rool, and others...which lead them to be wrong despite them holding on for the whole ride, the same has happened this time. For the die hard, hopefully it works out. But there’s potential for certain wants to not be met, and that’s a reality that this website, and others, needs to at least entertain.

 

[Pakky]

mmmmmmm no thank you i'll order a Wonder Red instead please

I love Wonderful 101. PLEASE NINTENDO PORT THIS!

 

[Will]

Hi, I'm a character modeler, and it doesn't matter how many people are on-staff, only one person is working on a model at any given time. You're looking at at least a week for that alone, depending on the bureaucracy. Two weeks is the standard for non-player character models.

Usually day one you get a blockout out to the rigging team. Then by day two the rigging team has a wip they can give to the animation team. Then they'll be working simultaneously with the modeler, but they can't actually finalize the animations until they receive the final rigged asset, which the rigger can't get to them until they receive the finished model. The rigger will get at least two days to build their rig, minimum, if they're using a pre-built rig system, which a game like this will be using. Then the animation team will have another two weeks to finalize their rough animations, this is probably where the echo process saves the most time, as the animations are mostly already done. There's also the look-dev team, but they can do their work at the same time as the animation team, so they don't add anything to the clock.

The only thing more people on staff really accomplishes is that you can be building more characters simultaneously. There's still a hard limit to how fast the work can be done on any individual character.

In fact, while the tools for building a character have improved with time, the expected quality level has outpaced the tools. It takes longer to do the "same" work that it did two decades ago, because now everything is in HD.

What actually makes the echoes so much faster to produce is that you already know everything "works." The attacks are tested, balanced, de-bugged already. You're just duplicating and tweaking a bit. This is a significant time-save. But I still can't see an echo being fully implemented in anything short of three weeks, and that's only if absolutely everything goes right the first time and there's no need to change anything.

So are you implying that Chrom was half-baked out of the oven starting in late June/early July?

 

[Guybrush20X6]

Side note: just noticed the resummarise alerts option in Alerts.

A godsend for when someone goes through a thread and likes all the posts. Approve.

 

[Deleted member]

Spoiler: Naruto

...Kowagaruna Naruto
Saoto mamore~

There. posted the remaining lyrics.

If I wasn't feeling lazy, I'd transcribe the extended version.

 

[Nazyrus]

Great Miyu design, I wouldn't mind getting her, or Fay, as newcomers or echoes in Smash for Star Fox.

Valkyrie would also be a good choice.

Female Star fox characters is something i will always welcome to Smash. But I feel like if they didn't do it with Krystal… I don't know what moveset would Fay and Miyu get, being pilots as well… either more echoes or sakurai would have to think of unique stuff for any of those two (or both).

 

[Green_Pikmin*]

Interesting thing to note about Geno: There were 6 DLC Packs for Mii Costumes. Geno was the only character for DLC Pack 5: https://www.mariowiki.com/List_of_Mii_Outfits

I'm not sure why this was done, but he also was the only Mii costume to get a title card:

So yeah, Geno has a bit of special treatment by Sakurai and the Smash Developers. There is a reason why people think he's likely in this time around (If Square gave them the right to make these costumes, what's the problem for letting them work on an original character?)

Additionally, if the inclusion of these Mii costumes and their potential sales point to anything (so far, Chrom, K. Rool, and Inkling are in, while Ashley, Knuckles, and Zero are Assist trophies), then the following Characters could still be considered as potentials for Smash Ultimate:

Isabelle
Heihachi (Bamco)
Akira/Jacky (Sega)
Black Knight
Lloyd (Bamco)
Viridi
Monster Hunter (Capcom)
Geno (Square)
Gil (Bamco)
Majora's Mask

With the rest of costumed characters being deconfirmed (either being Assist Trophies, part of a Final Smash or move (Toad), etc).

So going over each:

Isabelle: If Vergeben is correct, she is in

Heihachi and Lloyd: Being Bamco characters and Smash now being a Bamco created game, these costumes may have been added because of this reason (to see if there is any interest in a Bamco character for the game). Either could happen, just don't know IF they'll happen. Could be either AT's or Characters.

Akira/Jacky: Sega reps. To me, Virtua Fighter just seems like a lesser Tekken/Street Fighter in terms of competition so I'm not sure if they'd ever be considered. At most maybe an AT.

Black Knight: As per the screenshots posted before, his absence in the background (if its him) may hint at his inclusion if Sakurai wanted to eliminate redundancy. Echo fighter for Ike is possible.

Viridi: I could see her happening, but I'm not sure how much priority Sakurai would put for her over Medusa, who'd fit better as an Echo fighter (but perhaps he makes her one with different proportions?). However I can see both happening over someone like Hades. She could be a very cool AT however, while Medusa takes the role of Echo fighter.

Monster Hunter: It being conspicuously absent from Rathalos's trailer and likely the difficuly in making a balanced moveset (You'd have 14 different weapon types to choose from) possibly means its not in the base roster at least. I don't see him/her being an AT, since Rathalos is in, but perhaps a DLC character in the future since Monster Hunter is more popular than ever before.

Geno: Explained earlier. I have reasons to believe he is in the game.

Gil: I actually see this being the surprise/wtf/retro character. It, however, is yet another 3rd party character owned by Bamco. Like Lloyd and Heihachi, I'm just not sure what their reasoning was for including this Mii costume, only that its possible Bamco wanted the Smash 4 team to gauge who fans might have liked out of the 3 while they worked on Ultimate post-2015.

Majora's Mask: This is a tricky one. The mask is not a character, but primarily owned by Skull Kid. However, due to Skull Kid's "hints" (possible removal as an AT/Replaced with the Moon, item that performs his exact same function as an AT, Young Link's final smash being hidden, remixed MM music in Ultimate, Termina returning, etc) and common acceptance as a possible character for Ultimate, I'll say that its possible he is a character.

So out of all of this, if I had to guess, based solely on Mii Costumes:

Unique Newcomers:
Geno
Skull Kid
Heihachi/Lloyd/Gil

Echo Fighters:
Medusa
Isabelle
Black Knight

AT's:
Viridi
Akira/Jacky
Heihachi/Lloyd/Gil (Whomever does not get a newcomer promotion, perhaps none receive one)


I want to make it clear that aside from these characters, everyone else from the Mii costume list is represented so far in Smash Ultimate in some way, new or old! Be it an assist trophy (Ashley, Zero, etc), actual newcomers (K. Rool, Inkling, Chrom, etc), final smash assets (Proto-man, Mega Man .exe,

And just to make clear: This has nothing to do with characters not on this list. Ridley was not a mii costume. Dark Samus was not a Mii costume, Daisy was not a Mii costume. Isaac, a pokemon, Banjo, Bandana Dee, Albert Einstein, and George Washington all still have the ability to get into Smash.

In all seriousness though, this just may point at who we could expect outside of other obvious characters.

Any thoughts?

Really good breakdown, if I had any thoughts it would be that only time will tell.

 

[DarkFalcon]

Except thats how you view it now. The fact is, games increase their promotions the closer they get to release. We have ~4 months left till Ultimate. In 2 months, Sakurai revealed 4 unique characters. Following this trend, Sakurai could reveal upwards of 4-8 more unique newcomers depending on how optimistic you are out the games reveals.

I just personally believe Sakurai is subverting expectations on purpose to surprise more us more. I definitely expect 3-6 more characters (Echoes+Unique) but I wouldn't be shocked if it was a surprisingly larger number than that (Around 8-14 more altogether)

Trust me I'd LOVE to be surprised. I could even see us getting 4 more unique newcomers, I just don't think we're gonna reach the levels of Smash 4. 8 unique newcomers still means he wasn't lying. I'd love to be wrong and have him reveal like 10 more in the next 4 months, but I think that's absurdly unrealistic.

 

[Deleted member]

Side note: just noticed the resummarise alerts option in Alerts.

A godsend for when someone goes through a thread and likes all the posts. Approve.

It does look cool this my last post at smashboards i reset my password to a bunch of random letters and I'm about to sign out so bye i gess

 

[Deleted member]

Trust me I'd LOVE to be surprised. I could even see us getting 4 more unique newcomers, I just don't think we're gonna reach the levels of Smash 4. 8 unique newcomers still means he wasn't lying. I'd love to be wrong and have him reveal like 10 more in the next 4 months, but I think that's absurdly unrealistic.

But Sakurai's a troll™ so obviously he's misleading us and we're gonna get 20 more characters. You'll see!

 

[XenoWarriorX]

If I wasn't feeling lazy, I'd transcribe the extended version.

what
WHAT
WHAT

 

[Omega Tyrant]

The whole "hope you weren't expecting too many newcomers" thing is rather meaningless to begin with, it's a vague statement where how much is "too many" changes from person to person; was just more than Inklings and Ridley too many, or is over 20 newcomers too many? Regardless of if we just get one more newcomer or we get 15 more, you can't really say Sakurai was lying about it.

I've harped on it many times before, but at face value you can really just take the statement to mean less unique newcomers than Brawl and Smash 4 had as those set the prior expectations for newcomer count, which could be anything less than 15, whereas the range from 5-14 is very large and thus is not very useful for trying to speculate the amount of full-fledged newcomers there will be in the game. The embracing of clones with the introduction of Echoes also muddles the true "newcomer count".

 

[LetterO]

If we get a direct at the end of September or in October, I could see Skull Kid maybe being revealed because of Halloween, maybe?

 

[Noipoi]

On to topic of character splash arts, can I just say how clever "Incineroar brings the heat!" is?
It's both a reference to Incineroar being a fire type and the fact that Incineroar's a heel wrestler.
The role of a heel wrestler is to generate hate, or "heat" from the audience. When the crowd boos them for spitting in their opponents eye and slamming them with a chair that means the heel is doing their job. So Incineroar as a fire type brings the heat, and as a heel wrestler it brings the "heat". Cool right?










I just woke up from a nap indulge me.

 

[Thirdkoopa]

Hi, I'm a character modeler, and it doesn't matter how many people are on-staff, only one person is working on a model at any given time. You're looking at at least a week for that alone, depending on the bureaucracy. Two weeks is the standard for non-player character models.

Usually day one you get a blockout out to the rigging team. Then by day two the rigging team has a wip they can give to the animation team. Then they'll be working simultaneously with the modeler, but they can't actually finalize the animations until they receive the final rigged asset, which the rigger can't get to them until they receive the finished model. The rigger will get at least two days to build their rig, minimum, if they're using a pre-built rig system, which a game like this will be using. Then the animation team will have another two weeks to finalize their rough animations, this is probably where the echo process saves the most time, as the animations are mostly already done. There's also the look-dev team, but they can do their work at the same time as the animation team, so they don't add anything to the clock.

The only thing more people on staff really accomplishes is that you can be building more characters simultaneously. There's still a hard limit to how fast the work can be done on any individual character.

In fact, while the tools for building a character have improved with time, the expected quality level has outpaced the tools. It takes longer to do the "same" work that it did two decades ago, because now everything is in HD.

What actually makes the echoes so much faster to produce is that you already know everything "works." The attacks are tested, balanced, de-bugged already. You're just duplicating and tweaking a bit. This is a significant time-save. But I still can't see an echo being fully implemented in anything short of three weeks, and that's only if absolutely everything goes right the first time and there's no need to change anything.

Okay, so that's where my estimate is wrong - There's more staff so they're able to build them more at the same time. Gotcha. I'd say 1-2 weeks per echo then, but, echo's probably need a lot less staff. (Assuming Bureaucracy, three).

Also listen to this guy when it comes to animation. I know my 1's and 0's way better than my art.

So are you implying that Chrom was half-baked out of the oven starting in late June/early July?

Not impossible and I got a good laugh.

 

[Deleted member]

On to topic of character splash arts, can I just say how clever "Incineroar brings the heat!" is?
It's both a reference to Incineroar being a fire type and the fact that Incineroar's a heel wrestler.
The role of a heel wrestler is to generate hate, or "heat" from the audience. When the crowd boos them for spitting in their opponents eye and slamming them with a chair that means the heel is doing their job. So Incineroar as a fire type brings the heat, and as a heel wrestler it brings the "heat". Cool right?

We had "Little Mac Punches In!" for Smash 4, so it seems like the kind of lame pun they'd do.

 

[Nazyrus]

If we get a direct at the end of September or in October, I could see Skull Kid maybe being revealed because of Halloween, maybe?

by that logic Simon Belmont would've made a lot more sense to be revealed by halloween. I don't think holidays timming really mean much for reveals… but that's just me

 

[Will]

Not impossible and I got a good laugh.

I feel like it's around that time frame. Look at him. He looks like the Pillsbury ****ing Doughboy, he better get a touch-up and updates CSS before the game comes out or else I'm gonna be mega disappointed.

 

[Pakky]

- Ashley was one of the most likely newcomers
- Mimikyu was a better and more obvious choice than Decidueye and Incineroar

In between E3 and August 8th:

- Echo Fighters aren't going to be a huge thing/focus
- The Ballot is only going to be for a few characters, not most
- 3rd Party franchises might not get Echo Fighters
- Mimikyu wouldn't be a Pokeball
- Ashley couldn't possibly be an Assist Trophy

Honestly, these two hit me the hardest, and I can admit I was wrong.

Both made so much sense with the evidence presented but I always kept Incineroar in mind based on the same evidence, and I knew if we got Pokeball info, it was going to push one or both of them forward. In this case, Incinroar won and even though I'm torn I understand.

Ashely not making it in is odd, given the support but, yeah I don't know.

The 3rd party thing I was always opened to because it seemed like a fan rool (See what I did, does it make sense? No but it was funny to me).

The ballot, I believed in because at the time the costumes and Bayo just seemed weird to me, and I love Bayo.

 

[Paperchampion23]

Yeah, but....how many characters can possibly be left? When Sakurai said not to expect too many, I kinda read it as "Don't expect as many newcomers Wii U had because we brought back all the veterans". We've had 8 brand new so far, right? 4 unique and 4 echo?

How many new characters were introduced in the Wii U smash? 17 right? (Bowser Jr, Rosalina & Luma, Palutena, Dark Pitt, Greninja, Lucina, Robin, Shulk, Little mac, Wii Fit Trainer, Villager, Duck Hunt Dog, Mega Man, Pac-Man, and the Mii Fighters (which according to the numbering count as 3 characters). We actually had 20 if Charizard, Zero Suit Samus, and Sheik were considered 'new' since they were separated from their original counterpart.

With that in mind, and the fact we've had 8 Newcomers so far, I'm guessing, according to Sakurai's statement (assuming he wasn't trolling), we're either matching or getting less than the number introduced for wii U. That means 9 or less. And with all characters to be revealed before the release (and since the release is the 1st week of December), I'm guessing we'll know everybody by November's end. If its 9 characters left, We may get them in threes (3 in September, 3 in October, final 3 in November). Of course, if Charizard and Co. were considered separate, then we may have a max of 12 to expect and if Sakurai wants to blow our minds with another 50 fact Extravaganza and reveal a ton, they could always do 2 in September, 3 in October, 6 in November for a mind-blowing extravaganza, and 1 final on, or right before, release day as a surprise.

Just spitballing, but I hadn't really expected a large amount of added characters due to all veterans returning anyway, so I've always taken his statement to mean "Don't expect more Newcomers than you got last game".

Don't count echoes in that number though. 16 of those characters are unique and original. Only 4 of Ultimate's characters so far are unique. We could get 10 unique characters overall and it still be "signficantly less" than Smash 4's new characters.

Even if we got 20 Echoes on top of that, they aren't original or exactly new, but it could be feasibly easier to make those 20 characters than it would be to make another 6 unique characters.


This is why I have a feeling Sakurai is kind of messing with us. Yes, I don't expect to get "too many more fighters" in terms of newcomers (maybe 4-6 more), but I almost half expect there to be another 10-12 Echoes tucked away here. They apparently do not take nearly as long to make, and in order to compensate for a lower number of unique newcomers this time around, Sakurai may add more of these to make everyone happier.

 

[LetterO]

by that logic Simon Belmont would've made a lot more sense to be revealed by halloween. I don't think holidays timming really mean much for reveals… but that's just me

Guess not, but if all the hints are taken into account, I think it'd make sense if Skull Kid was revealed next.

 

[Thirdkoopa]

I feel like it's around that time frame. Look at him. He looks like the Pillsbury ****ing Doughboy, he better get a touch-up and updates CSS before the game comes out or else I'm gonna be mega disappointed.

I'm optimistic but I'm also doubting it. Kinda goes back to that talk vaanrose and I had earlier where he was hoping Smash 4 Link was fixed.

 

[Rocket Raccoon]

Platinum

Bayonetta has Sex Pistols the Demon, not Star Platinum.

 

[papagenos]

All i'm going to say is this. I've been toying with saying this or not, but I'm just gonna say it for the reality check.

Prior to Smash Ultimate being revealed, this website said:

- Ashley was one of the most likely newcomers
- Mimikyu was a better and more obvious choice than Decidueye and Incineroar
- There would be cuts
- There'd only be a few reveals of veterans AND newcomers
- Snake had no chance of coming back
- Waluigi was the most likely Mario "rep"

Very few people, disagreed with at least a few of these things. Every single one of them turned out to be wrong. This website, and several others, were taken aback because they were wrong about just about everything.

In between E3 and August 8th:

- Echo Fighters aren't going to be a huge thing/focus
- The Ballot is only going to be for a few characters, not most
- 3rd Party franchises might not get Echo Fighters
- Mimikyu wouldn't be a Pokeball
- Ashley couldn't possibly be an Assist Trophy

Once again, major websites and the Smash character speculation community were proven very wrong.

Folks, my point is this. Smash after Smash, Direct after Direct, we get stuff wrong. After the August Direct, 2 characters that I know for a fact had a MASSIVE fan-following on sites like 4chan, Smashboards, GameFAQS, or Resetera got disconfirmed.

I thought they were likely? Guess they weren't. There is nothing...NOTHING different about what everyone keeps saying about Bandanna Waddle Dee. Yeah he's got fans. He can do stuff with a spear. Ashley had fans and could do stuff with magic because she was a witch. Mimikyu was popular and could do stuff because he's a Pokemon. Sure enough, the speculation community at large was wrong.

This is certainly not to say that I think Bandanna Waddle Dee is impossible, as I can see him happening. I'm impressed that fans are sticking to their guns, and I think that's a good thing to be honest.

I think what we need to realize though, is that the wants of the Smash fanbase on sites like this one and others is not necessarily similar to that of the casual crowd or fans who don’t use this site but love Smash.

This game isn’t just for Smashboards. It’s catered to everybody. I’m already noticing past mistakes repeating themselves in that supporters of various characters quickly become condescending toward people who disagree on either likelihood or interest of characters like Ashley and Bandanna Waddle Dee.

I don’t really care if BWD is in, granted i’m not really a fan of the idea. But the reaction of some people here has been...surprising. But, if you wanted an example of an echo chamber, that’s how they work. If you surround yourself with like-opinions, you won’t see differing ones as often, giving an inaccurate representation of popularity/reality of a given situation. When we see something we don’t agree with in a situation like this, we may consider it ridiculous. It’s not just Smash that this happens with, it’s everywhere.

Just like Smash 4 in which fans were over the moon expecting Ridley, K.Rool, and others...which lead them to be wrong despite them holding on for the whole ride, the same has happened this time. For the die hard, hopefully it works out. But there’s potential for certain wants to not be met, and that’s a reality that this website, and others, needs to at least entertain.

i completely agree, especially about bandana waddle dee. i thought he was super likely (i still do) but the more i find out about this game and what characters are getting in, who the leakers are talking about, who might sakurai be hinting at etc... the less likely a lot of the safe bets of a few months ago are looking and instead the more out there "ballot picks" like isaac or geno look MORE likely than the characters that would seem liekly to have been chosen for past smash games.

for instance skull kid is looking incredibly likely where as if you go by past smash games, getting a non-triforce holding zelda rep, especially one from an older zelda game and not the current iteration, would be called "unlikely".

it feels like its ALL about genuine popularity this time, and past characters who would have been looked over despite being insanely popular nintendo characters (skull kid, majoras mask is on everything zelda merchandise and has been for years) are now probably who we'll get.

 

[viewtifulduck82]

All i'm going to say is this. I've been toying with saying this or not, but I'm just gonna say it for the reality check.

Prior to Smash Ultimate being revealed, this website said:

- Ashley was one of the most likely newcomers
- Mimikyu was a better and more obvious choice than Decidueye and Incineroar
- There would be cuts
- There'd only be a few reveals of veterans AND newcomers
- Snake had no chance of coming back
- Waluigi was the most likely Mario "rep"

Very few people, disagreed with at least a few of these things. Every single one of them turned out to be wrong. This website, and several others, were taken aback because they were wrong about just about everything.

In between E3 and August 8th:

- Echo Fighters aren't going to be a huge thing/focus
- The Ballot is only going to be for a few characters, not most
- 3rd Party franchises might not get Echo Fighters
- Mimikyu wouldn't be a Pokeball
- Ashley couldn't possibly be an Assist Trophy

Once again, major websites and the Smash character speculation community were proven very wrong.

Folks, my point is this. Smash after Smash, Direct after Direct, we get stuff wrong. After the August Direct, 2 characters that I know for a fact had a MASSIVE fan-following on sites like 4chan, Smashboards, GameFAQS, or Resetera got disconfirmed.

I thought they were likely? Guess they weren't. There is nothing...NOTHING different about what everyone keeps saying about Bandanna Waddle Dee. Yeah he's got fans. He can do stuff with a spear. Ashley had fans and could do stuff with magic because she was a witch. Mimikyu was popular and could do stuff because he's a Pokemon. Sure enough, the speculation community at large was wrong.

This is certainly not to say that I think Bandanna Waddle Dee is impossible, as I can see him happening. I'm impressed that fans are sticking to their guns, and I think that's a good thing to be honest.

I think what we need to realize though, is that the wants of the Smash fanbase on sites like this one and others is not necessarily similar to that of the casual crowd or fans who don’t use this site but love Smash.

This game isn’t just for Smashboards. It’s catered to everybody. I’m already noticing past mistakes repeating themselves in that supporters of various characters quickly become condescending toward people who disagree on either likelihood or interest of characters like Ashley and Bandanna Waddle Dee.

I don’t really care if BWD is in, granted i’m not really a fan of the idea. But the reaction of some people here has been...surprising. But, if you wanted an example of an echo chamber, that’s how they work. If you surround yourself with like-opinions, you won’t see differing ones as often, giving an inaccurate representation of popularity/reality of a given situation. When we see something we don’t agree with in a situation like this, we may consider it ridiculous. It’s not just Smash that this happens with, it’s everywhere.

Just like Smash 4 in which fans were over the moon expecting Ridley, K.Rool, and others...which lead them to be wrong despite them holding on for the whole ride, the same has happened this time. For the die hard, hopefully it works out. But there’s potential for certain wants to not be met, and that’s a reality that this website, and others, needs to at least entertain.

Preeeeeeeeeeach. Been saying this for awhile now. This site will never learn, and for every member that does, 4 more will appear that haven't learned.

Also, for anyone saying they think sakurai was just pulling the community's legs by telling us not to expect many characters, please stop. Literally the quickest way to disappoint yourself. You are the poster that says "I cant believe this is it" and "really underwhelming roster, can't believe sakurai let us down" on release date.

Sakurai has 0 reason to lie to you. If he even felt the need to tell you not to look out for a ton of newcomers, it's because he felt he needed to throw out some preemptive damage control. Please take him at face value for your own sake. Way better to be surprised with what you end up getting than to feel like what you got sucks. Keep those expectations in check.

 

[DarkFalcon]

But I still can't see an echo being fully implemented in anything short of three weeks, and that's only if absolutely everything goes right the first time and there's no need to change anything.

That was roughly the estimate I had in my head before I asked. How long would you say it took for Dark Pit? The model is pretty much exact. Lucina's model is obviously different, but everything else seems pretty much the same. This stuff is interesting to me so I like to get insight from people who know how it works.

 

[StormC]

think what we need to realize though, is that the wants of the Smash fanbase on sites like this one and others is not necessarily similar to that of the casual crowd or fans who don’t use this site but love Smash.

Bandana Dee is very popular among casual fans so I'm not really sure what your point is.

Personally I put his chances down to roughly a coin flip.

 

[vaanrose]

So are you implying that Chrom was half-baked out of the oven starting in late June/early July?

Sometimes a character model is just bad even after it's considered finished, lol.

But it is standard practice for production to move along with an "80% there" model, only to be finalized near the very end of production. At no point during the three year dev cycle of the new God of War was Kratos ever considered "finished." They were still adjusting his model like two weeks before the game went gold, long after his face had been plastered all over the place on advertising.

 

[Guybrush20X6]

It does look cool this my last post at smashboards i reset my password to a bunch of random letters and I'm about to sign out so bye i gess

...
What an odd choice of message to leave on.

 

[Thirdkoopa]

Bandana Dee is very popular among casual fans so I'm not really sure what your point is.

Personally I put his chances down to roughly a coin flip.

Scol's point is that just because it's the Smashboards (or internet) popular opinion, doesn't mean it'll happen, and that sometimes people can disagree and still have valid points.

I'm not always in 100% agreement w/ Johnknight1 but he brought up some valid points that are worth dhiscussing. If I'm to be honest, a lot of the hive mind discussions have been very dismissive, and as my "hi I've been around speculation since Brawl" has proven, sometimes it's when we get too dismissive/hivemind that we're not looking in the right places

I had that few set of days where I got people to look at polls that weren't the ballot, and I feel like, for the people who were around for that, it was pretty eye-opening.