• Welcome to Smashboards, the world's largest Super Smash Brothers community! Over 250,000 Smash Bros. fans from around the world have come to discuss these great games in over 19 million posts!

    You are currently viewing our boards as a visitor. Click here to sign up right now and start on your path in the Smash community!

The prettiest Shadow Siren unveils herself: The Vivian Support Thread

AceAttorney9000

Smash Lord
Joined
Oct 25, 2019
Messages
1,881


Who is Vivian?
Vivian is a character from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, the second installment in the Paper Mario sub-series. The game sees Mario embark on a mission to collect the seven Crystal Stars to open up the titular Thousand-Year Door, while also doing battle with the X-Nauts. Vivian initially starts off as an enemy, specifically as one of the Shadow Sirens with her sisters Beldam and Marilyn, but after Mario befriends her, she defects from the Shadow Sirens and joins you as one of your partners.

I'll do you one better. WHY is Vivian... a good pick for Smash?
My reasoning for why Vivian should be a playable character in Smash are very similar to the general reasoning why Geno from Super Mario RPG should be playable in Smash...
  • Among Mario's partners in The Thousand-Year Door, Vivian stands out as one of the more unique characters. No other character in Mario's party remotely looks like her, as well as no other characters in the game in general other than her sisters.
  • Her combat abilities in the game, mostly revolving around inflicting status effects on enemies, as well as the general mechanics of The Thousand-Year Door's battle system, would make for a unique moveset.
  • Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door is considered by many fans (myself included) to be not only one of the better Mario spin-off games, but also the absolute peak of the Paper Mario series so far. Much like Geno, Vivians inclusion would be representing a beloved fan favorite game in the Mario series.
That being said, there are legitimate arguments why Vivian wouldn't be picked for Smash...
  • While the arguments for her are similar to those of Geno's, one thing Geno has that Vivian lacks is a massive fan following, one that has supported their character since at least the days of Brawl. While not without her fans, Vivian has no such fan following of the same magnitude as Geno's.
  • With Nintendo's treatment of the Paper Mario series as of late (seemingly ignoring the fans' cries for another fully-fledged RPG Paper Mario game and instead continuing with the Sticker Star/Color Splash style of gameplay), it's entirely possible that Vivian, as well as any character from the first three Paper Mario games, is entirely out of the running for Smash simply because Nintendo views those games as an old shame of sorts.
Moveset
Vivian is considered to be one of the better partners (at least in regards to offense) in The Thousand-Year Door, mainly due to her combat schtick of inflicting status effects with her attacks (even her initial basic attack, Shade Fist, inflicts the Burn status on a single enemy). In addition to this, her moveset could also involve summoning the other partners in The Thousand-Year Door for attacks and recovery.
  • :GCB:Fiery Jinx
    • Vivian snaps her fingers a total of three times, each generating a fiery explosion. Like Wii Fit Trainer's Deep Breathing, the attack is accompanied by a light blue circle shrinking down to a smaller red one, and timing the button presses accurately will result in bigger explosions that inflict more damage.
  • :GCR:+:GCB:Shell Toss
    • Koops appears, retracts into his shell, and shoots forward for a sizable distance before returning to Vivian. The move can not only damage opponents, but also grab any items in the way and bring them back to Vivian.
  • :GCU:+:GCB:Flutter Jump
    • Vivian summons the Yoshi Kid and the two flutter-jump forward. The move has good horizontal recover, but poor vertical recovery.
  • :GCD:+:GCB:Veil
    • Vivian retreats into her shadow, disappearing into the ground and rendering her invulnerable to attacks for 4 seconds. However, Vivian is still vulnerable during the move's beginning and ending animations, both of which take 2 seconds and 1 second, respectively.
  • Final Smash - Supernova
    • The Crystal Star will fly in front of Vivian. If it hits any of the opponents, they will be transported to a stage in front of an audience, and Vivian will use the Crystal Star to perform Supernova, one of the Special Moves in The Thousand-Year Door.

Music
If Vivian were to get into Super Smash Bros. Ultimate as a DLC character who comes with music and spirits, she would provide an opportunity to bring in more music from not only the Paper Mario games, but also from its sister series, the Mario & Luigi games.

Spirits
Like with music, Vivian would be a good opportunity to bring in more spirits of characters from both the Paper Mario and Mario & Luigi games, with both games providing no shortage of unique characters.
  • Goombario
  • Kooper
  • Bombette
  • Parakarry
  • Lady Bow
  • Watt
  • Sushie
  • Lakilester
  • Kolorado
  • Koopa Bros.
  • Tubba Blubba
  • General Guy
  • Twink
  • Star Spirits
  • Merlon
  • Goombella
  • Koops
  • Flurrie
  • Yoshi Kid
  • Bobbery
  • Ms. Mowz
  • X-Naut
  • Lord Crump
  • Hooktail
  • Beldam
  • Marilyn
  • Rawk Hawk
  • Doopliss
  • Cortez
  • Grodus
  • Shadow Queen (Real Form)
  • Crystal Stars
  • Tippi
  • Pixls
  • Tiptron
  • Count Bleck
  • Nastasia
  • O'Chunks
  • Mimi
  • Bonechill
  • Shadoo
  • End Boss
  • Cackletta
  • Tolstar
  • Dragohoho
  • Popple
  • Rookie
  • Trunkle
  • Jellyfish Sisters
  • Queen Bean
  • Harhall
  • Jojora
  • Cackletta (Spirit Form)
  • Elder Princess Shroob
  • Kylie Koopa
  • Stuffwell
  • Toadsworth the Younger
  • Yoob
  • Shrowser

Miscellaneous Trivia
  • In the original Japanese release and most European releases of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, Vivian is depicted as a transgender male character who identifies as female, with other characters' dialogue referring to her with male pronouns. In the American and German releases of the game, due to issues with the age ratings, this aspect of Vivian is removed completely, with the dialogue altered so that Vivian is only ever referred to with female pronouns.
  • Vivian makes cameo appearances in Super Paper Mario, via a painting of Mario's previous partners in the Mario Bros. house, and as a Catch Card that can be obtained by completing the Dual of 100 in Sammer's Kingdom. The game also contains unused sprite data for Vivian and the rest of Mario's partners from both the original game and The Thousand-Year Door, implying that they were all originally going to appear at some point before being scrapped.
  • Vivian appears in both Super Smash Bros. Brawl and Ultimate as a sticker and spirit, respectively.
    • Vivian's sticker in Brawl can be equipped to any fighter, and has the effect of increasing the power of energy attacks.
    • Vivian's spirit in Ultimate is an Advanced-class Shield-type primary spirit, with the effect of reducing your weight. Her Spirit Battle is against an invisible Mr. Game & Watch on the Battlefield form of Luigi's Mansion.

What about you guys? Do you support Vivian for Smash?
 
Last edited:

RetrogamerMax

Smash Legend
Joined
Sep 3, 2018
Messages
12,221
Location
Houston, Texas
NNID
RetrogamerMax2
Vivian is my favorite party member in Thousand Year Door and I would find her or him to be more unique then a Boo. Honestly, I would take her over King Boo anyday for Smash even though I would take both if that was a option. But yeah, put me on the support list.

Edit: You should setup a support list and call it the Shadow Sirens.
 
Last edited:

PokéfreakofBACON

Smash Ace
Joined
Jul 3, 2015
Messages
860
NNID
PokefreakofBACON
Switch FC
SW-7469-1948-3865
How come nobody told me this thread exists? >:L

Vivian is honestly one of my most wanted characters in Smash of all time. I'd talk about her way more if she weren't so far from being feasible.

I made a moveset for her of sorts. Tell me what you think of it. :)

Concept:
Vivian is one of the three Shadow Sirens, and one of Mario's Partners in TTYD. Her main abilities revolve around being a shadow-mage, being able to disappear into a shadow to hide in plain sight. She also uses fire in her Shade Fist and Fiery Jinx abilities. Vivian's moveset will be fairly standard, most of her moves being punches with fire effects, and some unique special moves, especially Veil. However, to contrast her moves being rather standard, she'll have a gimmick in being able to give opponents various 'status effects,' just like all her moves do in-game.

Gimmick:
A lot of Vivian's moves will inflict some sort of status effect. Any fire-based move will burn the opponent, some moves have a chance to confuse the opponent, and Vivian can also apply a charge status effect to herself.

Burn- Opponents that are burned will take damage once every half a second for 2 seconds. Each "tick" of damage deals less than 1%, and only has enough knockback to interrupt their actions (like Falco laser) making it more of an annoyance to your opponent than a combo starter.

Confusion- Similar to Mario's cape and similar moves, confusion will flip the opponent and reverse their controls. With Vivian however, it lasts a bit longer (~1-2 seconds max), and has an icon above their head while under the effects.

Stats:
Very lightweight, one double jump, relatively average movement speed. Most of her moves will be pretty slow, but very strong. Vivian's "tail" extends below her to touch the ground (or the bottom blastzone) but has no hitbox, it's purely visual.

Specials:
Up B- Veil
A very non-standard recovery where Vivian will disappear into the ground directly beneath her, becoming intangible very quickly after it's used, and then reappearing a moment later. If used while there's no ground beneath her, she'll instead teleport to center-stage. This move is downright broken for recovering and landing, but it leaves her wide open for a punish if the opponent can predict it due to always going to the same place and having a bit of vulnerability.

Side B- Infatuate
Vivian blows a kiss, a slow-moving projectile shaped like a heart that travels in a wavy pattern in front of her. It doesn't deal any knockback on-hit, but instead deals 1-2% and confuses the opponent.

Down B- Charge
Vivian charges up energy, and then hops in place when she's finished. Stalls falling mid-air, but she can't move while charging. If interrupted, she won't gain the charge, but won't lose previous charges. While Vivian is charged, her next attack will deal more damage, but less knockback. The lower knockback will roughly cancel out with the extra damage to be relatively unchanged. It can be stacked up to 3 times for a more potent effect, but wears off after attacking, even if the attack misses! If she uses any move, with the exception of a few (Side B, Up B, Ledge/Get-up Attack, Final Smash, using an item) all charge stacks will be used whether it hits or not.

Neutral B- Fiery Jinx
Vivian raises her finger before creating an explosion of fire around her, dealing a ton of damage and knockback to anyone unfortunate enough to be caught inside. Long start-up, high-risk, high-reward. Kills VERY early, and if they don't die to it they get set on fire for 5 seconds instead of just 2. Comparable to Falcon Punch, but with a bigger hitbox. The explosion becomes bigger with charge stacks, instead of doing more damage.

Final Smash- Shadow Princess Fiery Jinx
Vivian vanishes, before appearing in the background and transforming to a giant Shadow-Queen-Esque form. (Shadow Queen but with Vivian's hat, basically.) Once there, a command prompt shows up on screen where the player has to input A/B/X/Y (or equivalent buttons for their controller) just like using Fiery Jinx in TTYD- this version of the move hits the entire screen if successful, KO'ing pretty much anyone that isn't below 20%.

Normals:
(Might do this later, don't feel like it right now)
The large majority of Vivian's normals are different kinds of punches, and most punches inflict burn on opponents. All of her normals are relatively slow, to balance around the power of burn.

Hopefully I can single-handedly revive this thread, lol.

also vivian says trans rights
 
Last edited:

Sabrewulf238

Smash Hero
Joined
Oct 17, 2007
Messages
5,164
Location
Ireland
There was a time when I had hope for this character. I remember back in Brawl I was a big supporter of Vivian.

At this point it seems like it would be a miracle just to see her as an assist trophy.
 

RetrogamerMax

Smash Legend
Joined
Sep 3, 2018
Messages
12,221
Location
Houston, Texas
NNID
RetrogamerMax2
There was a time when I had hope for this character. I remember back in Brawl I was a big supporter of Vivian.

At this point it seems like it would be a miracle just to see her as an assist trophy.
I would totally be down with that seeing how much of a pipedream Vivian really is. She has a snowball's chance in hell of ever making it into the roster especially if Paper Mario is getting the cold shoulder not receiving a slot yet.
 

Wario Wario Wario

Smash Legend
Joined
Sep 3, 2017
Messages
11,562
Location
Ed Bighead for NASB 2
I love this character, but I'm not sure she's Smash material honestly... she would be a good Mario Kart or Mario Tennis character through - especially if they gave her a cute deep voice like Rachel Bighead in Rocko's Modern Life: Static Cling.
 

zferolie

Smash Hero
Joined
Jul 2, 2013
Messages
5,002
While i think he best shot is with paper mario, she was my favorite character in the game, and I 100% support her

I love this character, but I'm not sure she's Smash material honestly... she would be a good Mario Kart or Mario Tennis character through - especially if they gave her a cute deep voice like Rachel Bighead in Rocko's Modern Life: Static Cling.
Man any of the Paper mario cast deserves to show up in the sports and kart games....
 
Last edited:

Blankiturayman

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Sep 17, 2014
Messages
459
I support! Definitely one of my favorite characters in Mario RPGs; I especially like how she's one of the partners that's more "out-there", as in, you don't really see anything like her in regular Mario, as opposed to some other partners (Not that the others are bad, on the contrary, they're great). I think you could do a lot of cool stuff for her moveset with her shadow and fire powers.
 

Sabrewulf238

Smash Hero
Joined
Oct 17, 2007
Messages
5,164
Location
Ireland
Does anyone have any extra moveset ideas they want to share for Vivian? It doesn't necessarily have to be a move she used in her game, it could also be an idea inspired by her shadow siren abilities, just as long as it's still something that represents her faithfully.

I've been getting into spriting recently and I've also been getting interested in Rivals of Aether, so I want to try modding Vivian into the game as a playable fighter. I was thinking she's a good option to start with because she has a fairly simple design. (as in she's not a human with scary human anatomy)

I'm only in the really early stages yet and I'm probably underestimating the amount of work necessary to go into this but I'll figure it out along the way.

VivianIdleSprite.png


The fingers are really hard to get right when you don't have much space to work with. I'm fairly happy with the left hand (our left not her left) but the right hand still feels wrong to me. Any critiques are welcome!
 

zferolie

Smash Hero
Joined
Jul 2, 2013
Messages
5,002
Does anyone have any extra moveset ideas they want to share for Vivian? It doesn't necessarily have to be a move she used in her game, it could also be an idea inspired by her shadow siren abilities, just as long as it's still something that represents her faithfully.

I've been getting into spriting recently and I've also been getting interested in Rivals of Aether, so I want to try modding Vivian into the game as a playable fighter. I was thinking she's a good option to start with because she has a fairly simple design. (as in she's not a human with scary human anatomy)

I'm only in the really early stages yet and I'm probably underestimating the amount of work necessary to go into this but I'll figure it out along the way.

View attachment 285128

The fingers are really hard to get right when you don't have much space to work with. I'm fairly happy with the left hand (our left not her left) but the right hand still feels wrong to me. Any critiques are welcome!
Thats really nice! I want to start to learn spriting so I can make some progress in my game ideas. What are you using to learn or do it? got any tips?
 

Sabrewulf238

Smash Hero
Joined
Oct 17, 2007
Messages
5,164
Location
Ireland
Thats really nice! I want to start to learn spriting so I can make some progress in my game ideas. What are you using to learn or do it? got any tips?
I bought an app recently called Aseprite. (It's $18.99 but it's a one time payment) I heard a lot of good things about it so I went for it.

I'm really glad I did because I've found it to be really intuitive and easy to use so far (although I guess it helps if you're already familiar with other art programs like Photoshop, so you already understand the basic tools and layers) and it's made spriting more fun.

It also has a useful AI tool called "pixel perfect" that makes it so your linework never doubles up. (so it means a bit less cleanup afterwards)

As for tips, honestly I've only recently started so I'm not sure. There's some people on Youtube I've been watching that are really good though. (MortMort, Pixel Pete, Alvin Roe) Also this persons blog: https://blog.studiominiboss.com/pixelart (I think they did the sprite work for Celeste)
 
Last edited:

zferolie

Smash Hero
Joined
Jul 2, 2013
Messages
5,002
I bought an app recently called Aseprite. (It's $18.99 but it's a one time payment) I heard a lot of good things about it so I went for it.

I'm really glad I did because I've found it to be really intuitive and easy to use so far (although I guess it helps if you're already familiar with other art programs like Photoshop, so you already understand the basic tools and layers) and it's made spriting more fun.

It also has a useful AI tool called "pixel perfect" that makes it so your linework never doubles up. (so it means a bit less cleanup afterwards)

As for tips, honestly I've only recently started so I'm not sure. There's some people on Youtube I've been watching that are really good though. (MortMort, Pixel Pete, Alvin Roe) Also this persons blog: https://blog.studiominiboss.com/pixelart (I think they did the sprite work for Celeste)
Ah yes I have Aseprite on steam. I'll check that blog out.

I am a terrible artist but I want to try and be good with pixel art...
 

Sabrewulf238

Smash Hero
Joined
Oct 17, 2007
Messages
5,164
Location
Ireland
How would you feel about Vivian having a "Fiery Jinx" attack that could take a directional input?

Basically you press b and then she starts pointing (like when she casts Fiery Jinx) and then you can aim where she's pointing and then when you release b, three bursts of fire appear in a line from where she was pointing. (and then the move would cause burn damage for a while afterwards)

(I'm brainstorming for Rivals but it's relevant to Smash too)
 
Last edited:

lady_sky skipper

Smash Ace
Joined
Jan 29, 2017
Messages
810
Location
Hawaii
Vivian is an awesome character from an awesome RPG I've played back in college, I support her getting into Smash. :)
 
Top Bottom