A stage's reveal is no indication as to how far in development it is or long it has been done. Are you implying that since we've had characters / stages not revealed yet that they just recently started working on them? They've been working on all the characters and stages since the beginning of game development. For all you know they could have begun work on Mushroom Kingdom U before Pyrosphere. Maybe that's why Mushroom Kingdom was complete enough to be used in the E3 demo. You don't know. You're making assumptions that lead you to believe you're right. That is being biased, whether you admit it or not.
No, that's called being logical. You, just like every detractor, make assumptions based on some stupid 8 second clip and outdated arguments that started from a stupid meme. Sakurai never said anything about Ridley being a stage hazard, it was implied, implied =/= confirm. You interpreted it as a dis-confirmation, even though Sakurai didn't specifically say Ridley was not playable, like he has done for other dis-confirmed characters. You're assuming that from that clip, that he's 100% a stage hazard, and completely ignoring evidence that suggests a possibility of a playable Ridley. No other "dis-confirmed" character has been teased like Ridley, but you still ignore this. It's funny because there are plenty of stages created after Pyrosphere, and we know more about them than that stage. Pyrosphere development was likely started before June 2013, and considering it looked finished in August, and the fact that Sakurai's team have to work on tonnes of stages throughout the two years, there is absolutely no way he would need to have 8 months+ for a stage and its main feature.
If you think Sakurai would need all this time for said feature, or would stop working on the feature and get back to it later, that is ridiculous. You're saying that Ridley and Pyrosphere would need from June 2013 (possible start of actual development, not conceptual development) to beyond June 2014? It's also possible that work on Pyrosphere started before then. But remember, Sakurai didn't start the project until after Kid Icarus: Uprising, which was towards the end of March
2012. You mentioned that they have worked on the stages since the start of the development. Sakurai and his team would not, I repeat, would not start full development of stages and characters straight away. He would need to do the planning of the project. Concepts, ideas, selection of playable characters, modes, selection of music, etc. Since you supposedly do game development "as a hobby", you should know this. However, you are not in a team, therefore you would not be developing in the same pace as that of Sakurai and Sora/Bandai Namco. It would probably take a few months, at least until possibly June 2012. So, right now we've seen 2 years of development already.
How is Pyrosphere and Ridley not completed in that amount of time? And remember, the Pictures of the Day and screenshots only started being released from
E3 2013. Sakurai should be nearing the end of development for the 3DS version, and WiiU version is only out later because a) it's HD and therefore takes slightly more time (and Nintendo underestimated the effort and time it takes for HD game development), b) WiiU version has different modes to 3DS, perhaps a few that take extra time to develop for, c) WiiU is a newer console, and therefore trickier to develop for because developers are only getting used to developing for the console. Mushroom Kingdom U seems to look like it was developed much after Pyrosphere, and it was missing one of its stage hazards and possibly other parts that the stage transforms to. It's possible that Sakurai might have tried to soften the blow for Ridley fans by hinting he's not playable, which is wrong of him to do because we would have rather had the same treatment as other fans with dis-confirmed characters - quick and straight to the point. We'd be disappointed but eventually would have gotten over it, but no instead Sakurai is continuing to not talk about Ridley. It's also possible that he deliberately showed that clip to get people talking, and perhaps hide Ridley's actual role.
Plus Sakurai might have not wanted to over do it with stage hazards, maybe he purposely removed Nabbit from Mushroom Kingdom U for the demo. Then again, people wanted to see the entire Pyrosphere for what it is, they wanted to see all its features. However, Sakurai deliberately left the Pyrosphere out of the demos, and completely didn't mention Ridley at all in the E3 Direct Event, perhaps it was because the lack of time. But here's the thing, regardless of whether Ridley is a stage hazard or playable, E3 was
the perfect time to reveal him. People wanted to see Ridley in action, after seeing the SSB Direct, they were intrigued by how he works and what he does. One problem: Sakurai didn't show Ridley, or mention him, at all (he even stopped people from asking questions about possible characters at the conference). Ridley was not "unfinished" during E3, that is silly, the SSB Direct "showed" that Ridley was ready enough to be in action enough to be revealed but wasn't, and the time between that Direct and E3, Sakurai's team could work on the bugs and adjustments, then show him off at the E3 event. Sakurai chose not to, for reasons unknown to everyone apart from Sakurai and the team. With the reason that Ridley wasn't shown at E3 as a hazard, people thought up the possibility that Ridley could still be playable. The fact that you're just jumping at these people, especially in this thread, for believing that Ridley still has a chance to be playable, basically saying we're in denial, the evidence is "right in front of our eyes", not reading or taking notice of our points and possible theories (basically just coming here to troll), you are the one being biased. Would you do the same to another character if they had the same type of clip? No, no I don't think you would. Because it's Ridley, and you believe in an old meme. Because Ridley is different than the rest, because you assume that what you think is right, and ignore anything that's different. You even said yourself that you "couldn't be bothered to check the thread" as to what has been said. That is pure laziness, and just shows that you're not willing to listen to anything we say.
That clip is enough for you, never mind that Ridley didn't attack anyone, just floated there, and moved very slowly, all which are against his character, and would make him a terribly done boss. Perhaps that clip was scripted, perhaps Sakurai was controlling a playable Ridley and chose to have the clip of Ridley and Pikachu fighting on the Pyrosphere, making people think he's a hazard, then surprise us with playable Ridley. We don't know, that is why this thread is still around, and still speculating. Yes, saying "I believe 100% that Ridley is playable" is silly, but at the same time, so is saying "I believe 100% that Ridley is not playable and is a stage hazard", because we don't have concrete information about Ridley, we only have a small clip and a PotD message to go on, both of which
could be misleading. If Ridley's development did start late, then that is bad development planning, plain and simple, you cannot deny this. Given the development time of Super Smash Bros. for 3DS/WiiU, over two years is plenty of time for developing characters, playable and non-playable, though adding alt costumes will further development time. I would only think that playable characters would have the excuse of being incomplete (given that we saw place holders of profile images during the SSB Direct), since they'd be more complicated to do (especially since they now have custom moves added to their move sets), whereas stage hazard characters have certain set number of attacks and movements programmed and developed.
Again, you don't know how long it takes to program Ridley's bos AI and you're making assumptions that back up your own desire. Most fighting games don't have a giant Ridley in one of the stages, nor many of the other features in a Smash Bros. game. And no, he probably doesn't want to talk too much about the Wii U version until after the 3DS version's release, because right now he's trying to hype up the 3DS version. He'll hype up the Wii U version afterwards.
You're the one making assumptions, and I never claimed to have knowledge over AI programming, but it's common sense that a stage hazard element shouldn't take 8 or so months to do, especially from a team with experience of developing Fighting games at a faster rate (like Bandai Namco) than what Nintendo usually did with previous Super Smash Bros. titles. If you were a small team or an individual developer, then yes that would be the case. As I said, the project started at the end of March 2012, but development of characters, stages, and other content would have likely started before June 2012, since Sakurai reported that the game's development was in its first steps. A year and 2 months later (14 months), Sakurai revealed the Pyrosphere stage. Um, 14 months is pleeeennntttyyy of time to work on the stage and its stage hazard, you know the thing that's supposedly the main attraction, one that people
want to see. But then, Sakurai just teases Ridley without mentioning his name, and then for several months we see no Ridley in the Pyrosphere pictures. Then during the SSB Direct, we see a shadow and a quick glance at the tail (if paused at the right moment/slowed down). He did not name Ridley, nor show him, nor did he flat out say "Ridley's a boss on Pyrosphere, he isn't playable" like he did with other dis-confirmed characters.
You're saying after 14 months that Ridley's not done, and then after 20 months he's still not done? Yes there are plenty of stages, characters and other content to work on as well, but a stage hazard would probably only need a few months, perhaps 5 months at most. 20+ months? Ridiculous. It's like you're assuming that Sakurai decided to get his team to start working on Ridley months after Pyrosphere's reveal in 2013, which come on, that would be bad development. Yes Sakurai probably doesn't want to talk too much about the Wii U version until after the 3DS version's release, and yes it is likely because right now he's trying to hype up the 3DS version more, but that's simply because it's the version that's being released first. It still doesn't stop him posting pictures of the WiiU version, especially unfinished things like stages (Mushroom Kingdom U). Oh and by the way, Sakurai showed an incomplete version of Pyrosphere FD during the SSB Direct, but months later shows pictures of a more completed Pyrosphere FD.
The games
didn't have to have Final Destination forms of stages, but Sakurai decided to for the team to make them, for the competitive side. Yes Final Destination stages lack stage hazards, but remember, not all stages that these Final Destinations are based on have stage hazards. Battlefield has a Final Destination form, yet
it doesn't have stage hazards. It's just a standard stage with 3 platforms. This doesn't mean that Pyrosphere doesn't have stage hazards, it likely does, but you get my point. I would have thought that priority would have gone to finishing development on normal stages, and then start development on Final Destination versions afterwards. The thing is, you're taking everything Sakurai says with face value, especially the SSB Direct, even though Sakurai seems to a light-hearted personality and has made numerous jokes and teasing throughout. If you actually read the thread, you would have noticed that people had posted quotes form interviews that Sakurai doesn't like to disappoint fans or mislead them. Plenty of things Sakurai has done, he has given concise information for things, he has joked around (i.e. "I'm still alive", the substitute doll"), he has trolled fans (Zero Suit Samus fake disconfirmation; Palutena: the Pseudo Palutena trophy, the reference of the statue, the numerous PotD posted after the picture "leak"; Zelda's new down move and " don't worry, Sheik is back"; Greninja's trailer), and he has also been straight forward about which characters are not playable (quick and simple, named, shown, roles).
However, with that last point, Sakurai has not been straight forward with Ridley. Like I said, he has not mentioned him by name (only made a subtle reference to him), he has not shown him (clip with the camera looking at the ground and close up, a shadow and a quick glance at the tail if people stop the frame at the right time, but not showing what he looks like), and he has not mentioned his role, this is suspicious behaviour. Remember, he said "other boss characters make appearances on other stages...", this only implies that Ridley is part of the stage, it does not confirm or deny that he is a stage hazard. Perhaps Sakurai wants to not reveal Ridley incase of chaos and further arguments, but the longer he leaves it, the worse it becomes. The fact that Ridley has not had a straightforward dis-confirmation like dis-confirmed characters, it's reasonable for people to question Ridley's role. And on top of that, Ridley never had this kind of teasing level during Brawl's Dojo!! updates, Sakurai posted Ridley's theme before the release and that was it. Oh, but you won't think about other possibilities would you, you'll just go, "oh, 100% stage hazard, 100% dis-confirmed!". That's a confirmation bias.
I am a Ridley supporter, I would very much like to have Ridley as a playable character. However, I am up for Ridley to have both a playable role, and a WiiU exclusive stage hazard role, together in the game. I have not denied that the shadow in the direct in question belongs to Ridley, nor have I said that Ridley is not a stage hazard. I have however, looked at what people have hypothesized, and I have logically come to the conclusion that it's possible for Ridley to be both playable and a hazard at the same time (playable, and hazard when not selected by the player). You on the other hand seem to be too darn stubborn, believing that Ridley can only have one role (a rule not set in stone), a role that Sakurai has not 100% confirmed, and you seem to want to annoy the fans by shoving your beliefs down our throats. You mock people for having hope for a character that hasn't been dis-confirmed, you attack those who dislike people like yourself who dismiss everything that you don't believe in, and hypocritically say that we shouldn't call you and detractors "TooBigots", when you and detractors mock us, call us names, and use disgusting language to describe us. Read the thread, don't attack people in a support thread, you just look like a troll who wants to start arguments for no reason.
Oh, so if someone disagrees with you then they're an idiot? Very mature.
There's that immaturity again. If you want to debate, I'll debate, but I'm not going to pander to your immature namecalling and mocking. That's what people resort to when they know they're wrong, anyway.
A bit ironic mate, you haven't even put forward any decent arguments, all you've done is entered this thread and laughed at people who think differently, basically saying "stop being blind, he's a boss character, stop grasping at straws". And you have the nerve to say I'm immature? I've actually
contributed to this thread, I've actually thought up of ideas of
both playable and stage hazard Ridley (and I'm not wrong by the way). You? You haven't done a damn thing that's constructive here, and I highly doubt that you have the capability to make a decent constructive argument, the way you're being right now. All you seem to do is go "nope, wrong, you're in denial" posts without strengthening your points, and then you go further into hypocrisy by talking down on people for mocking detractors for their ignorant and outdated opinions, when detractors are always unpleasant about us and use disgusting language to label us. If you're not going to contribute to this thread, actually discuss Ridley (the whole point of the thread), and keep resorting to attack people and mock them for thinking differently to you, in a CHARACTER SUPPORT THREAD, then please go away. People here are not going to go out of our way to mock fans of dis-confirmed characters, or go into unconfirmed characters and spout things like "they don't stand a chance, give up" or "disconfirmed, lol u suck" like you're basically doing to us (at least I hope people won't). All I, and other Ridley fans, want is for Ridley to be playable, that's it, and we discuss whatever else relates to Ridley, the good stuff and the bad stuff. That's why this thread exists.
Please don't bother replying to this, because it only further proves to me and the entire thread members that you're not here to discuss about the character, and just want to pick fights. If you want to continue in the discussion of the thread, you should start by
actually reading what has been posted by various members, putting forward reasonable points in a civilised matter, and not throw abuse at us just because we think differently to you. Until Sakurai flat out says that Ridley isn't playable, we are entitled to continue to believe that he still has a chance, just like fans for other unconfirmed characters.
