Like I said before, I disagree with the Lightning part. They are trying to appeal to a lot of people here. If they only appealed to the people that have been with Playstation for a very long time, they would miss out on the new people. Folks like Lightning, maybe Dante, Raiden, Sackboy, etc, are appealing to the people who have gotten into Playstation fairly recently. They can't just appeal to one group like the people that discuss the game online think they can.
I'm very, very excited to see if Lightning makes it in the game. She's my most anticipated character.
I think we need to see them in action and see them officially revealed before we have people burning things.
Exaclty and the casual fans out there will be like "I don't know about this game, who can I play as?" And if it was entirely PSone and 2 characters they would be like "Who?". So some, SOME, characters that have immediate appeal and recognition are a good thing and I do think the ones they have selected, aside from Big Daddy, still champion the history of Playstation.
Dante, DINO or not, is a 10+ year old character dating back to the early days of PS2, and so is Raiden. So to say these characters aren't part of the history is nonsense.
People who are recent to Playstation aren't going to all of a sudden recognise DINO, Lightning and Raiden. Out of the three, Raiden is the most recognisable and that's because he's a character who has history and has been around for a decade. His solo game isn't even launching until next year but he doesn't fall in the same category as the other two because he's been around since PS2.
DINO doesn't even have his game released yet, and is far removed from the more recognisable Dante design. Lightning is instantly less recognisable than various FF characters even if her game is recent. Simply because the fanbase for FF isn't exactly ever changing. So having her included means little. Put in Tidus, Yuna, Cloud, Squall, Sephiroth and all would bring in a bigger audience. Cloud, even though ancient, is still far more iconic and recognisable.
The only character out of the third party selection who came out this generation and is immediately recognisable is Big Daddy. That's it. In that respect, his inclusion is somewhat understandable.
Raiden, who is the next most recogniable aside from Heihachi, is someone who has a decade long history. He's not a new character.
And Heihachi has been around since PS1.
Lightning and DINO are odd ones out.
