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1.8 million votes were cast for the Smash ballot, more info might be coming
- Thread starter Cerium
- Start date
hydragonwarrior
Member
Bayo was probably 4th or 5th
Green Mamba
Member
It sounds less like luck and more due to the fact that Fire Emblem has a very steady release schedule thanks to having a dedicated team and relatively small budgets. Meanwhile Donkey Kong gets batted around to whoever and Metroid was basically assassinated by Nintendo themselves.
Concerning your point on Donkey Kong it then sounds like Diddy was very lucky to be in Brawl at all, considering the only big DK release between Melee and Brawl was Jungle Beat and Diddy was existing purely off spinoff fumes. SSB4 was very much more focused on what was going on right here, right now, and while it's obviously due to the character well running dry, I think making the newcomers entirely drawn from either super recent relevancy mixed with one or two intentionally very retro throwbacks is going to make good characters slip out of the process through absolutely no fault of their own.
I tend to think that Smash Bros is nerdier than other Nintendo franchises - in the sense that the people who play are more knowledgeable about video games and value the mainstream hits less - and so its cast cast is disproportionate to popularity in part for that reason.
It's a bit old, but look at this Famitsu poll. Being a dedicated gaming magazine, the people who are going to vote on this poll are probably not the casual gaming audience. There's no Wii Sports in there even though it's (going by japanltdranking) the second biggest seller ever on Wii in Japan. And I don't think it was bundled, at least not at first.
But we can see that Mother 2 is high on the list, and we have Ness as a mainstay along with a second Mother character. Xenoblade's up there, and we have Shulk as a newcomer. There are two Fire Emblems before you get to Donkey Kong.
I think this list is particularly interesting to look at when we're discussing Smash Bros' roster. Let's look at which series are here without having playable reps (lumping in spinoffs like Super Mario RPG into the main series). We've got Famicom Tantei Club, and we know that Sakurai had been thinking of making Ayumi Tachibana from that game into a character. We've got Joy Mecha Fight, and we've heard him mention Sukapon as an item. We've got Banjo Tooie, and we know that he was thinking of Banjo before the whole Rare fallout. Though we've also got Magical Vacation, Shin Onigashima, and some old sports games, which are left out.
I'm also half convinced that Ice Climbers is only here because of Smash Bros because seriously who gives a fuck about Ice Climbers
It's a bit old, but look at this Famitsu poll. Being a dedicated gaming magazine, the people who are going to vote on this poll are probably not the casual gaming audience. There's no Wii Sports in there even though it's (going by japanltdranking) the second biggest seller ever on Wii in Japan. And I don't think it was bundled, at least not at first.
But we can see that Mother 2 is high on the list, and we have Ness as a mainstay along with a second Mother character. Xenoblade's up there, and we have Shulk as a newcomer. There are two Fire Emblems before you get to Donkey Kong.
I think this list is particularly interesting to look at when we're discussing Smash Bros' roster. Let's look at which series are here without having playable reps (lumping in spinoffs like Super Mario RPG into the main series). We've got Famicom Tantei Club, and we know that Sakurai had been thinking of making Ayumi Tachibana from that game into a character. We've got Joy Mecha Fight, and we've heard him mention Sukapon as an item. We've got Banjo Tooie, and we know that he was thinking of Banjo before the whole Rare fallout. Though we've also got Magical Vacation, Shin Onigashima, and some old sports games, which are left out.
I'm also half convinced that Ice Climbers is only here because of Smash Bros because seriously who gives a fuck about Ice Climbers
TheDinoman
Member
A theory I have: Maybe Sakurai just didn't think Dixie was all that interesting.
When it came to Smash 4, Sakurai basically gave himself a challenge to make every newcomer as completely unique and inventive as much as possible. He got offtrack a little with Dark Pit and Lucina but those were just alternative costumes made into their own character slots at the last minute.
I don't know, perhaps when compared to Little Mac ("ground based brawler who can gain access to a instant KO attack"), Robin ("magic and sword user with depletable weapons"), or Rosalina ("puppet user who fights alongside a luma partner"), maybe Dixie ("monkey who flips her hair around") just wasn't as exciting to Sakurai. I saw someone made a interesting point awhile ago, in that "How would you make Dixie's trailer that exciting?". It's kinda the same thing with Chrom.
I always felt that with Dixie, they'd do the Lucas/Wolf thing and use Diddy's moveset as a base but modify it to the point where she's more different, but it seems Sakurai didn't want to do that with any character this time, at least initially in the planning process.
When it came to Smash 4, Sakurai basically gave himself a challenge to make every newcomer as completely unique and inventive as much as possible. He got offtrack a little with Dark Pit and Lucina but those were just alternative costumes made into their own character slots at the last minute.
I don't know, perhaps when compared to Little Mac ("ground based brawler who can gain access to a instant KO attack"), Robin ("magic and sword user with depletable weapons"), or Rosalina ("puppet user who fights alongside a luma partner"), maybe Dixie ("monkey who flips her hair around") just wasn't as exciting to Sakurai. I saw someone made a interesting point awhile ago, in that "How would you make Dixie's trailer that exciting?". It's kinda the same thing with Chrom.
I always felt that with Dixie, they'd do the Lucas/Wolf thing and use Diddy's moveset as a base but modify it to the point where she's more different, but it seems Sakurai didn't want to do that with any character this time, at least initially in the planning process.
A lot of those ideas are Sakurai's, though. Little Mac's super attack isn't an instant kill in Smash Bros, and he's not a ground-based fighter as a distinctive attribute (in that the only exception to ground-based fighting in Punch-Out!! is Dragon Chan). In the Punch-Out!! games, he's just a guy who dodges and punches a lot. Depletable weapons are also not special to Robin, and could have been implemented with any Fire Emblem character, and Rosalina never fought with the Luma.
You may be right in that Sakurai didn't find Dixie interesting, but I'm just saying that your evidence is pretty bad.
You may be right in that Sakurai didn't find Dixie interesting, but I'm just saying that your evidence is pretty bad.
Green Mamba
Member
I don't buy this reasoning at all, as it seems to stem from a lack of imagination. I mean, they cut interesting trailers of nobodies like Wii Fit Trainer and Duck Hunt, and we got interesting trailers out of Bowser Jr. and Pac-Man, two characters everyone was swearing up and down would be uninteresting newcomers. And it's not like every newcomer is some heretofore never seen game mechanics wizardry--Greninja does basically nothing mechanically that hasn't been done before, and we got an interesting trailer out of that, too.
And they've taken uninteresting characters and made them interesting at many points in the series--Ice Climbers, R.O.B., Duck Hunt, Little Mac, Sheik, etc. If Sakurai can't come up with something for Dixie, well....
Funnily enough, the CGI portion of Rosalina's trailer goes out of its way to give Rosalina herself as little spotlight as possible, instead focusing on Kirby, the Mario Kart cast, and Luma.
NinjaCoachZ
Member
I think the fact that Dixie was planned for Brawl twice indicates Sakurai's aware of her, but just on a lower priority.
In brawl the idea was she'd be a tag-team with Diddy. That didn't pan out, but she has leftover data toward the end of the files as a solo character (whereas the ICs have one directory, IIRC). I'm guessing the idea was "okay, if we have some extra time, we can squeeze her in as a low-effort bonus character" -- just like Wolf, Jiggs, and Toon Link were (and Roy, Doc, and Toon Zelda presumably would have been).
For SSB4 I think the thing is there were just so many new modern characters to catch up on that they ended up taking priority. I mean I love DK and all, but I can't fault Sakurai for choosing to work on the characters he did first. Except maaaaaybe Bowser Jr who I think has also been implied to have been one of those "bonus" characters who was on the verge of not making it, but did thanks to some extra oomph.
I think it's telling because he could've appeased Dixie fans by just making her an alt like Alph (or what Lucina was meant to be) but the fact that she's not in is a sign that clearly he thinks she has to be something above that. Honestly I think she's first in line for a future Smash game.
In brawl the idea was she'd be a tag-team with Diddy. That didn't pan out, but she has leftover data toward the end of the files as a solo character (whereas the ICs have one directory, IIRC). I'm guessing the idea was "okay, if we have some extra time, we can squeeze her in as a low-effort bonus character" -- just like Wolf, Jiggs, and Toon Link were (and Roy, Doc, and Toon Zelda presumably would have been).
For SSB4 I think the thing is there were just so many new modern characters to catch up on that they ended up taking priority. I mean I love DK and all, but I can't fault Sakurai for choosing to work on the characters he did first. Except maaaaaybe Bowser Jr who I think has also been implied to have been one of those "bonus" characters who was on the verge of not making it, but did thanks to some extra oomph.
I think it's telling because he could've appeased Dixie fans by just making her an alt like Alph (or what Lucina was meant to be) but the fact that she's not in is a sign that clearly he thinks she has to be something above that. Honestly I think she's first in line for a future Smash game.
Green Mamba
Member
Alt of who? She can't be a Diddy alt, he has a tail and she doesn't. The only way a character could be an alt is if they could get away with lifting the animations wholesale, Dixie couldn't do that for Diddy.
TheDinoman
Member
Dixie as an alt for Diddy would be really awkward, more so than Alph as an Olimar alt. It wouldn't really do her justice considering she wouldn't be able to fight with her hair and she doesn't use rocketbarrels. There's also the fact that Dixie doesn't have a tail.
EDIT: Basically what Green Mamba said above.
EDIT: Basically what Green Mamba said above.
NinjaCoachZ
Member
Forgot about that. Fuck me.
That said I do also want to say that I'm not a fan of the mentality that some franchises "deserve" more characters than others or that characters can be added just to fill a quota. Saying that as someone who'd like a DK character, I think it's unhealthy in general to get into this idea of attacking certain franchises for having more characters than your favourite, etc.
That said I do also want to say that I'm not a fan of the mentality that some franchises "deserve" more characters than others or that characters can be added just to fill a quota. Saying that as someone who'd like a DK character, I think it's unhealthy in general to get into this idea of attacking certain franchises for having more characters than your favourite, etc.
I think that there would be less discussion of Dixie as a playable character if there wasn't hints of her existing as one at one point. Not zero discussion, but notably less.
D
Deleted member 74300
Unconfirmed Member
Smash needs more bad guys. Removing Wolf didn't help things either.
There are so many bad guys that don't look gross though. Like Ridley.
I'm just puzzled that the push for Ridley fizzled out and seemed to be replaced by, of all characters, K Rool... It's just weird.
Green Mamba
Member
Ridley fizzled out because he was already in the base game and due to the fact he's basically the only hopeful Nintendo character that Sakurai has specifically said he thinks is impossible.
TheDinoman
Member
No one really pushes for Ridley anymore because Sakurai has flat out stated that he will never make him a playable character ever lol
D
Deleted member 74300
Unconfirmed Member
Because they figured that Sakurai would be too damn stubborn to add him in so they went for someone else.
I could understand not being interested in K. Rool because of how you see he in his games, because you think he ain't relevant, because you think other characters are better...
...but disqualifying him on accounts of "he's got an ugly design" is pretty damn alien to me. It's such a silly reason not to want someone in, nevermind the redesigns Smash gives to characters in its roster. Would you take someone seriously if they championed a character solely because they were good-looking?
...but disqualifying him on accounts of "he's got an ugly design" is pretty damn alien to me. It's such a silly reason not to want someone in, nevermind the redesigns Smash gives to characters in its roster. Would you take someone seriously if they championed a character solely because they were good-looking?
Green Mamba
Member
That's kind of funny to me because I think Ridley's Other M design is an affront to God and quite possibly the ugliest thing ever included in Smash Bros.
This too. I realize is common in Smash to prioritize the latest games in a series, but goodness gracious, did they seriously have to give Other M the lion's share of Metroid representation, going so far as to remove several Prime music tracks?
Rundas' Theme in Smash will have to be...another time...
The ballot must have been a complete shit show. I can imagine that a bulk of the entries were either trolling the ballot or picking pretty extreme, infeasible characters. I'm not denying that there are Bayonetta fans out there but it wasn't probably voted in by a landslide. I'm thinking she got less than 300,000 votes out of the 1.8 million and everything else was distributed over quite a few other characters that were ~ Bayonetta numbers. The other thing that always crossed my mind is that the whole ballot was a marketing stunt and these final characters were already in development prior to the ballot's end at the beginning of October. The design, voice work (for Pit/Palutena + Bayonetta + Kirby, etc), writing, and promotional stuff would have to be done in short order. Eh, personally, if Nintendo ever does a ballot like this again, they ought to design an app for Wii U and 3DS and do ballots through NNID. It'd narrow down active players and people that are likely going to play Smash and purchase the DLC.
TheDinoman
Member
As sad as it sounds, Nintendo basically sees Other M as the latest "mainline" Metroid game. They've always seen the Prime games as sort of a spinoff or gaiden story of sorts.
It's a factor into why Samus's powersuit is always based on the R&D1/Sakamoto developed games instead of Prime.
It's a factor into why Samus's powersuit is always based on the R&D1/Sakamoto developed games instead of Prime.
I mean all of those reasons are pretty relevant too don't get me wrong but the most glaring issue I have personally is that yeah his design is early 90's affront to the eyes garbage, he's fuckin gross and I can think of a million better characters off the top of my head, even if we limit it to villains.
I'm willing to give Sakurai the benefit of the doubt and think there was pressure to give Other M the level of representation it got...Like, yeah, its assets and music tracks were ripe for the taking and no doubt helped accelerate the creation of Metroid's trophies, music and new stage...but everything in Metroid Prime 3 must have been readily available as well. I don't know. It's not like the game's infamous reputation among the Metroid fanbase wasn't well known by the time Sakurai kicked off Sm4sh's doc design. Maybe it's a cultural thing? Perhaps Japanese fans were more receptive to Other M? Mainline or not, seems just weird to give so much of the spotlight to a game that's, to be polite, is less than fondly remembered by the fans.
Well my good man, the reason why I think any complaints having to do with someone's visuals don't hold much weight is because the art direction in Smash is more often than not top notch. Ice Climbers in Melee, Pit in Brawl, Duck Hunt in Sm4sh, their re-imaginations of characters that haven't been around in a while tend to be excellent. So I have no doubt that if K. Rool made it into Smash (as opposed to just a Mii Costume), that Sakurai and Co. would look into making his design as appealing as they could make it for the masses. I personally have no issue with it but it's what I think would happen, lol.
woopWOOP
Member
Also more heavyweight fighters. I like heavyweight fighters. I'd be totally cool playing as a demented fat crocodile that has the speed/weight of a custom fighter stuffed with defense equips.
At this point I'm expecting a lot of angry folks when a new Smash is announced with Sakurai, again, as the director.
So many want him to step down and be gone because he doesn't pick their favorite characters, lol
At this point I'm expecting a lot of angry folks when a new Smash is announced with Sakurai, again, as the director.
So many want him to step down and be gone because he doesn't pick their favorite characters, lol
The argument that worked on me is that he's one of the most recurring characters of one of the biggest Nintendo franchises, and distinctly represents the SNES era (which there isn't a ton of otherwise). Plus, his craziness and penchant for dressing up can be a distinguishing gimmick. Somewhere between Bowser and Wario.
I still think he looks lame, but if he had different costumes instead alternate colours (King, Captain, Baron, Boxer, Aztec) that would be pretty neat.
Sir Ilpalazzo
Member
I'd be okay with K. Rool. His out-of-game renders are pretty ugly and some of his fans (on and off of GAF) have acted pretty bizarrely, but there'd be a lot of room to make a cool moveset for him - although maybe working in things from all three DKC games and DK64 might make him feel like patchworky, I don't know. I never really actively wanted him but he could have been neat.
Spyder_Monkey
Banned
None of Nintendo's bad guys are really that iconic besides Bowser and maybe Ganondorf and King Dee Dee Dee. I supposed if they could spring for another Sega rep they could get Eggman which would be cool but other than that, I can't think any bad guy fit for Smash.
A character doesn't have to be iconic to get into Smash. If that was the case Falcon and Fox never would have made it into the original, let alone characters like Ice Climbers, Pit, Little Mac, etc in future installments.
Falcon, Fox, Ice Climbers, Pit, and Little Mac are all the main characters of their respective games, but villains are secondary characters by default. Secondary characters are at a big disadvantage when it comes to getting into Smash Bros.
Ridley, but Sakurai hates Ridley
They could have done Medusa instead of fucking Dark Pit. Or Hades. Hades is awesome.
TheDinoman
Member
Once again, it's not like they planned Dark Pit from the beginning of the game's development process. He, alongside Lucina and Dr. Mario were initially alternate costumes they decided to turn into their own character slots for various reasons.
I always disliked it when people say "well, if they wanted clones, why not Glass Joe/Dixie Kong/Dark Samus/etc?". Those characters were never planned as alts like Dark Pit was. In that sense, the poll of candidates for last minute clone characters were:
Dr. Mario
Lucina
Dark Pit
Alph
Wireframe Mac
All seven Koopalings
Male Wii Fit Trainer
Female Robin
And well, it goes without saying that only the top four made any real sense as possible clones. Alph was reportedly planned to be included as his own character with Rock Pikmin, but that never came to fruition.
So really, it was basically Dark Pit vs. Alph, not Dark Pit vs. Medusa, if you know what I mean.
I have no idea what would lead you to believe that.
IntelliHeath
As in "Heathcliff"
I think it's just bad timing. The design document is pretty much done during first half of 2012. Also Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze got released during early 2014, so I bet that Sakurai and the team want to focus on the game that got released somewhere in first half of 2015.
That's probably one of reasons why Splatoon's Inkling didn't become downloadable character, other than potential limitations.
From Nintendo, of course. Rest of my post leaves clear it was definitely not from fans.
friskykillface
Banned
free the Rool
Snake has to be #1 or #2
Snake has to be #1 or #2
Green Mamba
Member
The fact that there is absolutely no Metroid Prime trophies at all save for a few that were already in Brawl and the new Dark Samus trophy, combined with absolutely no new Metroid Prime music (save a worthless song rip from Hunters, come on) is incredibly bizarre. And there are plenty of Donkey Kong trophies from Retro Studios so it's not like they just didn't contact Retro for assets or anything. Metroid Prime was very nearly just straight up forgotten, and I don't see any easy answer there. I don't like to imagine that Sakurai's just that tone deaf to the Metroid fanbase. But if he was approaching it from the viewpoint of the basically nonexistant Japanese Metroid fanbase, maybe he is. I dunno. But the two new Prime colors for Samus plus the Dark Samus Assist show that he was at least a bit aware of it during production, but under what sky did anyone think song rips from Other M and Hunters were stronger desires than anything from Prime 3?
DecoReturns
Member
I always thought Fox and Falco were iconic. Everyone seems to know what Star Fox 64 is.
Even people that don't play video games.
RomanceDawn
Member
When it comes to trailers, anyone could be made to look exciting. There is a ton of ways that Dixie could be made to look unique but not everyone should now have a mystery factor that makes super mechanically different from the rest of the cast. For me, I need the straightforward Greninjas and Charizards of the cast. All Dixie would need is some spectacular gyro, spinning and twirling moves to give her some flair.
K Rool is a yucky looking character to me. The Mario Baseball redesign was cool for me. But however he looks I'd be happy to have him.
Source gaming posted an article a few weeks ago translating another interview from Sakurai. When asked about another series being worked on by him(and I think leaving behind smash for a while) he basically worried that the Smash team wouldn't be able to handle the series with out him.
Ridley will forever be a long shot but the only thing I can depend on about Sakurai is his current opinion is undependable.
K Rool is a yucky looking character to me. The Mario Baseball redesign was cool for me. But however he looks I'd be happy to have him.
Source gaming posted an article a few weeks ago translating another interview from Sakurai. When asked about another series being worked on by him(and I think leaving behind smash for a while) he basically worried that the Smash team wouldn't be able to handle the series with out him.
Ridley will forever be a long shot but the only thing I can depend on about Sakurai is his current opinion is undependable.
Choppasmith
Member
I have to admit, while not angry or salty, the beginning of Bayonetta's trailer made me think we were getting Hades or Medusa and I'm a little sad we didn't.
DecoReturns
Member
I hope next series keep the Announcement Trailers. They were fantastic and had plenty of Charm. Also hype as hell.
I know people complain about it replacing the intro video, but it's worth it.
I know people complain about it replacing the intro video, but it's worth it.
Spyder_Monkey
Banned
Ridley's never going to happen. You all need to accept that as a fact. He'll show up in Virtua Fighter before Smash.
Medusa, as a villain, sucks. Besides Kid Icarus has an infinitely better villain in Hades. Also, Dark Pit's my main and I hope he stays in the series forever. Haters going to hate I guess.
balladofwindfishes
Member
He hates Ridley so much he makes a very conscious effort to include him in basically every Smash as an important character doing what Ridley does best in half of them.
Lord_Byron28
Member
I think Medusa could be a pretty fun character. Her Uprising design is pretty good and her powers would be pretty fun to use. Too bad Uprising also moved her to the kiddie table.