TSR's Super Smash Bros Thread|SWITCH HYPE TRAIN NOW BOARDING

[psychospacecow]

honestly though, this sounds kinda like "man, kim jong un will open up the North Korea. it could totally happen. why do you guys think otherwise???"

Of course that it could happen, after all nothing is impossible. but the chance is already too low. And that's why we're highly against it.

it could happen, but it's hilariously unlikely.

and I would just love it if either happened. I'm not taking this all too seriously. It'd be awesome if he did somehow find his way into the game, but I'm not betting on it or anything. I just like imagining a couple different ways to work something out like that, ya know? Also 10/10, would unite the Koreas over Goku.

[Omegajak]

Honestly, I'm not trying to give Goku the last spot. I honestly would love Soma, Juste, Simon Belmont getting in we need some Castlevania! Heck Golden Sun why isn't anyone from Golden Sun in here?! Gamefreak and SEGA had past ties where's Pulseman at? I'm just saying in terms of marketing deals and ploys people are making moves Namco Bandai is one of them. A new movie is coming a Butoden is getting a Western release for the first time in ever and the old games are coming onto the E-store. I mean Cloud being a huge surprise to everyone just makes me ready for the next reveal if it's not Goku that just adds to the surprise because it'd be a smart move to put Goku in economically, no one could deny that it would be. If anything it'd just give more room for getting out chracters people always wanted we don't have to bring them back in new iterations. Unless of course Sakurai said this was the last game for a long while.

[Kriven]

Why does everybody keep saying "Cloud is so random!"

He really isn't--he's been the enduring face of the JRPG genre since 1997. Any other Final Fantasy character with the exception of a generic Black Mage would have been a way more "random" choice. Sure, his primary game isn't on a Nintendo console, but that doesn't mean he lacks the star power to be among a group of video game all-stars. He's a third-party character with at least five appearances in games on Nintendo devices, starring role regardless, and he's the mascot of an entire genre. Cloud isn't a random choice in the slightest. His inclusion does nothing to "OPEN THE FLOOD GATES." That point won't come until lesser third-party characters or third-party supporting characters (Tails, Protoman, Pac-Man Ghosts, etc.) start getting character slots.

As for non-video game characters getting in, I'm not opposed to the idea of a few very particular characters getting in... Namely, ones which Nintendo has worked with closely. Popeye, Mickey Mouse, James Bond (who was almost in the original game, and would have been were it not for licensing issues) would be fine with me. As much as I love the Jump SuperStars, I don't really want to see them invading a primary Smash game... a JSS vs SSB game (emphasis on JSS content) could be neat, though. Or if the Smash team wanted to go on and make a Jump-centric game using Smash assets, that would be great too.

Honestly before any of that, I would rather see cartoon and comic book elements from Nintendo (and supported third-party) franchises showing up. I'd like a Mario stage set in the DIC cartoon's Pasta Land. I'd like Leo Luster smashing with the Kongs. I'd like Sonic's Freedom Fighters to have fully realized 3-D trophies. I'd like to see Jodi Summers represent F-Zero based solely on her role in the anime, and by that token, I'd like to see the Anime characters fill-in for Pokemon Trainer when particular Pokemon are in play (Ash when Pikachu is in play, for example. Red with Charizard. Riley with Lucario.)

[Koh]

Dragon Quest is also highly JRPG and known as such, and has been mostly on Nintendo consoles, AND is Square Enix (used to just be Enix), but you don't see that in here. Would be closer to home than FF for sure, which does scratch the head on Cloud even further. Everyone knows a Dragon Quest Slime when they see it.

[psychospacecow]

I say Cloud is random because I really think he is random. A lot of the roster is strange.
Captain Falcon is a race car driver, and he's got a punch equivalent to the force of being hit by one because of Smash.

Dark Pit is a palette swap.

Dr. Mario is just Mario with a questionable doctrine.

Duck Hunt was literally just the thing that laughed at your failures and the thing you shot.

Wolf, Falco and Fox are pilots.

Jigglypuff is only in the game because of the anime.

Luigi is all kinds of different in Smash compared to his normal appearances.

Mr. Game & Watch is literally an entire generation of gaming.

Peach's most violent actions outside smash are a game about emotions and sports games.

R.O.B. is a peripheral.

Wii Fit Trainer is for exercise software.

Random isn't a bad thing by any means. I like random. It diversifies the roster and makes things interesting. Everyone complains whenever a new sword fighter shows up. No one complains when the animal crossing villager turns out to be a psycho killer in Smash Bros.

[Kriven]

Dragon Quest is also highly JRPG and known as such, and has been mostly on Nintendo consoles, AND is Square Enix (used to just be Enix), but you don't see that in here.  Would be closer to home than FF for sure, which does scratch the head on Cloud even further.  Everyone knows a Dragon Quest Slime when they see it.

Because the average consumer doesn't give a shit about Dragon Quest.
Most people, even people who are only extremely casual gamers, recognize the Final Fantasy brand. You don't have to dig much deeper to find a group of casuals who will recognize Cloud.

But here I am a pretty not-casual gamer and the only Dragon Quest character I can tell you about is Slime and Yangus (and only then because his name made me want hamburgers while my friend was playing).

I mean, I love Namco's Tales RPG games, and I love XenoSaga, and both are awesome JRPGs that I think people should play... but I'm not going to say that Lloyd or KOS-MOS should have gotten in over Cloud.

You have to take a step back when you make statements like this. You're so close to the situation and the hobby, that yeah, you're going to know Dragon Quest and you're going to be able to point at how many millions of dollars it has made and copies it has sold and its history on Nintendo platforms. But none of that matters. Cloud is THE JRPG character. You can't fight that. Superman is THE superhero. Goku is THE anime. These are just things that can't be argued with.

[Kosheh]

Everyone knows a Dragon Quest Slime when they see it.

Just showed my girlfriend a pictures and asked. I got "very happy teardrop"



?? ??

[psychospacecow]

Dragon Quest doesn't have as much international appeal, but if what I've been told is true, then its one of those big iconic series in Japan.

[Kriven]

I say Cloud is random because I really think he is random. A lot of the roster is strange.
Captain Falcon is a race car driver, and he's got a punch equivalent to the force of being hit by one because of Smash.

Dark Pit is a palette swap.

Dr. Mario is just Mario with a questionable doctrine.

Duck Hunt was literally just the thing that laughed at your failures and the thing you shot.

Wolf, Falco and Fox are pilots.

Jigglypuff is only in the game because of the anime.

Luigi is all kinds of different in Smash compared to his normal appearances.

Mr. Game & Watch is literally an entire generation of gaming.

Peach's most violent actions outside smash are a game about emotions and sports games.

R.O.B. is a peripheral.

Wii Fit Trainer is for exercise software.

Random isn't a bad thing by any means. I like random. It diversifies the roster and makes things interesting. Everyone complains whenever a new sword fighter shows up. No one complains when the animal crossing villager turns out to be a psycho killer in Smash Bros.

Almost none of these are random additions, and the ones that seem like they are now weren't when they debuted in the series (and have endured because they are legacy characters). Most of the Smash characters represent the previous gaming generation (with the exception of Smash 64).

F-Zero was a hot franchise for Nintendo when Captain Falcon was added to Smash 64. It was used to showcase Mode 7 on the SNES, had a sequel on the N64, and would go on to have two more sequels before becoming dormant.

Dark Pit is Sakurai's lovechild. He was around before he was even really a character (as Fallen Angel Pit in Brawl).

Duck Hunt - I'll Give you that.

Wolf, Falco, and Fox are mercenaries, first of all. They were also the most popular characters from a franchise which, at the time, was wildly popular. Fox got in because Star Fox SNES and Star Fox 64 were huge games, Falco was added again because of Star Fox 64, and Wolf came in following right on the heels of Adventures/Assault/Command. Literally none of this is random.

Jigglypuff was a primary character in the anime at the time and was extremely popular in Japan and was featured in a whole shitload of promotional material.

"Luigi is Different" but he didn't start that way and he really isn't all that different from his other portrayals. Luigi's character isn't very consistent. When Miyamoto depicts the character, he's as heroic as his brother... but at other times he's lazy, and other times he's a coward... in Paper Mario he's a deeply depressed character with a hero complex.

G&W - Pretty random, but I guess I should mention that Game & Watch Gallery was an active series at the time.

"Peach's Violent Actions" this still isn't random. This isn't how random works.

ROB - Yeah, he's a little out there, but he was still pretty predictable. Hell, I even predicted him if you go look at that old Pre-Brawl CSS I posted.

Wii Fit Trainer - Sure, but she also represents Nintendo's casual interests during the Wii generation.


A slew of highly financially successful characters in a game designed solely to profit on successful properties does not constitute "Random", particularly when those franchises are Nintendo-owned. Random would be Steve from Blue's Clues suddenly appearing in Smash.

Edit: The only reason anybody should have been blindsided by Cloud's inclusion is because of how weird SE can be with their properties and their relations with other companies. He's definitely in the "Top Ten" third-party characters that are likely to have representation, though. He's an A-List icon with Mario and Link.

[psychospacecow]

I think we might be arguing different things here. Commercially speaking, yeah they make sense. As a representation of the history it makes sense. It doesn't really make sense to have high octane racer falcon as the power house he is in Smash, etc.
From a commercial standpoint, it makes sense to include Goku too. Dragonball's game rights are with Namco Bandai. There's a new series, new games, two recent movies and likely more coming, and a gaming history older than a good chunk of the game's cast.

[Kriven]

Goku isn't a gaming icon, though. He's a comic book icon.

Smash Bros. is about characters that originated in video games or video game-related material. Where-as Goku appears in comic book-related video games.

It's like arguing that The Terminator should join the League of Extraordinary Gentleman because he's been in novelizations.

I think we might be arguing different things here.

No, you argued that a character's inclusion was random. I argued that it wasn't. Maybe you meant to argue that some of the ways in which the characters were represented had no precedent? That still has nothing to do with Cloud or Goku.

[psychospacecow]

Alright man. Whatever. I'm going past what I had intended at this point for a fun little discussion about what could be done for a character in this format. I stand by what I said about some of these characters being very random, but that's just me I guess. I was talking about characters being in a fighting game who you wouldn't expect. You were talking about them as a commercial representation, which both apply to it being random or not. Its a pretty loose category. Going based off what you had said, I don't see Goku as being all that strange, but my fun little idea seems to have been blown out of proportion a bit.

[Koh]

But here I am a pretty not-casual gamer and the only Dragon Quest character I can tell you about is Slime and Yangus (and only then because his name made me want hamburgers while my friend was playing).

These kinds of arguments are terrible.  You can't ever say "I don't know what this is, so therefore, no one knows what this is."  An exception doesn't define the rule; Dragon Quest came out before Final Fantasy, contrary to some beliefs, and is also so insanely popular.  Not as much here as Japan, but it's such a readily recognizeable series just as much as Final Fantasy.  FF wouldn't even exist without Dragon Quest, as DQ set the foundation for JRPGs when the first game was released.

[psychospacecow]

Also true just on the fact that literally no one would know who Roy was if it wasn't for Smash Bros. If I'm not mistaken, his first appearance in a US release was Fire Emblem Awakening.

[Kriven]

I'm not saying Dragon Quest isn't a major franchise, though.

I'm saying it's not Final Fantasy. It's never going to be. As much depth as there might be to Dragon Quest, and as awesome as its characters could be, and as influential as the franchise has been on its genre, it's pretty much always going to be in Final Fantasy's shadow. None of its protagonists will be able to hold a candle to Cloud, because Cloud is really the first video game protagonist to be taken seriously. FF7 didn't make waves when it launched; it made tsunamis.

---

Also true just on the fact that literally no one would know who Roy was if it wasn't for Smash Bros. If I'm not mistaken, his first appearance in a US release was Fire Emblem Awakening.

You're again comparing a Nintendo-owned property to an outside property. In this case, Roy and Marth were included in Smash Bros. for marketing purposes: Roy for his own game in Japan (which was a stipulation, actually--Sakurai had to include Roy if he wanted Marth, or IS wouldn't allow it), and the duo to strike up interest in the United States.

If we compare legacy-for-legacy, most of the Nintendo characters should be replaced with Frogger, Bomberman, Belmont, Earthworm Jim, Crash Bandicoot, Lara Croft, Master Chief, and Spyro... but it is still a Nintendo celebration first, and an industry celebration second.