#SmashBrosUltimate - Smash Bros for Switch.

[DioShiba]

As long as Mewtwo says things in Japanese about how he's the strongest every victory screen then I'd love to have voice toggle back.

[titleknown]

Since you can KO certain Assist Trophies now, maybe a Classic Mode round where you fight a team of 10 Waluigi's for example? A Team Assist Trophy instead of Fighting Mii Team, Fighting Alloys, Fighting Wireframes and Fighting Polygon Team.

Honestly, I really like that idea, but I also really; really hope "Everyone Is Here" also means that all the teams are coming back, IE Fighting Polygon/Wireframe/Alloys/ect. Namely because I like the Fighting Polygon Team a lot.

[Kriven]

Always wanted "Fighting Polygon" to be Smash Bros.' version of Mokujin, tbh.

[DioShiba]

That'd be a lot of polygons for each character, but to be honest I would love to see that from the original game incorporated into Ultimate because it's way more feasible than it sounds.

It was possible for characters to be edited with specific textures in Brawl and Smash for Wii U, I fail to see why it would be impossible for the characters to be edited down to their core polygons and have their own specific models for the multiman smash games and maybe a new classic mode that has more randomness to it.

[Kriven]

I don't know much about models. Is it really more involved than simply turning all of the textures purple?

[DioShiba]

Come to think of it, if there is a certain aesthetic that Sakruai wants to go for if it's straight up like the polygon fighters from Smash 64 I'd imagine that perhaps their polygons would be simplified a bit to look somewhat low poly.

But, If I'm really honest then chances are Sakurai will likely come up with retextures for the characters and come up with a new name for the fighting team if he decides to do something like that.

[Ton]

I've posted this elsewhere, but not here. I think.

We could really see Geno this time. Here's my logic.

1. Sakurai wanted to put him in Brawl, but couldn't at the time.
2. With Cloud in Smash 6, that means Nintendo has already worked out some kind of deal with them.
3. Two 3rd party characters per company is not unheard of. Look at Megaman and Ryu, both from Capcom.
4. There will never be another reveal as big as Sonic or Cloud or Snake (twice!). Those are some of the biggest gets possible for Smash. The only place to go from there is to the fans.
5. Along with #4, this game seems to be leaning heavily on pleasing fans. Everyone is back, most stages are back, and the new reveals, Inkling, Daisy, and Ridley, have all been huge requests for years. Other characters, including Geno and K. Rool have also been requested for a long time.
6. Building off of 4 & 5, Sakurai seems to be suggesting that this will be his final Smash game. He's said this in the past, but with the sheer amount of work in this, it seems like he may be telling the truth this time. This could mean he's willing to pull out all the stops.

So what do you think? Geno playable and Mallow as an assist?

[NICKtendo DS]

Most rules that dictate whether a character is fit for Smash or not are purely fan made and Sakurai has broken some if not most of these rules on several occasions, including the so-called "only one character per third-party company"-rule. Man, you can't even trust Sakurai himself. Villager and Pac-Man are playable, despite his skeptisism towards them.

So here's the reason why Geno could be in Smash Ultimate: There are no rules that prevent him from doing so. Plain and simple.
I personally think Geno is a weird choice, since he's only appeared in 1 Mario spin-off game and made a cameo appearance in another, but I wouldn't be surprised. He already has his foot in the door with his Mii Gunner Costume.

I personally don't think Geno is likely to appear, because despite the fan demand (see how far that got Waluigi) and all the other things that work in his favor, he's still a one-off character from a Mario spin-off. Does my opinion matter? Not really. I'm skeptical, I think even Dark Samus' chances are leagues above his (Metroid bias may apply), but it wouldn't surprise me if he made it in. Ridley didn't surprise me either. That's because anything* is possible, especially with how Ultimate is produced.

On the topic of Mii Costumes, I hope that aside from trophies like in Smash 4, you can buy these costumes in an in-game shop. Having that final piece of gear randomly drop was a freaking nightmare. Maybe have more stock than that to make your earnings feel more valuable, like Gear (the stat-altering stuff, not the Mii Costumes) and, if they're still a thing (I doubt it, given the circumstances), Custom Moves. Maybe these Custom Moves, instead of each character having 3 per Special Move, only Mii Fighters have them, but they'll have a way larger variety.

*Does not include the likes of Shrek, Thomas the Tank Engine and I want to say Goku, but he's in a weird gray area. He's a manga character originally, but he has a huge legacy when it comes to videogames and videogames like Dragon Ball Heroes kept the Dragon Ball franchise relevant and succesful when the manga and anime didn't. Licensing is going to be a bitch however.

[Ton]

I think Sakurai saying he's wanted him before, plus the fact that Square copyrights have already been sorted, plus the complete lack of any Mario RPG series representation may help his chances.

[Kriven]

Licensing is going to be a bitch however.

Licensing for Goku shouldn't be too difficult. Namco owns the video game license to the Dragon Ball (and Naruto) franchise, and Namco is working on Smash, and Namco and Nintendo are on very good terms with one another. Getting Goku into Smash wouldn't even be an eighth of the nightmare that would be actually localizing Jump Super Stars.

[sammyrms1]

On the topic of voice toggle, now that Marth is voiced in English, I hope you can switch between English and Japanese for characters like him. It wouldn't kill me if there wasn't, but I've always known Marth as the guy that speaks Japanese in Smash Bros.

Hope they also get Roy's English VA from Fire Emblem Heroes.

[NICKtendo DS]

Licensing is going to be a bitch however.

Licensing for Goku shouldn't be too difficult. Namco owns the video game license to the Dragon Ball (and Naruto) franchise, and Namco is working on Smash, and Namco and Nintendo are on very good terms with one another. Getting Goku into Smash wouldn't even be an eighth of the nightmare that would be actually localizing Jump Super Stars.

So for the rights as a videogame character, Namco is all they have to worry about? I always thought he was stuck to a bunch of license holders, both in Japan and in the West.

[Kriven]

Licensing is going to be a bitch however.

Licensing for Goku shouldn't be too difficult. Namco owns the video game license to the Dragon Ball (and Naruto) franchise, and Namco is working on Smash, and Namco and Nintendo are on very good terms with one another. Getting Goku into Smash wouldn't even be an eighth of the nightmare that would be actually localizing Jump Super Stars.

So for the rights as a videogame character, Namco is all they have to worry about? I always thought he was stuck to a bunch of license holders, both in Japan and in the West.

Shueisha might have a certain amount of say in how the product is ultimately used, but Namco has more control over the aspects of the IP they're licensed to use than people might think. There's probably another company or two in the West who has a certain amount of control over localized depictions of the character, but it's important to note that Dragon Ball games which aren't crossover titles don't usually have trouble making it to the west. Namco has an in with the companies they work with, and I don't think that for the inclusion of Dragon Ball or Naruto characters you would see the huge clusterfuck people like to imagine when they think about other Jump crossover games. Usually that clusterfuck isn't even a matter of English localization companies fighting, but the fact that Namco owns the license for one franchise in the west, but Sega owns the license for Bleach, and Konami might own the license for Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, and Koei Tecmo might own One Piece. The rights issues that cause problems are when competing game publishers own rights to the characters required for a crossover effort. Usually--in the case of manga--not because Viz and Funimation don't want the game to happen. I also think the fact that JStars Victory Vs. managed to get an official English release indicates that a certain amount of "smoothing out" has happened regarding characters published in Shonen Jump.

Edit: I forgot to add that often with licensed games, a studio is licensed for a set period of time or for a certain number of games, or even only to do one game and then the license reverts back to Shueisha. Namco has held onto the DBZ and Naruto properties for a significant amount of time, and they publish games within those franchises much more regularly than you see a lot of other manga games getting published. I of course don't have the contracts laid out in front of me, but the fact that even the games they didn't develop (Xenoverse and Fighter Z) were still published by Namco, the fact they've held the franchises for so long, and the fact that they produce sequels, side games, and sometimes even crossovers with their own properties (like Tekken), all indicate to me that Namco has a sweeter deal with those properties than you typically see in licensed games.

[DioShiba]

I could potentially see anime or manga based characters in smash in the next installment after Ultimate, but I feel as though that this smash game is more of a celebration of the series thus far and I think they may keep limiting themselves to video game characters this time around.

I can understand where Sakurai's stances change over time so I don't want to keep saying "Characters that didn't originate from games have no chance of making it in", but given the circumstances I have strong feelings that, to name a few random characters it is unlikely he'll throw characters like Goku, Naruto, Sailor Moon, Spike Speigel, Jotaro or any other character from Japanese media that originated outside of video games for the moment. At this point given how many franchises beyond gaming have seeped their way onto consoles over time nothing is impossible.

[Ton]

There won't ever be anime characters in Smash. Sakurai has said that it's strictly a video game character roster.