Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS Development History

This is a timeline for “Super Smash Brothers for 3DS/ Wii U”. Hopefully it will be useful. The work on this was done primarily by IntelliHeath1 and myself, in order to provide reliable information on when things occurred. Since development is still ongoing, updates will be made in the future. Furthermore, if you are aware of a certain event missing please let us know in the comments so I can update this post. Special shout out to — for their Smash Development post on SmashBoards, which filled in some blanks. Also, for IntelliHeath1 for providing the skeleton for this post. Please note, that all dates were adjusted for Japanese time, and therefore more be a day later than what you may remember.

Also, you can now “like” Source Gaming on Facebook. Neat!

2011

• Iwata announces Super Smash Bros Wii U and 3DS during Nintendo E3 2011 (June) conference in order to attract new team members. Iwata states that he began discussing the idea a couple months before.
• June 23th, 2011  Public and Private Famitsu Column, “no concrete plan”

2012

• Feb 2012, Sakurai tweeted that, during his brainstorming, he had been looking over Super Smash Bros Dojo, and reflecting on the past game’s development.
• March 22, 2012 – Sakurai is looking for a new house to live in for development.
• April 26th 2012 – Sakurai presents a proposal to Nintendo
• May 2012 – Sakurai finishes the first draft of the Smash for Wii U/3DS project plan (Vol 469)
• June 2012 Nintendo Direct confirmed joint-project between Sora, LTD and Namco Bandai at E3
• June 22nd, 2012 – a press site detailing Bandai Namco’s involvement with Smash is launched
• June 22nd, 20112 an English portion of the Masahiro Sakurai and Masaya Kobayashi is placed on Nintendo.com
• During June 2012, Sakurai announces that the prototype is looking good.
• During Aug 2012, Sakurai stated that game system had been completed.
• August 2012, Sakurai is explaining the new character movesets to the staff. Robin was fully decided.

2013

• June 2013 Gematsu is tipped off to a potential leak.
• June 11th, 2013 Nintendo Direct release a first trailer of Super Smash Bros 3DS and Wii U, which confirmed 9 veteran characters and 3 newcomers; Mario, Link, Pikachu, Kirby, Samus, Pit, Fox, Donkey Kong, Bowser, Villager, Wii Fit Trainer and Mega Man.
• Super Smash Bros Wii U and 3DS website went up on June 11, 2013
• Daily Image stars on June 12, 2013.
• July 12th, 2013 Pikmin and Olimar are revealed
• July 25th, 2013 – Sakurai confirms that the new game won’t have a story mode in vol. 432 of his Famitsu column.
• August 7th, 2013 Luigi is revealed
• September 12th, 2013 Peach is revealed
• September 26th, 2013 Toon Link is revealed
• October 1st, 2013 Sonic is revealed
• November 17th, 2013 Marth is revealed
• December 18th, 2013 Rosalina and Luma are revealed
• December 26th, 2013 Zelda is revealed

2014

• January 10th, 2014 Dedede is revealed
• January 31st, 2014 Lucario is revealed
• February 14th, 2014 Little Mac is revealed
• February 21st, 2014 Diddy Kong is revealed
• March 26th, 2014 – “for 3DS/ Wii U” is announced as the official subtitle for the games.
• April 4th, 2014 SmashBros Twitter account launched
• April 9th, 2014 More information comes in from Gematsu about the roster.
• April 9th, 2014 Smash Direct: Greninja, Charizard, Yoshi, Sheik, Zero Suit Samus, Smash Run revealed.
• April/May 2014 Xander Mobus records Japanese names of characters, including “Purin”. Might not be the first instance of recording. (Thanks to Awwa for the heads up!)
• May 23rd, 2014 Ike is revealed
• June 9th, 2014 Additional information from the Gematsu leaker is published.
• June 10th, 2014 Smash for Wii U invitational
• June 10th, 2014 Palutena, PacMan and Mii Fighter, Customization
• July 14th, 2014 Robin, Lucina and Captain Falcon are revealed
• August 13th, 2014 Metaknight is revealed
• August 19th, 2014 the ERSB leak is revealed to the public.
• August 29th, 2014 Shulk is revealed
• September 10th, 2014 – Demo for Smash 3DS goes live
• September 13th, 2014 – Smash 3DS is released in Japan
• October 3rd, 2014 – Smash 3DS is released in the West
• October 23rd, 2014 – 50 Reasons Direct. Mewtwo revealed. Bowser Jr. trailer released.
• November 5th, 2014 – Duck Hunt trailer released.
• November 8th,2014 – 3DS XL Smash Bros edition is launched in Japan
• November 21st, 2014 – Smash for Wii U is launched in the West
• December 5t, 2014 – Picture of the Day ends
• December 6th, 2014 – Smash for Wii U is launched in Japan.

33

2015

• January 29th, 2015 – 1.0.2 was released for the Wii U, adding additional 8 Player Smash stages.
• March 19th, 2015 – Sakurai appears on NicoNico, states that Mewtwo is almost ready.
• April 1st, 2015 – DLC is announced for Super Smash Brothers.
• April 15th, 2015 – Mewtwo was made available for Club Nintendo members who registered both versions of the game.
• April 28th, 2015 – Mewtwo is made available for purchase the general public.
• June 14th, 2015 – Roy, Ryu and Lucas were made available for purchase. Miiverse, Dreamland 64 and Suzaku Castle were also made available.

• November 12th, 2015 – Cloud was announced in the Nintendo Direct.

• December 16th, 2015 – Bayonetta and Corrin were revealed in the final Smash broadcast and Cloud was released shortly after.

• January 31st, 2016 – Sakurai appears on Tokaigi to announce that Bayonetta and Corrin are set to be released the following Thursday.
• February 4th, 2016 – Bayonetta and Corrin are released.
• February 10th, 2016 – Sakurai confirms that development has finished in his Famitsu Column.

Additional Information

• Yoshito Higuchi and Masaya Kobayashi are team leaders for Development teams.
• Sakurai sometimes worked from 10 AM – midnight during development (Day in a Life of Director). Afterwards, he would sometimes ride a stationary bike while playing games in order to keep in shape and to continue his research for Smash (Novemeber 2013, vol 439-442).
• Bandai Namco was selected due to their work on the Tekken series, and close relationship with Nintendo.
• Majority of development happened at Bandai Namco Studio which is located in Mirai-Kenkyusho, Toyko, Japan.
• Sakurai expressed his interests that he intended to bring back old Nintendo characters for the games.
• Heihachi was briefly considered.
• Takamaru was briefly considered.
• Sakurai stated that Ridley would have numerous issues if he made it into the game.
• Ice Climbers were cut due to technical limitations.
• Transforming characters were cut due to technical limitations.
• Other parts of the original project plan did not make it into the game.
• Model alterations had to be done for some characters in 8 player Smash.
• Other cut content was found in the Wii U version.
• Feeling that the series had found its target audience and introducing gimmicks would hinder rather than help the brand, Sakurai explained that he was thinking of ways to introduce a new, different experience, while retaining the frantic gameplay from previous installments.
• Tripping were removed from the game, and gameplay would be between Melee and Brawl
• DLC was made with the fans in mind.
• Mewtwo was originally not going to be premium DLC, but because of issues with sharing among family members, the team decided to release Mewtwo for purchase.
• No balance patches were originally planned after 1.0.4, but since then the game has received numerous updates.
• There is a playtesting team which produces reports. These reports have a slight impact on balance changes.

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