Today, we will be trying out a new format. This post will argue why Sakurai shouldn’t return to the next Smash. Another post detailing why he should will also be posted. We are going to let you the readers decide which argument is more convincing. Please read BOTH sides before deciding the winner. The link to vote will be at the bottom of each post.
The post is divided into subsections arguing one particular point. Let us know in the comments, or on Twitter, what you agree or disagree in this post!
Gets Lost in the Small Details:
Sakurai is known to have an obsessive personality, and he needs things to match his vision perfectly. As a result, I personally feel that a lot of minor, easy quality-of-life improvements are often not implemented. The lack of a stage hazard toggle because it was in Playstation All-Stars: Battle Royale, for example. Or the inability to purchase customs in Smash for (or really, anything to combat the extreme difficulty of obtaining customs in Smash for in the first place). Because his vision often involves tailoring the game to the hardware to show off what makes it unique, this leads to situations like 8-player Smash being heavily integrated into Classic Mode, which is almost universally considered a step down from previous entries. Superficially, I appreciate the breadth of knowledge and attention to detail Sakurai brings and I understand the appeal that has to Nintendo diehards…but part of me wishes that we got a more polished single player and other additions over things like that. In general, it seems like he hates delegating and independent initiative in his games, given description of his work schedule, I can’t help but feel like maybe Sakurai is just a bit inefficient (although I understand that game development is no walk in the park).
Has Issues Meeting Deadlines:
Sakurai has a lot of issues meeting deadlines. Recently, his games have either been delayed, or have a long development cycle. Kirby Air Ride was originally an N64 title, then scrapped completely and (possibly) made from the ground up on the Gamecube! Melee was almost delayed, but was saved by Satoru Iwata himself. Brawl was delayed — twice! This was because of adding Sonic, and possibly the difficulties surrounding Subspace Emissary. Smash for Wii U and 3DS had a long development time, though to be fair it was two versions of Smash. However, because of the delay, the Wii U suffered from not having a Smash title at launch.
Sakurai Bias:
While Sakurai has argued against “Sakurai Bias” in the past, some fans believe it still exists. He has often made excuses for not including non-Sakurai Kirby content, or with overrepresentation of Fire Emblem and Kid Icarus. Even with his excuses, the fact is that there’s too much Fire Emblem and Kid Icarus content in Smash for Wii U. He tried justifying Corrin’s inclusion by stating he was hesitant against the idea — but the fact is almost 30% of the DLC characters was Fire Emblem alone. For fans of Smash who aren’t Fire Emblem fans, that’s simply too much content for the tactical RPG. DLC could have been better planned out, and included content that would appease all the fans. Sakurai may not like to admit it, but there seems to be some bias in his selection process.
Doesn’t Cater to the Competitive Community:
Dan Fornace, the creator of the indie game Rivals of Aether, posted a tweet that I think encapsulates this problem fairly well. In contrast to Sakurai’s statement– “We wanna avoid a situation where it becomes a game sort of like other competitive fighting games, where it’s only appreciated by a very small, passionate group of sort of maniac players,” Dan edited the statement to say “We want a situation where it’s appreciated by a small passionate group of awesome players.” To be clear, Sakurai has no obligation to cater towards the competitive community. However, it probably wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that Nintendo and Sakurai’s attitude towards competitive Smash is probably one of the least appreciative attitudes towards a competitive scene by its own creators in relevant gaming history. I don’t think this is hyperbole– almost all creators and directors universally love seeing their game played at a high levels, seeing tactics and mechanics they never considered feasible or knew existed being played out in high-stakes matches, and they love supporting it. Reminder: Nintendo didn’t just want Melee (after the community raised $94,000 to donate to breast cancer research!) to not be streamed at Evo 2013, they wanted to cancel the entire Melee portion of the event. Much smaller companies have poured in far more support into the competitive scenes of their games than Nintendo ever has.
Ultimately, not caring about the competitive community is probably not the biggest concern for most people, and that’s fine. I also don’t think that caring about the competitive community means that the next Smash could should play more like Melee. That sort of game design minutiae isn’t really the point. But it does feel like Sakurai has always felt like casual and competitive enjoyment is mutually exclusive, and I genuinely do not believe that’s the case. Sakurai’s fears about casuals being stomped have always felt like extremely niche, bizarre corner cases that I can’t actually ever imagine happening in a real-life scenario (or alternatively, are applicable to every Smash game). Project M was just as, if not more enjoyable in casual play than Brawl was, I never felt that the addition of the Melee mechanics in that game made my casual friends enjoy that game any less, even when they were playing with other competitive players. And is it such a terrible thing to throw a bone to (a certain subset of) your most avid fans?
Finally, Smash has grown as an esport, and while I don’t think Smash should be designed to be an esport (whatever that means) or necessarily as a competitive fighting game, it is obviously popular and serves as a great advertisement for the game. Additionally, Nintendo could be making a lot more money with the game-as-service model (do you know how many skins I would buy for 99 cents each? The answer is all of them), and with proper sponsorship and growth could be even bigger. Smash is literally the only esport with sizable viewership that has no developer support, which is basically a wholly unique phenomenon within esports, imagine how big it could get with actual support (and for the record: tweeting out the stream link to a top 8 once a year is not really support).
Also final note: Nintendo, I know you don’t make money off of competitive Melee, but you could if you wanted. I would literally buy whatever new console you make and also offer you my firstborn if Melee HD was a thing. Just saying.
Sakurai has, ever since Brawl, turned the other cheek to the competitive Smash community. While many still play Smash 4 and even Brawl competitively, it’s tough to argue that those mechanics are superior to Melee in any way unless you are one that is opposed to pushing the game to its limits. Many would argue that there is no reason for Sakurai not to balance the game for these players. While of course it wouldn’t be fair if one character had a game breaking ability in items mode, does it really make sense to balance the game to the extreme for those players when they don’t necessarily care about perfect balance in the first place? Those who play with competitive rulesets appreciate balance tweaks much more than anyone else, so why not balance the game for them if they’re the only ones who would notice frame data or kill percents?
“Catering to the competitive community” can go many different ways. It could be a return to Melee like advanced mechanics and physics. Sakurai argues that this turns off casual players since they don’t want to be beaten so easily. But many would argue that it just makes sense that the more experienced player would win the match. Such a huge skill gap only lets the loser know how much they can learn in a seemingly simple game. “Catering to the competitive community” could also be just improving the Brawl and Smash 4 formula. Less landing lag, tighter mechanics, and other gameplay changes are all major changes that would need to be taken into account at the beginning of a game’s balancing cycle and development. While hazardless stages, saving rulesets, and more are all simple changes that would help the most passionate Smash players enjoy the game much more. Yet Sakurai doesn’t add these features for seemingly no reason. Most likely it isn’t to spite those competitive players, but with so many obvious and seemingly simple additions, it’s hard not to take it that way for some.
Poor Understanding of Competitive Smash:
When Sakurai does try to cater to competitive players (an extremely rare occurrence), it usually just ends up being insulting to competitive players. Take “For Glory” for example. The ruleset proposed in For Glory is one that someone with tiny knowledge of competitive Smash would come up with. Final Destination, no items, stock mode. But anyone who has put any time at all into understanding competitive Smash would know that most of the time, Final Destination isn’t even the fairest stage. Many characters benefit from a stage without platforms which creates unbalanced matchups. Many would argue that “Battlefield” is actually a better stage for competitive play due to pretty much every character being able to succeed in some fashion at the highest level. (For Smash 4, many would actually argue Smashville as well).
When we look at balance changes made to Smash throughout its patch cycle, we see another example of Sakurai (and the development team in this instance) not understanding what players are asking for. Many unnecessary nerfs were made (the origin of the “Better Nerf Greninja” meme) and many characters desperately needing buffs were ignored (#BuffThePuff). It leads many to question who is making these changes. Why buff a move no one ever complained about by .2%? Why was that change necessary? If all these minute changes are being made for the primary purpose of balancing casual gameplay, why even make the effort if none of those casual players would never take the time to notice in the first place? Either Sakurai and the dev team isn’t even taking competitive thoughts into account, or they have no actual understanding of competitive smash in the first place. The former of which would be much less insulting for many.
New Blood Would Shake up the Formula:
A new director would definitely shake things up. While Sakurai has constantly surprised the community with some of his choices, there’s some things that have relatively stayed the same. Sakurai has stated that he believes new fighters shake up the formula for Smash. A new director would take a new approach, and maybe build a better structure for those fighters to really thrive. It’s no secret that Smash Tour and the Classic Mode on the Wii U had lukewarm reception among the community. In addition, many people felt the Wii U version was lacking in single player content (possibly due to his idea of home vs. stadium). With Splatoon, Nintendo saw new success from their ability to utilize young talent within Nintendo, and Kimishima has said he’d like to look into new ways into introducing the young developers at Nintendo, and to incorporate them more. With Nintendo’s looking to incorporate new talent, it might be time for someone else to take the mantel to see what Smash can evolve into.
One thing I learned from writing the Metroid Series Analysis was that, often, the original director of the game may not be that knowledgeable on their own series success. The director doesn’t love his game and they might not understand why people liked it. They are removed from outside perspectives. This argument can be levied at other Nintendo directors as well, but Sakurai may be missing why his series is successful in the first place. He may even be making the series based on what he wants to work on, not what is best for the series.
Consider the 3DS version. The entire generation of Super Smash Bros. was built around just having to have a 3DS version. But the 3DS has plenty of limitations. Those who have played the game know there are issues connecting with other players, even when near by. The new mode, Smash Run, can’t have more than one player in the arena despite it being a major feature of its predecessor, Kirby Air Ride’s City Trial. The Wii U version also suffered. Why is Classic Mode so weird? Because it had to be different from the 3DS version. Why are the modes all over the place? Because there had to be a difference between the two games.
There are other complaints that Sakurai didn’t understand. Some fans complained about the inclusion of costume characters such as Lucina and Dark Pit. Sakurai said that fans should see it like a free dessert, but some fans may argue that, ‘would they be happy with a poorly made dessert…even if it was free?’ Fans did not like these characters because they reduced the value of characters already in the game. They are too similar to existing characters, so one has the potential to be superior to the other. Super Smash Bros fans have never been ecstatic about clone characters.
Sakurai seems to be missing why everyone loves Super Smash Bros. I’d argue that the series should be handed off because it is time to let someone try their hand at it who grew up with the series and can feel what made it great. Sakurai is an amazing game designer, but for all his strengths, he’ll never understand Super Smash Bros like you and I.
I find a lot of value in changing the Smash Bros. series by bringing in a new director. Franchises grow and die based on how they transfer over to a new generation. While Sakurai may look unaging, he can’t make games forever. A new director, with Sakurai as a creative advisor, would certainly make the “passing of the torch” a much easier and organic process.
Made Up His Mind on Certain Characters:
Sakurai has high expectations for characters that join Smash. In the past, he has talked about some of the criteria he uses to decide is a character is worthy for Smash. However…there are characters that have very vocal support, but have not been able to join the roster. Ridley, and Waluigi are two of those characters. Sakurai has stated in the past that he feels Ridley would require a lot of work in order to be represented correctly, something that some fans argue against. Waluigi, while not as requested as Ridley, does have a fanbase. However, Sakurai had only a few choice words for the purple menace, “Just because you try hard doesn’t mean you’ll make it into the battle.” A new director might be more willing to compromise to bring heavily requested characters, or changes to characters that some fans may want (such as Ganondorf).
Have you read this post, and Why Sakurai Should Return to the Next Smash?
- Smash Ultimate Development Timeline - May 16, 2020
- Straight from the Source: Koji Igarashi on Castlevania in Smash, Bloodstained - October 16, 2018
- Sakurai Discusses Isabelle, Echoes, and Newcomers - September 26, 2018
” However, because of the delay, the Wii U suffered from not having a Smash title at launch.”
I don’t get this point at all. The development of Smash 4 didn’t even start until Kid Icarus Uprising was complete, which was in 2012. How would’ve it been possible to release Smash Wii U in that same year?
I love how the competitive Smash comments are 2-3 times longer than anything else in either article. I get that people are passionate about it, but the lack of brevity doesn’t come across as very level-headed, especially when there isn’t something like “Sakurai designs Smash with a broad audience of players in mind” in the pro-Sakurai list. Never mind the economic reality that hardcore competitive players are a vocal minority of a playerbase that either plays the game differently or whose needs are overshot by the concerns listed here.
Well one of our arguments in the competitive section was how catering to competitive players can’t hurt casuals in anyway. But I digress. I don’t know why pointing out that the arguments are longer possibly means anything but a positive connotation. If anything it means there’s more in it’s favor. Is there a bias against Competitive players I sense here?
I don’t think lack of brevity means I’m not being level-headed. Are all long arguments shitty? I think that’s a terribly reductionist way of looking at the discussion.
And, well, there isn’t much else against him. We had to construct two sides of the argument.
To be fair, though:
“To be clear, Sakurai has no obligation to cater towards the competitive community. ”
“Ultimately, not caring about the competitive community is probably not the biggest concern for most people, and that’s fine. I also don’t think that caring about the competitive community means that the next Smash could should play more like Melee.”
“Finally, Smash has grown as an esport, and while I don’t think Smash should be designed to be an esport (whatever that means) or necessarily as a competitive fighting game, it is obviously popular and serves as a great advertisement for the game.”
I think I was pretty realistic and reasonable about how much the competitive side matters, which is to say, not a lot compared to the majority of people’s enjoyment of the game, which lies in other areas.
Also, I would say that “Sakurai designs Smash with a broad audience of players in mind” doesn’t even need to be in the pro-Sakurai list. I don’t think that’s something that’s really unique to Sakurai. I don’t think there’s any universe where Nintendo says “we need to direct Smash 5 to competitive players only.” Widespread appeal is the point of almost all video games, and I don’t think a Sakurai replacement wouldn’t be focused on that, so it wasn’t really a point we belabored.
Catering to the competitive scene comes in a few forms.
One, more competitive stages. As it is now, barely any of the stages are competitively viable, especially in contrast to how large the list of banned stages is. Even disregarding that, Omega stages feel like Sakurai didn’t really know what he was doing. FD isn’t actually that balanced, and Battlefield would have been a much better Stage to have everything be a reskin of.
Two, decent competitive balance. I know Smash caters towards casuals, but that’s not the issue. Casual players will be fine so long as it’s somewhat balanced for them. The only time minor changes need to be made (Every change Sans Bayonetta, she was OP for casuals (Not going on tangent) ) is when either A. It’s a fix to a bug, or B. Competitive play. If that were the case, only the characters at the top of the list would get nerfs, or someone would have noticed the bugs.
Three, A better For Glory. Competitive Smash does not revolve around one stage, and if you’re going to try and have a competitive format, do it right. It’s Stocks, never time, regardless of which game you’re playing.
Seems fa- 2…. No no no! There is no balance in fighting games! There’s ALWAYS a best character and worst character! Melee had awful balance and it still made the competitive scene and is going strong. All those patches, rage and non-patch nerfs and buffs is the closest we’re going to get to balanced. Everyone cannot be equally balanced. There’s too much of a contrast between characters to work. I understand nerfs to annoying characters and annoying things and some buffs that don’t break characters. But more than half the cast is currently viable. Leave the subject about balancing alone.
It seems that all of these points against Sakurai stem from one thing: his apparent stubbornness, which leads to his highly controlling and obsessive work ethic as a director. While I appreciate that Sakurai stays true to his creative vision and has an eye for the little things, I feel that his mindset is somewhat limiting the development team (as it undermines the team effort that the name implies) and Smash by extension. Sakurai also seems to be the overbearing type of creator: one that firmly believes that there is one superior way to enjoy his works and does not seem to want to learn why people enjoy them in particular ways. This is similar to a creator losing sight of what made their works popular, although Sakurai clearly knows that characters are the primary draw to Smash. Sakurai not fully understanding what hardcore Smash players want will eventually drive them away. This would be harmful to the series, as hardcore players constantly introduced Smash to new people by showing their friends or through the competitive scene.
Personally, I’d be totally fine with Sakurai out of the director’s chair (and into an advisory role), mainly because I feel that many of his shortcomings could be alleviated with some fresh blood. Sakurai is an excellent game designer, but I feel that he’d hold the series back if he doesn’t learn to tone down his stubbornness, which would allow him to more easily consider new ideas, trust his development team, and fully understand what made Smash popular to so many different people.
Sakurai’s stubbornness is the reason why we have Pac Man in the game in an actual good design. I know for a fact many developers would’ve stepped down and just say “…okay…” if Namco wanted them to use that ugly Ghostly Adventures design like the company did Sakurai…. Ugh.
Namco never actually told Sakurai to use the Ghostly Adventures design as far as we know. Sakurai simply stated that if they had he would have considered dropping Pac-man altogether. Namco was perfectly satisfied with Sakurai’s use of the character: https://sourcegaming.info/2015/06/26/800/
Fair enough for now I guess.
My two cents:
Sakurai has indeed said that he places a significant focus on casual play and making the game accessible, and this is evident in Smash’s design. However, I think that this is also beneficial to the competitive scene in some ways. By making the game more accessible, it opens up the competitive scene to newcomers. A new player may be intimidated by Melee’s wall of tech skill, but with a game like Smash for Wii U, it is much easier to learn the ropes. With simpler mechanics, new players can more easily follow high-level matches, and understand the skill that is involved – and thus, it seems more possible to achieve. And while Melee may be more intense and fast-paced, the Wii U game is still exciting enough to play and to watch. Also, while it is true that Nintendo is not as supportive as other companies are in terms of the tournament scene, this is not likely to be the fault of Sakurai himself. While it is possible for Smash to cater more to the competitive scene in terms of its design, I think that what we have right now is more than good enough to have a great competitive scene and high-level gameplay.
The other primary case against Sakurai is his bias, or his character choice. As noted in the article in favor of Sakurai’s return, much of his “bias,” and other things such as the addition of clones, can be justified through other means. Clone characters, which also make up a good chunk of Smash for Wii U’s “bias” picks (Dark Pit and Lucina), take up barely any development time, and were originally simple alternate costumes. The point of clone characters overshadowing the originals does hold some amount of water, but much of it is based on preference. Marth’s tipper is stronger, but Lucina’s blade allows for more leeway in terms of execution. Dark Pit’s Electroshock Arm KOs earlier in ideal circumstances, but Pit’s added arrow control and more consistent Upperdash Arm give him different advantages and disadvantages, and the two are generally seen as very similar in terms of overall strength.
It is true that Sakurai has dismissed characters such as Waluigi and Ridley in the past. However, as we have seen with the latest character roster, Sakurai has also been known to change his mind. Villager, Pacman, and the Miis are examples of this: during Brawl’s development, Sakurai could not think of a good way to implement these characters into the game. By the next game, however, he came up with good ideas and implemented the fighters into the game. For future entries in the series, the same could very well happen for Ridley or Waluigi. And of course, one other thing must be considered. If Sakurai were to be replaced, there is no guarantee that the next director in the series would not be biased. In fact, assuming that the new director is in fact human, it is almost guaranteed.
Sakurai’s best attribute is how much he cares about Smash and the characters and series that are represented. As noted, again, in the other article, he puts a lot of attention-to-detail into the games, with little touches that make everything feel just right. While a new developer may start anew and cut down the character roster, Sakurai cares about each fighter, and is hesitant to cut characters that are beloved by fans. Of course, given development constraints, some cuts are inevitable, but Sakurai tries hard to bring back as many fighters as possible.
In the end, the question of whether or not Sakurai should be replaced depends on his replacement. Sakurai has several flaws as a game designer, and a new designer could indeed remedy those issues. However, that also comes at the risk of losing what makes Smash special. Sakurai cares deeply about each character, series, and detail; he is friendly with many big names in the industry; and he has been with Smash the whole way through. This may all be lost with a new designer, and with Sakurai’s track record, I am more than content with keeping him around.
Clones being easily additions doesn’t change the fact that he added them to series that didn’t need more characters.
Deal with it. All last minute clones are one of the same with the carbon copies from the other games. Extra = Extra. Don’t like the fact that the clones came from series that you don’t want to see get more reps? That’s to bad
Clones are bad game design and not everyone is willing to blindly defend them because they were made by Daddy Sakurai like you do. Don’t like it that people don’t like lazy rehashes? That’s too bad.
Whatever floats your boat Cargo. The blatant majority doesn’t even care about the clones, which plays a part on how little they actually matter they don’t take any time off of anything and they’ve been in the small minority in every Smash games’ roster. Those “lazy rehashes” are made for the people who want them and develop to become an enjoyable semi-clone like Falco, Ganon and TL. You small bunch making a scene out of nothing are only wasting your time.
I don’t think we should toss Sakurai into the garbage, as he has a lot going for him, and his respect and knowledge are very high.
However, I think that Sakurai bias is in fact very apparent in Smash (people don’t get rid of bias in one day), and not even just competitive Smash, which mind you is a huge advertisement for newcomers, but all of Smash has lots of balancing issues. I think it’d be nice to have someone to give different views and helps diversify the choices of the team.
For a game of it’s caliber, I think haven’t one head director can lead to a lot of bias and loss of various interesting ideas.
@SmashChu
“Sakurai is an amazing game designer, but for all his strengths, he’ll never understand Super Smash Bros like you and I.”
Don’t you think you’re being a bit presumptuous here? If anything I think the opposite is more correct.
I understand the arguments against Sakurai but people cannot use “balancing” as a legit argument. It’s literally IMPOSSIBLE to completely balance a roster with this diversity, size and contrast. You cannot look at a 4-way between Link, Bayonetta, Jigglypuff and Game and Watch and say “Hey! I can make this fairly evenly matched and preserve everything about them and keep their gimmicks while not raising the game’s rating (Bayonetta, Snake)!”. There will always be a best character, a worst character and stuff in-between. Them’s the breaks. It’s how it works in a meta.
“Sakurai is biased/He messes up, rid of him!” If you truly believe there’s a non-nobody dev out there that has 0% bias toward anything and cannot make mistakes in experimenting. …I got bad news for you. Sakurai has been at least doing his best to keep his bias toned down. He literally held off Meta Knight and DDD in Melee in fear of it. “B-But the FE characters!!!” They ending up at 6 out of pure CHANCE. How was Sakurai supposed to know Lucina was going to make it 6 back when there was only 4. Which is a fair amount especially where the series is at right now. Roy got in because of popularity and Corrin because of advertisement, Fates was around the block when the two ORIGINAL characters were fully functional and complete. Timing and time limits play way too big of a part to be ignored. Other characters got in for this reasoning too so Roy and Corrin are not “special snowflakes”. ((Greninja. Mewtwo etc.))
Calling it chance isn’t really fair either. He made a conscious decision to put Roy and the Corrins in AFTER the game was produced. He knew that it would stack the roster and the DLC. And honestly, as far in advance as they plan these things, he probably knew that the Corrins would be in it before Roy was released. Plus, it’s not like he just HAD to promote Fates.
It is fair because the development was crazy and too many things passed by Smash 4’s development. There was going to advertisement. It was inevitable. There was literally a new ad character apart of the main roster aka Greninja. It’s basic fact that Sakurai is obsessed with details, he’s a rather tidy man. It’s not a big surprise to see him cut it down in separate stuff. He didn’t need to but it was the only game that didn’t cause scheduling problems lmao! Roy got in because of a dead fad from Melee. That’s it. Like Lucas, Roy and him are both veterans that are nobodies until Smash. Mewtwo was a test subject to see if the DLC would work out. He literally had a model. Lucas still used his Brawl form in that old trophy of him.
You act as if you were in the room when these things happened. Nintendo did not force Greninja or the Corrins. That was Sakurai.
and? That was apart of his organization. There has always been advertisement in all the other games than just Smash 4. DLC was organized into separate sections. If Pichu was more popular than Roy, guess what will happen? Pichu would be in the game instead! THE FE chars came together by pure chance. If something was off things would’ve more than likely changed,
It was hardly pure chance. He could have picked a different advertisement character. The basic fact is that he chose to do it. He is biased to a degree whether he knows it or not (and you are definitely biased, so I am really wasting my time; go bother someone else).
No he couldn’t have, it didn’t line up with the timing and schedule to implement and make not one but two fully functional characters. You can’t talk about being biased when you’re biased against Sakurai. Seriously shut up and leave if you don’t want to deal with me so much maggot.
“They ending up at 6 out of pure CHANCE.”
Yeah, he just accidentally slipped six characters in. One day he wasn’t paying attention for a second, and then BAM, accidentally coded Corrin and Roy.
“How was Sakurai supposed to know Lucina was going to make it 6 back when there was only 4.”
Because he shouldn’t have added any more. Hell, Lucina shouldn’t have been playable either. Should have been three characters.
Tough luck pal, stuff was needed and they were there.
They weren’t needed and your Fire Emblem fanboyism doesn’t change that.
Yeah they were needed. Stuff was organized into requirements and separate tidy sections and those two were one of if not the best option. Even then that’s not an legit excuse to get rid of Sakurai when he can just change the rep count or easily just give some series more characters. But that’s too reasonable huh? Lol!
“and those two were one of if not the best option”
Lol, whatever you say.
Your reasoning to get rid of a man on the level of Sakurai is beyond ridiculous. Especially that reasoning being some slight character issues that can easily be resolved.
Just like how 2/7 of the Smash DLC characters consists of Fire Emblem characters, 2/7 of the arguments made against Sakurai being the director of the next Smash game are towards the competitive scene. Doesn’t that look a little biased towards competitive play on the opposing side?
The fact that there are people who defend Fire Emblem getting six characters in Smash 4 when even Sakurai admits it was too much is hilarious.
We can do what we please. We don’t have to blindly hate on them because you want to lol.
Even the man you blindly praise thinks Corrin was pushing it. Really speaks volumes about your blind defence when even Sakurai can see it.
Yet you’re using that petty reason to try to say a creative man with more pros than cons who earned his respect should be thrown into the trash? That’s even more pathetic.
I’m not defending nor opposing Fire Emblem having six characters, I’m just stating a simple fact.
I do think he should either step down or learn to work with a co-producer (unlikely, I know). I think he is simply given too much freedom to do whatever he wants with no checks and that just makes him even more stubborn.
I disagree, Smash being free-willed and doing it’s own thing gives it it’s own charm. Smash Bros choosing to not follow the crowd and do things differently is why who’s going to get picked is so interesting. Yeah people get hyped over wanting their favorite character but there’s always that Sakurai-factor: You don’t know what to expect from him. You’ll never see a dev in Sakurai’s position put in Wii Fit Trainer but now with lots of individuals are getting salty over fun-filled inclusions like those too.
Have you EVER considered at all that the co-dev and Sakurai option might not be a perfect solution you think it is. They could easily have differing views and not get along. Then they would try to find common ground and things would more than likely get limited some. I do not want to put up with that again the 3ds has already done enough. I loved those little Ice Climber shits from their gimmick to their cheap wobbling it was hilarious to see the salt. I’d rather not a potential game get chained down again thank you.
Of course you disagree. Could you please stop fan-boying? Seriously, must you be so vehement in your commenting campaign? It’s not even worth arguing with you.
What? Can’t accept the fact that I’m going out my way to defend Sakurai? Come back to me when you aren’t salty over everything thank you.
You’re comments are probably exceeding parts of the articles in length. Not to mention you come off as really stubborn and arrogant. Kind of like me, just more potent.
That’s my thing. But unlike you I’m not quick to judge off first site. I’m blunt and brash but I speak the truth. I would rather not Smash Bros get held down. Sakurai’s pros outweigh his cons.
Opinion is so often mistaken for truth. Also, I’ve seen you confront half the comments on these articles. You are confrontational. That is backed up by evidence rather than a first sight.
Yeah because Sakurai having more pros than cons is totally an opinion. I don’t think so, all the things I ramble about. They are not usually made up. They come from articles on this site and facts. Oh good you finally found a point that actually holds ground. Yes I am and I really don’t care.
Sakurai is too much of a creative man and a great asset to Smash when he’s able to implement ideas that work: to be going out like this.
I would like to point out that while Roy received some hate, it reached much higher levels when Corrin was announced. People would argue that Corrin was the sixth Fire Emblem character, and it was just too much. People were expecting new Nintendo characters, and the outrage when the only one announced was ANOTHER Fire Emblem character is undertandable. I love Fire Emblem, and I love Corrin’s concept in Smash, but even I was a bit dissapointed despite the fact that I could not wait to play as him. The case is, in my opinion, it is not Corrin the one who surpassed the limit of reasonable Fire Emblem representation.
Marth is the original character. Ike was the second FE character in Smash and is popular. Robin is one of the main characters of the FE game which was going to be the last one, but instead became the first in a new opportunity for the franchise. Lucina is a clone, true, but she was the most popular character in Awakening and I have never seen before so many people so happy that she got announced even if she was a clone. Corrin is very unique and it is true that he was released within a perfect timing. On the other hand, I get that Roy is popular and people missed him. He was my second main character in Melee. But if Sakurai was going to reveal Corrin, he may have better not done Roy. The game did not need a half-clone of a character that already had a clone. The game would have been perfectly fine with 5 Fire Emblem characters, only one of them being a (reasonable and popular) clone. Sometimes it is better doing the best for the game as a whole rather than fulfilling the desires of some fans.
Another point I want to make is about detail put in everything. It is amazing in graphics, stages, animations… But even here we can find some bias. Or may I say negative bias. There are 5 Zelda characters, except that isn’t totally true. From the 5 characters, there is only ONE moveset based on Zelda games. Sheik never entered in battle during a main game, so her moveset is completely invented, and I don’t remember Zelda throwing some random glitter or kicking people out of Hyrule. She surely has the spells from Ocarina of Time, but that is about it. There is nothing taken from the actual character except from the new down special attack. Ganondorf and Toon Link are perfectly fine characters worth representation, but did not bring new movesets with them. So, that leaves Link’s moveset as the only one truly inspired by The Legend of Zelda… I would really like to see Sakurai put a bit more love and care on one of the most important and beloved franchises from Nintendo.
Now, I don’t think Sakurai should be completely replaced or removed. He has done lots of amazing things so far, and Smash would probably not be the same without him. But I do believe that choosing a new co-director could do some good, both to the franchise and to the amount of work Sakurai has to do with each game.
Answer me this: Sakurai has always gave spots to playable characters in Smash if they have some legit reasoning behind them. Advertisement, Popularity, Relevancy and History (thus the entire roster). 95% of the entire Zelda cast are one-offs that are lucky to even appear in a second game.
You may not remember Zelda doing that but she hardly does anything noteworthy, gameplay wise. What’s wrong with getting creative with Sheik and Zelda’s movesets? Blame the series for keeping Zelda as this elegant princess who doesn’t do anything. Sheik was based off all those ninja content you would see. There’s nothing wrong with it when that gives more leverage on what they can do in the future. Especially when a person (forgot his name) said he wanted to make a Sheik focused game. Smash can be some heavy material for that. ((Zelda IS starting to acknowledge Smash a little more, like from what I heard Toon Link in Hyrule Warriors had one of his taunts as an attack or something.)) Using Zelda from Hyrule Warriors would be an inefficient path forward since that would not represent Zelda at her best which Smash did much better in my opinion.
Toon Link may not be original but he’s the same person what did you expect? I don’t mind minor tinkering with the current Ganon like some new animations and such but definitely not an overhaul with that jank ridiculous PM moveset.
I can understand where you’re coming from and Zelda needs a new character but everything is definitely in fact fine the way it is.
That was not really a question. It is a fact that most Zelda characters are one-offs, and that despite the high popularity of some of them it is improbable for the franchise to receive a new character. I’d love Impa with her Skyward Sword design, but I know it’s not very likely for her to appear. I’m not sure what the answer that you are looking for is.
In Twilight Princess, Zelda was about to use a rapier-like sword, and we have seen her using both the Light Arrows and some kind of magic from time to time. It is true that Link being the almost exclusive focus of the games limits her screen time and the amount of things she can do during the games, but her help has been crucial or very important in some moments of the games. Zelda is about wisdom, and so she is not the kind of person to wield battle magic as she does in Smash. I personally prefer her portrayal in Hyrule Warriors, where she is a fast yet not very powerful character, and casts some light magic for some area attacks. I play as Zelda in Smash a lot, and I like her gameplay, but in my opinion she is better represented in Hyrule Warriors. Of course, it is just my opinion, and I respect that you prefer her Smash portrayal. Sheik is more similar in her both approaches, being that there is no main material to work with but her appearance, but using the magical melodies from the main series gives the nod to her Hyrule Warriors incarnation as well for me. Just give her the Ocarina instead of the Harp and she would be fine.
Toon Link could have used the Deku Leaf, the Skull Hammer and the Wind Waker for some attacks or specials. At least it would have been a bit more different than Link while increasing the Wind Waker’s representation in the game.
I was not saying in my comment that the characters were awful or anything like that, but making the point that there are 5 Zelda characters in Smash, with just 3 different movesets and only 1 of them being fully based in Zelda games. I believe that Zelda main games should try to develop some characters other than Link a bit further. There have been some little tries. Midna and the Rebellion in Twilight Princess, Zelda in Spirit Tracks, Impa in Skyward Sword and Hilda in a Link Between Worlds are seen fighting or kind of fighting, and Anjean also confronts Byrne in Spirit Tracks, just outscreen. That is, of course, not counting villains. There is a lot of moveset potential within the series, and even the characters already in Smash could get some work done. I would really love to see that potential further explored, be it in the form of new characters or be it in the form of a deeper revision of existing ones.
That’s why Zelda has less characters then it should. Hopefully with so much Toon Zelda getting pushed in our faces I hope Sakurai brings her back like he did back in Brawl. She is one of the forbidden seven ((I think the name was)) and is one of the rare ones to show up in 5 or more games.
But again Zelda for the majority of the series is this elegant princess who would throw magic and switch to Sheik. Which Smash represented. Hyrule Warriors went for the minority on how Zelda’s displayed in the series powerful swift and would easily be able to keep up with Link on the battlefield and I can respect that. But I feel like there cannot be room for the two Zelda’s to combine without a drawback of some sort so elegant Zelda is the way to go for Smash.
I feel like it’s been represented fine and honestly, it’s not that bad. I can respect that Smash chooses not to follow the crowd. It makes things more interesting with different displays from separate games like Hyrule Warriors and Smash.
Midna has an assist along with Skull Kid and Ghirahim. That’s the closest the one-off sides and villains can get to keep it fair as possible. Also that Phantom, Toon Zelda’s in is represented in a new move for Zelda. So the other games are getting recognition somewhat just in different ways like stages and alive assists without having to pick a favorite from the bunch of one-offs.
While I agree Corrin wasn’t the one who surpassed the limit, keeping him even without Roy would still have Fire Emblem overrepped. Five Emblem is not big enough to warrant five characters. Hell, even Lucina was pushing it.
I really hate to say it, but you got a good point with Roy;
While not a playable character, Lyn is still a rep of the Elibe games.
(Though I am personally really grateful for Roy’s inclusion, not to mention I love his amiibo.)
You forgot to point out these things:
Both versions have same number of characters, but priced different on two different consoles, one being far more popular than the other.
Insisting on new characters only for the reason that they’re new, such as WFT & the flavor of the month Fire Emblem characters that are never used again for the next game.
Trying to use Smash Bros. to add popularity to games rather than games trying to gain popularity themselves.
Creating his OWN Smash Bros. characters before even thinking about creating his own Kid Icarus characters.
They didn’t use that because that point is absolutely ridiculous! So what if those two were separate it was a one-time gimmick that’s not going to happen with the possible 5th game on the hybrid. It’s going to be a system-only game. I heavily and utterly doubt there’s going to be a 4ds anytime soon so…
Wii Fit was never added because she was new how baseless can you get. Wii Fit Trainer was added because she was meant to be a surprise fun-filled choice that fits in. Sakurai even says this: https://www.eventhubs.com/news/2013/aug/01/sakurai-did-not-add-villager-and-wii-fit-trainer-means-shock-fans-feels-they-are-unique-and-fit-well-smash/
The FE characters. Ike was waaay more than just a flavor of the month. Him being a popular lord and showing up in both two Smash and FE games proved that he is going to stay. Roy had leftover data in Brawl along with Mewtwo. The only thing that sealed his fate that there wasn’t enough time so uh…. Corrin is way too original to be dropped.
Did You Know: Fire Emblem gained it’s popularity and saved itself because of Awakening not Smash. Sakurai just used the game to put in a new and original character aka Robin. Who did some justice for FE that it’s not just swordsmen and fits in. Kid Icarus Uprising and the Kid Icarus series in general is still unpopular. Sakurai only flaunted it because a lot of stuff looked great to be in Smash and was easy to port. Uprising is a game he made after all.
lol wut? No playable character has been Smash-exclusive. Dark pit showed up in Uprising before his appearance in Smash
“Also not very creative” PFFFT HAHAHAH! He’s totally not creative when he’s the man who made up all the movesets even for the ones who barely do anything and/or never fight. ever. Zelda, Sheik, Game and Watch, ROB, Wii Fit Trainer, Duck Hunt Dog, etc. He’s also the man who made several games and is the reason Kirby exists.
Your points are stupid lol.
He still made a bad choice that negatively affected a console’s sales. Just because a new system comes out doesn’t mean he could do no wrong.
Wii Fit Trainer, does that sounds like a character that is timeless, or a character that is outdated? If Wii Fit Trainer can be a character, then any Nintendo character can be in Smash Bros. Oh, what about Captain Rainbow? It would be a “surprising, fun-filled” choice too.
I owned Radiant Dawn & nothing about that game was popular. LOL. The only reason people have known about Fire Emblem was because of Sakurai. That’s like saying my favorite NFL team is the Browns, so therefore they’re the best team in the league. I would not say Fire Emblem is one of the worst Nintendo franchises, but nowhere near worthy of having 6 whole characters.
You know why you consider Robin original? Because Sakurai did nothing to make Ike or Roy so, despite what they are able to use in their respective games. Some creative mind.
Of course, it’s his game, so he’ll want to promote it. He’ll want to use Smash Bros. as a vehicle to make his games more popular than they really are. Kid Icarus got two new characters, both of which aren’t even fit or worthy of being playable characters to begin with, in favor of Paper Mario, Krystal, or Dixie Kong. They don’t matter to Sakurai, therefore, their series are inferior to the ones he cherishes.
What if I told you many of those move-sets suck? You didn’t even mention Mario, whose special moves are worthless. You didn’t mention Donkey Kong either, who still has a useless & highly inappropriate Final Smash. Wario has gotten worse, & doesn’t even reflect the moves he did in his own games. As for the new characters? What can I give Little Mac? Oh I know: A counter! Let’s give them all counters because I can’t think of anything better to give them.
The 3ds version and Wii U version together sold decent. Smash 4 couldn’t of saved the Wii U. Nintendo already dug it’s grave too far deep. Not much was willing to buy the U for Smash, which proves that Wii U was far too in it’s own self-destruction to be saved. So what if the gimmick didn’t work? Nobody knew if it was going to work that’s the point of experimenting: Learning from your mistakes. Sakurai won’t repeat the same mistake. It was too much of a hassle for two games for two separate consoles and it held Smash back. Making a mistake is a petty reason to rid of a creative man who’s pros outweigh his cons. “Could do no wrong” Is it common for you to assume without taking a minute to think? I never said that, dummy.
Actually… Wii Fit Trainer is used to represent the success ever-popular “Wii-era” she has some moves taken straight from Wii sports which sold tremendously. The Wii-era is history to Nintendo which Smash represents history. The Wii era’s all put into the character “Wii Fit Trainer” Nice try pal.
Ike is no clone, Roy being a last second clone out of creative characters is once again an petty attempt to bash Sakurai. Ike is one of the most popular lords. Ike didn’t just appear in only one game. FE having 6 characters were pure chance. Roy and Corrin got in because they barely and I mean BARELY surpassed the requirements. Corrin was the ad part that had the only release date that didn’t cause scheduling problems. Roy was the most popular character from Melee. Mewtwo was a test subject to see if DLC would work since he actually had a model and was scrapped once again in Sm4sh til DLC. Are you serious dude!? Robin is original because he’s an avatar and doesn’t have an canon signature weapon. Ike and Roy do and they have no choice but to use the swords. Corrin too, his ability to be a dragon is natural and his lance is apart of an normal critical attack. Don’t give me that.
Oh please, Palutena has long been apart of Kid Icarus series like Pit and is definitely fit. Leave her out of this dude. Dark Pit was a last second originally intended to be an alt clone. You wouldn’t of got any character over Dark Pit because he’s last second.
-Paper Mario lacked any actual good reasoning since there’s already a crap ton of Mario characters, don’t even.
-Dixie Kong got scrapped who was originally going to be a duo with Diddy and just doesn’t have an unique gimmick that can separate her. Some hair whipping doesn’t count.
-Krystal…. KRYSTAL!!!!? https://sourcegaming.info/2015/10/07/smash-bros-roster-cuts/ This article right here: in it explains why even Wolf couldn’t come back. You’ll see it. With Star Fox not getting anything you really think Sakurai would add that sexualized, horribly-written furry mistake into the game!? You have some nerve… Get that trashy character out of my sight. You lost what was left of your credibility.
That’s the best you can come up with? What Sakurai has contributed and done to earn respect destroys these poorly constructed points.
-Mario’s moveset specials is to further the fact he’s always been the average guy out of the group like 3d world for example. They can still be made of use you’re just not doing it right. They’re here to stay since they give old and new representation. The cape from Super Mario World to Fludd from Sunshine. If I got a dollar for every time any sort of Mario used the cape or fludd to reflect and/or gimp others into the blast zone I would be a millionaire.
-Donkey Kong’s Final Smash is just as wacky and random as the character and series. It’s to give representation to one of the newer DK games.
-Wario’s moves either work out or wouldn’t program well. They are crazy, wacky and random which perfectly fits Wario. In his down air his sticks his head down and spins his body for crying out loud! If that doesn’t speak “Wario” to you. … Do you even know how he is then?
-There’s several things wrong with this just like all your other shaky arguments. In Punch Out countering is an actual thing. Much less than half the cast uses that move and they tend to be tweaked with a different animation and even different results (example: Counter Surge sends upward)
Sakurai cannot and will not be in the trash can over petty reasons such as these.
The Wii-U was only two years old when it came out. Of course it didn’t work out when the cheaper of the two games was on a console everyone had at the time. Why would anyone want a Wii-U when they could just get the game at 2/3 of the price?
Because the Miis don’t…
Translation: I’ll believe whatever Sakurai says. “Just barely” as in “Palutena, Dark Pit, the Duck Hunt Dog, Ike, Robin, Lucina, Dr. Mario & Bayonetta (oh wait, spoiler!) isn’t big enough of a circle jerk.” If somebody else was the director, half of those names would not have been considered. They would look at timeless characters over pet projects.
You know what you do about Paper Mario? You take out Dr. Mario, don’t waste your time on all the Koopalings, and problem solved. Link & Toon Link can coexist but not Mario & Paper Mario? I guess that’s asking for too much.
“you really think Sakurai would add that sexualized, horribly-written furry mistake into the game!?”
Did you just describe Palutena? Sakurai even admitted that she would have been “too much work”. POOR Sakurai.
When does two reflector moves mean “average”? Mario has mostly performed a spin attack. It’s terrible implementation for Mario to still have the F.L.U.D.D. when he’s got more memorable moves. By that logic, Link’s arrows should be removed & replaced with that stupid spinning gear from Twilight Princess. How about that?
The bongos were taken after a flop music game Donkey Konga. Yeah, let’s dance along to a weak, small, lame attack that reflects the abilities of a 30 year old gaming icon. Donkey Konga isn’t even his newest game. It came out in 2004.
The Wario I know gives enemies piledrivers & shoulder tackles, as well as wear overalls.
Yeah, other boxers use the move. Mac can’t. Mac beats his opponents without resorting to cheap tactics. Why not give Mac a glove filled with horsehoes that he’d swing on a rope or give him a magical turban?
3ds was more popular than the Wii U long before Smash. Everyone had a 3ds before Smash and not a Wii U. Yet when the Switch is revealed more people were willing to throw money at it. That speaks volumes about the U. The Wii U did a lot of things wrong and you know it, That’s why it died. Smash couldn’t of saved it.
They sure don’t. They do not have anything referencing from the Wii, they were designed as an character insert type deal and doesn’t have any Wii game references like Wii Fit does so… Fail.
Sure pal, keep believing that. All the timeless characters have already been added you idiot. Paper Mario, Dixie and Krystal are not timeless. Stop circlejerking and pretending that a new developer would be perfect. Nah, that dev would flaws just like a certain man you hate so much but you wouldn’t care in negative bias toward Sakurai as long as you get your furry waifu.
Oh I see, you would rather have Paper Mario as an DIRECT clone of Mario than an original character. That’s the only thing you’re going to get from an clone and alternate costumes you idiot lol. Toon Link replaced Young Link that’s why Link and TL can exist.
Palutena isn’t a furry and was never written as a bad blatant love interest toward Pit and that’s it. Palutena has stuck around a series longer than Krystal ever did. Star Fox had nothing going for the series currently nothing but 64 remakes. Palutena > Krystal. You’re just finding excuses to bash because she’s from Kid Icarus.
It’s average because it’s in between strong and weak. Those moves can kill at early percents done right. The only memorable moves he has is jumping, 64 attacks and the fire flower. Which is all represented through his moveset sooo nice try. The FLUDD and Cape are memorable too so you’re being ridiculously petty.
It was one of the newest games around the days of Brawl and then it was altered to work better.
He wears overalls as an alternate costume and he’s still wacky and random even back then he was. Epic fail.
Technically Mac can counter if he blocks an attack and punches back. Little
*Little Mac has always been displayed as the guy who plays fair. It only makes sense he’s displayed that way in Smash too. Just give him swift and strong punches to make up for it.
“Link & Toon Link can coexist but not Mario & Paper Mario?”
Every Zelda game stars a different Link which makes sense for that situation, but the same cannot be said for Mario and Paper Mario.
Aside from Paper Jam which was Mario & Luigi with no input from intelligent Systems, the Paper Mario sub-series treats “Paper” Mario as the genuine article. Color Splash seems to contradict a bit of this with the Koopalings, but not much else really seems to cement the idea that Paper Mario is some separate entity – aside from Paper Jam.
You need games to sell the console. 3DS already had games, so it didn’t need Smash Bros. like the Wii-U did. By making the game for both consoles just takes away sales from the Wii-U. A console that was just revealed yesterday has nothing to do with it. That would be over 5 years next March, so a normal, and underwhelming life cycle it was.
Tomadachi Life? Find Mii? Miiverse?
Paper Mario = 16 years old, 6 games. Dixie Kong = 21 years old, 13 games. Krystal = 13 years old, 3 games. Sure Krystal may not be old or appeared in more games, but she has better reasons to be in the game instead of one-offs from Fire Emblem. Krystal was actually playable for a part of Starfox Adventures & as a multiplayer character in Starfox: Assault and Command. How can a new director screw up the roster any more than Sakurai has?
Now how would that work out? Is Zero Suit Samus a clone of Samus?
That’s not true. I like Medusa. Imagine that: a villain that’s not just an evil counterpart of the main character.
That’s what it means for a game to be timeless. Just because the old Starfox games are old doesn’t void them of their value. Why do you think Super Mario Maker sold over 3 1/2 million copies & is getting a 3DS port? THere are reasons why they didn’t make yet another new Mario game instead.
It’s average because it’s in between strong and weak. Those moves can kill at early percents done right. The only memorable moves he has is jumping, 64 attacks and the fire flower. Which is all represented through his moveset sooo nice try. The FLUDD and Cape are memorable too so you’re being ridiculously petty.
Those are gimmicks. F.L.U.D.D. was a one-off used to clean sludge & was never meant to be incorporated into Mario’s basic repertoire. Ever since Super Mario World, Mario has had some form of spin attack in most of his games.
Donkey Kong later had Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat, which was closer to the release of Brawl. A game in which you played the bongos to make DK defeat enemies and navigate through levels. Fail.
Epic fail indeed. Why would you have the more popular attire as the alternate attire? It’s not like he’s got moves that really reflect his actions in Wario Ware. His range is stubby, his basic attacks are uninspiring, and his Wii-U stage is obscure.
Mac does do counters, but not the same as the ones that Fire Emblem characters do. Counters in Punch-Out!! are punches that land right as the opponent is swinging a punch of his own.
It wasn’t the games. It had a decent lineup, it lacked 3rd party support, decent advertising, the gimmick didn’t appeal to both the casual and hardcore audience etc. The Wii U failed overall. Now you know.
Wasn’t represented by the playable Mii characters themselves, just stages lol.
As I said, Dixie lacks an gimmick that would make her fit in, it would only be just for the sake of adding DK characters which is terrible. Oh that director can and would by putting that mistake Krystal in. Krystal being playable for a bit doesn’t excuse the fact how generic she was and was a horribly-written character. That’s like asking for Elise from 06 to be in Smash. That’s how bad it is. Sakurai puts thought into everything at the very least, that new director would more than likely do stuff without any care. You cannot think of a new developer as a perfect being who cannot screw up or can get away with it. That isn’t fair at all. “One-off FE characters” Oh please, the only one-off is Roy who was supposed to be recent advertisement back in Melee. He only returned because of an ORGANIZED section of “Melee Returnee” which would’ve been Mewtwo if he wasn’t already going to be in Smash 4 but got cut once again, thus the test dummy to test the waters of DLC.
Zero Suit Samus was an entire separate character than a replacement. Have you NOT did your research? The development time between clones and original characters is drastically different. You will never ever get an original character out of an extra carbon copy clone and costumes. It’s simply impossible. That’s only wishful thinking. Welcome to reality.
That wouldn’t work out because as I said and it’s been long addressed: Original characters cannot replace clones. The development time is too different. It would be cool but then you would have another reason to bash Kid Icarus ((a minor IP still)) for having 4 reps.
Timeless is stuff that aged well: Star Fox has turned into a mess. Krystal is terrible and is more looked down upon than admired if we don’t count being flat out ignored LOL. Not very timeless if you ask me. Dixie and Paper Mario? Fair enough but they have their problems too. But it’s likely that Sakurai can come up with something for Dixie in the future since he did make up something for Villager, Miis and Pacman who wasn’t playable back in Brawl because they couldn’t fight. Just something wasn’t thought of yet.
Gimmicks that weren’t hated and is a good use of Mario’s down b to further set the fact he’s your average guy in between. Of course he isn’t going to get an heavy damage dealing move that isn’t in between. You may not like the move but the choice makes sense. “Spin attack” Down air.
Your point is….? Having a bunch of generic punches as a final smash wouldn’t program well and is extremely lame too.
You’re talking about yourself now? The Warioware clothes were more interesting and help him stand out. His range is stubby because he’s a close-combat fighter. Him being a long-ranged hard hitter would be unbalanced. He has moves that represent his whole EXISTENCE. Wacky and random. Wario Land Wario’s moveset is generic strong hits. That’s it.
Yeah but unlike the FE characters he doesn’t swing a sword in return or turn into a dragon. He looks like he’s going to take a blow, moves out the way and flies forward with a punch of his own. You and me both know that it works perfectly.
So after all of that, you excuse Sakurai of not directing that one system seller. XBox was dying, what did it have? Halo. How did it do? Better.
And so what?
AKA, Sakurai isn’t creative enough. Coming from the man who fought to put a dog in the game, Dixie “lacks an gimmick”. If only I knew which “Elise” you’re talking about because “06” is not the name of a game. I’m sure a new director would appreciate a lot more games than Sakurai does.
Good on you, but this is not 1992. Clones are no longer in fighting games except for Sakurai’s, hmm. They’re not in SF, they’re not in MK, they’re not in DOA, they’re not in Tekken or Pokken. They take the effort & decide to not cut corners.
That’s an excuse, if I ever saw one. Nobody misses Pichu, just like how nobody would miss Lucina and Pittool.
Krystal actually filled a cavity that was empty for a long while, which was a lack of a strong female presence in Star Fox. Peach was made into a playable character in Super Mario 3D World for the same reason. It’s not that Krystal has been ignored, but her inclusion in games that take place prior to her meeting team Starfox wouldn’t make sense & break continuity.
“She won’t show up this time, but I’d love to put her in a sequel if we’d get to make one!”
Starfox Zero Director, Yusuke Hashimoto.
We can’t “replace clones” but we can apparently replace a special move of Mario that he’s had in SSB 64 & Melee.
If you told me a single uppercut was lame, I would have had to see Ryu’s Final Smash or even Johnny Cage’s Fatality.
Unless Sakurai made 2 separate Wario characters (which he should have done, if we’re being fair here), he is at a fault with Wario. A. Powerful is one of Wario’s strongest traits, yet it’s hardly ever present, in Smash Bros. You can knock Kirby off the screen at 100% & he still won’t KO. B. When has Wario ever ran like he does in Smash Bros.? In Wario Land & Mario games, Wario is slow & hops when he runs. Sakurai’s Wario tiptoes at breakneck speed. You can still give a character “wacky” characteristics without altering his physical abilities.
Halo doesn’t have nearly as much flaws as the U. Smash wouldn’t of saved that failure. Stop comparing decent consoles with that mistake. The lineup is the reason why this much people even got the U. That’s it. It has too much flaws otherwise for Smash to make a difference.
That means the Miis didn’t represent the Wii era you moron!
Sakurai is not the most creative man in the world and that’s a fact, but he’s creative enough to keep things hype. “Appreciate more games” which is bias lol. Dixie has no gimmick and is currently generic, tough luck. You really don’t know anything if you can’t realize I was talking about that abomination Sonic game.
Too bad, that means clones have history and Smash keeping the trend going means it’s not blindly following the crowd. Which makes Smash stick out more, which is good.
“An excuse” whatever you say…
“Strong female presence” You try too hard to defend your furry waifu. She’s the Star Fox universe’s Princess Peach. Hopefully she’s an actual good character if she ever shows up again lmao.
https://sourcegaming.info/2015/08/01/smash-clones/ No you can’t. They’re made long after the roster’s been completed and before release date. Some random move can.
Doesn’t excuse the fact that would be lame. If I’m going to get a new Final Smash from DK it better be something actually good than generic punches. Ew.
Doesn’t work like that buddy, It’s all for the sake of balance that all his moves doesn’t kill early. You’re just going to have to deal with it. Warioland Wario is incredibly generic.
“Halo doesn’t have nearly as much flaws as the U” put an Xbox there instead of Halo. It’s also not that simple. Brawls Smash sold well because the console was successful. The Wii U version sold poorly without the 3ds version because the console was a failure.
Halo is a game, not a console. It goes to show how much you know about the situation.
I’m such an idiot. What was I thinking? “Miis representing the Wii era.”
Would that make Luigi generic? Alph? Lucina? I wouldn’t bother to know more about games like Sonic Boom.
Hahaha what? Mortal Kombat X has a cinematic style story mode that Street Fighter V & Tekken 7 later took inspiration too, because it was FANTASTIC. “Blindly following the crowd”, you mean making your product better? What you don’t want to make your product better?
Characters were cloned back in the 90s to save space on the cartridge/disk. There should be no excuse today for clones with the lack of restrictions in todays games. Katsuhiro Harada directed Tekken Tag Tournament 2, which brought back almost every character in the Tekken franchise, some of which were cloned in early games. He could have made Michelle Chang exactly like Julia and P-Jack like Jack-6, but he didn’t do that. Why? Because why play as P-Jack if he fights exactly like Jack-6? Having a clone character in this day and age is heavily frowned upon, & for good reasons. Just as hilarious is the excuse Sakurai made for it. “Dessert”. “Dessert” would be The Mystery Mushrooms in Super Mario Maker, or the name bank in Fallout 4.
Just like you try too hard defending an out of touch director who is obsessed with 2 game seri.
Except we aren’t talking about “some random move”. Some random move is pulling a device out of thin air & squirting water. When is Mario associated with water other than Super Mario Sunshine?
You sound like you’re trying too hard to convince people why the bongos are the best option for him. If only we had Koei make a Donkey Kong-themed Dynasty Warriors game. Because they’re proven to try harder than your so-called genius director.
That’s why you make him slow like he’s supposed to be. I have good faith that you have never played any Wario platform game.
I literally corrected that in another comment, making a fool out of yourself again??? Not surprised.
They have ZERO moves referencing Wii games just cheap knock-offs of other moves as specials.
All those characters you mentioned have more of a gimmick than Dixie. Luigi sucks up ghosts which is used in his final Smash. His thing being a more slippery clumsy Mario that jumps higher is more original than just some hair whipping and that’s it. Luigi has an wide variety of gimmicks: From thunder to an hammer. But of course that wasn’t around the time so he only got lucky simply because he’s much more popular than Dixie.
Having an small minority of clones in an roster doesn’t make your game worse, nice over-exaggeration. Clones used in Smash are extras to cater for people. It isn’t frowned upon anymore because there are barely any clones in Smash roster and clones don’t dominate anymore. The heavily heavy silent majority are the people who don’t care for the clones but aren’t against it. The people who enjoy them outnumber the people who are making a scene and causing problems out of nothing are the small minority. Why? Simply because there are fan-favorites that the fans were sure weren’t going to make it in over bigger characters with more of a name but they made it in anyway and those fans including me appreciate it.
If he was out of touch he still wouldn’t be making good games, keeping hype and/or still putting in characters the majority likes. ((Cough, Cloud Strife, Cough)) You’re just saying he’s out of touch for not bending over backwards for everybody LOL.
Yeah but random spinning punches are an TOTAL popular loved move. FLUDD is pretty well received along with Sunshine and gives the proper Modern Mario representation.
A Dynasty Warriors and 3d platformer fighter with blast zones are entire different things with entire different processes. But that idea sounds cool, I would love to see that and Sakurai take some ideas and we might get Dixie with a new gimmick. That would be so amazing!!!! But I’m going off topic- You were saying I was trying to convicne DK with just barrels. You got it all wrong. I said, if DK gets a new final smash it needs to be something good and creative instead of an Ike rehash slightly altered with punches,
That would be awkward, uhhh no thanks. I appreciate your attempted contributions. Sakurai actually played Classic Wario. Clearly he wasn’t interesting for an Warioland only moveset or he would’ve implemented everything like some characters do.
“put an Xbox there instead of Halo.” What was that supposed to mean?
The Miis appear in dozens of games. Which game do you want them to be based off of?
You’re not doing a very good job trying to play stupid. Dixie Kong’s got her hair, an electric guitar, and a gun that fires bubble gum. How hard is it to come up with moves for that?
Is it really appeasing and great to know that characters we don’t care much for are copied and pasted into Smash Bros? Dark Pit is no Dixie Kong. The fact you think that Pittool is even a major character is laughable.
The last game he made before this was Kid Icarus: Uprising. I was interested in getting the game, up until Sakurai decided to regard it as god’s gift to Nintendo & making Palutena out to be some megaton-sized E3 announcement. I would have been less subtle, like I don’t know, make another Kid Icarus game & see if it actually sells well before shoving her down everybody’s throat? And he’s the one that wants other Japanese developers to stop making so many niche games? I later found out that the way you play Kid Icarus: Uprising causes strain on your hand. They made a peripheral, only for that to hurt your back.
So then, why do you have to do “random spinning punches” so often in Super Mario Galaxy 1 & 2 and Super Mario 3D Land & World? Sunshine ranks rather low among the main Super Mario games & is only memorable just for the F.L.U.D.D.
It didn’t take Activision, an American dev known for repetitive shooters mind you, to think of moves for Donkey Kong.
Yyyyeah, I doubt that. Because if he did, he’d know how Wario actually runs…
Xbox had Halo which was an entire new IP and by the way you’re talking. That’s the reason it sold. Of course! The first ever Smash helped the N64 sell a lot too. Also the fact Xbox is nowhere near as bad as the Wii U. With PS4 and Xbox 1 vastly superior systems next to from the way it looked like: a Wii 2.0 and it had horrible advertisement confusing the audience and made everyone not interested in it.
Yet no game was chosen lol, they were made to be character inserts like if you wanted to insert yourself with a sword tada Mii Swordfighter! Not their actual individual character. Wii Fit Trainer represents apart of the Wii era.
Not interesting enough for an entire separate gimmick. It just would’ve been an Diddy Kong with more hair whips and a gum shooter instead of the popgun.
Thus Dark Pit is a clone. Stop making blind assumptions how you’re coming to stupid conclusions cracks me up. Dark Pit isn’t major and that’s why he’s only an extra clone. Unless you want Dixie to be a clone?
Stop rambling about Palutena, she’s an major part of the Kid Icarus series. She deserves to be there and she fits in fine. She’s not a one-off add-on from Uprising. She’s a well-liked character in general too. Even then she was released with Pacman and Miis so it was still hype for everyone.
Can you please stop pretending you know what you’re talking about? It’s not memorable for Fludd which would further support the fact it should be in Smash. It was remembered because it was a good game like Galaxy you moron.
What’s your point? Anyone can think of moves from looking at some games. It’s much easier for DK since he actually fought before. Characters are displayed differently in different games. It makes things interesting instead of the same ole same ole plastered everywhere. No thanks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAMaZQuQ7TQ Sakurai made an addition to the Wario series and used one of Warioland’s music for his victory theme. Wario does not need to be an rehash of Warioland Wario who’s incredibly generic. Again, you have no idea what you’re talking about.
Also not very creative.
About the only thing I could argue as to why FD was chosen over Battlefield was more due to data gathering by Nintendo during Brawl’s days. IIRC – When Brawl started you could allow Nintendo to take data from your fights and ‘use that data in ideas for future products’ or if anything else the data and replays that were used for Spectate mode.
Brawl’s Basic Brawl mode ended up with everyone being able to choose a stage and nine times out of ten, Final Destination was picked. This data I feel was more than likely used to decide what For Glory should be about. I don’t think it helped that competitive Melee players also relied heavily on Final Destination instead of Battlefield at the time Brawl’s data gathering was happening so the mentality that Final Destination was perhaps the most balanced stage at the time spilled over to every other part of For Glory’s design.
It’s a theory though. Thing is, I can’t blame Sakurai for that if that’s what the whole thing came about – it’s a lack of communication between fans and developers. But at the same time, I have to say that perhaps some fans expect the game to cater to their needs a bit too much and might be looking through tunnel vision.
for me it’s fine either way. he can stay, he can leave.
at this point the way smash must play and look is more than solidified, so i don’t think someone else would deviate from the formula that much. the smash experience is going to stay more or less the same, regardless of the director.
if we’re talking character selection… knowing that old sak will be in charge again will make me authomatically unexcited about the next smash, i don’t trust his choices anymore, in my opinion smash 4’s newcomers were really bad. so as long as the policy about making as less cuts as possible stays the same, i give my welcome to anyone else.
but then most seem to like his choices, and up until brawl he did a great work in that regard so it’s fine if he stays too, i guess.
whatever.
I don’t think “has issues meeting deadlines” is a strong argument. Melee almost getting delayed isn’t unreasonable at all considering the development time was ridiculously short for a game that was such a huge step up from Smash 64. As for Brawl and Smash 4, he didn’t work with his previous development team but had to lead a new group of people who have never worked on a Smash game. I’d argue that these games would have been delayed even longer if he wasn’t at the helm.
I also disagree that “he’s made up his mind on certain characters” considering he re-evaluates his criteria for every new Smash game. Characters that he determined to be unsuitable in the previous games end up being playable in the later games. One thing I’ve noticed is that he very rarely talks in absolutes during his interviews.
As for catering more towards competitive play, I think ironically Sakurai has to be the one to do it before he quits Smash. Iwata’s statements during Brawl’s development gives the impression that Sakurai is the only one Nintendo trusts to make big changes to the game and they would more or less keep the formula the same if he were to quit. I also don’t think Smash is a series Nintendo would hand to a young developer simply because of its scale and because third parties are more inclined to entrust a reputable developer with their IPs. In terms of reputable developers, I honestly don’t see any at Nintendo who has a strong focus on competitive play and would actually push for some changes in this direction.
Time to dig up the dead horse and beat it
Corrin – Timing, they weren’t going to keep making DLC forever, Nintendo themselves probably wanted Corrin in as an ad, if Fates was released in 2015 internationally Corrin probably wouldn’t have been added in.
The 3 Clones – why does anybody care again? Why are they the worst things to ever happen to smash? They’re just slightly modified versions of other characters.
corrin – i’m pretty sure he could have said no (or at least, i’ve got that impression from the interview). and i’m pretty sure we would have seen him even if fates released earlier. plus, it was really lame doing that ballot thing, hearing “from now on it’s going to be fanservice” and then getting the 6th fire emblem character from a game that wasn’t even out everywhere who was put there pretty explicitely only as advertisement. really lame.
the 3 clones – everybody is fine with dr. mario, since he’s returning from melee and he is actually different enough from mario (very different attributes, 3 more or less original special moves, a worse recovery, and little differences here and there like fair, dair, nair, fsmash, usmash etc.) he shouldn’t be dumped with the other two.
lucina is kinda ok i guess, even if she is extremely redundant. dark pit, on the other hand… if you have to add a character that’s exactly the same as another one, why bother? who cares if he took no work. thing is, it’s easy to see that he took no work. he’s sad.
then there was the additional salt, since mario, fire emblem and kid icarus were already the only series to receive newcomers (pokèmon too, but it lost squirtle and ivysaur), and then the only series to receive clones. then fire emblem got dlc chars, too. for mario it’s fine, but the other two didn’t deserve this royal treatment. had the clones been, say, alph and dark link, there would have been way less complaining all around. of this i’m sure.
I’d say he can come back for Smash 5, but he needs help. Someone with a lot of competitive knowledge & game dev experience, such as Dan Fornace of Rivals of Aether, or People from the Project M Dev Team. Both sides could correlate & work together. Sakurai focuses on the casual aspects of Smash, while the other focuses on the competitive aspects. As long as communication between the 2 sides, as well as with the fans, are good, the game could be a wild success in both aspects. While i wouldn’t be against dropping sakurai all together, it does leave with some possible risks. Want Proof? Look at Street Fighter 5.