Super Smash Bros Ultimate (SPOILER Thread)

Especially when that thing costs $25USD that they could spend on something they DO like.

Typically...you'd want to ignore the thing you don't care about.

That way, you can continue to not care about it.

Yeah, but if it's a chance to get characters you are interested in into a game you like and enjoy playing, it's only natural to feel a little disappointed if the characters announced for DLC aren't ones you care about. That doesn't mean they're bad choices, but it's also hard to just make yourself be not disappointed just because a character is popular with some other group.

I personally haven't cared much for the DLC so far, but I dom't regret buying the pass. I just want to have access to every fighter, even if I won't use them much.

I've never touched a Persona or Banjo-Kazooie game before, and while I'm mildly familiar with Dragon Quest and SNK's fighting games, I've never really explored those two besides one or two games like Builders and SNK Heroines. So I myself was not really inclined to be excited or even care about any of the DLC characters...

• Joker was a very nice curveball surprise, partially as a much-needed pick-me-up after the 11/1/18 Direct, also because his reveal and inclusion in Smash more or less blew the doors wide-open for guest characters. Now characters like Tracer and Artorias don't seem so impossible, do they?
• Hero and Terry Bogard being in Smash was awesome and almost cathartic, because their inclusion represents two of the most influential franchises in video games (Dragon Quest and The King of Fighters) getting the recognition they deserve... which makes it all the more disappointing, even heartbreaking, that Hero and Terry are being met with the general reactions they are right now. It's not just that people are going "literally who?", it's that they're reacting like that and then immediately dismissing them as a "wasted slot" because Hero and Terry aren't their most wanted characters... and then they wonder why they're constantly met with "HOES MAD" memes (and I won't be surprised one bit if the final Fighters Pass character gets a similar reaction, thus resulting in yet another variation of that meme).
• Again, I've never touched a Banjo-Kazooie game, and they were far from my most wanted characters for Smash... yet their inclusion was still exciting, because not only are they a heavily-requested fan favorite, they're a heavily-requested fan favorite that seemingly had the deck stacked against them in multiple ways (specifically being owned by a rival hardware company, who are more likely to let someone else like Master Chief or Steve into Smash if anyone).

... so you can bet I'm giving each of these series a try. I may not have a PS4 or Xbox One, but I'll still try any Persona game that makes its way to Switch (including Scramble and Shin Megami Tensei V), as well as the Banjo-Kazooie games if they also make the jump. Dragon Quest XI S now has me hooked after that awesome demo, and there's plenty of SNK fighting games to choose from on the eShop. I'm also excited to find out who the fifth and final Fighters Pass character will be. It could be someone from a game I don't know anything about but could be interesting for me. Even if it isn't, it'll still be the case for plenty of other people besides me, and hopefully the character will still be fun to use regardless.

That's very fair, and I think that's probably the healthiest way to look at it, honestly. I'm probably not going to - as mentioned, I'm hype averse to Persona and I don't like fighting games - but trying new things is fun and exciting, after all.

Even if I don't care about some of the DLC, I take solace in the fact that some people just flat out hate them.

Terry is currently my "hype" if that's how you guys call it. And it's more along the lines of me giving up on SNK representation (or even considering one) due to them practically dying until recently.

Anyway I just found something rather peculiar. We all know Dragon Quest is a cultural landmark in Japan. We all know the Erdrick is loved (and from what I watched with Yoshihiko, Madason). And yet on all officially published "characters considered in Smash" by third parties (no, not popularity polls or shit found in the internet - talking about stuff like 4gamer's "what the staff thought were most likely smash candidates" or famitsu's "what the readers thought were most likely smash candidates"), no one mentioned hero or DQ. I feel like it should be reiterated the enthusiast forums and even circles rarely ever reflect the cultural impact of things.

I find it funny that of the DLC characters so far, Hero is the one I wanted the most (I specifically wanted Loto, but he's a skin, so yay me), yet he's the one I enjoy playing the least of the four (including Piranha Plant) so far (I think it's the utterly random nature of the down special, though I'm not terribly fond of his neutral and side specials, either). Meanwhile, I honestly didn't want Banjo in there (I just don't like Banjo-Kazooie), but he plays pretty comfortably to me, and I only know Joker via friends and memes, yet I find him consistently the most fun to use (his Stance System suits my desire to switch playstyle).

I'm not the most hyped about Terry Bogard, but the trailer got me pretty excited (when they reference the ending of Fatal Fury with Geese in said trailer, I knew both who was getting it and that they'd honor the character well). What I'd absolutely love, even if I can't figure out how they'd do it, is if they referenced the multiplane action of Fatal Fury in Terry's dodge animation.

I'd also absolutely love if Terry's inclusion also included background gags about Capcom and SNK doing good-natured Take That! shots at each other. In particular, this would mean a potential background appearance by Dan Hibiki, which would make the DLC worth it to me all by itself.

Side note, I find it funny that "Ken with a hat" was the going sentiment when Fatal Fury was brought into my local arcade nearly 30 years ago... talk about a meme that won't die.

Finally... I mean, the DLC isn't going to be for everyone. My main question is, is it actually fun to use? So far, I honestly say on the "fun" scale, it's 3-for-3 to me so far.

I feel the exact same way. The one I'm most familiar with (Joker) honestly isn't very fun to play with while the one I wanted the least (Hero) is an absolute blast.

I haven't actually gotten every DLC fighter so far, but here's my opinions if anyone cares:

For Joker, he's from a series I'm unfamiliar with, but I kind of like the character design. I dunno, I feel like he's something Smash was missing.

With Hero, I wasn't overly thrilled with him. I know it's a meme to hate anime-esque swordsmen, but the character felt especially generic, right down to the name of "Hero". Even the design looked kind of Mii Fighter esque. Having said that, they actually did pull off giving them an interesting set of mechanics. I do get a bit of Schadenfreude by tournament players often hating the character.

With Banjo Kazooie, they absolutely nailed it. I love Banjo Kazooie, and they really did him justice. My only complaint is probably his stage, which I don't outright dislike, it just doesn't seem especially interesting to me.

As for Terry, he honestly disappoints me more than any other DLC fighter. I don't want to sound like I outright hate him, though. He's just from a series I haven't heard of until his announcement, and nothing about him yet strikes me as particularly unique.

"Yet"...even purposely, basic fighters don't let you know what their moves would be.

Just from visuals alone.

Also he's unfinished.

At the same time, we know he's a brawler character, so we can broadly assume what his moveset's going to look like.

Though I've never played SNK's fighting games (thinking of getting into one if Terry turns out good) I was already aware of how influential they were in the early gaming scene, and one of the reasons for the series' popularity (besides going into more character depth and backstory than your usual fighting game series) is their mechanical complexity and how much they're willing to let the combat system and character movesets evolve over time. It's very likely Terry will have some interesting mechanics to bring to the table, even if I'm curious how exactly they'll adapt some of those to a game like Smash.

Also, I can't wait for the chance to tease people who complain about sword-users in Smash by saying that there are too many fist-users in the game.

You can get even more specific with it. This is the eighth brawler-themed dude with fire powers.

Edited by LordVatek on Sep 13th 2019 at 2:02:30 PM

Let's see how long it takes for someone to respond with something like "It's a fighting game, so stop complaining about too many fist-users."

Edited by dragonfire5000 on Sep 13th 2019 at 11:00:12 AM

Why do people insist Terry is fire-elemental? He isn't. Those are battle kis meant to look more like explosions (hence POWAH GEYSAR) than flames. Hell his attacks don't even cause burn effects.

@Vatek: Eighth? Hmm... Mario, Luigi, Captain Falcon, Bowser, Charizard, Mii Brawler, Ryu (via the Shakunetsu Hadouken), Ken, and Incineroar... by my count, the number of fighters who use fire attacks and no weapons is at ten with the inclusion of Terry (which goes to show the point more, true).

Of course, I think my dismissal of the "too many swords" argument is well-known here at this point.

@dragonfire: Because nobody fights with swords, of course.

EDIT: @Ookamikun: To be fair, even if you've played a bit of SNK fighters (as I have; I didn't focus on them, but SNK got my quarters more than a few times), it's a pretty simple mistake to make. I mean, one of his moves is called Burning Knuckle; it's not unreasonable to assume that has something to do with fire.

Edited by 32_Footsteps on Sep 13th 2019 at 2:20:32 PM

I was specifically counting humanoids who fight primarily with punches and kicks and not much else so I wasn't counting Bowser and Charizard and I left out Mii Brawler due to being sort of a nebulous non-character. I also counted Ganondorf.

It looks like fire. I'm still counting it.

Edited by LordVatek on Sep 13th 2019 at 2:24:16 PM

Ah... I included Bowser and Charizard because I like being inclusive and, well, they do not use weapons by default and have fire attacks. I didn't include Ganondorf because his attacks are generally magic damage and not fire damage (that said, I forgot that his Volcano Kick does count as fire damage in the game, so yeah, he counts too).

So what does Fatal Fury have to set itself apart from other similar fighting games? Is it like Samurai Shodown where it's very easy to shave off the health bar with a combo?

FF's gimmick is that it has a mechanic called plane shifting which at the press of a button allows one to go into the background and foreground to evade and counter attacks. Of course there's also a button to attack people on a different plane to knock them back onto the same field. Also depending on the game you have a rage mechanic and power meter that can go from S-Gauge to P-Gauge that allows you to do different super moves. At the same time you can also gain unlimited supers while at low health.

KOF is a different ballgame from FF although Terry's moves are mostly the same.

Here's a playthrough of Real Bout Fatal Fury with Terry.

Here's some gameplay of Terry in KOF that shows him off in comparison

Plane shifting...if they don't bring back that DK stage along with Terry Bogard, that will be terribly negative.

Video: Hey, how's it going, dood?

Edited by randomness4 on Sep 13th 2019 at 1:24:57 AM

@randomness4 The implications of the word "yet" were intentional. They're definitely gonna have to sell the character to me, and it is indeed a hard sell, but I am open-minded to them being awesome somehow.

As far as I can tell, they're...well, a fighting game character with "flaming" fists of sorts and some fire-like powers.

Not a bad concept, not even an overdone one per se. I'm just having trouble seeing what sort of spin they're gonna give to him that makes him really stand out and be awesome.