Looking back, the journey that resulted in 86 characters in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate was a crazy one. Along the way, there were various concepts that were considered and scrapped by series director Masahiro Sakurai. Needless to say, the cast for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate might’ve looked very different had Sakurai’s decisions diverged in other directions for many of these circumstances.
For a long time, Sakurai has been adamant that only characters with origins tied directly to video games would ever be considered for Super Smash Bros. However, it turns out this hasn’t always been the case. There was a time in which Sakurai very briefly thought about including people from real life on the character select screen.
There can be no doubt that the contributions made by Reggie Fils-Aime, Shigeru Miyamoto, and Satoru Iwata of Nintendo have had considerable impacts on the gaming industry. Still, it’s a bit bizarre to think that Sakurai once actually considered all three of these individuals for spots on Super Smash Bros. 4’s roster.
“I don’t think the inclusion of these characters would be very interesting to a wide audience. For the amount of effort involved, I would actually prefer to add another roster character.” — Masahiro Sakurai
It’s believed that this was only a brief consideration as Sakurai decided against the idea for multiple reasons. Since then, the Super Smash Bros. series has only enlisted characters with origins tied to video games.
“I don’t think the inclusion of these characters would be very interesting to a wide audience,” said Sakurai of the idea of adding Reggie Fils-Aime, Shigeru Miyamoto, and Satoru Iwata to Super Smash Bros. “For the amount of effort involved, I would actually prefer to add another roster character. As it takes a lot of work to add a character to the game, it’s not a decision that can be taken lightly.”
Funnily enough, there are apparently plenty of fans out there that still want characters that don’t necessarily hail directly from video games to be playable in Super Smash Bros. According to Sakurai, there have been plenty of requests submitted by fans that pushed for this very thing.
“I get all these kinds of requests from abroad like, ‘Where is my favorite Iron Man?’ or ‘Where is my beloved Goku?'” once said Sakurai according to PushDustin’s translations. “However, basically (Smash) will only have content from video games in it.”
“I get all these kinds of requests from abroad like, ‘Where is my favorite Iron Man?’ or ‘Where is my beloved Goku?’ However, basically (Smash) will only have content from video games in it.” — Masahiro Sakurai
Though Sakurai has backpedaled on excluding certain characters (such as Ridley being too big to be playable), he has been adamant that Goku will never be in Smash. For those same reasons, we’ll also probably get a real life person playable in the series.
Despite this, Sakurai still wanted to appease these sort of fans without breaking the rules he had put in place. As a result, Sakurai eventually added the Mii Brawler, Mii Swordfighter, and Mii Gunner to Super Smash Bros. 4.
During the trailer for this reveal, Reggie Fils-Aime and Satoru Iwata had an epic confrontation that would not be out of place in the Dragon Ball series. This would be Sakurai’s compromise for those that would never have these sort of crazy requests fulfilled.
Notably, the Nintendo Switch 2 has finally been officially revealed. As such, a new entry in the Super Smash Bros. franchise is expected to launch on the console at some point as Nintendo has always released an entry with every mainline console since the Nintendo 64.
Masahiro Sakurai himself recently told fans that he’s been working on a secret game project since April 2022. Due to the timing of this, many of us believe that Sakurai’s next game will be for the Switch 2.
Is it too soon for this to be a sequel to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate? Technically speaking, it’s been over six years since the latest entry was originally released on December 7, 2018.
When a sequel inevitably does happen, we’ll probably see Sakurai returning to some older ideas as he’s done in the past. Even still, the likelihood of Sakurai once again considering the concept of including real life people as fighters feels incredibly slim.
Ultimately though, we’ll just have to see if this sort of thing can actually happen despite Sakurai’s reservations.
Source: Event Hubs
