Is Awakening trying too hard to appeal to Smash Bros fans?

[Shun One]

Agree about them using their new designs (especially Roy!) With DLC, if we get DLC characters, I've no doubt that we may see a return of every non-costume swapped character at some point simply because time is no longer a restraint. Sakurai can release the game, then add in the characters who didn't quite make the cut later on (as much fan-rage as this may cause, I'm for it if it means I can have more FE folks in Smash).

As for villains, I don't see FE getting a playable villain rep. That's not to say that I don't any FE villains will show up. Boss Battles opens the door for the massive Final Boss type characters that the series is known for. It'd be a nice throw-back to battle, let's say, the Fire Dragon from Blazing Sword in a similar field as to his battle animation.

[Light Lord]

I'd REALLY want to see Jill but it won't happen. As for characters, I think its clear that only plot important character would hit SSB4; personally, Krom would be the first choice since he's the star of FE13 (maybe tied with him is you know who).

Just a thought here, but how much of a chance do FE villains have to show up in an SSB game?

Mmmm, seeing as Ganondorf and Bowser appeared in Melee (as well as Mewtwo who is not entirely a villain), then Wario and King DDD (who once again, I don't see as a villain), I hope they would include one. They have many options with this one (Black Knight, Zephiel, Gharnef, FE13 enemy cast), then the Smash cast needs more villains too.

[Mirron]

I'd say Black Knight or Gharnef are the likely ones. I don't think Nergal is too likely, though he is from the first FE in the West, so may give him some sort of an edge over potential contenders. Alvis or Julius seem like possible choices as well, but Sigurd is what has the big popularity, though those two could be popular too. I'd really like to see Lyon, but that's not going to happen at all. Could be wrong on some of these points, but there are a lot of options, I just don't see it happening sadly, but I'd be happy to be wrong. I can't think of a major FE villain I'd be disappointed to play as.

Also, we got Wolf from Starfox (counts to me), and we got Ridley as a big boss, as well as Pokey, so I'd say we've got decent odds of a villain when I think about it a bit more. FE is probably next in line, after possibly Metroid or Pokemon (since both of them lack a playable villain currently, though Pokemon doesn't really lend itself towards one outside of Mewtwo).

[sunshineYON]

It is unrealistic to think a SSB will have any non-lord characters in it. I love a lot of characters in the series as much as the next guy, but characters like Canas and Jill will never be in it. I predict there will be 2 slots in the SSB4, one for Marth and the other for Krom. We'd be lucky if we got one more for some other Lord. Unless we got something like Super Emblem Brothers(and Sisters) in which popular FE characters battle it out, obscure fan favorites will never see the light of day. This is a shame because a lot of the lords are cookie cutter characters, there are plenty of less prominent characters in FE that would have cool/original move sets.

[Mirron]

Eh, I wouldn't say no to villain odds. I don't think they're high (simply because unlike other series, there isn't one particular recurring villain), but you pretty much have to be one of the faces of your series to be in SSB currently. And if it's not a Lord (possibly including major figures like Soren or some such, despite them not being Lords, but those are hard to quantify) or the main recurring humanoid villain, I doubt you'll see them in this. Unless they put a lot more focus on the uniqueness of their potential moveset, though expect if they did we'd see Hector/Ephraim and such as opposed to a non-Lord.

[Chorus]

I'd say Black Knight or Gharnef are the likely ones. I don't think Nergal is too likely, though he is from the first FE in the West, so may give him some sort of an edge over potential contenders. Alvis or Julius seem like possible choices as well, but Sigurd is what has the big popularity, though those two could be popular too. I'd really like to see Lyon, but that's not going to happen at all. Could be wrong on some of these points, but there are a lot of options, I just don't see it happening sadly, but I'd be happy to be wrong. I can't think of a major FE villain I'd be disappointed to play as.

Also, we got Wolf from Starfox (counts to me), and we got Ridley as a big boss, as well as Pokey, so I'd say we've got decent odds of a villain when I think about it a bit more. FE is probably next in line, after possibly Metroid or Pokemon (since both of them lack a playable villain currently, though Pokemon doesn't really lend itself towards one outside of Mewtwo).

In the event that we do get a villain, I sort of doubt that the Black Knight would be playable, as the armor would really push the willing suspension of disbelief when jumping ( I could be wrong, when you consider Ganondorf). I really think that an FE villain in SSB4 would likely be one of the sorcerer types. I'd say that the most likely would be Lyon or Yurius, maybe even Alvis or Fauder. I just think Gharnef is a little pushing the formula; he has no real defining trait, and we very well can't build a moveset with just Imhullu to go with. With Lyon and Yurius we could easily build movesets from the Dark magic tomes in their respective games, with Naglfar/Loptous as the Final Smash. If we don't get a playable FE villain, we could get a boss-type character. If that happened, my bets would be on Medeus or Idenn, though the fire dragon might be a possibility. There is no way, however, that Fomortiis or Doma could be included (if either do get included, I'll burn my house down).

[Arch]

^ We'll hold you to that house thing.

I could see Krom replacing Ike, honestly. The two are rather similar in style, and as long as we've got generally the same moveset with Krom, I doubt it would make that much of a difference. If not Krom, then perhaps Marth getting replaced by Masked Marth, with Fauder serving as a newcomer villain character? I honestly can't really see any of the series' other villains making the cut. Maybe the Black Knight as a boss character, but that's the only other that seems reasonable.

But, to address the actual point of the topic, yes. FE13 is trying too hard to be a crowd-pleaser; the fan-service is pretty blatant to appease series veterans, while the game is simultaneously trying really hard to appeal to that mainstream crowd that is acquainted with the series through Smash Bros., but haven't actually explored it. I hate to say "I told you so," but I called this one months ago .

Edited April 27, 2012 by Arch

[The Radiant Hero]

After seeing Aether animation ingame, I doubt that Krom would fit Ike role in SSB. infact he promotes to sword and shield wielder so expect Krom to have his own shit going on...

[Mirron]

It's not trying too hard though. That's the thing, it's appealing to fans of the series. But they aren't doing more than DLC, and it isn't a major thing you need to have. Krom has no real similarities to Ike (barring Aether, and based on this game it could just be that they're going to make it the Lord super skill from now on, as opposed to it being Ike's thing), and MM makes perfect sense within the context of the setting. It's really just a nice nod to the guy who started the series really. Personally, FE13 sounds like the best FE yet, and in general it's doing really well. May not be everyone's cup of tea (and I have some issues, like how they handled magic and such), but it definitely sounds like an overall step in the right direction.

[Rakath]

It really depends on what aspects of the huge crit the Brawl players gave Sakurai and co listen to.

Roster was a big one, so seeing more characters is a definite. How many is dependent on timetable. Sakurai and co are probably already on Smash 4 because Kid Icarus is done. How long they get to play on gameplay is probably going to determine roster. And if they add to the roster in updates... that's for Nintendo to pick.

Uniqueness was another big one, so seeing less Shotaclones is on the agenda (points against Roy, Doc Mario, Star Animals, Current gameplay Ganondorf).

Balance was called on (Meta Knights God Tier Status will probably get played down, more tweaking to the two Emblemers they got already).

Importance (Fire Emblem gets hurt here, but this is more aimed at R.O.B. than anything else).

The rest of it is on game mechanics like Trip and how Finals work, but if they focus on those issues then the above get less time, thus the chances of more FE cast get less work.

If they focus on bigger roster without worrying about Shotaclones, then giving Emblem more cast is likely, with tweaked levels of uniqueness. Comparatively speaking, if we got Masked Marth as a Falco to Marth's Fox, that would be more acceptable than the Ganondorf > Falcon relationship of movepools. As canon dictates a reason for the connection. Since Nobody complained about Mario and Luigi because Luigi plays very differently, yet is very similar to his original. As opposed to Ganondorf who isn't even the same verse as Falcon, and Pichu + Doc Mario who nobody cares about and wonder why they got in. We could also get back Roy (Heavily tweaked movepool, but Burning Blade helped since it had no similar mechanics to Dancing Blade but motions), Krom, and any other character.

If they focus on uniqueness, then Fire Emblem will probably get 2-3 characters. One will be Marth style speedster, one will be Ike styled heavy, and the third will have to be a non-blade user of one kind or another that is clearly nothing to do with the former two (Shiida or Ephraim as a Lancer, Innes or... Someone, I guess, as a Bowmaster, Micaiah, Lilina, or some villain as a Mage). But overall the roster would be smaller, and priority would be given to stronger franchises (Zelda getting a new character, Mario getting new updates, More Pokemon, etc).

If they focus on Balance we get characters that are 'safe' and won't threaten to be a new Metaknight. Roy instantly makes the cut (he was less dangerous than Roy), and whoever we get as 'new' would play closer to Ike than they would Marth. No way to predict what happens because this isn't a roster based issue exactly. Similarly mechanics wouldn't allow for much prediction, just that change will happen.

Given the early strong sales from 13, Fire Emblem is safe for having reps, no clue how safe it is for getting a strong rep pool unless Smash 4 is some sorta huuuuuge game along the lines of MvC2 (but with a lot of clones) or UMvC3 (With Nintendo not selling a Beta of the game before the real game comes out).

[BlueLore]

I think they will decide the fire emblem characters by their overall importance for the whole series.

Marth is the first fire emblem lord and the most recurring one,so he will stay for sure.

Ike has also a good chance of remaining in the roster,since his games are overall the most popular games and he is the only main character who is the main character in more than one game(except for marth obviously)

Roy may return,since he is one of the most popular lords(even though it is mostly because of melee) and it was his game that revived the fire emblem series,but he may also be too similar to ike and marth,since he only fights with a sword.

I don't really think,that a villain makes it into the game,because they most likely wouldn't include a viallain from a game,without including the hero of that game and I also think that they would only consider one of marths enemies,which would leave us with gharnef and medeus(and maybe hardin),but medeus fights only as a dragon and gharnef simply doesn't fit into the smash series.

I also think,that they might include some main characters in form of special costumes,so for example you could change marths outfit to turn him into krom or something like that.

[luchinania]

Ike has also a good chance of remaining in the roster,since his games are overall the most popular games and he is the only main character who is the main character in more than one game(except for marth obviously)

How can FE9/10 be the most popular games if they sold the least(barring FE5)? I can see Ike leaving and Marth staying since he's the first lord.

[Mirron]

I think Black Knight hopping and flipping around makes as much sense as Bowser or any of the heavy characters (King Dedede (and maybe Charizard) are the only ones I can see it working fine)). So I could definitely see him as a potential villain. I forgot to mention this earlier, but it's SSB, it makes as much sense as anything else. Just means that he'd have less jump and weigh more. But I'd prefer to see Gharnef or a villain from a game which isn't getting a rep, simply because one is the original villain (for the most part) and the other would be spreading the focus to hit as many games as they can. I think almost all of the primary villains could work as a playable rep, only issue is making them work in the story (assuming we have one, if not then any of them work, most are dark magic users of some sort or another (or so it seems from what I've looked into, magic at least is a common thing)).

[Rakath]

Yeah, when I tried to figure out how to make a balanced Black Knight for Brawl (before full roster) he was heavy, slow moving, and relied on Warp Powder (Theorized Up+B) to get anywhere. But he took reduced damage at ranged and had reach (sword beams on certain attacks, like a 1-2 range sword does) and power to offset. He'd probably be in the same weight class as Charizard, and just as bad at Jumps. His weight and size can't be factors to discredit him as a fighter, but would probably leave him low tier because he'd lack mobility.

I'm not really keen on him being a member of the Smash 4 roster, but he's a possible. He still doesn't feel... unique or iconic enough for the role.

[Mirron]

I wasn't saying I wanted him, but I could see it happening. I'd much prefer Lyon, or Alvis/Julius, or most any potential villain, as Black Knight doesn't hold too much interest to me. But I still think it's possible for him to be playable, which was all I was pointing out.

[RNG Princess]

Alvis/Julius would be crazy ;W;

[Mirron]

I don't think it's too likely, but it could happen I suppose. Mostly I'd just be surprised if they included someone from Jugral that wasn't Sigurd (since I've always heard he's the most popular, and I'm sure they could make a mounted FE unit work (would also be unique for the SSB series)), and if they have him, I'd be surprised to see someone else on top of it. Could happen, but I don't think it's too likely really. I wouldn't mind seeing either of them, think they could make for fun playable characters.

[Melonhead]

I don't think it's too likely, but it could happen I suppose. Mostly I'd just be surprised if they included someone from Jugral that wasn't Sigurd (since I've always heard he's the most popular, and I'm sure they could make a mounted FE unit work (would also be unique for the SSB series)), and if they have him, I'd be surprised to see someone else on top of it. Could happen, but I don't think it's too likely really. I wouldn't mind seeing either of them, think they could make for fun playable characters.

A mounted unit... This is an interesting idea. More speed, and could sacrifice the horse in a recover for an extra jump.

[Rehab]

After seeing Aether animation ingame, I doubt that Krom would fit Ike role in SSB. infact he promotes to sword and shield wielder so expect Krom to have his own shit going on...

The Hero units in the GBA games have shields, though, and their critical is pretty similar to Aether.