Super Smash Bros. Ultimate News and Discussion: A Simple and Clean Finish

[Zapp Branniglenn]

I don't see anything wrong with the (likely) final Smash Direct airing within the next week or two. With Super Mario Party now out, Nintendo has nothing to push until Pokemon in mid november. And just because Sakurai is embarrassed to admit they have few characters left to announce doesn't mean its the same for modes, online play, and collectibles. Smash is more than a collection of character reveal trailers y'know. All we know is a variety of ways to play and tweak Versus mode and also Classic is returning. And with Nintendo finally having spilled the beans on what the Online service is, I imagine they can finally talk about how this game will do online play. Sakurai's also gone on record about his concern for "beating the leaks" and the biggest name in Smash speculation claims he's got details on the square character but doesn't want to jeopardize jobs. But if I were Sakurai I'd be thinking "these attention whoring shit eaters could change their minds any minute" and try to accelerate the schedule if possible to get past any other details that credible leakers would love to spoil.

October also seems neat because then all the smash directs leading to release are spaced two months apart. And I doubt there's another general nintendo Direct in 2018.  Plus there's the likely scenario of a demo in the same vein as Splatoon and ARMS where it happens for a few hours on specified weekends. Can't roll out demo dates like that if you wait until a week before release. So altogether I think a Direct in October is more likely than November so as not to steal Pokemon's spotlight. 

Edited October 7, 2018 by Glennstavos

[The DanMan]

17 hours ago, Armagon said:

So there's appearently rumors that there'll be a Smash Direct on the 10th kf this month.

Just a rumor but it would line up with the recent change on the Smash website....or maybe the recent change is what caused the rumor.

Bingo.

It's pure speculation based on the "new" tag for Isabelle disappearing.

[Lightchao42]

If we base our mindset on the Fifty Fact Extravaganza, which is likely the closest point of comparison (being one last infodump before release), then any final Ultimate Direct should be early-to-mid November; the Fifty Fact Extravaganza aired October 23, while Super Smash Bros. for Wii U was first released a month later, on November 21. By this reasoning, the final Direct would air about a month before Ultimate releases.

That isn't to say there can't be a new character announced this month, but I find a dedicated Smash Direct unlikely.

[Jave]

On 06-10-2018 at 9:53 PM, Armagon said:

So there's appearently rumors that there'll be a Smash Direct on the 10th kf this month.

Just a rumor but it would line up with the recent change on the Smash website....or maybe the recent change is what caused the rumor.

That, and also the unlisted video people discovered in the Smash Characters Playlist on Youtube.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

6 hours ago, Lightchao42 said:

If we base our mindset on the Fifty Fact Extravaganza, which is likely the closest point of comparison (being one last infodump before release), then any final Ultimate Direct should be early-to-mid November; the Fifty Fact Extravaganza aired October 23, while Super Smash Bros. for Wii U was first released a month later, on November 21. By this reasoning, the final Direct would air about a month before Ultimate releases.

That isn't to say there can't be a new character announced this month, but I find a dedicated Smash Direct unlikely.

The Fifty Fact Extravaganza was aired after Smash 4 released - on 3DS. And had the singular goal of selling people on the Wii U version and its unique features. As evidenced by the opening narration. It's schedule was inherent on there being two versions of a game to sell. If the 3DS and Wii U versions were released in the same month, for example, you can bet the final direct would have still been spaced between them. But Ultimate is just one game, so the final Direct has more freedom in when it can go up.

Incidentally, I can see them reusing the "50 Fact Extravaganza" format. It even feels fitting since the Announcer has not changed between games.

[Jedi]

New remix

 

[Armagon]

2 minutes ago, Jedi said:

New remix

 

Oh, another FE remix? Damn, there goes the theory that each series would only get one song preview before the game comes out.

This Id ~ Purpose remix is way better than the FE Heroes remix.

[Dai]

“A ninja-like fighter that battles with moves like the Water Shuriken. Greninja can use a log for clever counterattacks, and this Pokémon can even stick to walls. During its Final Smash, it turns into Ash-Greninja...!?”

I’m not surprised, but I wonder if they’re really going to change how his initial final Smash functioned at all.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

13 hours ago, Dai said:

“A ninja-like fighter that battles with moves like the Water Shuriken. Greninja can use a log for clever counterattacks, and this Pokémon can even stick to walls. During its Final Smash, it turns into Ash-Greninja...!?”

I’m not surprised, but I wonder if they’re really going to change how his initial final Smash functioned at all.

Could just be an aesthetic flourish onto the existing move. Dunno if Ash-Greninja has any unique abilities to draw on. Greninja's also got a pretty appropriate final smash concept for the current trend of quick yet flashy moves. But it's also a weird decision since Greninja's final smash strips all the characters of their color against a moon background. So you wouldn't be able to see Greninja's changed colors. It also calls into question how Ash-Greninja would look if Greninja was wearing a different color palette.

I'd rather they just have Ash-Greninja as an alternate skin, but Smash Bros won't even have each pokemon's shiny color schemes, so I wouldn't hold out hope for such good ideas.

[Armagon]

3 hours ago, Glennstavos said:

Dunno if Ash-Greninja has any unique abilities to draw on

It's got the giant fuck-all Water Shuriken that looks like it was taken out of Naruto and should've won Ash the Leauge but didn't.

[Slumber]

On 10/9/2018 at 7:34 PM, Jedi said:

New remix

Even as somebody who has never been big on FE music, that's a mighty fine remix.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

So I may be heading up to Genesis 6, the first national tournament for Ultimate. But the real reason I'm going is because our speedrunning communities were approached by one of the organizers interested in debuting some new types of content on Day 1 when pools are going on and there's nothing too interesting to stream. So you may see me and a few others doing a race of all characters' Bonus Stages s in Smash 64.

Nothing is set in stone at the moment, but I'd love to help show the world how great these games can be outside of Versus mode. We're work shopping all sorts of showcase formats for each game and mode and trying to unite each game's speedrunning community into one brand that could support future events. Oh, and while I'm there I might as well enter for Ultimate even if I can't imagine myself finding time to get good at that game before February. 

[NinjaMonkey]

Today's (Monday) blog post is Shulk and it reads as follows: He is the only fighter that can change his status during battle. His sword, the Monado, allows him to switch between five modes – Jump, Speed, Shield, Buster and Smash – which change his abilities for a short time. Fun fact: Shulk's eighth colour variation puts him in a pair of swimming trunks!

[Anomalocaris]

3 hours ago, NinjaMonkey said:

Today's (Monday) blog post is Shulk and it reads as follows: He is the only fighter that can change his status during battle. His sword, the Monado, allows him to switch between five modes – Jump, Speed, Shield, Buster and Smash – which change his abilities for a short time. Fun fact: Shulk's eighth colour variation puts him in a pair of swimming trunks!

RIP the Malosian dream.

[Johann]

22 minutes ago, Anomalocaris said:

RIP the Malosian dream.

Not that I expected Shulk echoes, but to be fair, the blog update text isn't exactly clear on everything. It's kinda like how people thought Ness was going to be cut for Brawl due to a sentence on the Dojo about Lucas.

[a bear]

Technically it’s wrong because Kirby, but eh.

A lot of people liked to suggest so-and-so as a stance character, usually involving multiple movesets. Coincidentally, Elma and Rex regularly come up since that’d fit their games’ mechanics more than Shulk’s. Most of our newcomers are pretty straightforward compared to Smash 4 however (with exception to Inkling’s ink), and it’s really unlikely that Sakurai would invest so much time on one character unless they transformed into multiple. And by transforming, I mean drastically changing who you play as rather than swapping weapons (or support characters in Rex’s case).

Not that that suggests we aren’t getting Elma or Rex or whoever, but that they’d have a more traditional moveset.

[The DanMan]

4 hours ago, a bear said:

Technically it’s wrong because Kirby, but eh.

A lot of people liked to suggest so-and-so as a stance character, usually involving multiple movesets. Coincidentally, Elma and Rex regularly come up since that’d fit their games’ mechanics more than Shulk’s. Most of our newcomers are pretty straightforward compared to Smash 4 however (with exception to Inkling’s ink), and it’s really unlikely that Sakurai would invest so much time on one character unless they transformed into multiple. And by transforming, I mean drastically changing who you play as rather than swapping weapons (or support characters in Rex’s case).

Not that that suggests we aren’t getting Elma or Rex or whoever, but that they’d have a more traditional moveset.

I mean, Rex switching between Pyra/Mythra/the Catalyst would be possible because their weapons are all swords. They could realistically merge the animations and share arts (Rex and Pyra are shown flinging out a fire projectile in cutscenes but can't in gameplay; meanwhile the Catalyst has a projectile as one of their normal arts), just with different effects. Rex would always have to use one of them, so it could be something like Pyra as the default/Mythra with greater damage and knockback but also more damage and knockback received/the Catalyst dealing slightly less damage but having a health drain effect on every hit.

But nobody was really expecting either of them at base at this point, so I don't think there's much to read into anyways.

Anyways, I'm a bit late to the party here but download cards for Ultimate have started coming out in Japan. And... well... look at the character ordering:

An empty spot next to Ryu and a spot after Isabelle. Right as the box theory predicted, and the perfect places for Ken (who's confirmed already thanks to the image leak) and Incineroar.

[NinjaMonkey]

1 hour ago, The DanMan said:

Ken (who's confirmed already thanks to the image leak) 

When was that confirmed as legitimate?

[Lightchao42]

Catalyst isn't necessary, Rex would be perfectly fine with just Pyra and Mythra.

1 hour ago, The DanMan said:

And... well... look at the character ordering:

Or it's arranged like that because the last row doesn't have enough characters to be full, so it's centered because it wouldn't be aesthetically pleasing for there to be two blank spaces on Isabelle's right. By that reasoning, the positions of the blanks would have nothing to do with whoever the remaining characters are. And really, why would they deliberately leave hints to who the final characters are through positioning like that?

Though the download card is really quite nice; I like physical versions but I'd be tempted to get it just for how it looks.

Edited October 16, 2018 by Lightchao42

[Florete]

2 hours ago, The DanMan said:

Anyways, I'm a bit late to the party here but download cards for Ultimate have started coming out in Japan. And... well... look at the character ordering:

  Reveal hidden contents

An empty spot next to Ryu and a spot after Isabelle. Right as the box theory predicted, and the perfect places for Ken (who's confirmed already thanks to the image leak) and Incineroar.

 

 

Not only is this old news, that's not the perfect place for Ken. He'd be after Ryu, not before.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

Ha! Card Theory? Keep up with the times, kiddos. Most of us are already on Tinder theory, baby! I'm bummed that we're getting another three pokemon characters and that Ryo Hazuki only appears as an assist trophy who generates toys from a capsule machine for you to pick up, but the selfie feature is sooooo cool and Pigma Dengar is the best newcomer addition that I never knew I wanted.

[Jedi]

DK looking to be a great grabber again. 

 

[The DanMan]

9 hours ago, Florete said:

Not only is this old news, that's not the perfect place for Ken. He'd be after Ryu, not before.

As I said, I'm a bit late to the party; and obviously he'd be after Ryu, but there's still space for him. It's a piece of official artwork that has the perfect amount of empty spots to support the Box leak.

10 hours ago, Lightchao42 said:

Catalyst isn't necessary, Rex would be perfectly fine with just Pyra and Mythra.

Or it's arranged like that because the last row doesn't have enough characters to be full, so it's centered because it wouldn't be aesthetically pleasing for there to be two blank spaces on Isabelle's right. By that reasoning, the positions of the blanks would have nothing to do with whoever the remaining characters are. And really, why would they deliberately leave hints to who the final characters are through positioning like that?

Though the download card is really quite nice; I like physical versions but I'd be tempted to get it just for how it looks.

Why would they deliberately have designed the LE box to show only one side yet have enough for people to deduce there's an extra character on the other side? They could've gone with a different arrangement, yet this is what they've been going with. And it lines up perfectly with the most legitimate rumors right now.

With there being less than 2 months left until release and Sakurai explicitly saying they're slowing down with the reveals, it's looking more likely every day.

10 hours ago, NinjaMonkey said:

When was that confirmed as legitimate?

The main leak debunkers gave up and said it's legitimate, and every further attempt to debunk it has only further given it credence:

>Based on the folds of his clothing, Ken's model seems to be directly based off of Ryu's, who got a model update in Ultimate
>Moray Towers is shown without any ink, which is not possible in normal gameplay
>Ken's and Pac-Man are slightly clipping through the ramp Pac-Man's shadow is glitched/only partially on the ramp-- stuff that happens on the actual stage in that area
>Mappy (the mouse police officer Pac-Man can pull out with his neutral special) has a sprite that's two pixels different in Ultimate than in Smash 4, and it's using Ultimate's version (something that wasn't even really known until people started trying to debunk the image)
>Pichu's icon is actually slightly different from every other one we've seen, showing slightly more of his ears
>Ken's portrait being faded out is due to Pac-Man being close to it-- something that would happen in the Wii U version of Smash 4 and Brawl (character portraits fading out if characters got close to them)
>Pichu at first appears to be too big-- but screenshots have shown he (and Young Link) are both larger than they were in the past.

Obviously it's not a 2D drawing trying to masquerade as 3D (all of those were identifiable immediately upon closer inspection), and the pure attention to detail and improbabilities (Ken being directly based off of a model that isn't publicly available yet, the stage missing an element that's always present in footage we've seen) make it incredibly unlikely that it's anything other than legitimate.

The image in question:

[NoirCore]

On 10/15/2018 at 1:26 AM, Johann said:

Not that I expected Shulk echoes, but to be fair, the blog update text isn't exactly clear on everything. It's kinda like how people thought Ness was going to be cut for Brawl due to a sentence on the Dojo about Lucas.

Ah, who could forget "up until now". I'm still wondering how that blog post was typed the way it was. :o

[Armagon]

https://t.co/EuX7kbFDq6?amp=1

Flash Man Stage remix

51 days remain until Smash Ultimate and we still haven't gotten a new Kid Icarus or Xenoblade song previewed, i am prepping the nukes as i type this.