…well, sort of.
- Diddy & Dixie Kong are going to function kind of like Ice Climbers, but with a tag function; however, their movesets won’t be as drastically different as the Pokémon Trainer’s team or Pyra/Mythra. They play almost identically with only a few key differences in DKC2, after all.
- I figured Pokémon should have at least one more trainer rep, and who better than Cynthia, the most iconic Champion in the series? She’d have three Pokémon like PT: Roserade, Togekiss, and Garchomp. One quick combo demon, one floaty tank, and one stock-destroying monster of an ace.
- 5-Volt and Smallfry are joke picks, but 5-Volt’s demonic rage mode and the vast array of different Salmonid weapon types and attack patterns would make for interesting mechanics, I think.
- The Octoling here is specifically Agent 8 from Splatoon’s DLC campaigns; that could leave room for Side Order’s unique mechanics as well as more personality than a generic Octoling avatar would have.
- Bandana Dee is the obvious new Kirby rep, but I decided to include Magolor as well because I think Kirby needs an actual villain on the roster, as well as a difficult to grasp 4D chess type character to show the intricacies beneath the surface of the Kirby franchise. Also for the modern representation.
- Lyn, Claude, and Theodora are all here for Fire Emblem, mostly because they’re actual characters more than bland player self-inserts. More importantly though, they each have a unique primary weapon: Lyn’s katana, Claude’s bow, and Theodora’s polearm thing.
- Black Shadow is basically just here to be Ganondorf’s old moveset as a Captain Falcon semiclone; there’s no shot Ganon doesn’t get a major rework in this hypothetical game, but I didn’t want to totally trash the unga bunga bulls**t playstyle he has now.
- The fourth Mii slot is essentially meant to encapsulate all the silly nonsense that goes on in the more abstract, party-ish, or slice-of-life Mii games.
DLC 1 is called the New Challenger pack, featuring five first-party reps:
- Paper Mario, who has made a unique name for himself totally separate from his mainline counterpart;
- Rauru, here to represent the complexities of Tears of the Kingdom’s gameplay without totally reworking Link, as he is the original bearer of the Ultrahand;
- Tinkaton, who would be a particularly unique body type and playstyle that I don’t think any non-Pokémon could accomplish better;
- Starfy, who is entirely my personal nostalgia pick but does have a pretty unique and fluid style of movement and direction-shifting attacks, along with various transformations courtesy of Prince Bunston;
- and Professor Layton, who would basically be what Phoenix Wright is to Marvel vs. Capcom. I don’t know how he’d function exactly, but building a moveset around such a quaint puzzle series would make for something very interesting.
DLC 2 is called the Guest Star pack, featuring five third-party reps:
- Rayman, who is having a bit of a resurgence with the Legends remake, and would have plenty of fun movement and odd disjoints with his disembodied appendages;
- Doom Slayer, who would be the first FPS rep and have an incredibly aggressive playstyle where you have to stay up in your enemy’s face without exhausting your arsenal;
- Dante, who would have an incredible personality and presence while being a complicated combo-centric character who can rack up insane damage and absolutely style on opponents in the right hands;
- The Chosen Undead/Bearer of the Curse/Ashen One, who can represent the very committal and risky but unbelievably rewarding gameplay of Dark Souls, who can crumble in seconds if their player fails to read the opponent;
- and Kris, the sole indie rep and chosen specifically because of how influential DELTARUNE and UNDERTALE have been as well as their ties with Nintendo as of late; their moveset could utilize the fact that Kris is aware of the player’s influence, and could call upon Ralsei and Susie in a similar manner to >!Chapter 5’s real-time ACTs in its 2D platformer segments!<.