Today the
internet saw a Smash Bros leak that revealed Ryu from Street Fighter to be a DLC pack making him part of Nintendo’s new marketing trick of adding third party
characters to try and get more people to buy the game. All realistic
joking aside the inclusion of third party characters is ginues as it allows fans
to access fights they could ever hope to become real. That was always the
intention of the Smash series to begin with but having third party characters invites fans of multiple franchises to come and enjoy the experience. Since Brawl for
the WII we’ve seen many fans debate and demand certain characters to be in the
series. Some of which have actually turned up like Sonic, Mega
Man, Pac-Man and now Ryu however theirs one third party character that no one
seems to be mentioning but I personally think would make a great addition to
the franchise, I am of course talking about the orange rodent known as Crash
Bandicoot.
Since the reveal
of Pac-Man last year the thought of Crash being in the game has become something that fills me with excitement but like always theirs that part of my brain that keeps telling you that the likelihood of it happening is on the same level as Spider-Man, X-Men and Fantastic Four joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Of
course over the coming months time changed, Nintendo announced DLC characters,
they introduced the fighter ballot (which let fans vote on who they wanted to
see in the game) and Spider-Man joined the MCU. Now anything is possible thanks
to the Ryu announcement but unfortunately not many people seem to agree with me
on Crash being in Smash Bros with the repeated response being “it wouldn’t
work”. For this post I will explain my reasons for wanting Crash Bandicoot in
Smash Bros and why I personally think he would make a great choice for the game.
He use to be rival’s with Mario
Yes I am aware
that this is a cilice but it’s important to note that back in the early days of
3D Gaming (N64, PS1, Sega Saturn/ Dreamcast) Crash was known as an arch rival
to Mario during this era. Now lets amylase this for a minute, this
newest installment of the franchise includes Sonic, Mega Man and Pac-Man all
three of those characters were rivals with Mario at some point within a
different era of gaming. Pac-Man during the arcade, Mega Man during the NES (in terms of selling more copies) and Sonic during the 16-bit era
(SNES, SEGA GYNESIS). Now If you include Crash Badicoot someone who was around
during start of 3D you basically have the complete collection of gaming rivals.
Not to mention back in 1995 (the year I was born) Sony and Nintendo made a deal to
produce a CD add on for the SNES, of course these plans did not happen and this
is what gave Sony the inspiration to create the PlayStation, no Nintendo no
PlayStation. Added the Bandicoot would be a great reference to the two
companies rivalry back in the day.
It would make up for PlayStation All Stars
For those of you
who are unaware for this title, “PlayStation All Stars” was Sony’s poor attempt
at making their own version of Smash Bros. However the plan backfired and now
Sony is more than anything willing to pretend that the game ever existed. One
of the many mistakes they made with that game was completely leaving out one of
their core fighter’s aka Crash Bandicoot. Now I am aware that Crash was a third
party character but that’s no excuse if Nintendo can get Ryu a Street Fighter
than Sony can easily get Crash for “All Stars”.
It could reboot Crash’s Career
As a lot of
people know Crash’s career has pretty much been in a creatively stagnant since
becoming a third party character in the early 2000’s. His last game was released
in 2009 and barley sold any units. Granted Naughtydog has stated their interest
in buying the rights back to try and reboot the franchise however I do believe that
bringing him into the Smash Bros Universe could be the final push to get the
character back on track. Adding him into the roster could help increase the characters popularity not just for old gamers but new
ones as well that may not of heard of the character before. This would help gain interest for a new generation and maybe help create new games.
Crash’s Moves List
With the Smash
Bros series a lot the character moves tend to represent some of their moves from pervious installments
of their series, this would be the same for Crash. This is mainly the part were the “it wouldn’t
work” argument comes in as people tend ask what moves would he preform. Personally I think Crash would have a great set of moves for Smash Bros
and here are a few suggestions. Just to be clear I’m talking about the standard
set of moves (The ones you preform with the B button) as those are the main
moves most people focus on.
B-Spin: Probably
the most obvious one but by pressing B constantly will cause Crash to spin on
the spot. You would also be able to tilt the control stick to left or right to
move Crash to get more hits.
Side and B Slide:
Tilting the control stick sideways (left or right) will cause Crash to slide
across the stage. This move is from Crash Bandicoot 2 and would be helpful when
trying to gain an extra hit on your opponent.
(Skip to 3:27-3:33)
Up and B Jet
Pack: Another move from Crash 2 this move will allow Crash to fly over the
stage and allow him to get back to the stage if thrown off.
Down and B Body
Slam: This move is where Crash can slam on the stage with
his body. This move would allow him to gain extra damage on opponents who come into contact with it, similar to Yoshi’s Ground Pound attack
Final Smash: This
final Smash would be where Crash would gain Aku Aku to cover this face and make
him invisible for a short period of time. This would be from the original games
where if Crash found three Aku Aku masks his face would be covered and he would
be able to run around the stage push enemy’s away with just one hit. However in
Smash Bros it would work in the same way Wario’s Final Smash does where his
movies would become a lot more powerful and cause appoints to fly off the stage
with just one hit.
Conclusion
So in Conclusion
I think that Crash Bandicoot would make a great character for Smash Bros. If
you disagree feel free to explain why in the comments below. Also which third
party character would you like to see in Smash Bros?