He's finally here and I can't believe it! (Thoughts on the final Smash character, and the end of an era)

     When I was in 7th grade, a kid on my bus told me that Nintendo officials were meeting to determine whether or not Sora from the Kingdom Hearts series would be put in Super Smash Bros. Brawl, the next game in Nintendo's iconic mascot fighting game. I wasn't sure if I could believe him, but boy was that flame lit in my heart. Super Smash Bros. Brawl was a big deal for many reasons, chief among them being the third party characters which arrived in the forms of Solid Snake from Metal Gear Solid and Sonic the Hedgehog, from the title of the same name. While Sora didn't show up in the game, the inclusion of the third party characters meant that perhaps there was a chance that some day, we could see the arrival of everyone's favorite clown-shoe-wearing, Keyblade-swinging boy, to fight alongside the greats like Mario and Link. As of October 18th, that dream will finally be a reality. On Tuesday, October 5, we received word of the last Smash Ultimate character and found Sora's name there inside the final envelope. Over ten years of hopes from my young self have finally come true, and I'm going to talk about this in this week's blog post.

The trailer that launched 1000 reactions!

    First of all, I want to talk about the amazing character trailer that we got today. It begins just the way that the original teaser trailer ended way back in 2018. The Smash Bros. logo is hanging in the sky engulfed in flames, though now we see it isn't just Inkling staring at the logo, but all of the characters from the entire game. The logo suddenly burns out, leaving one ember still blazing on the ground as the area gets dark. We see all of the characters reverting into their trophy forms, seemingly symbolizing that Smash is over, and they're all left in trophy form to wait until the next game begins (if there is a future game). We see all of the lifeless characters until Mario slowly opens his eyes and fixes his gaze on the flame. Mario slowly gets off of his trophy pedestal which disappears and walks over to the flame. After looking at it for a moment, he thrusts his fist into the fire, picks it up, and throws it into the distance. The flame spins through the air until it reveals a Mickey Mouse keychain, then zooms out to show the Kingdom Key from Kingdom Hearts. The Keyblade fires a beam out into the void, which then opens a giant keyhole that Sora flies through along with light, then begins soaring around the area while all the characters watch. The characters all return from trophy form, seemingly summoned back from the light of the keyhole. He lands and summons the Keyblade to him, then the splash screen appears, proclaiming, "Sora is finally here!" We then see a bunch of different scenes of Sora in action, then it goes back to the CG style from the trailer before, where we see Sora shaking hands with Mario while all of the other characters are watching approvingly, and it shows the Smash Bros Ultimate logo for the final time, this time with X Kingdom Hearts. This trailer definitely made me tear up a bit, as they had the orchestral version of "Simple and Clean" which they've put in basically every trailer for any Kingdom Hearts game, which always just gets to me.

Why Sora?

    Many have long said that there is no character in the world who would make everyone happy, and no matter how many people are absolutely ecstatic at getting Sora in this game, there are just as many people who are sad or even angry about the inclusion. Sakurai shared some interesting information in the direct presentation, calling back to the Smash Ballot, a big deal leading up to the 5th DLC character for Smash Bros. for 3DS and Wii U. Bayonetta got that spot in the roster, so we all assumed that she must have won the ballot vote, even though it seemed pretty fishy at the time following the Wii U exclusive Bayonetta 2. It turns out that Sora was actually the winner of the Smash Ballot, but Satoru Iwata (the former CEO of Nintendo who sadly passed away back in 2015) decided not to share the results of the poll and put Bayonetta out instead. I'd imagine this was due to some hefty negotiations between Nintendo, Square Enix, and Disney, though he didn't say exactly why they decided to hold him back. I think he's a pretty fantastic final pick to wrap up what is truly the ultimate Smash Bros. game. 

    I'm sorry to all of the fans who didn't get their picks in the game, that's always a bitter pill to swallow, and I've certainly swallowed some bitter ones in the past, but I'm happy to see a lot of positive reactions from the internet this morning following the announcement. I think the most important thing we need to understand here is that video games are not exactly "One size fits all." Everyone has their own favorite game, and not everyone will agree about which games are great and which are terrible, which is fine. There's always an element of subjectivity to any kind of art form like this, which is why everyone has different opinions on everything. While I'm personally excited for Sora's inclusion in this game, I hope you don't take this as me rubbing it in anyone's face who is disappointed about it. I'm also just happy with new Smash Bros. content in general, so I've really been happy with all of the fighters that they've put out as part of the two fighter passes as well as the base game. All of them have pretty unique move sets, so even if I haven't been personally attached to a character, I still have enjoyed playing with all of them.

The Impact of Smash!

    It's wild that Smash Bros. Ultimate has now just about completed its nearly three year journey to completion, and now there are going to be 82 unique characters to play with (not even counting the Echo Fighters). Along with that, there are over 1,100 songs in the soundtrack of this game and well over 100 stages to fight on. This truly is the ultimate version of Super Smash Bros, and with more and more rumors circulating that this may be Masahiro Sakurai's last time in the director's chair for the Smash series, there is no way to understate his contributions to video game history overall. Sakurai himself has gone on the record and said that this game will not happen again, he's certainly not going to put all of the characters from this game in another game, as this task has been monumental in more ways than one. Smash Bros. Ultimate has really lived up to its tagline, "everyone is here" and it's made the museum-esque nature that the series has had really since its conception even more impressive, paying tribute to almost every corner of the games industry. If this is indeed the last Smash Bros. game that Sakurai works on, his impressive track record of working almost non-stop on the next game can finally end and he can hopefully take a nice vacation for a change. Whether the rumors are true or not, Sakurai deserves some serious respect for helming the teams on the massive projects that he's made. Thank you, Mr. Sakurai, for everything that you've done for the gaming community as a whole. Your name will not be forgotten, no matter what the future holds. As far as I'm concerned, everyone would not have been there if not for you.

    Thanks for reading this post, friends! I am really excited for what the future of Smash Bros. holds, if there's anything past Sora. I'm glad that he's finally in there, and I hope that people will enjoy playing as him when they have a chance starting on October 18. What do you think about Sora? I hope you're as excited as I am, but I'm sure many people are upset about it. Let me know what you think in the comments if you want! I've been your Self-Proclaimed Smash Bros. fan, and I'll talk to you next week!