Super Smash Bros. Ultimate ended up being one of the biggest cross over in gaming and not only with the fighters but also with including character in the form of spirits, items, music, mii costumes and various other components. So, with Sora being the last fighter to be added to the game, I thought it would be a fun thought experiment to think of roster that a game like Smash Bros. could be, in an alternate universe where there weren’t any limitation or legal loops to jump through.

The goal is to create a fighter roster that includes and try to fit as many game titles and franchises as possible. Here are the rules I gave myself to follow when building this roster:

1. Rosters has to 70 characters. Basically, rounding out the ‘69’ base roster for when Smash Ultimate released.
2. Only 1 character from a game series/franchise. This way I can’t ‘cheat’ and use a series like Final Fantasy to fill out 13 to 15 spots on the roster.
3. Avoid “Character Creator” based characters. So, no characters like the Dragonborn from Skyrim.
4. Character must have an origin in video games, meaning no Goku or Grinch or whatever else the internet thought of during the past 3 years.

With the rules in place, we can now move to the picking process, but before we start just to disclaimer, this is just my personal picks so if you don’t agree, awesome and now go make your own list. Also, this is just talking about the roster, I will not even attempt to think about move sets as I figure there are those who are way more creative and well-verse in fighting game mechanics that have probably already done that. Though, imagining a character in Smash Bros., Injustice and other fighter gams may be part of the reasoning. With that out of the way let’s move on to the actually roster building process.

Now, I will fully admit, I kind of thought of this just in the past month so I’m going to use 2 games as a jumping off point. One of course being Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and other being PlayStation All-stars. Using the rosters from these 2 games will give me a good base to build off of. From Smash Bros. I kept the following fighters:

• Mario (Super Mario)
• Donkey Kong (Donkey Kong)
• Link (Legend of Zelda)
• Samus (Metroid)
• Yoshi (Yoshi)
• Kirby (Kirby)
• Fox (Star Fox)
• Pikachu (Pokémon)
• Ness (Earthbound)
• Capt. Falcon (F-Zero)
• Ike (Fire Emblem)
• Pit (Kid Icarus)
• Wario (Wario Ware)
• Snake (Metal Gear Solid)
• Sonic (Sonic the Hedgehog)
• Olimar (Pikmin)
• Isabelle (Animal Crossing)
• Mega Man (Mega man)
• Little Mac (Punch Out)
• Pac-Man (Pac-Man)
• Shulk (Xenoblade Chronicles)
• Duck Hunt (Duck Hunt)
• Ryu (Street Figher)
• Sephiroth (Final Fantasy 7)
• Bayonetta (Bayonetta)
• Inkling (Splatoon)
• Simon (Castlevania)
• Banjo & Kazooie (Banjo-Kazooie)
• Terry (Fatal Fury)
• Min Min (Arms)
• Steve (Minecraft)
• Sora (Kingdom Hearts)

Starting with the Smash Bros. roster was the obvious starting point as this would hit several main series under the Nintendo umbrella, but it was got Bandi-Namco, Sega, Capcom and a few Playstation characters. So, starting with the Nintendo characters; Mario, Donkey Kong, Link, Samus, Kirby and Fox were easy pics as they are the stars of their series and some of the original fighters. I chose Pikachu as the Pokémon rep as it was one of the original smash fighters and is the mascot for the franchise. For Wario and Yoshi, I followed the official Smash Bros. site and since that separated them into the Yoshi and Wario Ware series, that followed the 2^nd rule of 1 Character from a series. I chose Ike as the Fire Emblem series, basically at random. I’m not really familiar with that series so I just picked one. Ness, Capt. Falcon, Pit, Little Mac and Olimar were another set of easy picks and I chose Isabelle as she is a beloved character of the series. Shulk seemed to be the more notable character from the Xenoblade Chronicles so I just went with that. Characters like; Ice Climbers, Duck Hunt, Wii Fit Trainer. Mr. Game & Watch and R.O.B, I always saw as “super silly” characters that I figure I could cut for other characters, however, I kept Duck Hunt because it was one of the first games I played as a kid so it has a special place in my heart. The final 2 Nintendo characters were Inkling and Min Min as newer IP reps.

Now moving over to the non-Nintendo Smash characters, we start with Sonic, Snake, Mega Man and Pac-Man as then cover several franchises. Next up is Ryu which is always a character I think about when I think about Street Fighter. Now, I could have selected any of the other Final Fantasy characters but I feel like Sephiroth is probably the well-known villain in the series so we will stick with him.  After that, the other easy picks were Bayonetta, Simon, Banjo & Kazooie and Terry. I know Steve should be consider as one of the “super silly characters” I talked about early but have to give Minecraft its dues and keep a rep on the roster. Lastly, Sora rounds up the final picks from the Smash Bros. rosters to give us a solid base in my opinion. Next, we will look at the PlayStation All-Stars rosters to help build this roster.

 From PlayStation All-Star rosters I chose:

• Heihachi (Tekken)
• Jak and Daxter (Jak and Daxter)
• Kratos (God of War)
• Nathan Drake (Uncharted)
• Ratchet and Clank (Ratchet and Clank)
• Sly Cooper (Sly Cooper series)
• Spike (Ape Escape, PS1 design please)
• Issac Clarke (Dead Space)
• Big Daddy (Bioshock)
• Sweet Tooth (Twisted Metal)
• Cole Macrath (Infamous)

I had a smaller cast of characters to pick from and I stuck with some of the better known ones so I more room for other options. First thing is, I chose Heihachi for Kazuya to rep Tekken as when I think of the series either Heihachi or King come to mind first before Kazuya. Jak and Daxter, Ratch and Clank, Sly Cooper, and Spike definitely were personal picks as played these games a lot growing up and just have such good memories. Kratos and Nathan Drake were two more easy picks due to their ‘recent’ games. Issac, Cole, Big Daddy and Sweet Tooth I figure were good additions as they are from unique series. With that, I have ‘stole’ enough fighters so now I have to get creative and figure I start with a next group of the roster I like to call: the Indie Icons.

My picks to represent Indie games are:

• Cuphead (Cuphead)
• Sans (Undertale, yes, I know the memes just get over it)
• Shovel Knight (Shovel Knight)
• Shantae (Shantae)
• Hat Kid (Hat in Time)
• The Kid (Bastion)
• Juan (Guacamelee)

Going to start with, yes, I picked Sans from Undertale as a fighter for this roster and not cause of the memes but I honestly think it could be interesting character to have. Cuphead to give another unique gun-base fighter. I picked Shantae and Shovel Knight as I know Shovel Knight has been a fighter in other games and Shantae was requested for Smash Bros. Ultimate. Hat Kid only because I love the Hat in Time game and I picked ‘The Kid’ from Bastion for the same reason though in a Smash Bros. like game it could be like Byleth and the ‘special’ could be different weapons. For my final for this group is Juan because some of my favorite fighters to use in other fighting games I like to pick the wrestler/luchador character. I know there are way, way more Indie characters I could have picked but I wanted to try to give other “big name” fighters in the roster. And speaking of fighters, the next group of picks I have labeled: Fighting Forefathers.

I wanted to add some characters from other fighting game series since I have Tekken, Street Fighter and Fatal Fury reps on the list. The additional fighter game reps I decided to add were:

• Sub-Zero (Mortal Kombat)
• Ragna the Bloodedge (Blazblue series)
• Sol Badguy (Guilty Gear series)

Wasn’t sure which Mortal Kombat character to pick but I felt Sub-Zero was a safe chose for the series rep. Adding Ragna as BlazBlu is one of the series I have actually put a good chunk of time in and Sol seem like a good pick due to the recent game that came out. After picking these 3 characters, I went through several “Top X game of x year/all time/etc.” and picked some characters from those lists and here are those picks:

• Aloy (Horizon Zero Dawn)
• Dante (Devil May Cry)
• Rayman (Rayman)
• Sam Fisher (Splinter Cell)
• Altair (Assassin’s Creed)
• Master Chief (Halo)
• Crash Bandicoot (Crash Bandicoot)
• Spyro (Spyro the Dragon)
• Doom Slayer (Doom)
• Laura Croft (Tomb Raider)
• Crono (Chrono Trigger)

Aloy may seem like an odd character given there a newer character with only one game but it felt like it could be interesting to see in a fighting game setting with all the different weapons. Dante, the white hair one and not the one from DMC, would be fun just to see how he would interact with other characters in Injustice style intros. Rayman, Crash and Spyro have been some of my favorite characters so I really wanted to add them. Sam Fisher, or at least the Splinter Cell game, and Laura Croft have had a long legacy in gaming and felt like they needed to part of this roster and Altair began the Assassin’s Creed series and imaging a down special being him landing in a hay stack is just something I need to see apparently. Master Chief and Doom Slayer were easy picks giving there influences on the first-person shooter genre. Lastly, I picked Crono from Chrono Trigger as it is a classic JRPG and generally felt like a good pick as a fighter. Down to 6 more picks and these may seem odd and out there to some.

The final 6 fighters to this fantasy roster are:

• Asura (Asura’s Wrath)
• Travis Touchdown (No More Heroes)
• Raz (Psychonaunts)
• Ty (Ty the Tasmanian Tiger)
• Kazuma Kiryu (Yakuza series)
• Conker (Conker’s Bad Fur Day)

Ok, maybe Travis Touchdown wouldn’t be too odd to see in this list but given the craziness I have seen from those games it could be an odd fit. Ty was one of the PS2 games I played a lot when I was younger and was part group that were trying to become the next gen icons back in the day. As for Raz, just felt like that character could use more recognition so why not have him slap the crap out of Mario. Asura’s Wrath just seemed like such a different gaming experience that I was curious to see him in a brawler/fighting game. I picked Conker as he is an icon from Rare and just needs to slap some people with a stack of cash. And finally, Kazuma from the Yakuza series, though I haven’t played the series but from what I have seen it feel like it would be a fun time seeing him brawl it out against other characters, and if the game does have something like final smashes, is should be kicking a door at a character, just saying and with that the final slot in this 70-fighter roster has bee filled. There were many, many games that I wanted to include, however, I decided not to in an effort to have a wide spread of games, which I probably still failed in doing that but at least I like to think I tried. It was fun to learn a bit about games that I have never touch and hopefully pick some good ones. Again, this is just my opinion and I have a feeling this would change from person to person and that is the fun part of thought experiments like this. With that all said remember to Stay Safe, Be Kind and Game On!