#chrom with bayonetta's legs

[thanisama0u0]

The lovers with bayonetta's legs 🤑

[smashy-headcanons]

Ren once took some of the other Smashers, along with some Assist Trophies and Pokémon, dancing after finding a copy of Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight and getting a serious case of déjà vu.

When he tried to convince the wardens and Igor to turn the Velvet Room back into Club Velvet, all that accomplished was getting him on the wardens’ bad side and kicked out of the Velvet Room more forcefully than usual. To this day, he still doesn’t know how Igor felt about “Club Velvet,” but, based on the wardens’ reactions to his mention of it, that’s probably for the best.

Master Hand and Crazy Hand were much more willing to help with this event. Of course, there was some debate over how to go about it. Crazy Hand wanted to just let everyone dance crazy, while Master Hand wanted to have a ball like the one from Dancing in Starlight/Dancing in Moonlight, where teams of dancers compete to see who can build up the most hype.

Between Sonic’s frequent breakdancing, Bayonetta’s dancing that she even incorporates into her fighting style, and Ren being the guy that started the whole thing, the whole Sega Squad joined in.

The Sega Squad also helped with the playlist, resulting in most of the Smashers being introduced to Jet Set Radio’s soundtrack, thanks to Sonic and Bayonetta. And getting memed on, thanks to just Sonic. And hearing a lot of jazz thanks to Bayonetta and Ren.

Every Mario universe character joined, even the tyrannical King K. Rool and the non-sapient Piranha Plant. Waluigi, of course, only joined the festivities to resume his (actually canon) harebrained scheme to take over the world with his superior dance moves.

None of the Metroid characters danced. Ridley, however, did try to kill everyone. Unfortunately for him, Bayonetta could fight him back while still dancing to the beat of the music. That’s just the kind of thing she would do, honestly.

Of course Kirby would join. And he was adorable as always.

R.O.B. tried his best, okay? It’s hard to dance with a flat base that allows for hovering instead of legs!

Not only did the Inklings join in, but Agent 3 called in a favor from a couple of her friends. What the other Inklings didn’t know, however, was that those friends were The Squid Sisters. When they found out “calling in a few favors from a couple of friends” meant “setting up a Squid Sisters concert for us and a bunch of video game characters,” heads exploded from sheer hype.

Chrom tried to dance like Olivia or Inigo, but not only did he fail miserably, he also wound up breaking everything. He is now banned from dancing.

For someone who “refused to go” because it was “a waste of time,” Shadow sure was upset about the Run DMC version of Walk this Way playing instead of the original version.

(submitted by specternabbermaiori)

[xb-squaredx]

The Unwritten “Rules” of Smash Bros. Speculation

Super Smash Bros. has become one of the most ambitious crossovers in all of gaming, featuring characters from seemingly endless franchises duking it out. With each new installment, fans eagerly make the cases for their preferred choices, and with the advent of DLC, even after the game launches fans still speculate as to who will join the battle. The most recent title, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, is no exception. As of this writing, we have six more DLC characters incoming for Ultimate, and speculation is in full swing. While it IS fun to speculate, attempting to narrow an almost infinite number of choices down to just six is quite the undertaking, so I thought it’d be more interesting to instead look at the arguments people often have for or against certain inclusions. I aim to compile the “rules” of who can and cannot get into Smash Bros. and see which rules hold water and which ones are on thin ice. Let’s begin!

NINTENDO ONLY

I’ll start with what was once one of the most binding rules for speculation. Smash Bros. was at one time, a celebration and collection of solely Nintendo-owned IPs, and despite fans pleas, various other characters from other companies surely couldn’t join in the fun. At least, until Brawl. Snake from the Metal Gear franchise and Sonic the Hedgehog himself made the leap from dream to reality as they were added to the roster and from that day onwards, nothing has ever been the same. In fact, we’re at a point now where most wish lists are populated almost entirely by third-party characters. It’s safe to say that this particular rule WAS broken and should be casted aside, however in its place another, similar rule has cropped up.

FRIENDLY RELATIONS

OK, so Nintendo doesn’t need to own the character in question…but they damn well better have been on a Nintendo console! The better the relationship between Nintendo and the game/franchise in question, the better chance they have of appearing in Smash, at least according to some people. Looking at our guests in general, this rule DOES seem to hold some water. Snake is a tad of a stretch, as the bulk of the Metal Gear Solid games aren’t on Nintendo platforms, though Twin Snakes exists, and the original Metal Gear was on the NES, so you could make an argument for him. Sonic, Mega Man, Simon and Pac-Man have made plenty of appearances on Nintendo consoles and while Microsoft owns Banjo now, he got his start with Nintendo. But then we have Cloud and Joker, who throw a wrench into the works. Both characters at the time of their playable debut had only appeared in spinoffs on Nintendo systems, with the games they made their ACTUAL debut in not appearing on any Nintendo console. Cloud famously made his debut in the first Final Fantasy game to NOT be on a Nintendo system. Over the years however, Cloud would appear in cameos in smaller spinoffs, as early as the Game Boy Advance as a summon in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, and as per Sakurai’s own explanation, Cloud is meant to be a rep for the franchise on the whole, and there were indeed six other games Nintendo had on their consoles as “justification.” For Joker however, the Persona series stuck to Sony platforms, though the series they spun off from, Shin Megami Tensei, DID have tied to Nintendo, and the spinoff Persona Q was released as a 3DS title, so he gets in…BARELY.

I do find it interesting to note that, even if fans might not hold belief in this “rule,” other developers seem to respect it. When asked if Dante from the Devil May Cry series could see a playable appearance in Smash, Capcom instead stated that his own games would have to be on Switch first…and then a few months later, they put Devil May Cry 1 on Switch. Is this merely a coincidence? Maybe, but it’s pretty funny all the same. So far this rule has been bent, not broken, but I think it’s only a matter of time. This of course isn’t the only “rule” that’s open to some wiggle-room.

2 SEXY 2 VIOLENT

Nintendo is a family-friendly company and while they DO occasionally opt for more mature titles, they seem to put a lot of importance on casting a wide net and not going for too many ratings above T for Teen, or the rough equivalent in Europe and Japan. So when it comes to Smash, which is in part a celebration of all of Nintendo (plus guests), it pays to make sure THAT game keeps a similar rating. So any character addition that could jeopardize that rating is immediately suspect in the eyes of fans, and I’m inclined to agree. Throughout Smash’s life, we’ve seen how Nintendo and Sakurai have had to bow to the almighty ratings board. Items like the Ray Gun are designed to be as cartoonish as possible, and while this IS a game about smacking people around with punches, kicks, tail swipes and the like, it’s often presented in a very over-the-top manner to lower the impact. Now, there’s plenty of ways to play up the more cartoonish aspects of violence for new playable reps, but there seem to be limits. Bayonetta can’t use her gory Torture Attacks, for one, and when it comes to firearms, the series is a little gun-shy with depicting them. Snake famously only uses explosives, despite firearms being pretty common in his games. However in recent years we’ve seen some deviations from this. Bayonetta is allowed to use her guns, and Joker himself prominently uses his own gun. Granted, Bayonetta’s firing magic bullets and technically Joker’s using a model gun, but they’re still more realistic than the standard Smash shooter. So while it’s POSSIBLE to see the likes of the Mortal Kombat cast or the Doomslayer himself, I also wouldn’t hold my breath.

(Credit to @LetItMelo on Twitter)

God forbid you show any skin either! If a character is overtly sexual in their design, there’s a good chance they’ll be excluded from all the smashing going on, and we’ve seen this in various different forms throughout the series. Following the onslaught of horny players using the in-game camera to look under character’s skirts and the like in Melee and Brawl, female character models now have nothing but darkness underneath skirts and dresses. Or you can be like Rosalina and have the entire universe there. Even non-playable characters can’t escape alteration or even outright removal. Data suggests that the Fire Emblem character Tharja was supposed to be a trophy in the 3DS version of Smash 4, however the trophy does not exist in-game and the fact that her outfit is mostly a sheer bodysuit likely has something to do with it. In Ultimate in particular, the Xenoblade character Mythra had her Spirit altered; her boob window was removed and she gained tights on her otherwise bare legs. And this was just for some 2D art! Then there’s the case of Mai Shiranui, who was excluded from making a cameo on Terry Bogard’s stage, despite the multitude of other SNK character cameos and her status as one of the more recognizable SNK characters. In the Japanese version of Terry’s showcase video, Sakurai specifically states that the ratings board prevented them from including her.

But Bayonetta got in! And sure, she did, but with some concessions made. Her Wicked Weaves no longer leave her naked, only losing part of her outfit, and her more sexual traits are downplayed. There’s also Zero Suit Samus’ uh…let’s say alluring design, so there’s clearly wiggle room here, but at the same time both characters in question are still relatively covered up. I’m not saying it’s impossible for a Senran Kagura or Dead or Alive character to make the leap to playable status but I AM saying that they’d probably have to cover up or get some breast reduction surgery before they can make their debut. Still, ratings are not set in stone and over time, things change and gray areas emerge. With that in mind, I suppose we might as well take a look at one of the murkier, unclear “rules” fans have invented.

HE’S AN ASSIST, GET OVER IT

Being a playable character isn’t the ONLY way to be represented in Super Smash Bros. of course, and throughout the years we’ve seen various ways to get in on the fun. Stages, items, trophies, assists, Spirits, and Mii costumes all exist as ways to make a nod to virtually any franchise under the sun, but the question remains…if you’re already represented in such a way, do you have a shot at being made playable? Looking across the games, the answer would seem to be “Maybe in the next game.” Pit was a trophy in Melee before being brought back (and redesigned) for Brawl. The likes of Little Mac, Dark Samus and Isabelle have been Assist Trophies in one game, only to become playable in the next, and while Chrom and King K. Rool were Mii costumes in Smash 4 they’re playable in Ultimate. So far, we haven’t seen a single character make the playable jump in the same game, even with the option of DLC, but is it really such an impossibility?

Looking at items, like the Assist Trophies or even the Pokeball items, there are times when certain items won’t spawn, so it’s not too much of a stretch to say that, if Waluigi was chosen as a playable character, you couldn’t just find a way to keep his Assist Trophy from popping up in a match. This seems to happen in stages too; if a Link is playable in the Spirit Tracks stage, another character conducts the train. To run counter to that though, Ridley being made playable (and scaled down) is likely the biggest reason that the Pyrosphere stage didn’t make the return in Ultimate. That being said…Chrom is playable now, but he’s still part of both Robin’s Final Smash AND their win screens so…who can say what the actual edict is here?

Spirits are definitely a strange issue; if we take it as fact that if you have a Spirit in the game already, you can’t be made playable…that essentially means that 99% of Nintendo’s stable are ineligible and that just doesn’t seem right to me. Why limit yourself that much? Your only remaining options are brand new games that come out after Ultimate, though we’ve also had DLC spirits added in to promote a lot of these games. I’d like to assume that, at the very least, if you get in as a DLC Spirit, it’s unlikely that you’d be made playable later on. We have cases like the random Resident Evil Spirit event that casually gave us the most popular villain (Wesker) and the three most iconic protagonists of the series (Jill, Leon and Chris), which would make me question what a Resident Evil Spirit Board for a potential DLC character would look like. Why add that franchise in AHEAD of their playable appearance? Overall, I’d argue that a character with a Spirit in the base game has a chance of being made into playable DLC…but it’s a slight chance.

But then we have costumes…and this is where it can get interesting. Characters that are already playable can have costumes based off of them, as the likes of Link and Samus demonstrate, and even in the case of someone like Chrom who finally made the leap to playable, his costume still exists. But it’s the third-party costumes that garner the most attention. At launch, none of the third-party costumes from Smash 4 were in Ultimate, though as the Fighter’s Pass has doled out characters, these costumes have been slowly brought back, alongside new ones. At present, all of Namco’s costumes have yet to be seen, as well as the costume of one oft-requested puppet, Geno. Does this mean Namco will get a DLC rep, or that Geno will finally make the dreams of many fans come true? Anything’s possible, but there are no guarantees. As we can see with the likes of Sans and Cuphead, it’s also possible for characters to be added in as more elaborate costumes than your typical Mii flair. It certainly seems more likely to me that, say, Shantae could get a special Mii costume, even when she’s already a Spirit in the base game, and this might apply to other fan favorites too. On the whole though, there’s just a lot that’s up in the air regarding this particular rule. Nothing has contradicted it yet, but I can’t say I’d rule anything out in this case. If there’s ONE stipulation we have gotten confirmation on MULTIPLE times however, it’s this next “rule.”

NO GOKU ALLOWED

Smash Bros. celebrates video games, end of story, so all the cries to add in X character from some other form of media are ultimately fruitless. Sakurai won’t add Son Goku from Dragon Ball, and we won’t get Iron Man or Shrek. At present, the only characters that aren’t strictly FROM a video game, are at least intimately related TO video games. Both R.O.B. and Mr. Game&Watch are basically mascots for the NES and Game&Watch systems respectively, and they’re deeply tied to Nintendo’s own history as it is, so no one really bats an eye at their inclusion. Aside from kinda “tainting” the pureness of the series by introducing something that’s not a video game, there’s also licensing issues to consider…as well as the fact that it’d be a Pandora’s box the likes of which we’d never recover from. If Goku got in, then why not George Costanza or Spongebob or Walter White? It’d never end and the series would lose its identity.

There are still, however, a few characters that fans desperately want in the game, and they have this rule to contend with first. Geralt of the Witcher series is brought up as a possible inclusion, however the character originates from books. While the games have certainly gained notoriety and in some cases have surpassed the books in the public consciousness, that doesn’t change the fact that Geralt isn’t strictly a video game character. Oddly enough, however, he’s made the rounds in a lot of different video games over the past few years. He’s available as a character customization option in Daemon X Machina for one, a Switch-exclusive mecha game from 2019, and also in 2019 he was a guest character in Soulcalibur VI. Granted, that series has already seen guests from other mediums, like from the Spawn comics or characters from the Star Wars series. His appearance in Monster Hunter: World is also pretty unexpected, so it wouldn’t be completely out of nowhere to expect him to eventually make it to gaming’s biggest crossover, but I have my doubts. There’s also Sora from the Kingdom Hearts series, and while he DID originate in a video game, he is co-owned by Disney, and is closely tied to their properties as a result. Now, it’s not as if Nintendo hasn’t had a relationship with Disney; plenty of Disney games have appeared on Nintendo systems, but including Sora in Smash would either mean erasing any connections to the Disney characters in his games, or adapting them and subsequently breaking this massive rule and causing pandemonium! OK, it’s not as serious as all that, but it’d be a…delicate deal at any rate. Disney is pretty protective of their IPs, and Sora is also co-owned by Square Enix who is also pretty protective and hard to work with…Cloud barely got back into Smash Ultimate for one thing, and the rights for all that Dragon Quest music couldn’t have been cheap, so I feel like Nintendo wouldn’t be willing to go in on this a third time, especially with Disney’s involvement. But…miracles can happen, I suppose.

LITERALLY WHO?!

For our last “rule” here, I want to tackle one of the more subjective stipulations: relevancy. When it comes to shooting down character choices, you’ll often hear things like “that series hasn’t had a new entry in YEARS, so why would they promote that?!” or “that puppet’s been in one niche game that no one knows about!” It is true that characters in Smash do tend to promote newer games, as the likes of Roy, Corrin, Byleth, Joker and Hero show. I mean, why ELSE is the hero from Dragon Quest XI the default costume, other than that he’s the new hotness? But I think it’s clear at this point, especially when it comes to Ultimate, that being relevant isn’t everything. King K. Rool hasn’t been used in well over a decade, but he was added due to fan demand. A similar thing can be said for Banjo, as Microsoft hasn’t exactly used that IP in a while, and many would argue that Minecraft is a much more relevant rep from Microsoft if anything.

You’ll see people complain about certain inclusions with the argument that “no one knows who that character is!” but often that just demonstrates the complainer’s own bubble. Many in the West might not have gone CRAZY when Hero was announced, but Japan LOVES Dragon Quest and its inclusion is HUGE. Sakurai himself even notes this when going over Terry Bogard and SNK’s own history in the arcades. Relevancy only matters so much; if fans want them, and they bring something new and fun to the table, they have a chance. So this rule, as far as I’m concerned, isn’t one to take seriously. One man’s niche is another’s mainstream, really.

CONCLUSION

At the end of the day, Super Smash Bros. frequently makes dreams come true and breaks through any preconceived notions regarding who can and cannot smash, so I do find it somewhat of a fool’s errand to compile these “rules” and act like they’re the gospel. In truth, Nintendo and Sakurai can do whatever they want, and with enough time and money, anything is possible. There was once a time when we thought Sonic or Banjo fighting Mario and Link was a pipe dream, or hell…the entire concept of Nintendo all-stars all in one place was pretty farfetched over 20 years ago, but look at where we are now. As the old saying goes, rules are made to be broken…so clearly our next 6 characters are Doomslayer, Kasumi from DOA, Waluigi, Geno, Sora and Hank Hill. Yup. And I for one will be INCREDIBLY DISAPPOINTED if that is not the case!

In all seriousness, speculate away, because at the end of the day, it’s pretty fun and harmless by itself! Just…hype responsibly, OK?

Happy Smashing

-B

[courageous-little-foxgirl]

Made a new Chromnetta! “Because no one asked for it but I did it anyways.” - @jolteonjordansh, who did the first and was such a huge inspiration ;D Check out the Original: http://jolteonjordansh.tumblr.com/post/114528691753/chrom-with-bayonetta-legs-because-no-one-asked-for Risen King Chrom - Bayonetta Mix by me: @beyondfantasycosplay