Highlights
- Masahiro Sakurai reveals the behind-the-scenes process of creating the character reveal trailers in Super Smash Bros., showcasing the abilities of each fighter uniquely.
- The trailers were created for all fans to easily enjoy, breaking down the plots between gameplay and CG segments, and supervised by Sakurai himself.
- The character reveal trailers gained immense popularity and support from fans, becoming an important source of encouragement for Sakurai and the development team.
Masahiro Sakurai, the creator and director of the Super Smash Bros. series, gave fans some insight into the creation of the fighter reveal trailers that have been made for the franchise over the years. Nintendo's crossover franchise has been famous for its extensive character roster, picking fighters not only from Nintendo's catalog but also several third-party fighters from across gaming history. One of the most exciting parts about a Super Smash Bros. game is the roster, especially during the pre-release period going into a game or with DLC fighters, which became more prevalent with the fourth and fifth titles in the series, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.
The tradition of Super Smash Bros.'s elaborate character reveals can be traced back to Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the Wii, where Sakurai was providing fans with information about the game via daily blog posts on the Super Smash Bros. DOJO website. While there would be promotional trailer videos, such as the one shown at E3 2006 and a surprise reveal trailer for Sonic the Hedgehog (who was one of the most highly requested fighters at the time of release), this tradition wouldn't be put into place until the aforementioned Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS. Masahiro Sakurai recently went into detail about how these trailers were made for the series.
According to Sakurai, these movie sequences were created to show the abilities of each individual fighter in a unique way since Super Smash Bros. was a crossover game. These videos were created in a way for all fans to enjoy easily, instead of being tied to progress like in Brawl's Subspace Emissary Adventure mode. As such, the fighter reveals were conceptualized, breaking them down between gameplay and CG segments. The plots of these videos were all written by Sakurai himself, except for Pyra and Mythra's trailers, which were written by Monolith Soft instead.
These scripts would then be handed off to Digital Frontier, a motion picture company that specializes in CG animation and handled the reveals for the series. For the gameplay portion, these were recorded by members of the Smash Bros. development team, with the footage being captured using replay features and debug camera tools. All of these Smash Bros. trailers were supervised by Sakurai himself, adding small details like interactions between fighters or serious and comical elements.
Sakurai noted that all of the Super Smash Bros. character reveal trailers became incredibly popular, especially during the pre-release period where there was plenty of hype between the releases of games and the DLC fighters. He thanked the fans for supporting them, as these reactions were a huge source of encouragement. He concludes by stating that he is lucky to have worked on a series as special as Super Smash Bros.
Super Smash Bros.
Super Smash Bros is a Nintendo-exclusive 3D action fighting and brawling game starring a roster of beloved Nintendo and third-party characters. Taking place across a plethora of arenas, players duke it out in real-time as their favorite characters.
