Super Smash Bros. Ultimate director Masahiro Sakurai hosted a broadcast this week revealing the final character joining the crossover fighting game's line-up. Nintendo even made a point to announce this separate, dedicated event during its September 2021 Direct. It's a miracle that the reveal of Kingdom Hearts' Sora coming to Super Smash Bros. pleased as many fans as it did.
While speculation on who the final Super Smash Bros. Ultimate fighter could be set the Internet ablaze in anticipation for the event, Sora was a character many fans believed could never join the game's roster, which includes from both Nintendo and third-party IP including Square Enix's Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, as well as Microsoft's Banjo-Kazooie and Minecraft. With Smash Ultimate appearing as a sort of "game of dreams," and Nintendo's strong relationship with Square Enix, it's now strange to consider that Sora was looked at as an "impossible" character.
The Disney Dillemma
Most of the skepticism surrounding Sora's inclusion in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate came down to one major factor: Disney. While it's fair to assume the Kingdom Hearts series is property of Square Enix first and foremost due to its developer and abundance of Tetsuya Nomura-designed original characters, the franchise is a collaboration with the Walt Disney Company. While many have argued Square Enix is trying to move the series away from Disney due to a couple of story decisions near the end of Kingdom Hearts 3, the reality is that many fans only discovered it because of its use of characters such as Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and Goofy.
Even Cloud's inclusion in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and Nintendo 3DS suggested Square Enix itself had some initial reservations with including its characters in Nintendo's fighting game series. While that has changed in Ultimate, it means that not only did Nintendo have to approach Square Enix regarding the inclusion of Sora in Super Smash Bros., it also had to approach The Walt Disney Company.
The Difficulties With Adding Sora
Fans of the fourth Smash Bros. title will remember that when Cloud was added as DLC in 2015, he was the only character to not receive an English voice language option, and his stage based on Final Fantasy 7's Midgar only included two pieces of music - both lifted directly from the 1997 PlayStation game. This treatment of the character carried into Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and wasn't rectified until December 2020, when Final Fantasy 7's villain Sephiroth was added to Smash with a new stage and a host of music. Sephiroth also never received an English voice option.
Given it was even difficult to work with Square Enix until recently, it's understandable why Nintendo had difficulty negotiating with Disney, a company notoriously protective of its IP. In early 2020, Kinda Funny Gamescast co-host Imran Khan said Nintendo had approached Disney Japan with the hopes of negotiating Sora's inclusion in Smash, and that Disney would not allow Nintendo to use the character.
However, this crossover makes sense considering Disney's increased efforts into making a name for itself in the video games industry thanks to licensing its IP such as Marvel and Star Wars. It's hardly a coincidence that this rise to relevance comes after Kingdom Hearts 3 became one of the highest-selling games of 2019, evolving the series' Disney representation to franchises created by subsidiaries such as Pixar and Marvel, including Toy Story, Monsters Inc., and Big Hero 6. It's not known exactly how Nintendo did it, but after years of waiting, the company was finally able to convince Disney and Square Enix to bring Sora to Super Smash Bros. Utimate. When the character releases next week, fans should undoubtedly be happy to see him.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is available now on Nintendo Switch.
