CONTROVERSIAL OPINION: Characters to Remove and Replace in The Next Smash Bros.

[Wman1996]

PAOerfulone said:

Not including Echos, the final roster size for Smash Ultimate including DLC is 82.

I'd say you could cut that size in half and have a roster of 41, maybe 45-50. So somewhere between Brawl and 4's roster size, and still have a kick as Smash Bros. game with a lot of content and is much better balanced. All the effort and resources that would have gone into another character can now go into making another fighting mode, or more music tracks, or a single-player campaign that takes the best of Melee's Adventure Mode and Brawl's Subspace Emissary to give us something really awesome.

But regarding the characters and the roster specifically. Start with the original 12 and then go from there.

Edit: Looking at the roster and writing them down on an Excel list + doing some brainstorming... I think they could realistically cut Ultimate's roster down to at least 41 and then have 9 newcomers that haven't been in a Smash game before to take them up to 50 along with the new and different modes so that the game feels different and unique enough to stand on its own. And that's without counting the DLC they would inevitably do to add more fighters and keep interest going.

A lot of the 41 vets would have to be re-tooled a lot to justifying cutting half the roster. It takes a lot of work regardless but bringing back 41 veterans mostly unchanged and only 9 newcomers sounds very risky.