> Read 'Pikachu's Greatest Rival!'

> Meowth?

> Nope, Digimon

> iamdissapoint.jpg



In all seriousness I think it's a pretty awful, not to mention unlikely idea to include a Digimon of any kind, even if they did function as a sort of 'rival' in advertising terms as Sonic did to Mario in Brawl. First of all to consider is the fact that Digimon has really done little to contribute to Nintendo's brand over the years, whereas characters such as Sonic and Megaman have made a huge impact. "But what about Snake? He hasn't contributed to Nintendo much either!" - no, no he hasn't, but he was the exception to the rule on account of Sakurai's/Kojima's friendship, so unless the creator of Digimon is BFF's with Sakurai too, I think we can rule that entry route out. Agumon will have a tough time fitting into Sakurai's "exceptional circumstances" criteria, especially given that as the original poster has pointed out, it's a Namco-Bandai franchise. How often do you see Agumon come up in Namco threads?



So even if you assume for the sake of hypothesis that Namco-Bandai will see a character in Smash, there's the ever-crucial factors of popularity and importance. I'm not gonna break down every Namco-Bandai characters' chances but I think it's safe to say that Pac-Man takes priority in terms of importance to the industry and to Nintendo (lots of Nintendo higher-ups love Pac-Man as well; Miyamoto for example), and if we factor in popularity among fans, Agumon will also have stiff competition with Lloyd Irving, Klonoa, and the cast of Tekken.



And I think it goes without saying that inclusion of Digimon will devalue the Pokemon characters in Smash. This seems like a silly point to those of us who are in the know ("hardcore gamers" if we want to use that awful term), but what about somebody who hasn't played either series? It'd be ever-too-easy to confuse the incredibly similar concepts. What about somebody who played the original Pokemon games and hasn't kept up with the series for fear of the fact that "all the new Pokemon look like effin' Digimon?". Or for that matter, the laaaaaarge portion of the population who have, and always will see Digimon as a second-rate Pokemon rip-off? It seems very petty to appeal to the lowest common denominator, but these people exist, and in startlingly large numbers.



Oh, and there's the fact that Digimon is well past its prime. Some might argue the same of Sonic and Megaman though, so I guess that's more of a personal gripe than a legitimate complaint.