Super Smash Bros. Ultimate had a 40-minute Nintendo Direct exclusive for the fighting game, the last one until the games is fully released. In this Direct, game director Masahiro Sakurai detailed the last few game features, and its full character roster.
On launch, there will be 74 characters, which includes all the past playable characters from all Smash Bros. games. The last two to be announced is Ken (Street Fighter, Echo Fighter for Ryu) and Incineroar (Pokemon) who has sick wrestling moves.
In addition, early adopters will receive one bonus character, Piranha Plant (Super Mario). Five more characters, all of them brand-new, will be added as DLC and can be bought together as as season pass.
The new mode and feature being added is Spirit Mode. There are tons of non-playable characters that still appear in the Smash games previously in the form of trophies. Now they can be earned, equipped, enhanced, destroyed and sent to do expeditions similar to what you see in gacha games.
Each spirit has a rarity based on stars, has an one of three elements that forms a rock-paper-scissors weapon triangle and is essentially a picture with numbers attached.
Primary spirits improve your fighter’s stats & will have their own power levels: Novice, Advanced, Ace, & Legend. Support spirits will lend additional skills to your primary spirit. Find the perfect combination of spirits and take your fighter to new heights! pic.twitter.com/uht4v1EvL2
— Nintendo Versus (@NintendoVS) November 1, 2018
It is not necessarily a gacha system, however. Spirits can be obtained by winning Spirit battles. These battles have a theme and will use existing characters to emulate the Spirit. The Able Sisters from Animal Crossing is presented as three Sonics with drills, for example.
You can have a character equipped with the spirits to enhance your characters ability. Characters with spirits can also be taken online to fight as well.
There is also a single-player mode revealed at the end of the trailer, World Of Light. It started with a rather epic intro and from there snippets of gameplay is shown, utilising these spirits.
See what happens at the beginning of Super #SmashBros Ultimate that caused characters to transform into spirits! pic.twitter.com/pyA3U35RFS
— Nintendo UK VS (@NintendoUKVS) November 1, 2018
You can watch the entire 40-minute Direct here.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate will be out on December 7th exclusively on the Nintendo Switch.