I'm guessing after Cloud got in, the Final Fantasy VII fanbase rallied around Sephiroth and he got an insane amount of request as a result.  Considering how devoted that games fanbase is, can't blame Nintendo and Sakurai for wanting that easy money.

Holy crap! I was actually going to make a joke this morning about it being Sephiroth when I saw there was an announcement happening. For some reason, my brain instantly pulled up that name when trying to think of any big name characters still not in Smash and I thought about how there were other Nintendo villains that had been added for Ultimate so now it was time for the 3rd party characters to start getting their villains added.

That thinking led me in a direction of wondering about future Smash titles. Since it seems unlikely Nintendo would partner with all these third parties again and Sakurai has pretty much stated it probably can't happen again then perhaps Nintendo would partner with a couple thirds and include a lot more of their characters so that you'd see a bunch of series with the protagonists, antagonists and some side characters to make future editions stand out a bit and give their rosters something to help them standout from other editions in the series.

If only I had taken the time to post that guess. Then I'd have been able to claim I'm a Nintendo Insider and get people paying me for more future leaks and hot news tips. Instead I dismissed it that Nintendo might do that idea in the future so why have another FF7 character now with Sakurai's goal seemingly to make Ultimate crossover with as many series as possible so it wouldn't happen now. And Square was already kind of stingy with the amount of FF music that they allowed with Cloud so why have another FF7 character instead of a different entry like Chrono Trigger or the Mana series. A real lesson for me today. Always be postin'!

*sigh*

Well, maybe we'll get a decent selection of Final Fantasy songs in Smash now as a result of the most overrated villain in the history of gaming (ESPECIALLY in this year's remake) getting into Smash.

4/4 so far on disappointing new character announcements in this 2nd Fighter's Pass. I mean, we could have at least gotten a character from a DIFFERENT Final Fantasy game than the one we already had.

Someone didn’t watch the trailer, a massive love letter to Advent Children which is weird because Sephiroth is barely in it. Sorry, spoilers for a 15 year old movie. I digress. Every DLC character gets a new stage. 1:30 in the trailer shows the new stage for the first time. Looks like the Northern Cave with Lifestream making an appearance. Sorry, spoilers for a 23 year old game.

Let’s not kid ourselves here. You would’ve been disappointed regardless because you’re always disappointed. Have you considered not buying the DLC?

Yes, that's why I came back and removed that text. I rewatched the trailer and saw that.

Incidentally, as little as Sephy's in that PoS Advent Children, at least it was longer than he was actually in the original game.  ;)

Sure, I'll likely always be a little disappointed to some extent since the characters I'd like to see in Smash are a little more obscure (which, IMO, is what this DLC should be for, since you're catering to the hardcore, but I digress). Still, compared to the 1st Fighter's Pass, the 2nd's felt pretty lacking so far. Hopefully the last 3 characters pick up the slack. I could have sworn we were on character 4, but we're only at 3.

As for "not buying the DLC", it's Smash. Nintendo's not putting out SP content for it and we won't be getting a new Smash for at least another generation, so you either get the new characters & stages, or you don't play the game.

The DLC is for straight up squeezing more money from marks like me. Besides Byleth in Fighter Pass Vol. 1 and Min Min in Fighter Pass Vol. 2, all of the choices have been strategically picked to make money by either being a hardcore choice (i.e. Joker, Hero) or too popular to not recognize (i.e. Steve). Byleth and Min Min were obvious marketing choices. Fine, I get it. Min Min needed the exposure more. Fire Emblem is popular enough on its own, but Nintendo picked Byleth, and Sakurai loves him some anime swordsmen.

Banjo-Kazooie was the only DLC character I was legitimately excited about. I’ll gladly take the others because I just like having every fighter. Jill Valentine is the only other character I will go Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs for, and that’s just not going to happen for me.

I mean, there are 74 characters in the base game. I don’t know how 12 more really moves the needle from not playing the game to playing the game. Hey, to each his own.

This was so fun to see; had a grin from the first second to the last. I never got around to buying the 2nd fighter pass because I had already spent money on games I have yet to play. Maybe I'll get around to it now.

As for gripes, yeah, it coulda/shoulda been Terra/Tina. Or maybe Elma from Xenoblade X. Or some really weird character from an SNES JRPG that barely got released. Or, if I'm being my most selfish with my dreams, it could be an anime swordswoman from a gacha game I play too much of.

Fair point that there was an opportunity to truly surprised rather than pump up the hype with popular characters and/or advertisements. But... I can't deny that The Black Mages One Winged Angel! So good!