Ryu and Roy to Join Smash's Roster?

Look, I’ll be blunt: I was GOING to write about EA closing down several free-to-play games or the closing of 2K Australia, which are both worthy pieces of news. But, little secret about me: I prefer to write about good news than bad news, and when I saw this I flipped my lid, freaked out for a few seconds, then realized it actually wasn’t as big a deal as it first seemed but is still a big deal.

A while back, Nintendo did a poll asking people what characters—Nintendo or otherwise—they’d like to see added to the Super Smash Brothers roster via DLC. Submissions streamed in, and while I’m certain we may never find out who actually got voted for the most (I doubt Nintendo would ever go public with that news, lest people accuse them of ignoring the results) that doesn’t mean Nintendo didn’t have plans for that list… and perhaps, one of the suggested characters is going to be joining the ranks of Mario and Yoshi… none other than Street Fighter’s Ryu!

Now, accept this with a grain—scratch that—a boulder of salt. Nintendo nor Capcom has said anything about this officially, and our information, reliable as it is, stems from code-diggers over Reddit… but still, the implications are exciting!

While digging through the sound files in the latest Smash Brothers update (one that included some much-needed nerfs to Diddy Kong), Reddit User Shinyquagsire discovered several sound files: one is Roy’s victory theme, marking Roy as a very likely contender for a fighter in the game, but the second one is unmistakably the Street Fighter theme, abridged like one of the victory themes. Interesting, but in no way implicates that Ryu specifically will join the roster.

But then this stage music, an extended version of Ryu’s theme, seems to cinch it: either this is an elaborate ploy, where someone made SSB-sounding music to trick the world into thinking we might see Street Fighter in the next SSB patch, OR… Ryu really is going to join the fray.

That’s really cool, but at the same time, perfectly logical. Remember, Capcom already partnered with Nintendo to bring Mega Man into the mix, Ryu is a logical addition to the third-party roster, thinking about it. That helps add credibility to Shinyquagsire’s claims a lot more than if he had found, say, Uncharted music in the files for Smash.

Still, time will tell if this is all actually happening, or if it's just a clever hoax. Here’s hoping for the latter.