New Super Smash Bros. Will Feature Customization, No Story Mode

In his column in Famitsu magazine, translated by Kotaku, Super Smash Bros. creator Masahiro Sakurai revealed the next game in the series won’t have a story mode to speak of and will feature new customization options.

The last titles in the fighting game series, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, featured a story mode called Subspace Emissary that incorporated all of the game’s characters, complete with story cutscenes between battles. The new Super Smash Bros. won’t have such a mode, however, because of the Internet.

It disappointed Sakurai that gamers put the cutscenes of the Subspace Emissary story on YouTube and other sites so others can view them without playing through the game. To Sakurai that made the cutscenes less special and less of a reward, so the next game in the series simply won’t have them.

Instead of the story cutscenes, Sakurai and his team want to create videos that benefit from sharing such as the introduction videos for new characters like Mega Man, Animal Crossing Villager and Wii Fit Trainer. He wants to create similar videos for all upcoming new characters, which could mean a number of exciting new videos in the future.

Despite the lack of a story mode, Sakurai said Super Smash Bros. for 3DS will have a feature that will “act as a separate mode from the standard versus play.” Presumably the mode will play to the portable nature of the system. There is no mention of a similar feature on the Wii U version.

The series creator also reiterated that both versions of the game will have stages unique to their system. The 3DS game will have arenas based on portable games, while the Wii U version will have stages based on home console games. For example, the 3DS version will have a Zelda stage inspired by Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks, while the Wii U version may have a Skyward Sword-themed arena instead.

Finally, Sakurai said players will be able to customize characters in their games, and that customization will affect character performance. How that works, however, is unclear. In Smash Bros. Brawl players could use stickers for boosted performance in the story mode, but not in versus mode. This customization could be similarly tied to single-player modes only.

Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and 3DS will come to their respective consoles sometime in 2014, which is entirely too long a wait.