Sakurai on expanding the Smash roster with each release – “I throw my body and soul into every project with the mindset that this is the last one”

Game Informer published the “Smash Bros. Diaries” from director Masahiro Sakurai in its previous two issues. Most of what has been shared thus far is rehash from Sakurai’s Famitsu columns, but this month’s entry does have some very noteworthy quotes.

One of the questions Sakurai addresses: “You’ve talked about how you select characters, but why does the roster continue to expand with each release?”

Sakurai starts out by stating how when he works on Smash Bros. – or any other project for that matter – he puts in his full effort. “I throw my body and soul into every project with the mindset that this is the last one,” he says. This has led to a huge amount of characters and features “where it’s almost an impossible quantity to work with.”

Characters are remade in each Smash Bros. release since there are different development studios working on the games. There is also a higher development cost per character “since it takes work to give characters a wide dynamic range while still sticking to their backstories”.

All in all, Sakurai calls the entire process “relentless.”

If you’re interested in checking out Sakurai’s full comments, head past the break.

For every Smash project, as I’m working on it, I always think to myself, “This is it – the last Smash Bros.!” Of course, after the original game and Super Smash Bros. Melee, the Wii and Nintendo 3DS entries came out anyway, which makes it a bit difficult to deny the possibility of future games. The point I’m trying to make here is that I throw my body and soul into every project with the mindset that this is the last one. As a result, there have been a lot of new characters and features added. It’s to the point where it’s almost an impossible quantity to work with – this lineup of polished characters, each with such a litany of things to implement.

The characters get remade every game since we keep switching development studios. And since it takes work to give characters a wide dynamic range while still sticking to their backstories, this leads to more development cost per character. I think, for most games, just having a few new characters would be all one could expect.

In a word, it’s relentless. Right now, I have no way to picture whether things will go as well next time.

Thanks to Jake for the tip.