Brawl received character cuts, no sequel until a new approach is thought of
“It’s taken over three years to make Brawl but I actually stopped trying to include new ideas early on in development. What happened in the next year and a half was that we distilled the game down, worked out which ideas we had time to include and which we didn’t. Sadly, we had to trim out many great concepts just to keep within the time contraints. I had a lot more characters, for example.. but sadly I can’t discuss which ones didn’t make it. There are 39 characters in the game this time around and just adding a few more wouldn’t be enough to justify a new game in my opinion; I’d have to draw a line in the sand and have a new approach to make it worthwhile. As long as the fans enjoy it, though, that’s what matters and in the distant future, I guess that might be something I have to consider.” – Masahiro Sakurai, creator of Super Smash Bros.
I have to wonder…Were one of those “cut” characters Geno? Or how about Ridley? Either way, I do believe Brawl’s character roster is respectable, although in the future, some more fan favorites would be great.