There was a time when Travis Touchdown was considered a good shout for a spot on the Super Smash Bros. Ultimate roster, and while he technically did make his way into the game as a Mii Fighter costume, the real collab actually ended up appearing in No More Heroes 3.
As those who have played the game already will know, No More Heroes 3 features a number of special matches which change up the game's usual formula, often taking on characteristics of other game genres or specific well-known titles. In danger of spoiling the game for anyone who hasn't finished it yet (head back to safety now if you'd like), the final boss battle is very reminiscent of Super Smash Bros., and it turns out that Nintendo was completely on board.
In an interview with Siliconera, creator Suda51 explains that both Nintendo and Smash series director Masahiro Sakurai actually gave him their blessing to develop the final scene as he liked:
"As for the Smash Bros. thing, that’s kind of a different story. Actually, I wrote that up kind of screwing around. It mainly started as a joke. I was gonna say 'OK, we’re gonna have FU and Travis take each other on in a sumo style fight, and hey! Let’s make it Smash Bros. style.' I wrote it up a total rip-off of the Smash Bros. style and we started developing it. When I saw it coming to shape, I thought this might be a problem because it was really Smash Bros.-y. It was really, really close to the actual game. I decided to change it, or completely get rid of it altogether.
But before I did that, I actually went and spoke to the people at Nintendo to see what they thought. I was kind of surprised that they told me 'No, do it! Go for it! We think it’s really cool and that it’s better like this. If anybody gives you s*** for it, we’ll take responsibility for it. We’re not gonna get mad. It’s fine.' Sakurai himself even said 'Yeah, this is cool. You have my blessing. Go for it.'
I was like… Really? Are you sure this is OK? And they were like 'No, definitely. Totally. Do it. Go for it.' So instead of changing it to a different style to not rip off Smash Bros. Nintendo basically told me to rip them off as much as I could. And that’s how that boss fight kind of came to be. It started out as kind of a stupid joke, and the people who mattered happened to like it not only supported it, but requested to keep it in."
You can see the fight itself in the video below from the 20-minute mark, but be warned that the clip features lots of bad language:
You can read Siliconera's full interview with Suda51 here.
[source siliconera.com]
Comments 27
I had no idea this was in the game. I didn't have the time to play it yet
i was absolutely overjoyed when i saw this scene and had to take like five minutes to process what was going on, it's no travis in smash but it was certainly a great ending scene
Nintendo having more respect for other big game devs than their own fans...
Unsurprising.
This part floored me, but played a bit jank. Cool it got their blessing though!
Now that's cool of them. Now I'm itching to play it more now.
@Noid To be fair, Suda did ask for permission.
Anything else, this is just a 'Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl' or 'Brawlhalla' situation. As long as it's not their IP then they won't really do anything.
Removed - inappropriate
That's pure awesomeness.
That’s absolutely hilarious. Originality spawned from being as unoriginal as possible. That’s extremely meta
This is amazing!!!!! Woww i love this.
its a dam shame he and doomslayer got robbed from joining smash roster instead a slap in the face to everyone they ended up as mii outfits.
@Kreko Yeah, I thought the same thing. Granted, this sort of this is par for the course for No More Heroes, but I wouldn't have specifically guess a Smash style fight. They definitely should not have put it in a headline.
@RiasGremory They couldn't add everyone so at least they added them as Mii costumes. I personally see it better than not having anything at all so I don't see how it is a slap in the face.
Might want to change the spoilery title...
Eventually I'll get around to playing NMH III, but right now, so many games are on my plate.
It was an amazing end-game battle - I only wish there was more of the smash-style gameplay in the game
You guys really may want to do something against spoilerinos like this. Be a bit more discrete.
Yeah it was definitely at least better then the NMH2 final boss fight
Well I'm glad I beat the game last week because this was one of the pop off moments. Considering the 'main' FU fight was totally terrible (one of the only bad boss fights in the game) but the ending was near Wonderful 101 ending of crazy.
Definitely recommend the game there are a lot of surprises besides this.
@Onett it's in the article title though.
Wow, that's pretty awesome.
And I'm laughing at people losing their minds because the general idea of what the final boss battle is gets "spoiled". People have gotten so sensitive, it's going to get to the point where if you say "The aesthetics of the fiery lava stage are really great," people will lose their minds and scream "Wah, now that stage has been spoiled for me!"
@roy130390 thats ***** instead of having so many fire emblem characters they could of giving us travis,doom slayer,and even ryu from ninja gaiden for plus steve from minecraft made no sense either just another wasted spot.
@RiasGremory Steve from Minecraft is a gaming icon as it's the mascot/main character of one of the biggest games ever. I don't even like Minecraft, but how is one of the most popular game characters participating in a game that invites the most popular characters nonsensical?
Also yes, many icons are missing, but it's not like Nintendo doesn't like getting money. There's simply stuff to consider like the negotiations to get them as well as the work and resources behind development. It's also really difficult to please everyone dude, for example, I prefer other characters over pretty much every character that you mentioned.
As for the Fire Emblem characters I think that even without them we wouldn't have gotten more characters from different franchises. They were added to promote the games and are more like an "extra". People think that they took places from others but many aren't considering that perhaps these are all the licenses, resources and time that they could (or even wanted) to invest in this entry and that said characters probably took way less trouble to add just to expand the roster.
@roy130390 right? Plus. Who's to say Ultimate was the last Smash game? There's also the next one.
@Zyph
And people will of course ignore the asked for permission bit. And if they said No it'd be No and not whining on the internet.
And like you said, they just took a similar mechanic not Nintendo's characters. Plenty of games on the eShop are very obvious if not blatant with their inspiration and Nintendo is completely fine with promoting those and even putting them in Indie Directs. "Fans" could just as well make their own IP based on the franchise they supposedly love without any issue.
I also wouldn't necessarily call Grasshopper a big dev.
Family friendly Nintendo, eh…
Aight, which employee threw out the s-bomb?
Haha, that is excellent actually. I'm still on the fence with this one, might pick it up one day. Looks fun!
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