Smash Bros. Ultimate - Sakurai talks Joker's progress and reveal, thanks fans, and investigating online issues

Another week, another feature from Masahiro Sakurai in Famitsu. Check out the blurbs below to see what Sakurai had to talk about this week. Translation courtesy of NintendoEverything...

On Joker's progress

Early on in release day, we revealed that Persona 5’s protagonist, Joker, is going to join Ultimate’s roster as another fighter. Joker is the first of Ultimate’s DLC characters, so the character isn’t at a stage in development where he’s playable yet. That being said, development has been progressing soundly. As readers familiar with my columns may already know, I personally have a lot of respect for P5. I really think that working on this character has been an endless source of motivation for me.

On Joker's reveal

Nintendo had first approached me with a request: “We want you to reveal that Joker’s in development at The Game Awards 2018.” The timing wasn’t bad at all, it really was what made the flower that was Ultimate’s release bloom. Of course, I hadn’t even started on development at that point, so there wasn’t any gameplay we could show off.

On Ultimate's popularity and thanking fans

Now that Smash Bros. is on sale, it has been incredibly popular; I’ve gotten so many thank you’s and appreciative comments from all over the world! I’m the one that should be thanking you!! Seeing everybody play the game… I’m lucky to have worked on it, now that it’s over.

On online play issues

On the other hand, now that Ultimate is out, is the online matchmaking system not working out well? I’ve got my own suspicions, so I’m going to look into it some. I’d like to make adjustments wherever possible to fix it wherever it needs fixing. Though, by the time this column is published, it’ll probably be old news already – I’ll keep doing my best one thing at a time.