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Is Bayonetta a household name? (Or, which Smash Bros characters do you have to explain the most?)
- Thread starter KartuneDX
- Start date
It was a fairly large NES peripheral used for a couple of games. Nintendo used it to market the NES as a toy instead of a game console to circumvent the North American market's fear of video games after the '83 crash, and some survey data actually supports that R.O.B. was a critical part of the system's launch success.
Most of my friends who game just play Warzone, Fortnite, or 2k on Xbox and haven't cared about Nintendo or Sony since the Gamecube/PS2. I'd have to explain a very significant chunk of that roster to them. Hell, some of those characters are unknown to me. Who the hell is Terry?
I'm not talking about the series itself, I'm talking about the characters.
gosh if only Smash Bros games came with a thorough, text-filled guide that players were incentivized into filling up so that they could learn about all the characters
wait
wait
I'm forever sour about the lack of a trophy collection in Ultimate
Eh? Sephiroth is probably the most iconic video game villain outside of Bowser, Ganon and Eggman.
I think Mr. Game & Watch is the one who would take the longest to explain, not only you have to start with that pre-Famicom story about Gunpei Yokoi watching business men playing on calculators in their train ride commutes, but you need to end up denying the urban myths surrounding Nintendo, the Yakuza, and Virtual Boy's failed run. And that's before telling that Mr. G&W's technically an OC, amalgamation of various characters, but also ended up appearing in the GBA gallery games after Melee...
Sephiroth is probably much more known than Eggman is honestly.
How do you figure? Robotnik's been in everything from video games to cartoons to comics and movies for 30 years.
Sephiroth is in one mainline Final Fantasy, its remake, and its prequel. And a film that absolutely no one who hasn't played Final Fantasy VII has any interest in seeing.
I mean, one was a Happy Meal toy...
i don't think they consider that, a lot are deep cuts so far as regular folks are concerned
that's why they excite fans, right?
that's why they excite fans, right?
I always have to explain the Fire Emblem characters. I'm guessing because there's so many of them.
Bayonetta is not a "household name," but I'd say she's definitely more recognizable than the following, in general:
And if you begin talking about modern audiences (ie; people that didn't grow up with the SNES), I'd wager she's more recognizable than Simon, Richter, the entire Star Fox crew, Meta Knight, Samus, Ridley, and even Duck Hunt.
- Every Fire Emblem character. The Bayo games have been on a lot more platforms and played by a lot more people than Awakening. And in the case of Fates and 3H, the avatars aren't as recognizable as the rest of the cast.
- Pit, Palutena, and Dark Pit (KI:U is fantastic, but only sold a little over a million units)
- Shulk
And if you begin talking about modern audiences (ie; people that didn't grow up with the SNES), I'd wager she's more recognizable than Simon, Richter, the entire Star Fox crew, Meta Knight, Samus, Ridley, and even Duck Hunt.
I'd strike Ness, Chrom, Meta Knight, Dark Pit, Ike, Lucas, King Dedede, Olimar, Wolf, Robin, Shulk, Corrin, Bayonetta, Richter (I think people are more likely to know Simon than Richter), King K. Rool, Hero, Byleth, and Min-Min from that list. I don't think those characters are that well known to people outside the general gaming sphere.
I agree that Bayonetta isn't quite a household name. A lot of characters in Smash might have to be explained to people that don't know them. Imagine trying to explain Joker to people (although there's a chance they might know him given how popular Persona 5 was), but otherwise the explanation is about how the SMT series existed, SMT if...was made, and spinned off into the Persona series.
I would still argue a lot of people know Marth and Roy just from word of mouth from Melee. Even if they don't know them being from FE, they know them from Smash.
I believe the explanation is rather simple. You see, first they made Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3. Then they made Persona 4. And Persona 4 was so successful, they said, "hey, we should make a spin-off!" and made Shin Megami Tensei 4. And then Persona 5 happened, and because that was also successful, it is receiving its own spin-off, Shin Megami Tensei 5. :)
I think the answers here will skew pretty heavily towards North America/Europe, obviously.
While I wouldn't call him a household name like Mario or Sonic, Terry is one of the bigger names in the cast here in south america. Every gas station, dinky bar and shopping mall had at least one KOF machine. He's not that unkown as he is up there. He, Mai, Iori, Kyo and Rugal are iconic.
Same thing with Hero over in Japan.
While I wouldn't call him a household name like Mario or Sonic, Terry is one of the bigger names in the cast here in south america. Every gas station, dinky bar and shopping mall had at least one KOF machine. He's not that unkown as he is up there. He, Mai, Iori, Kyo and Rugal are iconic.
Same thing with Hero over in Japan.
I'm stil baffled that US doesn't give Terry some love. Even big fighting games streamers/youtubers haven't played KOF in the 90's. This is shocking.
But c'mon, why picking on Bayonetta? We have characters from games that weren't released on west (Lucas, from Mother 3), lots of Fire Emblem characters that even me (who plays vidoegames a lot) only know from Smash (because I haven't player all FEs), and SHULK.
No, Shulk is not as known as Bayonetta. So... what's the problem? ;-)
But c'mon, why picking on Bayonetta? We have characters from games that weren't released on west (Lucas, from Mother 3), lots of Fire Emblem characters that even me (who plays vidoegames a lot) only know from Smash (because I haven't player all FEs), and SHULK.
No, Shulk is not as known as Bayonetta. So... what's the problem? ;-)
No, not even close. Somehow the Sonic the Hedgehog movie was the biggest video game movie of all time despite its theater run being canceled halfway through due to COVID. Sonic continues to be very widely well known.
I think the problem with the STH movie is that the version of Eggman in that is so different from other versions, that people who know of the movie wouldn't actually recognize Eggman/Robotnik from the games themselves. Though I also think the movie version is probably more well known than the video game version.
I have no idea how to quantify game sales vs movie ticket/DVD sales, though.
people mostly know mario, sonic, pacman and minecraft guy
some here really overestimate how popular bayonetta is though. game didnt sell that much and outside of her being "weird" to the main public there is not really anything else people can remember about the series. i freaking played it and i cant name more than 2 characters from it
some here really overestimate how popular bayonetta is though. game didnt sell that much and outside of her being "weird" to the main public there is not really anything else people can remember about the series. i freaking played it and i cant name more than 2 characters from it
Funnily enough i think more people would recognize wii fit trainer than most of the other characters
And peeps are still underestimate how popular fighting games were in some areas of the world. I'd easily say Terry is more recognizable in here than Banjo & Kazooie, despite the later making a far larger splash around the net
And peeps are still underestimate how popular fighting games were in some areas of the world. I'd easily say Terry is more recognizable in here than Banjo & Kazooie, despite the later making a far larger splash around the net
I have to explain every character to my kids that's not a Mario character or other big ones like Link and Zelda they've seen a bunch.
Not entirely true. Fire Emblem in the west was outselling Japan for years. Fire Emblem's western sales are basically a straight line from selling "sightly less than Japan" to "completely outselling Japan". The only exception was the DS release which did poorly everywhere, but especially so in the west. Hence why Awakening is regarded as reviving the series.
Terry is 100% a more recognizable character in other (non-small) part of the world, like South America and Asia. Every kid in China played KoF sometimes in their life and Terry is up there with Kyo and Iori, Banjo and Kazooie are non-entities there.
we had a term here, "street fighter de rodoviária", which was mainly about random arcades around bus stations, bars, local stores and the likes. lots of people played them, old people even, and KoF was very popular. i'm fairly sure people would more easily recognize even "obscure" KoF characters like Benimaru and Ralf than stuff like bayonetta
Gotta be Roy.
He looks super super generic, for one.
Fire Emblem on the whole might be popular, but Roy's game only ever released in Japan, on a handheld system, in 2002. That's not recent at all, and unlike Marth, he was only the lead for a single game. Roy has cameo'd a few other times, but that was it.
VS Shulk: Shulk was the main character of a relatively more visible game, which got rereleases multiple times, on multiple systems, across multiple regions. His game was even the center of a pressure campaign asking for release! Not huge, but what splash did Fire Emblem 6 make? Nothing.
VS Bayo: Bayo has been on more recent games, across more systems, with wider geographical distribution, and was a flagship character for a mildly known action studio. Her details stand out too. A half naked butterfly hair witch? Weaponizing demons to fight angels? Sticks in the head.
VS ROB: Old, but he was the face of older video game market comeback ads, as previously mentioned. That's gunna spur a few memories; maybe parents recall having to buy this big, weird looking robot peripheral.
VS Terry: Terry has a much richer history, has been in a billion games, some of which have been on arcades; his face probably adorned some of those public-facing machines.
VS Pit/Palu: Not colossally known, but I recall for the longest time of how "that Kid Icarus game on the NES" was super well regarded - and then, of course, he got a second followup game. This followup game even had it's own fancy console changing peripheral, for one of the most popular handheld systems of all time.
Now, there are definitely ways that the above characters might not be known, and Roy would be. For the average non gamer too, they'd have no idea about any of them. Who the hell's mom knows about Platinum, for instance? What on earth is a "Shulk"? Operation Rainfall? Yet everything about Roy isn't in his favor here. Small game, small release, to a small country; literally a clone on his biggest stage. Even his name is generic. It's Roy. He's only known because of Smash, guaranteed.
He looks super super generic, for one.
Fire Emblem on the whole might be popular, but Roy's game only ever released in Japan, on a handheld system, in 2002. That's not recent at all, and unlike Marth, he was only the lead for a single game. Roy has cameo'd a few other times, but that was it.
VS Shulk: Shulk was the main character of a relatively more visible game, which got rereleases multiple times, on multiple systems, across multiple regions. His game was even the center of a pressure campaign asking for release! Not huge, but what splash did Fire Emblem 6 make? Nothing.
VS Bayo: Bayo has been on more recent games, across more systems, with wider geographical distribution, and was a flagship character for a mildly known action studio. Her details stand out too. A half naked butterfly hair witch? Weaponizing demons to fight angels? Sticks in the head.
VS ROB: Old, but he was the face of older video game market comeback ads, as previously mentioned. That's gunna spur a few memories; maybe parents recall having to buy this big, weird looking robot peripheral.
VS Terry: Terry has a much richer history, has been in a billion games, some of which have been on arcades; his face probably adorned some of those public-facing machines.
VS Pit/Palu: Not colossally known, but I recall for the longest time of how "that Kid Icarus game on the NES" was super well regarded - and then, of course, he got a second followup game. This followup game even had it's own fancy console changing peripheral, for one of the most popular handheld systems of all time.
Now, there are definitely ways that the above characters might not be known, and Roy would be. For the average non gamer too, they'd have no idea about any of them. Who the hell's mom knows about Platinum, for instance? What on earth is a "Shulk"? Operation Rainfall? Yet everything about Roy isn't in his favor here. Small game, small release, to a small country; literally a clone on his biggest stage. Even his name is generic. It's Roy. He's only known because of Smash, guaranteed.
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to my casual friends, only they knew about less than 10 or so characters and i had to explain everyone else to them. that was back in the SSB4 days.
they would still recognize the same ones. a lot of the characters in here hve no reach outside gaming. people like to call out the FE characters, Shulk or other anime characters but the fact is that if you're not Mario, a Pokemon or maybe Link, you're just as underground as any FE character to the casuals (yeah, Kirby, Star Fox, Metroid and everything else is FE tier of recognition beyond enthuiasts). some slight exceptions are Sonic, Pac-man and Megaman when it comes to older series and even then some people don't know them that widely compared to Mario and co.
they would still recognize the same ones. a lot of the characters in here hve no reach outside gaming. people like to call out the FE characters, Shulk or other anime characters but the fact is that if you're not Mario, a Pokemon or maybe Link, you're just as underground as any FE character to the casuals (yeah, Kirby, Star Fox, Metroid and everything else is FE tier of recognition beyond enthuiasts). some slight exceptions are Sonic, Pac-man and Megaman when it comes to older series and even then some people don't know them that widely compared to Mario and co.
Oh, so that's why I see it described as a Trojan Horse. I wasn't sure if it was a game character, Nintendo's mascot before Mario, or the first Astro's Playroom but TIL. That's pretty cool.
After the mainline Nintendo characters and Sonic, forget it. You'll be explaining the rest of them to most people.
I wouldn't call Bayonetta niche, but she isn't super popular either. I would say she's more of a core-gamer classic. Pretty much every hardcore fan knows or even played a Bayonetta game once, but people lighter on the whole gaming hobby likely don't know her, as opposed to something like Mario or etc which literally every single person knows
People here think Kat from Gravity Rush and Dartz from Legend of Dragoon are household names.
I would go as far as to say that even Zelda isnt a household name, let alone link.
Sonic, Mario, Pacman and Donkey Kong are household names. Pretty much every clothes store that exists sells merch of them continuously for decades and they're referenced in mainstream movies from time to time.
People far removed from games will also probably recognise Pikachus design but depending on their age maybe not his name.
Those of you who think Serpharoph is a household name, even in Japan, are dreaming.
Sonic, Mario, Pacman and Donkey Kong are household names. Pretty much every clothes store that exists sells merch of them continuously for decades and they're referenced in mainstream movies from time to time.
People far removed from games will also probably recognise Pikachus design but depending on their age maybe not his name.
Those of you who think Serpharoph is a household name, even in Japan, are dreaming.
Pikachu is certainly a household name, and I'd argue Jigglypuff is as well, and maybe Squirtle, Charizard and Mewtwo. Any other playable Pokémon in Smash isn't.