Dragon Quest‘s Hero Is Coming to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Today

By Harry todd | July 30, 2019 | 2:19pm

Image via Nintendo/YouTube

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Dragon Quest‘s Hero Is Coming to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Today

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Nintendo’s flagship fighting game and de facto history textbook, is getting a new fighter this afternoon (July 30), according to a new video presentation. The new character, simply dubbed Hero, hails from the legendary Dragon Quest franchise, a long-running series of Japanese role-playing games that holds some of the highest worldwide sales numbers, despite not being a household name in North America.

And while you might not know much about the Dragon Quest series, you’ll probably think that the character design looks vaguely familiar; that’s because the character design for the franchise is done by Akira Toriyama, the mind behind the Dragon Ball manga and anime. Fans of that series will definitely see shades of Trunks and Goku in the various playable skins for Hero, which are pulled from four different entries in the 11-strong Dragon Quest saga.

As for how exactly Hero is going to play in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, it seems to be a mix of Shulk’s stat-boosting and Robin’s spell-casting. Touted as having the largest moveset in franchise history, Hero has his own command menu and pool of mana points that’ll make any JRPG fan feel right at home in the brawler.

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Hero also seems totally broken, a veritable slot machine of a character that probably won’t get much tournament play. One of his moves pulls a random effect out of the ether that could be positive or negative, while another has the character self-imploding to deal massive damage. He has a recovery move called “Zoom” that brings him back to the stage from anywhere. Of course, this all is assuming that you can navigate the menus fast enough in the chaos of the battlefield, but it’ll be interesting to see what competitive players make of the character.

With the addition of Hero comes a new stage, Yggdrasil’s Altar, and several new tracks added to the game’s already-massive soundtrack. The stage has treasure chests that hold various items when they aren’t trying to attack you, but otherwise looks like a fairly straightforward battlefield. The Challenger Pack #2 compiles all of the new goodies for $5.99, or you can buy the Fighter Pass, which includes the already released Joker character from Persona 5, the previously announced addition of Banjo Kazooie and other unannounced new fighters for $24.99 on the Nintendo eShop.

Alongside all this Hero news came the announcement of new Mii Fighter costumes and various quality of life updates that’ll be rolling out in the game’s new update. You can catch all of that information in the video below. After picking up the new character, check out our list of tips for Ultimate here, or a breakdown of the best fighters in the competitive community here. Check out more info on the new Dragon Quest game here.