Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's Upcoming DLC Characters May Be Delayed Due to Coronavirus

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's upcoming DLC characters may be delayed due to the coronavirus. According to a leaked excerpt from Masahiro Sakurai's latest Famitsu column, the ongoing outbreak of COVID-19 has had an impact on the development of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and the Nintendo Switch's upcoming DLC characters. Word of the excerpt comes way of industry journalist and translator PushDustIn, who relays word that Sakurai had plans to present information about DLC to publishers, but this has been put on hold because of the pandemic.

Meanwhile, the excerpt apparently reveals that if someone at the office is found to have the virus, then the whole building will shut down, and development will be put on hold, which would delay the release of future DLC characters and content even further. That said, if all of this comes to fruition, there's a possibility Nintendo will still reveal the next DLC fighter or fighters as planned, but no development work will be done.

At the moment of publishing, it's currently unclear if the column is talking about just one upcoming fighter or the entire slate of DLC characters, because Japanese does not have plurals like English. So, in other words, without more context, it's not clear if Sakurai is talking about one fighter or multiple fighters. On top of this, because we currently don't have the entire column, all of this should be taken with a grain of salt, because who knows what's being lost in translation without the proper context. That said, the column is scheduled to drop tomorrow, so we will have more official information very soon.

Sakurai had plans to present information about new fighter(s) to a publisher(s), but that's been put on hold now.

If someone at the office is found to have COVID-19, then the whole building would be shut down and development would be put on hold.

(cont)

— PushDustIn (@PushDustIn) March 17, 2020

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is available on the Nintendo Switch and the Nintendo Switch only. For more news, media, rumors, and leaks on the best-selling and critically-acclaimed 2018 game, be sure to take a second and peruse all of our past and recent coverage of the title by clicking right here.

H/T, Ryokutya.