Super Smash Bros. series creator Masahiro Sakurai has confirmed that the next entry in the series is currently not being planned. The final update for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate was recently released, bringing one last round of balance updates for the roster, and closing the books on the game.

Sakurai has been working non-stop on the Super Smash Bros. series for years now. Super Smash Bros. 3DS/Wii U had its development extended, due to the introduction of DLC to the series. The development of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate started as soon as work on Super Smash Bros. 3DS/Wii U ended, and it expanded on the foundation laid out by the previous two games, in order to hasten its production. The game launched at the end of 2018 to mass critical and commercial success, becoming the third best-selling Nintendo Switch game. Eventually, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate became the best-selling fighting game of all time.

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The future of the Super Smash Bros. series is now in question, as Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is such a massive game and includes so many third-party characters that any future entries would have a hard time topping it. Sakurai recently spoke to IGN about the future of the Super Smash Bros. series. He was asked whether he would be returning to the series in the future, but it seems there are currently no plans for any more games in the series.

“When you say ‘returning to the series’, it makes it sound like there is going to be another Super Smash Bros. title, but currently, there are no such plans. It would be best not to assume that there will always be another one.”

It’s not surprising that Nintendo isn’t thinking about the next entry just yet. The short development time between Super Smash Bros. 3DS/Wii U and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate was due to a few factors. Nintendo was coming off the failure of the Wii U and needed big hits for the Switch within its first few years, and a new Super Smash Bros. game would be a huge draw for the system, so it was a priority for the company. The fact that Super Smash Bros. Ultimate was built on the groundwork established by Super Smash Bros. 3DS/Wii U also cut development time considerably.

Sakurai has spent a great deal of his time working on the Super Smash Bros. series. Sakurai has discussed potential plans for the future, which could even mean stepping away from game development for good. If Nintendo wants to make a new Super Smash Bros. game for the Switch’s successor, then he might be interested in returning, but there are currently no plans to continue the series.

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Source: IGN

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Scott Baird
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Scott has been writing for Screen Rant since 2016 and regularly contributes to The Gamer. He has previously written articles and video scripts for websites like Cracked, Dorkly, Topless Robot, and TopTenz.
A graduate of Edge Hill University in the UK, Scott started out as a film student before moving into journalism. It turned out that wasting a childhood playing video games, reading comic books, and watching movies could be used for finding employment, regardless of what any career advisor might tell you. Scott specializes in gaming and has loved the medium since the early ‘90s when his first console was a ZX Spectrum that used to take 40 minutes to load a game from a tape cassette player to a black and white TV set. Scott now writes game reviews for Screen Rant and The Gamer, as well as news reports, opinion pieces, and game guides. He can be contacted on LinkedIn.

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