New Smash Ultimate clues hint at Dante being Fighters Pass Volume 2 DLC
CapcomEvidence is stacking up in favor of Devil May Cry’s Dante coming to Super Smash Bros Ultimate as a future DLC fighter.
Capcom’s gun and sword-wielding bad boy has been a popular candidate to make it to Smash for a while, but lately, there have been some clues that may point to his arrival in Nintendo’s flagship fighter.
The most recent theory comes from when PlatinumGames co-founder and former Devil May Cry Director Hideki Kamiya was asked about which characters he wanted to see in Smash Ultimate during a GameXplain interview.
Kamiya stated he would like to see Leonhardt ‘Leo’ Victorion from Anarchy Reigns, Wonder Red from Wonderful 101, Viewtiful Joe and Okami’s Amaterasu in the game but neglected to mention Dante.
(Segment starts at 9:05 for mobile viewers)
This exclusion is key, because back in December 2018, Kamiya posted a poll on his Twitter asking fans which character they would like to see in Smash. The options available were Dante, Viewtiful Joe, Amaterasu and Wonder Red.
While the poll has since been deleted, Dante reportedly lead the pack with a whopping 40% of the vote. This is significant because according to writer Liam Robertson, Kamiya has used Twitter polls to survey for future projects.
Could Kamiya have purposely left Dante out when questioned by GameXplain because the Son Of Sparda is already a lock for Fighters Pass Volume 2?
A while back, he put up a poll asking which Capcom game they'd like to see him work on. In my research, I found that he was actually in talks with Capcom at the time to make that happen. It was his way of tallying interest: https://t.co/wIPy0oR8jB
— Liam (@liamrobertson.bsky) (@Doctor_Cupcakes) December 18, 2018
M-Theory and DmC
Additionally, another new theory that possibly points towards Dante is “M-Theory.” Basically, according to M-Theory, Nintendo purposely prevents showing logos from M-rated games in promotional content, including Sakurai Presents videos, to keep the ESRB compilation rating at Everyone to Teen.
Notably, for Mii Fighters, the North American versions of the trailers remove references to Assassin’s Creed and Fallout, replacing the names with Altair and Vault Boy. Meanwhile, the European trailers keep the Assassin’s Creed and Fallout logos. Plus, on the Fighters Pass Volume 2 screen, the ARMS logo isn’t shown in the North American version while it is in all the others.
It’s possible that an upcoming fighter is from an M-rated game (such as Devil May Cry) and Nintendo doesn’t want to show the DMC logo on the Fighters Pass Volume 2 page because it would result in an E-M rating.
ESRBA slip of the tongue?
Moving on, V’s voice actor in Devil May Cry 5 seemed to inadvertently reveal that Dante would be coming to Smash when discussing the game.
“To be part of Marvel vs Capcom or Super Smash Bros would be huge, which is what Dante is going to be,” Brian Hanford blurted after gushing over the fighting game franchise in an interview.
It’s possible that Hanford had loose lips when discussing Smash and revealed more than he was technically allowed to.
CapcomDmC’s Director weighs in
Finally, in 2019, Devil May Cry Director Hideaki Itsuno hinted that in order to be in Smash, a franchise needs some history with Nintendo.
“Well, you think about it… I’m pretty sure that they… all the characters in Smash at least have some game on a Nintendo platform, right?” he said in an interview with VG 24/7. “Well, that’s the thing. Devil May Cry has never been on a Nintendo platform. So it seems like the first thing to do would be to get Capcom to put Devil May Cry on a Nintendo platform in some way, shape or form – whatever game that might be.”
Since them, Devil May Cry has come out on the Switch, seemingly meeting all the criteria Itsuno laid out for the fighter to be eligible.
While there’s still no guarantee he’ll be coming, with all this circumstantial evidence it’s looking more and more likely that Dante ends up arriving in Smash Ultimate’s Fighters Pass Volume 2.