Super Smash Bros. Ultimate may be the main game for the Smash community nowadays, but it’s not the only one. Even though it is over 2 decades since it released, Super Smash Bros. Melee is still popular, and there is still an active competitive scene. Fans, for years, have also been asking for an HD remaster of the game, but Nintendo has not responded.
Well, we may now know why, thanks to Kit and Krysta. They no longer work at Nintendo, and Nintendo Minute has long since concluded, but they now have their own podcast that occasionally offers insight into their time at Nintendo, including things people didn’t know. For example, the pair revealed that, while Nintendo is aware of the demand for Super Smash Bros. Melee HD, they’re very hostile to the matter.
When the pair were at Nintendo, they said that it’s the sort of topic that “it’s a Mother 3-level game where you kind of tense up”. The main reason for this mindset within Nintendo is because of the community. Krysta said that “there are so many negative things from a Nintendo perspective around Melee that it’s just like… now there’s this ‘black market emulation’ around it and all this other stuff that Nintendo does not like”.
Nintendo also doesn’t feel that the community would be satisfied with it, no matter what they did. The reason being, according to Kit, is that Nintendo thinks that “if you change even one minuscule detail about this game, it’d be like ‘Oh, This game is not viable”. Because of this, Kit says that “from [Nintendo’s] standpoint, there’s actually no incentive for them to do this. If you can’t satisfy the Melee fanbase, there’s no point in doing the project”.
There’s also the issue that, while some fans may want a HD remaster of Melee, many others, especially outside of the Melee community, may not care for it because Super Smash Bros. Ultimate exists. Kit explained that “for everybody else, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is great. They don’t have this affinity and they don’t want to lug around a CRT, so they don’t need it”.
According to Krysta, Nintendo’s public approach to the topic is that they “just have to do the ‘sweep it under the rug’ tactic. Don’t talk about Melee. You let them do their thing and you just move on”. All in all, Kit and Krysta both agreed that “it’s never going to happen”. Krysta even went as far as to say that “It’s absolutely, 100% never going to happen”.
Source
Thanks to GreatSong1 for the tip!
