With the fighting game Pokken Tournament having a free trial on Nintendo Switch, some new theories have popped up suggesting that this could be a sign that the next Smash Ultimate DLC is Pokemon-related.
On July 22, Nintendo revealed that the Tekken-inspired Pokemon fighter Pokken Tournament DX would be free to play from July 29 to August 4. In the past, the company has made certain games free when they would have a Smash character introduced.
For instance, prior to Fire Emblem’s Byleth being available, they made Fire Emblem Warriors free-to-play for a limited time.
Then, when they announced that an ARMS fighter would be joining the Smash roster as DLC 6, they made ARMS free to play for anyone with a Nintendo Switch Online membership.
Do I smell a Pokken character coming to Smash soon ?!
— Phsyco Red (@PhsycoRed) July 22, 2020
With this knowledge in mind, fans on Twitter have begun to theorize what this could mean for Smash.
“Remember how we got ARMS full game trial? Wouldn’t it be funny if we got another Pokemon in Smash after this Pokken trial?” Phantom_Akizen remarked.
Others appeared to draw the same conclusions, writing about how this Pokken free trial could lead to a future Pokemon DLC reveal.
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https://twitter.com/Phantom_Akizen/status/1286476218481737730
The speculation also spread to GameFaqs forums where user OfficialPotato explained how the recent first-party DLC fighters have had free trials of their franchises before they were added to Smash.
It should be noted that while this doesn’t confirm that a Pokemon will be the seventh DLC fighter, it has been long speculated that one will be coming in Fighters Pass Volume 2.
This also doesn’t mean that the Pokemon has to necessarily be from Pokken. As it stands, Charizard, Lucario, Pikachu, and Mewtwo are all featured in both titles. Even Pikachu Libre makes an appearance as an alternate costume in Smash.
-> arms is free for one full week-> arms gets a smash fighter
-> pokken is free for one week-> ???? https://t.co/5R2ndCDPzK
— Bernie (@BernieBrando) July 23, 2020
Regardless, there are still five more DLC spots to come as part of Fighters Pass Volume 2. The final, eleventh spot is set to be released by December 31, 2021, so there’s still a lot of time left for Nintendo to crank out the content.
Only time will tell if this theory with Pokken and Smash ends up panning out or falling flat.