Echo Fighters

[Valigarmander]

So far the only confirmed Echo Fighters in SSBU are Lucina (Marth), Dark Pit (Pit), and Daisy (Peach). (Apparently characters like Lucas and Dr. Mario are different enough from their counterparts not to qualify.) What other characters would you like to see join the roster as an Echo Fighter?

Not gonna lie, I'd be happy to see Funky Kong as an echo of DK. He's basically just Donkey with shades and a do-rag to begin with, and Smash Bros. wouldn't be the weirdest place he's popped up in.

[DarkZero]

not sure if they'd do an echo figher for 3rd party characters but here's two off the top of my head: proto man for mega man and ken for ryu.

[Marilink]

As unlikely as it is that they would add two Metroid characters in the same iteration of Smash, I think Dark Samus is a candidate. Maybe it's not even that crazy to consider, since it could be a tie-in to Metroid Prime 4.

Besides, Dark Samus would make a great Echo Fighter. Just look at the Metroid Prime 2 subtitle.

[CaptHayfever]

^^For what it's worth, Proto Man has already been shown as part of Mega's upgraded final smash. Ken is a cool idea, though.

^Dark Samus has actually been one of my wish-list characters for a while; although that was in part because it wouldn't be a clone/echo like, say, SA-X would.

Doc not being an echo makes sense, by virtue of his keeping the Tornado while Mario has FLUDD.
I'm genuinely shocked that Pichu isn't indexed as an echo, though.

At the other end of the spectrum, Alph & the Koopalings are still just alternate costumes.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

[Calamity Panfan]

dan hibiki for a ryu echo fighter that hurts himself pichu-style

[DarkZero]

^^pikachu has received a few moveset changes in this game, notably his neutral air is a multi-hit with a new animation and his down air is a meteor. i think pichu probably has a more classic moveset so the two are different.

i think what makes dark pit and lucina specifically echo fighters and not just clones is that they are by far the most similar to their original counterparts. dark pit and lucina even have the exact same stats as their base characters, which even the melee clones switched up.

[X-3]

Yeah, in Melee Pichu has a different weight and frame data from Pikachu. The Echo moniker is for characters that are almost exactly the same as their originals save for one or two things. It's also so we stop side-eyeing Dark Pit.

-Samus->Dark Samus has probably been the most common suggestion I've seen, probably because Samus no longer has her Dark Samus-looking costume from 4. I wanted Dark Samus as a unique character but seeing as Ridley made it an Echo is fine.
-Sonic->Shadow has been another common one I've seen due to the Knuckles AT being in the E3 demo instead of Shadow.
-This is a strange one but Meta Knight->Dark Meta Knight has been another suggestion I've seen. This one kind of seems flimsy to me because it kind of uses this as evidence.
-Fox->Sebastian the Crab: This is undoubtedly well-deserved.

Spoiler.

So basically Echo Fighters are an chance to add Dark versions of every character.

[Apollo the Just]

i want Actual Literal Lloyd Irving as an echo fighter to the sword-using Mii

[Auron]

So my question about echo fighters is this: since Sakurai said that there will not be that many new characters added into Smash Ultimate because they are including every previous character, do echo fighters count as new characters or can they just be added in without counting towards the roster number?

[MeowMan]

i'm pretty sure echo fighters do count towards the roster number, but Sakurai's exact (translated, who knows how well) words were "I hope you didn't expect too many new fighters" which could also easily be interpreted as him hoping we didn't expect too many fighter reveals during e3. so who knows how many new fighters there really could be. i'd still bet that there won't be all that many, but people seem to be adding meaning to Sakurai's sort-of vague words

[Auron]

It was incredibly vague. Its possible that none of the echo fighters actually count towards the total roster because in the video they were all labeled as 24e or 56e and such instead of a different number. You can probably assume that they need less development time because they are copied from other move sets. But who knows. Definitely not me.