Super Smash Bros. 4 News: New Character Added to Roster Before Release Date

Another day, another newly confirmed character for the highly anticipated Super Smash Bros. 4—Lucario, the popular Pokémon character seen in previous Super Smash Bros. games, will officially be returning to the series.

Nintendo announced Lucario's return to the franchise on the official Super Smash Bros. website, as well as the Miiverse page of game director Masahiro Sakurai.

"Pic of the day. The heroic Aura Pokémon, Lucario, joins the battle!! We've increased the influence of Aura this time, so a damaged Lucario is truly a force to be reckoned with," wrote Sakurai on his Miiverse page. 

Lucario first appeared in Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the Wii. The character uses a variety of standard fighting moves along with powerful aura attacks, as seen in the new screenshots of the character. With the character's inclusion to the game, there are now over three dozen confirmed characters, with the majority returning characters as opposed to completely new fighters making their debut in the new game.

Super Smash Bros. 4 is set to appear sometime in 2014, however, Nintendo has remained quiet on exact release dates for the Wii U and 3DS versions of the game. Nintendo had a prime chance to announce if the game would be available sometime in the near future during their third quarter earnings financial call, but the company did not give any new information. Considering that Nintendo announced Mario Kart 8 would be coming in May, this may indicate that Nintendo does not believe Super Smash Bros. 4 will be ready before then.

Nintendo is pinning much of its hopes for 2014 on Super Smash Bros. 4 as the game is one of the most anticipated games of the year across every platform available to gamers. The company has announced a new fighter for the game, bringing the roster up to 22 different characters. 

The game will be coming to the Wii U and 3DS, with both versions of the game having some key differences. Chief among these differences is that the 3DS will have stages based on handheld games, while the Wii U will have stages based on console games. One example of this is the Spirit Tracks stage on the 3DS and the Skyloft stage on the Wii U, which are both based on Legend of Zelda games. The two versions of the game will also have different trophies.