Sakurai announced as director of Smash Bros. Revolution

Masahiro Sakurai, whose past work includes the Kirby series, Smash Bros. series, and Meteos, was revealed today to be the director and game designer for upcoming Smash Bros. game, hinted earlier at appearing alongside the console’s launch.

However, if Sakurai is just now joining the project, the game may not be far along. Could Nintendo, a company notorious for long development cycles (they even pushed Zelda past the holiday season to finish it), create a top-notch game Revolution showcase in time for launch, or will Smash Bros. be pushed back until, say, next Christmas?

IGN has previously quoted Sakurai as praising the controller’s simplicity, adding that he is “sympathetic for Nintendo’s stance of reducing hurdles for games…it’s good that the controller buttons have been reduced to just one.” Is this a reflection on a possible control scheme for the upcoming beat-em-up? It sounds like Sakurai will eschew using the classic control shell, after all.

Article curtosity of Ross Miller, from Joystiq.com