oh, I'm sure it's somehow different
I mean, it is kind of.
Once you know a single player story, thats it. You know the story, and minus a few exceptions, your playing the game will not change your opinion on it.
Conversely, if you know all the characters to Smash, you don't know how you will react to playing as them. Who knows, Little Mac could be awesome to play as, or he could be absolute dog shit, but you'll never really know for sure until you
actually play the damn game. The fact that working towards something that actually matters is also a benefit as well, cause spoilers, some of us don't play Smash for online stuff. I want to have a reason to play the game other than online mode that actually matters.
I agree that it's definitely rewarding for people playing single-player, but in a fighting game multiplayer should take precedence IMO. People playing single player still have other unlockable things, like trophies and stickers, even if they don't actually reward you with anything in-game. Maybe they could give people who play single-player other things, like.....music tracks? Idk. Maybe characters should be unlockable just for single-player, but playable from the start in multiplayer. Though that still takes away from the secrets.
I think part of the problem with this logic is that the characters are all relatively easy to unlock, so you're not "playing and being rewarded" for very long. I still see where you're coming from though.
I can see where you are coming from, but the thing that I've always liked about Smash that its really accessible to everyone. I mean, I'm no fighting game guy myself, but my impression on most fighting games is that you haven't even really begun to get good at the game until you know every move by heart, which is usually no easy feat. Most fighting games I see are played with online multiplayer as its priority, but Smash is weird in that its
local multiplayer seems to take precedence. My biggest reason for keeping characters unlockable is that it gives the game some extra legs besides its multiplayer. I want to feel motivated to do the single player, and not because there is literally nothing else to do. There really is nothing quite as rewarding as characters, although you could debate stages maybe, so that to me helps get some life out of the game.