CH5 - E1: Monster Hunter

Yet Another Prince:
When first planning this episode, Crono was originally going to be joined by the Prince of Sable from For the Frog the Bell Tolls. While the Prince still appears in the episode as a cameo, he was replaced with Ori, as I had cooler ideas with Ori in the episode, and thought that the Ori series deserved some representation.

King Koopa:
The villain of this episode was always planned to be Bowser, but Bowser Jr. wasn’t going to be with him. In fact, none of the Koopa Army was going to join Bowser, with only Rathalos joining Bowser in the battle against the others.

CH5 - E2: A Million Monkeys

Getting Fancy:
Sackboy and Specter were always planned to go against each other in this episode, as well as plenty of Pipo Monkeys and George from Rampage. However, Sackboy was to be joined by two different heroes: Fancy Pants from the Fancy Pants series and Mr. Game & Watch from the Game & Watch games. The episode would simply consist of these three teaming up to take down Specter. I replaced these characters with Diddy Kong, Jak, and Daxter because I could more easily incorporate these characters, and the characters being animals, specifically a monkey, added some conflict.

Not Funky:
PaRappa’s team initially wasn’t supposed to appear in this episode. Instead, their first appearance would be in the Good and Evil episode, which is four chapters after their debut. I decided to add them to this episode to give them more screen time, and I think pitting them against Specter gave some cool ideas.

CH5 - E3: Green Thunder

Team Avalanche:
This episode remained relatively the same, with Dante and Cloud always intended to be in it. The biggest difference is that Cloud was intended to be accompanied by Tifa and Barret before they would be killed by Mr. L. This was scrapped as the chances of all three of these characters from the same series showing up in the same area was slim, and I already placed Team Chaotix and the Cooper Gang together.

CH5 - E4: Wily Wars

Robotics:
This episode, while always taking place in Dr. Wily’s lab, was going to be fairly different. The episode was going to start with Dr. Light sending Mega Man after Dr. Wily. At this point, Ness was still written into the Tragic Reconstruction episode, but I soon swapped the two characters. This episode was also going to feature Frisk from Undertale teaming up with R.O.B. similar to how Ness does in the final episode. Frisk would then find Robo from Chrono Trigger and boot him up to help them. Tails and Ness would then fight Frisk, Robo, and R.O.B. before being stopped by Mega Man and Samus. Frisk was removed since Frisk is mainly portrayed as a pacifist, so having Frisk fight wouldn’t be true to character. Robo was removed because I felt I didn’t need another character from Chrono Trigger, and felt other series deserved representation.

Wily’s Lab:
Vectorman was one of three options for characters who would team up with Samus. The other two characters were Captain Astro from Astrobot and ‘Splosion Man from the ‘Splosion Man games. I ended up going with Vectorman since he has a vast moveset and was a good robot to replace Robo. Astro and ‘Splosion Man still make cameos in the episode.

CH5 - E5: Going Commando

Aliens:
Crypto originally wasn’t going to be in this episode, instead just having the Covenant invade Earth. Crypto was added since it would make more sense for him to recruit others for a war on the humans, and his goofy moveset was a contrast to the Covenant’s more traditional way of fighting, which I thought was interesting.

CH5 - E6: Tomb Raider

Genie in a Bottle:
The original plot of this episode had Lara Croft and Wario racing towards a different treasure in the pyramid: a genie which would be Shantae. Lara and Shantae would team up and fight Ra alongside Kirby’s group similar to the final version. Shantae was cut because Shantae being in a bottle didn’t seem true to her series.

Tomb Raiding Duo:
After cutting Shantae from the episode, the two options for a new character to join Lara were Marlow Briggs and Sphinx from Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy. Marlow was chosen since Ra was already going to be the villain of the episode.

CH5 - E7: Uprising

Don’t Deal With the Devil:
The Uprising episode went through multiple changes, despite always containing Pit and Scorpion. The first version of the episode had them teaming up with both Cuphead and Mugman from Cuphead in order to defeat Hades from Kid Icarus: Uprising. Hades was scrapped for being too big of a challenge for this small cast of characters, and the Cuphead duo was cut due to not wanting this group to be too big and not just wanting to put in all the popular indie characters for the sake of having them.

Battle of the Gods:
The second version of this episode had a villain team-up of Zeus from God of War and King Dice from Cuphead. The plot would have the two summon Diablo from the Diablo series. A new character was also intended to be added: Morrigan from Darkstalkers. The episode would have our heroes stop Zeus and King Dice, and eventually Diablo. This was scrapped in favor of having an ending to Quan Chi’s reign, since it was always planned for him to summon Shinnok. Morrigan was also scrapped so that the group to not become too big.