Mario Strikers: Battle League is approaching its June 10 release date, and its roster of playable characters appears to be missing series staple Daisy. Nintendo's upcoming sports game features five-on-five games of soccer, where the Mario franchise's famed characters raucously battle over the ball and use special power-up shots to get it past the Boom Boom Koopa goalkeepers. Battle League features just 10 selectable characters from the Mushroom Kingdom, so omissions are expected, but Daisy being cut is a bit of a surprise.
Before Battle League was announced in February 2022, a follow-up to 2007's Mario Strikers Charged was seeming increasingly unlikely. The first two Mario Strikers games involve more violence than Nintendo has recently let its characters engage in, and some of the company's sports series seemed to be on indefinite hiatus - a Mario baseball game still hasn't come to Switch. Battle League is well on the way, though, and one of its major evolutions in gameplay is filling the entire team with top tier characters, which only makes Daisy's exclusion more noticeable.
Previous Mario Strikers games reserved the Mushroom Kingdom A-listers for the team captain spot, with the other roster positions being filled by more generic characters such as Boo or Monty Mole. Battle League allows for eight players on a single console, each having the opportunity to use one of the game's 10 characters. So many characters in one match makes it very odd that Nintendo would omit some of the franchise's other popular characters like Daisy, Birdo, and Toadette. Only the developers at Nintendo know why Battle League settled on a 10 character roster, but the decision was likely influenced by the opportunity to add content after the game launches.
Daisy Is A Likely DLC Character For Mario Strikers: Battle League
Nintendo's sports games have not been immune to the industry's trend toward live service games, but they are at least not inundated with microtransactions. The most recent two, Mario Tennis Aces and Mario Golf: Super Rush, both received a steady stream of free content for a decent period after launch, including new characters. If this is any indication toward Battle League's future, Daisy seems like the most obvious character to be the game's first post-release addition. Her not making the initial cut is strange considering both Peach and Rosalina are in the game, but she's certainly popular enough to drum up some excitement if she's added at a later time.
The soccer meets Mario Kart gameplay of Battle League is interesting enough, and the chance to unlock new gear that changes a characters stats may add some complexity, but the omission of characters like Daisy and the meager 10 character roster may be a concern for those who felt Aces and Super Rush were light on content. Both games are now in more respectable states now than they were at launch, but having the entirety of Battle League's content from the outset is preferable. Daisy is usually one of the core characters for Nintendo's party games, but she's seemingly been replaced by Rosalina in Mario Strikers: Battle League, perhaps being relegated to DLC status.