Now that Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 has finally been officially announced after spending months as one of the industry's worst-kept secrets, you might think that the rumours and leaks might slow down. Sadly, it looks like that's not the case, as the game's full cover art has seemingly leaked online after pre-orders went live on Amazon US.
The cover art leak was shared over on the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl subreddit by Redditor White_Mantra, who said, "I hate speculation, here you go". The leaked image is the extended cover art for the game that features all newcomers and possibly hints at what characters have been cut from the roster.
Let's start off with the fun stuff first - the newbies. According to the art, the newcomers being added to the game include Gerald and Gertie from Hey Arnold, Plankton from SpongeBob, Ember from Danny Phantom, Azula from The Legend of Korra, Daggett and Norbert from Angry Beavers, and El Tigre from, well, El Tigre.
It's a pretty strange roster, but perhaps not that surprising for a series that previously included Hugh Neutron and Oblina. Speaking of which, the cover art could also be hinting that a large number of the roster from the first game has been removed. It's not clear if some of the veterans just aren't included on the cover art or if their not being there means that they've been taken out, but if the latter is true then we're not going to be seeing Leonardo, Michelangelo, Lincoln Loud, Oblina, Shredder, Hugh Neutron, Powdered Toast Man, Shredder, Toph, Helga, CatDog, and Sandy.
Not including so many veterans would be quite a significant cut to the game's roster, but it also makes some sense considering how much of All-Star Brawl 2 has seemingly been made from scratch. That being said, it would be a little strange to take big hits like Hugh away from the roster after so much work was put into them the first time around. It would also be weird to not have all four Ninja Turtles in one game and to remove Lincoln Loud, the main character of one of Nick's most popular shows, only to keep his sister instead.
PapaGenos has said that there are no confirmed character cuts so far, which suggests that a lot of the veterans simply aren't on the box art, but we'll have to wait and see what Ludosity reveals over the coming months.