Scrapped character ideas included Silver Surfer (his fighting style — energy blasts & zooming around on his board—didn't mesh well with a fighting game system), Dr. Strange (too similar to Dr. Doom), Mr. Fantastic (his stretching abilities were too hard to draw into sprite form), Daredevil (not compelling as a fighter), Black Widow (Same reason as Daredevil), Hawkeye (Not enough abilities for a moveset) and Scarlet Witch (too overpowered). Dr. Strange, Black Widow and Hawkeye eventually made their way into later games in the series.
Scrapped ideas for potential characters included Howard the Duck (cut because the director felt Norimaro already filled the gag character role in the series and the failure of the Howard the Duck movie), She-Hulk (cut because the fourth-wall shenanigans wouldn't fly in arcades and she'd be a slightly-worse Hulk otherwise) and Spider-Ham (who Capcom USA suggested instead of Howard the Duck. He was cut for the same reason as Howard). She-Hulk later appeared in Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds.
Galactus was considered as a potential final boss, but was cut as Marvel said that "a god-level entity like Galactus isn't someone the heroes could just beat up". Katsuya Akitomo objected to this, saying that there was a precedent for the heroes physically defeating Galactus in 1982's Fantastic Four #243. He tried to reasonably explain that we'd establish that Galactus was starved & that they really wanted to recreate this classic event in our game, but they stubbornly said no. Galactus later appeared in Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds as the final boss of the game.
Iron Man was supposed to be included in the game as a fighter, returning from Marvel Super Heroes, but was cut because another company (most likely Acclaim, who made Iron Man and X-O Manowar in Heavy Metal two years prior) had an exclusive limited time license on the character. War Machine, who in the game is a palette swap of Iron Man's sprite, was used instead.
Armored Spider-Man (a grey recolor of Spider-Man) was supposed to be the Symbiote Spider-Man from the Secret Wars storyline, but was cut as it was too difficult to redraw the pixels required to make the character different from the normal Spider-Man sprite.
The character of Norimaro, based on Japanese comedian Noritake 'Noritaro' Kinashi, was cut from the international releases of the game due to Marvel's objections over the character, as they didn't want some random underpowered gag character going against their heroes. Capcom managed to convince Marvel to keep him on the condition he only appears within the Japanese release of the game.
A model and a self-heal ability parameter for Ratchet were extensively worked on, suggesting the Autobot Medic was going to play a bigger role in the game than just appearing in cutscenes, possibly as a playable character in the Autobot Campaign or as a boss in the Decepticon Campaign.
Contributed by PirateGoofy
On the disc, there is an unused character called "Evil Bumblebee" with black blood-splatter-like spots on his vehicle mode, which is Bee's old '77 Camaro alt mode. It is unknown if this was supposed to be a separate character from Bumblebee or the same character sporting a different look.
Contributed by PirateGoofy
Cyclonus' signature Mini-Con Crumplezone appears attached to Cyclonus' Vehicle Mode as his cockpit, but never appears anywhere else in the game outside of this, not even alongside Cyclonus or part of his "chest" when he is in Robot mode. It's possible this was done by the developers to make the Decepticon a little more intimidating during his boss battle.
Contributed by PirateGoofy
Although there are a total of 20 unused Mini-Cons in the game's data, most of them are just text strings. However, two were extensively worked on before being scrapped. The first one was called "Endgame" and would have summoned large "holes in the fabric of space" that would have sucked enemies and objects into them. The second dropped Mini-Con is called "Bug-Out" and would have called upon "Emergency Warp Gates". Although Endgame was scrapped, his model was reused for in-game Mini-Cons Discord, Twister, and Overwatch.
Contributed by PirateGoofy
Decepticon Cassette Ratbat was going to appear in the game, but was cut prior to release. He has a full model rendered in the game's data.
Contributed by PirateGoofy
In the original Game Boy release, the levels "Turn Off the Giant Faucet!" and "Escape from the Tea Cup!" contain a unique fish enemy that grabs Wario and pins him to a wall until he escapes. For unknown reasons, the Game Boy Color release replaces this enemy with a standard sawfish; however, full-color graphics for it are still present in the game's code.
Contributed by game4brains
Though Tam Tam does not return as a playable character, the game's code still contains his character data, suggesting that he was going to be in the game in an early stage of development. However, any attempts to access the data will result in the game crashing.
Contributed by DrakeVagabond
Though K9999 isn't playable, the data for his character is still in the arcade version and can be selected using external cheat devices. Here, he uses Kyo's icon on the select screen and Kula's while in battle. In battle, his color palette is bugged but is otherwise fully functional.
Contributed by DrakeVagabond
There is an unused model of Dr. Heinz Doofensmirtz found in the game's data, suggesting that he was either intended to be playable or appear as a boss in a scrapped Phineas & Ferb playset.
Contributed by CuriousUserX90
The design of the Anti-Funk, the final boss of the game, originally resembled the hood of a Ku Klux Klan member. This design made it into early review copies of the game before Sega discovered its existence and rejected it, forcing the developers to change it to a skull just before the game's release. In a 2003 Xbox Nation magazine interview with series creator Greg Johnson, he elaborated on the origin of the design:
"When I was doing it, it was actually an accident. We had done a bunch of designs for the Anti-Funk, and the artist had done this unintentionally. I looked at it and said, “Wow, that’s funny. That looks like a Ku Klux Klan hat.” And then I thought about it for a second and I said, “Well hey, what better villain for these black characters who are spreading the funk than the love and this kind of oblique reference?” Because it wasn’t [obvious]—it was open to interpretation."
Contributed by GamerBen144
The reason why Taka-Arashi was cut from the roster was that the developers didn't think his large size and play style could fit with the new game's speed. He would later be added back to the roster in the enhanced versions of Virtua Fighter 5.
Contributed by DrakeVagabond
In a 1996 Gamest interview, some of the featured concept art shows designs for 2 characters named "Marisu" and "Teresu" who were not included in the final game. The game's character designer Mimori Fujinomiya commented:
"These were characters looked too much like ripoffs of the koropokkuru, so I abandoned them. Their personalities were too similar to Macky and Pentell, anyway. I do like their Robo-Dog though."
"These were characters looked too much like ripoffs of the koropokkuru, so I abandoned them. Their personalities were too similar to Macky and Pentell, anyway. I do like their Robo-Dog though."
Contributed by ProtoSnake
Geese Howard from Fatal Fury was originally meant to appear as a playable character, but the developers abandoned this plan, citing "various considerations at the time" in retrospect as the reason for his exclusion. Geese would eventually appear as a playable character in The King of Fighters '96.
Contributed by DrakeVagabond
The code of an early version of Dead or Alive 2 lists Genra and Raidou as being part of the roster, suggesting that they were going to be in the game early on in its development.
Contributed by DrakeVagabond
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