Super Smash Bros. Poll

After the release of Super Smash Bros. in Japan, the official website asked players to send in a questionnaire, detailing their favourite characters in Smash 64 and those they wished were in the game. As the internet was still in its infancy, from a modern perspective, not many votes were submitted. The voting was open until 31st May 1999, with the results being released the next day. The overall total votes were not publicly released.

Favourite character
The first poll would arrange characters by series, showing further candidates.

Given the popularity of Metal Mario, and the rest of the polls being based on things players want to see in the future, the poll could have influenced the Metal Box and Super Mushroom's appearances in Melee.

Aggregate results
These results were released second.

Results by series
A third poll would arrange characters by series, showing further candidates.

Impact
All but 3 characters in the poll results — Ogma, a Blast Corps robot, and Doraemon — would later appear in the Smash franchise in some capacity; if not as playable fighters, they would appear through cameos, such as as items, trophies, stickers, or spirits. Even James Bond, a character largely seen as out of Smash's reach, has seen representation in the Proximity Mine from GoldenEye 007 in the PAL and NTSC releases of Melee, and Ash Ketchum has been indirectly referenced through Pokémon Trainer and Secret Ninja Attack.

A similar poll, the Smash Bros. Fighter Ballot, would be launched in 2015, 16 years later; this poll would be used to determine the final DLC character for Super Smash Bros. 4, and influence the roster choices in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Out of all realisable characters for Smash 4, Bayonetta won, but the true winner was revealed to be Sora after he was revealed to be the final DLC character for Ultimate.