Original Generation

When you have a Crisis Crossover or a Massive Multiplayer Crossover, you'll need something to motivate the heroes into action. While having the Big Bads of the series team up can work, sometimes you want a new, even Greater-Scope Villain. One that requires such a massive team-up of heroism.

And then, why stop there? Why not go the full way and make a new Hero for this crossover? That way you can have a central conflict for the entire story. Plus, since you'll have an original character tied to this story instead of the differing canons of the other series, you'll be able to have more character development for the main character all in all.

The Greater-Scope Villain variety is somewhat more common than the new Hero variety. Crossovers with new heroes, however, have a tendency to become a series in their own right, a Spin-Off that just happens to have crossover origins.

If a completely original villain is created just for a crossover, that's a Crossover-Exclusive Villain. Compare and contrast Crossover Villain-in-Chief, where an already established villain somehow becomes the leader of a Villain Team-Up of the crossed-over criminals. No relation to First Installment Wins.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Fai, Kurogane, and Fei Wang Reed are the only new main characters in Tsubasa -RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE-, the rest being Alternate Universe versions of characters from other CLAMP works, or from ×××HOLiC, a sister manga by all intents and purposes, being the stories simultaneous (as much as the setting allows) and deeply intertwined.
• Pretty Cure:
  • Ayumi Sakagami, the first movie-only active heroic Pretty Cure, in Pretty Cure All Stars New Stage.
  • Pretty Cure All Stars F features another movie-exclusive Cure with Cure Supreme. She's notable for being the first (and possibly) only unambiguously evil Cure that isn't an Evil Knockoff, having infiltrated Cure Sky's team to find out why the Pretty Cures won't stay dead.
  • The Yes! Pretty Cure 5 movie and Heart Catch Pretty Cure movie both had original Cures, but the ones from Yes! were evil and the one in Heartcatch was just to set up a bit of backstory.
• As per Word of God, Tohru in Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid was created by throwing together whatever characteristics Cool-Kyou Shinsha thought would be cool, unlike the rest of the dragons (who are taken from various mythologies).
• Gundam Build Fighters indulges in this a lot, since the show's premise is people building customized Gundam models and battling them using an arcade-style machine. The sequel Gundam Build Fighters Try branches out further in this regard, with several characters making models that are wholly original designs that draw inspiration from one or more of the Gundam universes, rather than being built from a specific, preexisting mobile suit. Most prominently, protagonist Sekai Kamiki's Build Burning Gundam was made in the style of Mobile Fighter G Gundam but wasn't based off of one specific Mobile Fighter^note Word of God refuted the idea that the Build Burning was named for "Burning Gundam", the Bowdlerized name for God Gundam from the official English dub; likewise Wilfred and Shia Kijima have Gundams inspired by Mobile Suit Gundam 00 while their teammate Saga Adou's Gundam The End is a mish-mash of concepts borrowed from about four different sources (G, Wing, 00, and Unicorn).

Card Games

• Yu-Gi-Oh!: The ZEXAL anime only introduced 46 of the 100 Emperor's Key Numbers and the manga, which is a completely different continuity, introduced only 24 new Numbers. The remaining 30 Numbers have been introduced by the OCG long after the anime and manga had already finished.

Comic Books

• The Marvel Versus DC crossover had a new character named Access. As he's co-owned by the two companies, he isn't used very often.
• The Transformers Collaborative line saw a few transformerized versions of famous vehicles from other companies, as well as an original character named Ectronymous Diamatron (aka Ectotron), a ghost-busting transformer.
• Specific to The DCU:
  • A well-known Greater-Scope Villain example is the Anti-Monitor from DC's Crisis on Infinite Earths. There were some new heroes as well—Pariah, Harbinger, the Monitor, Alex Luthor, Superboy-Prime, Lady Quark, and Doctor Light—but, with the exception of Doctor Light, they faded quickly after the event ended, only brought up when the writer wished to remind the readers of Crisis. Or in the case of Superboy-Prime, to make a Face–Heel Turn and become a recurring Big Bad in his own right.
  • In Final Crisis, the hero is Nix Uotan, a depowered Monitor.
  • Convergence introduces Telos, who serves as the Disc-One Final Boss of the series.
• Specific to Marvel Universe:
  • Onslaught, created for the Onslaught Saga that eventually led to Heroes Reborn.
  • Lampshaded in the anthology Wha... huh?'s Identity Crisis parody — Identity Girl says she was created just because of that one.
  • Kid Kaiju was created for the Monsters Unleashed revival, which began as a crossover event, but continued later as an ongoing title featuring him.
  • Basically every character introduced in Spider-Verse —and there are lots of them— were created specifically for the event, most notably Spider-Gwen.
  • Subverted in Infinity Wars (2018) by Requiem - seemingly a new character created for the series, they are revealed to be Gamora early into the run.
  • Voyager, introduced in the Avengers Family Crossover Avengers: No Surrender as a formerly-forgotten heroine the others all see as one of the "classic" Avengers but actually the Grandmaster's daughter.
  • Ikon the Spaceknight was created for the Annihilators miniseries and is the only member of the titular team who is not a pre-existing character.

Fan Works

• Fantasia Times is a Massive Multiplayer Crossover with characters from numerous different fictional works; however, the lion's share of focus goes to the original characters Andi, Sera, and Scarlett — especially Andi. Even when the canon characters get A Day in the Limelight, they largely defer to Andi when it comes to important decisions.
• Hellsister Trilogy introduces D'Reema, Highfather's non-canonical daughter kidnapped by Darkseid during "The Apokolips Agenda".
• Hours 'Verse: As The Bells Toll and the works set on the Other Side extend Ryoji's supernatural side of the family to include much of Nyx and Erebus's Greek mythological family. Of particular note are Keres, who helps Ryoji and the Wild Cards rescue Minato from the Deepscape on This Side and acts as Thanatos' second-in-command on the Other Side, and Oizys, who makes some trouble with Momus on the aforementioned rescue trip on This Side and is Makoto's demon not-girlfriend on the Other Side.
• Star Trek: Phoenix: The story tends to skirt around canon Star Trek events instead of directly following or replacing them, and Equestria is entirely absent from events after the opening chapter. Consequently, a large portion of its cast, including all of the Phoenix's crew outside of Sunset and Twilight, consists of original characters.
• Throw Away Your Mask: Yamamoto Emiko, a Genki Girl who sits next to Akechi at Gekkoukan Elementary School and serves as his Strength Arcana social link. She acts as a Foil to Akechi and Ken, highlighting their Troubling Unchildlike Behavior with her far brighter outlook.
• A Is A primarily uses pre-existing characters for the various MV teams, but seeing as Battlefield 2142 has no named characters outside of lore snippets, the entirety of MV-4 are created whole-cloth for the series.

Films — Animation

• Wreck-It Ralph In an arcade with video games and their respective characters that exist in real life, the title character and friends came from games that were created specifically for this movie.

Films — Live-Action

• Godzilla, Mothra, and Rodan all originally appeared by themselves in their own separate Toho films. The former two would fight in the Crossover film Mothra vs. Godzilla, but when Toho decided to bring all three together in Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster, they were pitted against a new monster, King Ghidorah. This would lead to Toho's later Kaiju movies all more or less existing in the same universe.

Literature

• Jason and Medea from The Argonautica by Apollonius of Rhodes, which makes this Older Than Feudalism. New character, Jason, leads a team of Crossover characters from across Greek Mythology, yet in the end needs to be bailed out by another new character, Medea.
• Dante and Beatrice from The Divine Comedy. A Self-Insert of the author meets the souls of historical people and fictional characters and eventually meets his Unrequited Love.
• SD Gundam The Last World is an Intra-Franchise Crossover of SD Gundam, featuring characters from a good number of its works. It also includes a couple of characters made specifically for this story, including Sen-Pu Ninja Exia, Gundam the Gold, Ryuutei Unicorn, Tri Gunvoy, the Throne Siblings and so on.

Live-Action TV

• Kamen Rider:
  • The lead Rider of Kamen Rider Decade is an original character that serves to cross over elements of the nine series before him, partially by being able to make use of all their powers. His primary enemy, Narutaki, brings random enemies from the crossover elements to combat him. Diend, the second original Rider, serves as a rival who is less concerned with fighting Decade and more with stealing and trolling, but has the ability to send clones of crossover heroes or villains into battle for him. The major enemy group Dai-Shocker later appears, which is basically one or two people who got the smart idea to have all previous enemy groups in the Kamen Rider series stop fooling around and join forces.
  • The Grand Finale Movie is a bit more open about this: Wataru Kurenai, the original universe Kamen Rider Kiva, tells the cast that Decade exists solely to be whatever the Rider worlds need him to be: hero or villain, savior or destroyer. He has no home and no story of his own, and therefore after he presses the Reset Button through Suicide by Cop, there's supposedly no way to bring him back.
  • Ayakashi Rakider Chinomanako Diend Form is this in Kamen Rider Decade's Intercontinuity Crossover with Samurai Sentai Shinkenger. A monster of Shinkenger's world with powers stolen from Kamen Rider Diend, with the Diend Driver in its possession.
  • The Kamen Rider franchise's Movie Wars films, which bring together the current and previous Rider casts, tend to make use of these. The most unusual examples come from Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider Wizard & Fourze: Movie War Ultimatum, which introduces modernized versions of several Shotaro Ishinomori characters including Inazuman (as Kamen Rider Fourze's student), Bishoujo Kamen Poitrine (as the Donut shop owner's "inner self" from Kamen Rider Wizard), and the Akumaizer 3 (the film's Big Bads).
• The crossover film Kamen Rider × Super Sentai: Chou Super Hero Taisen provides two examples: Kamen Rider True Brave, the Game World counterpart of Hiiro Kagami/Kamen Rider Brave, and Kamen Sentai Gorider, a Rider-themed Sentai based on both shows' original seasons.

Puppet Shows

• A Muppet Family Christmas is a Christmas Special that is also a crossover between The Muppet Show, Sesame Street, Fraggle Rock, and Muppet Babies. The turkey and snowman characters who appeared in the special were created specifically for it. Both puppets would be reused again in The Muppet Christmas Carol.

Roleplay

• Super Magic Wars V: The Magical Girls/Warriors anointed by a mascot named Kuma and his counterpart Astra, which fight the Void Beasts, monsters seemingly made of rotting flesh with an appetite for magic and other related energies.

Theater

• Twice Charmed gives Lady Tremaine a Wicked Fairy Godfather who helps her plan revenge on Cinderella.

Video Games

• Trope Namer and probably the example that stands out the most in fiction, due to sheer numbers, are the various characters that Banpresto made for their Super Robot Wars series, as well as other crossover games (The Great Battle and Another Century's Episode, for example). Each game (excluding the first game and Super Robot Wars Compact) since Super Robot Wars 2 has added in new original heroes and villains, whose stories tend to link together the various licensed series in the game. The originals gained such a fandom that Banpresto made a Spin-Off series consisting of nothing but their original characters, called Super Robot Wars: Original Generation. This was convenient, as the lack of licensing issues made it possible to finally bring the series to international audiences for the first time.
  • The Original Generation games decidedly goes recursive, as a number of original characters were created just for these games.
  • And now the Super Robot Wars: Original Generation characters (At least Ryusei, Kyouske, and Masaki) have shown up in Another Century's Episode R, where they aren't treated as originals. Banpresto has found a way to make it go full circle.
  • Technically, the first Original Generation game was Super Robot Wars Gaiden, which predates Super Robot Wars: Original Generation by eight years. Unfortunately, its rather racy, risque dialogue sadly made this a No Export for You.
  • A Nintendo DS Action RPG, Super Robot Wars OG Saga: Endless Frontier, stars Alternate Universe versions of Super Robot Wars originals...along with the Namco × Capcom originals mentioned below and KOS-MOS from Xenosaga. Crazy, isn't it? The latter three are characters created by Monolith Soft, a co-developer with Banpresto for the game.
  • They also have a tendency to create new mechs and upgrades for already existing series. Among these are Great Zeorymer, Final Dancougar, and Mazinkaiser (the only one to become a Canon Immigrant).
  • In fact the Devil Gundam's third True Final Boss form is an original design for Shin Super Robot Wars.
  • Two Original Generation mecha had started their lives out as figurines. The first is the Fei Yen Ver. HD, which was Fei Yen mixed with Hatsune Miku. The other is Mazin Emperor G, the long-awaited upgrade to the Great Mazinger.
• In Kingdom Hearts, you have Sora and his friends to make the Heroes. There are a few other side characters, and then the Greater Scope Villains: the various incarnations of Xehanort, Organization XIII, and of course in general, The Heartless. Ultimately, the Kingdom Hearts games focus almost entirely on the original characters and their story, with the crossover elements being used as the backdrop for the world.
• The King of Fighters started as a Massive Multiplayer Crossover with a handful of original characters, but has slowly evolved to the point that the originals nearly outnumber the crossover characters. It's gotten to the point that most fans don't complain about the Fatal Fury cast being downplayed in what used to be their tournament, but that the preceding original protagonist characters have always had the spotlight stolen from them by other original characters, since every major story arc so far has a different protagonist. In the case of the main games, Kyo Kusanagi had the spotlight stolen from him years earlier in KOF '99, with K', who in turn got it stolen by Ash Crimson. Since Ash was a Villain Protagonist, as well as rather effeminate, it only added to his unpopularity until it was revealed that Ash was always on the side of the heroes. A good part of the fandom forgave him after that. As of XIV, Ash has since been replaced by Shun'ei, who's more of a Nice Guy than the previous protagonists were. The 3D Maximum Impact Series take this further by having different protagonists, Alba and Soiree Meira. The GBA Spin-Off series The King of Fighters EX has several new characters who have never appeared in the series proper, such as Moe Habana (essentially Kyo's Distaff Counterpart), an Aloof Dark-Haired Girl named Miu Kurosaki, and an Action Dad named Reiji Oogami.
• NeoGeo Battle Coliseum introduced two protagonists named Yuki and Ai, as well as an antagonist named Goodman. The Orochi clone Mizuchi may also count.
• The Capcom vs. series:
  • The Japanese version of Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter had Norimaro, a fighter based on comedian Noritake Kinashi.
  • Marvel vs. Capcom 2 had Ruby Heart, Amingo, SonSon's granddaughter (also named SonSon), and the boss Abyss.
  • Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite has Ultron-Sigma, a combination of Ultron from The Avengers and Sigma from Mega Man X. He also transforms into a more powerful form called Ultron Omega for the final battle.
  • Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium with Shin Akuma (as in "God Akuma", not "True Akuma") and God Rugal. These were slight twists on existing characters (Shin Akuma and Omega Rugal), but could only exist as part of the crossover, since their existence involves Rugal absorbing the Dark Hadou or forcing his Orochi power into Akuma.
  • SNK vs. Capcom: SVC Chaos introduced Serious Mr. Karate and Violent Ken. The latter is based on the brainwashed Ken from Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie, and has since become a Canon Immigrant.
  • Namco × Capcom brought in Reiji Arisu and Xiaomu, as well as Reiji's arch-nemesis Saya, all tied together by dimension-hopping shenanigans that gave an excuse for all the game settings (ranging from Ghosts 'n Goblins to Street Fighter to Soulcalibur to Xenosaga and even more) to be stitched together without too much scarring.
  • Cross Edge hosts a whole slew of new characters that are not from any of the games of the five companies that "Cross" it, including lead characters Kannagi Yuuto/York Neely and Aiba Mikoto/Miko Aiba. There's also Toya/Troy, Anesha, Judas, Lazarus, Augustine, Raizen, Vivi, Eruma/Mimi, and Iruma/Cece, who all seem to be part of a greater plot of gathering different "Souls" from different worlds, thus explaining why you see characters from Darkstalkers, Ar tonelico, the Atelier Series, Spectral Souls, and Disgaea.
  • Capcom Fighting Evolution had Ingrid, who was later added into the PSP version of Street Fighter Alpha 3. She was supposed to debut in the canceled 3D fighting game Capcom Fighting All-Stars with two other characters: D.D. and Rook.
  • Shin from Street Fighter Online: Mouse Generation is the only character in the game who isn't from a prior Capcom game or another license.
  • Project × Zone, Spiritual Successor to Namco × Capcom, features Kogoro Tenzai and Mii Kouryuji, as well as the originals from the latter game and a couple originals from Super Robot Wars and the Endless Frontier spinoff.
• The Super Smash Bros. series has a few:
  • Master Hand and Crazy Hand, most of the bosses, and the Fighting Polygons/Wire Frames/Alloys. Also of note, Master Hand crossed over into the Kirby games and gives Kirby his Smash Bros. Move set when copied.
  • While Giga Bowser is still technically Bowser, this extra-bestial form is unique to the Super Smash Bros. games, to the point where his series icon in Melee is the Smash Bros. insignia^note Master Hand, Crazy Hand, and the Wire Frames being the only others with this distinction and his spirit in Ultimate is listed under the Smash Bros. series while all the other Bowser spirits are labeled under the Mario series.
  • Super Smash Bros. Brawl: The story mode includes several examples of this:
    • The antagonists primarily consist of the all-original Subspace Army with its leader Tabuu. Notably, most of the playable characters are still entirely crossovers. (Although some receive traits unique to Smash Bros, like Mr. Game & Watch, who does not exist in his games. Instead, he is a Composite Character of all the Game & Watch handheld games. He is also the source of the aforementioned Subspace Army.)
    • The Subspace Emissary also has the Ancient Minister, who's actually a subversion. He's really R.O.B. And then double subverted, as R.O.B.'s characterization is unique for Smash.
    • Two other bosses from the Subspace Emissary, Galleom and Duon, are entirely original, although Duon's design at least was clearly inspired by Dialga and Palkia from Pokémon Diamond and Pearl.
  • While the Mii Fighters are based off the Miis, they are considered original to Smash and thus use the Smash icon as their series logo, compared to stages and music from various Mii games which use the Mii logo instead.
  • The fourth installment introduces Master Core, the final Boss of the game's single player mode, which is spawned from Master Hand.
  • Super Smash Bros. Ultimate has an Adventure Mode, "World of Light", with a new antagonist, Galeem, being the main threat. Later on, another enemy, Dharkon, appears as The Rival to Galeem, forming a Big Bad Ensemble.
• Tales Series has the crossover series Tales of the World: Narikiri Dungeon. The first crossover game, Narikiri Dungeon 2 on the Game Boy Color, had Mel and Dio, an entirely too cute matched set of silver-haired chibis with the ability to dress up as classes or monsters. When the series made the jump to the GBA, the new protagonists were given the ability to assume generic classes... or to go the whole way and become the other characters they were fighting alongside. These also included villains, spirits, and cameos like Wada Don and Mr. Driller. Oddly, Pac-Man has not been a costume yet.
  • And with the Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology series, the three Kanonnos and the three flying creatures (Mormo, Paneer, and Rockspring), among other original characters.
• Marvel Comics games tend to include these. Not counting Marvel vs. Capcom examples, listed above:
  • Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects has half the cast as originals, the title Imperfects, who were also intended to become Canon Immigrants. They didn't work out so well.
  • Marvel: Contest of Champions has had several: All-new characters include Guillotine, a Frenchwoman weilding a cursed sword (who ended up becoming a Canon Immigrant) and her later successor Guillotine 2099; Morningstar, and ancient undead queen; Purgatory, an alternate Morningstar corrupted by Guillotine's sword; Ægon, a gladiator who led a slave revolt; and Chee'ilth, a Native American woman aided by eagle and bear spirits. There are also new takes on existing characters and concepts, including Civil Warrior, a Captain America who had a Pyrrhic Victory in Civil War; King Groot, who never met Rocket Raccoon and became an Evil Overlord; symbiote-corrupted versions of Doctor Strange (Symbiote Supreme) and Howard the Duck (Venom the Duck); and the Overseer, a younger not-yet-insane version of the Hulk's "Maestro" future self.
  • Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 follows the rough plot of Civil War but eventually split offs into an original storyline when the nanites go rogue, creating a new villainous, viral Hive Mind intelligence known as the Fold. An evil cyborg Nick Fury being the closest thing the infection has for a figurehead effectively means they're more of an Original Generation concept.
  • For Captain America's 75th anniversary, all of Marvel's mobile titles debuted new alternate-universe versions of Cap.
    • Marvel Puzzle Quest, where Steve was assassinated and Peggy Carter became Captain America in his place. "Captain Carter" became popular enough to become a Canon Immigrant, appearing in both the comics and the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
    • In Marvel Future Fight, Steve never became a Fish out of Temporal Water and got to settle down with Peggy, and their daughter Sharon took up the mantle.
    • Marvel: Contest of Champions, as stated above, had a world where Civil War (2006) conflict escalated and Iron Man lost the war and his life, and Cap adopts his armor technology in guilt and becomes the Civil Warrior.
    • Marvel: Avengers Alliance had Knight America, a medieval-knight themed version from a "Second Dark Age" caused by a nuclear apocalypse, and Avengers Alliance 2 had Captain America 1901, a member of Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders.
  • Future Fight later debuted more original heroes; Luna Snow, a K-Pop Idol Singer with ice powers; Crescent, a martial artist Kid Hero who can summon a spirit bear named Io; and the Warriors of the Sky — Blue Dragon, War Tiger, Shadow Shell, and Sun Bird — a Multinational Team (specifically from various Asian countries) themed around The Four Gods. Luna Snow and Crescent became Canon Immigrants, joining the 2019 Asian-hero version of the Agents of Atlas, and Luna returned to games in Marvel Rivals.
  • Marvel Strike Force has Kestrel, a founder of S.T.R.I.K.E. who had gotten lost in the multiverse before finally making her way home and joining the rest of the heroes; Deathpool, the daughter of Deadpool and Death; Spider-Weaver, a spider-themed Najavo mystic; and Vahl, last of the Asgardians in their^note can be either gender thanks to alternate skins universe.
  • Midnight Suns features a new hero called the Hunter, a Hunter of Monsters and child of the demon Lilith. They're a way to involve Character Customization in what would otherwise be a team of pre-established Avengers.
• Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe has Dark Kahn, a Greater-Scope Villain who could only be created due to the crossover, being the result of Darkseid and Shao Kahn being struck down by Superman and Raiden respectively as they were going to escape into dimensional portals while the universes were separate. All this happening at the exact same spot in time and space, thus merging them and the two universes.
• Dengeki Gakuen RPG: Cross of Venus has a rare case of an unnamed original protagonist (and his (named) classmate), tying the various light novel series taken from the Dengeki magazine (including Shakugan no Shana, Bludgeoning Angel Dokurochan, Toradora!, Kino's Journey, A Certain Magical Index and Haruka Nogizaka's Secret among others) by forming a rag-tag party with their heroines in order to battle the Big Bad's Canon Defilement.
• Ruru and Nowel from Magical Battle Arena, a doujin 3D battle game featuring the Magical Girls and female mages from Lyrical Nanoha, Cardcaptor Sakura, Slayers, and Magical Circle Guru-Guru. Kirara and Sarara are somewhere in between, coming from Magical Girl Kirara And Sarara, an H-game that's related to this.
• The Nicktoons Unite! series has the Wise Old Crab as a rare case of a supporting original character (all of the playable characters are crossovers) and the Mawgu and Globulous Maximus as Big Bads (the other villains in the series are crossovers).
• Takumi and Haruna of the Shin'i Organization and villainess Kuu in Battle Moon Wars.
• The DS version of Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games has the Snow Spirits as a rare case of MacGuffin original characters. No such things are present in the Wii version.
• .hack//Link features characters from many previous entries in the series (Kite, Pi, Haseo, Midori, Albreio and so on) due to the fact that this is a 3rd version of the The World. The main character and villains however are entirely new.
• SD Gundam G Generation has a variety of original units which are Mobile Suit Variations (Prototypes which are handwaved to not exist in the anime). But the most prominent one is the Phoenix series of mobile suits which the Phoenix Gundam is said to be the strongest Gundam even in comparison to ∀ Gundam. Along with that is a set of original pilots which either is just meant to be filler or is part of a side story plot.
  • G Generation Wars play with this trope. You won't even aware of its existence until you unlock an EX mission, and it only appear in last two missions. Yet it turn out that events in the game was controlled by Generation System super computer.
  • And the Gundam Vs Series gives us the two Extreme Gundams, the pilot of one of which is voiced by GACKT.
• Dissidia Final Fantasy has Cosmos as the Big Good and the guiding force driving the heroes to defeat Chaos. Chaos himself sorta counts as this too, as he's from Final Fantasy originally, but has been reinvented to the point the only real similarities between his original incarnation and his Dissidia incarnation is their physical appearances and name. The Final Fantasy I Chaos was a generic demon One-Winged Angel transformation for Garland—Dissidia's Chaos is a Physical God and the Greater-Scope Villain to all previous Big Bads. Note that it's still implied that he is in fact the Chaos from Final Fantasy seeing as rigorous time-and-dimension travel is explained to come into play through the reports in 012. Garland says that he and Chaos are the same thing in a cutsceen anyway. Despite Garland being The Dragon to Chaos in this game.
  • The Warrior of Light from Dissidia and other Final Fantasy crossovers, who represents the original Final Fantasy I, is based on the main Fighter class from the original Final Fantasy. Much like Chaos, the Warrior was reinvented so heavily he's a new character with the original name.
• While he's arguably an Expy of St. Germain, newcomer Aeon is responsible for the events of Castlevania: Judgment.
• The Mario Golf and Mario Tennis series included original characters in the Nintendo 64 version of Mario Golf, the Game Boy Color versions of Mario Golf and Mario Tennis, and Mario Golf: Advance Tour and Mario Tennis: Power Tour on Game Boy Advance. This allows players to have a decent selection of characters to choose between in the former, and enough rivals, opponents, as well as as Playable OC Stand Ins in the latter four. Both GBC games can transfer their playable characters and their stats to their respective N64 versions, and the GBA and GC golf games follow in their footsteps.
• The Compati Hero Series, a Banpresto video game series which crossed Super-Deformed versions of Ultraman, Kamen Rider and Gundam, introduced a fourth hero in The Great Battle action game series called Fighter Roar. Roar is not a hero from any previous franchise, but a new character meant to represent Banpresto.
• The Parodius games have always had a greater or lesser number of Konami charaters in their player character roster. In the initial games the only character unique to the series was the octopus known as Takosuke in later games, but from Gokujou Parodius onward the number of original characters, not counting Expys and Palette Swaps, grew steadily larger.
• Rockman Xover, an iOS social game developed to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Rockman franchise, centers around a new Rockman named Over-1 who must rescue the other seven Rockman heroes.
• Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed has a small example, one of the secret characters is a living Dreamcast VMU that morphs into vehicles from Sega's games.
• Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey has the heroine, the pixie, the Bogs, and the Big Bad, Zara.
• Age of Mythology is a RTS game with the premise being a Crossover Cosmology between Greek, Egyptian and Norse mythology (the Definitive Edition also adds the Chinese, however those are made by another developer). The main playable character and protagonist is Arkantos, who is completely made up by the game's developers. Granted, he originates from Atlantis - a fictional ancient civilization which doesn't really exist in the real world history. The Atlanteans themselves also qualify - while they have some traits accurate to Plato's texts, when Atlantis was made playable in the first expansion pack, it's depicted as having many fantasy aesthetics made up the game's developers. Gladiators make up their human army units, they have mirror towers which fire solar beams, robot automatons, clay golems, llama trade caravans alongside Mesoamerican architecture, Greek Fire, Orichalcum, Electric Jellyfish, and other ahistorical oddities which clash with the other four playable cultures which exist(ed) in real life.
• SMITE is a Crossover Cosmology MOBA which features various mythological deities, heroes and monsters battling each other. Celebrating the game's 10 year anniversary in 2023, the developers released Martichoras who is a playable version of the ingame manticore Mooks. This basically is an Ascended Meme of the fan community joking about having a playable manticore god after this April Fools' Day video in 2016 gained over 2 million views. Going by Word of God, he's meant to represent the original manticore encountered and described by the Greek author Ctesias when travelling to India. However so much of Martichoras' ingame lore is made up by the developers, that he practically is an original character. While he is presented as their king (due to being the oldest and strongest), in actuality there were no named individual manticores ever in any recorded myth, let alone the species ever having a king.
• Persona:
  • The Updated Re-release of Persona 4: Arena, Persona 4: Arena Ultimax features the new character Sho Minazuki, who is the supposed Big Bad of the game, and can be selected with or without a Persona.
  • In Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth, despite most of the cast being from Persona 3 and Persona 4, Zen and Rei are brand new characters who debuted in Q.
  • Persona Q2: New Cinema Labyrinth features three new characters: Hikari, Nagi, and Doe.
• Dynasty Warriors and its offshoots:
  • Hyrule Warriors, a crossover spinoff with The Legend of Zelda, has multiple characters from the Zelda series who are either playable or appear as bosses (or both). However, there are also a few original characters. One is Cia, the primary villain, a sorceress with a Villainous Crush on Link. She's supported by Wizzro, an evil ring that was reborn into a sorcerer of darkness (inspired by Zelda baddy Wizzrobe), and Volga, a Blood Knight who sold his soul to Cia in order to gain power (inspired by Volvagia, the dragon boss from Zelda II: The Adventure of Link). Also, on the side of the heroes, there's the Cute Witch Lana, who has some history with Cia. The Legends port adds an additional original character, a Distaff Counterpart of Link named Linkle.
  • The Fire Emblem crossover Fire Emblem Warriors has its own original characters: the main characters and heirs to the throne of Aytolis, Rowan and Lianna, their mother and current queen, Yelena, the king and prince of the Gristonne kingdom, Oskar and Darios, and the game's main threat, the Chaos Dragon Velezark. Only Rowan and Lianna are fully playable warriors, though Darios is a reoccurring NPC and Velezark is the Final Boss.
  • Warriors Orochi, a crossover between Dynasty Warriors and its sister series, Samurai Warriors, has a lot of its own new characters, the most notable of which being the titular Big Bad of the series, Orochi. Beyond him and his different forms are literal dozens of other characters based on various mythologies, from Nuwa and Fu Xi^notewho originally debuted in Dynasty Warriors 3 before being wiped from the main series forever, presumably out of not wanting to stray too far from the source material all the way to Odin and Loki.
  • Warriors All-Stars, alongside its many characters from across Koei Tecmo's history, has three anthropomorphic characters named Tamaki, Shiki and Setsuna, whose ambitions to each seize the royal throne are what form the game's plot.
• Fighters Megamix has Deku the anthropomorphic Mexican jumping bean(!), Sibe, URA Bahn, a fighting chunk of meat on the bone, and the AM2 palm tree amidst its roster of characters hailing from Virtua Fighter, Fighting Vipers, Sonic the Fighters, Virtua Cop, Rent A Hero, and even Daytona USA.
• JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: The 7th Stand User has several, including the protagonist and an all-new group of antagonistic Stand users known as the Slaves To Fate. Additionally, the game includes a secondary route starting where the protagonist is attacked by J. Geil instead of Abdul and reunites at the fight against Judgment. This route features a cast of all-new characters, with the exception of Hol Horse, as well as Stroheim and Speedwagon if you managed to find them earlier.
• The one unifying character throughout the entire Dark Parables series is the Fairy Tale Detective, the player character, who must interact with the legendary characters of classic fairy tales and help them fix whatever is preventing them from reaching their Happily Ever After. There are also a handful of original characters among the fairy tale cast, but these are usually connected to the traditional stories in one way or another.
• Yo-kai Watch mainly uses actual Japanese youkai, however many are original characters. This is most obvious in the third game, where many of the "American yokai" are influenced by other material or are based on Eagle Land stereotypes.
• The crossover game LEGO Dimensions gives us Lord Vortech, whose goal is to smash together the various LEGO universes to create his vision of a "perfect" world. We also get his former assistant X-PO and their homeworld Vorton, which contains portals to all the licensed universes.
  • There's also "Gamer Kid" who is original to the game's Midway Arcade world.
  • The game also features several alternate rebuild versions of existing fictional tools, weapons and vehicles such as the Laser-Pulse TARDIS and Proton Zapper (rebuilt from the Ghostbusters' Ghost Trap) that make use of the fact they are built from LEGO and thus can have their structures rearranged.
• Heroes of the Storm makes up entirely new characters as heroes to represent fan-favourite units from Blizzard's real-time strategy franchises. As of late 2018, they also started adding "Nexus-born" heroes that are Original Generation for Blizzard as a whole, the two which were added to the hero roster being Orphea and Qhira.
• Fire Emblem Heroes gives us Alfonse and Sharena on the heroes' side, as well as a new incarnation of Legacy Character Anna. On the villains' side, we have Veronica (who was even voted to have a Brave Hero variation), the Mysterious Man (real name Bruno), and a mysterious woman -a Goddess- named Loki. Book II introduces the Ice Kingdom Nifl, featuring Fjorm, Gunnthrá, Yglr, and Hríd as allies, and the Fire Kingdom of Múspell, featuring Surtr, Laegjam, and Laevatein as its royalty, as well as Helbindi and the aforementioned Loki, as the antagonists. Before the end of Book II, all of them became playable in various intervals. Likewise, Book III introduces Eir (who is a new playable Mythical hero), and her adoptive mother Hel as the royals of the Realm of The Dead, and Lif (a Bad Future version of Alfonse who lost his Sharena) and Thrasir (a similar version of Veronica) as her generals (which eventually became Mythical Heroes). In Xenologue 5 (set between Books III and IV), Loki's fellow goddess, Thórr, is introduced as the Goddess of War and a prominent antagonist in modes such as Røkrr Sieges, Hall of Forms and Mjölnir's Strike, before becoming a Mythic Hero at the end of Book V. Book IV then introduces Peony, the Ljósálfar as its first Mythic Hero, her fellow Ljósálfar Mirabilis, and Freyr, Queen of Ljósálfheimr as allies; and Plumeria, Tiandra and Freja, Queen of the Dökkálfheimr as antagonists. Book V sees the apperances of Reginn, princess of Niðavellir as the respective first Mythic Hero, her stepbrothers Fafnir and Otr as initial antagonists, and Eitri as the true antagonist; as well as princesses Dagr and Nott as initial antagonists and later Mythical Heroes. Between Books V and VI, Nifl and Múspell, deities from their eponymus kingdoms, are properly introduced as new Heroes. And now, Book VI welcomes Ash, retainer of Askr as the first Mythic Hero; and leader of the Curse Directive Letzia from the royal family of Embla and Elm, retainer of Goddess Embla as antagonists. As with Nifl and Múspell, deities Askr and Embla from their respective kingdoms became Mythical Heroes before the end of Book VI.
• World of Final Fantasy has new heroes Lann and Reynn, cute animal sidekick Tama, mysterious deity Enna Kros, and villains the Bahamutian Federation interacting with classic characters, monsters and settings from across the Final Fantasy series.
• Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle has Beep-O, the avatar of the Supa-Merge headset, which is fused to a Rabbid (whom Bowser Jr. names "Spawny").
• Tokyo Mirage Sessions ♯FE has EVERYONE who isn't a Mirage be original to the game. Even the shopkeeper who only looks a lot like Anna but isn't really her.
• In Sailor Moon: Another Story, the sailors are up against the first three seasons of bad guys. The enemies are being resurrected by the Opposito Senshi, dark counterparts to the Inner Team, and their queen Apsu.
• Kirara Fantasia introduces several original generation characters to assist the Manga Time Kirara heroines, most prominently the witch Kirara. All of the playable characters remain Kirara imports, though.
• The console and Nintendo DS versions of Power Rangers: Super Legends both feature a character created for the game who never appeared in any of the Power Rangers shows. The character exclusive to the console version is the Future Omega Ranger, while the character exclusive to the DS version is the Guardian of the Hall of Legends.
• Final Fantasy XI's final expansion Rhapsodies of Vana'diel is instigated by the arrival of Iroha, a sorceress claiming to be the Player Character's apprentice from a doomed timeline. She and the player then avert the apocalypse in a story that has cameos from nearly every other major character.
• The majority of the teams in Mutant Football League are thorough parodies of real NFL teams, from their cities to their colors to their rosters, like the Scarolina Panzers/Carolina Panthers or Killadelphia Evils/Philadelphia Eagles. A handful, however, are completely original, namely the agile playmaking all-alien Galaxy Chaos, pass-happy all-robot Tokyo Terminators, the brutal (very nearly) all-orc Orcs of Hazzard, and the best team in the game, the Full Metal Mayhem.
• Funko Pop! Blitz is primarily a crossover game due to the nature of the line it is based on, but there are a few cases of original franchises characters:
  • Freddy Funko is the mascot of the Funko company. He is given multiple variants as additions in the game, and is also the tutorial character.
  • The Fantastik Plastik characters are pre-Pop Funko characters that were given Pop designs.
  • The Wetmore Forest characters are part of the unique Funko Pop! Monsters subline.
  • The Pets are part of the unique Funko Pop! Pets subline.
  • The Peppermint Lane characters are from Funko's original line of Christmas Pops.
  • The Pop! Around the World series is from a Funko-exclusive brand of characters.
• While Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled pools the vast majority of its roster from the greater Crash Bandicoot series, the Grand Prix events also add baby versions of Crash and Coco, and the brand-new King Chicken and Hasty (who is based on an old misconception regarding a "scrapped" Team Racing character).
• Call of Duty: Mobile crosses over different characters from the franchise, particularly Modern Warfare Trilogy and the Black Ops series. However, there are also new characters created exclusively for the game, as well as changes of backstory to the older characters to fit the game's narrative.
• Namco High: All of the romanceable characters are Namco (and Homestuck) property, with one exception: Cousin, the player character. In-universe, they are one of the cousins of the Prince from Katamari Damacy. They do not exist in the Katamari games and were created purely for the crossover.
• Friday the 13th: The Game had Temporary Online Content based on a concept by Tom Savini: what if Jason Voorhess Escaped from Hell after going there instead of being revived by Freddy Krueger? Also, since Jason's mask never came off in Jason's Dead or when he was in Uber-Jason form, the game designed unmasked looks for those versions.
  • Similarly, Evil Dead: The Game had a skin designed by Savini for Ash Williams based on the idea of Ash, instead of winding up in the Middle Ages, being transported to the dimension where evil itself came from, being physically warped by the corruption there.
• Warner Bros.' crossover platform fighter MultiVersus has Reindog, a Mix-and-Match Critter that was a royal guard for a kingdom destroyed by The Nothing during its initial expansion into the WB Multiverse.
• Almost all the racers in Walt Disney World Quest: Magical Racing Tour. Disney only allowed the developers to use Chip 'n Dale and Jiminy Cricket, forcing the developers to fill out the roster with ten new characters inspired by the park's attractions.
• To represent Tetris, Puyo Puyo Tetris introduced the crew of the S.S. Tetra, its members based on the seven Tetriminos. There's also Ex, who represents the crossover of both franchises yet is tied closely to the Tetris representatives in backstory. The sequel introduced Marle and Squares, both of whom share design aesthetics of the Falling Blocks of both series.
• Gundam: The Battle Master zigs-zags this, as while all of the mobile suits are ripped directly from the many anime series released up to the game's release, the pilots are all original characters co-existing in a pocket timeline not connected to any pre-established Gundam lore, such as the orphan bounty hunter Honey-B (pilots the ZZ Gundam), the no-nonsense federation officer Mercury Promenade (pilots the Zeta Gundam or RX-78), or the Ryu-parody Keiji Date (pilots the Hamma-Hamma or Nu Gundam). It's completely played straight with the Psycho Gundam Mk-III, which has yet to make a reappearance in any other Gundam media, made even more awkward as her pilot is the scorned woman Maria Nichols, who hijacked the Mobile Suit out of revenge. Needless to say, when The Battle Master 2 was brought over to the west as Battle Assault, they had to jump through a lot of hoops to justify its existence there, as all of the original cast members were scrapped in favor of using the official anime characters.
• The Japanese-exclusive Tatsunoko Fight crosses over four of Tatsunoko Production's properties (Science Ninja Team Gatchaman, Neo Human Casshern, Tekkaman, and Hurricane Polymar), as well an original property dubbed Denkou Senka Volter that hadn't existed before or after the game's release. There's also the main antagonist of Rosraisen, who isn't a part of Volter despite this fact.

Western Animation

• Princess Lana and Kevin of Captain N: The Game Master serve two purposes. Princess Lana's storyline exists to create a single universe for all the crossovers to take place in along with a central plotline for the series to follow. Kevin exists to make sure that A) none of the other franchise characters is the star (which could piss off a licensee) and B) there was someone to appeal to the target audience of game-buying kids. Normally, he would also be there to ensure nobody's character got derailed, but, well...
• (The Villain Whose Name Isn't) Shirley was literally created (in the most literal case of Create Your Own Villain ever) in the third The Jimmy Timmy Power Hour.
• Reptil from The Super Hero Squad Show, who later immigrated to the mainstream Marvel universe.
• Similar to Reptil, Evan Daniels/Spyke and Kaldur/Aqualad in their respective shows are series original characters, both with a number of similarities. They're both African Americans with blond hair, that were indirectly brought into the comics later but received vocal hatred from sections of the fanbase for reasons other than being series original. And, before all of them, Firestar in Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, created because they couldn't get the copyright to use Johnny Storm.
• The Warrior King was a character created for a Cross Through event that spanned all four shows in USA Network's "Xtreme Action Team" Saturday morning block: Street Fighter, The Savage Dragon, Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm and Wing Commander.
• When Rankin/Bass Productions welded several of its Christmas Specials to create Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July they wound up creating several new characters. Most notable is a Big Bad named Winterbolt, a wizard who ruled the North Pole before Santa arrived. He worked with two lesser villains, a Jerkass businessman and an Evil Counterpart for Rudolph who had not actually existed in his previous specials.
• While Pibby is a Crisis Crossover between numerous Cartoon Network properties, the main characters (the titular Pibby, Alloy Boy, and Melira) were all created for the show.

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