It was a surprise when Nintendo announced that Namco Bandai would contribute to the development of the next Smash Bros. game on the 3DS and the Wii U. Katsuhiro Harada, a producer of the Tekken series, has explained that:

I think Nintendo chose us just because Smash Brothers is a fighting game. We have over 17 years of continuously developing titles in our franchise [Tekken], I think they felt we were a choice for that.

And, more interestingly:

Also, we’ve continually developed a very good relationship with Nintendo. Maybe not necessarily in the public spotlight but kind of behind the scenes. We have established a very good working relationship with them. Not just Nintendo, but as a company, we have a very good relationship with Sakurai-san at Sora as well. I think that we are in very good position to make a great game for the Smash Brothers series.

I wonder if this means we’ll see more collaborations in the future.