Not content to enjoy the Super Smash Bros. Brawl experience with a mere cast of available characters, a group of fans out there have hacked a bunch of the game's character textures to "add" new playable characters based on old favorites.  Thrill as Sonic the Hedgehog is replaced by his rival Shadow, Mario becomes the twisted Shadow Mario, and Samus Aran takes on the guise of her many Metroid Prime forms.

This project is all about paying homage to the video game characters that have inspired and enthralled us for generations. I’ll never forget the first time I transformed into Fierce Deity*, or unlocked the coveted Black Yoshi. We give our heart-filled thanks to the creative geniuses who thought up these characters and breathed life into them, as they changed our lives forever.

To honor these various characters, we have begun a project replacing two costumes of each character of smash with a new one. Sometimes it’s a creative color change, sometimes it’s a completely new character.

It's nice to see that even in today's modern era of vast amounts of system memory and comparatively large storage capacity that there is still a place in our hearts and our consoles for the time honored tradition of palette swaps.   

* That must have hurt!

(via Wii Fanboy)