I remember RFN's theory of a decided list that was already in place, and the characters with the most votes on that list would be chosen. I'll take that one step further, there was no list. Nintendo already knew who they were putting in next. Although I'm sure these characters got a ton of votes, especially Roy, It's hard for me to believe that Ryu was the second or first popular pick by fans. I don't care much for street fighter, and the only other fire emblem character I wanted was chrom. That being said, I'd be curious to see the actual poll numbers. The reason I think Ryu was being made before polls were even open, is because Nintendo would have needed the rights before they even started creating that character, and with Capcom being stupid these days, I don't think that was easy to do, and it probably took time.