The first characters

[SamiAmiaM]

Aha, so you do start with peach! And, today it was sort of announced that in the subspace emissary, you pretty much have to unlock every single character, except maybe mario and kirby.

That seems about right. Kirby and Mario get seperated. Kirby saves a princess who in turn helps him. Pit saves Mario from eminent doom. The two groups fight towards the ancient minister picking up more assisting characters along the way. But still a lot of the characters will most likely be unlocked before you see them in adventure.