Well, there is some good news about this game now. While still DLC characters, Blake and Yang are now explicitly called "Free DLC character(s)", so at least they are not locked behind a paywall.
Honestly, I kinda like that they're free DLC. it means that if you have no intention of ever picking that character up you don't have to. It can save you some frustration when fighting CPU's (fuck those Ness CPU's and damn them too)