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Ngamer's Initial 2008 Contest Impressions

Ngamer64 | Posted 8/21/2008 7:06:43 PM | message detail
I know, I know, there are 100 of these topics, so why should you pay attention to mine? Well, no need to- but I haven't looked at this new bracket at all yet, and want someplace to writedown my initial gut reactions, so I'll be able to look back on them later and see where I led myself astray. So, follow along if you'd like!

Before we start, here are the two other tabs I'm going to have open as I make my comments. Perhaps you would like to have them open as well, to follow along.

http://www.thengamer.com/xstats/ranks.php?year=2007c

http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Category:2007_Contest_Matches


GameFAQs Contest season is my favorite time of the year... but will this be a bracket worth getting overly excited about? Let's find out!
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Seventh verse, same as the sixth. 128 characters. 4 characters battle, 2 move on.

Well now, I can't say I'm especially surprised. As soon as we started digging into that nomination form and discovered that SB had entered 183 characters to the suggested list automatically, I was pretty much convinced we would be seeing another 128 character bracket of some kind. Then when he expanded the field even further, I became pretty much positive that he was going to add a new "twist" in the form of Tag Team matches- so Link would be paired up with the 128th character in, Cloud with the 127th, and so forth. In the face of THAT, a return to 4-ways isn't really so awful.

While I agree with the Stats consensus that 4-ways were a fun one-time gimmick that we didn't need to see again, eh, I still understand where SB is coming from. What characters really needed was some time off, which was why I pushed so hard for the Game Contest. But as is, we're going to have another year where the stats don't matter, then the Game Contest, then 1v1 Characters in the late Summer of '09... and THAT should be pretty interesting, since the last reliable set of numbers we'll be able to use will be those from way back in 2006! So in other words even if this Contest ends up being kind of a dud, I think then next two should be really good, so I can't fault SB too much.

The logo.

Ha, that's kind of cool. When CBVII was announced, some people in Stats were joking about how that must have been a sign that it would be FF7's big year... SB was clearly thinking along the same lines! I wonder how much such a biased opening logo will affect people predictions. Could certainly see something so nostalgic causing some people to pick Cloud to go farther than they would normally. Or what if variations of the FF7 theme remain the logo throughout the entire voting process? Could certainly subtly affect the way people vote... and with Square already being such a force in the 4-way format, this could be a heck of a season for them!

Pick the first and second place characters who will move on from each day's poll in order of finish.

Ah, there we go! You can accuse SB of a lack of creativity if you'd like, but at least the man learns from his mistakes, and he's already gone ahead and corrected his biggest one of '07 right off the bat. The stats showed that right around half of last season's predictors had no idea that order mattered, and that a further 10% or so picked as though it was just 1v1s with Player 1 fighting Player 2, and Player 3 fighting #4! And now I've moved ahead and see that he's even clarified the rule right on the bracket page, in bright yellow highlighting. Excellent work SB!

Also, if you don't recognize someone, hover your mouse over their name to see a brief description.

Ahh, very nicely done. I believe he set it up the same way back in '07, but in any case, it's a nice touch and very helpful.
TheArkOfTurus | Posted 8/21/2008 7:07:15 PM | message detail
Tag.
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Our eyes were removed
For our own safety. 3823-8286-6059
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/21/2008 7:07:38 PM | message detail
Division One

Jade Curtiss? Oh, you have GOT to be kidding me! When are people going to finally learn to stop wasting space on Tales characters? Jade proved himself to be one of the weakest characters in Contest HISTORY last season, finishing dead last in probably the weakest 4-pack of the whole season, as well as dead last in the overall X-stats. There's absolutely no excuse for bringing a character back after that. Zack I'm happy to see here- although I'm pretty sure he's going to bomb Balthier-style, he at least has some of the better potential of any newcomer. It's unfortunate, though, that Wario gets the free win due to Cecil LFFing strength away from Zack.

Pick: Wario > Zack

Oh good heavens, more Tales fodder? I realize you're going to see some tremendous weakness in a 4-pack opposite Link, but Agent J and Bidoof were at least funny fodder. As to the battle for second place, well... I don't think it will be much of a battle. Yes, Sonic Team sucks in 4 ways while Square is strong, but after the way Zidane fumbled away a perfect opportunity in that Ness/Liquid Snake/Alcuard fiasco, I'm putting 0 faith in him. I guess he'll have a chance at least since Link will hurt Shadow more than him... but it's not what I'd call a fighter's chance.

Pick: Link > Shadow

Hmmm, this is pretty interesting. Marth has been used as the poster boy for what strength being in Melee alone will grant a character, and honestly even putting FE aside, SSB should be enough to win this pack for him. Duke surprised me with that upset of Freeman last year, but lived up to his billing by collapsing once the opposition got tougher, so I think Kefka should be able to edge him. That leaves Niko... normally I'm extremely disrespectful to GTA and especially its characters, but Niko actually seems fairly well-liked, and this certainly sets us up for an epic Day/Night vote swing, like the one Marcus pulled on Kefka last time. Hm... I'm going to back Kefka here, but with very little confidence.

Pick: Marth > Kefka

Hey hey, that Guru rally sure paid off! Altair not only makes the cut, but earns a very winnable position. With no one else to hurt his Brawl appeal and being a Pokemon and all, Lucario seems a safe bet for #1, and Guybrush is of course some of the weakest fodder the Contests have ever seen. Which leaves quite a battle for second- sure Isaac looked like junk last year, but he was fighting two RPG characters and getting GameBoy SFFed by Pikachu, so does that really tell us anything? Well I guess it at least tells us that he's capable of being hurt by a Pokemon, so with that in mind I'm going to back Altair for the moment. At the very least he's going to have a good match pic and stand out from the Nintendo competition- could be a recipe for a Kratos-like solid performance.

Pick: Lucario > Altair

R2 and following

Well now, this is really something. Shadow > Wario was of course one of the many bracket-busting upsets of 2003, but Wario's had a bunch of new games since then + Brawl while Shadow has only disappointed. And then there's how bad Sonic is in 4 ways... but of course Link is going to be holding Wario way down; and what if he also holds down Shadow enough for the one stand-out character, Zack, to overperform? Wow, this is a really good one. I think I'm going to count on Wario's ugly showing against Fox and Meta Knight to be an indication of how badly Nintendo can hurt him and take Shadow here, but again I don't have much confidence.

Pick: Link > Shadow
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/21/2008 7:07:52 PM | message detail
Another solid 4-pack right here. It's one of those where the top two players shouldn't be too debatable, but where they hurt each other enough that it suddenly becomes anyone's ballgame. We saw Marth fold somewhat under pressure from Donkey Kong last season, so I think that combined with Lucario's Pokemon appeal should be enough to earn him a tight win. But from there... yikes, even as badly as he has disappointed in the past, it's hard to count Kefka out. But he's burned me too many times to put much faith in him, so I think I'm going with Marth in the second spot for right now, though I could see this being one of those where every character is right near the 25% mark.

Pick: Lucario > Marth


Oh jeez... if this is really The King of Nintendo/SSB SFF in a 4 pack with Lucario and Marth, who's to say Shadow won't have a chance of sneaking out a tight victory? I've got to imagine Link hurts Marth the most of anyone, so I'm going to count him out, but between Shadow and an LFFed Lucario... wow, have to back Lucario for his Pokemon audience right now, but I could certainly be changing this decision before brackets go final.

Pick: Link > Lucario

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/21/2008 7:08:59 PM | message detail
Whoa, tagged already?

Well got to do some work stuff, but I'll be back pretty quick to start on Div 2.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
trannyscience | Posted 8/21/2008 7:11:09 PM | message detail
spoilin' the analysis crew debut here!
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xyzzy
TyphlosionIsMe | Posted 8/21/2008 7:15:18 PM | message detail
tag

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Arrrr the SS Goku, Mighty fine boat... -fatmatt
Hope Frieza doesn't chuck an Iceberg at the Goku, otherwise it's all over. -Nekoslash
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/21/2008 7:16:26 PM | message detail
Eh, these are just some basic thoughts on who's going to win. My Crew writeups will be focused more towards my Oracle thoughts- not WHO will win so much as HOW MUCH each character will be getting. More stat-based and less gut reaction, you could say.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Undeniable | Posted 8/21/2008 7:19:17 PM | message detail
Tag
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" Let history decide if my actions were good or bad. For now we must simply forge ahead!" - Albert Simon
HeroicTronBonne | Posted 8/21/2008 7:21:40 PM | message detail
Tag, this outta be a good read
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The Straight Up G
WWEGSB Hardcore Legend and Board 8er Masa/Hiko
Lady Ashe | Posted 8/21/2008 7:23:46 PM | message detail
Good stuff, though I'm slightly annoyed by your use of the term "LFF". Cecil and Zack are SFFing each other, damnit!
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IceStormV2 | Posted 8/21/2008 7:28:51 PM | message detail
tag
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Nana Climber's Number 1 Fan.
"IceStorm... YOU ARE A GOD!!!" -Too many people to count
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/21/2008 7:38:14 PM | message detail
Division Two

Aw shoot, what bad placement for Sho. You have to figure if anyone would be poison to a TWEWY character, it would have to be someone more well-known from Kingdom Hearts. On the plus side, we have almost no reading on Roxas thanks to how he and Riku held each other back last year... Square looked good in 4 ways and Sora at least was very impressive, so I think I'd be backing Rox for the upset here if Sho wasn't in the mix. As is I'm going to have to side with L Snake, but with the way that guy collapses against decent competition I don't have huge confidence.

Pick: Luigi > Liquid Snake

Honestly now, why can Bowser never escape these Nintendo LFF situations? At least there's no Ryu in the mix this time to make a fool of him. I really like that Geno made it, and would love to see if his combined Square and Nintendo appeal would have been enough to launch him past Phoenix in a 1v1 setting. As is he'll get crushed by a strong Mario RPG party member- what a shame. As for Deckard, I guess D3 hype was enough to win over the nominators, but I don't see it winning many voters; he's pretty clearly out of his league here.

Pick: Bowser > Phoenix

Wowza! Such a cool matchup here... of course I'd back Zelda over Knux pretty easily in a 1v1, but after how bad she looked in that opening 4 way with Vincent, and with Mario in the poll to potentially hold her back? On the other hand, have we ever seen something Mario SFF something Zelda to any noticeable degree? And Fei should of course come out of this Nintendo LFF-fest smelling like roses, though contending for 2nd doesn't seem too reasonable. I think I'll back Knux here despite Sonic's 4 way failures of the past, but ZeldaFEAR could have me going back on this decision pretty quick.

Pick: Mario > Knuckles

Haha, MMX made the bracket after all! I knew SB was going to make it possible after he included him in the form, but all the rallies for X I saw died off fairly quick, so I wasn't sure he'd be able to survive the cut. In any case he won't need to perform like MM to win this weak group- and likewise, Mudkip shouldn't need too much help from 4chan to finish second. I mean come on, Lloyd couldn't even best HK-47 last season, and will only have weakened since then; why nominators continue to plague us with these Tales characters I'll never understand.

Pick: MMX > Mudkip

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/21/2008 8:20:38 PM | message detail
Crud, problem at work, won't be able to get back to this for a little bit.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Shaggy_Heru | Posted 8/21/2008 8:28:01 PM | message detail
neato
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~Shaggy~
Nominate Claude from Grand Theft Auto III!!! Screw everyone else!
Dr_Football | Posted 8/21/2008 8:29:38 PM | message detail
awesome
tag
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"Boy that is a gutless 6'7" .200 hitting formerly good player. What a joke."
Tom Grieve on Richie Sexson
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 12:15:47 AM | message detail
I hope people don't get too hung up on my terminology... if you want to, you can just pretend I said "SFF" every time I mention LFF, as the concept doesn't change. I just like to use the L because in a multi-way poll, even the character who wins is hurt by having another option who he shares a fanbase involved, unlike how in a 1v1 only the losing character gets hurt.

If you'd like to see that explanation in more detail with some examples, check out

http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/LFF

And I'm going to get back to going through the rest of the bracket... tomorrow afternoon!

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
voltch | Posted 8/22/2008 12:52:22 AM | message detail
did Square really do well last year and did Sonic fail so bad.
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Del Boy:He who dares, wins!
DaruniaTheGoron | Posted 8/22/2008 2:08:57 AM | message detail
Tag
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Joe Sakic, Captain; Career: 602 G, 966 A, 1568 P
Colorado Avalanche; Season: 28 G, 51 A, 79 P
KommunistKoala | Posted 8/22/2008 2:10:47 AM | message detail
Knuckles barely beat Rikku in the first round.

That's the only gleaming example I remember of fondly because of this one topic.

Also tag.

fortybelowsummer | Posted 8/22/2008 2:11:05 AM | message detail
Taggin this.
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Don't be scared, just be prepared for the worst.
For the Alliance
satai_delenn | Posted 8/22/2008 3:29:32 AM | message detail
Oh, tag!
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Attention, all yoctograms! (It's x2) DIE!
Ultimaphazon | Posted 8/22/2008 7:11:21 AM | message detail
Tag.
Your picks sound reasonable so far, but I doubt they'll make me change my mind on the debated matches.
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A pro isn't someone who sacrifices himself for his job. That's just a fool. - Reno, FFVII
Pyrostormer | Posted 8/22/2008 7:21:27 AM | message detail
Tagtagtag

Ngamer is amazing at this, as always

~*01010010 01001111 01000010*~
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Xenosaga is way better then any crappy game you enjoy.
http://img146.imageshack.us/img146/3592/1182804410526mu7.jpg
Xcarvenger | Posted 8/22/2008 7:25:43 AM | message detail
yessssss
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Pyrostormer | Posted 8/22/2008 7:50:06 AM | message detail
Meh, I've debated Niko > Kefka enough but I want to see what Ngamer has to say about it...

Anyway, in 2k5, Vercetti edged out Kefka by the smallest of margins.
In 2k7, Vercetti looked noticeably weaker -

http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Master_Chief_vs_Yuna_vs_Vercetti_vs_PaRappa_2007

Could you attribute Vercetti's weakness to the format of the contest, or due to an outside factor? Personally, I'd have to say it's only the latter. Vercetti did look a lot weaker in this contest, but it's not due to the format. First off, I see there being major SFF between Chief and Vercetti in his match - most of Vercetti's "casual fanbase" that would normally vote for him was instead tied up with Master Chief, a much stronger "casual fanbase" character.

With this kind of format, "casual fanbase" characters are seen as performing much stronger then they normally would in a 1v1 format. Case and point:

http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Kratos_vs_L-Block_vs_Kirby_vs_Donkey_Kong_2007
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Ryu_H_vs_Riku_vs_Roxas_vs_Haseo_2007
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Master_Chief_vs_Dante_vs_Luigi_vs_Pikachu_2007
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Ada_vs_Balthier_vs_Frank_West_vs_Jade_Curtiss_2007
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Marcus_vs_Kefka_vs_Tom_Nook_vs_Zelos_2007

It's quite clear that these "casual fanbase" characters (I've never really defined this, but I would say that it's characters with popular franchises on mostly Sony/Microsoft consoles, with most of their votes being in the early morning and night, while having weaker day votes) perform stronger then usual in this format, I'd guess because their fanbase will vote for them over whoever, so their numbers really show up more in this format...

Anyway, looking at Kefka, he looked a bit stronger -

http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Cloud_vs_Marcus_vs_Ocelot_vs_Kefka_2007

He got beat out by Marcus by quite a bit, but had the Cloud SFF to deal with. Still, Marcus over Ocelot - with all of the MGS4 hype abound - proves Marcus had real strength, and Kefka kept it pretty close in their previous match -

http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Marcus_vs_Kefka_vs_Tom_Nook_vs_Zelos_2007

Without the FF SFF. Of course, FF6 Advance had been released that year (http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/gbadvance/data/930370.html), and the Europe voters had gotten it pretty close to contest time. It's reasonable to assume that Kefka overperformed here, and this year, his strength will decline noticeably due to FF6 having faded out of the public eye.

Anyway.

I'd say that Vercetti's reason for looking as weak as he did last year was not because of the format, but because of a combination of Master Chief sucking away all of his votes from the casual fanbase in a clear case of LFF, AND a declining interest in his character overall. Furthermore, Kefka had just come off a release of FF6 Advance, which must've increased his strength by a reasonable amount, which is the reason he seemed as strong as he did.

We cannot assume that because Vercetti bombed last year, it will say the same thing about Niko, who has just had a critically acclaimed game released, is overall a lot more popular character then Vercetti was (I can't count the number of people who have said that they liked Niko but didn't really care for Vercetti, it's quite a bit), and has nobody to LFF him here. I suppose you could make a case for Duke and Niko sharing some of the same fanbase, but the majority of would-be Duke voters would opt for Niko in this scenario anyway.

Summary:
Vercetti underperformed due to LFF
Kefka overperformed due to FF6a
Niko now is a stronger character then 2K5 Vercetti, who was stronger then 2k5 Kefka.
Marth > Niko for that match is obvvvvvvv

There's my Niko > Kefka argument.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 1:12:38 PM | message detail
It's a fine argument. I'll address it after I finish the bracket.

Getting back to that in a few hours here.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 5:26:54 PM | message detail
I wanna ROCK!

Division 2

Round 2 and following


Whoa, awesome. There's always been a fair bit of debate in the Stats topics regarding Nintendo's triangle of Green Giants: Bowser, Luigi, and Yoshi. From 2003 and 2004 results, we see that the relationship between the two at least used to be Bowser > Yoshi > Luigi... but since then Yoshi's had that amazing showing on Dante, Luigi looked great on Zero and Kirby, and Bowser has pretty much just kept falling on his face ever since the '05 Sephiroth match. If pressed, I think I'd still pick the triangle in that same order in 1v1s- but since that's not what we're dealing with here, give me Luigi! He just seems to hold up better than Bowser in the 4 way setting, and has already proven he can hang with Ganon. Of course the other question is, what if these two Mario characters hurt each other enough to let L Snake back into the match. But... nah!

Pick: Luigi > Bowser

How absurd is it that after 6 character battlers, we still haven't ever seen Mario vs Mega Man OR Mario vs Sonic? I guess that's the price we pay for watching so many Mario v Cronos. In any case, I've always been of the impression that MM would fold when put up against Nintendo's main man, and I'm sticking with that here. So between MMX folding and Mudkip sucking up a sizable portion of Pokemon and 4chan/joke votes, will Knux be able to make a run at him? Again... nah! It's a nice idea in theory, but in practice I can't see anything with the name "Mega Man" attached faltering that badly in a key situation.

Pick: Mario > Mega Man X

Holy Nintendo, Batman! You know, Mega Man wasn't really THAT far behind Samus and Mario last season, and this is pretty much the worst draw imaginable for Mario. The 3 Mario-series guys should hurt each other enough to allow MMX a free ride to the next round, but now I have to seriously consider him entering that round with a first place finish. Hm... I think for the moment I'm going to go with MM being too much Nintendo himself to truly benefit from all the LFFing, though I could easily change my mind on that one later.

Pick: Mario > Mega Man X

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 5:54:10 PM | message detail
Division Three

Honestly now, whose bright idea is it to continue wasting character slots on Crash Bandicoot? Granted he was a legit nom in '02, but get with the times people! Perhaps I shouldn't be QUITE so hard on him though- he at least hung in tight with Bomberman last year, and actually took the day vote in that match (of course with how pathetic Magus is in that area, it's not saying much). Anyways, Nightmare should have no trouble topping him, especially now that SC4's in the mix, and naturally no one's going to come close to Samus. Congrats to the nominators for getting Raz into the field BTW; there's some fodder that's at least new and somewhat interesting.

Pick: Samus > Nightmare

D-yikes! How is it that no matter where Frog ends up being placed in a bracket, he always manages to make things interesting? KOS is no pushover, but I think her fatal flaw may be how she's no good with the Day Vote- the weakness you have to be able to exploit in order to top anything Chrono Trigger. I see Frog starting strong as always, building up a nice lead for 3 hours, and then slowly losing it to KM overnight... Fortunately it won't matter if she takes a daytime lead, thanks to Frog's killer final hour vote! However, the fly in the ointment is Neku. Surely having another Square RPG character in the mix couldn't hold Frog back TOO much, given how vastly different the CT and TWEWY audiences must be, but in a match this tight any little LFF could be the difference. I'm going to bank on Frog's comeback power for right now, but not with much confidence.

Pick: Ganon > Frog

Hey hey, Falco made it in! Awesome. And what's this? A free pass to Round Two? Even more awesome! I can't BELIEVE a character slot was wasted on Wander, one of the worse pieces of fodder we've ever witnessed, but on the plus side I've got to pat the nominators on the back for pushing GlaDOS through. I don't give her any kind of chance at upsetting Falco thanks to there not being anything else SSB in this pack, but it should still be very enjoyable to see her pound away on Wander all day.

Pick: Vincent > Falco

Gosh, after the way he dropped the ball last season, I wouldn't have been surprised in the least to see Balthier miss the cut. But here he is, back again and... what's this, with a reasonable chance at advancing? Scorpion is pretty clearly the class of this group, but what kind of FPS overlap are we going to see between Half-Life and Bioshock fans? Balthier's no world-beater himself, but with the way Freeman somehow manages to allow life's smallest obstacles to overcome him, I can just picture these two characters going back and forth choking 2nd place away. Let's not get too crazy though, I don't think BS has the kind of playrate to allow the Daddy to take advantage of those chokejobs and steal 2nd, but... you just never know with characters this weird. I'm going to back Mr. Freeman for the moment, but not making any guarantees one way or the other here.

Pick: Scorpion > Gordon

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 6:12:09 PM | message detail
Round Two and following

Eh, this isn't quite as much excitement as I expect from a Round Two matchup. We've already seen Samus vs Ganon, and we're already seen Samus vs Frog, and heck, we've even seen Samus + Frog + Fighting Character in the same 4 pack. Sammy and G-man might hold each other back enough to help Nightmare look good, but that's about all the entertainment I see coming out of this match... I guess we could also see if Frog holds up better than he did against Scorpion.

Pick: Samus > Ganon

I really love that Star Fox will finally be getting a chance to prove itself outside of a Nintendo SFF crushing. I like it so much in fact that I wish it were Fox himself in this position, ready to go toe to toe with Scorpion in a battle for the second spot. As is... well, it should still be interesting, but without anything else in the mix to spoil his fighting game appeal, I've got to back the ninja here. Gordon can't really hang with this group, but who knows, maybe he'll show up to play this year and actually contend with Falco for third.

Pick: Vincent > Scorpion

Bah. Bah, I say! I'd be the first in line to support a Ganon vs Vincent rematch (as I still feel he could tangle with anyone in that VV/Squall/Auron elite Square group, given the right circumstances), but not like this, not like this! The Nintendo LFF will give Vince a free pass into the next round, and then it becomes a matter of seeing if Ganon holds Sam back so far that she's forced to cough up first place. It's certainly a distinct possibility, since Vincent seems to feel very much at home in the 4 way format, but Sam wasn't bad herself (even with Link in the mix), so I'm going to give her the benefit of the doubt for the moment.

Pick: Samus > Vincent

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
KamikazePotato | Posted 8/22/2008 6:21:23 PM | message detail
tag

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Brawl FC: 4296-2658-3681 (KP)
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 6:59:51 PM | message detail
[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]
MarioSuperstar | Posted 8/22/2008 7:09:19 PM | message detail
Kratos over Alucard?
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*is Dranze*
Explicit Contest is my lord.
RPGuy96 | Posted 8/22/2008 7:10:20 PM | message detail
My good Ngamer, I think you're thinking of the wrong Kratos.
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Mustache...and green...
Heroic Palmer | Posted 8/22/2008 7:10:58 PM | message detail
Kratos is all kinds of dangerous

you should have saw what he did last year
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if it was Gaston!'s birthday i would let him teabag me- realo
MyWorldIsCrono | Posted 8/22/2008 7:11:51 PM | message detail
Thrall bombed because nobody really cares about him. He dosen't have the cool factor, nor a highly anticipated release focusing on him this fall.
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Vote for Hogger! He's the hardest boss to ever exist, and he roundhouse kicks Chuck Norris.
Heroic Palmer | Posted 8/22/2008 7:12:07 PM | message detail
oh yeah that Kratos

yeah n you might wanna change that -_-
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if it was Gaston!'s birthday i would let him teabag me- realo
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 7:29:56 PM | message detail
[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 7:31:47 PM | message detail
Oh crap! Man, all the more reason to hate these stupid Tales characters- now they've forced me to re-write my writeups!

Got to take care of a few things here, then I'll get back to patching up that mistake.

Son of a gun.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 7:45:02 PM | message detail
Well, at least that blunder proves that yes, I really am looking at this bracket for the first time without having read anyone else's thoughts beforehand.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 8:10:10 PM | message detail
Ok, here's a re-do. Everything will be same except for the Kratos match thoughts!
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Division Four AGAIN

Oh, would you look at that. Ammy gets rewarded for her fantastic run last season with a return trip to the Character Battle; kudos to the nominators on another fine decision! With the Okami Wiimake in her back pocket she should enter the bracket with increased strength as well- not that she'll need it to dispatch of this ugly group! Why in the world are we seeing Frank West again? This is a guy who failed to make any headway in the weakest 4-pack in Contest history, for Pete's sake. At least the group redeems itself with Kaim, who shouldn't threaten to advance but might as least give Frank a run for his money.

Pick: Crono > Ammy

Ohhoho! Insult SB's choice of bringing back 4 ways all you want, but here the man proves that he knows how to make a bracket. L-Block was an internet phenomenon, yes, but last season's bonus match proved that the piece was susceptible to the same weakness as everyone else: LFF. Make L the lone funny choice in a serious group and he's a powerhouse, but throw another joke into the mix and suddenly he becomes very human. Well, not human, but... you get the idea. Suddenly the entire bracket rests on the edge of a knife. Ryu and Meta Knight are both well-loved characters with recent or upcoming releases that have proven themselves to be legit contenders in a 4 way setting. Will the internet joke-rally behind L hard enough to have him contend again? If they try, will too many of those joke votes instead go to The Dog, allowing Ryu and MK to survive? It's the most important question of the season, because if that Dog fails us, L will be right back on a roll to the Championship- there's no stopping that train once it gets rolling. Talk about your insane first round matches!

Pick: Ryu > L-Block

Kratos from God of War thoughts:
Hooooray, Diddy made the cut! ...boooooray, he's in a horrible position! Judging by past stats, Alucard vs Donkey Kong would be a pretty decent 1v1 tossup. Throw Diddy into the mix instead of DK, and you have to tip the scales to Alucard. Throw Falcon into the pot to ruin part of Diddy's newfound Brawl strength, and you've broken the scale altogether! And how is it that Kratos gets so lucky- he wouldn't even be a shoe in against Kirby or DK, but instead he gets to have them hurt each other and advances easily, and now he gets identical treatment here. Oh well, this should still be an okay match, if only to see if Falcon will be able to make a serious run at Diddy.

Pick: Kratos > Alucard


Kratos from ToS thoughts:
Oh, THAT Kratos. Well then! This 4 pack just became a whole lot weaker, but also, a whole lot more interesting! Assuming Diddy is slightly weaker than DK, then judging by our last reliable numbers, all 4 of these characters are right in that 22% to 20% "barely above the fodder line" range. The difference, of course, is that Diddy won't be able to perform at that level because of Falcon sucking away some of his SSB support, while Falcon won't perform there because he's already shown that he'll collapse in the face of anything else Nintendo. With that in mind, Alucard becomes the clear favorite for the win, and as much as I hate to put faith in anything Tales (it has only burned me in the past), I've got to give the nod to Kratos A right now for that second spot. This pack has some awesome potential though; could even see a situation where Tales fails to hard that both Diddy AND Falcon are in the mix to advance!

Pick: Alucard > Kratos A
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 8:10:24 PM | message detail
...the Spy, seriously? I wasn't expecting to see any TF2 characters make the cut, except for perhaps the Heavy. Assuming he made the cut as well, that's Gordon, GlaDOS, the Heavy, and the Spy- a heck of a strong showing for Valve, a company know for its gameplay, not its characters! That has me very excited to see what HL2 will be capable of this Winter. But getting back to the matter at hand. Really happy to see Arthas back for another go-round, and without Diablo keeping him chained down this time, who knows what he'll be capable of. Ike's a casual favorite in Brawl, true, but with Pikachu getting all the Pokemon love and a good bit of the SSB support as well, is he going to be hamstringed enough to let Arthas slip by? It seems very possible, but now I just recalled how badly Thrall bombed despite having no Blizzard LFF to excuse him. Yeah, Arthas should have a great shot, but I'm sticking with the Brawl Boost until further notice.

Pick: Pikachu > Ike

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 8:25:10 PM | message detail
The re-writing continues.
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Round Two and following AGAIN

My oh my. Everyone's well aware of what an unprecedented wildcard L-Block is, but seeing him in a fresh bracket like this really slaps you in the face with that realization. If he survives the Dog this match will be right back in his wheelhouse- killing legit characters with wave after wave of outside joke votes, allowing him to easily top Crono. On the other hand, what if the rally for him is only half-hearted? Crono and Ryu both do well in this format, and there will be no Kirby/DK-style LFF to allow free passage to the next round. Also, this match will be taking place on about October 22nd- what if that's the day SF4 hits the 360? Or what if Square releases a trailer for CT:DS the day before, showing footage of some of the new sidequests? I'm going to try to bank on some of the luster having died from the L-Block joke this time around... but as always with this guy, I'm forced to do so with zero confidence.

Pick: Crono > Ryu

Kratos from GoW thoughts:
Seriously though, what's up with Kratos and befitting from SSB LFF? Here he goes AGAIN, turning what should have been a cool slugfest between himself and Pikachu into what ought to be a fairly easy victory thanks to Ike's presence. At least Pika has the Pokemon fan base to fall back on, which ought to help him hold up better than Kirby (who was also losing plenty of older Nintendo fans to that Tetris piece, IMO). On the plus side, Ike will get a good test of his strength in Alucard. Allie's an aging Contest star, true enough, but if Ike can best him despite Pika's presence I for one will be quite impressed.

Pick: Kratos > Pikachu


Kratos from ToS thoughts:
Hm... I wasn't a huge fan of this matchup when I thought it involved Kratos the God of War, but I'm also not crazy about it with this OTHER Kratos involved. Alucard's one of the characters who I feel suffers the most from the increased vote totals/more casual voting trends since 2004, and so even with Pika behind held back by Ike, I still think the Pokemon should have what it takes to walk out of this one a winner. Unfortunately Allie ought to keep it close enough where there won't be any legit chance of Ike sneaking through to steal 2nd place- nor do I feel Kratos A has what it takes to make a serious run at that position. I GUESS it will be kind of neat for Ike if he's able to beat Kratos despite the Pika hindrance, but honestly I don't know how much we'd be able to take away from a result like that.

Pick: Pikachu > Alucard
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 8:26:02 PM | message detail
Kratos from GoW thoughts:
Huzzah, no more L-Block headaches! If he stays out of the picture here, it becomes a really awesome fatal three-way; one of those rare setups between solid characters with about equal strength, and no LFF to bias the result. Crono's clearly no longer at 2004 levels, but he shouldn't need to be to take first here. Second though? My goodness! Yes Ryu put up 57% on Kratos back in '06, but hes sold a couple million games since then and has clearly become a casual favorite- this will be an ideal opportunity to prove himself. And then there's Pikachu; pretty clearly the weak link in terms of 1v1 strength, but we've seen the kind of damage he can inflict in this format when he gets to rally all of Nintendo and Pokemon behind himself. I think I'm going to go with Ryu once again on the basis of SF4 being either released or nearly released and heavily hyped by the time this match happens, but I'm fully aware of how badly this could backfire on me!

Pick: Crono > Ryu


Kratos from ToS thoughts:
Well dang, I liked this match more when I though it involved the good Kratos. It should still be a quality poll, but what I thought was a fatal three-way instead turns into a more standard fatal two-way. Crono should still be a decent distance out in front of this pack, and all the stuff I said about Pika being dangerous but Ryu possibly being able to counter with SF4 hype still holds. I'm still going to back Ryu in the hopes that the new SF comes through for me in the clutch, but yeah, I realize what a risk that is and its very possible I'll back out on that choice if no SF4 release date is announced yet before brackets close.

Pick: Crono > Ryu

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Super_Bowser | Posted 8/22/2008 8:43:13 PM | message detail
Tag
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"I know what you're thinking....all this power, AND looks too!" -Bowser
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 9:09:55 PM | message detail
Division Five

OMG, what a hilarious 4 pack! Tails, who began his Contest career by choking away a match to Alucard and most recently choked against The Boss, Tidus, the FF lead who has plummeted from choking away matches to Ganon to choking away matches to Kirby to most recently choking away a match to Pikachu, and Donkey Kong, the undisputed King of the Chokes. Oh, and WCC, which is just hilarious no matter how you look at it! I'm leaning toward Tidus here, on the basis that Square is stronger in this format and Tails figures to hold back DK slightly moreso than he would anyone else. But if Tidus manages to lose a match where he was favored against a Nintendo mid-carder yet AGAIN, I'm pretty sure I'm going to laugh so hard that I rupture something, perhaps fatally.

Pick: Tidus > DK

Oh hey, Banjo gets a chance to redeem himself in a non-Nintendo SFF beatdown situation. Honestly wasn't expecting to see him return, but it's a welcome surprise. MM will of course take this one going away, but whoa nelly, what a train wreck for that 2 spot. Banjo probably has the best natural strength of the group, but his 360 game won't be out in time to save him and now Olimar can counter with Brawl support. I don't want to touch Nero with a 10 foot pole- there didn't seem to be overly much hype for DMC4 and I didn't hear much in the way of glowing reviews for the title once it was released, but since I have no idea who's going to come out on top between Banjo and Olimar, I'm going to go with the safe route for now and back Nero here.

Pick: Mega Man > Nero

Whoa, Dedede made the cut? And Pit too? I guess BRAWLFEAR was justified after all, at least as far as noms were concerned! A shame they get stuck in a position like this where they have to hold each other back. Now then, Zero scored an extremely convincing win over Ryu H back in '05, so even if he's held back somewhat by other Nintendo options, I don't think he should have trouble securing this win. I could see Dedede making a serious run at second here- we saw how well Meta Knight stood up to the new format, and Kirby probably would have done the same except for the 1-2 combo of DK and L-Block. The King is also a Brawl favorite, whereas everyone seems to hate playing against Pit and I don't see too many people picking him at all, really. But again, it's another case where in the face of two Nintendo options you're not sure on, best to bank on the unaffected third party who's in the same range.

Pick: Zero > Ryu H

Ugh, could we PLEASE give up on Wesker one of these years? People who get beat by Lloyd Irving do not need to be seen in a Contest again. People who get beat by Kefka, who scores over 70% on them, do not need to be seen in a Contest again. Sackboy is at least colorful fodder, but I'm especially pleased to see Vivi in such a good position. Was a real shame that he was forced out so early last time around, glad justice has been done and he'll have a real shot to prove himself this time around.

Pick: Snake > Vivi

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
phattypython | Posted 8/22/2008 9:23:29 PM | message detail
Tag
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WoW Name: Siriusblack, Server: Wildhammer. Alliance.
Fayt_Esteed | Posted 8/22/2008 9:36:05 PM | message detail
Tag
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Isaac and Princess Kumatora for SSB4! SSBB Mains: Zelda, Peach, Lucas, Ness
Now we must duel, like two gleaming banjos on a moonlit stoop! -Dimentio, SPM
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 10:02:35 PM | message detail
Round Two and following

Aww, this time around its not as much fun. Yeah, DK and Tidus get to go head to head again, but this time Mega Man is in play to most likely steal enough of DK's "thunder" to cost him any chance to advance. And if Olimar or Banjo get here instead of Nero, then DK's REALLY up the creek. On the other hand, if Tidus could manage to lose out here despite having a R3 berth practically gift-wrapped for him, it would probably be more funny than all his other failures combined.

Pick: Mega Man > Tidus

Hmm, this is kind of neat. We've already seen Zero stomp all over Ryu H, and we've also already seen the ninja fold under pressure from Snake, so he's doubly a non-factor. But this setup of essentially a fair 1v1 between Zero and Vivi is really cool. FF has done very well in this format, but so has Mega Man (at least outside of matches involving Link). I think I'm going to side with Zero for right now, but if this ends up being one of those matches where everyone hiveminds in favor of him I'm definitely going to switch over to Vivi in search of the better payoff, because honestly this feels like a coin flip to me despite what last year's stats say.

Pick: Snake > Zero

Bah, if Zero makes it this far the Div 5 final isn't quite as interesting. He'll hold MM back and allow Snake a more dominant win, but won't nearly affect him enough to allow Tidus (or DK) any kind of shot at sneaking into 2nd. I guess it could be somewhat interesting to see if Zero holding MM to a stunning mere 56% was just a fluke, though. If Vivi makes it here instead it... ok, so I guess it's still not a barn burner, but at least it would help us solve the mystery of how connected Final Fantasy and MGS really are, as in would Snake be LFFed a little and allow MM some time in 1st? Plus that Vivi/Tidus result from last year was so close that maybe it could go the other way in a rematch.

Pick: Snake > Mega Man

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
chocoboslayer | Posted 8/22/2008 10:24:44 PM | message detail
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PotD's OFFICIAL King of Games™!
The Choco. The Cream of Yuna Fanboyism.
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Ngamer's Initial 2008 Contest Impressions - GameFAQs Contests Message Board - GameFAQs

GameFAQs Contests

Ngamer's Initial 2008 Contest Impressions

rpgsruleall | Posted 8/22/2008 11:32:36 PM | message detail
tag
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Fortune favors the bold.
-Virgil
DaruniaTheGoron | Posted 8/22/2008 11:36:41 PM | message detail
Wow, our brackets are like the exact same so far o_O
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Joe Sakic, Captain; Career: 602 G, 966 A, 1568 P
Colorado Avalanche; Season: 28 G, 51 A, 79 P
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 11:37:33 PM | message detail
Division Six

Chris Redfield? Oh, come on now! The guy got survival-horror SFFed by PYRAMID HEAD. If that isn't an indication that you should stop applying for Contests, I don't know what is. Very cool to see Fox, like Falco before him, placed in a winnable position where he'll be able to prove that he can do more than just own those lower on the Nintendo totem pole. I really like what SB's doing with this bracket so far- there's been several matches like this, where Sora/Fox would be a pretty interesting 1v1 and SB seems to realize that and keeps LFF out of the mix so that the two can have a legit battle. Now, I imagine Sora's going to be the favorite here, but I'm going to stick with a Fox upset here, just because I think it'll be very close and would like to root for my favorite.

Pick: Fox > Sora

Oh jeez, I mistook Nathan Drake for Nathan Hale for a second there and was about to tear the nominators a third corn chute. Not that Drake's going to be all-world, but new really bad fodder is always preferable to old really bad fodder in my book. Anyways, was excited when I saw CATS up against such weak competition, but then I kept scrolling and saw Yoshi hanging out at the bottom of the group. Sorry CATS, maybe next year! But wow, this is once again exactly what I'm talking about- seems clear that SB remembers that Snake was only able to manage 57% on both Yoshi and Squall back in '06, so he's set them up against one another in what pretty much amounts to a fair square 1v1. I went out on a limb a little bit for Fox, but ehhh, much as I like Yoshi I feel Squall still be a touch too strong for him here. This should make for a really good match though, with Squall taking a commanding overnight lead before Yoshi mounts a strong comeback once the sun comes up.

Pick: Squall > Yoshi

Axel Steel, really? Color me surprised! I did think he was the best bet in terms of the Guitar Heroes, but still would have made him a serious longshot to make the field. Hm... as badly as Midna disappointed last year, she didn't really do THAT bad- expectations were just set way too high. She'll enter this thing as a clear favorite, but I guess I wouldn't count out Edgeworth entirely; he got such an awful draw last season, having to fight through The King of SFF and three-way Nintendo handheld LFF just to scrap together any votes at all. I could see this potentially turning into something of a Phoenix/Bomberman situation, with B8 keeping Edgy's head above water and maintaining a slim lead on Midna in the early going, but once that Zelda day votes kicks in she should be able to put this out of contention.

Pick: Cloud > Midna

Welllllllll now, what have we here? Mewtwo has lost alot of his punch since he was left on the sidelines for Brawl, IMO, but he's still not a pushover and his Pokemon fanbase should be enough to vault him to first here without breaking a sweat. Then we have Ness, the very definition of the fodder line for many years now, and Pac, who has danced back and forth across that fodder line ever since 2002. Of course we all know he collapses at the first sign of an old school opponent, but no other classic character is present here- PLUS some of Ness' SSB appeal is bound to be eaten up by Mewtwo. Boy, this is a toughie... but I just don't feel that the larger and more casual GameFAQs crowd we have these days is going to be won over by a long gone icon like Pac, and since Ness will at least have his core base of Earthbound supporters to fall back on, I think I'll take him to edge out the 2nd place here. Oh yeah, and cool to see that Travis made the bracket after all.

Pick: Mewtwo > Ness

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
DaruniaTheGoron | Posted 8/22/2008 11:38:21 PM | message detail
Oh, except I have the division 1 result going a little differently with Niko > Kefka messing up subsequent rounds :P
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Joe Sakic, Captain; Career: 602 G, 966 A, 1568 P
Colorado Avalanche; Season: 28 G, 51 A, 79 P
TheKoolAidShoto | Posted 8/22/2008 11:45:00 PM | message detail
Once RE5 comes out, I expect Chris Redfield to hit Leon Kennedy's level.
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Yeah, you lost your virginity. Just like a homeless guy staring into the window of an office building means he got a job.- Colonel Alloy
MoogleKupo141 | Posted 8/22/2008 11:45:51 PM | message detail
Chris only hits Leon level if he has lines like "Where's everybody going? Bingo?"
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For your health.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/22/2008 11:58:20 PM | message detail
Round Two and following

And SB has done it again. Delightful! All these characters are fairly close in strength, but since he couldn't remove the LFF completely he did the next best thing and evened it out, 2 v 2. If Sora is able to hurt Squall more than Fox hurts Yoshi (which isn't entirely absurd, given that people agree much of Squall's newfound strength comes from KH), that could open the door for a Yoshi first place. But are we even sure that Yoshi's higher on the N totem pole than Fox? I know Yoshi always wins those favorite Mario character polls, but Fox is a fan favorite in his own right, and I don't think it's wise to write him off completely in this poll. Still, the most likely course of events seems to be a narrow Squall win over Yoshi, so I'm going to go with that at least for right now.

Pick: Squall > Yoshi

Even when held back by Bowser and Toad, Mewtwo managed to come out ahead of Midna in last season's stats, so there's really not much to debate here in terms of first and second place. There should still be two fun things to watch for in this poll though: will Ness have what it takes to redeem himself from that blown opportunity last season by edging out Midna? And also, just how incredible is Cloud going to look in eating up the percentage against these three Nintendo options? Whew, that's going to be a killing!

Pick: Cloud > Mewtwo

Haha, this has been such an awesome division right down to the end. Cloud destroyed Squall with 76% of the vote back in '04, and though the FF8 lead has surely closed the gap at least somewhat, the door still figures to be wide open for Yoshi to slip through with more or less a free pass. If this were last year's bracket that would be the case, but oh no! SB once again evens out the LFF here, leaving us to wonder if Mewtwo will leach away enough Nintendo and SSB vote to put Squall back in the driver's seat. I think it's going to be very close, but in the end you don't bet against the kind of massive damage Cloud can inflict on opponents, especially those from within his own series, so I'm going to pick Yoshi to finally power past Squall on the strength of his Day Vote here.

Pick: Cloud > Yoshi

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 12:29:00 AM | message detail
Division Seven

In an odd turn of events, I did expect Jinjo. I did NOT, however, expect Lucas- seriously, this BrawlFEAR is just out of control, and with this much nomination support I think we're going to be surprised by some of these Brawl newcomers in terms of their poll performance as well. (Remember that with over 200,000 nominations this year, making the field without a massive B8 rally is probably a pretty good indication that you're going to be collecting alot of votes.) I can't see Lucas being at Ness' level, so he shouldn't do much to hold Kirby back, which will be a refreshing change of pace after his terrible luck last season. This time around his luck will be determined by whether or not Big Boss pulls down another Snake picture- but I'm betting on Kirby not being THAT unlucky, so I'll pick him for the win here.

Pick: Kirby > Big Boss

What in the world- how did Layton end up making this bracket? I guess it helps to have your game named after you, and to have such an interesting title for that game, but even so he's got to be right up there in terms of most obscure characters to ever make the cut. Anyways, I keep hearing that Raiden is great in MGS4 and should be getting a nice boost, but he shouldn't even need it to dispatch of Kain. I don't expect MC to be as big a beast as he was last season now that the H3 hype has died off, but he'll score at least one blowout in '08 thanks to this match.

Pick: Master Chief > Raiden

Bah, we already have Nightmare, do we really need Siegfried as well? MacMillan's an odd choice, but given CoD4's tremendous sales and how people are still playing it to this day, he could make for at least a somewhat interesting entrant. In any case, both might be okayish but they should still finish far behind Leon and Riku, and I also can't really see Riku contending for the win... this is one of those odd cases of four legit, solid characters, yet I'm not seeing too much about this match that could be in question.

Pick: Leon > Riku

Hogger? Uh oh! Any time a character manages to make the field despite having zero Board 8 presence, it gets me a little worried. But when it's a World of Warcraft character who must have been massively rallied, I get doubly nervous. When I see that he'll get to beat up on the same really bad fodder character that L-Block vaulted over in order to get his historic train rolling, I get triply nervous. Yeah, this Hogger character isn't going to have massive internet-wide appeal like L-Block, but dedicated WoW support could still take you a long way in this tourney, given the 4 way setup... I'd like to think we could count on the Final Fantasy brand to push Ramza through and cut off the nonsense before it starts, but after the way he flopped against Kirby his last time out, I'm not so sure. I'm going to back Ramza for now, but this is certainly a matchup to keep an eye on.

Pick: Dante > Ramza

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 12:51:02 AM | message detail
Round Two and following

I know I said MC wouldn't have the same A game he brought to the table in '07, but come on, he was performing right in that Sonic/Mega Man range last season- even if he's only got his B game, it should still be enough to edge out Kirby. As I look more closely though... there's bound to be some overlap between MGS and Halo, and with this being a double helping of MGS, perhaps Kirby could take a small advantage and run with it. Eh, it's a possibility, but for the moment the most interesting thing about this poll should be the battle between Big Boss and Raiden for third. I've heard both of those guys put into consideration for 2nd strongest in the MGS series (along with L Snake and Ocelot), so it will be cool to at least get some kind of answer on that front.

Pick: Master Chief > Kirby

Uh oh, where have we heard this song and dance before? Leon and Dante will cruise to an easy 1-2 finish, it's just a matter of which ends up on top, who cares that they're both Capcom, they can't possibly share THAT much of a fanbase, and... whoops! Fortunately for them, if Ramza can survive the first round he ought to have enough Square clout to hold Riku back from seriously contending for the 2 spot. However, if an unaffected third party like Hogger can push his way into this one, watch out, Riku could be Pikachu all over again! I also think that Leon's underperformance last year was really weird, and that much of it must have been his awful match pic... but even so, doesn't seem too possible for Dante to be bested by him, given that much cushion.

Pick: Dante > Leon

The déjà vu continues; here's exactly the matchup we were supposed to see last year, and which caused so much debate, except then it was going to be Master Chief/Dante/Leon/Ganon, rather that those three plus Kirby. Last time a pig picture sunk Ganon and put Luigi into the mix, where he could have had a chance to win outright if not for Pikachu leaching all his strength! Even with two Nintendo characters in the poll last time, MC was humbled to the point where Dante nearly went blow for blow with him. This time, with Leon to further leach those mature votes, I think Kirby will be in prime position to pull off this upset. Boy, would that ever make up for his disappointing 2007 outing!

Pick: Kirby > Master Chief

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 1:18:15 AM | message detail
Division Eight

Oh, what the devil? I didn't hear a single peep about Sandbag on this board, which could only mean that he was massively rallied by smashboards, which means I can't entirely dismiss him. Gracious, just a bit ago I was going to say that Lucas would be the best test of what a purely SSB character is worth in this setting, but now it's clear that he's been topped. But wait, Sonic's going to be pulling in some of that Smash vote himself! Alright, strike that, guess we won't have to worry about this bag making too much noise after all. And that's a darn good thing for Magus- with the way he's been managing to flop every time the Day Vote kicks in for the past three years, I wouldn't put it past a bag of sand to be able to rally past him!

Pick: Sonic > Magus

Hey, this should be decently enjoyable. Auron's clearly a step above the rest of this group, but Rydia's presence should serve to at least keep the others from being beaten too bloodily. And Marcus looked pretty good in this format last year, plus we'll have to keep in mind that Gears 2 is going to be released in early November. Subby should still be the favorite, but hey, whose to say which is going to show up on match day: the Sub-Zero that finished only 6% back of Sonic in their Round One match, or the one who (for no reason at all) finished 21% back of Sonic in Round Two. Because if its the latter, Marcus should have a great shot at this upset.

Pick: Sonic > Sub-Zero

Ack! This was supposed to be the year we found out something about Tifa's real strength- we're not going to learn anything by seeing her job to Sephiroth all season long! On the plus side, even if she crumbles as badly as Vincent under his pressure, the rest of this group is so incredibly weak that she should at least live to fight another day. Seriously, he's been right around 10% on Base Link three years running now... could we please stop putting Ratchet into the brackets one of these days?

Pick: Sephiroth > Tifa

Wait a dang minute- Jill vs Ocelot Round Two? I realize it was quite a debated match last time around, but with the way Ocelot won in such undramatic fashion despite an ugly match pic, this is not a rematch I would have expected. I mean, it's not like he took it so easily that the result can't change, and Cloud always has such a big effect on polls that things could very easily be different with him out of the picture, but still... In any case, Kratos should roll to an easy win here, and it's really cool to see the Heavy make the cut, but can't say I expect much out of him.

Pick: Kratos > Ocelot

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
aNdySP99 | Posted 8/23/2008 1:21:29 AM | message detail
Awesome write ups.

What do you think of a possible Samus > Mario upset?
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 1:36:09 AM | message detail
Round Two and following

Welp, seems like another of those oddball cases where despite having four legitimately strong characters in a setting with no real LFF to speak of, there still won't be that much to debate about the result. Sonic's a clear step ahead of Auron, Auron has already put up 60% on Subby, we've already seen Sonic and Subby in action together, and Magus doesn't stand to be much of a factor against competition of this caliber. I suppose you could make a case for Square SFF possibly holding Auron back far enough for Subby to have a run at him, but with how far apart the releases of CT and FFX where that would be stretching it in my opinion.

Pick: Sonic > Auron

That whole idea with FF7 blowing up MGS seemed to have some good backing heading into last year, but then Ocelot went ahead and outlasted Jill despite Cloud being in the poll, so now I don't know what to think anymore. Aside, of course, from the fact that Ocelot's not going to be in contention here regardless. If this were a straight up 1v1, I'd take Tifa over Kratos without too much hesitation. But with Seph dragging her down like a boat anchor, I'm having serious trouble coming up with a way she'll be able to compete with Kratos, no matter how much TJF she may come up with for the match pic. Hm... yeah, that's a shame, I'd probably take Tifa if this were anyone other than Sephiroth or Cloud sharing the poll with her.

Pick: Sephiroth > Kratos

That's somewhat strange- all these years, and Sonic has never met up with Sephiroth in a Contest before. Of course he did get 66'd by Cloud back in '03, which amounts to pretty much the same thing. At least he'll have the Brawl Boost going for him here in '08, and plus with Auron in the picture to keep Seph from getting too far out of range... nay, sorry, Sonic Team's just done too poorly in this format for me to back that upset. Auron > Sonic would be the more intriguing choice actually, if only Seph was replaced by Mario, or someone else who could hold Sonic back a little. As is, Auron will have to settle for once again ending a Contest on a sour note. This will be the fourth year that he gets drummed out looking like a fool to either Sephiroth or Cloud; why can't the poor guy ever catch a break?

Pick: Sephiroth > Sonic

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 1:37:36 AM | message detail
Alright, that takes care of all the early rounds! I'll be back to look at the final section of the bracket and also give my thoughts on this year's snubs... tomorrow!

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Dilated Chemist | Posted 8/23/2008 2:03:26 AM | message detail
Fox > Sora? Wow, things have changed.

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Tatl | Posted 8/23/2008 2:05:08 AM | message detail
Nice write-ups. I was actually shocked to see most of my choices were on-par with yours...which re-assured me that I made the right choices. Outside of 2-3 (maybe 4-5) matches that I feel are more likely to go another way (Big Daddy > Gordon and Midna > Mewtwo, for example), I agree with you completly.

I do have to admit though, I had L-Block going to the finals. After reading through your write-ups and thinking back to last year, I pulled L-Block out in round 2. L-Block was strong last year because no one thought he was a threat. This year, I can see all the anti/hate-votes trying to take him out as well as some of his strength fading in favor of the other jokes. I still have a sneaking suspision that he'll win it all, but I remember how slow he took getting his strength. Only this time, he won't have the element of suprise on his side.

Though I'd love to see him getting to the finals again just for the "LOLs".
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Tatl | Posted 8/23/2008 2:06:30 AM | message detail
Fox > Sora? Wow, things have changed

That was another one I didn't change.

Sora will not lose to Fox...ever.
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octoinky | Posted 8/23/2008 2:10:24 AM | message detail
disappointed I had basically idental picks... we always end up with the same brackets in our little contests
Chaotic Mind | Posted 8/23/2008 4:58:54 AM | message detail
Wow, so far my bracket is nearly identical to yours. Makes me feel like i actually have a shot at getting on the leader board this year. I still fear the block is going to win it all again though. If you're right and it's eliminated in round 2 that will destroy my bracket. I'd still be happy though. Joke or not, a f'ing block should not be allowed into a character contest.
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linkhatesganon | Posted 8/23/2008 7:04:00 AM | message detail
Tag for reading later, after all N thinks my bracket looks good >_>
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 1:47:21 PM | message detail
Before I finish the bracket out, it's time to look back at the

Big Snubs for 2008

I'm going to base these on stingers' B8 nom tally, which he still needs to update BTW, but his most recent update should get us close enough.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/genmessage.php?board=8&topic=44763275&page=6

Charizard - 25 noms

What the CRAP? Sure, there was never an official Char rally that took off, but I mentioned him plenty during the nomination period and pushed for him in every single "who should I nom?" topic that came up the first two days, and it seemed to pay off as he easily beat out Mewtwo on B8 and finished as one of our top characters. It blows my mind that he'd have been out-nomed by something like Prof. Layton. Surely SB must have put in some kind of Pokemon cap or a Nintendo cap, right?

Angry Sun - 19 noms

While only 19 people admitted to backing the Sun in the topic, the nom rally for him finished with well over 100 committed members, so it was clear that he had the support to make the bracket. The trouble was that SB disrespected him by never allowing him onto the suggestion list, so some of those noms went to "Angry Sun - Super Mario Bros. 3" while others went to "The Angry Sun - Mario 3" and so forth, so he was never going to have a legit shot at making the field. What's odd though is that SB gave credit to every other crazy joke character, but not this one...

Brock - 19 noms

Not a big shocker... although Brock originated in the games, people probably consider him more of an anime character, so I doubt he got any support outside of this board.

Dan Hibiki - 18 noms

Bit surprised to see Dan left out. There was a pretty powerful rally for him, and SB accepted him and put him on the suggestion list after the second day, so I was pretty sure he'd be sneaking into one of the final slots before all was said and done.

Cid Highwind - 16 noms

A little surprised to see Kain make the field instead of Cid, considering he only had 8 noms on B8 to Cid's 16, but still, people should just be happy that at least one of them will be seen in action this year.

Terry Bogard - 16 noms

Eh, Terry did alright, but as I said before, Dan was the snub that was more surprising to me.

Proto Man - 14 noms

I guess between MM and MMX and Zero there wasn't enough support left to go around for Proto. He'd have been on my list of people likely to sneak into one of the final slots if I'd have made one, but again, this isn't a huge snub.

Seifer Almasy - 13 noms

What the HECK is up with Seifer? He was set up beautifully last season, coming in as one of the Rally Contest winners and earning an extremely respectable 57 B8 nominations- support that should have made him a shoe-in even for a contest of 64. But even with the field doubled he misses the cut, making him far and away the biggest snub of the season! But we weren't going to let that happen again, right? Wrong! I can't believe we've 0/2 on this guy.

Yoshimitsu - 13 noms

Eh, Yoshi had 15 noms last year and didn't make the cut either. He's got a core base of support, but its pretty clear that no one cares much for him outside of that group, so I'm not going to be surprised as he continues to fail at making the field.

Laguna Loire - 12 noms

Lag improved this year, up from only 7 B8 noms last time around, but clearly still has some work to do before becoming a serious Top 128 contender.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 1:48:26 PM | message detail
11 noms - Agent J, Chun Li, Gina Vasquez, Midgar Zolom

Gina, well you had to expect that, as I doubt hardly anyone outside of those 11 went with that nom. J was going to be a longshot regardless- kind of bad that he missed given how he had the worst draw imaginable last time. Zolom's in the boat with Angry Sun, just too many joke options and not enough noms to go around, but it's kind of silly that the one thing he was meant to show (the floor strength for anything remotely connected to FF7) has still not been found out, thanks to Cloud last year. Chun Li is actually a legit surprise miss in my mind... she looked decent in the Female Bracket and is apparently one of the stars of SF4, so I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.

While we're on the subject, it seems that nominations this year were really anti-female. Aeris didn't make the cut (don't blame people after the way she bombed out to Sora), but neither did Yuna (poor girl, she just got overshadowed by MC all last season), Chun Li, Lara Croft (hurray, finally!), Princess Peach (whoa, a bit surprising), Rikku (that sucks, she's always looked decent, and would have easily topped Knuckles last year if not for Vaan), Kairi (meh), Claire (double meh), Ada Wong (whoa really? she even won a match outright last year!), or any of the DoA or SC eye candy. From that list, Yuna and Rikku are pretty big snubs in my mind, while Peach is clearly bad in this format but is at least an interesting matchup for someone non-Nintendo, and Ada is surely very weak but didn't deserve to be cut. On the plus side, this anti-female bias helped keep Kerrigan out of the mix, so in the end I guess I'm all for it!

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
MyWorldIsCrono | Posted 8/23/2008 1:49:05 PM | message detail
I'm glad that Ngamer realizes not to take hogger lightly
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Vote for Hogger! He's the hardest boss to ever exist, and he roundhouse kicks Chuck Norris.
B8OnePieceGod | Posted 8/23/2008 1:54:44 PM | message detail
I don't know why Archer doesn't make these sub lists.
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MyWorldIsCrono | Posted 8/23/2008 1:55:54 PM | message detail
http://www.ffcompendium.com/jobimages/t-archer-a.jpg
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Vote for Hogger! He's the hardest boss to ever exist, and he roundhouse kicks Chuck Norris.
B8OnePieceGod | Posted 8/23/2008 1:56:36 PM | message detail
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 1:57:07 PM | message detail
Last batch I'll look at:

10 noms - Gene, Gilgamesh, Ken Masters, Red XIII

I'll just smile and nod and pretend I know who Gene is. Gilgamesh missing is a huge slap in the face; he was the #3 biggest snub last season (behind only Seifer and Diddy) despite I think being a Rally winner, so just like Seifer I was sure his supporters would be getting their revenge by pushing him in this time around. But nope! Ken I would also have expected to make the bracket this time around- he's right there on the SF4 cover, and with no Akuma or Chun Li or M. Bison threatening this year, who else did SF fans have to rally behind aside from Ryu? That's a real shame. Red, eh, I just don't think anything new from FF7 is going to be making the cut until someone develops a sustained drive for them. Cloud and Seph and Vince are always going to eat up the casuals, but until someone gets the board to rally all in the same direction for one of the minor characters, it's always going to be split too many ways to allow any of them entry. Heck, even Tifa got left out last season, and then this year Aeris was kicked to the curb!

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
MyWorldIsCrono | Posted 8/23/2008 1:58:15 PM | message detail
gilgamesh is based off a non gaming character
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Vote for Hogger! He's the hardest boss to ever exist, and he roundhouse kicks Chuck Norris.
transience | Posted 8/23/2008 2:06:45 PM | message detail
But wait, Sonic's going to be pulling in some of that Smash vote himself! Alright, strike that, guess we won't have to worry about this bag making too much noise after all.

I want you to remember these words in October.
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 2:11:04 PM | message detail
Now let's take a look at my own nominations and see how they placed.


Altair Assassin's Creed - Awesome result for Altair, and proof positive that the Guru system WORKS. That's why everyone should sign up right now- next time around, it could be a game of your choosing in a position of power like this!

GlaDOS Portal - Really good result for GlaDOS; I thought this would just be a B8 fad kind of rally when it kicked off, but its clear that the internet got behind her as well and pushed her into a pretty favorable spot.

Diddy Kong Donkey Kong Country - Whoo hoo! The #2 snub of '07 redeems himself while the #1 and #3 again fell on their faces. Of course, appearing in Brawl may have had something to do with that! A shame that he ended up with another SSBer, but oh well, it's still a winnable position for him.

Meta Knight Kirby - Very nice result here. Ryu's clearly going to advance, which leaves MK and The Dog as the two most important characters of the entire 128 in many respects- if they aren't able to stop the Block train from rolling, it's possible that no one can!

Charizard Pokemon - Really, really awful snub that I'm still confused and upset about.

Fox McCloud Star Fox - Excellent result for Fox, who will get to prove himself against first Sora and then Yoshi. Couldn't ask for much more.

Seifer Almasy Final Fantasy VIII - Once again, an odd snub that I don't understand. If there some kind of FF cap in play here that I'm not aware of?

Angry Sun Super Mario Bros. 3 - Kind of a poor snub in that he could have been funny, but oh well, there's more than enough jokes around this year to make up for it.

Gilgamesh Final Fantasy V - Not as big as Seifer, but still, odd that this guy just can't catch a break.

Tabuu Super Smash Bros. Brawl - Eh, there was no rally here at all and I just threw him in as an afterthought, with the idea being he would be a perfect test of how something Brawl-only would be able to do. But instead we have Sandbag to fill that position, so oh well!

Jigglypuff Pokemon - Would like to have seen him in to the complete the set of original 12 SSBers. Someone needs to get a rally going for him next year and make it stick so we can finally do that.

Tifa Lockheart Final Fantasy VII - A shame that we couldn't get her enough support to keep her out of Seph's wheelhouse.

Ken Street Fighter - Kind of a weird snub, but eh, maybe SF4 will be a hit and he can stage a comeback next time.

Yeti Ski Free - Last second idea. There was a very minor rally created after I announced my nom for him, but it fizzled out quickly. There's always next year!

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Denzokuken | Posted 8/23/2008 2:46:17 PM | message detail
tag
SSBM_Guy | Posted 8/23/2008 2:56:33 PM | message detail
tag
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dragon22391 | Posted 8/23/2008 2:56:47 PM | message detail
Tag
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Tatl | Posted 8/23/2008 4:05:36 PM | message detail
Hehe...

The only noms we had in common were Diddy and Charizard.
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Demon HunterX | Posted 8/23/2008 7:33:36 PM | message detail
tag
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Currently playing: HoMM3, FFII
Next up: PW:T+T ; Awaiting: SC2
Lady Ashe | Posted 8/23/2008 7:52:27 PM | message detail

MyWorldIsCrono (#077)
gilgamesh is based off a non gaming character



Damn, that must also explain why Diablo never gets in despite me constantly nominating him.
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ProfitProphet | Posted 8/23/2008 8:20:42 PM | message detail
Pretty similar to my picks. Most of them are just in a different order.
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Surskit | Posted 8/23/2008 8:21:48 PM | message detail
Ski Free Yeti... that's a good one. I'll keep him in mind for next year.

Fantastic write-ups so far. Just hope you aren't right about Sandbag. D:
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 10:37:59 PM | message detail
Wait a darn minute here son. Is Sandbag seriously being hyped as the next L-Block? I'll have to look into that more closely... but first, let's finish out this bracket!


The Final Stuff

Link
Lucario
Mario
Mega Man X

Whoa, how weird is it to see Lucario in a grouping like this? (It should have been Charizard!) This is kind of an odd setup, with so much Nintendo going at each other. Put this to me in early 2005 and I'd probably have taken MMX for the 2 spot- MM and Mario was a debatable result, and Link was sure to hold him back plenty while Lucario could steal some Nintendo support as well. But post-Nintendo Boost, Mario's blown the gap wide open between himself and the rest of the field (except for maybe Snake), and given how well he held up against Link in that poll with Seph and Vince last season, I don't see him going down here. Still, I could see MMX taking a run at him in the early couple hours at least, and Lucario ought to be able to hold up decently well thanks to the Pokemon support, so this should be a pretty good one.

Pick: Link > Mario

Samus
Vincent
Crono
Ryu

Haha, Vincent vs Crono round two! Very cool setup by SB here. Crono's got to be happy with getting SNES classics Link and Zero out of the poll, but honestly even this pair might swing results too far in Vince's favor... Super Metroid was a well-loved SNES classic, and of course the same could be said for SFII, and so once again I feel VV enters the matchup with a slight advantage versus this being a pure 1v1. Sammy should be able to take this with ease since there's no Link or Mario in sight, and Ryu's independent enough that I expect a pretty respectable showing out of him, but I'm just not seeing much of a way for Crono to overcome his obstacles and advance here. Outside from something like a big CT:DS trailer hitting the day before, which I guess is possible. Bah, have to take Vince for now, but I'm still not counting Crono out entirely.

Pick: Samus > Vincent

Snake
Mega Man
Cloud
Yoshi

Hmmm, this is a pretty cool little setup. The weird FF7 to MGS connection would have us believe that Cloud's presence could hinder Snake, perhaps far enough to allow MM to make a serious run at him. Between MGS expanding past the PSX so much recently (and especially the Brawl part of that expansion), I doubt the two are joined at the hip so much anymore, and Snake's strong independent showing in multi-ways the last two years seems to speak to this. There was also a theory last year saying that, since MM crushed Yoshi directly so badly a couple seasons back, they're bound to be connected enough that they'll hold each other back. That one pretty much went out the window when MM gave Samus a serious run in that sprite round despite Yoshi's presence. So in the end I'd say both Cloud and Yoshi are more or less negligible, and that this result should end up pretty close to a true 1v1 between Snake and MM. ...just a shame that Mega hasn't done anything yet to counter their 2006 result!

EDIT - Oh wait, I just noticed that Mega Man 9 will hit digital shelves late next month! I'm one of those who is giving that game a lot of credit; I think between the retro style, cool music, fun gameplay, bargain price, and availability on all three consoles this is going to be major success for the series, and make it relevant for the first time in many years. But even so, sorry, the gap between Snake and MM is just too large!

Pick: Cloud > Snake
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 10:38:57 PM | message detail
Kirby
Master Chief
Sephiroth
Sonic

Ohhh, this is really slick. I distinctly remember a number of complaints from the Lopens of the world last season relating to how unfair MC's placement was, how he was stronger than Sonic and perhaps even on par with Mario and Samus in this format, and deserved a spot in the Final instead of that dumb Block. Well, put up or shut up! If the Chief comes up short here, he'll really have no excuse... Sonic's been acting more and more like a Nintendo character lately, and now that he's a Brawler he and Kirby should share even more of a base than ever in the past. Sephy and MC ought to be independent enough to take full advantage of the situation... unless of course Master Chief's huge showing last year was largely Dew-fueled Halomania, and he'll be coming back down to earth now that all our 360 owners have moved elsewhere. Which I think is a distinct possibility! This is a toughie, but for now my gut reaction is saying that Kirby's just going to be too large a hindrance, that Sonic can't quite keep up in this format with that kind of disadvantage, but I reserve the right to switch back from MC at a later date if I see everyone bandwagoning him. Because this result is still far from a sure thing in my eyes!

Pick: Sephiroth > Master Chief

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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 11:03:33 PM | message detail
Link
Mario
Samus
Vincent

Oh wow. Oh wow! The most dangerous character outside of the Noble Nine, granted a setup that you couldn't possibly have drawn up any better. There should be some serious fireworks here! I know I just got done saying how great Mario held up against Link last season, at least relative to our expectations, and of course we all recall how well Mario nullified Samus in the past, and how he and Link combined to make her a complete non-factor back in the Battle Royale. But when you bring out the big guns of Nintendo LFF like this against a Square character who has proven himself as a beast in this format, you're just asking for trouble. Honestly I could see anything happening in this one- anywhere from the Nintendo factor being way overrated and Vincent never being in contention to it being way underrated and seeing him make a serious run at Link himself! For the moment I'm going to play it "safe" and just call for a slim upset of Mario in this one, but after some more thought I could see myself placing Vince literally anywhere in this one.

EDIT - And as an afterthought... what if CT:DS comes through for him, and its Crono in this position instead? Boy oh boy, what a sweet setup for Mario vs Crono IV that would be!

Pick: Link > Vincent

Cloud
Snake
Sephiroth
Vincent

I think SB made all the right choices with the positioning of these eight. Moving Cloud or Seph up would have destroyed Vincent's chances and turned things into a Link > the other guy no-brainer, whereas here we get to see a weakened Cloud forced to do battle with the two most dangerously independent entities in the entire bracket- I love it! With Cloud in the mix we've seen that both Snake and Samus are capable of taking down Sephiroth in this multiway format, so Seph coming dead last here is just a forgone conclusion. The question instead becomes, as before, is there any truth to the idea of Snake being hurt by FF7? Because let's not forget what an insane Dew-fueled Day Vote tear Master Chief went on to very nearly come all the way back and take 2nd place away from Snake in that L-Block match last year. If Solid shows any kind of FF vulnerability, MC could have him KOed within just a few hours of the kiddies getting home from school! Otherwise, if Seph acts as an even bigger boat anchor than expected, could a Snake victory over Cloud actually be possible? Or, dare I say it... both Snake AND MC sneaking by him in the final hours? Boy, wouldn't that be something! I'm going with what seems to be the safe pick for right now, but this is certainly a match that bears further looking into, and there's a good chance I switch to a more offensive-minded result here at a later date.

Pick: Cloud > Snake


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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Lady Ashe | Posted 8/23/2008 11:09:00 PM | message detail
uhhh ngamer
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/23/2008 11:14:44 PM | message detail
The Final

Link
Vincent
Cloud
Snake

Let's see here... Goodness, with Sephiroth out of the picture, if Mario were able to make it to this spot in place of Vincent I'd have to give serious consideration to the Cloud over Link upset! Otherwise imagine if Sephiroth could somehow survive the previous round; what a massacre for the ages that would be for Link. Looking at these four as is, though, there doesn't appear all that much to get crazy about here in the Championship. Vince will weaken Cloud enough for Link to run away with an extremely easy victory, but I doubt he would be able to hurt him badly enough to allow Snake a real shot at the second place finish. Well actually, this final could potentially be pretty intense... imagine if Sephiroth holds Cloud back far enough for Snake to make a serious run at him in the previous round, but Cloud survives a nailbiter, only to be forced the run the gauntlet against Snake for another 24 hours the next day, this time with Vincent keeping him down! I guess it's at least possible for Vincent to be a bigger leach on Cloud than Sephiroth- maybe he and Cloud have slightly more in common in some ways? Anyways, I'm going for the vanilla Link over Cloud result for now, but as with the past few matches I definitely think there's a ton of factors at work here that could result in a surprising turn of events for us- I'll have to mull them over a little longer before I finalize any decisions here in this last stretch.

Pick: Link > Cloud

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Lady Ashe | Posted 8/23/2008 11:17:45 PM | message detail
A solid analysis! I think we've got a couple of disagreements here or there, but your bracket is definitely one of the closest to mine I've seen.

Might want to fix that little bit in MC's last match though!
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/24/2008 1:10:04 AM | message detail
Ohh, I see it now. Whoops, replace Vincent with MC in the second to last matchup!


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Justin_Crossing | Posted 8/24/2008 1:15:24 AM | message detail
Vincent is my wild card in this.

I don't know that much about him nor his fanbase so I'm not sure,
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Tatl | Posted 8/24/2008 6:15:21 AM | message detail
I know that Sonic has been getting weaker as the years go by without successful games, but I didn't think he'd be in this much pain in the finals...

Brawl will definately boost Sonic and Kirby up a bit from last year, and with the Halo3 hype gone, MC won't be nearly as strong as last year (still strong, just not that strong.)

Even with Kirby SFFing Sonic, I'm not sure I could see MC getting passed Sonic (after all, Sonic DOES have a new game for the fans.) Kirby's not THAT much of a SFF vaccumm is he? It's possible, of course, but I just don't see it actually happening. Guess it's one of those 50/50 matches.


I do agree with you about Crono though. Vincent did beat Crono out last year (even though it didn't break the Nine because it's a 4-way and not 1v1), and, assuming Crono follows the pattern of getting weaker every year, he'd likely lose this rematch too.

Which does through Mario/Link/Samus into question. Link > all 3 for sure, but would the SFF really be enough to put Vincent into 2nd? I can see it... If Ryu > Bowser last year is anything to go by, 3-way SFF split is nothing to laugh at.

Going to have to do some reconsidering of my finals...
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Nemo Incognito | Posted 8/24/2008 6:51:36 AM | message detail
Hogger isn't going anywhere. If the WoW fanbase truly cared about the contest they could steamroll it with sheer force of unimaginable numbers but Arthas and Thrall being so unremarkable last year proves they don't.

Excellent topic would read again A+

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for your phantomile....
linkhatesganon | Posted 8/24/2008 8:21:45 AM | message detail
I understand now why N thinks my bracket is so good, we have the same in most matches u.u
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devilmaylaugh1 | Posted 8/24/2008 8:29:44 AM | message detail
where can you spend the gift certificates
Pyrostormer | Posted 8/24/2008 8:32:29 AM | message detail
Hm, I still like Marth > Niko

Hell, I have Link > Shadow right now for round 3 and I might change that to Link > Niko o_o I guess I'm just overestimating GTA though

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Ngamer's Initial 2008 Contest Impressions - GameFAQs Contests Message Board - GameFAQs

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Ngamer's Initial 2008 Contest Impressions

snowjoe188 | Posted 8/24/2008 9:36:30 AM | message detail
Ngamer, I'm guessing you meant Auron > Sub-Zero as opposed to Sonic > Sub-Zero in Match 2 of Division Eight?...
octoinky | Posted 8/24/2008 10:15:24 AM | message detail
ugh, still nearly identical to mine. Gonna be one of those contests like our '03(?) battle, where the ONLY match we had different was yoshi vs luigi, basically. I'll have to take a second look at this bracket and try to pick apart your mistakes.


One thing you made a good point of is how one little upset will change EVERYTHING. Especially in who the winner will be... Cloud could win the contest, or (in a massive upset) fail to even place.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/24/2008 9:04:30 PM | message detail
Yeah, meant to say Auron, not sure how Sonic's name got in there.

Eh, I wouldn't worry about it too much octo. Like I said, those were just my initial gut reactions. In the next couple weeks here I'm going to look into the discussion more, get an idea what's being debated and what's being unwisely considered a lock, then go back to my bracket and carefully choose some high-reward upsets here and there.

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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:16:06 PM | message detail
Alright, I'm going to try to get my head straight in terms of all the

Upcoming Releases

that could potentially have an effect on performances this season. For reference, the Contest is going to run from September 15th to November 17th, 2008, assuming no errors or delays.

* Miles Edgeworth is getting a new game for the DS, a point and click crimescene investigating thriller called something like Miles Edgeworth: Perfect Prosecutor. Unfortunately doesn't look like it will be out until well in 2009... still, maybe next year!

* Tom Nook will be getting a new game- Animal Crossing: City Folk, which will be hitting North American Wii consoles on November 15th, and will apparently be available in Europe and Japan before the end of the year as well.

* Banjo will be getting a new game, Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts, which will be released on November 14th in North America and on the 21st in Europe. However, anyone who pre-orders the game ahead of time will be given a code or something to download the original N64 Banjo game onto their 360 for free, 2 weeks before Nuts and Bolts is released.

* Big Daddy will be exposed to a new audience when 2007 Game of the Year Bioshock is released for the PS3 on October 21st (24th for Europe). Apparently this version of the game will include some new content, such as some new multiplayer modes. Also, a sequel is in the works, but won't be released until late 2009, and ALSO, a movie version is in the works, but that's still a long ways off.

* Tim is expected to reach a new audience sometime in 2008 yet, as Braid is being readied for a release on the PC. A PS3 port is also rumored to be in the works, but is unlikely to happen in time to effect the Contest.

* Cpt MacMillian won't be involved, but anyways, Call of Duty: World at War will reach North American audiences on November 11th, and arrive in Europe a little later that month. It will be available for all the major consoles and also the PC.

* Alucard will be one of the 14 playable characters available in Castlevania: Judgement, the first fighting game in the series. The 3D fighter will be available for the Wii on November 18th, but won't hit European or Japanese shores until 2009.

* Crono, Magus, and Frog will be exposed to a new audience on November 25th when Chrono Trigger: DS hits shelves in America (it will arrive in Japan slightly later, and not until early '09 for Europe). The remake will feature a new sidequest/dungeon and also a wireless play mode where 2 to 4 DS owners can play together.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:17:07 PM | message detail
* Crash Bandicoot is for some reason having a 15th game released this year called Crash: Mind over Mutant. It's an action/platformer and will be available for the PS2, 360, Wii, PSP, and DS. There are plans to have it released in Europe as well before the end of the year.

* Frank West will be exposed to a new audience this year when his game is ported to the Nintendo Wii under the unfortunate title Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop. No official release date has been announced, but Capcom would like to have the game ready in time for the holiday season. It's apparently being reworked considerably: no 72 hour countdown clock, no one save slot limit, a new camera system based on the RE4 engine, motion controls against based on the RE4 engine, and fixes to some of the glitches that plagued the 360 release.

* Deckard Cain will be making waves when Diablo III is released- however, that still appears to be a long ways off, as the game is reportedly only 50% completed. Given Blizzard's perfectionist development schedule, Cain may have been rallied into the Contest two years two early!

* Duke Nukem will make a grand comeback to the gaming scene as soon as Duke Nukem Forever is released; sure to be any day now!

* Marcus Fenix will being chainsaw-gunning his way through more enemies on November 7th, when Gears of War 2 is released worldwide for the 360.

* Kratos will continue his killing spree in God of War III, which is coming soon... but unfortunately not until March of 2009, so it seems doubtful that hype will effect his Contest performance any.

* Niko Bellic will reach out and touch a new audience on November 18th, when Grand Theft Auto IV is released for the PC. It will be available for European PC owners 3 days later.

* Axel Steel will be returning to rock you all night long in Guitar Hero: World Tour, which hits the PS2, PS3, Wii, and 360 worldwide on October 26th. Axel won't be featured on the cover art as he was in GHII, but will be the first base character available in the game (base because you'll be able to do all kinds of customization).

* GlaDOS will be warming the hearts of more gamers before the end of the year, as Portal: Still Alive will soon be hitting the 360's Live Arcade. This enhanced port will include new levels and achievements; there are also plans for Portal-based multiplayer mods which may be arriving for the PC in the near future, and a sequel is confirmed to be in the works, though little is known on it yet.

* The Heavy and Spy from Team Fortress 2 will continue charming audiences worldwide during the upcoming Contest, as Valve has no plans to stop support the game with additional weapons, achievements, and map packs.

* I'm not sure if Master Chief is IN the game, but in any case hundreds of soldiers in his amor will be appearing in Halo Wars, the new RTS prequel to the series. Unfortunately that won't be hitting stores until the Spring of '09. Likewise the Peter Jackson/Guillermo del Toro Halo movie project has stalled out, so a major announcement on that front doesn't seem likely during the Contest.

* Roxas will play a starring role in the upcoming DS release Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, due for release in Japan this November. The storyline involves what went on with Roxas and Riku during the one year between the events of KH1 and KH2. The bad news is? It's unlikely that the game will make it to American shores before the end of '08.
transience | Posted 8/25/2008 11:18:00 PM | message detail
N has the cookie cutter bracket. who else could make a bracket that everyone agrees with?
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xyzzy
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:18:08 PM | message detail
* Kirby is scheduled to make his solo debut on the Wii sometime in the near future, as a currently untitled 3D sidescroller is still on the books for a Japanese release before the end of the year. Unfortunately little is known about this new game, and it seems unlikely that it could make it to America or Europe before Christmas even if it does meet that launch date for Japan.

* Sackboy somehow made it into the Contest even before his game hit the market, which of course will put him in a good position when puzzle/platformer LittleBigPlanet hits PS3s sometime in October. No exact release date has been released for the US, but its scheduled to arrive in Europe soon after, on the 29th.

* Mega Man will be thrust back into the spotlight in late September when Mega Man 9 (or as its known in Japan, Rockman 9: The Ambition's Revival!! ) is released for a budget price on the Wii, 360, and PS3. The WiiWare versions for both the US and Japan are confirmed for September, though no official date has been set for Europe. Also, here's an interesting factoid: To help promote the game, a Rockman 9 Original Soundtrack will be released September 12th 2008, and Rockman 9 Arrange Album will be released in October 10th 2008 in Japan. Also, sometime in August, an official E-Tank energy drink will be released, costing ¥137 each. Game Fuel, eat your heart out!

* Mario, Geno, Bowser, and the gang could be in for some increased exposure (not that they need it) right in the middle of the Contest: Super Mario RPG was released for the Wii Virtual Console last week in Europe (it had already been out in Japan for two months), and a North American release is expected to be just around the corner.

* Ness may be in for a similar (much more needed) boost, as Earthbound is expected to be released on the Virtual Console sometime in the near future (although no official date has been set).

* Some other character-affecting titles that have been rated by the ESRB and could very well hit the VC during the Contest or just before:

- Mega Man 2
- Sonic & Knuckles
- Kirby's Dream Land 3
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:18:47 PM | message detail
* Worlds collide on November 10th when MK vs DC hits shelves for the 360 and PS3. Some of the rivalries hinted at from early promotional material appear to be Sub-Zero vs Batman (these two will be featured having a stare-off on the box art) and Scorpion vs Superman. ...wow.

* Lucario and the rest of the Diamond/Pearl crew will be returning to the DS with Pokemon Platinum, an enhanced remake of the 5th generation that will be available on September 13th. Too bad that's a Japan-only release date; no official announcement has been made yet for when it will arrive in America!

* Chris Redfield should enjoy a significant boost in popularity with the release of Resident Evil 5, where the player will control Chris much as they did Leon in RE4. However... RE5 won't be hitting store until March of '09, so that Redfield rally came a little too early.

* Ryu will resume his battles in Street Fighter IV, which Capcom is still hoping to have hit the 360, PS3, and PC in time for the upcoming holiday season- but they haven't been able to set any firm release date yet, so it's possible the 2.5D fighter won't arrive until early 2009.

* Sonic will once again hit home consoles on November 18th with Sonic Unleashed, a 3D game with mostly 2D-style side scrolling where Sonic... turns into a wolf whenever the moon is out, wha? Why does everyone have to turn into wolves these days? Anyways, he'll be unleashed on the PS2, PS3, Wii, and 360 all at once, worldwide.

* As if L-Block needs any more help... Tetris Party is planned for release on the Wii in either September or October of this year. The game will include a 4 player vs mode for local play as well as a 6 player vs mode over WiFi amongst its 18 total game modes.

* Arthas returns to the main stage in World of WarCraft: Wrath of the Lich King, the second WoW expansion, and one which centers entirely around Arthas himself as players will be scrambling to reach Level 80 and do battle with him (in his new Lich King form). No official release date has been announced, but WotLK will most likely arrive sometime around the middle of November- and considering The Burning Crusade's 3.5 million in sales in its first month, this is not going to be a soft release!

And... that appears to be everything. Holy yikes, that was alot more than I expected! Obviously a ton of what I covered is going to have 0 Contest impact, but oh well, I wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything that could possibly trip us up down the line.

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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:22:40 PM | message detail
Yeah tranny I know. But never fear, I'm secretly altering my bracket now to include all the highly brilliant upsets!

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transience | Posted 8/25/2008 11:24:31 PM | message detail
holy jesus N you put way too much work into that

the real game is Mega Man 9. these other ones won't affect the contest as they're coming out too late or the people will be eliminated by then. but Mega Man 9 is one to think about.

want a comparison? well, here's Capcom's latest XBLA/PSN game, Bionic Commando: Rearmed:

http://kotaku.com/5041155/bionic-commando-rearmed-first-week-download-numbers

that's pretty damn good, and MM9 should smash that, what with being a new game, having a lot more hype behind it, and being a series more people are into.
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xyzzy
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:45:03 PM | message detail
Well yes, the trouble is that nearly all of these new titles are bunched up during those "ideal" one or two weeks before the Thanksgiving rush. I hate to say it after all the waiting around we did, but... this Contest could have been considerably more interesting had it been delayed another month, or 6 weeks or so.

But, eh... on the other hand, lately its almost seemed that games and their characters can peak well in advance of the actual release date, just on hype alone. Remember all the talk about how Zelda and Ganon were going to be invincible "post-TP?" Granted none of these releases are going to be garnering Zelda-level hype, but still, we might see enough excitement to swing an odd result or two.

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transience | Posted 8/25/2008 11:46:22 PM | message detail
that's only for AAA mega-hyped titles. you're not gonna see a Big Daddy boost due to Bioshock PS3 hype, for example.
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xyzzy
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:49:09 PM | message detail
Oh and

UPDATE: The first of the downloadable "expansion packs" for GTA IV is going to be hitting in November. It will only be available for the 360, but apparently its going to be pretty significant, adding a good 10 to 15 hours of gameplay, so we could certainly see an uptick in GTA traffic afterwards looking to beat the new missions, or beforehand looking into if the expansion is worth the purchase. (I didn't include this originally because I'd heard these packs weren't going to be out until early '09.)

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Fayt_Esteed | Posted 8/25/2008 11:52:03 PM | message detail
Other than Brawl, Marth and Kirby could be affected by FEDS being released in Japan and Kirby 64 having been released on the VC earlier this year, respectively...But who knows? Personally, I doubt it.
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/25/2008 11:53:22 PM | message detail
Oh jeez, don't ask me to go into new releases since last Contest that could potentially affect characters. I'll be here all week!

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Fayt_Esteed | Posted 8/25/2008 11:56:48 PM | message detail
Hmm. Either way, Alucard/Falcon/Diddy/Kratos A sounds like a pain to predict. We all know that Tales characters are weak, and Falcon and Diddy will SFF each other.
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Isaac and Princess Kumatora for SSB4! SSBB Mains: Zelda, Peach, Lucas, Ness
Now we must duel, like two gleaming banjos on a moonlit stoop! -Dimentio, SPM
Panthera | Posted 8/26/2008 12:02:31 AM | message detail
For the record, you seem to have included Vincent in a place you wanted Master Chief to be in in the semi-finals.

I have Sonic in that match instead of MC, and the whole thing is giving me major headaches. I have Cloud>Snake right now, but I'm about as sure of that as I am sure of the exact amount of rain drops that are falling on my roof right now per second are. Sephiroth won't place, that much is certain (unless Nintendo reveals a self-destruct they installed in every copy of Brawl and detonates it and everyone turns on Snake and Sonic as a result). Sonic I'm about 99% sure won't place (he looked pretty bad last year, and his supposed "Brawl boost" didn't seem to last beyond the round it was announced during). But I don't know if Sephiroth will weaken Cloud enough for Snake to slip through. Snake should be just as strong, if not stronger, this year than last; a new MGS game is nothing but good news for him, and he's extremely popular in Brawl (although some hate him for being too good). If it weren't for the fact that Cloud doesn't seem to weaken much, if at all, over the years despite how old his game is, Snake would be an easy pick for me here. But considering it's Cloud, and that the Brawl fanbase will have at least a small portion eaten by Sonic...gah. I could toss a coin on this and it would be an acceptable answer.
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Heroic Dr Wily | Posted 8/26/2008 12:07:22 AM | message detail
You forgot Wario Land Shake It coming out next month, through it probably won't do anything with Link SFFing Wario.

Augh, why didn't Bacon put Link in the lower half...
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Gaddswell | Posted 8/26/2008 12:09:49 AM | message detail
You forgot ToS2 for the Wii in your Upcoming Releases list. I hear that it'll likely be out in November.
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Nominate Pikachu for the character battle!
Shaggy_Heru | Posted 8/26/2008 12:12:26 AM | message detail
you forgot to mention Claude being snubbed - I had atleast 20 pledges for him by the end

oh well when I win that guru thing this year that's who you all will be nominating for next year
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~Shaggy~
Nominate Claude from Grand Theft Auto III!!! Screw everyone else!
AndrewWarner | Posted 8/26/2008 12:17:39 AM | message detail
Tag
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The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.
Ngamer64 | Posted 8/27/2008 10:03:47 PM | message detail
Keeping this around for some stuff I might want to write up later.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
G0EMONIMPACT | Posted 8/27/2008 10:09:09 PM | message detail
Man, nobody has Crono/Vincent SFFing each other for Ryu to get to the Finals with Samus except me.
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/28/2008 6:39:03 PM | message detail
Alright, I just printed out the bracket (BTW, if you'd like to do the same, I'm hosting Dp's printable version over at

http://thengamer.com/gamefaqs/cb7bracket1-byDp.jpg
http://thengamer.com/gamefaqs/cb7bracket2-byDp.jpg
)

and I penned in all the first round results that I'm at least 90% sure of, with the idea being that I could get those "locks" locked down early and then give some consideration to the rest before finalizing my bracket. To my surprise, after taking some time away from the bracket and coming back with a fresh outlook, there are only 13 R1 locks! Those are

D1:
Lucario > Altair

D2:
MMX > Mudkip

D3:
Samus > Nightmare
Vincent > Falco

D4:
Crono > Ammy

D5:
Zero > Ryu H.
Snake > Vivi

D6:
Squall > Yoshi
Cloud > Midna

D7:
Kirby > Big Boss
MC > Raiden
Leon > Riku

D8:
Sonic > Magus

I mean alot of these other polls are pretty much locks, but I looked at the matches from a few different angles and was able to come up with a situation where there was some doubt as to the winner in everything else for R1. This is a pretty strong testament to the work SB put into creating the bracket this year IMO, or at the very least the effort he put into keeping the top half balanced (it kind of seems like he got bored or ran out of time near the bottom, as there's some wasted potential in D7 and D8 that you certainly don't see any hint of in D1 or D2).

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MyWorldIsCrono | Posted 8/28/2008 6:40:20 PM | message detail
hey ngamer, you are like the only person i've seen who doesn't say that dante > ramza is lock

why isnt it
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Ngamer64 | Posted 8/28/2008 6:58:32 PM | message detail
My faith in Ramza is still shaken from the way Kirby slapped him across the face a while back. Plus we need to keep in mind

- Ramza's very much a threat to get another truly awful match pic
- Disgaea is a tactical RPG that appealed to much the same audience as FFT; just look at Ulti for example. while that's going to mainly make Laharl look really bad, it also figures to hold Ramza back some from LFF
- Dante was one of the biggest icons of the PSX/PS2 era, which isn't going to do Ramza or Laharl any favors

So considering that, it honestly wouldn't take that much of the WoW fanbase finder Hogger funny for him to swing this upset.

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Chaotic Mind | Posted 8/29/2008 12:59:14 PM | message detail
I have Riku > Leon in R1. I think Leon's more likely to lose votes to the other 2 guys in the poll than Riku is, and he's really not that much stronger than Riku. At least not according to your x-stats website =)
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Xcarvenger | Posted 8/31/2008 4:56:56 AM | message detail
D5:
Zero > Ryu H.

D6:
Cloud > Midna

D7:
Kirby > Big Boss

D8:
Sonic > Magus

Those are not locks imho >_>

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Xcarvenger | Posted 9/2/2008 4:56:48 AM | message detail
I thought the contest should be finished on GameFAQs' birthday <_<
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Ngamer64 | Posted 9/3/2008 12:22:42 PM | message detail
I'll discuss those locks shortly.

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The Real Truth | Posted 9/3/2008 12:25:56 PM | message detail
Yeah I don't agree with your locks either.
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The Real Truth | Posted 9/3/2008 12:36:19 PM | message detail
D4:
Crono > Ammy (Ammy wasn't that strong and we don't know how strong Kaim is)

D5:
Zero > Ryu H. (Seriously disagree with this one, either could win but Zero shares somewhat of a fanbase with both Pit and King Dedede. Ryu is all alone here and he did great last year)

D6:
Cloud > Midna (How well will Axel do? He'll likely flop but he has the potential to take second. Midna sucked last contest)

D7:
Kirby > Big Boss (I could see something weird happening in this match. Lucas is here to take a few votes from Kirby and then Jinjo will either flop or do decent. I have this in my bracket though)

MC > Raiden (I also have this but I wouldn't completely knock Kain out of the running)
Leon > Riku (Call of Duta 4 is huge. Captain MacMillan will either flop or do decent.)

D8:
Sonic > Magus (Sandbag is taking second here.)

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Ngamer64 | Posted 9/3/2008 1:25:21 PM | message detail
Alright, since there's such heavy demand, I'll go back and briefly comment on each of my locks, explaining why I'm at least 90% confident in them.

Lucario > Altair - Guybrush has a very limited fanbase in this or any other format, and Isaac wasn't so hot years back and figures to have fallen off since then, so they shouldn't be in contention. I suppose you could make some kind of case for Lucario being held back by a fellow GameBoy character, but I don't buy it- people used the same to say Pikachu would flop in R1 last year, and look how that turned out. Altair's game sold well and he shouldn't be complete fodder, but even so Pokemon + SSB combined doesn't figure to be pushed aside so lightly; Lucario should win with a fairly comfortable gap.

MMX > Mudkip - Even assuming MMX is vastly inferior to MM (which I don't believe), he would still have no trouble placing first here. As for Mudkip, we saw him refuse to fold against much stiffer Nintendo competition than Lloyd and Nook, and we know that 4chan will be there in any case if Lloyd could somehow make a game of it, so this should be no problem for him whatsoever.

Samus > Nightmare - Samus is way out of everyone's league, natch. Raz has a dedicated fanbase, but it will be too small to do anything, and even though Crash surprised me by not completely falling on his face last year, Nightmare looked easily stronger in his own matches and now has SC4 to fall back on. There isn't much room for debate here.

Vincent > Falco - Vinny is head and heels above the rest. Wander has already shown himself to be very bad fodder, and GlaDOS (while a cute choice that will surely get a decent bit of backing from the internet at large) does not figure to be able to withstand a popular Star Fox character, let alone one that is a fan favorite in both Melee and Brawl.

Crono > Ammy - Crono rocks this pack. Frank West is already known to be pretty bad fodder. Ammy is the lead of a Game of the Year that just had a very successful remake on the Wii, with very appealing character design and who is sure to once again look great in the match pic. Against Kaim, a character from a 360 RPG that only sold around 300k in North America? Sorry, but we've already seen how much cult RPGs are worth in this format- namely not much. And if there ARE many GameFAQs users who enjoyed LO for its "old school Square-like battle mechanics", how many of those people are going to be picking Crono instead? Probably a good bit.

Zero > Ryu H. - While I agree that Ryu H didn't do bad for himself in this format last year, let's remember that Zero likewise more than held his own, at least until put up against two SNES legends at once. I don't see him having that problem here- yes Pit and Dedede have been around for many years, but I'm betting that 80% of their current popularity stems from Brawl, which should leave them at each others throats while Zero Nintendo old school appeal goes relatively untouched. And that leaves us with Zero v Ryu- a matchup that Zero took with 63% of the vote not too long ago. Yes, Ryu has had NG2 since we last saw him in action, but how many people are still playing that? I'm betting its not enough to keep this competitive.

Snake > Vivi - Snake takes this running away, naturally. Sackboy should pick up some sympathy votes here and there, but doesn't have the recognition needed to pull anything like an L-Block and be in contention. Wesker is just awful- remember that Lara Croft topped him without too much trouble last season. Would you really pick Vivi to have any kind of problem with Lara? I didn't think so.
Ngamer64 | Posted 9/3/2008 1:25:35 PM | message detail
Squall > Yoshi - I don't think Squall is entirely out of Yoshi's league. In fact between Brawl and Kart and the continued success of SMW on the VC, I'd have been very tempted to take him straight up over Squall in a 1v1 this year. But in this format? Sorry, Vincent/Auron/Squall and the like have done enough to prove to me that they each 4ways alive as long as you keep too much LFF out of the equation. Yoshi's at least a Mario series favorite who should stand to maintain his natural strength better a Peach or Bowser, but I still don't think it will be enough.

Cloud > Midna - Midna was "bad" last year, but only relative to our unrealistically high expectations, IMO. When not getting held back by Nintendo, she at least managed to hang in there with Scorpion, which is a ton more than you could say for Edgeworth. True, Miles got a terrible draw last year, but I wouldn't consider this upset unless he was Phoenix himself- and even then I'd almost surely go with Midna. As for Axel, he doesn't figure to be a factor. I give Rock Band/Guitar Hero all kinds of credit as games, and can't wait to see how they do in the upcoming Contest, but a character from one of them? Naaah, just don't see it.


I'll finish up in a bit.

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Ngamer64 | Posted 9/3/2008 2:33:01 PM | message detail
Kirby > Big Boss - Hmmm... Lucas is a newcomer to the world of SSB and figures to be weak regardless, but I think enough people like him in Brawl to let him hold Kirby back at least a touch. And actually now that I look at it, I overlooked Jinjo in my original analysis- easy to do, since he'll surely be relying almost entirely on joke votes, but the few legit Nintendo votes he does pull down are bound to come at Kirby's expense. When you combine that with BB having the potential for a great Almost Snake picture right out of the box, I've got to admit that I made a mistake here. Kirby and BB will advancing together, of course, but I was wrong to be 90% sure that Kirby would be coming out of this one in first place.

MC > Raiden - Layton's got to be one of the most sure-fire nonfactors we've ever seen in a Contest. MC is way, way out of these other guy's league in this format. And I still feel that Raiden over Kain is a very safe pick. Raiden didn't exactly wow us last year, but remember that he was dressed like a toaster in both match pics- this season those same toaster pics won't hurt him, since everyone likely to support him will already have experienced Toaster Raiden in MGS4. Kain on the other hand will have a tough time matching Cecil's level of popularity, and even if he did, Cecil was still weaker than what we saw from Raiden in '07. I guess I can understand an objection to calling this result a "lock", but I'm at least going into it with a high level of confidence.

Leon > Riku - Yes CoD4 was a huge hit and massively loved, and I plan to give it plenty of respect next year in the Game Contest. But I've talked to a number of people who played through the entire single player campaign, and all of them either didn't known MacMillan at all or barely recognized him. Which makes sense, he's apparently only in one level, and is covered in seaweed the entire time! Come on now, are you really going to pick THIS

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2132/2234132637_eb71e08e64_m.jpg

To knock off Riku? Oh and I don't see Siegfried being much of a factor at all, SC4 recency or not.

Sonic > Magus - Magus rules the early vote, Sonic rules the morning vote and day time. What does that leave for Sandbag? The SSB vote, yes, but Sonic's going to be taking a decent chunk of that himself. I give the bag credit for having pretty good potential as "the next L-Block," but I just feel that he got a bad draw here and so his potential is going to be limited. Now imagine if he IS able to make a game of it with Magus as the match enters the afternoon. Where will bag supporters turn to rally enough support to keep him going? Smashboards? That's nice, but that's only a couple thousand votes, and what do you do from there? L-Block was a joke that the whole internet could get behind, whereas I get the sense that outside of smashboards and B8, the internet is pretty much tired of all this SSB hype post-Brawl and would be more likely to rally AGAINST Brawl right now than for it.

So there you have it; down to only 12 locks, which is actually more like 11 locks and 1 almost-lock.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Gaddswell | Posted 9/4/2008 2:42:00 AM | message detail
I don`t think Leon > Riku is such a lock myself. Riku did get 45% on a Yoshi that beat Dante, while Leon got 45% on Bowser just two years ago. Granted, KH2 came at around that time, but they should still be close enough to each other that Riku > Leon could happen in round 1 depending on how the other two affect them.
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greatone10 | Posted 9/4/2008 5:16:40 AM | message detail
Well, N sure was right about Super Mario RPG. However, the one character it could have affected the most got royally screwed by bracket placement. Geno pretty much got screwed by getting stuck in the same with Bowser. Put Vincent or Zero in that match and Geno > Phoenix becomes a sexy pick.
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Donkey Kong Country 2 for next Games contest.
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Ngamer64 | Posted 9/4/2008 5:26:04 PM | message detail
Yeah, that's a shame about poor Geno.

Update! Wrath of the Lich King has been confirmed for a November 4th release date- too late to help Arthas in the first round, most likely, but if he's able to survive past that there could be enough hype and anticipation from WoW fans to help him do some damage.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
trannyscience | Posted 9/4/2008 5:29:30 PM | message detail
we'll see if that's the real release date.
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xyzzy
MyWorldIsCrono | Posted 9/4/2008 5:31:32 PM | message detail
Update! Wrath of the Lich King has been confirmed for a November 4th release date- too late to help Arthas in the first round, most likely, but if he's able to survive past that there could be enough hype and anticipation from WoW fans to help him do some damage.

It'll help him in the first round due to the Pre patch for wotlk, with Arthas invading 2 of the main player cities in the game, in mid to late september. right around the time of his match.
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Married to Heroic Palmer on 9/4/2008!
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Ngamer64 | Posted 9/6/2008 12:47:37 AM | message detail
That's some darn fine info.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Xcarvenger | Posted 9/8/2008 4:57:05 AM | message detail
Hmm.

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Xcarvenger | Posted 9/10/2008 4:55:45 AM | message detail
This is still alive!
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Ngamer64 | Posted 9/10/2008 10:03:33 AM | message detail
Thanks for the boost Carvey!

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
Xcarvenger | Posted 9/12/2008 4:56:42 AM | message detail
You are very welcome!
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Xcarvenger | Posted 9/14/2008 4:53:13 AM | message detail
I wonder if Ngamer still loves this topic...
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Xcarvenger | Posted 9/16/2008 4:59:26 AM | message detail
>_>
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Xcarvenger | Posted 9/17/2008 7:24:17 PM | message detail
This makes it three full pages! Time to let this purge then.
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Ngamer's Initial 2008 Contest Impressions - GameFAQs Contests Message Board - GameFAQs

GameFAQs Contests

Ngamer's Initial 2008 Contest Impressions

Ngamer64 | Posted 9/17/2008 7:26:14 PM | message detail
Later on tonight I might make a new topic called Ngamer Predicts the Upsets where I'll discuss all the picks I made against the BOP this bracket. Depending on how things go with the Guru and stuff... so if so I'll link it in here and then close this topic to send it off on a high note.

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He isn't a killer. He just wins - thoroughly.
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