Contest Stats and Discussion - Part 1325

I can finally fix the first post since some people think bastardizing it is cute.

Thanks to the efforts of @LadyVyxx and @Ngamer64, we found out we're set for a contest in early 2020, which is almost assuredly going to be Game of the Decade 2. Assuming chalk, Breath of the Wild or Smash Bros. Ultimate is going to thoroughly annihilate that contest. Probably Zelda because of the LAW, though Brawl almost won last time: http://www.gamefaqscontests.com/drupal/node/22?matchnum=4195&num=2

Zelda had a 1500 vote lead and only won by 900. If people actually loved Brawl the way they love Melee or Smash Ultimate, it very well could have won. If we proxy in Breath of the Wild and Smash Ultimate, who knows? Ultimate is no joke; it just set the record for most played and most watched game at EVO, and it's legitimately the most played game in that series. It's far more balanced than Melee and has a shot at having a much longer shelf life, too. Compare tournament results. Melee's are always the same few characters. Ultimate's are always all over the place. This is a good thing for shelf life.

The wild card is Fortnite (League of Legends came out in 2009, so it's not eligible). Fortnite is by far the most popular game right now. The anti-rallying stuff worked in a character contest because no one really cares about this site anymore. We're ranked 17,000th on Alexa, when we used to be top 100 (or higher) on the regular. Last contest I threw 10 bucks at Maximilian Dude, while he was streaming Smash Ultimate fresh off release, during the Mario/Cloud match. The response when he read my thing was "that site still exists?!". Cloud won two updates and it barely mattered. This site is more or less a joke among gamers right now, and that is never getting fixed. I see it with my contribution hits. Used to be on fire, now it's nothing. The same thing is true for everyone else. Outside of people googling an answer and sending people here, this place is dead as a hammer.

But here's the thing. People care waaaaaaay more about games than they do characters. If the Fortnite fanbase looks past our site being dead and wants it to flatten everything else, then it is absolutely going to flatten everything else. It got an appearance in Avengers Endgame and recently gave 3 million to a tournament winner. I mean come on, that's just nuts.

So I think it's Zelda, Smash, or Fortnite. What say you guys?

~*creativename's contest site (all things contest!)*~
http://www.gamefaqscontests.com/drupal/

~*The Board 8 Wiki (lots of useful contest and board information, including all past Post-Contest Analysis from Ulti, transience, Ed Bellis, and others)*~
http://board8.wikia.com/

~*List of All Polls (a search bar is at the bottom)*~
http://www.gamefaqs.com/poll/index.html

~*NGamer64's Archive Sites (good stuff!) and (LOL) X-Stats Sim*~
http://www.thengamer.com/
http://thengamer.com/xstats

~*GameFAQs Contests Hall of Fame*~
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/GameFAQs_Contests_Hall_of_Fame
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/GameFAQs_Contests_Match_Hall_of_Fame

~*Character Contest Histories*~
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Contest_Histories

~*Simple Explanation of Extrapolated Standings*~
A = Strongest Character
B = Character Weaker than A
C = Character Weaker than B
To figure out a character's Xsts Percentage ---> [(CvB)(BvA)]/50 = CvA
To compare how C would do against B ---> [(CvA)/(BvA)]*50 = CvB
To figure out how B would do against A ---> [(CvA)/(CvB)]*50 = BvA

~*All the Match Pics*~
http://www.gamefaqscontests.com/gallery/index.php

~*Leonhart4's Trend Charts*~
https://spreadsheets.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?hl=en&key=tOGmynfNIiNy5VukpEF-PdA&hl=en#gid=0

~*Daily Vote Trends - An Explanation for Dummies*~
http://board8.wikia.com/wiki/Daily_Vote_Trends

Fortnite will be as strong as World of Warcraft. A game like Persona 5 will destroy it.

Zylothewolf posted...

Fortnite will be as strong as World of Warcraft. A game like Persona 5 will destroy it.

MOLTEN LAVA TAKES. And it might actually be true, which is hilarious.

Fortnite will undoubtedly be a wild card I'm sure I'll predict horribly

Fortnite is going to be trash. Even at its peak a year or 2 ago, it wouldn't be worth much, but now with all of the bad PR with their latest updates it won't be doing much of anything.

Fortnite is all about the rally power. It was never going to go anywhere on its own strength.

Fortnite is going to be complete fodder unless the fanbase shows up en masse. And I don't think it will, as its young fanbase isn't going to give a s*** about our contests.

Also, woo new contest. Can't believe it has been 10 years since GotD. I was just wrapping up with university when we had that contest, and now I have a wife/kid/house. Hard to believe laughing at the board during GSC/MM was that long ago. What a great contest that was.

Ulti_PCA posted...

I can finally fix the first post since some people think bastardizing it is cute.

Thanks to the efforts of @LadyVyxx and @Ngamer64, we found out we're set for a contest in early 2020, which is almost assuredly going to be Game of the Decade 2. Assuming chalk, Breath of the Wild or Smash Bros. Ultimate is going to thoroughly annihilate that contest. Probably Zelda because of the LAW, though Brawl almost won last time: http://www.gamefaqscontests.com/drupal/node/22?matchnum=4195&num=2

That's good news. I hope the contest starts in January 2020, shortly after the GotY polls end. I'm also perfectly fine with opening up the nominations before the end of 2019 (sometime around December 15th-20th) because I don't expect any notable games to be released during the final 2 weeks of the year.

Fortnite's reddit page is massive and if one of the inevitable posts about it being in the contest gets hot, it's game over.

guffguy89 posted...

Fortnite's reddit page is massive and if one of the inevitable posts about it being in the contest gets hot, it's game over.

Same size as Hearthstone's.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/6083-best-game-ever-day-9-zelda-ocarina-of-time-vs-hearthstone

guffguy89 posted...

Fortnite's reddit page is massive and if one of the inevitable posts about it being in the contest gets hot, it's game over.

I guess that's where the second half of my post comes in...

It should also be noted that Fortnite has a lot of famous streamers that have tons of followers, which is another possible source for votals if one of them decides to pick up the cause.

Fortnite could tank obviously, but to completely dismiss its rally potential is a misunderstanding of its current popularity.

Calling Smash as the winner right now. Zelda in second. Mario Odyssey getting top 10 (but imo should be top 3).

Skyrim wins 3-4 matches even though nobody cares about it outside of mods anymore and the game legitimately breaks itself every 5 minutes without unofficial patches.

Soulsborne Die Twice outperforms Bayonetta 2 and DMC5 despite being inferior to Bayo and DMC.

Rallybait games don't get rallied for another contest.

I don't even have a problem with rallies. I just didn't like the way they affected the 2013 and 2015 contests. In theory nothing really wrong with bringing in more votes.

LinkMarioSamus posted...

I don't even have a problem with rallies. I just didn't like the way they affected the 2013 and 2015 contests. In theory nothing really wrong with bringing in more votes.

My feelings in a nutshell.

Rallies irk me when I'm doing good at the Oracle, but other than that it's fine.

the problem is that there's really no way to prevent rallies from overwhelming the contest with as few innate votes the site brings now

in the early days it just wasn't possible for a single site to dominate the contest

allen is always saying that the site is healthy and strong as ever, just that people only come to visit when they're googling s*** they can't find easily on youtube

so nobody goes to the front page or votes in the potd, you'd think the best anti-rally measure would be to actually have the poll in multiple places on the site, but for some reason he doesn't wanna do that

ZenOfThunder posted...

so nobody goes to the front page or votes in the potd, you'd think the best anti-rally measure would be to actually have the poll in multiple places on the site, but for some reason he doesn't wanna do that

Another option is to run a site alert such as what is seen right here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20130912033943/https://www.gamefaqs.com/

The site alert was only used for the final 4 regular matches of the 2013 contest, but it hasn't been used a single time for any of the later contests. I'd like to see Allen go back to using site alerts to promote the final matches of a contest because that can serve as a possible anti-rally measure.

In any case 2013 and 2015 were still probably more exciting contests on the whole than 2018. But I'm not going to pull an Ulti and insists that anyone who begs to differ is wrong. I just don't like the idea of telling people not to come vote on our site because they might interfere with the contest in ways we don't want.

And what did we really lose in '13 and '15 from rallies? We didn't get to see Chrono Trigger vs. Final Fantasy VII, any "fair" clash between the Mario games and RBY, and a clash between the winner of those? That would have been nice, sure, but what was what we really got that much worse? It can be inferred anyway that CT beats FFVII now (with Cloud still being stronger than Crono due to having a personality and being in Smash), and that RBY would handle the Mario games no problem. All right, so we were deprived of seeing CT/FFVII vs. RBY in the semifinals in favor of a Melee-Undertale rally-fest. Okay.

On a side note, I kept viewing Snake as underwhelming last contest until I realized that he only really looked bad against Zelda and Samus, and that IIRC Snake got a comparable percentage on Samus to what Crono got against Cloud. If Samus/Cloud is still a debatable matchup, Snake is somehow still an upper tier Noble Niner, but by this point the Noble Nine are guaranteed to no longer be the 9 strongest characters even in a "fair" setting. We probably just expected more out of Snake due to how well he did against Link in the 2013 bonus match.

I'm rather surprised by how strong Samus is in that case, being an easy top 4 character and potential top 3, but it makes sense. She just covers every base among the site's voters.

We lost Chrono Trigger either giving OoT the fight of its life or even winning straight up. No gimmicks or handicaps involved.

Team Rocket Elite posted...

We lost Chrono Trigger either giving OoT the fight of its life or even winning straight up. No gimmicks or handicaps involved.

One of the few times the Smash fans got it right!

Team Rocket Elite posted...

We lost Chrono Trigger either giving OoT the fight of its life or even winning straight up. No gimmicks or handicaps involved.

Oh yeah, that was definitely a possibility, I forgot. Instead we had a foregone-by-that-point Undertale stomp. Point still stands otherwise?

UltimaterializerX posted...

Team Rocket Elite posted...

We lost Chrono Trigger either giving OoT the fight of its life or even winning straight up. No gimmicks or handicaps involved.

One of the few times the Smash fans got it right!

nope this was even worse than Mario/Crono II

Random question. I bought a PS 4 like 1.5 years ago. Since I am a huge FF fan I wanted to buy FF 15. BUT I remember they kep updating it so I waited. Now is the game finished at last?

Safer_777 posted...

Random question. I bought a PS 4 like 1.5 years ago. Since I am a huge FF fan I wanted to buy FF 15. BUT I remember they kep updating it so I waited. Now is the game finished at last?

No idea but my guess is if it's not finished by now it'll never get done

Well, it's "finished" in the sense that they stopped updating it but it's more like they abandoned it.

Okay thanks people.

LeonhartFour posted...

UltimaterializerX posted...

Team Rocket Elite posted...

show hidden quote(s)

We lost Chrono Trigger either giving OoT the fight of its life or even winning straight up. No gimmicks or handicaps involved.

One of the few times the Smash fans got it right!

nope this was even worse than Mario/Crono II

To be quite honest, despite how much I hated what Melee and Undertale did back then, Melee vs. Undertale was probably the best match of that contest.

A rofl-stomping Melee that beat what was arguably the strongest game in the contest (barely, but still), followed by an incredible struggle to keep up with Undertale's monstrous updates, was truly a sight to behold.

Melee/Undertale was a foregone conclusion like every other Undertale match after it beat ME3

no thanks

LeonhartFour posted...

Melee/Undertale was a foregone conclusion like every other Undertale match after it beat ME3

no thanks

Most super rallies don’t win contests though?

okay bro

the only thing that could have stopped it is if they didn't come back next round

but they did and after that it was over

Just realized that Sephiroth had to go through Captain Falcon and Ryu last contest, just like Cloud did in 2010. Interesting coincidence.

Doesn't direct extrapolation from 2010 have Ryu getting about the same % on Sephiroth that he got last contest? What happened to Ryu?

Super rallies that have won contests: L-Block 2007, Draven 2010, Undertale 2015. That's it. That's the entire list. You could maybe make a case for something like Majora's Mask in 2009, but it's hard to pinpoint the difference between s***-kicking badass and a rally that swamped an entire contest. The difference is probably everyone agreeing that without a rally, an entrant has no chance of winning a contest.

Can we agree way more than three super rallies failed or do I have to actually list them all? Summer 2002 alone had three (Cloud, Mario, Crono), and arguably six if you include Seph/Samus/Mega Man, that all failed to actually win that contest.

Or are we only allowed to include actual fodder or jokes? Because in Summer 2008 alone Zack, Cube, Sandbag, L-Block, and Master Chief all caught lightning in a bottle. Lopen even called the last one. They all eventually got their asses whooped. If you include actual decent characters in there, you could possibly even argue Dante, Pikachu, and Snake were being mega-rallied as a counter to what was going on, because the entire deal that year was everyone arguing over rallies and scouring the internet for help. That entire contest was the year joke characters and rallies took over and all canceled each other out.

Past that Missingno was rallied and lost. Starcraft rallied and lost. Link, of all people, has rallied and lost multiple times. You can in fact get rallied and still lose. Hell I still think Link would have beaten Draven without our site getting DDoS'd and Allen pretending the timing was total coincidence. I love how he spent that entire contest asking Reddit to vote, then got pissy once Reddit voted.

LinkMarioSamus posted...

Doesn't direct extrapolation from 2010 have Ryu getting about the same % on Sephiroth that he got last contest? What happened to Ryu?

Probably nothing. Just a weird match. If you want to point to anything, you can point to SFV's poor reception.

also I think you can see what Draven and Undertale have in common that literally all those other examples don't

they were able to take advantage of the fact that the site's innate vote totals have plummeted since the end of 2010

plus L-Block and Draven didn't even have to get 50% of the votes to win, which helped them weather the early rounds; L-Block probably doesn't even survive round 2 if Kirby doesn't get LFF'd by DK

I still can't believe it has been 9 years that Draven won. Damn! I feel old. But then again I remember that contest and the one that Undertale won the most since well so many topics and posts and all that stuff.
Hope in the new contest we have something excited. Otherwise we should stop making them.

Safer_777 posted...

I still can't believe it has been 9 years that Draven won. Damn! I feel old. But then again I remember that contest and the one that Undertale won the most since well so many topics and posts and all that stuff.
Hope in the new contest we have something excited. Otherwise we should stop making them.

It hasn't been. Draven was 2013, not 2010.

Yeah that was a straight up typo.

Team Rocket Elite posted...

We lost Chrono Trigger either giving OoT the fight of its life or even winning straight up. No gimmicks or handicaps involved.

Also, in 2013, Snake almost certainly would have won the finals against Link and a Nintendo third wheel.

Link vs Zelda vs Cloud

Who wins today and by how much?

MetalmindStats posted...

Team Rocket Elite posted...

We lost Chrono Trigger either giving OoT the fight of its life or even winning straight up. No gimmicks or handicaps involved.

Also, in 2013, Snake almost certainly would have won the finals against Link and a Nintendo third wheel.

That one hurts.

Team Rocket Elite posted...

Link vs Zelda vs Cloud

Who wins today and by how much?

Zelda would go as low as the fanbase needed her to go for Link to win.

LeonhartFour posted...

Zelda would go as low as the fanbase needed her to go for Link to win.

I would tend to agree with this. In terms of margin, I think Link would only barely secure the win, but the match would be not nearly as close as the final score indicates. Something like 43-42-15 sounds right to me.

Well, we already saw it in the 2009 Games Contest final. OoT would never beat LttP that badly unless it absolutely needed to.

Link beat Cloud 60/40. Zelda can’t hurt him enough.

I'm willing to ensure Zelda is the new Sephiroth. She can have N9-strength while at the same time resist SFF by her own fanbase.

Link couldn't even double Zelda last contest, and Cloud had also proven to be slightly-yet-solidly stronger than her.

Enough to make Cloud win? I wouldn't bet on it, but maybe we could have a match there.

No, Nintendo knows how the game is played when it comes to Link and OoT. They'll fall in line when needed. It always happens without fail.

I think Zelda winning that three-way via shenanigans is more likely than Cloud taking it.

I agree with Leon The fanbase would sacrifice Xelda at any cost just so Link doesnt lose

Link probably wouldn’t even have to do very much. If he pushed his 63.56% on Zelda past a doubling - and it’s very clear from the start of Link/Zelda that the latter was bandwagoned there - then, assuming Cloud is worth 40% on Link 1-on-1, even if not a single person who’d vote Cloud against Link defected to Zelda, Cloud would still lose.

Ah so it was 2013, not 2010. Okay. Still I hope this contest has some rallies. Hey say what you want but at least they make things excited!

we just need to hope FFVIIR is a huge hit to give us a chance of possibly making it interesting

but there's also BOTW2 on the horizon so either way Cloud has no chance