Contest Stats and Discussion - Part 1379

Scheduling notes for when contest retrospectives begin for 2025 (because there are a bunch!):

CBVIII - Ongoing!
Game of the Decade 2 - 3/27
Villains - 5/7
SC2K5 - 7/19
Game of the Decade 1 - 10/20
Games 2015: 11/5

~*creativename's contest site*~
http://www.gamefaqscontests.com/drupal/

~*The Board 8 Wiki (lots of useful contest and board information, including all past Post-Contest Analyses*~
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/Main_Page

~*List of All Polls (a search bar is at the bottom)*~
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll

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

~*GameFAQs Contests Hall of Fame*~
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/GameFAQs_Contests_Hall_of_Fame
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/GameFAQs_Contests_Match_Hall_of_Fame

~*Closest Wire-To-Wire Matches*~
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/Closest_Wire-to-Wire_Matches

~*All-Time Guru List*~
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/All_Time_Guru_Rankings

~*Most Surprising Results*~
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/Most_Surprising_Results

~*Contest Histories*~
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Contest_Histories

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

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

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

~*Simple Explanation of Extrapolated Standings*~
A = Strongest Character
B = Character Weaker than A
C = Character Weaker than B
To figure out a character's extrapolated 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

Up we go

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3818-gear-division-round-2-solid-snake-vs-fox-mccloud

This was the first loss by Fox since 2002 that didn't involve some sort of SFF. This wasn't a surprising result though because the Oracle average was pretty close to the final percentage. It just confirmed what we already believed about Fox: He's a pretty decent midcarder.

Fox has an odd contest history. He always seemed decent but has never really had a big win in a debated match or a show of strength other than maybe his match against Lloyd from this contest in round one.

On what we were discussing in the last topic I do wonder what the alternate timeline where the sale never happens looks like for contests. We probably get a Game of the 90’s contest late 2021/early 2022 and stick to the contest every ~16 months schedule we were on as Allen seemed keen to still have them. Does Allen still leave when he did? Who knows. Hard to imagine it not being better overall for every website under that umbrella though.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3819-gear-division-round-2-pikachu-vs-shepard

It's amazing the difference one great game makes. Shepard was the one finishing dead last behind the Magus/Sandbag duel in 2008, and two years later, he's putting up 39% on Pikachu. Three years later, he's beating Aerith. Five years later, he's struggling to beat K. Rool and getting doubled by Ryu. Makes me wonder just how badly Pikachu would beat Shepard now.

Oh I apparently made the Pikachu picture that match, I just learned by opening the poll link. I'm pretty surr I have not sent in more pictures ecer than I can count on my fingers, so that's a bit of a random match to have sent one in for.

I'm not convinced Shepard beats Aerith 1v1 that's year but solid performance nonetheless.

Just the fact that Shepard was able to beat Aerith at all in any format is an achievement

Like yeah, this was probably the strongest Shepard against the weakest Aerith we've ever seen, but it's still crazy that it happened and that we weren't even surprised by it

Yeah as I said, solid performance nonetheless!

Writing was there with the 2 seed (and Aerith being seemed 20). I think it was a somewhat popular upset here.

Best part about the match is easily Tharja staring at Aerith and having a quote that death in inevitable while killing her in the contest.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3820-gear-division-round-2-auron-vs-zero

Zen ran a Rate the Match Pic topic series during this contest. If I'm not mistaken, I believe this was the highest rated pic made by Allen (that is to say, through the first three rounds). Auron and Zero are two of the coolest dudes in their respective series, so it makes sense.

As for the match itself, Zero put up a good fight early. Auron had less than 53% and less than a 100 vote lead at the freeze. However, the combination of the powerful FF night vote and the pitiful Mega Man night vote allowed Auron to make the final score look more respectable.

Auron vs. Zero would be much closer in 2018 based on x-stats (and comparing Sonic/Auron vs. Pikachu/Zero), though Auron still seems to be the winner. And back in 2003 I'm betting Auron would beat Zero by about the same amount as expected in 2018 (granted, in 2003-2005 Auron was behind SFF, so most people didn't give him enough credit back then) . Funny how in the last years of character battles some characters returned to their old strength. (Auron has always been pretty stable, but Zero weakened noticeably...)

What other characters besides Zero started off relatively strong, weakened, and then returned to their old strength in 2018 (roughly)?

Aerith
Jill valentine

I don't feel like taking the time to find others....

I wish Pikachu returned to his old strength imhotbqh

Seriously though, Magus probably fits the bill there, too.

Haste_2 posted...

What other characters besides Zero started off relatively strong, weakened, and then returned to their old strength in 2018 (roughly)?

Not sure about characters, but for games, Chrono Trigger.

Leonhart4 posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3820-gear-division-round-2-auron-vs-zero

Zen ran a Rate the Match Pic topic series during this contest. If I'm not mistaken, I believe this was the highest rated pic made by Allen (that is to say, through the first three rounds). Auron and Zero are two of the coolest dudes in their respective series, so it makes sense.

As for the match itself, Zero put up a good fight early. Auron had less than 53% and less than a 100 vote lead at the freeze. However, the combination of the powerful FF night vote and the pitiful Mega Man night vote allowed Auron to make the final score look more respectable.

Allen did ratings in that topic?

No, it was the highest rated pic Allen made

in other words, the highest score for a non-user made picture

It doesn’t say Allen made either picture tho. I’m confused.

Derp, that's my bad. For whatever the reason, my mind blanked that this was a contest where Allen let us make the pictures from the start.

I think the highest rating was for the match pic where each character's pic was made individually instead of the freeform pics that were allowed starting in round 4 and on.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3821-gear-division-round-2-terra-branford-vs-squall

This was considered a dud by Squall. The Oracle average was nearly 70% for him. Dissidia or not, people were expecting him to lay an SFF beatdown on Terra akin to what he had done to Tidus in 2006.

However, for whatever the reason, we've seen little evidence of disproportionate overlap between Old Square and New Square, and that manifested again here.

Regardless, Squall and Auron had both fallen shy of their round 2 expectations and their round 3 showdown was up in the air. At the very least, whoever you had winning, you had to feel good about their chances

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3822-jenova-division-round-2-sephiroth-vs-vincent

Speaking of failing to deliver on SFF, the Oracle expectation for Sephiroth was just over 68% here. People really thought he'd lay the smack down once the match pic was revealed and you could barely see Vincent!

But one person dared to dream and got the #1 Oracle pick for this match (me, if you didn't get that)...!

That Vincent picture is fantastic and I won’t be convinced otherwise! <_<

This might be the most cursed match since Tidus/Shadow, right down to 'well, the winner looked good the next round!' Neither Sephiroth nor Vincent have been the same since.

UltimaterializerX posted...

That Vincent picture is fantastic and I won’t be convinced otherwise! <_<

The picture is fine

It doesn't work with the format

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3823-jenova-division-round-2-yoshi-vs-missingno

There was a lot of debate over how this match would play out. Most expected Missingno to win since Yoshi is weaker than Crono, but would it be a blowout? Would Missingno jump out to a big lead early and then Yoshi would whittle away at the lead and come up short?

As it turns out, Yoshi actually led this match for nearly the first two hours, although most people expected it wouldn't hold because he couldn't get his lead any higher than 200 votes. Sure enough, Missingno eventually took over and pulled away for a fairly comfortable win.

This set up a major showdown against one of the members of Clinkeroth, our contest triumvirate for nearly a decade. Could Missingno topple Sephiroth? People thought that it being a night match would be to its disadvantage, but one thing was for sure: We all wanted to see what would happen.

This division half was pretty stacked even without Missingno. Two NN member and two more that are definitely top 32.

And also Guybrush

Marth is a pretty strong #16 seed too!

Leonhart4 posted...

Speaking of failing to deliver on SFF, the Oracle expectation for Sephiroth was just over 68% here. People really thought he'd lay the smack down once the match pic was revealed and you could barely see Vincent!

Well, it's certainly not the worst round 2 Vincent picture ever.

_SecretSquirrel posted...

Well, it's certainly not the worst round 2 Vincent picture ever.

This body is the curse that's been given to me

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3824-jenova-division-round-2-big-daddy-vs-ness

I believe this is the only contest to feature matches on my birthday, and they were both good results! I don't know what it is, but I always picked against Ness in debated matches. It usually backfired on me, but this time, it worked in my favor! Ness led for the first 20 minutes, but then Big Daddy rolled him from there.

Ness always seemed weirdly strong to me.

Happy birthday

I believe this is the only contest to feature matches on my birthday, and they were both good results!

Huh? Happy birthday, then!


(Credit to MCAshe from DeviantART)

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday!

I remember when Big Daddy was that strong, these days Ness reverses that.

LightningStrikes posted...

Happy birthday!

I remember when Big Daddy was that strong, these days Ness reverses that.

Well yeah, since the next time we saw Big Daddy, he was losing to Lloyd Irving!

BioShock has had some randomly strong showings here and there.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3825-jenova-division-round-2-tifa-lockheart-vs-gordon-freeman

And we've reached the end of round 2, with a bit of a boring match. Tifa won easily and without any sort of slow start. For whatever the reason, she's repeatedly shown herself to be immune to the usual FFVII trends.

man what Gordon could have done with a lucky bracket

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3826-hyrule-division-round-3-link-vs-mega-man-x

Round 3 was our traditional sprite round. This time, Allen put a CRTV border around the pics and made the background (which featured a non-sprite pic) fuzzy for an old school feel.

Not much to say about this match though! Link doubled MMX, probably some SFF involved of indeterminate amount. Eventually Link will be able to SFF everyone.

The backgrounds were user made as well. Allen only added the TV thing.

MMX running into Link twice is kind of sad. He was set to do that a third time as well.

ctesjbuvf posted...

The backgrounds were user made as well. Allen only added the TV thing.

I am aware! I have a story related to one of the match pics when we get to it!

Ah, then I must've misread.

I meant that he made the background fuzzy, not that he made the pic

I can see how that might be unclear

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3827-hyrule-division-round-3-luigi-vs-wccube

By the time this match rolled around, most people expected Luigi to win fairly easily, but few thought he'd flirt with a doubling early on and put up nearly 65% (the Oracle average was 58%).

Luigi had made it past the third round in a one-on-one contest for the first time, and his reward was...an imminent SFF beatdown at the hands of Link.

Do you think it would make contests better or worse if the brackets were meticulously crafted based on some kind of public democratic process

If you let the Stats Topic regulars craft the bracket, it'd definitely be better than what we get because we'd avoid SFF and pointless rematches as much as possible.

Based on how Add/Remove went for Games 2009, not sure I'd trust a general open process...!

Add/Remove is actually less democratic too

edit: though I'm not sure I remember how that works

Someone made an Add/Remove suggestion, and if enough people in the topic supported it, then it was done

We replaced Golden Sun with Fire Emblem in a match with Melee and Wind Waker, don't trust democracy

Fat Luigi was funny.

Leonhart4 posted...

We replaced Golden Sun with Fire Emblem in a match with Melee and Wind Waker, don't trust democracy

Add/Remove is letting a small group of elites override the will of the peopl

pjbasis posted...

Add/Remove is letting a small group of elites override the will of the peopl

If the elites were in charge, it'd have never happened...!