Contest Stats and Discussion - Part 1381

Absolutely

Be interesting to see if 1998 would still win on a different site. I imagine younger people would vote for something in the 2000s

I could see 2017 upend it as an iconic year

it’s basically OOT vs BOTW but has a lot of depth outside of it too

pjbasis posted...

does '1998' also fall under LAW

It wins because of OoT so yes

Oh hey favorite 2-D Mario with no Wonder, super lame. Well, I guess it does say "Classic" but I don't expect we'll get a follow-up poll for the NSMB games and on.

Also oof World got the first 10 votes, I was the first vote for 3

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/2020-is-sephiroth-truly-the-greatest-video-game-villain-of-all

Literally 45% of the site thought Sephiroth was the best villain ever, what a time to be alive.

Also even in this bonus poll, we still don't get Bowser vs. Ganondorf. Why the heck is Kefka here instead of Bowser? Maybe CJayC wanted to vote for Kefka, so he included him at Bowser's expense for some reason.

Second vote for 3 checking in! I guess "classic" is why they didn't bother with Wonder.

Bowser not being in that pool is criminal

Yoshi's Island in third place for now. That's good.

Yoshi's Island is a Yoshi game, not a Mario game. If it's because of the SMW2 moniker, the first Wario Land game should be in the poll too (due to being Super Mario Land 3).

SMB1 in third place now. That's better.

I don't understand how the site is getting older but nostalgia for Mario 3 is getting lesser

Give me back my 2004 GameFAQs

I think the age range that has really stuck around here started gaming in the SNES/Genesis generation, and a lot of them might have just discovered NES gaming a little bit later with remakes, emulation, etc., so SMB3 just doesn't hit the same nostalgia that World does.

Super Mario All-Stars is a thing too though, and sold over 10 million copies.
I'm a SNES baby marginally below gamefaqs' average age and my first three games were Super Mario World, Mario Paint, and Super Mario All-Stars.

Leonhart4 posted...

I don't understand how the site is getting older but nostalgia for Mario 3 is getting lesser

Give me back my 2004 GameFAQs

Hey, I did my LFF part by voting for Yoshi's Island!

AxemRedRanger posted...

Super Mario All-Stars is a thing too though, and sold over 10 million copies.
I'm a SNES baby marginally below gamefaqs' average age and my first three games were Super Mario World, Mario Paint, and Super Mario All-Stars.

Yeah, All Stars is how I initially played the NES games too. But I do think experiencing them in the compilation format has an effect on those who played them first.

Now, I do wonder how "Super Mario All Stars" would perform in our poll format. It theoretically should be eligible as an entrant as it has a separate listing in GameFAQs's database, and unlike "Sonic 3 & Knuckles," it doesn't have to rely on review scores of a sub-par PC port to be considered in games contests.

The All Star versions are the best but i never played them on the NES.

Yesmar_ posted...

Hey, I did my LFF part by voting for Yoshi's Island!

I countered it by voting for SMB1 with 3 as my second choice

Leonhart4 posted...

I don't understand how the site is getting older but nostalgia for Mario 3 is getting lesser

Give me back my 2004 GameFAQs

It's not that Mario 3 is getting weaker, it's that the SNES is getting stronger.

To put it in perspective, 10 years ago Super Mario RPG beat the likely strongest non-Nintendo/Square games on this site and was never threatened by them, in what is probably the biggest sign of how much of a beast the SNES had become other than maybe Mega Man X putting up 44% on FFX in a matchup of what was probably a middle of the road SNES game against probably the third-strongest FF.

Since then I would bet the trend of SNES-gaming boosting did not end, especially since 2015 was maybe the low point of Nintendo.

Perhaps, although 3 and World's percentages in this poll have been pretty stable every time it's been run since 2017 (although 3 is down a little from where it was in 2017).

I should add that it's entirely possible that a 1v1 match between SMB3 and SMW is still 50/50. If you allocate Yoshi's Island to World, and all the rest to SMB3, you end up with a 52/48 or 53/47 result. Not much movement from 2009. All of these "classic" Mario polls are from 2017 and later, so we have no direct 2000's era result to compare it to; this just could just be one of those weird POTD results we get from time to time, like the Mario character one. There are some polls from the early 2000's and those do show SMB3 solidly ahead, but they include 64/Sunshine, and it wouldn't surprise me if those games' supporters broke SMW's way,

All that said, I would take SMW in a direct match, and wouldn't be that worried about it. I'm just trying to play Devil's Advocate.

where's the next poll

I need to know if there's a proper followup or if we just go back to random POTDs

Ah there it is

Boring poll is boring

Oh hey, I just noticed this DToast post from 4 days ago.:

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/6-gamefaqs-announcements/80990240

Collaborations, Competitions, and Contests

Speaking of impact — I’m hoping to have the Fanatical idea up and running before the next State of the Site. We’ve got some Metacritic conversations scheduled for next week, and a new Community Director is starting in June. That should help us pull all the moving pieces together for broader community initiatives. The folks in suits are also starting to ask what we can do, which gives me the perfect opportunity to hand over folders of behind-the-scenes planning that’s already been happening.

This Fanatical idea appears to be something to do with FAQS, not a contest, but this is not an unpromising message. It seems like "Contests" was added to the heading for this section when compared to previous months.

Maybe it'll just be those monthly contests Allen used to do on the board back in the day

Or even the ones DToast has been doing infrequently in the past few years.

Let's keep pushing DToast for a new contest. We can get one by 2028 if we start now.

Nah I'm good

Don't see the harm

I don't trust them to run a good contest and I'd rather enjoy the nostalgia of the good old days than be subjected to the sadness of a bad contest

I think I'd just dismiss the results but still have my fun.

I think the odds of me having any fun with it are pretty low because I have respect for what these contests have been and have meant to me

Maybe they could surprise me and run a great contest, but I wouldn't bet on it

Leon just doesn't want to see Squall get kicked in the teeth by Simon Belmont.

Yeah that's fair. I also have a lot respect for these contests and what they have meant but I doubt anything could take that away.

WarThaNemesis2 posted...

Leon just doesn't want to see Squall get kicked in the teeth by Simon Belmont.

I mean I had to come to grips with the fact that Squall would never be what he once was again after 2018

I think watching contest matches have less than 5000 votes might be the saddest part actually

The sad part of that was that Squall doesn't really get that exposure many places in tbe bracket. But he got to be who Zelda smashed in to claim NN strength.

What character would be the most helped by low vote totals

my gut… says Phoenix Wright?

The Chrono Trigger characters

Leonhart4 posted...

I have respect for what these contests have been and have meant to me

I feel the same about [insert game series] but I'm still gonna give the new one a go!

pjbasis posted...

I feel the same about [insert game series] but I'm still gonna give the new one a go!

There's a better chance a new Metal Gear is good than a new contest would be...!

If we ever have a new character contest, would any of the Clair Obscur characters be any good? My gut says they'd be high fodder because GameFAQs is still GameFAQs at the end of the day and none of them truly stick out the way that say 2B can.

Leonhart4 posted...

There's a better chance a new Metal Gear is good than a new contest would be...!

Metal Gear Survive is worse than any contest!

OrangeCrush980 posted...

If we ever have a new character contest, would any of the Clair Obscur characters be any good? My gut says they'd be high fodder because GameFAQs is still GameFAQs at the end of the day and none of them truly stick out the way that say 2B can.

Not sure if any 2024 or 2025 characters would be stronger. 2023 has BG3 characters who I'd take over E33 characters in general.

That doesn't count

Leonhart4 posted...

I think watching contest matches have less than 5000 votes might be the saddest part actually

This is the biggest thing for me. Once we dropped below 10k average votes it's like, who cares anymore.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/2022-which-big-name-sequel-are-you-most-looking-forward-to

This is a fun look back on a different time in this site's history

I think TP still wins this poll today if you just make it a "favorite game" poll but Oblivion would be an easy 2nd

It can't be overstated how horribly FFXII bombed on this site. The game itself manages *some* strength by virtue of being pre-complete implosion Final Fantasy, but probably the funniest result of the four-ways was Vaan being a huge warning sign that Balthier was going to bomb, only for him to bomb worse than even the most negative expectation could have.

Yeah, I think FFXIII catches a lot of slack for being the turning point for the series, but it really did start with XII.

XIII's problem is less that it was the turning point and more that it was the point where people realized this was the trend.

XI was...an online game, XII was...okay, but okay at a time when Final Fantasy being anything below spectacular was 'terrible game'.

Of course here XIII more catches slack for Lightning being weaker for having 3 games released than she was without actually having any games.

I feel like people warmed up a bit to FF12 over (a long) time. Although, maybe it was Zodiac Age that helped with that.

I think people who already liked XII played Zodiac Age and grew to appreciate it more. I'd wager it didn't turn a lot of non-fans into fans.