Lurker > Evillordexdeath

Battle 129: Ganondorf vs Yoshi

A bit debatable, but I'm inclined to stick with the Nintendo hierarchy and favor the Zelda character. Ganon wins with 52%

Battle 130: Sora vs Bowser

This is a rematch from 2010. Back then, Sora only scored 45.3. I'm not convinced that KHIII hype does enough for him here. Bowser wins with 51%

Battle 131: Squall vs Auron

Simple Square hierarchy match where Squall should have it. Squall wins with 55%

Battle 132: Tifa vs Sephiroth

Another 2010 rematch. Sephiroth won last time despite being glitched. I really don't think Luigi or X can take him either. Sephiroth wins with 60%

Battle 133: (1) Link vs (8) Mega Man

It's Link. Link wins with 70%

Battle 134: (4) Cloud Strife vs (5) Crono

It's Cloud. Cloud wins with 60%

Battle 135: (3) Snake vs (6) Sonic the Hedgehog

It's Snake. Snake wins with 58%

Battle 136: (2) Samus Aran vs (7) Mario

IT'S FREAKING MARIO. As an aside, if Sephiroth does make it here, I think it's very unlikely that he can't beat Samus too. Mario wins with 58%

Battle 121: (1) Link vs Ganondorf

It's Link. I hope Ganon does make it here, because Link will pulverize him so badly that Dante and Leon will look weaker than 2B.

Well, not 2B in the stats, because she'll be behind Ness/Bowser, but you get the point. Link wins with 80%

Battle 122: (8) Mega Man vs Yoshi

If Zero is here, Mega Man will trash him. There are very few cases where the hero doesn't beat the supporting character, and Mega Man has won that match directly on multiple occasions.

Mega Man doesn't really deserve to be the 8 seed of the noble nine and has always been well ahead of Yoshi. The best chance to upset him is probably if Pikachu is here, but Mega Man doesn't seem to be very susceptible to Pokemon - he spent the 2013 wiping it from the face of the contest, including a win against Charizard where everything was stacked against him. Mega Man wins with 60%

Battle 123: (4) Cloud Strife vs Sora

No amount of KHIII hype can get the kid over this mountain. No reasonable estimation of Cloud's decline lets Red or Big Boss touch him either. Cloud wins with 70%

Battle 124: (5) Crono vs Bowser

I think Crono would have beaten Pikachu if Magus wasn't there. Bowser might be stronger, so this is the best chance for a legend to fall - or perhaps the second. Still, I don't see it, especially not after that 2015 CT run. Crono wins with 55%

Battle 125: (3) Solid Snake vs Squall

We've seen this one before. I strongly doubt any of the other possibilities will be stronger than Squall by enough to make up the difference between him and Snake. Easy call. Snake wins with 60%

Battle 126: (6) Sonic the Hedgehog vs Auron

Sonic holds up pretty well 1v1. I'm sure some people will call for an upset, just like they did with Ganondorf and Kirby. Sonic wins with 55%

Battle 127: (2) Samus vs Tifa

Look at that shiny number 2 beside Samus' name. It may seem odd, but she has consistently done very well in these. Snake deserved it more, since he beat her in 2013 and outperformed her against Cloud in 2010, but I suppose Samus does have that old head-to-head win against him.

But I digress. We saw this match in 2013, and Tifa didn't keep it as close as she did in 2006. Samus wins with 58%

Battle 128: (7) Mario vs Sephiroth

I'm tempted to call this one in favor of Sephiroth. He annihilated Mario twice over in the past. But that was a long time ago, and exaggerated though his fall may be, he's not the clear third place that he once was. The 2010 X-stats project that he will narrowly lose this battle. Now, that was the same Sephiroth who had Missingno's ghost hanging over him, but it wouldn't have happened regardless if it were 2005. The big problem is that Sephiroth is a character who goes through every contest with a target on his back. FFVII has been placed in a position where it can easily do very well this contest. Tifa, Sephiroth, and even Vincent have a good shot at winning their divisions, and Aeris could make it a few rounds deep. If that happens, we can expect a torrent of "FFVII always wins" complaining and more anti-votes than ever when Cloud and Sephiroth's big matches come around.

We have to hope that, for all these disadvantages, Sephiroth still has the pure strength that it takes to bring down Mario. I'd like to believe that, but I don't think I'm brave enough. Mario wins with 50.5%

Battle 117: (1) Squall Leonhart vs (15) Aeris Gainsborough

Squall is well ahead of Aeris. He beat her no problem in 2007. There's also that 2008 poll where the Squall/Sora team dominated the Yoshi/Fox Nintendo Squad. Squall was first in that match - and Fox was last.

For all the variation this division contains, it should be another example where the top half is clearly stronger. Squall wins with 60%

Battle 118: (13) Riku vs (3) Auron

Unless Geralt turns out to be a monster, which I doubt, this division is the reverse. No one else has a shot against Auron/Vincent. Auron wins with 60%

Battle 119: (1) Luigi vs (3) Tifa Lockhart

This is Fox/Aeris with stronger characters. Tifa has always looked a little better. The game is all about guessing if FFVII will have lost enough power. Tifa wins with 52%

Battle 120: (1) Sephiroth vs (3) Ryu

Veni veni venias, ne me mori facias (gloriosa)
Veni veni venias, ne me mori facias (generousa)
Veni veni venias ... wait, people are actually talking about this one?

Okay, the time has finally come. Let's talk about Sephiroth.

To begin with, Sephiroth was arbitrarily removed from the legends. Allen took him out because he thought it would look a little bit better without two characters from the same game.

Sephiroth's fall from grace appears to be a deeply ingrained belief on this board. I even saw one poster, I forget who, call him "the weak link of the noble nine." Below Crono or Sonic! That fall from grace begins in 2006, when he narrowly lost to Snake in the Battle Royale - while Cloud was SFFing him into the ground. Then he lost to Snake and Kirby in 2008 - again with Cloud in the poll.

He lost cleanly to Snake in 2010. But there's one thing a lot of people overlook when they talk about that match: Sephiroth sacrificed himself to save us from Missingno. He lost to Snake (who has become very powerful) by about 5,000 votes with the help of the anti-voting that match earned him. Then in 2013, he lost to Draven and the "chosen one" Mewtwo. In other words, at least in my estimation, rumors of Sephiroth's death have been greatly exaggerated. Using the X-stats from Sephiroth's greatest contest embarrassments, he's projected to win this match with 58-63%. Only one character has ever broken 60% on Ryu in a 1v1: Cloud in 2010, who doubled him.

Mario or Samus beating Sephiroth? Sure, I can see it. But Ryu or Luigi taking him down? Let's not be animals here. Sephiroth wins with 58%

Sephiroth died for your sins.

Alright, boys, this is the only day I have off work until the contest starts, so we're finishing this thing today. On to round 4.

Battle 113: (4) Ganondorf vs. (2) Leon Kennedy

I think that Vivi vs. Ganondorf is the perfect example of a trap match. In 2013, they have a direct battle which suggests that Vivi should annihilate Ganon. I love Vivi, so I would be happy if that were the case, but there were so many factors in Vivi's favor then that the match is obviously worthless. Vivi was rallied then, and Ganondorf had Mario hammering him down. If that match were run in 2010, Ganon would be the heavy favorite. The X-stats project him to win with ~58%

Dante and Leon could be here just as easily. I think that the upper half's winner beats the lower half's winner every time. Dante has beaten Leon directly and Ganon is clearly a step above Leon's level. Ganondorf wins with 56%

Battle 114: (1) Zero vs. (3) Yoshi

If Pikachu is here, he has a Pokemon game getting released on match day, which certainly can't hurt. Let's hope that Yoshi can take out the rat so we don't have to see its ugly yellow mug in the Legends bracket.

As for these two, you can plug them into the X-stats for almost any year and project a win for Yoshi. He wrecks in the 2010 stats and loses in 2007's. 2013 has him winning with 50.04. I'm inclined to think that Yoshi wins it out with a little help from a "Nintendo resurgence factor," though I'm not sure he even needs anything like that. I'm not confident picking him here when I'm not even sure he can beat Pikachu, though. Yoshi wins with 52%

Battle 115: (1) Sora vs (3) Alucard

There's a tone of possible variations in this division, but I think that the top half winner takes the division final in any case. Sora/Big Boss should be more than a match for Alucard/Kefka/L-Block, so if Red can hang with those two, he shouldn't have trouble here. If it does turn out as I predicted, Sora and Alucard had a match in 2005, which Sora won with 55% of the vote. Kingdom Hearts is Light, after all, which is bad news for a vampire. Sora wins with 55%

Battle 116: (1) Bowser vs (2) Kirby

Bowser edged this one out way back in 2005. But like Pikachu, Kirby spent a long time getting stronger in these. He has some very impressive wins from the 4-ways. He beat Sonic and even Sephiroth, with Cloud sharing the poll in the latter case. Sephiroth got his revenge in 2013, but the pink ball held close enough to make himself look very good in the process. Even there, the multi-way format clearly benefited him.

One thing I notice, when looking through Kirby's history, is that all his impressive performances have come when he was not exposed to the upper-tier Nintendo characters. He can shine against Metal Gear or FF characters, and even Sonic, but he's never been able to pull off a big win against someone like Luigi or Bowser. Stick him in a poll with DK, and he loses to Kratos.

If there is such a thing as rSFF, it probably appears within the confines of the strict Nintendo hierarchy, and if Bowser even needs that, it might be the factor that gets him the win here. All things considered, I'm more confident in him out of the pair of them. The dum pink ball loses with 48%

Division 7

Battle 109: (1) Luigi vs. (4) Nathan Drake

Another easy one. Luigi wins with 60%

Battle 110: (3) Tifa Lockhart vs. (2) Mega Man X

Mewtwo could potentially be here too. If he is, either Tifa has fallen off or Mewtwo is the real thing. Only in the latter case can he challenge X - it would be a tossup in that case.

And so is this match. X hasn't been around for long, but he's nearly as strong as the original. In 2008 he held pretty close to Mario - however, Zelda and Luigi were in the same polls, and he still lost. Once Link came into the picture, he finished in 4th, behind Zack Fair.

That certainly indicates that he has a lot of fanbase overlap with Nintendo, like the original Mega Man. And that's significant, because in 2010 he scored higher on Link than Luigi or Sonic did. Then, in 2013, he beat Ryu head-to-head, while Draven crushed them both. In the bonus poll, he finished behind Mario and Crono by enough to make me doubt that he competes with Mega Man proper.

Tifa has finished in or near the top ten in the X-stats for every contest in which she has appeared. She has put up impressive numbers on Samus and Sephiroth in the past, and she's even ranked as #7 in the adjusted 2013 X-stats - above Cloud.

My problem with this match is that both characters' pedigrees contain a lot of things I don't trust. I wouldn't want to read the outcome based on one character getting SFF'd into the ground slightly less badly by Link than a Nintendo character and a fellow 3rd party whose games are now mostly on Nintendo consoles. I wouldn't want to try and predict the results based on Tifa's obviously anomalous ancient match with Samus or the adjusted-to-pointlessness 2013 X-stats either.

This is yet another match that's all about predicting how things have changed in the past ten years. Will FFVII have continued to decline? Will the site's demographic shift reverse its fortunes somewhat? Will Mega Man 11's release help X, and how strong is he compared to the original in any case? I don't really know. I've had them both in my bracket at different times. I think FFVII will do well this year, so far now I'll say that Tifa wins with 50.5%

Division 8

Battle 111: (1) Sephiroth vs. (5) Amaterasu

Veni veni venias, ne me mori facias Sephiroth wins with 65%

Battle 112: (3) Ryu vs. (2) Aqua

No less simple than Sephiroth's match, really. KOS-MOS could very well be here instead, and Ryu wrecked her before. Ryu wins with 65%

Ryu H should beat Simon without any trouble. They've both been around for a long time and Hayabusa has always come out ahead. Simon is a winless character.

There's a lot of guesswork involved with Bayonetta and Geralt. Riku too, given that it's unclear how important KHIII will be. I agree that Bayonetta's boost, to the degree that she gets one, is more about her franchise than anything. But I don't think it will be worth much. Bayonetta 2 did alright in the games contest, I guess, since it held up sort of well on RDR which then got 40% on SotC. But that isn't the kind of hype that should put her over Riku, let alone Auron or Vincent. Let's be reasonable here.

I think the top half of the division is a three-man race between Geralt, Ryu, and Riku, with Sans Undertale as the potential wild-card if he gets rallied. It's hard to imagine Bayonetta putting up 45% on Yoshi or bringing down Jill Valentine. I'm not that confident in Geralt either. I'm tempted to go back to taking Ryu over him.

I think I can explain why Roy hasn't made it before. It's because neither Fire Emblem nor Smash fans will think of him right away when asked to name their favorite characters.

He doesn't do much to stand out in either game. In FE6 he's a standard Lord with lackluster combat and in Melee he's largely overshadowed by Marth. People seem to really dislike the clone/echo fighter characters too in my experience.

I think Riku's odds against Bayonetta are pretty good. Even after his bad match in 2013, he's projected to win with 60% against her - unfortunately, since Bayonetta hasn't been in any other contests, those are the only numbers we have.

Bayonetta made it into Smash and has seen the release of her second game since then. On Riku's end, KHIII is closer now. I wouldn't be too surprised if both characters boosted - though Bayonetta might attract some anti-votes from competitive Smash players because her design is really unhealthy for that game. That shouldn't be a big factor. Ultimately I think that Bayonetta is the type of semi-mainstream character who won't really do that well on this site - 2013 kind of makes it look that way - and she had a solid amount of ground to make up for before she reached Riku's level, so I would favor him. I also think that the results of Dedede, Pit, Lucas, Wario, Lucario, etc. show that being in Smash doesn't power characters up that much. I think it's related to the effect that I mentioned earlier with Chrono Trigger. Any given Smash 4 character is only one among like 50, so a lot of people who played the games won't have spent much time with them. Bayonetta was a DLC character in 4, on top of that, which reduces the number of people who were exposed to her through it even further.

One thing I failed to mention with respect to Riku: He and Ryu H. had two direct matchups in 2007. Ryu H won handily the first time around, because Roxas was in the poll as well - he actually surpassed the KH boys' total. Then Riku won in round 2, with Snake and Nightmare added in. That's a really weird result, and it probably doesn't tell us much except that they're close to one another in strength. I guess that's why the potential rematch was set up.

Vincent has historically been much stronger than Magus. The 2010 X-stats project him to win with 70% of the vote. Even the 2013 stats project an easy win for him, probably thanks to Metwo's run.

This is purely speculative, but I think that Chrono Trigger as a game will always get a lot more respect than its characters. None of the characters in that game, except Crono, really take a prominent position in the story. Even Frog completes his arc around halfway through - he's not that much more important than anyone else. I think this might partially explain why there's such a steep drop in contest power after Crono.

I think you have to bet hard on Vincent falling off a cliff for Magus to win, but at least it's only a one point pick, so you can take the risk - provided Vincent can't take down Auron, that is.

It bears mentioning that Waluigi's prospects for success are entirely rally-based. I don't see much reason to assume he'll be stronger than Wario. Even in 2013 Aeris is projected to double Wario.

EDIT: I didn't realize Waluigi was in the 2013 contest. He lost badly to Raiden in the first round. For what little it's worth, he's higher than Wario in the X-stats, and they project Aeris to score 62% on him.

Division 6

Battle 87x: (4) Auron vs (11) Vincent Valentine

Rather than strategic betting, like I was thinking of earlier, I would propose that the way to play this contest is to try and be as accurate as possible. Auron should have better odds. If Vincent turns out to be nearly as weak as 2013 made him look, Auron wins. If he doesn't, Auron still has a chance. I still think the upset is viable, but I'm too chicken to back it personally. Auron wins with 53%

Battle 107: (1) Geralt vs (13) Riku

Looking over his past performances, Riku's contest strength actually deserves a lot of respect. Going by the stats, his match with Hayabusa is a bit of a tossup - they should be close. Riku has the trump card of KHIII hype, which would lead me to favor him in that battle.

Geralt confuses things somewhat. He would have to occupy a fairly specific power range to defeat Hayabusa but lose to Riku, unless that KHIII hype has boosted Riku like mad. Of course, it's not a given that Geralt can beat Hayabusa to begin with, and I wouldn't be confident picking him to make the division finals. I imagine this is a bit of a hot take, but I consider him to have the best odds of anyone, so Riku wins with 52%

Battle 108: (3) Auron vs (10) Sub-Zero

Easy one. If Vincent is here instead, then he's still strong enough to beat Auron, and thus he easily beats Subby. Auron wins with 60%

I assume that Jill and Waluigi both make it to round 3 in your bracket, correct?

I think that if Walugi is there, he probably wins easily. Jill is close enough to Fox that she doesn't really change the writeup with Aeris. If it were 2003, Aeris would win easily, and today it's about guessing how far she has fallen.

I do think that Shadow > Ness is a respectable pick. In Ness' defense, Big Daddy held up relatively well on Tifa and is actually ahead of Ammy in the X-stats, which also predict a close win for Ness against Shadow. Shadow is quite a strange entity in these contests, going from his close loss to Mario to losing to Tidus in one year, and in 2008 he even lost to Zidane. That's a significant one because Ness beat Zidane directly in 2007 (though he might have been helped by being the only Nintendo character in that poll.) After Earthbound and the SNES doing so well in 2015 it makes sense that Ness would do a little better than usual, while people's perception of Shadow only seems to get worse over time.

I can't really see the argument for Lightning. I'd have to hear the case for her.

Division 5

Battle 105: (1) Squall vs (4) Zelda

Squall is really strong in these things - comparable to Vincent, Auron, Tifa, and possibly even Sonic. He wrecked Yoshi in 2008, and easily dispatched Missingno in 2013. Zelda, for her part, is no slouch either, but if you compare their performances against Vincent and Aeris, Squall is definitely ahead. I think he should be the favorite. People are expecting a BotW boost for Zelda, and I'm sure there will be some effect, but to my knowledge it takes a long time for her to actually appear in person in that game. A principle in these things is that characters who only show up much later on tend to be very weak, so I expect the same to apply to boosts from new games. Zelda does talk to you using telepathy right from the beginning, but I don't think there will be enough of a positive association with her disembodied voice to boost her over Squall. Also, KHIII hype, boys. Leon wins with 53%

Battle 106: (11) Fox McCloud vs (15) Aeris Gainsborough

Back in the day this would've been an easy call for Aeris. The 2002 and 2003 stats project her to score around 70% of the vote. Fast forward to 2010 and that number drops to 50.5. We've had eight more years for Aeris to decline since then. The prevailing wisdom on this board is that FFVII will be much weaker now than it was in 2010, extending an observable trend that had been going since about 2003. I suspect that most people would take Fox now on the basis of that trend.

The tricky thing is that with such a long gap, we can't say for sure that the trend has continued. In 2015, the SNES dominated and FFVII looked pretty good, although Ocarina beat it soundly in the bonus poll. People mainly explain that dominance with the idea that GameFAQs' demographics have shifted toward the old, and therefore 90s games, and the SNES in particular, will dominate. But if that is true, it might revivify FFVII somewhat. Few things should be as closely associated with nostalgia for this site's userbase.

I don't like favoring Fox in a debatable matchup, because I've picked him out of fanboyism before and it's burned me. It's a difficult call, mainly because we don't really know what Aeris is worth today. She lost to Shepard in 2013, but Fox's own performance in that contest is even more humiliating. Aeris wins with 51%

Dark Souls

I think that taking Pikachu to win his division is a perfectly legitimate choice - I had that in my bracket at one point. If Pokemon does surprisingly turn out to be as strong as 2013 suggests, I think he'll take it with no difficulty. Let's Go will probably be less of a factor than HG/SS was back in 2010, but it should give him a nice edge and it's difficult to imagine him losing to Zero with that help. In my estimation, Yoshi is being given a bit of a bad rap and all three of those characters should be in the discussion. Yoshi does have that bad 2008 performance where Squall/Sora were first and second above him and Fox, but he also has his Crono-level score against Missingno, so it's hard to say for sure where he is.

Division 3

Battle 101: (1) Sora vs (4) Big Boss

Another match between two characters who are often quite close in the x-stats. I think that Sora has a few more factors going for him, between KHIII hype and the possibility of a Big Boss sprite pic since this is the third match. There's also the matter of MGS' 2015 performance. To Big Boss' credit, MGS3 emerged as the strongest game in the series that contest. But they all did rather poorly, which might signify a drop for the characters, although that's highly speculative. The most recent Metal Gear game was survive, which could leave a bad taste in people's mouths and inspire them to vote against MGS characters.

Sora might even have a bracket voting advantage due to that sexy 1 seed. Sora wins with 53%

Battle 102: (3) Alucard vs (7) Kefka

For the sake of round 2, Kefka's impossible-to-predict precise strength didn't really matter. For this match, it becomes relevant again. If we do have another sprite round, Kefka might gain some power by being graced once again with his final boss sprite from FFVI. Is that enough to take down Alucard? I can't really say, but my inclination is no. I expect that Kefka is another example of a character who is overhyped because of an anomalous 2013 performance. I have to admit that I'm also inclined toward Alucard because of the aforementioned history of him winning debated matches - unless he's up against Kingdom Hearts. Alucard wins with 55%

Division 4

Battle 103: (9) Ness vs (4) Bowser

We previously established that Ness is as strong as Mario, and we've seen that match before. Ness wins with 70%

I wish. As a matter of fact, we've seen this match before, and it wasn't pretty. If 2B is here, she will get a higher percentage compared to Ness, but she stands no chance of winning. Bowser wins with 75%

Battle 104: (6) Ike vs (2) Kirby

Easy one. The dum pink ball wins with 75%

I'm skeptical of the Pokemon dominance, especially in CBIX, as is probably clear by now. This will be the contest where we find out for sure how real it is. I could get burned. It wouldn't shock me. But I'm fairly confident in Bowser and Tifa, at least.

9S (Nier Automata)
&
Wolf O'Donnell (Star Fox 64)

I think it's very up in the air too. I initially had Vivi in my bracket and even had him down while I was writing about the match here, but when I looked back over what I had said I realized that I had essentially spent the entire time writing reasons why Vivi should lose. I thought of the idea that FFIX tending to get better too, but I became a bit more skeptical of that after looking at Vivi's two DK matchups. Apart from 2013, that increase isn't very clear in his history, at least to me.

Division 2

Battle 99: (1) Zero vs (5) Noctis Lucis Caelum

Should be an easy win for Zero regardless of his opponent. Zero wins with 65%

Battle 100: (3) Yoshi vs (7) Pikachu

Of all the debatable matches involving Pokemon, this is the one where I'm most inclined to pick it to win. I think that the rat is the most popular character from Pokemon here. He's probably the best example of a character who grows stronger over time. As much as I like the idea that Parappa the Rapper is stronger than Shepard, something tells me that isn't the case.

Yoshi would be ranked ahead in any year before 2010. Pikachu is probably overrated in 2010's stats, even after the adjustments, thanks to facing Snake during the sprite round, followed by Snake avenging Missingno and picking up a bandwagon against Cloud. Yoshi's value is probably wonky too due to Missingno. I don't really buy the idea that he was that close to Crono then.

I've probably said enough about 2013, but if you need more convincing, note that Yoshi was behind Link that year and that makes it very difficult to get a read on him. I think there was a topic recently where the consensus was that Yoshi is easily weaker than Luigi or Bowser, but I'm not sure there's enough evidence behind that claim.

The reason I initially picked Yoshi was because of the idea of the Nintendo hierarchy. It just didn't seem right to predict that a beloved Mario character like Yoshi (who always wins the 8-way Mario character polls here) to lose to a Pokemon, even Pikachu. We might see a case of the fabled rSFF here, but I think they're close to one another indirectly. It's a choice I've gone back and forth on, but I'll say that Yoshi wins with 52% Goodbye Pokemon.

I would like to solicit opinions on the following matches:

Noctis' path
Sora vs Red
Auron vs Vincent
Dante vs Ganondorf

The bracket itself is excellent, and full of difficult matches. My main concern is that a lot of those potential matches will never be realized because of another huge contest-ending rally that replaces them with blindingly obvious blowouts.

Round 3

Battle 97: (1) Dante vs (4) Ganondorf

Both of these characters are obviously very powerful, but their precise strength is somewhat hard to gauge. Ganon isn't that high on the Nintendo totem pole, and a lot of his matches are hidden behind some kind of SFF. There's also the matter of a potential BotW boost. I think that will be a relatively small factor, particularly for Ganon, but it can be taken into account.

For instance, Dante is well ahead of Ganon in 2010's raw X-Stats, but Ganon has a valid excuse: he lost to Sonic with his LttP sprite, and then Sonic got pulverized by Link. Everyone behind Sonic will look weaker than he really is because of that final performance. The stats on NGamer's site adjust for that, and they have these two characters right next to one another.

Dante isn't as bad, but some things like the wide difference in his percentages on Ryu and to a lesser extent Leon look a little suspect. There's also the matter of his 2013 run. I think a lot of people will look at that and underestimate Dante as a result. I'm not even sure if it was a "DmC deboost." It might just be that Squirtle was going wild that year - something we have reason to believe based on Squirtle's victory over Cloud in the next round. Of course, if it was because of the reboot, Devil May Cry 5 should help nullify a lot of that loss, as I said before.

I'm not sure that the stats help that much with this one. My initial inclination was to pick Ganon, and given how close they are in stats and history I'll stick with that. Ganondorf wins with 51%

Battle 98: (3) Vivi vs (2) Leon Kennedy

Vivi is riding high after his upset of Mario last time around, and I think that's another great example of how trusting 2013 can turn on you. He was the beneficiary of a rally in that match, as well as the obvious handicap Mario faced - being weighed down by Ganondorf. In my estimation, that performance says very little about Vivi's strength at all.

This is a debatable match. Leon would probably be the favorite if it were run in 2010. They even have two direct matches from 2007. The second was unfair because Tidus was there with them, but in the first, alongside Ridley and Spyro, Leon was the winner.

I think there's a perception that Vivi has trended upward over time, but his first match back in 2004 was a 56% victory over DK, and his first match in 2010 was... a 56% victory over DK.

One advantage Vivi does have is that people will remember his upset last year and vote for him on that basis. It will probably give him a bit of a bracket advantage as well. That might be enough to secure him a small victory - looking at a year like 2010 indicates that he doesn't have too much ground to make up. But that's being somewhat selective, because other years show him further behind, and 2013 (where Vivi is far ahead) is the least reliable. Leon wins with 50.3%

I think that Samus and Mario should be considered nearly even indirectly. If Sephiroth can beat one, he can probably beat the other. If he can't beat one, he can't beat either.

I don't think Witcher 3 gained a rally, no. People have discussed the possibility because CDPR are fairly active with their community online, I believe.

Hayabusa > Geralt is completely reasonable. I had it in my bracket at one point and I may even switch back. There's a lot of guesswork involved. Kefka's 3-way performance was pretty weird, so 2013 Hayabusa extrapolations might not be the most reliable, though who knows. Geralt could easily be stronger than Altair was that year too, for all we know.

Division 7

Luigi and MMX win easily, and Drake should have no trouble either. Chief is very weak now.

Battle 91: (3) Tifa Lockhart vs (11) Metwo

Don't trust Metwo's 2013 percentages. They're clearly inflated by a wide variety of factors, including the attempted counter-rally to take down Draven with him. He will not be nearly that strong with the return to 1v1. One might even call him a fraud.

Tifa was comparable to Vincent at his height. She once went toe-to-toe with Samus, and she even held up very well in 2013 - also against Samus. The recently-released adjusted stats even put her in the top 10, above Cloud. I really don't think that she's as strong as he is, but taking down Mewtwo shouldn't be too much to ask. Tifa wins with 58%

Division 8

Sephiroth and Ryu should have no trouble. Ammy's win should be easy enough as well. Lara has never been on the same level. Ammy is something of a deceptive high-midcarder.

Battle 96: KOS-MOS vs Aqua

Another possibly debatable match with a relatively-strong midcarder. I would guess that Axel, rather than Sora or Riku, is the best metric for Aqua's strength. She will most likely suffer from being in a PSP "Spin-off," even if BBS' status has been elevated within the series and it's received multiple re-releases. She's also only one of three protagonists in her first game, which tends to hurt characters. KOS-MOS is not that great either and has only grown weaker over time, so it's a tough call. KHIII hype will do Aqua some favors, since she's prominent in some of the trailers and she doesn't have to reach a terribly high benchmark to be able to win here, but remember that her seed is essentially meaningless because she was a guru nom. Though perhaps it isn't completely so, since she did beat out Sully there. I'm inclined to give KH a lot of credit now, and will say that Aqua wins with 50.5%

Division 5

Squall, Zelda, Fox/Jill, and Aeris all win with ease.

Division 6

Battle 85: (1) Geralt vs. (8) Ryu Hayabusa

This one is all about guessing how strong Geralt will be. I think he's likely to be the best of the newcomers, but he's facing off against a midcarder who has beaten the likes of Jill Valentine in the past. That's not necessarily a barrier he can't naturally overcome, though. It's hard to say for sure. Hayabusa might have decayed over time as well. Geralt wins with 52%

Battle 86: (12) Pac-Man vs. (13) Riku

Not too hard. Riku consistently out-performs Pac-Man and ranks hire in the X-Stats. What's more, he's been in these contests much more often than Pac-Man ever since his first appearance in 2005 - he hasn't missed a contest since, while Pac-Man didn't make it into 2006 or 2010. Thus, if Bayonetta can beat him, she should be able to beat Pac-Man as well.

I don't think that Sans Undertale has a chance on the basis of his natural GameFAQs strength. Riku wins with 60%

Battle 87: (3) Auron vs (11) Vincent Valentine

If it weren't for 2013, this match would be incredibly up in the air. People are probably overestimating Auron's chances, because 2013 was a strange year. That being said, Vincent doesn't suddenly become a lock if we choose to ignore that contest. For instance, they tend to be within only a few spots of one another in the X-Stats. Sometimes, Auron is the one ahead.

Historically, these are both very powerful characters and whoever wins this match should be the favorite to take the division, so choosing the right one is necessary for the sake of winning the contest. I don't really believe that Vincent has suddenly declined far below other FF7 characters with whom he used to be equal. That's probably reading too much into individual results which could very well be anomalies. Auron has been a little more consistent and shouldn't be as easy to sabotage with a pic, although I doubt Allen will let that happen to Vincent again.

I really think it's a tossup. I'm inclined to pick Vincent just because it will put me ahead of a lot of other Board 8 posters if it pans out. Vincent wins with 50.1%

Battle 88: (10) Sub-Zero vs. (15) Claire Redfield

Sub-Zero should win against either opponent without much trouble, unless Ren is somehow far stronger than Yu. Needless to say, if Shulk really can beat Sub-Zero, he should win his second match with ease. I really don't think that will pan out, though, based on how weak he was before and Smash not appearing to help low-ranking characters that much. Sub-Zero wins with 60%

As much as I hate to cite it again, Skylanders was out in 2013, which probably provides us with the best idea of how it will help Spyro. And he did get closer to Morrigan that year than he did in 2002, but that's the size of what it did: it got him a little bit closer to her. He still lost. I don't think that it's enough to make up the difference between him and Chun-Li.

Skylanders is just about the furthest thing from a game you would expect to be popular on GameFAQs. I really think that Chun-Li > Spyro is a super easy call and that far too much has been made of it here.

Division 3

Battle 73: (1) Sora vs. (9) Pokemon Trainer Red

In my estimation, we need to grant Red two generous assumptions for him to win here: Pokemon needs to be as strong as it was in 2013, and KHIII hype can't have helped Sora much. The latter being the case wouldn't be too shocking, but I really don't expect the former. I've probably cited 2013 too often myself. It was a year with a bad format and a lot of outside influence directed at causing chaos. Square characters like Cloud and Sora himself performed badly, but then Vivi beat Mario. Pokemon advanced very deep into the contest - but Charizard lost to Mega Man with Zero in the poll.

If it were Pikachu here instead, I can see him winning, but I think Sora should be the favorite over Red. Sora wins with 55%

Battle 75: (3) Alucard vs. (6) Yuna

As odd as it may sound, Yuna is just not Captain Falcon. The Captain has outperformed her significantly in the last two contests - and so has Alucard. Betting against Alucard in these contests has a long history of backfiring. In fact, that history goes all the way back to the first character battle, when people expected him to lose to Tails. You would have to bank on him really falling off a cliff here for her to win, and for that to happen despite SotN's good performance (where people expected Banjo-Kazooie might be able to beat it) in 2015 and the site's apparent demographic shift toward older audiences. Alucard wins with 58%

This division's other two matches are easy enough. Big Boss and the Kefka/L-Block winner should have no difficulty.

Division 4

Battle 77: (1) 2B vs (9) Ness

Perhaps it's wishful thinking on my part, but I just don't think 2B will be up to much. Ness is a low midcarder at best, but his game got a surprising amount of respect in 2015 and he's been around for ages, plus he has a relatively dedicated fandom to draw upon (although maybe the same can be said for 2B, I don't really know.) Ness wins with 53%

Battle 78: (12) Charizard vs (4) Bowser

Remember that a new Pokemon game was released on match day last time around. Remember that Charizard was riding a bandwagon and had only won 55-45 against Kratos two rounds before. And remember that Charizard lost to Mega Man despite Zero being in the match, during a year of absolute Pokemon dominance. This match is a trap. Bowser with with 60%

Battle 79: (3) Phoenix Wright vs (6) Ike

Phoenix being the favorite here is an example of people extending trends from previous years without confirmation that they've continued - and it might be that it's happening because we love Phoenix so much. Ike is above him in the X-stats for both 2010 and, for what little it's worth, 2013, though Phoenix is far ahead of Ike in the unadjusted 2013 stats, which are worth even less. But it's not as though it's illogical to extend those trends - it's just opening yourself up to a risk that they'll mislead you. Ike feels like a solid 2-point upset pick that could get you ahead of a lot of the board. He's also had some reason to boost since then - he's had Heroes, the Waifu Emblem strain of FE is more popular than the previous installments and references him, he's always in Smash, and there was even that FE/Dynasty Warriors game. I think I'll pull the trigger on it, unless someone else has a good reason to correct me. Ike wins with 51%

Battle 80: (10) Isaac vs. (2) Kirby

Back to free points. Kirby wins with 70%

Sure, that's possible. They would each mow down everything in their path until they met one another. After that, you'd have to guess which one is stronger.

Characters from mainstream competitive games (like D.Va and Draven) have the highest overall rally potential. With Melee vs. Undertale, we saw that a game which has been rallying for longer has an advantage - Melee didn't start rallying until round 4, when it needed that help to beat Chrono Trigger. That might have a slight impact on D.Va since she could potentially beat Aloy without needing to rally. Monika might have a slight advantage over Sans because her game is younger and hasn't won before.

All of those reasons are highly speculative, of course. There will be a lot of luck involved in predicting which rallies would win against others, just like there is for predicting which rallies will come to fruition in the first place.

Yes. Vincent was the first outside character to defeat a Noble Nine member. He took down Crono in one of the 4-way contests. He was still very strong as recently as 2010, when he was 11th in the adjusted x-stats (ahead of Auron) and 19th in the raws (behind Auron.) People are down on him now because he did very badly in the most recent character battle. We don't really know for sure how reliable a metric that is, because that contest was anomalous in a lot of ways and remains the most recent contest, but there was a long downward trend for FFVII before that, so most people expect Vincent to be relatively weak this year, and Auron has always been a strong character himself.

Now we're moving into round 2. Needless to say, from here on there's some variation in the bracket. I might not discuss a match that you think will happen. I will try to cover variations besides the ones I predict, but feel free to post if you think I've missed a valid one.

Division 1

Dante, Ganondorf, Vivi, and Leon win their matches easily, regardless of who they're up against. The closest thing to a debatable match here is Leon/Tidus, which would still be considered an easy call any year that it was run. The only way there's any variance here is if you think Chloe can get rallied - and keep in mind that LiS itself failed to do so on the year of its release.

Division 2

Zero, Yoshi, and Pikachu should have easy matchups. Pokemon characters probably aren't as strong as you think they are, but Pikachu should still be a good step ahead of Kratos.

Battle 70: (5) Noctis Lucis Caelum vs (13) Wario

In all likelihood, there exists a strength gap between Master Hand and Wario, and Wario occupies the high end. The question is whether Noctis falls into that gap. He could be outside it on either end, for all we know.

I suppose the best metric we have for him is Lightning, but even that doesn't feel particularly helpful because Final Fantasy games vary so much between installments, in terms of people's perceptions. To my knowledge Noctis isn't as commonly-hated a character as Lightning, which should help him somewhat, but he's also further removed from Square's glory days. People who were turned away by FFXII or XIII might never even have given his game a chance.

I'm not inclined to put much faith in Noctis, but at the same time I think very little of Wario's strength in these. For now, I'll say that Noctis wins with 50.5% If he does score onl 52 on Master Hand, like I predicted before, then he's probably in trouble here.

Needless to say, if Monika is here, she stomps. This will be the last time I mention rally characters. If you have one winning its first round match, with the possible exception of D.Va, you should take it to the end of the contest in every case.

Battle 57: (1) Sephiroth vs (16) Albert Wesker

Estuans interius ira vehementi
Estuans interius ira vehementi
Sephiroth ... wins with 75%

Battle 58: (8) Richter Belmont vs (9) Captain Falcon

Richter is only in the contest because of Smash. Unluckily for him, he's up against the king of only being in the contest because of Smash. Captain Falcon wins with 65%

Battle 59: (5) Amaterasu vs (12) Draven

Ammy is surprisingly strong. Draven, meanwhile, was horrifically weak before he received his rally. I don't think it will happen again, especially since r/league wants nothing to do with this contest ever again. Draven will be a little less pathetic because of people remembering his victory last time, though. Ammy wins with 70%

Battle 60: (4) Lara Croft vs (13) Metal Man

F R E E P O I N T S Lara wins with 80%

Battle 61: (3) Ryu vs. (14) Lloyd Irving

Lloyd will get creamed. Fox creamed him before. At least he'll still be stronger than Velvet. Ryu wins with 70%

Battle 62: (6) Commander Shepard vs (11) King K. Rool

Lots of free points in this division. Shepard wins with 70%

Battle 63: (7) Ellie vs (10) KOS-MOS

Ellie might be a little bit stronger than Elizabeth. That should put her around Crash-tier. KOS-MOS might well be weaker now than she was in the past, but she won't be that bad, I don't think. You could pick a worse upset. KOS-MOS wins with 60%

Battle 64: (2) Aqua vs (15) Quiet

There is even an outside possibility of Quiet winning this match, creating our fourth 15 > 2 "upset" of the contest. I wouldn't count on it, though. The Metal Gear franchise's mediocre BGE 2015 performance and Quiet's relatively minor status in her game don't bode that well for her. Aqua wins with 55%

Maybe, but not enough.

I think that, if Ren is equal or only slightly stronger when compared to Yu, Claire should be the favorite.

Zidane > Shulk would be a super easy pick to me, and Lightning > Shulk only slightly less so. Based on the previous performances of characters like Lucas, Dedede, and Pit, Smash doesn't really redeem people that much.

Underleveled

This has gotta be the most unfair assessment of Chloe I've ever seen.

Not that I think she'll win. She'll probably get somewhere around 41%. But that's a pretty bad way to describe her to those not in the know.

Yeah, some of my writeups are more meant to be comedic than factual. Chloe's is one, and Sans Undertale's is another. I know he's not the real protagonist and that games 2015 was not really the most recent contest. But it's funnier to call him that. It's also funnier to insist on calling him Sans Undertale.

In terms of substance, I think that Clementine is the best metric we have for Chloe. I think Chloe will be weaker than Clem. They're from similar games, but Walking Dead was a slightly bigger deal and Clementine is a lot less polarizing. Therefore, I think the percentage I gave Lightning was low, if anything. Chloe might even be the last character I pick to round out my bottom 5.

Probably Superman, but none of the others. I think characters from outside of gaming would probably be very weak in these things, with few exceptions.

Battle 48: (2) Ren Amamiya vs. (15) Claire Redfield

This is Claire's fourth match, and a good chance for her first win. This contest has really devalued the idea of a 2 seed. It won't be shocking if we see not one, but three 15 > 2 upsets this time around. Ren, whose best metric is Yu Nakurami, clearly does not deserve that ranking.

But is he weak enough to lose to Claire, of 48% on Kairi fame? Maybe not. I'd like to know what other people think. I heard some people claim that P5 will be stronger than its predecessor, but I don't really know why you'd think that. For now, I'll say that Claire wins with 52%

Battle 49: (1) Luigi vs. (16) Miles Edgeworth

Luigi wins with 75%

Battle 50: (8) Frog vs. (9) Monokuma

Monobear doesn't even have a chance at a rally. I notice that I've called a few different characters bottom 5 so far. Well, here's another one. Frog wins with 80%

Battle 51: (5) Master Chief vs. (12) Goro Majima

Chief has gone from a wildly inconsistent character who pulls off legendary matches to just plain weak, and there's really no way for him to rebound on this site. That being said, he should still have what it takes to bring down a Yakuza character. Chief wins with 60%

Battle 52: (4) Nathan Drake vs (13) Miles 'Tails' Prower

Maybe this isn't quite what you'd call a free point, but Tails has never done well here and has nearly no chance. Drake wins with 58%

Battle 53: (3) Tifa Lockhart vs (14) Geno

Here they are. Tifa wins with 75%

Battle 54: (6) GLaDOS vs (11) Mewtwo

This match is really too bad. GLaDOS is not a slouch. This placement feels like a bit of a waste of her. Mewtwo may be a fraud, but I don't think he's this much of one. Watch his percentage closely, though. Mewtwo wins with 55%

Battle 55: (7) King Dedede vs (10) Revolver Ocelot

Don't get the choice of Dedede. That was probably an even worse NRT choice than Estelle. Ocelot wins with 65%

Battle 56: (2) Mega Man X vs (15) Isabelle

Now here's a proper 2 seed. Free points. X wins with 75%

If you could interview the voters, I wouldn't be too surprised if LiS or Undertale voters generally skewed more to the left than the rest of the site already does. But I don't think they will rally one of those as a protest of Kavanaugh's nomination or anything along those lines, no.

Battle 43: (5) Sans Undertale vs. (12) Pac-Man

In case you don't know, Sans Undertale is the main character of Undertale, which won the most recent GameFAQs contest. As such, he's one of the characters in the rally discussion. Allen really seems to like the guy, since he not only gave him a winnable match, but actually let him into the contest twice under different names.

To begin with, let's talk about how strong Sans Undertale will be without a rally. This site demonstrably does not care about his game. It was getting doubled by the hated Mass Effect 3 before its rally kicked in. It also had an underwhelming performance in GotY, and after the contest, a PotD ran asking people if it had convinced them to play Undertale. The overwhelming response was one of apathy. He's probably not quite in the bottom 5 as a starting point, but he won't be able to beat Pac-Man.

I think it's exceptionally hard for the same entity to rally twice. There will be a sense of "been there, done that." Undertale is also past its peak as a game. I don't think it will be Sans Undertale who gets the rally. Pac-Man wins with 60%

Battle 44: (4) Bayonetta vs. (12) Riku

I picked Riku at first, but I wasn't too confident. Looking over the guy's previous performances gives me more faith in him. He's done surprisingly well for himself over the years - though maybe not too surprisingly, since his bro is a high-ranking character. Riku is probably the second-strongest guy from KH, and he's scored over 60% on Ramza, defeated Ryu H, and lost close matches against Frog, Captain Falcon, and even Yoshi. Bayonetta didn't quite double N in 2013 - who was not hugely stronger than Wander. To be fair, in round 2 she came sort-of-close on Alucard. I don't think that extrapolating from that match would get her to Riku's percentage on Captain Falcon, but she's had a lot of reason to boost since then - but with KHIII being a highly-anticipated game these days, the same might be said of Riku.

Bayonetta 2 wasn't great in 2015, but it wasn't terrible either - it got like 37% on RDR, which then got 40% on SotC. So perhaps it will give her a decent boost - which she needs. She has to beat his boost by enough to overtake the gap that already existed between them, it seems. I think it's a bit of a long shot. Riku wins with 52%

Battle 45: (3) Auron vs. (14) Lucina

Back to free points. Auron wins with 70%

Battle 46: (6) Magus vs. (11) Vincent Valentine

Vincent's a tough guy to call in terms of his strength. He used to be a #10 candidate - and in fact, he was the first guy to break the noble nine in any format - so long as we don't count Solano's B8-only poll. But after that 2013 loss to Phoenix Wright it's hard to say how far he's fallen. Magus was way below him in the past, and is himself a legendary choker.

I think that Vincent will surprise people a little bit, but he should be the favorite in this match regardless. Vincent wins with 60%

Battle 47: (7) Shulk vs. (10) Sub-Zero

Rounding out the post with some free points. Sub-Zero wins with 58%

Battle 39: (7) Shovel Knight vs. (10) Captain Toad

This one is debatable to a certain extent. All we really know is that both characters will be weak. I'm inclined toward Toad because he's a Nintendo character people recognize, and because indie gaming has a record of doing really poorly here - or at least it did in 2015. Toad wins with 53%

Battle 40: (2) Waluigi vs. (15) Aerith Gainsborough

Aeris is our first of quite a few FFVII characters to have a match this year. See's also the only one with a realistic chance of losing round 1. Whatever estimate you may have of FFVII's decline, I really don't think Waluigi can hold up to her without a rally (mainly based on Wario's past strength.) To me, it does seem possible that he could catch a meme-based rally. He might be one of the more likely candidates, but I still don't think it's that likely. Aeris might even have the strength to hold up against a round 1 rally where someone like Jak couldn't. Aeris wins with 65%

Battle 41: (1) Geralt vs. (16) Rosalina

Rosalina is a relatively well-liked Nintendo character with some exposure to her. Galaxy has never really gotten its due on this site, which doesn't bode that well for her. The best gauge of Geralt that we have is Witcher III's half-decent performance in 2015. He'll be in some debatable matches later, but I don't think Rosalina has enough going for her to bring him down. Geralt wins with 60%

Battle 42: (8) Ryu Hayabusa vs. (9) Simon Belmont

Being in Smash doesn't seem to do all that much for a lot of characters. We found that out in the 4-ways particularly. One point of trivia: in his only contest appearance, Lucas ended up losing directly to the Jinzo from Banjo-Kazooie, and was last in the X-Stats. This was after he appeared in Brawl. Hayabusa wins with 58%

Battle 33: (1) Squall Leonhart vs (16) Hat Kid

Squall wins with 85%

Battle 34: (8) Garrus Vakarian vs. (9) Ramza Beoulve

Mass Effect's status as a series has really degraded since the last contest. It makes sense to assume that the characters will be weaker on that basis. Last time around, Garrus came kind of close to Sub-Zero. That should be ahead of Ramza pretty easily - Ramza is another example of a character with an embarrassing contest history, particularly that loss to Hogger. He has to hope that his game has undergone some of the resurgence we saw from Chrono Trigger in 2015 - or that Garrus has fallen off really rapidly. As much as I love FFT, I don't think either of those are likely. Garrus wins with 55%

Battle 35: (5) Metal Sonic vs. (12) The Boss

Since Metal Sonic has never appeared before, this one could be a bit tricky. The Boss isn't that great. She barely edged out Drake in 2010, though she did have the seeding - and therefore bracket votes - against her. Metal Sonic might pull it off - I feel like he could end up having some strength. I think he'd have to be the second-strongest Sonic character to win this in the first place. The Boss wins with 55%

Battle 36: (4) Zelda vs. (13) Ezio Auditore da Firenze

This is a rematch. Last time Ezio was a 2 seed. Zelda scored 62%. She should go higher this time. He'll be weaker, and she might even be stronger. Zelda wins with 70%

Battle 37: (3) Aloy vs. (14) D.Va

D.Va is one of the characters people have suggested as a rally target. I said earlier that I think she's one of the more likely ones, and that's because I think she at least theoretically has what she needs. So far, we've seen three contest winning rallies: one from a complete joke character, one from a character from a competitive online game with a huge playerbase, and one from a smash-hit indie game that had been released only a couple of months before. D.Va fits into the second category. Overwatch's playerbase certainly is large enough to win her the contest if they care enough.

The really sad thing is that she might not even need a rally to be Aloy. That could turn out to help her - she would get out of the first match with no trouble. But it could also be her downfall: if she doesn't need it, her rally won't get started, and therefore she will have to begin it in round 2, against an opponent who just might be too strong for a fresh rally. After all, Fox is no Jak. D.Va wins with 50.5%

Battle 38: (6) Jill Valentine vs. (11) Fox McCloud

I was being a bit flippant just there, because these two are actually really close. In 2010 Jill scored 33% on Samus - and Fox scored 33% on Snake. Fox is only a few spots ahead of her in the X-Stats for that year. Part of my inclination to take Fox is just that he's a character I really like (I nominated him for this contest.) In 2013, Fox looked like he might have been able to take down a Pokemon character if the format didn't screw him. Meanwhile, Jill finished a little ahead of Kratos while getting blown out by Mega Man. Maybe you can cite some kind of Capcom SFF and say that this isn't a fair comparison, but would I take Fox over Kratos? Yes. Easily. Fox wins with 52%

I picked GLaDOS. I think the Portal games have excellent writing.

Battles 27 & 28: (5) Terra Branford vs. (12) Charizard & (4) Bowser vs. (13) Gordon Freeman

More free points. Charizard and Bowser win with 65% each.

Battle 29: (3) Phoenix Wright vs (14) Chris Redfield

Chris is somewhat hard to get a read on. The only characters he's ever placed ahead of are Tim (Braid) and some guy from CoD. He's lost to Pyramid Head, but he also has a half-decent performance against Fox and Sora. In 2010, he did slightly worse than Ridley against Cloud. Meanwhile, Phoenix has only become stronger over time and is now clearly more powerful than Vincent, so he wins easily.

In all seriousness, Phoenix should probably be the favorite but no one should feel too comfortable about him. For what little it's worth, Chris is actually ahead of him in the 2010 X-Stats. Phoenix wins with 53%

Battle 30: (6) Ike vs. (11) Joel

The Last of Us was not too weak in Games 2015. Joel is probably better than someone like Clementine, but I don't think he'll be worth much in any case. Ike has at least beaten Zidane - not that Zidane is exactly a demon in these. Ike wins with 58%

Battle 31: (7) Estelle Bright vs. (10) Isaac

This will be the day when we get to find out just how terrible a fodder character Estelle is. It's somewhere in the range of "definitively fodder" and "Bottom 5." Board 8 organized around her in order to answer this question. Hope it was worth it, guys. Isaac wins with 70%

Battle 32: (2) Kirby vs. (15) Guile

The dum pink ball wins with 80%

I think that L-Block and other joke characters tend to do better with registered users than unregistered ones. There's some discussion about it in the stats topic, if I recall right.

Since the difference won't be huge (registered users might vote for L-Block at 53% while unregistered ones vote for Kefka at around the same, for instance, though those numbers are essentially made up.) That being the case, it won't change the outcome unless the match is really close - but Kefka/L-Block could easily be a match that's close enough for that.

Kefka might be the type to do well with registered users too for all I know. Someone else would be better qualified to comment on that.

Battle 23: (7) Kefka vs. (10) L-Block

Kefka's matches have never made any sense. This match has like 40% in a ten way poll about which Round 1 match is hardest to call. L-Blocks' contest victory is now 10 years old, so only the most dedicated joke-voters will still find his presence here funny. As I recall, Kefka has done relatively well recently, and the block has faded into the background as you would expect. I don't think that we have enough information to go on. I think I'll just lean toward Kefka due to FF fanboyism. Kefka wins with 50.3%

Battle 24: (2) Kazuma Kiryu vs. (15) Bomberman

Kazuma is heavily overseeded. I think the Yakuza guys will be really weak here. It's hard to say if they'll be Bomberman-level weak, though - that guy has really lived up to his name in these things. My initial inclination was that Bomberman's status as a minor gaming icon will give him the edge, but characters like that have failed a lot before, so who knows. Bomberman wins with 52%

Battle 25: (1) 2B vs. (16) Cayde-6

With a different draw, 2B might have become the second 1 seed to lose in round 1. Luckily for her, she's matched against a strong contender for the lowest spot in the xstats. I have no idea who nominated Cayde or why but I think he has all the makings of a neo-Tanner. 2B could destroy this matchup and still lose in round 2. 2B wins with 70%

Battle 26: (8) Shadow the Hedgehog vs. (9) Ness

I nominated both of these guys. Thinking about it now, they might be my two favorite characters in the bracket, so seeing them matched up against each other is kind of rough.

I think Ness has this one. Shadow is a strange contest entity, but since that ~45% on Mario he's fallen off a cliff and today he can only beat the likes of Yu Nakurami. Ness isn't a hell of a lot better, but he's not as hated - or as much of a laughingstock. I'll be voting for him too. Ness wins with 55%, proving himself to be as strong as Mario.

Battle 17: (1) Sora vs. (16) Ryo Hazuki

Sora wins with 70%

Battle 18: (8) Neptune vs. (9) Pokemon Trainer Red

Red wins with 80%

Battle 19: (5) Crash Bandicoot vs. (12) Cecil Harvey

Crash is riding high at the moment, coming off a contest in which he won his first match. It wasn't very impressive on the whole, and he went on to lose to Elizabeth. Meanwhile, Cecil was out losing to Wrex, and has yet to bag his own first win. The PS1 Crash games have had a re-release since then, but I doubt it matters much. I think I'll take Cecil just because a close loss to Knuckles looks a little better than anything Crash has done. Cecil wins with 55%

Battle 20: (4) Big Boss vs. (13) Ridley

No reasonable estimation of Ridley's Smash announcement boost should bridge the gap between these two. Big Boss wins with 60%

Battle 21: (3) Alucard vs. (14) Princess Peach

There's a tiny amount of upset hype for this one. Seems like people give Alucard a low estimate every year, and feel the burn for it just as frequently. Alucard wins with 58%

TsunamiXXVIII posted...

People still care about Dante? Well, I guess they must if he got a 1-seed, but honestly, the last time I remember DmC being relevant was that reboot or whatever it was that everyone hated.

Devil May Cry V is currently in development. Some trailers for it came out around E3. They're giving the DmC universe the boot and bringing back the old white-haired Dante. That will probably generate a bit more goodwill toward him and make something like that a little harder to pull off than it would have been in '13, for instance. Personally, I just don't see Cuphead being able to pull in enough support regardless of what kind of pic Dante gets.

I think Waluigi and D.Va are the most likely. I can't really see it happening for Bowser. To me it seems like people won't vote for the Bowsette meme when they're faced with the name Bowser and a picture of him in his regular giant turtle-monster form. I think that degree of separation will stop the joke from working for a lot of people. God willing, we'll be spared a massive rally this time. I wouldn't feel very confident in any of the possibilities if I were going for the "guess the rally" method.

Battle 13: (3) Yoshi vs. (14) Shantae

Free points. Yoshi wins with 80%

Battle 14: (6) Velvet Crowe vs. (11) James Sunderland

Both of these characters are newcomers, but we've seen their series in action before. They're destined to be weak. For instance, Jade Curtiss has the distinction of being last in the x-stats for one of the fourway contests. Silent Hill 2 and Pyramid Head have both appeared before and done very poorly. It's a tough call, because it's hard to say how strong Velvet or James might be in comparison to these counterparts.

I think Velvet will be pathetic. James at least has a reputation as a character and his game is well-respected, even if it isn't popular - which seems to count for something and might explain, for instance, Shadow of the Colossus' strength in these contests. James wins with 53%

Battle 15: (7) Pikachu vs. (10) Scorpion

Scorpion is a character who could easily win a match - or several - with the right placement. Pikachu is the kind of road-block he definitely can't overcome, sadly. Pikachu wins with 60%

Battle 16: (2) Kratos vs. (15) John Marston

It makes sense to suspect that both of these guys will be a bit stronger than usual. Kratos was well ahead of John before, so I don't think that will change. Kratos wins with 58%

Any comments on Tidus/DK and Zidane/Knuckles would be appreciated.

Battle 11 (5) Noctis Lucis Caelum vs (12) Master Hand

It's hard not to see this match and remember Master Hand's bout with Kuja. It's tempting to pick the hand just on the basis of that memory. He was a weak character back then - he went on to lose rather soundly to Robotnik.

This match is all about guessing how strong Noctis will turn out to be. I think he'll be weak - maybe even weaker than Lightning. It's hard to say if that would make him weak enough to lose this match. Master Hand might be stronger now or he might be weaker - I can't think of a good reason for either assumption. He's been in every smash game but his appearances are never all that exciting.

I think I'd take Lightning over Kuja, at any rate. I'd like to hear other people's guesses about Noctis' strength. For now, I think I'll lean toward him, because I think there should be enough space between Lightning and Master Hand to begin with. Noctis wins with 52%.

Battle 12: (4) Monika vs. (13) Wario

When this board discussed possible contest-winning rallies before the release of the bracket, Monika was one of the first names that came up. She has been given a nice winnable match against Wario, who has a history as one of the lowest rungs on the Nintendo ladder. It makes sense to compare her game to Undertale - at least out of all the huge rallies we've seen so far.

I don't think it will be Monika, and here's the main reason:

Undertale's release date: September 15, 2015
BGE 3's start date: November 5, 2015

Doki Doki Literature Club's release date: September 22, 2017
CBX's start date: October 19, 2018

Undertale was the latest big thing right in the middle of the contest - it had just been released a month and a half before. It was more of a hot topic then than it was a year later. I don't think that DDLR was ever as big a deal as Undertale to begin with, but people have had a full year to cool on the game - and to move onto something else. In my estimation, a small indie release won't be able to command a huge rally with that kind of distance.

I also think that Monika's natural strength will put her in the bottom five in terms of X-Stats. This site doesn't care about DDLR, and I don't really think that a "cute anime girl" people have never heard of will have the kind of appeal to make them vote for her. She definitely can't take Wario without a rally, so if you have her winning here, I suggest you also take her to win the contest.

Wario wins with 65%

Battle 7: (7) Tidus vs. (10) Donkey Kong

This is a tough one. DK has never been a strong character, and a few years ago Tidus would be the favorite. For what it's worth, plugging them both into the X-stats almost always returns a win for the FF protagonist. Both of them looked decent in 2013. DK beat Lightning soundly with Falco bringing him down, while Tidus nearly beat Missingno, which then held up well on Squall.

I think it come down to how much weaker you expect FF to be now. If it hasn't collapsed too badly, Tidus should edge out the win. I'm inclined to pick him. I don't think FF we'll be as weak as some people claim. I think a lot of its failings in 2013 might be best seen as anomalies of the format and the year. That might be bias speaking, though. Tidus wins with 51%

Battle 8: (2) Leon Kennedy vs. (15) Dragonborn

We've seen the Dragonborn before, and he's not on Leon's level. Leon wins with 60%

Battle 9: (1) Zero vs. (16) Primrose

Primrose is probably a bottom 10 character. Being in an ensemble-cast game won't help her any. Zero wins with 75%

Battle 10: (8) Zidane vs. (9) Knuckles the Echidna

When I first saw this match, I picked Knuckles without thinking much. Leon predicted that Zidane would win in his topic, making the cogent point that Knuckles scored 52% against Cecil in 2010. That kind of score on Cecil does suggest a lose to Zidane. Meanwhile, Zidane lost to Ike in that same contest. Which would imply that Ike is soundly better than Knuckles as well. The whole thing feels kind of screwy to me. I don't know what to make of this one.

Remember that the average age of people who vote in this site's PotD is like 30. The child vote shouldn't be a huge factor in Spyro's favor.

I'm quite confident that Chun-Li will win that match. You'd have to expect a large swing in the strength of one or both of them compared to previous contests for Spyro to win. I don't think there's good reason to expect that. Hype for the Spyro trilogy remake won't do that much for him.

Wasn't there a push for Sully here on Board 8? Does anyone else here know about this? That might partially explain his seeding. A lot of the time, seeds can be deceptive because of things like this.

Battle 4: (4) Ganondorf vs. (13) Neku Sakuraba

Another really easy one. Ganondorf wins with 78%

Battle 5: (3) Vivi vs. (14) Yu Nakurami

Vivi wins with 70%

Battle 6: (6) Victor Sullivan vs. (11) Aya Brea

Once upon a time, Aya Brea nearly beat DK. Now she's in a debatable match against a character who by all rights should be pathetically weak. Nathan Drake has an embarrassing contest history. First he lost to CATS, then he lost to The Boss despite being a 2 seed. In 2013 he finally won a match - barely edging out Pac-Man.

Most of the time, secondary characters like Sully are significantly weaker than the hero. I know that Sully's in all the UC games, but I don't really think he'll be an exception to that rule. My guess is that he'll turn out to be a really weak character and that will be just enough to let Aya take it, but who really knows.

Aya wins with 55%

VideoboysaysCube posted...

By the way, who is Monika. Never heard of her or the game she's from. Where's her popularity coming from?

She's from a game called Doki Doki Literature Club. It's free on Steam, and when it came out (in September of last year, if I recall right,) there was a bit of buzz over it. Apparently the subreddit is still pretty active, so people think she has rally potential. Her base strength on this site should be close to bottom five levels.

guffguy89

Also, I guess I'm the only one that thinks Spyro has a chance to win that match against Chun-Li?

They've both been in the contests a couple times. Spyro has looked pretty bad (he barely got 10% in a four-way poll in 2007,) and 3D platformer characters have a long history of being really weak. Chun-Li has some half-decent results to her name, though mainly in the female half of the 2006 bracket, which is old and might have boosted her a little.

Chloe catching a rally would be the necessary condition for her to win, yeah. My guess for Lightning's percentage is probably low if she doesn't, actually. I would take Clementine to beat her normally, and Clementine was phenomenally weak.

She does have the advantage that Lightning would be an easy character to rally against, but I don't think she's a great bet for a rally personally. Big rallies seem to require fairly specific circumstances, which is something I'll get into once we get to Monika's match. I think LiS is a bit too old. Here's a way of thinking about it: the game itself didn't really rally in 2015, when it was much more of a hot topic.