LogFAQs > #983230047

24. Cloud Strife vs. Link vs. Sephiroth vs. Solid Snake (Fall 2006) BR

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/1/1d50fc62.jpg

Cloud Strife 23.7% 32131
Link 42.68% 57860
Sephiroth 16.79% 22754
Solid Snake 16.83% 22810
TOTAL VOTES 135555
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/Cloud_Strife_vs_Link_vs_Sephiroth_vs_Solid_Snake_2006
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/2564-battle-royale-day-3

The Battle Royale was our second attempt at removing some of the Elites from the Main Bracket in order to make things more interesting and less predictable. And while it did manage to increase the stakes of the Male Bracket, overall the format was greeted with much less enthusiasm than the Tournament of Champions had been the previous year, with at least one prominent user leaving the board in a huff over Mario being lumped in with Clinkeroth as a contest force that needed to be removed. While the format of the Royale was something that we had never seen before, and while there was a good amount of debate about when certain eliminations would happen, we all thought that we had a good read on the big picture of the Battle Royale overall: the two less popular Nintendo icons (Mario, Samus) would be eliminated first due to Links presence, then the Male winner would go, leaving us once again with Clinkeroth remaining for the penultimate match. And for the first two rounds of the Battle Royale, that prediction came true, with Samus and then Mario getting eliminated in short order. There would be one wrinkle that would arrive in the Battle Royales third day, and in it would come in the form of the Star of the 2006 Contest: Solid Snake.

Snake has been such a fountain of strength for so many years now, and it makes so much sense that he is, that it can be hard to remember that there was a time when he was the weak link of the Noble Nine. Of course he *should* have been stronger. Thats what we all thought in 2002. Snakes so cool, hes gonna get tons of votes. But that wasnt the case for the first four contests, when Snake always seemed to struggle to live up to his very clear potential. But then, at E3 2006, he appeared in the famous Brawl teaser, and his contest trajectory would change for good. Boosted by newfound Nintendo support, Snake swept through the Male Bracket in such a dominant fashion that it was almost taken for granted that he would beat Samus too in the Finals of the Main Bracket. He would be brought down to Earth a bit after Samus beat him relatively easily en route to her own contest victory, but this is another chapter of Snakes history that has been somewhat forgotten based on what came next: his run in the Battle Royale.

As previously mentioned, Samus and Mario were eliminated in the first two days of the BR, and Snake was expected to be eliminated in Day 3, but something curious had happened in Day 2 that initially flew under the radar. Despite finishing in third place as he had on Day 1, Sephiroth took all day to get there, only pulling ahead of Snake at ~9:30 PM, marking the closest Clinkeroth had come to being defeated in four years. This result was noticeably worse than what Sephiroth had done against Snake on Day 1, and if the downward trend continued, well, maybe Snake would have a chance at making it to Day 4 of the Battle Royale after all. Well, the match started and initially at least, that is exactly what happened. Snake got off to a smashing start against Sephy, his lead breaking 500 votes just after 1 hour, and then breaking 600 an hour after that. Anyone who had thought that Snakes 2006 run had run out of steam after his loss to Samus was realizing their mistake, and it was beginning to look like Snake had just been biding his time for one final upset instead. As the Early Vote wore off, and the First Night Vote kicked into gear, Sephiroth was able to increase his percentage, but Snake kept increasing his lead, slowly, but surely, never letting Sephiroth do anything more than stall him out for an update or two. The morning hit, and rather than hold Snake back as was so often the case, it gave him a second wind, eventually pushing Snakes lead over Sephiroth to near 900 votes. A titan of these contests was on the verge of being eliminated, and it was little old Snake who was about to do it.

This match would end up being a Tale of Two Halves however, and shortly after the halfway point, at around 2:30 PM, once the ASV started to roll in, Sephiroth would make his move. Sephiroth? King of the ASV? Unexpected as it might have been, Sephiroth was proving that Clinkeroth was not willing to go down without a fight, and he would spend the next 9 hours tearing down the lead that Snake had spent the rest of the match building up. Within an hour or two, the celebrations for Snakes victory were put on hold as it became clear that Sephiroth might just advance to the penultimate match after all. Rarely has the board been as united in support of an elite character as they were in this match, but all of that goodwill seemingly didnt matter as afternoon turned into evening and Sephiroths comeback turned into something that could not be avoided. He wouldnt quite hit his mark from the day before, but by 10:30 PM he had drawn Snakes lead down to single digits, and for the next hour and a half, everything froze. As the board buzzed with excitement, the match remained locked in a 50/50 battle for third, Sephiroth finally, just barely pulling into the lead with 15 minutes to go. But he couldnt put it away, leading by a mere 2 votes on the second to last update.

Normally, in a situation such as this, the board would be mass refreshing the previous poll to see who the winner was, but in this case that wasnt necessary. Simply refreshing the home page on schedule at 12:00 AM would show you the new poll, and the three participants in it: Link, Cloud, and.Snaaaaake! The board erupted at this revelation, and everyone rushed to see how much he had won by. It turned out to be a suspiciously large amount, but considering the fact that even a 3 vote shift would have put Snake over the top, it didnt matter. For the first time since the first contest, over four years prior, Clinkeroth had been defeated, even if it had taken our first ever four way poll to do so. And while he didnt do anything impressive in his final match, Snake would go out on top this year in a way that few other characters ever have. He had upended the order of the Noble Nine, and entered the next phase of his contest career.