Board 8 > Leonhart Analyzes the Bracket!

(+) Yeah! (+)

Sprites are horribly disadvantageous for many characters. We'd have probably gotten rid of the sprite round ages ago if it had ever actually cost Snake a match.
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Banking on general FFVII apathy and Ryu getting a bit of a boost from Smash.

I think it's the perfect storm for a Sephiroth loss, really.
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and I just hope people don't resort to pic sabotage this year

it's not fun for anyone and no one thinks you're clever for doing it
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UltimaterializerX posted...

It's not sabotage if both characters look bad.

if both characters look bad then make a different pic

and it's extremely rare to see a sprite round match where both characters have terrible sprites anyway (or at least not where one isn't decidedly worse)
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i haven't done pic sabotage in a while, i grew out of it

however i'm a pic mercenary this year and i have like 45 obligations to fill so if someone requests a sabotage pic i am now obliged and capable
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make an MGS3 Ocelot pic
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The annoying part of this is that none of the rally characters are easy to sabotage (save Game Boy Color Waluigi, but I doubt that would help.)
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Ironically, a sprite round for Sans would probably benefit him more than hurt him, assuming he makes it to Round 3, anyway. I think he can do that without rallies. He's not getting beyond that without one, though.
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The match picture has no effect on rallies because rallied voters are told who to vote for before they see the match picture.
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Team Rocket Elite posted...

The match picture has no effect on rallies because rallied voters are told who to vote for before they see the match picture.

I'm kinda surprised it has an effect on anyone anymore.
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LeonhartFour posted...

transience posted...

Leon, where are your hourly charts? it looks like sc2k5's kinda dead

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NZSFYa6CpacbjZf5jK6orhE7Xtn42ksEFFQEUfzYIj0/edit#gid=1468623839

I've actually been updating them because I realized for some reason I never included CBIX's on there.

SC2K5 had something weird happen recently. The data hasn't been lost. If you have the right link, you can still get to it, but all of the links on the site itself are broken. I guess we can get cn to fix it once he comes back for the contest.

Does the same go for old contest match pictures? Creative's site doesn't let me go straight to them anymore.
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Yeah, if you can find the actual link itself, they'll still show up.
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Never understood why the "sprite round" was even a thing to begin with
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Panthera posted...

Never understood why the "sprite round" was even a thing to begin with

It was just kind of a thing CJayC did ever year around Round 3 or so and it wasn't until we started getting a larger influx of characters that debuted after the 16 bit era in later rounds that we started thinking otherwise about it.

There was one year that we flat out scrapped the sprite round and went straight into freeform pics because nobody wanted to do them.
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LeonhartFour posted...

Noble Niner actually loses to a non-Noble Niner 1-on-1 for 24 straight hours (still hasn't happened...!).

Does Missingno not count for some reason?
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pjbasis posted...

LeonhartFour posted...

Noble Niner actually loses to a non-Noble Niner 1-on-1 for 24 straight hours (still hasn't happened...!).

Does Missingno not count for some reason?

24 straight hours
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HaRRicH posted...

Does the same go for old contest match pictures? Creative's site doesn't let me go straight to them anymore.

LeonhartFour posted...

Yeah, if you can find the actual link itself, they'll still show up.

for instance

http://www.gamefaqscontests.com/gallery/albums/cb9/5162.jpg

you can change the numbers to get a lot of CBIX's match pics from there, I guess, but if you try to go to the main gallery page or anything it doesn't work
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oh shit 2010 was the 12 hour stuff

I forgot that was a thing
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So does anybody have a link to the pictures then? I've had to resort to the Board 8 Wiki, which I think only has one picture per match for the matches it has pictures for.

EDIT: just saw Leon's follow-up post, that's a start -- thanks!
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I just found that one at random browsing an old Stats Topic.

Trying to contact cn is probably your best bet because, like I said, the data isn't lost. We just can't access it properly.
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LeonhartFour posted...

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NZSFYa6CpacbjZf5jK6orhE7Xtn42ksEFFQEUfzYIj0/edit#gid=1468623839

I've actually been updating them because I realized for some reason I never included CBIX's on there.

I noticed the trend chart for the bonus matches aren't on there. I actually found a trend chart from the stats topic archives for the bonus match that happened in between Round 1 and Round 2, but I never got around to making trend charts for the other 3 bonus matches. Here are all of the bonus match trend charts:

Time | Chester | Caim | Dancin' | Votes
0:05 | 23.42% | 37.03% | 39.56% | 316
1:00 | 20.42% | 50.60% | 28.98% | 2688
2:00 | 20.86% | 54.79% | 24.35% | 2004
3:00 | 20.23% | 57.44% | 22.33% | 1760
4:00 | 18.79% | 56.49% | 24.72% | 1517
5:00 | 20.58% | 54.70% | 24.72% | 1404
6:00 | 20.16% | 54.27% | 25.56% | 1240
7:00 | 20.14% | 56.85% | 23.02% | 1008
8:00 | 20.77% | 56.53% | 22.70% | 987
9:00 | 18.94% | 55.92% | 25.14% | 903
10:00 | 19.06% | 56.41% | 24.53% | 897
11:00 | 20.92% | 54.67% | 24.41% | 889
12:00 | 18.24% | 57.81% | 23.96% | 839

Time | Mario | Crono | MMX | Votes
0:05 | 42.33% | 33.33% | 24.34% | 678
1:00 | 41.19% | 33.97% | 24.85% | 5220
2:00 | 40.22% | 34.70% | 25.08% | 4003
3:00 | 40.14% | 34.99% | 24.88% | 3610
4:00 | 39.67% | 35.10% | 25.23% | 2997
5:00 | 38.47% | 35.24% | 26.29% | 2792
6:00 | 38.79% | 35.71% | 25.51% | 2470
7:00 | 37.69% | 36.06% | 26.25% | 2324
8:00 | 39.30% | 34.72% | 25.98% | 2094
9:00 | 37.76% | 35.51% | 26.73% | 1949
10:00 | 38.88% | 35.09% | 26.03% | 1875
11:00 | 40.31% | 33.56% | 26.13% | 1925
12:00 | 37.57% | 34.93% | 27.50% | 1778

Time | Mewtwo | Pikachu | Mega Man | Votes
EBV | 31.19% | 18.20% | 50.61% | 654
PHV | 30.31% | 18.62% | 51.07% | 4725
FNV | 30.19% | 20.51% | 49.30% | 9411
BSV | 30.44% | 22.35% | 47.21% | 4675
DSV | 29.31% | 21.90% | 48.79% | 11192
ASV | 29.48% | 22.23% | 48.28% | 9908
SNV | 27.41% | 22.03% | 50.56% | 2061

Time | Link | Snake | Votes
EBV | 51.80% | 48.20% | 917
PHV | 51.66% | 48.34% | 7509
FNV | 50.72% | 49.28% | 12438
BSV | 53.58% | 46.42% | 6851
DSV | 55.18% | 44.82% | 12854
ASV | 54.52% | 45.48% | 14640
SNV | 57.31% | 42.69% | 2593
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Oh, right, I forgot 12 hours was a thing
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By DK's track record of upsets I meant last character contest and DKC2's run in the games contest. I like how I called DKC2 > Xenoblade correctly but wussed out on taking it to Round 3 just because DKC2's weak showing in 2009 made it seem wrong to take it that far. Shows what I know.

To be fair though DKC2 is probably pretty weak for an SNES game, seeing how it struggled against a cult Wii RPG and a 3DS game.

Anyway, Donkey Kong is receiving hyped new games on a fairly regular basis again, whereas Tidus and his game are just a few years older. Though I'm more just trying to pick an upset special more than anything else.

Ryu Hayabusa to Round 3 I'm also picking, but mostly because if Ryu H. last contest was still stronger than Altair and Lara Croft (based on their performances against Kefka), it makes sense he'd be stronger than Geralt.
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Given the significant number of stuffed votes that had to be removed from Cirno, here is a revised trend chart that excludes the stuffed votes:

Time | Tifa | Cirno | Chun-Li | Votes
0:05 | 59.31% | 10.73% | 29.96% | 494
1:00 | 62.14% | 9.62% | 28.25% | 5208
2:00 | 63.28% | 9.06% | 27.66% | 3069
3:00 | 62.76% | 10.62% | 26.62% | 2344
4:00 | 61.31% | 11.61% | 27.08% | 2016
5:00 | 62.84% | 10.58% | 26.58% | 1663
6:00 | 61.42% | 12.57% | 26.01% | 1488
7:00 | 64.15% | 11.40% | 24.45% | 1632
8:00 | 62.59% | 10.66% | 26.75% | 1895
9:00 | 63.87% | 10.15% | 25.98% | 2059
10:00 | 59.24% | 17.16% | 23.61% | 2279
11:00 | 59.65% | 13.71% | 26.64% | 2290
12:00 | 59.17% | 13.11% | 27.72% | 2197

With the exception of the results at the freeze, these trends were based off the same data that GameFAQs uses for their poll graphs. Even after the revised trends, the last 3 hours are possibly tainted by votes that weren't caught and there might have been some rallied votes during that time as well. I guess Leon could replace his old trend chart for Tifa/Cirno/Chun-Li with this revised trend chart instead.

Guybrush was the only other character after Cirno and Marisa to have stuffed votes removed during the 2013 contest, but he had only 96 votes removed from him. With such a small number of votes removed from Guybrush, I see no point in making a revised trend chart for his Round 1 match.
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so youre to blame for leons resident evil gaiden pic then
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UltimaterializerX posted...

Yeah well not everyone has a good sprite.

I did some light Google-fu in search of a Geralt sprite pic. There are, actually, some badass Geralt sprites floating around the internets.

I think Geralt is being underrated in this thread, possibly because he doesn't have a rich character battle history like so many of the contestants.

I've gotta believe Geralt will turn in a strong showing; his latest game is 3 years old, and still it's in the top 10 boards daily. Whether that will translate to success in the character battle, Idk. But I think he's beyond well-known by now, and doesn't face an especially difficult lineup (at least early on).
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Two thoughts:

Kingdom Hearts: The Story So Far is being released for PS4 on October 30th, it includes EVERY Kingdom Hearts title. I'm already picking Sora, but for those who were waffling, that may help.

Also: I am picking Shadow because I'm BANKING on him being announced for Smash sometime in the next few weeks. Could be a mistake but gotta take some risks aye
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Yeah I admit I know jack squat about Geralt and his games.
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Technically speaking, in 2003 and 2007 Round 3 was "First Appearances" (except Mario vs. Crono. Always cheating, lol), not sprites per se. That wouldn't help most, but at least we wouldn't have to deal with RE: Gaiden!
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It was disappointing that Allen got rid of the sprite round in 2008. I really wanted to see what kind of pic Gordon Freeman would get there.
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UltimaterializerX posted...

Yeah well not everyone has a good sprite.

Which is why we don't need to have it anymore
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Xeybozn posted...

It was disappointing that Allen got rid of the sprite round in 2008. I really wanted to see what kind of pic Gordon Freeman would get there.

There are models of Gordon that appear in Opposing Force and Blue Shift, we would have had to rip it from there
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we should have instituted a rule that any character that lacked an official sprite art would instead be represented by a bottle of sprite
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i had to do a sprite pic of Altair once, it sucked

when you get a full-body pic of the dude and it's all squished down to fit in the pic he looks terrible. just some awkward white smear.
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if leon ever has to compete in the sprite round again, someone should use a leon sprite from the cancelled (apparently it was actually released!) Tiger game.com port

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4-QxmzxkN8" data-time="

I mean it at least beats out Resident Evil Gaiden!
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About the potential Zero vs Pikachu match, if I'm getting the dates right, isn't that happening the same day Pokemon Let's Go comes out?
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Let's Go is going to do absolutely nothing for that Zero match

Even Pokemon fans don't care about it. At all. I've been told most of the fan sites get like no additional traffic whenever news about it shows up which is not the case with other Pokemon games. Contrast to Charizard in 2010 when people really were pumped for HGSS.

It won't boost Pikachu but it won't deboost him either because it's still Pikachu. It just exists.
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Ranticoot posted...

Let's Go is going to do absolutely nothing for that Zero match

Even Pokemon fans don't care about it. At all. I've been told most of the fan sites get like no additional traffic whenever news about it shows up which is not the case with other Pokemon games. Contrast to Charizard in 2010 when people really were pumped for HGSS.

It won't boost Pikachu but it won't deboost him either because it's still Pikachu. It just exists.

Well, Meltan got attention, but nothing else did.
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what about Detective Pikachu though
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i'm sure ryan reynolds will tweet a rally for pikachu
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Does Ryan Reynolds tweet about Character Battle matches often?
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ffmasterjose posted...

Does Ryan Reynolds tweet about Character Battle matches often?

Makes me wish Deadpool was eligible, but noooo lets have dumb non-characters be eligible instead >:(

ffmasterjose posted...

Does Ryan Reynolds tweet about Character Battle matches often?

yeah he's a huge fan of Caim, that's how he was able to beat Chester
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I mean if we can get David Hayter and Jennifer Hale to tweet about the contest surely Ryan Reynolds isn't a huge step up from that
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HeroicSpiderPig posted...

Technically speaking, in 2003 and 2007 Round 3 was "First Appearances" (except Mario vs. Crono. Always cheating, lol), not sprites per se. That wouldn't help most, but at least we wouldn't have to deal with RE: Gaiden!

it'd still be horrendous for Hayabusa and Big Boss if nothing else
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Just Monika.
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