Character Battle X Contest Analysis Crew - Part 10 GameFAQs Contests

Current Guest List: Send write-ups to mastermoltar@gmail.com

Mega Man vs. Crono - Luster Soldier
Solid Snake vs. Samus Aran - spooky96

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Crew Predictions: 123/141

Crew Prediction Challenge:

Monika: 120
transience: 119
Kleenex: 115
Leonhart: 114
Guest: 111

Crew Accuracy Challenge: Monika gets the point for Link.

transience: 35
Guest: 33 (BetrayedTangy, SuperNiceDog (4), pjbasis, garetha200 (4), ZenOfThunder, Ranticoot (2), Hbthebattle (2), NowItsAngeTime, spooky96 (3), RoseChevalier, Lopen (2), paulg235 (3), DoctorJimmy133, Janus5k, BT, TsunamiXXVIII, ctesjbuvf (2), MetalmindStats (2))
Kleenex: 30
Monika: 23
Leonhart: 21

tag

save_us.snake

I all for Zelda now. I think t hough that even Hentai rallies will not help against Link.

Zelda is the hero of hyrule

Losers Bracket: Round 3 – Mega Man vs. Crono

Monika’s Analysis

Mega Man
Legends Round 1 - 49.89% vs. Pikachu
Losers Round 1 - 60.03% vs. Ganondorf
Losers Round 2 - 50.67% vs. Pikachu

Crono
Legends Round 1 - 54.88% vs. Bowser
Legends Round 2 - 43.27% vs. Cloud Strife
Losers Round 2 - 54.75% vs. Bowser

I’ve been waffling on this match ever since the first round of the winner’s bracket. Before it started, I figured Crono would be slightly stronger because CT boosting and everything. I thought I would be more confident after seeing MM essentially be equal with Pikachu, but Crono isn’t really lighting the world on fire with average performances on Bowser and a mediocre showing on Cloud.

That said...I think I’m still going to stick with Crono here since the numbers are slightly in his favor. 55% on Bowser says a little more to me than 50% on Pikachu.

Monika’s Voting Tip of the Day: When in doubt, go with your gut!

Monika’s Prediction of the Day: Crono – 51%

...That's my advice for today! Thanks for listening~

transience’s Analysis

I'm super excited to see this one. It's my two favourite popular characters! Sorry, Samus, you can't match up with these guys. In my mind it's a rematch of a really underrated 2005 match. The Sonic/Mega and Mega/Crono matches were really tight. Both of those matches went as expected but not by much.

There are so many numbers that you can crunch in this one. It's basically Yoshi vs. Bowser though. Crono got 54.88% and 54.72% on Bowser; Pikachu got 54.8% on Yoshi, Mega and Pikachu may as well be equal. I think the consensus is Bowser over Yoshi, and thus Crono over Mega Man. The stats through Cloud and Pikachu show Crono being a couple percentage points above Mega, so unless there's some SFF in the Link/Pikachu match, Crono's probably good for a 53-47 win or so. Everything kinda lines up nicely. Mega and Sonic never feel very far apart and but Sonic's not looked great.

I dunno though. I'm kinda low on Crono. I watched him not really do very well on Cloud who just got embarrassed by Link. It's mostly relative to old performances, to be fair. He's still ahead of Mega by the numbers. With FF7 being so uniformly bad, I'm kinda feeling Mega Man for this one. I guess you could make a case that everyone on the site is playing the new Smash game and Crono's the odd man out. I guess that's convincing, in a way, but this is the worst of trailers where we digest games from afar and don't actually play them. I'm gonna go with Mega Man though. Hopefully Moltar goes the other way because I'm tired of being one point behind him for a month.

transience's prediction: Mega Man with 50.67%

Leonhart’s Analysis

Honestly, I want Mega Man to win this just to avoid a pointless rematch between Cloud and Crono. The numbers might favor him here, too. Even with the potential for Link/Pikachu SFF, Crono isn’t that far ahead of Mega Man in the X-Stats after Link/Cloud. I suppose there’s also the possibility that Cloud SFF’d Crono a little bit since he did underperform a tad based on Alucard/Bowser. Either way, I can’t imagine either character winning by a huge margin, but Mega Man is the only one I could see winning this comfortably (say 53-54%), despite how good that makes Pikachu look (augh). I think if Crono wins, he just narrowly edges him out. As such, I’ll hope for the best and side with Mega Man.

Leonhart’s Vote: Mega Man

Leonhart’s Prediction: Mega Man with 53.01%

Kleenex’s Analysis

I can see this match going either way and you can probably make an argument for either character winning. Based on their two matches, we can set Mega Man and Pikachu to being roughly 50/50 - the results were close enough that they could flip back and for depending on which day you ran the match or even what hour the match was started. So given that, where do we put Pikachu on the Nintendo hierarchy? Is the stronger than Bowser? My gut reaction is yes. I think he’s looked better in all his indirect matches this year, and I think he’d edge out Bowser in a direct match. It would probably be fairly close though. Is it enough to close the the ~55/45 gap we saw between Bowser and Crono? I’m not convinced. I think this probably ends up something like 52/48, maybe 51/49 in favor of Crono. If PIkachu was here I’d be a lot more worried, I think the novelty of Pikachu beating Crono is more dangerous and might have pushed him over that hump. I’m not sure Mega Man has it in him to do that, especially because Mega Man and Crono both have fairly similar trends. I’d expect whoever is ahead after the first 30 minutes of this match to win.

Kleenex’s Prediction: Crono with 51%

Guest's Analysis - Luster Soldier

This may be the closest we get to having a true coin flip match. It could easily go either way. Mega Man is expected to get 55.41% on Yoshi by going through the MM/Pikachu rematch. Bowser has to get 50.70% or 50.84% Yoshi for Crono to be equal to Mega Man. I could see Bowser getting above that on Yoshi, but Yoshi/Luigi/Bowser have always been very close to each other that it is quite possible Bowser hasn't boosted at all.

Mega Man winning this match would be better just to avoid a Crono/Cloud rematch. Mega Man/Cloud is more interesting as the match has not happened in a 1v1 format. Only a fairly small percentage of registered users would even vote Mega Man to avoid this rematch, but it could be one intangible in Mega Man's favor when the match could be decided by less than 50 votes. Based on general voting trends among registered/anonymous users, I think Mega Man will have the edge with registered users. Mega Man also has better rally potential outside of GameFAQs than Crono. For a late match clutch situation, both characters have shown some clutch ability in the past. Crono activated his clutch to get his revenge on Vincent in 2008 while Mega Man out-clutched Charizard in 2013.

Luster Soldier's Bracket: Cloud Strife

Luster Soldier's Second Chance Bracket: Crono

Luster Soldier's Prediction: Mega Man - 50.09%

Crew Consensus: Mega Man wins in a 3-2 split.

huh, I thought Crono would be the favorite here. he is by the numbers!

that Monika pic is epic. Doki Doki is just a fantastic video game.

Losers Bracket: Round 3 – Solid Snake vs. Samus Aran

Monika’s Analysis

Snake
Legends Round 1 - 49.68% vs. Zelda
Losers Round 1 - 61.48% vs. Auron
Losers Round 2 - 57.53% vs. Sonic the Hedgehog

Samus
Legends Round 1 - 58.93% vs. Tifa Lockheart
Legends Round 2 - 48.58% vs. Mario
Losers Round 2 - 58.58% vs. Tifa Lockheart

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/2561

Can’t talk about this match without bringing this up. Snake was looking unstoppable until Samus...stopped him with ease. She’s got the advantage going into the match simply due to that.

Snake has gotten stronger since then, but Samus is currently benefiting from a very strong Nintendo site shift right now. That’s another point in her favor.

What about Zelda? She beat Snake and Mario, while Samus lost to Mario. I’m of the opinion that Zelda is benefiting from a bit of a bandwagon, so the Zelda that beat Snake is a little weaker than current Zelda. You also probably know how I feel about Samus and Mario indirectly as well.

In short, I’m still giving Samus the edge here. Like I said in an earlier write-up, until I actually see her losing to someone outside of the top hierarchy guys, I’m putting faith in her over everyone else.

Monika’s Voting Tip of the Day: Hey, have you heard of a game called Super Sma--...Wait, what? I was just spacing out and I started talking for some reason...

Monika’s Prediction of the Day: Samus – 52%

...That's my advice for today! Thanks for listening~

transience’s Analysis

The Zelda match really makes Snake look good. She's looking like a possible #2, which is crazy. Snake was within a few votes of her so he could be #3.

There's been a lot of back and forth about Mario, Samus, Tifa and Sephiroth, and I just think I prefer to trust my priors over trying to sort out that tangled web. Sephiroth isn't good this year but I don't think he's below Tifa. I just think the fanbase went with the protagonist over the antagonist there. I don't put a lot of stock in it. SFF seems dead unless you're in the literal same game, and so I think Mario and Samus is just a legit result. I don't really think that hard about it, honestly. Samus has been talked about as this theoretically stronger character since 2004's match with Cloud and she's never been able to put it together. You'll have to prove it to me before I give you the benefit of the doubt.

That said, I'm too invested in the Samus over Snake matchup to pick against Samus. That was my pet pick from the beginning and I'm sticking with it. The winner here vs. Mario and Zelda -- in whatever order -- is going to be really fun. Snake gives us the purest matchup but Samus feels like the underdog trying to right the wrongs of the past. Then again, maybe that's Zelda. Go Samus.

transience's prediction: Samus with 52.67%

Leonhart’s Analysis

After seeing Snake lose to Zelda right out of the gate, my faith in him was a little shaken, but now she’s beating Mario, so my confidence is back! I’ve seen people talk about how Samus pulled rank on Snake in 2006, and she’d pull rank again if need be, but I don’t agree with that. I know Snake vaulted into the top tier because of Smash, but I don’t think that means he’s suddenly subject to the Nintendo hierarchy. He hasn’t really shown any indications of it outside of potentially that match with Samus.

I think what happened against Samus was similar to what happened between Mario and Sephiroth in 2005. Both Samus and Sephiroth underperformed in the last couple matches of the female bracket and the Villains Contest, respectfully. Samus had a good excuse against Tifa, at least, but still, she didn’t look good. Yet after Mario and Snake dominated their brackets, they both lost easily in against Seph and Samus, so what caused that? I don’t know what it is, but I suppose there’s a part of the voter base that feels comfortable voting the other way as long as the other character isn’t in danger of losing. We’ve seen random overperformances by losing characters in every contest (people would probably point to Ganondorf/Chun-Li or maybe Bowser/2B this year as examples). Yet when they face the big boys (or girls), their strength comes back. I don’t understand it, but it seems to happen.

I also think Snake has gotten stronger since 2006. He outperformed Samus against a common opponent in Cloud in 2010, and he outperformed her directly in the 2013 finals. Yes, I know the Draven rallies muddle the numbers, but Snake was already well ahead of Samus even before Hayter got involved. The one thing that gives me pause is the fact that Nintendo is in a better place now than they were in 2013 or even 2010. The Switch is huge and Smash Ultimate literally just released yesterday. That being said, I think Ultimate’s release could benefit Snake because of the whole EVERYONE IS HERE THING since it was a big surprise that Nintendo brought him back and people were hyped to have him again as a result. I’m going to stand by Snake here because he’s still our one hope for a finals that isn’t completely boring and riddled with SFF. This is his final mission.

Leonhart’s Vote: Solid Snake

Leonhart’s Prediction: Solid Snake with 51.15%

Kleenex’s Analysis

You could probably make a case for Snake to win this match, but I think you’d be wrong. Snake has looked a bit better in loserville than he did in the winner’s bracket, but Samus has still been way more impressive for my money. Best case scenario for Snake in this match is a 2k6 finals redux. Worst case scenario is for him to look like he might lose to Tifa.

Kleenex’s Prediction: Samus with 54%

Guest’s Analysis - spooky96

I'm seeing the Oracle topic right now and seeing that Samus is the overwhelmingly the favorite for this match, and rightfully so, as Snake, Samus, Cloud, Mario all of them are so close in strength that any slight boost will likely be able enough to win the match. Smash released two days back, and I think this will likely give just enough votes to Samus to get by Snake. Then there's part of me seeing today's match - Mario/Zelda, and I'm thinking Zelda=Snake=Mario and Mario beat Samus quite safely (relatively speaking), so I'm definitely tempted to go for the upset here (picking Snake an upset?). I don't think Mario won over Samus due to some weird SFF thing, this contest hardly had any of that, except maybe the Link-Ganon match and Sephiroth-Tifa match (I still like to believe Sephiroth is naturally stronger, its just that FF7 fans really prefer Tifa now that the website has matured). I'll go with the underdog and pick Snake here, I know the rule says 'whenever in doubt go with Nintendo' and deep down I kinda of know Samus wins here, but Snake does have a legit shot. Going 50-50 with Zelda seems more and more impressive as the contest goes on.

Snake with 50.25%

Crew Consensus: Samus wins in another 3-2 split.

Wait we're back to 2? You kiddin me?

Lopen's Unofficial Analysisx2

Mega Man v Crono
The intuitive way for most people, as official analysts will tell you, is comparing Bowser and Yoshi who is stronger. Me I don't even want to speculate on that. You're trying to gauge who is stronger on the totem pole between two Mario guys where we've literally seen Yoshi > Luigi > Bowser > Yoshi go on. Also Yoshi is being measured through an SFF match-- one where I don't feel Yoshi looking slightly better coming out of is out of the question. Reading through Alucard or Bowser is shaky too as they've both shown signs that they've moved significantly.

Anyway so the intuitive way to me is to just go through the direct route. Unless we accept Link is a supreme fighting god, I remember time and time again the Mario/Mega Man/Crono block getting or being projected at around 37-39% on Link. So to me, when Cloud only gets that himself a match that should have no fishiness to it, that means he's fallen to their level.

And you say "but Lopen Crono was beaten with 56%" well sure. Crono's fallen further. Mega Man vs Cloud baby this is where the hype is!

Mega Man with 55.77%

Samus v Snake
I think War had it right when he said Smash favorites are getting a temporary power up and that's at least partially why Zelda is beating Mario today. Samus is one of the original 8 in Ultimate (and did quite well on the favorite of the original 12 poll) and while Snake in Brawl had some amount of hype Samus is the one more closely tied to Smash Bros. So the beast Mocking Samus (a Samus is some sort of space animal) will win this one despite it being Snake's match to lose measuring through Zelda. Not unlike 12 years ago.

Samus with 53.84%

Some weird logic in the Snake/Samus writeups. Were those made before Zelda started beating Mario worse than she beat Snake? (Not that Samus still cant win)

Imo any match up that has two of Mario, Zelda, Samus or Snake in it is a toss-up at this point.

Some weird logic in the Snake/Samus writeups. Were those made before Zelda started beating Mario worse than she beat Snake? (Not that Samus still cant win)

yes

also I still think Samus wins, I’m of the opinion that Zelda in today’s match is stronger than the Zelda that beat Snake

Dronefaqs ruins every contest

I disagree with that, but there's not much point in arguing when we're 4 hours away from the answer.

I’m just not as shackled by the stats as some others here. I think both of my picks today mostly go against them and that’s fine (not by a ton or anything)

Yeah I think this Zelda is like, kinda significantly stronger than the one that beat Snake. From Smash and also just bandwagon momentum. Samus will get the former as well so I think this one will be less close than it should be had Snake met Samus first. Rooting for Snake though

it’s crazy how many matches are just deadass even this year.

Samus gets like 61% on Sonic? Yeah sure whatever

This contest

makes sense to me! I’m on record saying I’d take Tifa over Sonic

Sonic probably beats Tifa but not by a lot. Tifa > Auron by at least a bit so there isn't a lot of breathing room

But this Samus is stronger than the one from a week ago I don't think extrapolating through Snake is going to be kind to anyone

jesus snake still going down

Snake looks better than Samus based on Zelda and Sonic matches right before it, only to get stomped.

Question am I talking about 2006 or 2018?

I'm hyped for Samus to kill Mario then kill Zelda and them MOMENTUM through Link

Samus redemption run it's time. This contest needs a new hero.

At the moment, what I'm most taking away from this is that every result falls into place if the only weirdness happened in Mario>Samus being super fraudulent.

Theory: ZSS is actually stronger than suit Samus now.

Snake's gonna be lucky to finish over 43 at this rate.

I have no clue what to make of the Crono match. who’s better overnight?

My gut says Mega Man loses overnight to pretty much everyone, but if there were someone he could win it against, it'd be Crono.

I guess Crono becausce he is from a JRPG?

looks like Crono will. I’d rather have Crono here for sure

KamikazePotato posted...

At the moment, what I'm most taking away from this is that every result falls into place if the only weirdness happened in Mario>Samus being super fraudulent.

Don't you also need some Zelda bandwagon effect for it to make sense ?

Hierarcy for Mario>Samus I believe.

feels weird to have crono behind early in the match and still expect him to win

Sonic is currently projected to get 38.42% on Samus.

it’s because mega is the only dude worse in europe than crono

I’m really not seeing the problem with Sonic getting around 40% on Samus.

The higher you put Sonic on Samus the more you argue Auron vs. Sephiroth or Tifa.

I’m fine with Sonic barely even being in the top 20 anymore tbqh

Sonic being <40% on Samus is a lot worse than he's ever been in the past. He's currently getting 38%. Even if you assume that Samus is the #2 on this site which she is it's just embarrassing. He's not supposed to be that far off from say, Crono, and Crono gets like 45% on Cloud.

What do you think Cloud gets on Sephiroth?

If he gets 55%, then he's only ~43.6% on Samus through Tifa/Sephiroth.

KamikazePotato posted...

Sonic being <40% on Samus is a lot worse than he's ever been in the past. He's currently getting 38%. Even if you assume that Samus is the #2 on this site which she is it's just embarrassing. He's not supposed to be that far off from say, Crono, and Crono gets like 45% on Cloud.

But maybe Cloud is also pretty bad now !

crono kinda getting buried here at the end of the hour

The Mana Sword posted...

crono kinda getting buried here at the end of the hour

Your negativity has powered him up!

Quick, predict Mega Man at like 55%!

Exactly how bad is Sonic looking right now ?
Who is the weakest character he would lose to according to lolstats ?