Game of the Decade: 2010-2019 Contest Analysis Crew - Part 3

The Mana Sword posted...

it’s gonna be hilarious when gta actually just ends up winning this division

I would kinda be okay with that

Mac Arrowny posted...

It's funny, before the contest, Three Houses getting 60% against Inquisition would've been seen as a huge win for it that probably guaranteed it winning the division.

Try 65%. 60-40 would have been as expected.

It's hard for me to imagine a funnier Round 1 result than Inquisition potentially losing to South Park. If you thought the FighterZ match spawned a lot of quotes, well...

transcience posted...

anyway, i’m the lowest pick for persona and fire emblem and the highest for xenoblade and gta. woohoo?

this seems pretty good! except, I sure don't feel good having Persona in this fight

I think as long as Persona can keep it close, it'll wind up winning

it'll have to weather the Euro vote more than anything else

Previous Results: Turns out Octopath and Shovel Knight are basically even! After a back and forth rally, SK squeaked out a win. Smash and Odyssey did okay, which was actually a bit underwhelming. Minecraft also did pretty well on Spider-Man, though the rallies also helped it out.

Crew Predictions: 70/76

Next Round Thoughts: Smash shouldn't have any trouble with Spider-Man, though it'll be interesting to see if it does better than ALBW. Odyssey also looks to be a clear favorite over SK.

Crew Prediction Challenge:

Kleenex: 69
Moltar: 69
transience: 66
Leonhart: 65
Guest: 59

Crew Accuracy Challenge: Leon gets the point for Smash and Mario, and transience gets the point for Spider-Man and SK.

Moltar: 24
Kleenex: 15
transience: 12
Leonhart: 11
Guest: 10 (spooky96, Hbthebattle (2), Black Turtle, ctes (2), MetalmindStats (2), MechanicalWall, Kotetsu)

aw yeah out of the basement

good enough

hey my first points this topic! about time

Round 2 – The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt vs. Mass Effect 3

Moltar’s Analysis

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Round 1 – 84.07% vs. Assassin's Creed Odyssey

Mass Effect 3
Round 1 – 60.63% vs. Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty

Mass Effect 2 =/= Mass Effect 3

Witcher looked strong in R1 and there may be some ~western game overlap~ here so I can see it doing well again.

ME fans care about ME2 and not so much about ME3. I actually think apathy helped it out last round, so I think Witcher is going to look really good here since people actually care about it.

Moltar’s Bracket: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Moltar’s Prediction: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – 70%

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transience’s Analysis

This seems like a dream match for Witcher 3. People are looking for a reason to ditch ME3 and Witcher 3 is the premiere WRPG of the last few years. ME2 did well but I think there was some WRPG overlap going on there - there may be some kind of hierarchy in place where the big games just eat the little ones. Well, Witcher 3 is a big one and ME3 is very much not.

transience's prediction: The Witcher 3 with 74.41%

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Leonhart’s Analysis

After a few crazy divisions, we get a bit of a breather! There’s really only one match up for debate today. People who have Witcher 3 going deep into the contest were feeling good after that massive number it dropped on Odyssey, even if it was the Assassin’s Creed one! As much as I love Mass Effect 3, it’s got no chance of even keeping it close. I wouldn’t take ME2 here, much less ME3. I don’t even know what a good number for Witcher 3 would be. I just want Mass Effect 3 to keep it respectable, but it probably won’t!

Leonhart’s Vote: Mass Effect 3

Leonhart’s Prediction: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt with 64.93%
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Kleenex’s Analysis

Well...so Mass Effect 2 didn’t end up being the flop that some of the smartest crew members predicted. Maybe Fallout 4 is just that bad, I don’t know. Either way, Mass Effect 3 is definitely many steps below the second game, and Witcher 3 had one of the more impressive blowouts in round 1. The result of this match was never in doubt, but it’s another opportunity for The Witcher to show that it might be the real favorite to make the finals from this half of the bracket.

Kleenex’s Prediction: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt with 72.75%

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Guest’s Analysis – ctes

The Witcher 3 started off looking very strong in round 1, slaughtering Assassin's Creed Odyssey, which is not something we care for, but still is a big brand name. The games are similar so there might have been SFF, but I do think AC was antivoted to some extend. Even if Black Flag winning shows it was less than I anticipated, it's still a reasonable assumption. Moreso, Witcher 3 is respected by basically everyone and disliked by none.

All this means that we still need to see what the Witcher can do before it becomes clear how big a threat it is. Is Mass Effect 3 the game it can do that against? I don't think ME3 looked particularly good against Starcraft II last round, but Witcher 3 probably needs a big number to show how it has risen up to threaten Skyrim (and Galaxy 2 depending on how that match looks I suppose). I think it needs to score above 70% here if it's still to be considered a threat to Dark Souls and Skyrim, and I think it gets it.

The Witcher 3 - 72.53%
Mass Effect 3 - 27.47%
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Crew Consensus: This does not end well for Mass Effect 3.

If W3 ends above 70% I would be suprised.

I figured I would have the low prediction there!

Did I miss a crew sign up thread somewhere? I only saw sign ups up to Division 4

MechanicalWall posted...

Did I miss a crew sign up thread somewhere? I only saw sign ups up to Division 4

He just posted them in the old topic instead of making a new one.

Wack

Making a new thread makes more sense to me, very few are gonna recheck that thread once they signed up for their match

They filled up very fast!

after seeing ME2 wreck F4, I don’t think expecting Witcher 3 to blow up ME3 is much of a stretch.

It could. I just have no feel for how strong either game really is. I think I'd even take ME3 over Fallout 4.

I think I’d take Fallout, and you said yourself that Witcher 3 probably beats ME2, so 70% seems reasonable.

Oh yeah, probably. I just don't know if that match was an overperformance and if it means Witcher 3 can do the same thing. SFF feels random sometimes.

Witcher 3 is probably the literal worst opponent in the bracket for Mass Effect 3 to face.

KamikazePotato posted...

Witcher 3 is probably the literal worst opponent in the bracket for Mass Effect 3 to face.

I think ME2 would probably be worse!

we have at least 2 of those today, maybe 3. div 5 has some bad setup before the fireworks at the end.

tranny's got the right idea here. ME3's going to get beat down hard.

I mean, I admitted in my writeup that I was being optimistic on ME3's behalf!

Witcher 3 gonna get 80% on ME3

Round 2 – Stardew Valley vs. Super Mario Galaxy 2

Moltar’s Analysis

Stardew Valley
Round 1 – 71.17% vs. Destiny

Super Mario Galaxy 2
Round 1 – 87.25% vs. Return of the Obra Dinn

Indie games vs big name games has not gone well for the indie game so far. Final Fantasy, GTA, and now Mario, and Mario is the most trusted name out of that group. Not expecting Stardew to look good here since

it’s

freakin

mario

Moltar’s Bracket: Super Mario Galaxy 2

Moltar’s Prediction: Super Mario Galaxy 2 – 70%

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transience’s Analysis

I could be wrong here, but I get the sense that Stardew was so popular because of its Nintendo-like sense of joy and chill. Mario Galaxy 2 might be a bad matchup for it here. Galaxy 2 doesn't quite have the rep of an Odyssey, but it's really super well regarded and I wonder if maybe it does weird things to our darling indie farming game here. This round is a day of bad matchups but it's going to set up a really hype round 3 between Galaxy and Witcher 3. We should probably start debating Stardew vs. ME3 now, even though both matchups seem like they could be bad barometers.

transience's prediction: Super Mario Galaxy 2 with 74.41%

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Leonhart’s Analysis

Stardew Valley put up the biggest number by an indie game in round 1, which is pretty impressive, even if it was against Destiny. Super Mario Galaxy 2 put up the blowout of the contest so far, but Return of the Obra Dinn is going to either be dead last or very close in the final X-Stats. Once again, I’m not even sure what to expect from Galaxy 2 here. I can’t imagine it loses, of course, but can it be impressive again? I think Stardew Valley is legit, and Galaxy 2 is still just an average game overall (although that’s basically a top tier game for the purposes of this contest). I’m going to aim low and hope Galaxy 2 proves me wrong!

Leonhart’s Vote: Super Mario Galaxy 2

Leonhart’s Prediction: Super Mario Galaxy 2 with 61.11%
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Kleenex’s Analysis

Stardew killed it last round, but Galaxy 2 *really* killed it. While Destiny is surely stronger than Obra Dinn, 87% is fucking monstrous. Stardew really didn’t have much of a shot even before that Galaxy performance, but it's even more clear now. So how well can Stardew holy up against a force like that? I actually think it’ll do pretty well. I’d peg Stardew as one of the top 3 indie games in the bracket, and even in the face of MARIO, I suspect it’ll have a reasonable showing, if getting doubled is reasonable.

Kleenex’s Prediction: Super Mario Galaxy 2 with 67.25%

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Guest’s Analysis – Ranticoot

I know a lot of people (including me) were impressed with Galaxy 2 last round, but since then, we've seen some of these big blowouts are not completely indicative of a strong winner. I don't know how Doom put up almost 90% on anything then puts up that little of a fight against RE2, but an obvious explanation would be that it's not super strong and got to use it being a famous name in video games to thrash a really obscure opponent. I think similarly of Galaxy 2 - it is a famous name that was able to capitalize on a game that is anything but.

Galaxy 2 shouldn't be in danger of losing here because Mario games should have more protection against indies than say FFXV, but I - another person who took ME1 > Galaxy 2 in 2015 - think Stardew Valley can embarrass it. An indie game putting up 71% is worth talking about, even if its fucking Destiny of all things, because that's pretty close to what Starcraft, which gave the stronger Mass Effect game ME2 fits last contest, scored on Destiny. More than anything I think very little of Galaxy 2 as far as strength goes. I think Galaxy 2 actually blowing this would be the all-time most embarrassing thing the Galaxy games have ever done.

Rant's prediction - Super Mario Galaxy 2 with 56.28%
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Crew Consensus: Stardew is stardone.

[mine was written before Cuphead completely faceplanted against GTA. I don't know what Galaxy gets but definitely not 56% anymore.]

We've already forgotten Galaxy 2 isn't anything special, huh. I could see that one going just like GTA/Cuphead because I think they're probably in similar strength ranges.

I think it has less to do with Galaxy 2 being special and more to do with the opposition being much worse than the last time around. although, I do think Galaxy 2 gets boosted by being one of the top games of the decade by most metrics.

I feel like Obra Dinn is probably just the weakest game in the bracket. It's obscure even by indie game standards, and it's so far outside of what this site likes that it probably have very few fans.

That's not to say the game is bad, but its fanbase is very, very small. I think Stardew might embarass Mario here.

transience posted...

I think it has less to do with Galaxy 2 being special and more to do with the opposition being much worse than the last time around. although, I do think Galaxy 2 gets boosted by being one of the top games of the decade by most metrics.

Yeah, we thought that about Galaxy 1 last time and it sucked! I don't think there's a huge difference between Galaxy 2 and GTAV or Stardew Valley and Cuphead.

We just can't stop overrating Mario! We've already done it once this round!

let's talk in 6 hours! I do think Stardew is good but not 40% on a core Mario game good. I think Witcher 3/Galaxy 2 could be a conversation, especially with how the site can lean sometimes.

as for today's matches, I think it'll be pretty funny if the final comes down to Cuphead vs. Ori

galaxy 2 is obviously acting a proxy for every pre-2010 mario game combined

Yah after DOOM got wrecked by RE2 a couple of days ago, it's pretty apparent that going beast mode against gutter tier games doesn't mean a whole lot. Sometimes the answer is yes, they really are THAT weak

Obviously Mario still wins here but I expect it to get exposed a bit this round and demoralize anyone that thought it might upset Witcher

Leonhart4 posted...

Yeah, we thought that about Galaxy 1 last time and it sucked! I don't think there's a huge difference between Galaxy 2 and GTAV or Stardew Valley and Cuphead.

We just can't stop overrating Mario! We've already done it once this round!

Considering how Mario bombed all over the place in 2015 and ruined quite a few brackets I'm surprised ppl still expect all that much from it

Like do we think DMC5 is a clear and easy winner over Stardew Valley? Or do we think Galaxy 2 isn't that far from Odyssey? I don't think I buy either of those.

But I also think talking it up to beat Witcher because of the format of the contest when it couldn't even beat ME1 is silly!

yeah I guess DMC5 throws a big wrench into my thinking huh

well maybe happiness SFF will carry Mario here

STARdew valley

Mario collects STARS

seems ripe for SFF to me

Round 2 – Fallout: New Vegas vs. Dark Souls III

Moltar’s Analysis

Fallout: New Vegas
Round 1 – 79.40% vs. The Stanley Parable

Dark Souls III
Round 1 – 69.93% vs. Dishonored

Well, a few days ago I was liking New Vegas here, but there have been some interesting developments recently. Fallout 4 laying an egg against ME2 is something, but like with ME2 compared to ME3, New Vegas is not as disliked as 4, so it should hold up better here.

The more important thing is Bloodborne getting a rally against FE: Awakening when it didn’t even need it. That confirmed to me that Soulsborne fans do feel strongly enough to come to the site and vote for their games.

New Vegas did better on weaker competition, but I don’t think Dishonored is that much better than Stanley Parable. Going off the R1 results I’d say New Vegas has the edge.

I don’t like banking on rallies to happen for an entity that hasn’t gotten a rally yet, but if this match ends up close enough to be skewed by a rally, then Souls takes this.

Moltar’s Bracket: Fallout: New Vegas

Moltar’s Prediction: Fallout: New Vegas – 54%

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transience’s Analysis

I have kind of a bad feeling about this one after Fallout 4 bombed against ME2. I stand by the idea that ME2/F4 might have been wonky, but I still am not convinced on New Vegas. I've never seen it as a top game. Meanwhile, we just watched Bloodborne, mini-rally or not, pretty much blow the doors off of Awakening. Maybe DS3 has a shot here?

I'm not going to abandon Fallout here, but I'm not super comfortable with it. If there's any kind of rally I guess that could be something, but the Bloodborne rally talk kind of overshadowed what was already a commanding win against a Nintendo game. Dark Souls 3 isn't close to Bloodborne or Dark Souls though.

transience's prediction: Fallout: New Vegas with 54.56%

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Leonhart’s Analysis

Now we come to the one debated match of the round in this division. This felt a lot more debatable at the freeze when New Vegas wasn’t putting up that much more on Stanley Parable than Dark Souls III was on Dishonored. By the end of the match, New Vegas had gotten up to nearly 80% and DS3 was at 70%, so I think it did enough to still be the favorite coming into this one. I do worry about Fallout’s horrendous board vote though. It might have its work cut out for it at first, but I think it’ll eventually rise to the occasion and get the job done.

Leonhart’s Vote: Fallout: New Vegas

Leonhart’s Prediction: Fallout: New Vegas with 54.72%
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Kleenex’s Analysis

After seeing how poorly Fallout 4 did, I feel a lot less comfortable about the outcome of this match. Yes, New Vegas is definitely more well liked, but the other Souls games have performed quite well for the most part. The only reason I’m hesitant to jump on the upset here is that I really don’t think Dishonored is very good. It’d still beat Stanley, but I don’t know if it’d be enough to close the gap between the two performances. This’ll probably be a close one, but I’m feeling like I want to side with Fallout. That’s definitely never backfired on me.

Kleenex’s Prediction: Fallout: New Vegas with 52.50%

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Guest’s Analysis – ZeldaTPLink

Before the contest started, this wasn't a very debated match. The xstats have New Vegas beating the first Dark Souls by 55%. DS3 is not as popular as DS1. Sure, Dark Souls may have grown in popularity and Fallout may have fallen, but this seems like a big gap to clear.

Round 1 gave a little hope to DS3, as we saw it beating Dishonored, but it also showed New Vegas quadrupling a weak indie like all strong games ought to. It helped calm down the fears that the rot in the Fallout series might have extended to New Vegas. The fans of that series are cool with it.

This match doesn't feel super debatable, right?

... right?

https://old.reddit.com/r/bloodborne/comments/g07usr/bloodborne_up_for_game_of_decade_at_gamefaqs/

Welcome to the League of Soulsborne.

A few days ago, the Bloodborne fandom added about 1900 votes to the poll. Extrapolating from the votals if the first round 2 match, that means New Vegas needs to be winning by at least 53.6% to be out of the rally's reach. I think it can do it?

Wait, but this was a Bloodborne rally, not a DS3 one, right? But they are the same series. And that's the first issue. People who play Bloodborne play Dark Souls. The two subreddits have similar numbers of people online, although the Dark Souls one has more followers. One subreddit can behave similarly to the other... I think? It's hard to say, we are treading complete alien ground here, by trying to figure out if a rally can be transplanted into another from the same series. And into a less popular game, to boot (but if it can, start fearing what the first Dark Souls can do!).

The second issue is that, even if New Vegas can build that gap, how much bigger can these rallies get? Since 2018, we have come to realize that most rallies are really hard to build steam, because subreddits aren't huge like that LoL one from 2013, and people generally don't care about gameFAQs anymore. But the Bloodborne one got big, and I have a feeling this is the kind of hardcore community who may take it seriously and decide they want to dominate the contest. Plus, let's say they find a way to reach out to even more voters, such as a twitter bot, and it's now a discussion of what game from the bracket can even stop these Soulsborne ones.

I feel like New Vegas might not be that kind of hero. This was already feeling like a dangerous match before the Bloodborne rally happened, now the winds are pointing to the Soulsborne series making a show in this bracket. New Vegas is standing on that position of being just enough better than the competition to be able to suffer a defeat from a rally. My gut says DS3 can do this. But I hope it's wrong, because I hate contest-dominating rallies.

May the LAW save us all.

Dark Souls III - 51%
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Crew Consensus: Most of us are sticking with New Vegas, but our Guest is going with Dark Souls III

Good work as usual guest

although I was expecting someone from the regular Crew to flip to DS3

I very nearly did!

are people really worried about rallies? I don’t frequent the stats topic much but wasn’t it a fairly minor rally?

transcience posted...

are people really worried about rallies? I don’t frequent the stats topic much but wasn’t it a fairly minor rally?

Yeah, it wasn't worth all that much, but if it's a close match, it could make a difference.

People don't have the same kind of passion for Dark Souls III they do for Dark Souls I or Bloodborne. Wouldn't completely rule out the possibility of a rally, but hard to imagine it'd be on the same scale as the Bloodborne one.

You are right that Dark Souls 3 doesn't really hold the same passion as some of the other FROM titles, but it is still quite active today compared to the likes of Sekiro, Bloodborne, and others.

Mostly because of the active PvP scene still.

I was surprised so many people favoured New Vegas here. I know it's probably the strongest Fallout game, but I figured 4 and that other side game left a bad enough taste in everyone's mouth that DS3 would win cleanly. Then again, I've been having a shitty contest, so what the fuck do I know

souls subreddit is peanuts compared to the fallout community. if they try something funny they are gonna get burned specially against a sacred cow like New Vegas.

BlAcK TuRtLe posted...

I was surprised so many people favoured New Vegas here. I know it's probably the strongest Fallout game, but I figured 4 and that other side game left a bad enough taste in everyone's mouth that DS3 would win cleanly. Then again, I've been having a shitty contest, so what the fuck do I know

New Vegas has the advantage of not being made by Bethesda (they only published it), so it escapes a lot of the backlash. Doesn't help that many who worked on the original Fallout games worked on New Vegas as well.

In recent contests I've come to realize subreddit size isn't what really defines a rally's success. It's the level of engagement of the community.

The bloodborne and souls reddits aren't that big, they have 100-200 people online at a time each. But they put out a 2k vote rallly. Everyone who came in, voted. It had 800 upvotes.

I'm worried it might bandwagon, especially with 3 soulsborne games in the bracket. Heck, they could try to rally in both subs at once. Or a discord. Or get a dev twitter. Sky is the limit. Or maybe Link is.

Yeah, you've got to find a community that cares, and the Soulsborne community seems to care based on one small example. We'll see if they care about 3 enough if someone attempts it and if the match isn't close.