(14)Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest vs (6)Fire Emblem: Awakening 2015

Ulti's Analysis
Even though Donkey Kong Country 2 pulled off one of the best upsets of round 1, in our closest wire-to-wire match ever, Fire Emblem was the favorite in round 2. Donkey Kong's failures in debated matches are well-documented, and his failures against Nintendo are also well-documented. Let's not forget that Donkey Kong is the original reason we have something called Same Fanbase Factor in the first place: http://www.gamefaqs.com/poll/988-north-division-semifinals-mario-vs-donkey-kong

DKC2 fans were hoping for a win here, but they all knew it was hope at best given DK's contest history. Also worth noting here is Fire Emblem Awakening is a reasonably strong game, and is likely the strongest game in the Fire Emblem series. For that reason, Fire Emblem was the heavy Oracle favorite.

When the match finally started and DKC2 closely won the board vote, there was much rejoicing. There are DKC series fans that have hoped for years to see something from the series make it into round 3 of a contest. Unfortunately Awakening was recovering before the freeze, so DKC2's 50 vote board vote lead shrunk to 33. People kind of figured the match was over at this point.

As fate would have it, the match actually was over at this point, but not in Fire Emblem's favor. Donkey Kong started increasing his lead with constant updates in the 50-55% range, and kept it moving overnight. Fire Emblem made one small push during the dead zone when it cut 50 votes, but DKC2 easily recovered. When the morning vote hit and easily favored DKC2, the match was dead and over. Donkey Kong Country 2 was finally making round 3 of a contest, and it won two close matches to do it. The final number here may have been 52-48, but the match was never truly in doubt.

Given Donkey Kong's propensity to choke in close matches, winning two of them was some weird contest alternate universe. DKC2 making it to round 3 was one of the best stories of this entire contest, especially given how debated this fourpack was pre-contest. It could have potentially been SFFd into the ground by the other three games it shared this fourpack with. Not only did DKC2 resist the old Nintendo SFF bugaboo, but it won. Twice. In close matches.

Donkey Kong's reputation won't be totally erased by this contest, but these two wins sure help erase a lot of it. There was even a reasonable debate to be had with the DKC2/SotN match, which would have been unheard of before this contest. Congrats to Donkey Kong for finally pulling one off.