Ulti's Analysis[]
True fact: I heavily considered taking Rosalina to win three matches, and eventually settled on "Nintendo can't be THAT strong, right?". Picked Geralt here with zero faith whatsoever, because GameFAQs people haven't played anything released after 1999. There was very little faith that Geralt would be able to justify his seeding and largely because of him, this division was seen as the weakest in the entire contest. Pretty much everyone picked Auron to win it, but for the top half there were picks all over the place. The case could legitimately be made for all eight characters winning three times because of how bad they all were.
For 15 minutes, those fears were very well placed. This match was a stone cold tie for three updates, and people pretty much lost their shit over it. This wasn't just a 1 seed crapping the bed. This match was very significant, because it was the first time we'd ever seen a character originating from outside a video game in a 1v1 character battle. I know Dracula and Adolf Hitler happened, but those were in a gimmick contest. This was the real thing. A 1v1 character battle where you get the match all to yourself. Geralt was our breaker of a glass ceiling we've all wanted gone for years.
And he looked like absolute piss for 15 minutes, and made me wish I had stuck with the Rosalina pick. Thankfully, the dude made a quick recovery and was able to wreck the rest of the poll. I chalk it up to simple nerves, like how a super hyped 1 seed in the NCAAs might look bad for a half before wrecking shop. That's essentially what Geralt did here. He wasn't just a new character; he was representing all of our hopes to one day see a Spiderman, a Batman, a Superman, a Simba, or what have you. Allen broke his rule to allow Witcher 3 representation in this bracket, and I'm glad he did. This would not be the first Geralt match to follow the trend you see here.
I need to mention this before I forget. I like Allen a lot, but not changing Geralt's match picture to this when the Witcher Netflix thing was announced was just a crime: https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--EDDNwFn0--/c_scale,f_auto,fl_progressive,q_80,w_800/fvnnf23urglkrot4xasa.png
Like how does he miss that? Seriously bro.
This also bears mentioning: fictional characters 100% need to be allowed into these brackets. None of us want something insane like 90% fictional characters in a bracket, but as a random example, Spiderman for the PS4 is going to get a bunch of Game of the Year hype. Yet Spiderman can't make a bracket? Dumb. The easy exception here is allowing characters in who have obvious reasons for it. Charles Barkley should never make a character battle. It's just a dumb troll nomination. But Batman after an Arkham game, Spiderman after his PS4 game, or Thanos after Fortnite? Come on man, this is easy stuff and should have been a thing ages ago.
Lightning_Strikes's Analysis[]
What happened?: This is definitely the most interesting 1/16 match, featuring an entirely new character versus the rare untested Nintendo character. Geralt also doesn't originate in a video game, one of very few characters in these to not do so (but not the only one, Dracula and Amaterasu).The Witcher (well, 3 anyway) is good on here, and Geralt is both a good representative of the game and a good character, but it's facing a very dominant Nintendo. Rosalina's likely to be no weakling, being very popular in the fandom and having been effectively promoted to the status of Mario main character. Some even took her to win in an upset. That didn't happen but it did look far closer than the typical one of these. Geralt started pretty badly as well but eventually managed a fair looking 56/44 win.
What could this mean?: Rosalina is probably pretty good, we've seen all the signs from other Nintendo characters. I've seen Rosalina called the weakest Mario character on here and I don't buy it - I'm having a hard time seeing her losing to Captain Toad, Toad-ass Toad, or even Waluigi maybe. She is in all likelihood the strongest 16 seed, so this doesn't necessarily reflect poorly on Geralt. It wasn't necessarily a show of strength either though - Geralt should still squeak by Simon but might have a tough time, and then faces some serious competition from a certain other witchy contestant.
Safer777's Analysis[]
Man this match suddens me. This is why other sites make fun of us. Geralt who is in one of the best games ever and he is an awesome character barely defeats a low tier Nintendo character. Yeah she is in Smash I know. I recently finished Witcher 3 GOTY. Just play this game. Seriously. Do it. Then you will see how good a writing in a video game can be! And how main characters should get written! Still Geralt won I guess. Even if only someone could contact CD Project and get a rally for Geralt I don't believe anyone would complain if Geralt won the whole thing. Seriously just play the damn game if you haven't!
Also another thing why the taste of the site is bad. Geralt was losing at the start! Seriously! Can you people stop voting for everything from Nintendo? There are other games and characters and companies too. I wonder why other sites don't care for us! Okay he was losing only at the freeze but still. He recovered nicely at least.
Also we have something here that is amazing. Geralt originated in a Book but here he is! We had people that were real life people, like Lu Bu and even Hitler! so we now have someone from a book too! Come on Admin, just let us have characters that are in good games too. Arkham games are good. Why not having Arkham Batman? Just a thought. It would make the contests great again!
Tsunami's Analysis[]
Okay, okay, I've learned my lesson already. I needed to be talked out of taking Binding of Isaac: Rebirth to upset Witcher 3 in Round 1 of 2015, and I underestimated it again here. It's an understandable mental block, though: Recent game, WRPG, this shouldn't be strong, right? Even though in both cases, the opponent wasn't exactly old either.
Geralt may not have entered the mainstream until The Witcher 3 in 2015, nor made his video game debut at all until 2004, but he actually made his overall debut just a few months after Link. Much was made of the fact that other characters that debuted in non-video game media were not allowed into the bracket, but Geralt was a 1-seed. Was this a trial run, or did Allen just rationalize it that a lot of gamers might not even realize that Geralt originated in a short story and then a series of novels, while everyone knows that Spider-Man originated in a comic book?
And make no mistake, I fully expected Rosalina to be weak. I get the feeling that a lot of people feel that she's been forced into too many of the spinoffs and was better as a single-game character. But she's still a Mario character, and with this division, that could have been enough for multiple wins.