Results[]
Round One
Ulti's Analysis[]
| Division | Division 5 |
|---|---|
| Match # | 40 |
| Match Date | Saturday, November 14, 2015 |
| Oracle Expectations |
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night - 64.44% 97 for - 0 against |
| GameFAQs Prediction |
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night - 88.76% |
SUBTITLE WAR!!
While Banjo-Kazooie was busy stinking up the joint, Symphony of the Night was out there proving it was the clear favorite in the Xenoblade/DKC2/Fire Emblem/Mario Maker/Banjo-Kazooie/Symphony of the Night brigade. Symphony of the Night put out the best performance in all of round 1 among this eightpack, and it was especially important given Banjo-Kazooie's massive percentage bleed. Symphony of the Night had never won two matches in a contest before, and the jinx was clearly about to end this year.
It didn't even bother giving Phoenix Wright the typical Board 8 joke trend that Phoenix usually gets. This was just a merciless 75-25 beating right from the start, which in a way is a shame because Phoenix Wright 3 is by far the best game in that series. It doesn't have the best character -- that honor goes to Manfred von Karma -- but it's without a doubt the best of the games. I don't want to delve too far into spoilers here, but it has one of the best villains in gaming and is definitely worth a run if you like visual novels.
This match was neat, because it's the biggest blowout Alucard or his game have ever given anything in these contests. Even if you look at fourways or that god-awful rivalry contest, this match right here was it. Symphony of the Night meant business this contest.
Ctes's Analysis[]
I think a lot of us were genuinely surprised to see Symphony of the Night receive a second seed. The other second seeds were either big names that came out after the last game contest or well established favorites in these contests. Symphony of the Night shouldn't be a #2 seed based on strength probably, though it's very likely stronger than maybe three of the other #2 seeds, four at the absolute most. Yet of all of them, Symphony of the Night was the most surprising #2 seed. It was an #11 seed in 2004, and while I know that contest had less entrants, failing to be worth much and with tons of newer contests coming since then, for it to somehow get a #2 seed now is remarkable. We saw it in both the other contests it was eligible in, but losing a 60-40 match to GoldenEye didn't exactly make it shine and in 2009 it was caught in perhaps the strongest division, so getting second place in round 1 was probably lucky. This contest though, it had its time to shine. We weren't even expecting it to be worth much and yet it had a clear and easy path to the division finals. While that has a lot to do with extremely lucky bracket placement, it still made SotN stand out a little bit, so maybe we'll be thinking better of it next time.
Symphony of the Night had a mostly predictable path, but this performance was really good. Ace Attorney is not worth much in these contests outside of the board vote, but the first one managed to look relatively good against Skyrim so for Trials and Tribulations to lose this badly here was not expected. They didn't look that far apart last time. Sure, Final Fantasy IX scored roughly the same on Trials and Tribulations as SotN did here, but Mario Kart Wii beat the first Ace Attorney, which is pretty much just as bad imo. And I know it likely took the Undertale rally spillover for Ace Attorney to avoid the doubling against Skyrim, but wouldn't we all expect Skyrim to easily beat SotN? The games shouldn't be that far apart, SotN looked incredible, that's all there is to it. If there was any doubt about SotN winning against Banjo next round, then it ended today, not because of Banjo disappointing, but because of SotN looking really legit. Lastly, here's something extra. When the bracket got delayed and SBAllen gave us hints about the games in return, one of his hints was that the longest title was 52 characters including spaces and everything. Paratroopa successfully figured that to be Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trials and Tribulations easily, so here's a little extra deserved credit for that impressive work.