Results[]
Wednesday, April 1, 2020
Ulti's Analysis[]
| Division | Division 3 |
|---|---|
| Match # | 22 |
| Match Date | Wednesday, April 01, 2020 |
| Oracle Expectations |
Shovel Knight - 60.52% 65 for - 1 against |
| GameFAQs Prediction |
Shovel Knight - 76.67% |
| User Votes |
Shovel Knight - 6009 Dragon's Dogma - 3206 |
| Anonymous Votes |
Shovel Knight - 4663 Dragon's Dogma - 2809 |
I know Undertale losing took up all the attention and most of the whining during this quartet of contest matches, but believe it or not, three other matches did in fact happen at the same time. One such match was Shovel Knight getting a ho-hum win over Dragon's Dogma. Some indie games were okay in this contest. Most were not. Shovel Knight is one of the ones that looked quite alright. It was actually over 70% early on before bleeding percentage all day, but the only stat that really matters in sports is wins and losses.
Thanks to Undertale causing a bunch of noise, Dragon's Dogma fans (all 9 of them) got off easy for all the whining they did during this loss. What was so special about this game that it supposedly should have won this match? To try and find the answer myself, I went on Youtube, searched up the game's title, and immediately spotted a video called "Dragon's Dogma Is The Best Game You've Never Played". Okay, fair enough.
Oh, it's the guy responsible for making the bad Devil May Cry games. No thanks. Moving on.
Ctes's Analysis[]
In a round where indie games were hyped to be as beastly as they were, this match should have served as a warning to us. We did expect worse of Shovel Knight on average though, so it probably only made the belief stronger, if it made any difference at all. Most were under the impression it was mostly indie games from the latter half of the decade that benefit, so what Shovel Knight did probably didn’t matter much to our overall view. Dragon’s Dogma is also an unknown quantity so the result would have to be extreme to change any overall views. I’m sure most of the people predicting a lower result simply ended up thinking that Dragon’s Dogma was a bit weaker than expected.
The match should have served as an indie of just about how high an indie game could hope to reach. We were a bit back and forwards about what indie game was strongest. Everyone could agree that Shovel Knight was among the top, because of all the exposure and releases it has had. The best they could hope for were a doubling of Dragon’s Dogma. You can hear that doesn’t sound too good, no one gave Dragon’s Dogma any chances today. The game was fine, but we would’ve probably forgotten about it if it hadn’t gotten released on current generation consoles by now. I doubt it did the game many favors being released at a time where Devil May Cry was not thought the best of, when it’s basically Devil May Cry in disguise. Being able to beat it is not the most impressive feat.
Safer777's Analysis[]
So another indie game here. BUT I at least have heard of it! Shovel Knight has somehow become the face of indie games. Don't know why, he just has. He has even appeared in Smash Ultimate! Not as playable character but still. I don't know anything about Dragon's Dogma but I do believe it was liked. Then again all games in the contest were liked am I right?
So for the match. Shovel Knight won easily. The only question that I have, is it the strongest Indie game here? Hard to say. It is super popular, it is like on 10 consoles or more! Damn! So many expansions, DLC and support too. Oh and all free. Yup. Big companies should learn from this. So nice to see at least some indies that deserve to do well doing well.
Tsunami's Analysis[]
While you'd never know it by my picks this year, I've actually gotten off to some pretty good starts in Guru before, even holding sole possession of first place in the Guru after correctly calling every match in Division 5 (two outright upsets and two others where the favorite had less than 60% of the brackets). That ended with Shovel Knight failing to be the indie darling I'd expected it to be. It's commonly accepted that for a rallied entrant to get moving, they need to have weak early competition to get past, because something too strong will kill it before it starts. L-Block didn't have to get past anyone stronger than Laharl in Round 1 and got a favorable LFF situation in Round 2, and Draven only needed to get past Jak and Chie Satonaka. Hell, L-Block and Draven were both Guru favorites to reach Round 2! But only that far. And Undertale got the polarizing Mass Effect 3, just weak enough for its rallies to work. Shovel Knight, in Round 1 of the 2015 Contest, was set to face Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Betting against GTA is never terribly risky on GameFAQs, so this was certainly a possible upset. And waiting in Round 2? The casuals would no doubt think it to be the massively popular World of Warcraft, as evidenced by prediction percentages in previous contests, but of course we all know that WoW is trash here, and so the Guru consensus (if you can call a roughly 5-3 ratio "consensus") was that it would be Chrono Cross, which is much maligned for being an alleged sequel to Chrono Trigger and not being even remotely as good a game. Either way, seems like a perfect target to start a bandwagon. If I'd really been thinking about it, I probably would've considered that enough time for the bandwagon to be fully rolling and picked more upsets based on the rallyFEAR effect, but mercifully I didn't, because while Shovel Knight did respectably, it never came close to beating GTA:SA. Come 2018, however, it seems that the casuals don't learn, because they must've seen 38.72% on GTA:SA and said "this game's really strong!" Shovel Knight the character was, astonishingly, comfortably favored in Round 1 against Captain Toad; the Gurus weren't so easily fooled.
So when Shovel Knight came out strong against Dragon's Dogma, people were suddenly amazed. It was favored, of course, but it was still considered a strong performance, and the masses who picked Undertale for two rounds were feeling even worse because Shovel Knight to R3 wasn't nearly as unpopular a pick as it would be if Octopath actually got there.