Results[]
Ulti's Analysis[]
| Round | Division 2 Semi Final |
|---|---|
| Match # | 36 |
| Match Date | Monday, October 8th, 2007 |
| Oracle Expectations |
Auron - 30.22% Bowser - 27.95% Ryu - 25.55% Shadow - 16.37% |
| GameFAQs Expectations |
Auron first place (4pts) - 44.90% Auron second place (2pts) - 11.80% Ryu second place (4pts) - 28.11% Ryu first place (2pts) - 8.26% |
| Advancing Prediction |
Auron - 56.70% (20,823) Ryu - 36.37% (13,357) |
So hey, remember this match? It was only two years before the 2007 contest happened.
Or hell, just go back to the first round of THIS contest.
With all the Nintendo removed and that 2005 beating in his back pocket, Bowser should have been able to get ahead of Ryu easily. This match was four strong characters (so we thought, lol Shadow) from four different companies: Square, Sega, Nintendo and Capcom. No SFF here, supposedly, yet Ryu > Bowser in this poll is borderline inexplicable. Bowser did well with the board vote, but after 15 minutes he just thoroughly collapsed. Ryu dominated him overnight, especially after the Nintendo Power Hour ended, and Bowser teased a comeback attempt with the morning vote before utterly collapsing once again. It was one of the weirdest matches of the whole contest, and I have no explanation for it other than "fourway hijinx". Maybe the villain's contest overrated Bowser and allowed him to way overperform in 2005, maybe Ryu is a hidden fourway monster, or maybe it's just a combination of the two. But this was a bad loss for Bowser that he wasn't able to get over for three years, and even after beating Sora in 2010 he was stuck going up against Charizard on the very release date of Pokemon HG/SS. Someone needs to cut this poor guy a break.
Not to be lost here is how well Auron did and how bad Shadow did. 2004 straight-up overrated Shadow, and he's been paying for it ever since. This match also foreshadowed how much of a fourway monster Auron truly was. Just look at how he did in 2008 if you want proof.
Stats and Analysis[]
- Auron overperformed by +5.61%, the #23 most impressive performance of 2007
here was one of the most anticipated matches of the contest. four strong characters, three of them having won updates against Noble Niners, no SFF whatsoever. a rare treat in a contest such as this, and with an audience such as the Square/Nintendo-obsessed one that we have here. on top of that, we had a really interesting round 1 match, where Ryu beat Bowser with the help of two other Nintendo characters leeching like hell off of him. would Ryu be able to continue this trend? by now, it was clear that fighting game characters were in their element in this four-way contest, so Ryu and Bowser were looked at as near-equals, and a complete toss-up.
Auron was expected to take first after a dominating round 1 win, and he did -- almost too easily. Auron had one of the great performances no one will ever remember, because it just didn't matter. some of the weaker Noble Niners would struggle to do what Auron did against formidable competition. would Crono get nearly 36%? who knows, really. but Auron had a hell of a match. he did better than Ryu at night. Ryu led Sonic at night at one point. he beat him even worse in the daytime. good show, Auron.
the main event, of course, was Ryu vs. Bowser. Bowser started out with the lead, and this time he didn't lose it after two minutes. he couldn't extent it past 20 votes though, and it was clear that people were bracket voting by this point so things looked pretty bad for him. he was up 19 at the freeze, but Bowser has a fantastic board vote.. and bam, Ryu was ahead at 00:10. Bowser fought back, cutting the match to 2 votes, but from there Ryu took off. Ryu zoomed off to an 1800 vote lead by morning time.
Street Fighter's morning vote is legendarily bad, and Mario's morning vote is fantastic, so it was no surprise when Bowser started cutting at the lead. it was a pretty pitiful cut compared to expectations, though, and Ryu didn't really go anywhere. by 9am, though, Ryu started really bleeding, and Bowser took advantage of it. Bowser took 500 votes off the lead, and the after-school vote was still to come. Bowser looked like he had a huge comeback in him.
but it wasn't to be - once Ryu's awful morning vote was over, he went back to winning updates and actually extended his lead throughout the afternoon. having lost 59-41 to Bowser in 2005, Ryu pushed the Koopa out of contest, having beaten him twice in a row. Bowser has now had two pretty bad contests in a row, and Ryu had a great chance to make round 4 thanks to Auron and Cloud being in the same match.
(I hated this match, by the way - I had Ryu in my bracket for most of the bracketmaking period, but wussed out. oh well.)
Match Trends[]
