Results[]
Ulti's Analysis[]
| Division | 3 |
|---|---|
| Match # | 12 |
| Match Date | Monday, September 29th, 2008 |
| Oracle Expectations |
Scorpion - 35.06% Gordon Freeman - 27.54% Balthier Bunansa - 21.78% Big Daddy - 15.53% |
| GameFAQs Expectations |
Scorpion first place (2pts) - 28.78% Scorpion second place (1pt) - 36.79% Gordon second place (2pts) - 29.62% Gordon first place (1pt) - 34.23% |
| Advancing Prediction |
Scorpion - 65.57% (28,131) Gordon - 63.85% (27,394) |
If you hop in the wayback machine and only look at the guru picks and such, you'd think this was some predictable match that we could all just talk about for 30 seconds and move on. And on the surface, that's true. Balthier totally crapped the bed in 2007 when everyone expected him to get first place over Ada Wong of all people -- just a total choke job -- and people also knew that Big Daddy would be weak. GameFAQs, by and large, does not care about FPS characters.
Of course I say that with Gordon Freeman of Gordon Freeman Never Wins lore in the same match. Gordon, year after year, managed to keep choking away winnable matches. This dude lost to Tina Armstrong, who most people can't remember without Googling. This dude lost to Max Payne. This dude lost to Sam Fisher. Leon Kennedy was a predictable loss, but still. It took Phoenix Wright for Gordon to finally get off the schneid, and miraculously, Board 8 didn't hate the guy despite getting his first win on our mascot. He then repeated his winning ways in 2007, in a very debatable 4way match against Ike and Duke Nukem. He actually managed to not choke that year!
But then The Orange Box happened in October of 2007, and it gave everything involved a boost. We saw a little bit of a hint of this with GLaDOS doing okay in round one of this contest, but it was Gordon himself who really proved that it mattered. I also maintain that if 2008 was a 1v1 games contest and Portal had a good draw, Portal would have gotten a bandwagon and won the entire thing outright. We've seen new games catch fire and so off in these things over the years.
To the point. Everyone picked Scorpion > Gordon Freeman > the field in this match. We have the template from 2007; Sub-Zero > Gordon. But that was pre-Orange Box. Memes + good games = "uh oh" in the early parts of a contest poll, when the board vote rules.
Gordon caught a bunch of early votes, and had an early lead in the match. Balthier and that thing from Bioshock stunk up the place, as expected, and we all figured Scorpion would handle his business once the board vote died down. And he did. The first place spot was tied 15 minutes in, and we all figured Scorpion would cruise to this contest having yet another predictable result.
"NOT SO FAST, my friend!"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHJSVT8meQ8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVAc3q-7qPQ
I'm just saying this while looking at creativename's updater 12 years later. I remember this one very well. When Gordon Freeman won the next update to go by 100 votes, all hell broke loose on Board 8. You wouldn't know it to look at our board or our vote totals now, but people used to live and die by every 15 minute update in crazy matches. This one, despite being a round 1 fun match, had people going wild. GORDON FREEMAN was doing this? The same dude that lost to Tina Armstrong? THAT guy?!
Yeah, that guy. Orange Box love was real, and it's not like Mortal Kombat was sitting here doing much of anything. Those few updates where it looked like Gordon was going to shock the world were a total madhouse, and while I hate to rely on "you had to be there" analysis, it's the truth. For those of us who love these things, Gordon Freeman Never Wins felt like family. To see him go from that to this was amazing.
It didn't stop there, either. This dude actually held his lead overnight. He didn't build a lead or anything, but he held strong at 100-150 all night long. If he managed to catch the morning vote, he was legitimately going to pull off an impossible feat and actually get first place in this match.
You know the rest. Scorpion caught the morning vote, and that was that. It took a little while in the am hours before Scorpion fully controlled things, but fully control things he did. A fun match turned into Scorpion winning by 2200 votes fairly quickly, but no one talks about that part when they bring this match up. They talk about people losing their absolute shit for 7 hours. Conventional wisdom held that this would be Gordon's one and only moment this contest, as Vincent > Scorpion in round 2 looked like the most predictable result ever.
Yeah if you thought people lost their minds in this match, just wait.
Stats and Analysis[]
- Scorpion underperformed by -4.95%, the #15 most disappointing performance of 2008
What a difference a year makes, huh? Last year the big debate would've been between Balthier and Scorpion for first, with a few gung-ho Valvers chiming in for some Gordon Freeman upsets. Well, one Balthier bomb and Scorpion impressing later, and we end up with an easy Scorpion > Gordon pick, with pretty much zero chance of an upset on any side of the table.
Well, it didn't really end up that way. Gordon jumped out with his usual awesome board vote (seriously, we're so used to voting for the lovable loser we've forgotten how not to)... but he wasn't losing it. An update later Scorpion cut him, and the next he was ahead by 1 vote, and it looked like gravity was taking over despite the board's love of Mr. Freeman.
Then Gordon jumped out to an 84 vote lead, and all hell broke loose.
Somehow, some way, Gordon, who had lost as the favorite to DUKE NUKEM and nearly lost to pre-Brawl IKE, was giving Scorpion the fight of his life. For one glorious night vote Gordon was able to nurse a small lead until the day vote took hold... at which point he ended up losing by barely over 2000 votes. The universe saved for the moment (seriously every time Gordon comes in first it's destroyed and a new one is created, ask TRE), the inevitable showdown for next round looked ROUGH for Scorpion, especially if the showdown went down anything like Duke/Gordon II last year. Plus, there was Falco to think about in that whole mess. Suddenly Vincent/Falco/Scorpion/Gordon was one of the big matches of next round.
In this midst of this awesome whirlwind were Balthier and Big Daddy's performances. For the former, you really had to give it to Balthier for at least minimally exceeding expectations, although he's got a long way to go before he's even talked about in the same breath as the Zidanes of the world. And Big Daddy did well enough for me to conclude that Gordon probably wins this match outright if he's not here. C'mon Orange Box/Bioshock SFF you know you want some !!
Match Trends[]
Ngamer's Same Day Analysis[]
Match Prediction[]
Today we should be in for another good one. Three characters that are at least somewhat comparable in strength plus a newcomer who should have a pretty wide range. Let's jump right into it!
Last Known Values
- Scorpion - 26.73% (2007)
- Gordon - 19.89% (2007)
- Balthier - 17.09% (2007)
- Big Daddy - new
I'd never bought into Mortal Kombat too much in these Contests, but between that upset of Master Chief and how good both Subby and Scorp looked last season, they've made a believer. Actually pretty much everything connected with fighting games had solid showings in '07, and I don't see any reason for that to change this time around, so even though I don't think he's going to run away with this group as easily as some are predicting, I still can't see him being challenged for the win.
Big Daddy is one of our more exciting entrants IMO. Between the critical acclaim, Game of the Year awards, and the very positive reviews I've heard from most gamers, I'd have to imagine that Bioshock is going to have a strong core of support backing it all the way, much like GlaDOS did. Unlike GlaDOS, though, the big poppa ought to have considerable promise as a "joke character" on top of that. By joke I mean, his name is funny enough in itself, and then you look and its a giant mech kind of thing, whoa! Should have some decent casual appeal for those voters who don't feel strongly about any of the other choices (and considering Balthier and Gordon's past history, that could be quite a few!). I'm not going to do anything crazy and pick him for second outright, but heck, we've seen stranger things happen already this Contest.
Balthier was a flop in '07, I don't think anyone really denies that. He was supposed to be the next Auron, and instead looked like the next... uh, Cecil or something. And that was when FF12 was at its peak! Even so, I think he's going to have something of a chance here. Zack and Zidane have already impressed, and also, couldn't Daddy and Freeman share something of a fanbase? Moody, atmospheric, really good FPSes that are available on both the PC and the 360... I wouldn't call a huge overlap likely, but again, we've seen weirder things happen, and Gordon certainly has a history of allowing the slightest bumps in the road to throw him off course. Overall though, between the success of Portal and TF2 and the Orange Box helping HL2 reach something of a new audience, GF ought to have enough in the tank to pull this one out. So why can't I get rid of this nagging doubt?
Alright, but what happens when you translate those thoughts into numbers? With a little potting and stirring, THIS happens!
- Scorpion - 35.32%
- Gordon Freeman - 26.15%
- Balthier Bunansa - 22.04%
- Big Daddy - 16.49%
Gosh, do I ever feel nervous about those numbers though...
Ngamer Says: Scorpion > Gordon
Next Day Review[]
Man, GlaDOS alone was enough to get me nervous about WCC crashing the party... now we see that the Orange Box has turned even Gordon Freeman into a stud overnight? DK and Tidus better bring their A games if they want to advance out of that one! Which could be trouble, as I'm not sure either of them have A games anymore.