Kirby's Contest History

Who is Kirby?

Kirby is easily one of the cutest characters to ever grace existence. He's all of eight inches tall, but thanks to his ability to suck in any enemy of his choosing (as well as inherit their powers), Kirby has a lot of power for such a little guy. Just ask anyone who has ever played the original Smash Brothers.

Of course, aside from Kirby's seeding screwjob in 2002, there is another huge reason that Kirby is as popular as he is on Board 8: ertyu. In ertyu's first ever character contest, he rigged his results so that Kirby would lose, claiming that Kirby is a kiddy character who did not deserve to win anything. Two different legends were born on that day, with Kirby's board 8 popularity boost being the best of them. Kirby has grown to a legendary status on our board, and has even managed to win user-run contests ahead of the likes of Mario and Link. He may not be the strongest contest competitor, but he and his matches never cease to be fun to watch.

"the name brea aya Brea dont test me kirby or ill liberation you Kirby is just a dum pink ball face it losers Dante rules all Kirby sucks dick." - ertyu

Kirby's Contest History

Win-Loss Record: 18-10

Summer 2002 Contest - Southern Division - 14 Seed

• Southern Round 1 --- Lost to (3) Jill Valentine, 32837 [46.66%] - 37539 [53.34%]
• Extrapolated Strength --- 17th Place [25.54%]

Summer 2003 Contest - Southern Division - 3 Seed

• Southern Round 1 --- Defeated (14) Ramza Beoulve, 57862 [57.66%] - 42482 [42.34%]
• Southern Quarterfinal --- Lost to (6) Alucard, 48818 [47.79%] - 53328 [52.21%]
• Extrapolated Strength --- 25th Place [25.49%]

Summer 2004 Contest - Midgar Division - 5 Seed

• Midgar Round 1 --- Defeated (12) Kain, 52012 [64.65%] - 28436 [35.35%]
• Midgar Quarterfinal --- Lost to (4) Squall, 42084 [44.99%] - 51462 [55.01%]
• Extrapolated Strength --- 22nd Place [26.61%]

As popular as Kirby is on board 8, he's rather run-of-the-mill in contest polls. Aside from being horribly underseeded in 2002 against Jill Valentine, Kirby has been a middle of the pack type of character whose position on the bracket has been rather easy to call for most people. Everyone on board 8 seems to love him, but everyone seemed to know that Kirby would lose to Alucard in 2003 and Squall in 2004. Kirby, like Dante before 2004, seems to have issues getting out of the second round when facing better competition. And because Kirby has been around for so long, it's unlikely that he'll be going up any time soon. For Kirby to make any real dent in the contest, he'll need a 2002 Scorpion-like bracket position.

Summer 2005 Contest - Dream Division - 1 Seed

• Dream Round 1 --- Defeated (8) Cecil, 67556 [75.21%] - 22267 [24.79%]
• Dream Semifinal --- Defeated (4) Tidus, 58825 [57.65%] - 43215 [42.35%]
• Dream Final --- Lost to (3) Bowser, 39857 [47.88%] - 43392 [52.12%]
• Extrapolated Strength --- 13th Place [32.06%]

Before the Summer 2005 Contest began, many people looked at Kirby and assumed that his 1 seed was a fluke and that he only took the honor due to Canvas Curse coming out not too far before the nomination period; however, it wasn't long before Kirby proved that he was for real. Not only did Kirby blow out Cecil in a match that many expected Cecil to do well in, but he made Tidus look as weak as Ramza 2003 before avoiding an SFF beating against the favored Bowser in the Dream finals. Kirby did so well against Bowser that there were several parts in the match in which Kirby cut into Bowser's lead.

As for whether or not Kirby's new strength will hold up in the future, who knows. But for one contest, at least, Kirby put on quite the show given past performances.

Summer 2006 Contest - Blast Division - 3 Seed

• Blast Round 1 --- Defeated (6) Prince of Persia, 75274 [61.70%] - 46729 [38.30%]
• Blast Semifinal --- Lost to (2) Luigi, 50890 [47.69%] - 55812 [52.31%]
• Extrapolated Strength --- 23rd Place [32.06%]

Not too many SFF matches are close, but on the same token, it's almost impossible to see a comeback in an SFF match. This is why Kirby's loss to Luigi was more or less official within the first hour of the poll, which we should have seen coming when you combine Kirby's failure to dominate Prince with the way Luigi easily handled Zero. This contest was a small step back for Kirby given how well he performed in 2005, but perhaps he just looked bad due to being stuck against two stronger-than-expected characters.

Summer 2007 Contest - Division 7 - First Group

• Division 7 Round 1 --- 1st place, 57652 [44.39%] - L-Block, 40116 [30.89%] - Laharl, 22011 [16.95%] - Nathan Hale, 10098 [7.78%]
• Division 7 Round 2 --- 3rd place, 33122 [24.81%] - Kratos, 43362 [32.48%] - L-Block, 37825 [28.33%] - Donkey Kong, 19213 [14.39%]

This contest was another step backwards for Kirby. Prior to the contest, he was expected to escape division 7 alongside Solid Snake, but that was not to be. Sure, he won his first round fourpack easily, but he only scored 44% considering the competition. Of course, at the time we had no idea what a force the L-Block would become, but still. Perhaps having to deal with LFF against Donkey Kong in round two prevented him from advancing, but we can't tell. Regardless, this was a disappointing contest for Kirby.

Summer 2008 Contest - Division 7 - First Group

• Division 7 Round 1 --- 2nd place, 50515 [36.78%] - Big Boss, 66033 [48.08%] - Jinjo, 13034 [9.49%] - Lucas, 7766 [5.65%]
• Division 7 Round 2 --- 1st place, 42464 [31.47%] - Master Chief, 40903 [30.32%] - Big Boss, 35307 [26.17%] - Raiden, 16245 [12.04%]
• Division 7 Final --- 1st place, 42756 [29.96%] - Dante, 37324 [26.15%] - Master Chief, 34425 [24.12%] - Leon Kennedy, 28204 [19.76%]
• Contest Quarterfinal --- 2nd place, 31357 [23.1%] - Sephiroth, 52270 [38.5%] - Sonic the Hedgehog, 29182 [21.5%] - Dante, 22947 [16.9%]
• Contest Semifinal --- 3rd place, 31149 [22.66%] - Solid Snake, 42250 [30.74%] - Cloud Strife, 41927 [30.5%] - Sephiroth, 22134 [16.1%]

Kirby was one of the biggest surprises in the 2008 Contest, as many predicted him not to even make it out of his division. That statement proved even more true when Big Boss took first in Kirby's opening match (though many claim that the pic was to blame). Then Kirby took advantage of Big Boss/Raiden SFF and barely stole first from Master Chief. Then Dante and Leon slightly SFF'd each other, allowing Kirby to escape the division and knock-out the overhyped Chief. Then, Kirby did the unthinkable and finished 2000+ votes ahead of Sonic to make it to the semifinals. Kirby's run ended in the semi-finals, but not before keeping a lead on Cloud for the first hour of the match (much longer than most anti-Cloud votes normally last). Needless to say, this is Kirby's most successful contest yet.

Winter 2010 Contest - Chaos Division - 3 Seed

• Chaos Round 1 --- Defeated (14) Rikku, 30566 [57.53%] - 22560 [42.47%]
• Chaos Round 2 --- Defeated (6) GlaDOS, 33283 [68.40%] - 15377 [31.20%]
• Chaos Semifinal --- Defeated (7) Vivi, 40381 [57.63%] - 29685 [42.37%]
• Chaos Final --- Lost to (1) Sonic the Hedgehog, 32894 [45.39%] - 39575 [54.61%]
• Extrapolated Strength --- 36th Place [27.03%]

Even before Kirby took the field, there was hype surrounding the possibility of him winning the Chaos Division and advancing to the Elite 8 for the second straight year. After all, he'd already beaten Sonic in a fourway, so why couldn't he win head-to-head? The bandwagon really started rolling after Sonic laid an egg against Lightning, and when Knuckles struggled to escape his first-round match with Cecil, it was official: Sonic characters were worthless; Sonic was going to be the one to ruin the Noble Nine, and the only remaining question was whether Kirby would be the one to end it or if Ganondorf would do it a round earlier. In other words, the typical Board 8 overreaction. (Also, Crono beat Sonic to it.) Just as predictably, the roars started to quiet down after Kirby failed to break 60% against Rikku, despite the fact that as a Nintendo character, and one that looks like a pink puffball at that, Kirby's best time is the afternoon, so a night match against a Square character put him at a severe disadvantage and it probably should have been expected that Kirby would underperform compared to expectations for a 24-hour match. He recovered just fine. He however was no match against Sonic in the division final proving that his performance in the previous contest was nothing more than a bandwagon.

On another note, Kirby allowed for a good reading on the day vs. night effect, as he put up nearly-identical percentages in his night match with Rikku and his day match with Vivi. If it can be determined how far apart Vivi and Rikku were expected to be based on past results, one can figure out the types of shifts that are to be expected based on time of day.

Summer 2013 Contest - Division 3 - 4 Seed

• Division 3 Round 1 --- 1st place, 15109 [46.44%] - (15) Terra Branford, 11893 [36.55%] - (24) Princess Peach, 5533 [17.01%]
• Division 3 Round 2 --- 1st place, 13610 [51.28%] - (3) Elizabeth, 6496 [24.48%] - (12) Crash Bandicoot, 6433 [24.24%]
• Division 3 Final --- 2nd place, 17875 [33.65%] - (1) Sephiroth, 20144 [37.93%] - (5) Big Boss, 15096 [28.42%]

While Kirby did not look impressive in his first round match it could be blamed on Peach LFFing him. Kirby quickly showed his true colours in the second round easily crushing his opponents. With the noble nine losing left and right and Final Fantasy VII in general being weaker there was a lot of hype that Kirby would upset Sephiroth. The pictures also added to the hype with Kirby standing out in comparison to Sephiroth and Big Boss. Despite a large rally at the beginning of the poll Kirby was only able to keep even with Sephiroth and once those rallies died a few hours into the match Sephiroth was able to take control of the match leaving Kirby behind. It nonetheless was an impressive performance that confirms his status as a near-elite, and it would be interesting to see how he'd do in a rematch with Luigi or Bowser.

Fall 2018 Contest - Division 4 - 2 Seed

• Division 4 Round 1 --- Defeated (15) Guile, 21439 [74.54%], 7321 [25.46%]
• Division 4 Round 2 --- Defeated (6) Isaac, 21249 [70.29%] - 8982 [29.71%]
• Division 4 Semifinal --- Defeated (3) Phoenix Wright, 20621 [68.31%] - 9566 [31.69%]
• Division 4 Finals --- Lost to (4) Bowser, 13033 [46.14%] - 15211 [53.86%]

Nintendo was boosted to hell and back in 2018 as Smash Bros hype was at its highest, and Kirby showed this with flying colors as he steamrolled through lesser competitors in the first three rounds. But then came a rematch with Bowser, who with Mario Odyssey to help scored even higher on the pink puffball than in 2005. Kirby is popular, but he can't be expected to beat certain characters.