This match was gigantic. I'm pretty sure the #1 reason it was gigantic was because of the 1 and the 16 next to each other's name, though. If memory serves, you only got one nomination per console. Halo was literally the only Xbox game of note whereas Starcraft had to deal with the entire history of PC games. It was a bad system. Everything about spring 2004 was a bad idea, really. And it was amazing despite itself.
Make this match an 8-9 and it doesn't have the same level of hype. I still think it's a huge result though, even though no one should really pick Halo to be a huge favourite after watching Master Chief struggle with a dude named Felix. PC games were utter garbage in these contests. Probably the most notable example of a PC character was Gordon Freeman and he was the ultimate laughingstock by the time spring 2004 came around. Starcraft? It was hard to really believe in Starcraft. But it was also hard to see Halo going anywhere. I have no way to verify this, but I bet most people had it losing to Kingdom Hearts in the next round. (speaking of super odd results: Kingdom Hearts/Soul Calibur. I think Janus took Soul Calibur to beat Metal Gear in the series contest based off of that result alone. spring 2004, man. there won't ever be another like it.)
This match was an intense back and forth. Starcraft killed the night and Halo killed the day. Halo got up 1100 votes with 5 and a half hours to go and then Starcraft just went to work. It looked like it was probably going too slow and then, suddenly, it was over. It took like an hour and a half for a 600 vote lead to disappear.
And with that, Starcraft, and possibly the biggest natural bandwagon we've ever seen, was born.
-That's how nominations worked, yeah.
-Pretty much all of us had it losing to Kingdom Hearts.
-Nothing natural about it, as we saw with the Melee match. Ceej was terrible about cheating. It was sad how easy it actually was to do. ---
