Board 8 > transience asks questions about the bracket

(+) Yeah! (+)

Like, 1987 has Zelda, but 1985 also has Zelda. Because it has the console that gave us Zelda.
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But this is my logic, I don't know. Maybe the match pic with ZELDA on it speaks louder.
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it all depends on how they present the information. total crapshoot. the only thing you can bet on is Mario and Zelda.
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1996

top 5 games: Super Mario 64, Super Mario RPG, Resident Evil, Kirby Super Star, Diablo
notable consoles/technology: N64
GameFAQs strength: medium
historical importance: medium-high
rally potential: low
overall: medium

there's been a lot of debate over 1996. some people see it as a monster due to potential top 5 game Super Mario 64 and the Nintendo 64. I see it as being similar to 1995. the best two games are Mario and the third place game is Resident Evil which isn't terrible but its popular younger brother got beat good by Mario RPG.

the N64 is notable, probably moreso than the PS1 due to the way Mario 64 revolutionized platforming, but I don't think it's going to change its destiny too much. 96 has a tough path - 89, 90/2000 and then 1997 if it can get by those. it should probably be the favorite to make it to 97 but likely bows out there.

- how important is the N64?
- if 1990 beats 2000, will 1990/1996 turn into a Mario-off? does Final Fantasy tip the tide in favor of 90?
- can Resident Evil and/or Diablo help diversify 1996? it's largely a Nintendo year as everyone else was getting ready for PS1 development.
- if consoles are important, can 96 defeat 97?
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None of the 78/79/early 80s years will win a match. Everyone should know this. 89 will win its "prelim" easily. 87 will win 1 match. Thats all I see from the 80s.
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finally got in a bracket for this

this is kind of a silly contest, but it's actually kind of fun to predict because it's all mostly unknown quantities
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ZeldaTPLink posted...

And it doesn't make sense for a game to be better than its own console (unless it's something like Ocarina).

Except the console means absolutely nothing without the game. It's not like you have a PC where even without any games you can still do word processing or something.

Yeah I don't really care about console release dates in a contest like this, especially since most consoles kinda suck on launch. The PSX was a good system, but looking purely as a PSX fan, the strong years would be '97, '98, '99, and '00... certainly not '95. I feel '95 would be a weak year without Chrono Trigger (though CT is huge).

transience posted...

the N64 is notable, probably moreso than the PS1 due to the way Mario 64 revolutionized platforming

I don't really agree with this either. Here we are 20 years later, and most platformers still look more like Mario 3/World than they do like Mario 64. (Mario itself is arguably the main exception, but even then it developed into three separate streams, and it's no surprise that the 2D one is the best-seller.)
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well, all I mean is that 96 is a notable year for the 64 whereas 95 is not for the PS1.
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I think 1985 will matter for NES launch but no other console launch will have much impact; where 1983 is the video game crash, the launch of the NES has always represented the revival of the industry. It's kind of like 1915 in cinema; of course games existed before 1985, but this is where the industry really began to take shape into what we know today. It's not the NES launch as much as it being the beginning of the modern era (which even stands out to me as someone born years after the fact). There's a reason we had vote-ins for the years before 1985 specifically (SBAllen is totally doing this contest this year because it's the last he can do a 32-entrant bracket starting from the 'beginning' of modern gaming with each year since getting a spot). It's a rare case where a year should matter more than its individual parts.
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Do the massses know that history, though?
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The 1995/1997/2001 gauntlet is giving me nightmares.
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ZeldaTPLink posted...

Do the massses know that history, though?

I don't know if they can cite the year off hand but they will be able to recognize it from Mario 1 and the NES being in the picture.
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1997

top 5 games: Final Fantasy VII, Goldeneye 007, Mario Kart 64, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Star Fox 64
notable consoles/technology: none
GameFAQs strength: high
historical importance: medium
rally potential: low
overall: high

I'm just going to be blunt: some people think 1997 is at risk of not making the final and I just don't see it. from a pure GameFAQs game strength perspective, it's hard to argue against 97.

if it draws 1996, its best game is, at worst, equivalent; FF7 probably beats Mario 64, but if you want to go the other way, that's fine. 97 still has 007, MK64 and SOTN against.. I guess Mario RPG? Goldeneye whipped Mario RPG once upon a time and there's not a good reason to think otherwise. you have to rely on the N64 to mean a whole lot to go 96 over 97.

if it draws 1995, it's basically CT vs. FF7 - again, a slight CT win at absolute worst but then there's all those other games backing up 97.

if it draws 01, I think that's actually the best case scenario for 97. you get a match of FF7 vs. FFX, which is a clear FF7 win. you get Melee vs. 007/MK64 which is probably a lot more equal than you realize. MGS2 vs. SOTN is also a push. FF7 just breaks every tie here. the only exception here is a rally from Melee, which is very possible. but it's not winning straight up.

GameFAQs has been, for as long as we've done these things, a site stuck in 97 and 98, and I expect this contest to show that out bigtime.

- chances are we only get one or two Nintendo 64 games of the three. which ones do we get?
- has FF7 fallen off at all?
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2001 > 1997 is the upset special that I'm basically banking my whole bracket on. I think FFX + Melee is an insane one-two punch (in my opinion the best aside from 1998, which I cannot envision not winning the whole thing), and I think 2001 is much more within the average GameFAQs user's nostalgia window right now than people realize.

I don't think that's a radical pick. Might even end up being the cookie in guru.
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Goldeneye whipped Mario RPG once upon a time and there's not a good reason to think otherwise.

https://www.gamefaqs.com/poll/6076-best-game-ever-day-7-goldeneye-007-vs-diablo-ii
https://www.gamefaqs.com/poll/6169-best-game-ever-day-36-division-vii-final-super-mario-rpg-vs

Besides Super Mario RPG looking ridiculously good in 2015, Goldeneye did pretty poorly.
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you think Mario RPG beats Goldeneye? those numbers don't look that out of line to me.
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and besides, we saw it straight up
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We saw it 8 years ago! It matters about as much as Chrono Trigger losing to Super Mario 64 twice that contest.
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Lower votals favor radicalized fanbases

CT isn't actually strong if you have 100k votes, but with 20k votes it's a monster

Goldeneye is more casualbait probably, so it'd do better with more votez
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Mario RPG is weird. it's the ultimate leech. Leon is already rolling his eyes.

basically, it has massive crossover appeal while not actually being all that popular. it's Square and it's Nintendo. put it against anything but those two companies and it does great. put it up against a core fanbase and it collapses. it's not that unlike, say, Tetris in that regard.

the last contest had it facing GTA5, Oblivion, RE4 and MGS3 - all new games, none of them Square or Nintendo. the only game that fit that bill was Chrono Cross and it only got 60% on that. I think stats would say that RE4 gets like 56% on Chrono Cross. doesn't seem right to me.
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Chrono Cross is a monster and no one will tell me otherwise
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were you one of those SFII > Mario RPG predictors back in the day

because Super Mario RPG is Nintendo AND Square rolled into one. What more do you need? It's baby's first RPG for a lot of people, too (like me!), so it has a good amount of nostalgia.

In terms of GoldenEye vs. Mario RPG, this is probably a better corollary:

https://www.gamefaqs.com/poll/6127-best-game-ever-day-20-round-2-skyrim-vs-goldeneye-007
https://www.gamefaqs.com/poll/6100-best-game-ever-day-13-oblivion-vs-super-mario-rpg

How much do you think Oblivion is worth on Skyrim indirectly? Part of me thinks Mario RPG could have been bandwagoning the later into the contest we go, so I don't completely trust the RE4 and MGS3 results, but this was round 1. Mario RPG's got a decent bit of wiggle room to fit in there.

I've never trusted GoldenEye's perceived strength and I don't think any of us would think it was worth that much if not for that Top Ten contest back in 2005 when it finished 8th out of nowhere.

I don't dispute Mario RPG is susceptible to SFF though. Its matches with OoT and SSBM suggest Melee is worth 45% on OoT, which is...a bit of a stretch, to say the least, discounting how insanely seriously Melee fans take these things.

Paratroopa1 posted...

2001 > 1997 is the upset special that I'm basically banking my whole bracket on. I think FFX + Melee is an insane one-two punch (in my opinion the best aside from 1998, which I cannot envision not winning the whole thing), and I think 2001 is much more within the average GameFAQs user's nostalgia window right now than people realize.

It's feasible, but as the guy who overrates FFX to high heaven every year without fail, I'm picking 1997.
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also I have no idea how or if SFF will work in this contest so who knows if FFVII > FFX or Mario RPG's susceptibility matters at all
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I was! I'm one of those people who think SF2 should be a top 20 game just due to its incredible influence. I wouldn't take that as meaning anything in this context though.

I think Skyrim is a mile ahead of Oblivion. like maybe FF6 to FF7, but even more pronounced.
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1998

top 5 games: Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Pokemon Red/Blue, Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy Tactics, Xenogears
notable consoles/technology: none
GameFAQs strength: top
historical importance: high
rally potential: medium
overall: top

1998 speaks for itself. it's too bad Ocarina of Time is 1998 - because even without it, it'd be a monster. I don't really need to say anything else.

- what games get represented? I listed the GameFAQs top 5 above. you can substitute FFT or Xenogears for Starcraft if you want. a real, legitimate top 5 could also be Pokemon, Metal Gear Solid, Half-Life, Starcraft and Baldur's Gate. or Gran Turismo, or Resident Evil 2, or you name it. I think you can make a decent case that Ocarina doesn't even belong in a list of most influential games of 1998. that won't be the case here on GameFAQs, of course, but someone might have fun with a match.
- let me just say that while 1998 is far and away the clear winner of a GameFAQs match, I give it even odds for winning the contest and losing badly. all it takes is a slight wind and the GameFAQs vote can topple.
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I was one of those people who saw SF2 as just one game and not encompassing every single upgrade it spawned, and picking Mario RPG over that was easy. The original SF2 got obsoleted several times over!
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Let me put it this way - I can certainly envision scenarios in which 1998 loses, but I cannot come up anything but the most shaky justification for predicting anything but 1998. Any other pick to me is basically a longshot. This is like Link vs the field here. The field sometimes wins, but I'm only picking something from it if I think I need to to win the contest.

1998 only loses if outside interference happens.
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I just realized I said verbatim that I both can and cannot envision 1998 winning

it just depends on which hyperbole I feel like using at the time I guess

transience posted...

Mario RPG is weird. it's the ultimate leech. Leon is already rolling his eyes.

basically, it has massive crossover appeal while not actually being all that popular. it's Square and it's Nintendo. put it against anything but those two companies and it does great. put it up against a core fanbase and it collapses. it's not that unlike, say, Tetris in that regard.

the last contest had it facing GTA5, Oblivion, RE4 and MGS3 - all new games, none of them Square or Nintendo. the only game that fit that bill was Chrono Cross and it only got 60% on that. I think stats would say that RE4 gets like 56% on Chrono Cross. doesn't seem right to me.

This. SMRPG got an insanely lucky draw that contest. The whole point of that quarter of the bracket was to keep all the strong Nintendo and Square games out so MSG, RE4, or a western game would win. But SBAllen underestimated how much this site loves its JRPGs. SMRPG's 8-pack was (unintentionally) designed to make it and Chrono Cross look as good as possible, since they got to beat up modern western games that look strong but aren't really. Then the bandwagon gave it the needed boost to beat RE4 and MGS, which were also looking a bit off that contest.

Put SMRPG in the top half of the bracket and I doubt it amounts to much of anything.
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OrangeCrush980 posted...

Put SMRPG in the top half of the bracket and I doubt it amounts to much of anything.

Eh, let's not undersell its performance either. It was capable of winning a couple of matches just about anywhere in the bracket.
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2001 > 1997 isnt an upset. The top 3 years in this thing will probably be

1998
2001
2007

1994/1995 will be 4th by the "xstats"
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Metal_DK posted...

2001 > 1997 isnt an upset. The top 3 years in this thing will probably be

1998
2001
2007

1994/1995 will be 4th by the "xstats"

Don't sell 1997 short

yeah, Mario RPG is fine. it's a good competitor. it's like Scorpion in 2002 though - making the final four doesn't make you a contest legend. you just got a real nice draw.
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1999

top 5 games: Final Fantasy VIII, Super Smash Bros., Suikoden 2, Sonic Adventure, Soul Calibur
notable consoles/technology: Dreamcast
GameFAQs strength: medium
historical importance: low
rally potential: low
overall: medium

I should probably treat 1999 like 1995 - instead of CT, it's FF8, and there's a Smash Bros. there too - but I dunno. I just don't see FF8 as an all-time game. it's more like the followup to FF7, one that divides fans instead of unites them. Chrono Trigger brings RPG fans together. SSB is a good game but that series didn't blow up until Melee. I think 1999 could be an interesting year if it was up against something from the 80s or early 90s but it gets 1997 so it isn't even a very useful thought exercise.

1999 is also the year of the Dreamcast but I don't think that plays super well outside of the cool 9/9/99 thing. Sonic Adventure is the best that we got and those games have faded.

- does FF8 still resonate? results suggest maybe not but they're really inconclusive.
- does SSB hang with the giants? it's never had a chance to do so but it's probably not that far off from the other Smash games. they're kind of all the same, especially to a casual fan who just sees a bunch of Nintendo characters and 'super smash bros'.
- there's probably some non-GameFAQs game like Tony Hawk's Pro Skater or Everquest that makes the cut here and limits its drawing power. sad as it is to say, 99's best chance is probably loading up on Suikoden 2 and Legend of Dragoon and Lunar and all those kinds of games.
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1999 is the one year from the '90s I'd be interested to see face a year from the '00s or '10s

but nope it gets 1997 so whatever
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1999 is really kind of a shit year

Oh man, is it time to bust out the Adjusted 2015 X-stats (tm) again?

Super Mario RPG - 32.8256
Goldeneye - 28.81953144

SMRPG performed extremely well even if you entirely remove that RE4 match from the equation (which I had to because it was an outlier that destroyed all the rest of the stats). It ranked 18th in the entire field. Goldeneye didn't look nearly as strong as it used to...their positions basically reversed.
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2000
top 5 games: Zelda: Majora's Mask, Final Fantasy IX, Chrono Cross, Pokemon Gold/Silver, Diablo 2
notable consoles/technology: Playstation 2
GameFAQs strength: high
historical importance: high
rally potential: medium
overall: high

man, 2000 is good! five strong games plus the PS2. yeah, something like Deus Ex or Baldur's Gate 2 probably gets in over a more deserving entrant, but eh.

proxy of the decade Majora's Mask leads the pack though I don't think FF9 is all that far behind. Diablo 2 showed it was legit by fighting Goldeneye to a 55-45. Pokemon Gold/Silver is right there too - it was once upon a time the favorite to beat Majora.

the PS2 hit in 2000 but without any great games. this is largely still a PS1/N64 year. I wouldn't be surprised if people see 2000 and don't even associate the PS2 with it.

I like the idea of 1990 giving 2000 a fight. Mario 3 and FF are legit, but you can argue that Majora's Mask and FF9 are better on their own AND 2000 has more depth AND it has the PS2. I can go either way. if it gets past 1990, it draws 96 and Mario 64. if you can beat Mario 3, I don't see why you can't do Mario 64. 2000 could get to 1997 and then all hell breaks loose. that could be a fight and a half.

- this is true of all years, but what makes the list? there starts to be a lot of competition around 2000. you could see Vagrant Story or The Sims or Shenmue or Counter-Strike. all great games historically, but a listing of Majora/Sims/Shenmue/Diablo 2/Counter-Strike -- a totally legit list -- leaves a lot on the table.
- how much does the PS2 matter here without any games worth a damn? you can't point to a Mario or a Sonic here. your best is.. I don't even know. maybe Tony Hawk.
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transience posted...

Diablo 2 showed it was legit by fighting Goldeneye to a 55-45.

yeah that performance is what makes me dubious of GoldenEye because that's exactly what it got on MGS4 in GOTD

I think all of 2000's biggest names are a little overvalued, honestly.
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I don't follow - are you saying that MGS4 was weak? SOTC made everything muddy there, as did having three MGS games jammed together.
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The Mana Sword posted...

Chrono Cross is a monster and no one will tell me otherwise

Speaking of which

Diablo II - 26.12363361
Chrono Cross - 25.77466112

I dare you to name another site on the internet (not entirely dedicated to Square) that would let this be a close match
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transience posted...

I don't follow - are you saying that MGS4 was weak? SOTC made everything muddy there, as did having three MGS games jammed together.

MGS4 isn't awful but it's clearly the weakest MGS game. I don't think SMRPG or RE4 have any problem beating it these days.
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MGS4 is the weakest game now (well, MGS5), but I don't think that was all that clear by 2010.
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I think 4 was a little stronger than 2 back in 2010 but that's about it. SotC caught a bit of a bandwagon after beating MGS2 but 4 barely seemed to put up a fight afterwards, and then 3 took care of business despite that the bandwagon being in full swing by then. 4 also had a weak showing against Assassin's Creed. It's just never looked very good since the 2008 honeymoon ended.
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transience posted...

I don't follow - are you saying that MGS4 was weak? SOTC made everything muddy there, as did having three MGS games jammed together.

I don't think MGS4 is that strong, no. Its strength has been slowly declining ever since 2008. SOTC muddied everything up there, sure, but MGS4 was the easiest win it had. Being equal to MGS2 and MGS4 isn't really what you want if you're trying to claim GoldenEye has upper midcard strength. It's probably just a solid midcarder at this point.

It just depends on how strong you're trying to claim GoldenEye is, I guess. I think it's just sort of middle of the road at this point.
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I think using stats like this is a little disingenuous with the lay of the land as it is here in 2017 -- but, SOTC beat MGS4 by less than 500 votes. let's not pretend it was some kind of easy win!
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Well, what are we defining as midcard? Because MGS4 is still ranked 41/128 in 2015.

For funsies:

Super Mario RPG - 32.8256
Resident Evil 4 - 31.82113664
Final Fantasy IX - 31.7768
Metal Gear Solid 3 - 31.17118976
Metal Gear Solid - 31.16495552
Final Fantasy VIII - 29.2824 (Hi Leon)
Shadow of the Colossus - 28.94601069
Metal Gear Solid 2 - 28.86813516
Goldeneye - 28.81953144
Metal Gear Solid 4 - 27.10909814
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