Sorry to talk about GameFAQs but...

[PDorr3]

What is you're opinions on the character battle this year? link and mario go down this year (link lost to cloud, his first loss ever), and the final battle will be cloud vs sephiroth. Does this tell us something about gaming in general? its really a popularity contest, so square is dominating in that factor here, but I am sure if a character tournament was held here at DP (think about it joe!) there would be much more classic characters, and im sure the results would be much different. But I just wanted to bring up this point because its pretty ironic how two square characters, from the same game make it to the final battle.
You're thoughts?
(lol and im sorry for brining up gamefaqs, i know its pretty hated here, but this topic was pretty interesting and i thought it should be brought up)

[vintagegamecrazy]

I agree with you. Square is running the lead. There needs to be more of a variety of characters in the battles. You know what those battles say to me, that they prove that all people care about is games with great graphics and nothing else. Its sad but true.

[ManekiNeko]

I've never cared for those character battles. I'm convinced that the participants are voting for the games the characters are in, rather than the heroes themselves. I mean, Sonic and Aeris from Final Fantasy VII were running nearly neck and neck at one point. When the symbol for an important video game manufacturer nearly gets beaten by a bit character who dies halfway through the only game she's ever starred in, something is seriously wrong.
(Here's where someone else points out that Aeris made a cameo in Kingdom Hearts, and here's where I respond that I don't give a crap)

JR

[Ascending Wordsmith]

I always vote for characters I know don't have a snowball's chance in hell.

"Why?"

Cause it's all garbage to me. It's not the character people vote for, it's the game. In all honesty, I'd rather spend a day with Max Payne over Sephiroth. For one reason, Max has the ability to speak (which is very important when having a conversation). If I want to read text bubbles, I'll go pick up the comics section in my newspaper.

With all the characters that have been created since the beginning of gaming, you'd think a whole new slate of identities would be introduced every year.

[Kid Fenris]

Hey, Sephiroth hasn't made it to the finals yet! BLUE BOMBER 4EVA!!!

While it's amusing to see two adversaries square off in the final voting, the recent Character Battle was anything but interesting. From the start, it was evident that the Nintendo and Squaresoft icons would OWNZ, so there was little point in following it.

The next contest should exclude all characters who made it past the second round in this recent competition. Let's see some more obscure heroes and villains, like Spike McFang, Alisia Dragoon, Matic, Billy Lee Black, Colonel Vermon CaTaffy, Toki, Reana, Wonder Boy, Marion, and Fatman Joe!

Somehow, I don't think that people are voting for games instead of characters. If they were voting for games, Half-Life's Gordon Freeman would have beaten out Max Payne in the first round. And oddly enough, I'd have voted for Aeris over Sonic, since Aeris never had an insufferably whiny fox as a sidekick.

And we don't hate GameFAQs here. We love it for the unintentional amusement provided by the site's message boards.

[SoulBlazer]

Not to mention as honestly the best site on the web for help in a game....and where you can view my FAQ on Konami's Arcade Classics for the GBA! :D

(Sorry, could'nt resit a little plug.....)

But yeah, I agree with most of what was said. It's a popularity contest, but it has less to do with the current state of gaming then the average age of the kids who use the boards and the polls there. I only go for the GameSpot links, the release data, and the FAQ's. :)

[Oobgarm]

They should rename it "The Great RPG Character Battle", because that's what the vast majority of users on that site play. I don't mean to pigeonhole here, but most of those kids don't interact with others socially outside of their own homes, so they live vicariously through the characters in the games they play. They obess over them until the next big game comes along, then they attach themselves to a different character. It's sad, really.

I've tried to interact with some of the folks there on their F-Zero boards, but the site is so incredibly rampant with fanboyism and idiocy, it's not even worth my time. Why I even tried posting somewhere other than here is beyond me. LOL

I will give kudos to the site for being a wealth of knowledge, but their forum community is trash, IMO. :hmm:

[PDorr3]

Indeed, in the character battle 2004, all characters that made it past the first round should be excluded. This would make for a bit more interest...