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Kirby was a major board favorite and widely viewed as badly underseeded, but Jill took an early lead and held it throughout. The final result looked close, yet the writeup stresses that Kirby never mounted a serious comeback.

Kirby beat a heavily hyped Ramza, but the writeup considered Ramza's resistance surprisingly strong for a cult newcomer. The result ended the Ramza upset talk while raising doubts about Kirby before facing Alucard.

Alucard won a heavily debated match with Kirby after an almost even opening. Though the final result looked close, the writeup says Alucard established control almost immediately and captured his fourpack for a second straight year.

Kirby comfortably beat Kain in another routine early-round result. The writeup treats the match mainly as evidence that Legacy of Kain characters occupy contest slots without showing enough strength to justify them.

Squall beat Kirby in another predictable Midgar match, though Kirby performed better than expected. The writeup's main curiosity is that Squall only began separating after the match picture appeared.

Pic: The writeup says Kirby and Squall were dead even before the match picture appeared, after which Squall began pulling away, and explicitly suggests that the picture may have mattered.

Kirby demolished Cecil far beyond expectations and immediately looked much stronger than his seeding reputation suggested. The writeup credits both Kirby's rise and Cecil's terrible picture while treating the result as an early sign of a broad Nintendo boost.

Pic: The writeup calls Cecil's Amano image one of the worst match pictures in the contest and accepts that the picture likely contributed to how badly he underperformed against Kirby.

Kirby decisively beat Tidus after the board had once treated Tidus as the overwhelming favorite. The writeup sees the result as both a major Kirby validation and another humiliation in Tidus's long decline from his 2003 reputation.

Bowser survived a strong challenge from Kirby and gradually built enough of a lead to take the division. The close result weakened confidence in Bowser before Snake, with the writeup considering reverse SFF as one possible explanation.

SFF: The writeup presents reverse SFF as a viable explanation for Kirby keeping the match unusually close, with Kirby's starring role and bracket support potentially suppressing Bowser's expected advantage.

Kirby beat Prince of Persia but steadily lost ground after a stronger opening. The writeup credits Prince with proving respectable midcard strength while treating Kirby's performance as another bad sign before the next round.

Luigi pulled away after an initially even start, and the writeup says the final closeness overstated how competitive the match really was. It also treats the result as further evidence that Kirby's prior Dream Division strength was misleading.

SFF: The writeup says SFF favored Luigi and made a Kirby comeback effectively impossible once Luigi pulled away.

Kirby took first as expected, but L-Block immediately demolished expectations by beating Laharl for the other advancing spot and even briefly leading Kirby. The writeup remembers those opening minutes as the first astonishing sign of what L-Block would become later in the contest.

Kratos took first, but the important result was L-Block advancing again while Kirby was weakened by Donkey Kong. The writeup marks this as the point when L-Block stopped looking like a harmless joke and became a serious contest threat.

LFF: The writeup explicitly says Donkey Kong drained Nintendo support from Kirby, costing Kirby the advancing spot and allowing L-Block to move on.

Big Boss delivered a result the writeup remembers as almost unimaginable at the time, beating a heavily favored Kirby outright. The upset immediately turned Big Boss into one of the contest's biggest talking points.

LFF: The writeup says Jinjo and Lucas hurt Kirby by splitting Nintendo support, though it also stresses that this alone cannot explain the scale of Big Boss's upset.

Kirby advanced, but the real battle was Master Chief's comeback against Big Boss. Chief's late surge turned a long, competitive fight into another memorable rally-driven reversal.

Rally · LFF: The writeup says Master Chief's fans rallied hard enough to erase Big Boss's lead and secure advancement. It also says Raiden's near-total Metal Gear overlap drained support from Big Boss.

Kirby continued his unexpected run by taking first, while Dante beat Master Chief in the meaningful fight for the other advancing position. The writeup remembers the match as a fun clash of very different contest identities.

Kirby delivered another major shock by advancing ahead of Sonic, whose long decline finally produced a costly elimination. The writeup treats Sonic's failure as the culmination of years of warning signs rather than a random fluke.

Snake converted the divided field into a surprise first-place finish, while Cloud recovered enough to secure the other final berth. Sephiroth's collapse and Kirby's early pressure made the semifinal far stranger than expected.

SFF · LFF: The writeup says Kirby SFFed Sephiroth badly, leaving Sephiroth unusually weak. It also says Sephiroth leeched enough Final Fantasy support from Cloud to keep Cloud from catching outside contender Snake.

Kirby beat Rikku almost exactly as expected in a match with little suspense. Because Kirby needed an overperformance to sustain hopes of challenging Sonic, the merely routine win was treated as disappointing.

Kirby beat GLaDOS in a predictable match but fell far short of the strength his prior contest run implied. The writeup treats this as the point where serious Kirby-over-Sonic upset hopes collapsed.

Kirby beat Vivi without difficulty, but failed to look strong enough to preserve serious hopes of upsetting Sonic. The writeup treats Kirby's old four-way bandwagon strength as clearly gone.

Sonic beat Kirby comfortably and completed the collapse of years of hype that Ganondorf or Kirby might break the Noble Nine through him. The writeup treats Sonic as restored to roughly his traditional place.

Kirby won, but Terra's performance was the surprise as she benefited from Peach draining Nintendo support from Kirby. The writeup treats Terra's Dissidia-era strength as increasingly legitimate.

LFF · Pic: The writeup says Peach LFFed Kirby, helping Terra look unusually strong against him. It also explicitly calls Kirby's simple spherical design a major picture advantage.

Kirby won comfortably while Crash nearly completed a morning comeback on Elizabeth for second in the Expert Challenge ordering. The writeup celebrates the loss as Crash's best contest showing in years and a major warning about BioShock Infinite's strength.

Sephiroth survived an expected Kirby upset attempt after a long early deadlock, then unexpectedly dominated the morning and daytime vote. The writeup treats the result as a rare 2013 case where a Final Fantasy VII heavyweight reasserted himself.

Kirby delivered another huge Nintendo blowout while Guile never became remotely competitive. The writeup treats the result as part of the contest-wide pattern of Smash and Nintendo characters outperforming expectations.

Kirby demolished Isaac in a matchup the writeup considers heavily distorted by shared Nintendo and handheld appeal. The blowout further strengthened Kirby's status as a division favorite.

SFF: The writeup explicitly calls Kirby versus Isaac an SFF match, arguing that Kirby's handheld-heavy Nintendo fanbase strongly overlaps with Golden Sun's audience.

Kirby demolished Phoenix and erased the significance of Phoenix's narrow rules-assisted win over Ike. The blowout made Kirby the popular favorite over Bowser despite older evidence favoring Bowser.

Bowser upset the heavily favored Kirby and repeated his old head-to-head superiority despite most mid-contest predictions flipping toward Kirby. The writeup treats Bowser's broader Mario appeal and recent relevance as more durable than Kirby's apparent momentum.