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Magus won comfortably but failed to match the enormous expectations created by his pre-contest hype. The writeup says supporters blamed his low seed and kept treating him as a potential challenger to Link despite the underwhelming showing.

Magus survived a dramatic Ganondorf comeback after his early lead nearly vanished during the morning vote. The razor-thin win punctured the enormous Magus-versus-Link hype even as it produced one of the contest's most memorable close matches.

Link ended the once-enormous Magus upset hype with a comfortable win, though Magus still performed better than expected. The writeup leaves the reason for that overperformance unresolved, mentioning both board hype and possible sprite-picture effects without settling on either.

Magus dominated Luca Blight in a low-interest match before his difficult second-round draw. The writeup uses Luca's weak showing and the quiet poll to argue that vocal cult support does not translate into broad contest strength.

Crono crushed Magus in a matchup the writeup considers another casualty of the company-based bracket. Magus briefly led with Board 8 support, but the eventual SFF blowout left no useful opportunity to test his real strength.

SFF: The writeup explicitly says Magus was hit by SFF against fellow Chrono Trigger character Crono, making the lopsided result a poor measure of Magus's standalone strength.

Knuckles stunned a board that had essentially treated Magus as a lock and even a possible division winner. Magus led early before Knuckles's daytime strength took over, producing one of the contest's most memorable bracket-busting upsets.

Magus took first but looked weak enough to damage any hopes of a deep run, while Phoenix Wright turned the fight for second into the real match. Bomberman mounted a long afternoon comeback, only for the heavily favored Board 8 character to hold on at the end.

Mario cruised while Big Boss demolished Magus for the other advancing spot. The writeup treats the newly revealed Naked Snake picture as the defining factor that transformed expectations before the poll even began.

Pic: The writeup calls Big Boss's Naked Snake image one of the clearest picture-factor examples, saying the strong recognizable picture helped turn the matchup against Magus decisively in Big Boss's favor.

Sonic won comfortably, but Sandbag's comeback against Magus supplied the real drama. The upset confirmed both Magus's long-running reputation for disappointing and the continuing power of joke entrants.

Rally: The writeup says Sandbag's comeback went beyond a normal daytime trend and identifies a rally as the reason the joke entrant surged past Magus.

A heavily debated 8/9 matchup ended almost immediately when Alucard took control and never yielded an update. The writeup treats the rout as further evidence that Magus and Chrono Trigger had continued to decline.

Magus finally won a heavily debated match by beating Otacon and Jade comfortably enough to make the pre-match panic look excessive. The writeup treats the victory as rare positive news in Magus's long history of contest disappointments.

Pikachu decisively eliminated Crono after Magus collapsed under same-series overlap. The result became one of the clearest signs that the old Noble Nine hierarchy no longer controlled the bracket.

SFF: The writeup explicitly says Magus was SFFed into the ground by Crono, giving Pikachu the opening it needed.

Vincent survived a surprisingly strong Magus challenge in a matchup between two former contest heavyweights who had both declined badly. The writeup treats the narrow win as evidence that Vincent's fall had been even steeper than expected.