Nowadays I don’t visit GameSpy (or any other site like it) very often, but I do feel compelled to point you towards something very cool that they’re doing now: The Ultimate Gaming Grudge. Or maybe it’s called “Title Fight”. It’s so awesome it needs two names.
The concept is pretty straight-forward. First, take 64 popular video games and arrange them in tournament brackets not unlike what you see in college basketball or other sports. This gives you 32 pairings of “This Game” vs. “That Game”. Next, have readers vote on each of these pairs so that the game with the most votes proceeds to the next round and is paired up again with another game that also got more votes than its last opponent. Repeat until there’s only one pair left, then repeat again to decide the “Best. Game. EVAR.”
Here’s a picture to help you visualize. Click on it to see the brackets on GameSpy.com if you still don’t get it:
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It’s a very cool idea and the folks at GameSpy.com have implemented it beautifully. For truly obsessive folks there’s running commentary on each day’s matchups as well as the aforementioned brackets page. From what I hear, they’re getting bookoos of traffic off of this idea and people are enjoying it.
Incidentally, this idea has been incubating for a while. We were talking about it for maybe a year before I quit GameSpy. Everybody knew it was a winner, but we just didn’t have the systems to do it until we built a new polling system (which was one of the last projects I managed). I’m glad they finally did it.
In fact, the idea goes even further back to a fantastic tournament called The Road to Springfield, which did the same thing but with supporting cast members from The Simpsons instead of games. I remember checking that tournament every day to see who was coming out on top. It all came down to an incredibly close, nail-biting showdown between C. Montgomery Burns and Ralph Wiggum. Burns won, 3,089 to 2,951.
Personally, I think GameSpy should have covered all the bases by pitting popular video games against characters from The Simpsons. THAT would be the ultimate poll.
Oh, and speaking of GameSpy Industries, as of yesterday they are technically no more. Gone. Kaput. Instead, the merger with the owners of IGN went through and we now have IGN GameSpy. Those are some impressive numbers in that press release, and I wish everyone who survived the merger the best of luck. I wish just as much luck (if not more) to those who didn’t.
By the way, my money is on Half-Life to win the whole thing. I know, I know. Really going out on a limb here, eh?
It’ll be Counter-Strike.