10 years later and I still hate the Screwattack website redesign lmao
Episode 31: Terminator vs Robocop
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20140918084922/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictions-terminator-vs-robocop
I think this was the first episode that Torrian worked on? At the very least it's the first one that I remember him working on.
Looking back Death Battle was really lucky to get someone like Torrian on the show. He single handedly did the work that required entire teams in later seasons. It’s my personal belief that he was probably clinically insane, cause I can’t figure out how he was able to accomplish any of his animations in any kind of reasonable timeframe.
Anyway the animation on this fight was a great introduction for him and I liked the ending where Robocop strapped Terminator to a rock.
Episode 32: Luigi vs Tails
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20150415235138/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictions-luigi-vs-tails
Ok so this one is another funny fight because of how much Mario and Sonic stats have changed in the vs community. I distinctly remember us sending messages to Ben, and our opinions essentially boiling down to “Well, Tails is obviously faster(cause Sonic fast), he can fly and he’s smarter, so it’s pretty reasonable to think he wins”. Obviously this is not a super in depth analysis by current standards. They also still referenced Archie stuff in this ep, using his backstory from those comics along with Adventures/Satam.
Anyway I don’t recall the outcome causing too much controversy, but the “Luigi struggles to lift a large radish” line did get some jokes at the time.
On another note this was around the time we tried to launch our own podcast. This will become important later, so remember it!
https://web.archive.org/web/20140112004214/http://www.screwattack.com/news/its-time-deathcast
Episode 33: Pokemon Battle Royal
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20140508195442/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictions-pokemon-gen-1-starter-battle-royale
I remember this fight went through various changes. Initially it was just going to be the pokemon in their starter forms. Then they changed it to be the Pokemon in their final evolutions. I don’t remember when it was decided that it would only use naturally learned moves.
I think I sided with Venusaur during this fight, saying he could put the others to sleep, hide or prolong the battle via healing. I recall the others on the blog team telling me “Venasuar is not a fucking ninja that’s going to be able to hide the entire fight. He’s a giant fat frog”.
Anyway the fight was solid and the finishing blow was pretty brutal. I think looking back my biggest question was how the “1000s of possible choices and here’s the percentages of outcomes” thing was determined. Did they use a spreadsheet?
I’ll also say this is where I think the prediction blogs started to get “better”. They still don’t have calcs, or detailed links, or whatever. But they’re better organized and at least overview the abilities of all the characters' weapons, abilities, and history fairly well. While there's still a decent amount of “eyeballing”, the verdicts also sound a bit more in line with the logic that became common in the more current blogs.
Episode 34: Fulgore vs Sektor
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20140613135503/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictions-fulgore-vs-sektor
I barely remember this fight. I think most people agreed that the outcome was correct. That said, I remember people getting angry that it was Sektor that was chosen to be Fulgore’s opponent. A lot of people argued he should have fought Cryax. They look like color swaps to me tbh.
Episode 35: Godzilla vs Gamera
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20140918100355/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictions-godzilla-vs-gamera
This is another Torrian fight that is pretty ridiculous when you remember it came out in 2014. I don’t think the fight had much of a debate surrounding it. It’s pretty obvious that Godzilla is stronger and would have more to pull from even with common knowledge.
Episode 36: Batman vs Captain America
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20140908093406/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictions-batman-vs-captain-america
So this was a “controversial one”. This was the second fight that the blog got “wrong”. In hindsight I’m not sure if that assertion holds up or not.
At the time our belief was that Cap should be much stronger than Batman and should realistically be able to instantly kill him with the shield or block all his weapons. The episode said Batman had better stealth abilities and that he’d be able to separate Cap from the shield, giving him the win.
In the years since I’ve come to believe Cap was probably strong enough to win based on actual “calcs” from the Marvel universe, but recently I think it’s more likely that Batman would have some random gadget that could win the fight. Granted Cap probably has more equipment that wasn’t included in the episode either.
Episode 37: Tigerzord vs Gundam
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20141229232128/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictionstigerzord-vs-epyon
I remember this episode primarily due to it being the first ep I interacted with a guy named William Proto. Most people might not know who that is, but he was pretty big in the community back at the time for actually being able to do math and calculations.
Given everything was “eyeballing” up until that point, being able to back up characters abilities with real numbers pretty much made you an unquestioned god to fans of the show(Though for the record Proto didn’t have a god complex and was pretty nice. We liked to talk about Megaman sometimes).
Anyway I remember him being really into Gundom and being firmly on the side of Epyon winning. Something I think the rest of the blog team fell behind.
Proto’s wall https://web.archive.org/web/20151022135118/http://www.screwattack.com/news/protos-calculation-compilation-part-1
The fight itself was pretty great btw. It made great use of the size difference between both mechs and was pretty humorous. Though I wonder if modern audiences would get angry at how the episode plays Zechs off as kinda being a melodramatic angsty teen.
Episode 38: Ryu vs Scorpion
ODBFB Prediction: https://web.archive.org/web/20141101023919/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-predictions-ryu-vs-scorpion
This is another episode that the ODBFB had gotten “wrong”. Most people still rolled with it given the “just drop him into lava while teleporting” arguments, but I remember it being met with more scrutiny than a lot of other eps until this point.
Still I enjoyed how intense the battle was, particularly once it got taken to hell. I find it funny in hindsight how easy a lot of animations tend to make Ryu going evil though. From the way he acts in most fight animations you’d think he’s constantly at risk of going into a homicidal rage any time he stubs his toe.
Episode 39: Deadpool vs Deathstroke.
ODBFB: Wayback didn’t work. But luckily I still had it saved in google drives and reuploaded it. https://ulltraguy.blogspot.com/2024/04/old-blog.html
Anyway I remember this ep heavily because of us writing a 4th wall breaking joke into the blog where Deadpool would proclaim he won(the blog sided against him).
-----------
Deadpool
Hold it right there! I'm not sure who these 'researchers' are to have the balls to say this Slade guy can best me, but it ain't happenin! I mean, one of them (I think he called himself ‘Shitty Strategist’ or something) predicted I wouldn't waste my time reading or watching crap made by a bunch of nerds like them! Well, that guy isn’t a fortune teller because guess what!? I just did!...Not too sure if I should feel happy or sad about that.
But anyway, after reading the indisputable bias (I'm told people like to throw that word around in excess here) these numbskull Deathstroke supporters are spouting, I've come here to side with the TRULY logical people and show my support for...Well, me! I have this fight in the bag! I mean, I'm ME! I got the coolness, the wackiness, and a handsome bod that can woe Death her-er-itself!
And what do they mean Deathstroke isn't a rip-off of me?! The guns, the fancy blades, the outfit. The dude's totally copying my act! The guy’s nothin’ more than a mortal, grouchy version of me! I’m funnier, I have more fanboys, more edginess, and now that I’ve read all of his comics (which are woefully inferior to mine) I know every move Slady (HA! That sounds like lady!) is going to be making!...Er, okay I didn’t read EVERY comic starring Slady since I think most of New 52 kind of sucks, but I have this fight!
After all, I took down the entire Marvel Universe in that one totally valid and canon comic!...Well, okay, an alternate universe version of me did that, but it still counts! Has Deathstroke solo’d the entire DC Universe? Didn’t think so! To conclude, I am awesome, Deathstroke sucks, and I will definitely win this!
---------------
Funny enough he did win lol.
Anyway, remember when I said Torrian was crazy? I swear to god this episode is like 9 minutes long? I don’t think we’d ever be able to match something like that now. The choreography was pretty creative for that matter, like the breakdancing scene. Personally I think the ep leans a bit to hard on the “memepool” characterization, but I think it's still a “classic” episode.
Episode 40: Kirby vs Buu
This is one of my favorite “old” Death Battle eps for a few reasons.
Something that is easy to take for granted now is this idea that Kirby is this uber powerful godslayer. Even disregarding all the weird inconsistencies people have had in their opinions on Kirby stats over the years, back at the time him being that powerful was not common knowledge. I remember Lousy making this entire blog about Kirby to say “oh ho ho. He’s way stronger than you think”. I also recall community member BrawlHero making a blog on Kirby vs Buu to convince people it was viable.
Funny. Now people say this unironically.
Lousy’s’ Kirby blog https://web.archive.org/web/20140701234506/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-analysis-pink-abyss-horrific-might
BrawlHero Kirby vs Buu Blog https://web.archive.org/web/20141221162315/http://www.screwattack.com/news/death-battle-prediction-kirby-vs-majin-buu
I remember originally Kirby was going to fight Ditto, and I actually took notes on Ditto before they realized it was a stomp. Then they changed it to Majin Buu.
The debate on this episode was pretty intense. I remember there being tons of arguments about what abilities Kirby could access, which Buu’s variants could show up, how absorption would factor. Could Kirby freeze Buu or transmute him, etc. There was also a lot of scrutiny over the megatons punching game for some reason and none of the black holes in Kirby were allowed to count. It’s way different than the opinions people have on the series now.
Anyway during the debate I met Kirby Kid, who later on became a member of the actual research team. I’m also gonna mention I met Grand Blazer around this time as well, who also became a member of the actual research team down the line. It’s funny almost ALL of the researchers have been friends or known each other for the better part of 10 years.
https://web.archive.org/web/20140128031506/http://www.screwattack.com/user/kirby-kid
https://web.archive.org/web/20140718182305/http://www.screwattack.com/user/grand-blazer
Anyway most of the blog sided with Kirby at the time and I remember being pretty happy when he won. The animation was also pretty funny and I thought the DBZ Abridged reference at the end was cool. I actually think we ended up influencing their decision to do that looking back at old messages.
…..
In HINDSIGHT I’m not sure if Kirby legit should have won at the time or not. Over the years Kirby has been a franchise that people have been exceedingly inconsistent with. People used to not think they were planetary or MFTL back then. A lot of dimension or scaling feats accepted today were also dismissed at the time. There’s also the fact Buu probably should have been waaaaay faster and stronger than the show said he was going by current standards.
Currently I think based on what was available “back then”, Kirby “possibly” could have won based on some of the dimension feats (like Magalor, Drawcia, etc). Speed would depend on if Buu got the DBZ movies, but Kirby would definitely have versatility.
Nowadays Kirby would “probably” lose because of Buu being active in Super, and the shockwave punch. Unless you buy into some cosmology whatever the Kirby series hasn’t fully delved into.
That said, it was still an enjoyable fight and I think in hindsight Kirby’s reputation skyrocketing since the video made the casual audience much more willing to overlook some of its rough edges.
In the words of Kirby Kid
“201 Megatons was enough”
I miss Proto Dude.
ReplyDelete