So that's it guys! The Free Rider World Cup 4 is over!
Anonyymi is the great champion once again! The first double champion of this contest. The Finnish Dynasty is still going strong. Major congrats to
Calculus as well for finishing in second, you did great. Also for
Sannin for the 3rd place. There will be so much more to talk about later in this post about the final results, but here's a quick recap on the history of this contest for the ones who might not know or the ones that want to remember.
The Free Rider World Cup was created by
DblU on August, 2015. The first edition
(see here) had 24 participants starting with an Qualifiers/Elimination round like this year, but then it went straight to the Knockouts Stages with 16 participants. It was a very interesting thing for the ghosting communty, although it wasn't the first racing contest on this game. @speedy_XD did 2 Racing Contests before (both won by
WrzodX), back in 2014-2015 (and went back on doing it a few months ago), so it for sure was a source of inspiration. Back to the FRHD World Cup, the only participants of that contest that were in this year's contest were
spruce (as
Coolman2 at the time) and I. Shoutout to
Eryp, though, that was in that competition and was on the hosting team this time. In the first year,
Noob (still as F1N at the time) started the Finnish Dynasty after barely beating
WrzodX in a very close final match. A really good match for the Championship Finals. I took the 3rd place after beating Asierro (
ProLogoMaker ) on the 3rd place match.
DblU decided to host a second edition of this in January, 2016. This edition
(see here) had 30 participants, with 4 participants that were involved in this year's contest: Eryp, spruce and I, again, but this time we had
Backtwice as well. And not only he participated, but he won, keeping Finland on the top. It was a league system with 8 rounds, prizes for top 5. Top 5 had
KONSTRUKT in 5th, me in 4th,
darksmoke11 in 3rd,
Noob in 2nd and
Backtwice in 1st.
Since we didn't had any (that I can remember) successful big ghosting contests in 2017 or 2018 (R.I.P. NFRL) I decided to step forward instead of just saying "Yo, someone should revive and host this" every once in a while. So in January, 2019 after asking for
DblU's permission to use the name, I "took over" the hosting part of the contest and did the third edition of the contest
(see here). It was similar to the second edition, but it had 10 rounds instead of 8. With 29 contestants and after such a long journey,
Anonyymi was crowned the champion, with
RedOrBlue as the runner-up,
Stevie.T as the 3rd,
RustyClarkson as the 4th and I finished in 5th, completing the top 5. But last year we got an unbelievable over 100k pot, so there was coins for everyone in the contest, literally, lol.
So in this year's contest, I'll not talk much about the journeys of the top 5 players because I did it in the last big post of mine. But I'll talk about their performance on the Finals and the contest as a whole.
5th Place - BrendanMagill - After a really good impression on his first time on FRHD World Cups last year, with a 7th place overall, you shined once again and got a very deserving 5th place. You said that you were without internet for the last round, so that sucks, but you did good. You still manage to get a ghost somehow, a 3:17.10 ghost, so thank you for the effort! Nice job!
4th Place - ShamatoZ - What a great performance in this contest! As I said in the last post, I didn't know much about you but I'm looking forward to see what you can bring to the ghosting community. Well done! You got the 4th best time overall among the people in the contest and currently has the 10th best time on the track, a 1:38.27 ghost. Really good job!
3rd Place - Sannin - With a great ghost, you had a comfortable win this time. I don't know if you are 100% happy with your results or still slightly disappointed for missing your chance to be in the Finals so early, but not matter what you showed us that you are a really great ghoster and you did put on a nice show! There was drama, there was skill, there was revenge, it was fun watching you in this contest, haha. You had three 2nd place overalls and 3 first place overalls and still didn't make the finals, but you climbed all the way from the first round of the Losers Bracket winning every single game, winning the Losers Bracket and the 3rd Place match. Congrats, man! I hope you have a better luck with the calendar next time, because you are not the 2nd player with most ghost features because of luck. You might be one of our best weapons in the Finland vs World (but not Finland) war, haha. Still, congrats, man! You did good. Got the 3rd place among the players in the contest and the 5th place on the track (I see you RedOrBlue and tetrationiscool) with a good 1:11.13.
2nd Place - Calculus - You tried. You did good. Still wasn't enough, but that doesn't take away anything from you. You smashed some pretty good opponents and showed us that you are a class A ghoster. Solid ghost (apparently on mobile? wow), solid contest, 2nd best ghost among the contestants but also 2nd best ghost on the track, a 1:03.77 ghost, so congrats! You did your best. Really solid stuff. Congrats! It's not easy to finish in 2nd on a Free Rider World Cup. Hope to see you in the next one!
1st Place - The one and only Anonyymi - The question of last year still is without an answer: Can someone stop Anonyymi? We don't know yet. This time, besides the legend ZPresley, no one did. We might be looking 2 the all-time best player of Free Rider. Over 50 ghosts featured, 2 Free Rider World Cup titles. The Finnish GOAT keeps the legacy. Noob and Backtwice are probably proud, haha. Maybe you will be defeated someday but this day isn't today. Amazing contest, amazing ghost in the finals, a 1:02.83. Crushed it once again!
FINAL THOUGHTS - CONTESTANTS
First of all, thank you for everyone that participated as a contestant in this competition. There's no point on hosting a competition if people don't show up. This year, we broke the record of participants of the Free Rider World Cup, that was of 30 participants in the second edition. This time we had 53 applications and 50 actual participants, from that point of view, it was a great sucess.
So thank you to
Anonyymi,
spruce,
Ultraviolet,
Calculus,
TuttiFruity,
Sannin,
Cork,
ShamatoZ,
Slayed,
FunBunOne,
BrendanMagill,
Pie42,
Inactive,
demimondance,
Uniior,
Backtwice,
Totoca12 (lol),
panda_rider,
Odala,
Exylies,
Polarized/
Selesele,
DblU,
Coated_Badger,
Wolf777,
LightningBerk,
weem,
NewGoblin,
Calm.Wizard, Flower-shirt,
Chaos-Fallen,
Netsik,
ZPresley,
OdysseusSupreme,
INCINERATOR,
Radiology,
Srtrindade,
Apocolypse,
cammh08,
pssst,
sboggsl,
Lildonny,
DietFood,
shrimpersgate,
MaxReznik,
BenTheUnknown,
Sara29,
MasterWrecker,
BagelsBAK210,
Hunt3r_26 and
ei8ht for being part of the contest. You all played a role in this contest, even if it was small. Thank you, guys!
Some of you guys stood out for the skills, some others for the consistency and respect for the contest, some for the efforts, some for disappering or barely showing up, lol. But anyways, it was good to see you guys around, that's why we do this.
FINAL THOUGHTS - TRACKS
Ok, so there's a point that some of you guys probably had some complaints about: the tracks. So let's discuss about it a little bit.
Qualifiers -
https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/688318-frhd-world-cup-4-qualifiers - Track by
BrandonBishop50 &
Totoca12 - I honestly didn't see many complaints about this one, so I guess it was okay. I saw a few people thinking that it was a little bit glitchy, which I can understand and it was my bad. The track was made by
BrandonBishop50 and it was a very smooth ride. But I felt like the track was kinda empty, so I changed the ground a little bit and added many of the details. I think it was still good most of the time, but it might have been a little bit glitchy indeed. 9.7k plays and a 84% approval with 77 votes is not bad at all.
Group Stage Match 1 -
https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/689862-tears - Track by
Eryp - Insane track, couldn't criticize this track at all (other than the portal at the end that made me lose some good runs).
Eryp did a solid job on this one. It was the first Free Rider World Cup track that was featured, and it was well-deserved. I assume most people liked this one as well. 16.6k plays and a 91% approval with 121 votes is amazing.
Group Stage Match 2 -https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/690920-primus - Track by
Odala &
Totoca12 - I know that many people didn't like this track, but let's put some things in perspective. Yeah, I had a team, but doing this contest this year was my idea and I said that I would help with the tracks. I planned on helping with most of the tracks, but it wasn't possible through the whole contest. Also, I was hosting the contest and I had a last minute trip that I had to go for almost a week, so it kinda made things a little more complicated, since I said I would actively help with the 2nd track.
Odala started the track and helped as much as I could before I left, but couldn't do as much as I wanted. We wanted to have a few parts with vehicles in the tracks of the Group Stages and leave the "only-bike" tracks for the Knockouts Stages. So it was kinda of an agreement to have a vehicle track there, so
Odala was just following something that I suggested and we agreed on. Also, I couldn't help as much as I wanted, so I think that it was a still a good track overall, based in what we had in mind. Yeah, many people didn't like the helicopter, but it's a part of the game since 2015 or 2016, so we thought people wouldn't mind that much. But it is what it is. We don't get everything right everytime. We know we could have done better if we started earlier. But we tried. Lessons learned for the next time. But it wasn't such a failure based on the votes: a 75% approval with 32 votes in a track with 1.5k plays.
Group Stage Match 3 -https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/691727-tortilla - Track by
BrandonBishop50 &
Calculus - Another not so fan-favorite track, haha. Vehicles again! Ok, you guys don't like vehicles, I get it! My bad on this track was only actually play the track when it was released since I had just arrived from my trip and had no part on this track. I'm not saying that it's bad or anything, but I was away and didn't ghost the previous track, so I pretty much didn't see much of the feedback on the track, and then I didn't have any part on this track, so I was kinda surprised to see 2 tracks being hated like this "out of nowhere" in my perspective. If I was home I would probably advise Brandon to go easy on the vehicles, but since it was an idea that I approved, to make a track with different vehicles, I didn't do it, since I hadn't seen the feedback yet. And to be honest,
Pie42 did a track way harder than this where I got a 4 minute long ghost last year, that did exactly what this track did: a track with all of the 4 different vehicles. And although only 9 (or 11) people completed that track last year, people mostly enjoyed the track. So this vehicle thing it's kinda unpredictable. But I get it. People claimed that me as ghoster should have tested the tracks to see if they were good enough to ghost, and I admit I didn't do it well enough for matches 2 and 3 of the Group Stages. Not because I wanted, but it was because I honestly didn't have the time. People can ask like if I didn't have the time, why do the contest in the first place? I would say that although some of the things I had to do during this contest were kinda unplanned, and also that if I didn't had the initiative, we probably weren't going to have a FRHD World Cup this year, or at least not now. So I came without any tracks done and without any coins, but I tried my best, and most of the things worked out well. So, I know it wasn't a perfect track, also the shortcut wasn't a winner move. I personally don't like vehicles very much, especially in competitions, but I thought it was necessary to have some of them, because they are a part of the game. Shouout to
BrandonBishop50 for coming up with another track (and a decent one) in a short period of time, and also for
Calculus for helping. Overall it had 51 votes, a 71% approval and 3.2k plays.
Round of 16 - https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/692958-frhd-world-cup-4-round-of-16 - Track by
Eryp - Not detailed as the first one from him, but Eryp did a good track, with an interesting and competitive ride. I think most people liked it. I might have saw one or two small complaints, but people enjoyed the track. 86% approval, 37 votes, 3.2k plays
Quarterfinals - https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/694026-frhd-world-cup-4-quarterfinals - Track by
Totoca12 - Not much to say about this one. People enjoyed the trial aspect of the it for the most part. Small complaints about the slightly glitchy beginning ant the bombs at the end, but other than that I think it was fine. 88% approval, 25 votes and 2.1k plays.
Semifinals - https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/694930-frhd-world-cup-round-3-fixed - Track by
BrandonBishop50 ft.
Pie42,
Exylies and more - Despite it not being very detailed, I really enjoyed this ride. But people apparently didn't think the same. Yeah, after my trial in the Quarterfinals, I could see that people weren't expecting a much easier track in the Semifinals, but I still didn't think that the hate was needed, but people are free to express their opinions. People had problems with tracks last year, especially the 5th track. It happens. I think if the Quarterfinals and Semifinals tracks were switched and we had some extra time to work on this one it would have been better. But it was good in my opinion. Solid job by
BrandonBishop50 for doing another track. Thanks to everyone else who helped as well. 56% approval, 25 votes, 0.5k plays.
Losers Bracket Semifinals - https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/696070-frhd-world-cup-3-lb-semifinals - Track by
Totoca12 - Despite being a little hard for some people, I think most people liked the challenge. Same vibe of trial that I did previously. I think it worked out okay. 80% approval, 15 votes, 0.4k plays.
Losers Bracket Finals - https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/705753-world-cup-round-5 - Track by
Coated_Badger - Really great job by
Coated_Badger. Great ride, cool details, solid job with the track. Congrats! 81% approval, 31 votes, 1.2k plays.
Championship Finals -
https://www.freeriderhd.com/t/706438-dinosaur - Track by
Exylies - What an epic track! Awesome ride, great details, it was worthy of a Free Rider World Cup Championship Finals track. Thank you, man! I know you had to rush it a little bit, but it worked out great. 90% approval, 50 votes, 2.2k plays.
So, my overall opinion is that the tracks were great. Dinosaur, Tears and
Coated_Badger's were definitely in a different level of detail, but we have some cool rides on many tracks as well. Yeah, we did some mistakes, especially on the Group Stage, but I think we learned some lessons and we will try to be better in the future. I hope it was an enjoyable experience overall.
(PLEASE TELL IN THE COMMENTS WHICH TRACK WAS THE BEST FOR YOU)
FINAL THOUGHTS - FORMAT + MY EXPERIENCE
I did like every Free Rider World Cup format so far. In the first one it was straight up Elimination and then Knockouts. Really dynamic. Second one was more skill and consistency based, since it was a league. And it as very nice. Third one as well, but it was too long. But I really enjoyed this year's format. We had a Qualifier, Group Stage then Knockouts. I think it's good this way. It's a mix of momentum and consistency, so it's nice. But I would like to hear the opinions from you guys on this. I had fun hosting it the way it was, but of course it's more important to hear the participants on this matter.
(PLEASE TELL IN THE COMMENTS WHICH FORMAT DO YOU THINK IT'S THE BEST)
FINAL THOUGHTS - PRIZES
This is the most important matter now, since the contest is over. But I'll have to make you guys wait a little bit. I'm still waiting on
mR..A and
Char for Pro and some coupons of coins, so hold on a little bit with the coins, we are not sure of exactly how much we will have, but we have some confirmed donations already, and we will have at least a 50k pot if everything goes right.
This is not a scam, haha. Last year we delivered the coins a little bit late but we did and we will do it again. We are probably not going to have the same pot as last year but we are going to do our best to have some great prizes.
In a different note, this year we had some extra motivation for you guys. REAL CASH! Major thanks to the GOATS
Cork and
Eryp for pulling this off. Correct me if I'm wrong, but what I got is that each of them are going to to a 20$ donation each. So we have a real cash pot of 40$. That's not an insane amount, but that is so cool for motivation and to keep this community moving. This one goes to everyone that might have said to you that riding those bikes online wouldn't pay your bills, haha. They are probably still right, but 40$ less right than last time, haha.
So this is how it will go: Eryp is going to donate 15$ to
Anonyymi and 5$ to
Calculus.
Cork will donate 10$ to
Anonyymi, 5$ to
Calculus and 5$ to
Sannin.
So, besides the coins,
Anonyymi will get 25$,
Calculus will get 10$ and
Sannin will get 5$. They will contact you on how they are going to do that, because I'm not very good at handling those international money transfers things. Also, will let you guys know if something changes, but so far this is what we have for the prizes. Congrats, guys!
FINAL THOUGHTS - THE TEAM + SPECIAL THANKS
Guys, but let's be honest. I took the initiative and all, but I really COULD HAVE NOT DONE this contest without my team. So here is my thank you to each one of you guys:
Odala - Thank you for reaching out willing to help, you did help with ideas, with the track, with your participation in the contest, so thank you! I know you got busy at the end but that's fine. It's how life goes.
Eryp - Thank you, man. Just thank you. 2 really amazing tracks and a sponsorship of real cash, many great ideas, helped so much with the seeding and many other stuff. Really couldn't have done it as well as we did without you.
BrandonBishop50 - This guy is a legend. His efforts on making the tracks, making updates to the people when I couldn't, promoting the contest and making those beautiful spreadsheets with constant updates, doing the brackets, having so many ideas for the contest. This couldn't be done without you, man. Hope to count with you in the last one. Also you did a good form/survey that I'll talk about in the end.
SPECIAL THANKS TO:
Cork - For the cash donation. Really nice of you, man! You made the contest better.
demimondance - For the coin donation. Just like last year, you are becoming an official sponsor.
MasterWrecker,
Srtrindade and
Exylies - For reaching out for the coin donations. Let's hope mR..A and Char can help us get the donations done as soon as possible.
Coated_Badger - And also Exylies again for the tracks. Same for
Calculus,
Pie42 and everyone who helped somehow.
PS: If I forgot someone I'm sorry. You were important as well.
FINAL THOUGHTS - FUTURE CONTESTS
So that's it. It's the end of this contest. Please let me know what you thought of the contest in the comments and in the poll that I'll make. Also in this form that
BrandonBishop50 did:
https://forms.gle/UUw1TrHG6y2kYc1t8.
Let us know about what you think of the format, the hosts, the tracks, the calendar and everything.
I'm planning on making this contest again next year. If I have the time I might do a only-bike trial contest before the next Free Rider World Cup. Let's see if we can get this done.
Also, how cool would be to have something like the NFRL again? If you guys want something like this I could help, but I would need a lot of people on the team because it's a lot to handle
Click if you don't know what I'm talking about:
https://community.freeriderhd.com/threads/announcement-nfrl.6661/
Thank you guys for joining! We will talk soon enough about the prizes again! In the meantime, give us your feedback.
PS: It's 5 am where I am, so it's already my birthday. So don't be so mean, lol. 22 years. I'm old.
Edit: Poll tomorrow, I have to sleep.
Edit2: I'll mention some things about the players not on top 5 when I talk about the prizes.
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