I've read every post in this thread, and I'm surprised nobody mentioned this possibility:
1. A reliable member / organization within our community sets up a PayPal account.
2. We donate to that account
instead of this (which, as others pointed out, is a gamble).
3. Before the deadline passes in 21 days, the aforementioned reliable member/organization/whatever makes an informed decision. If a corporation like Sony or grassroots competition (like the MLP: FiM community!) donated
more than the resources we gathered, then we can either:
a) return the funds back to our generous smashers.
b) or pool our assets for our own upcoming event.
4. If we somehow collected the most money, then we transfer our funds over to this charity drive, and we win.
There's just 1 problem. Someone else claimed the EVO staff are purposely hiding donation amounts for each game. I REALLY hope that's not true