Not be a total douchebag? cuz when i ask pros to play they just shove their ego in my face.
Hey Alex,
It would be awesome if once a week you could set up a live stream where you fight people from the chat and analyze the match afterwards, answer questions, and offer advice and insight into top player strategy. You could have a different guest every week playing their respective specialized character and they could also offer matchup advice and insight.
You could also take a recorded match between two mid-level players and talk about what they are doing right, what they are doing wrong, and what you think they should have done differently.
Something like the dogface show, but for strategy and tips. If you could get it put up on eventhubs or SRK’s front page weekly I think it would definitely lift the overall skill level here in the states.
A lot of us watch matches on youtube, but we aren’t picking up on the nuances of what a person is doing to win.
Thanks
The biggest and best thing I could think of would be to support new players as much as I can. As a novice-level fighting game player, it makes me feel really welcomed when a top player takes time out of his day to play with me, and the one time that this has happened to me(thanks adamYUKI!), he also made a point to tell me why he beat me every time. “You’re using move X a little too much.” “Your rushdown’s not bad, but try this.”
If I were a top player, I would be a teacher. More players means more hype.
Sounds like your gameplan for 2010 cuz I did just about everything that could be done last year. :lovin:
Well said, I just put out some of that last night. I put out Arturo Sanchez beating Daigo in a money match and included with the direct download link is Arturo’s analysis of the match where he talks about his mindset, staying cool under pressure agains Daigo, etc.
Believe it or not… it was the community itself (not the games) that got me more interested in gaming.
The kick backs and clubs back in the day were what got me goin’. Nothin’ like a night of havin’ a few drinks and playin’ some games. This comment may be dismissed as a joke, but it was true for me (and possibly others)
I guess it can be analogized to goin’ to work… and doin’ somethin’ fun with your coworkers…
If you like kickin’ it with the people you work with… you’ll get more involved in your work…
Let’s break down your great replies-
Writing:
FAQs, Threads, Articles,Blogs
Media:
Youtube,Streams,Video Reviews
Social Events:
Arcade/Console gatherings, Tourneys
What works best for me is media and social events. This way I can level up the community in a more visual/hands-on approach during grind sessions. Unfortunately my writing sucks and it takes a lot of time. Like writing this post!
Maybe I can get someone to write stuff for me or take notes during my sessions?
For now I’m dedicating my time to Streams-
The following events are open to the public via RSVP:
Weds Night Fights 2010 Season http://www.justin.tv/gytnews/archive
House of Cicada Events http://www.justin.tv/cicadatehl337
Specialists http://www.justin.tv/cicadatehl337
All of these events are recorded on justin.tv so you can watch any part of it whenever you want.
These events also have in-depth match commentary by me, James Chen, UltraDavid, and many other top players that can grace us with their presence :lovin:
What would be great if I could collaborate with out of state communities more often.
Back in the days,when SHGL arcade was still around, players from Vegas,Norcal,AZ,even EC would come on any given weekend with just a little heads up.
No tournaments, just a “Hey, I’m from (insert out of state region here), I’ll be in your area from this time to this time.”
Don’t get me wrong, I love tournaments, but theres no grinding there. Just play wait,chit chat, play, finish.
Players like AfroLegends,Combofiend,Viscant,ShadyK,Sabre,Kim1234,etc. grinded with the best players in the country in long sets to get to where they are. Back then the motivation was pain in losing and wasting quarters.
In other words, I would like to see the community hold events that get more playtime. Not limited to top players, but for every level.
I’ll think of more stuff… my gf is yelling at me now I think
first and foremost. some top players have to rid of their ego’s. it has loosened up quite a bit over the years, luckily. back in the day, it was intimidating for a lot of learning players to approach a top player and ask for advice. it was basically “if you arent a known player, dont talk to me” attitude. so basically what im saying is, the big names need to be more inviting to the new players. we were all there at one point. but like i said tho, luckily, this has loosened up quite a bit over the past good years.
A big problem i see at times, is where training sessions or tourneys are held. Some people don’t feel comfortable going to someone’s house that they dont even know. Right out of the gate, it can feel un-welcoming for a new player in the scene since its a private spot. I think top players and/or organizers gotta try and host stuff in public areas more often(obviously arcade if its possible), gaming centers, restaurants, etc… this is another area that the scene is really improving on which is awesome. it gives us more exposure to random people that had no idea there was a scene.
when you beatdown new players, give them advice. discuss the match. some will listen, some wont and feel insulted.
during streams, having commentary is obviously pretty important. But when I watch, its usually useless marvel style commentary of “oh ooooh oooh ooh ooh ooh” and random EC catch phrases. We really need to find good commentators that are well versed in the game that’s being played. gotta have the analyst and the color commentator of course. when the commentators are just being jackasses(like most of the time) it makes the scene look stupid to viewers. Right now, no one touches seth killian in this department. He keeps it very insightful and he really breaks down the nuances well and that really goes a long way for younger players. we really need to strive for this as i think it’s very important. We gotta take the streams more seriously. Still have fun and joke around of course(color commentator) but you gotta balance it out with insightful commentating. It really goes a long way.
find ways to make training sessions more meaningful. too many scenes just play eachother and go through the motions. i think more scenes need to get a program/training regimen into place. the stuff that valle and also the san diego crew are doing sounds awesome. the addition of ban matches, while it may make low level players more butthurt, is a great idea. it will get you to play harder to stay in, instead of just going through the motions and have nothing at stake. you gotta have something to get you in that mentality that you cannot afford to lose.
find ways to get tourneys to pay out for top 8. this is mainly for larger tourneys. those people that constantly get 4th-8th might actually become even more motivated to get higher since they got the little taste of money. I know this is a hard thing to accomplish due to low entry fees and then attendance matters. but its possible at a lot of tourneys.
if you notice a player tends to have issues fighting certain characters, use that character to help give him more experience.
in the end, the main thing is not to intimidate. you gotta do whatever you can to make the new players feel more welcome and not so scared to play you or join tourneys. i feel the scene is getting better about this, but we still got a long way to go!
Would just like to chime in that local community centres might be good for this, might be worth checking that out if you’ve got one, probably going to be cheaper then renting out a gaming centre or something, might need to bring some of those multi socket things (you know a line of sockets you plug into one, can’t think of the name for them) and some folding furniture to get the consoles hooked up with though.
Yea, one time I asked Valle if he would play me at SHGLBMX’s, and he said that he was so much better than me that I wouldn’t learn anything, so he didn’t. =[
I’m kind of on the fence on making top players more approachable. Sure, for some it can be inspiring, but I think an adverse affect is instead of gaining confidence through getting better, some get “I play with…” syndrome and just assume they are better because they somewhat regularly play with a top player.
I think when you throw out a net to the more easily intimidated players, you also catch people who simply will never have the motivation in the first place to ever become good, and will end up being a waste of time. I don’t want to sound like a cynic, and like I said, I’m on the fence, but I have to wonder how many people who were at one point too afraid to go to a local tournament, ended up becoming a very strong player.
In my training session, physical talent on the SF machine is only half the work. Your mind has to be strong to overcome obstacles in a competitive environment.
This was taught to me by the greats (Watson,Shaeffer).
They knew I was coming up in the SF world and tried to hold me down as much as possible(shit talking, losing streaks, etc) to eventually surpass them. This made me into how Jeff Shaeffer explained in his videos “a machine”. “Only plays to win.”
Back to Wonder_Chef -
He asked me if he could play me sometime during the session.
“I refused, simply said you are not good enough” (very harsh indeed, but its a reality check)
I was playing in the (experts only station) where he was playing in the intermediates.
You have to qualify to enter the expert’s station in order to play the best.
My intentions was for him to take some hate against me to better himself, to prove that he is worthy of one day making it in the experts station.
One week later:
He was one of the 4 lowest scorers of the night and that = Ban Match.
If you are banned you are no longer welcome back unless you place top 8 in a So.Cali tourney with other top players present. (or my discretion)
So when I called his name, he banned himself without even trying.
His reason: He banned himself because he was having a bad day.
If this is incorrect info Wonder_Chef please let me know ASAP because I have 20+ witnesses.
When i played XBL championship mode (G2, G1) i would usually beat most of the people i played. But once in a while i would get my ass kicked by someone. Right after the match i would add them to my friends list so i could play them over and over until i figured out a way to beat them. I think this is the easiest way for people to get better.
Also, I think people underestimate the importance of matchup knowledge in this game. I think SF4 basically comes down to Mindgames, Execution, and Matchups. You can gain matchup knowledge from playing top players that use a particular character and / or watch videos of high level players using your character against that character.
Example: Chun vs Rufus used to be a hard matchup for me. I would lose to the most basic Rufus’s imagineable because there was a simple tactic i didnt think of to make the match easier. It never occured to me to block his dive kicks low so i could charge EX SBK until i saw Dae do it in one of his videos. Now the threat of EX SBK makes his dive kick pressure a lot easier to deal with.
So another tip to give to players is to learn every matchup.
What does that have anything to do with the subject? Yes I got banned that night, but that has NOTHING to do with what I said.
All that I’m saying is that you refusing to play me “because you’re so much better than me that I won’t learn anything” isn’t something that’s going to help the community.
Neither is the way you threw blatant personal insults at me after I got banned at SHGLBMX’s, when I didn’t provoke them in the least. Being a top player means that you have a responsibility to be the bigger man, not to act like a child and throw insults like “There’s no room for tampons here.”
^oh shi-
Is that the story behind the avatar? lol
Good ol’ srk drama.
Anyway, I dont care…if someone beats me i want to keep playing them until I can beat them…Im not the type to ask for help…or admit im a low level player…I mean if someon thinks i suck…i think…“look at this fucking guy”…“im gonna destroy him”
well I doubt this was helpful.
This has everything to do with the topic to be honest.
You are a prime example of how to address somebody that says they want to “level up”, but when push comes to shove, you can’t handle the pressure. Shit talking is part of the culture, deal with it.
If you want to be a casual player, you have many other sessions you can go to.
I’m in the business of winning and you went to MY Training Session. I didn’t ask you to go there.
Also,
Read my reply more carefully next time.
My intentions for not wanting to play you…
Keep up the :crybaby:, cause it seems you’re better at that than learning to play SF with us.
if you started playing sf with gayfighter4 and think you are a “top playa”…
you are not. not even close. stop pretending.
^^^^ Douchebags like Snake dont have people skills.
Not everybody learns the same way. A good teacher understands that. You don’t seem to, so you can only teach a certain type of person.
Not playing somebody because they won’t learn anything? What type of teacher are you? A bad one. Not someone who I would let teach me. Whooping my ass is one thing, saying that I need to get a lot better is one thing, but not playing me is another. Wonder Chef forget this duchebag…
True you need a strong backbone in the fighting game community, but teachers should not be the ones talking shit to their students. Grrrr…
You see, an attitude like this isn’t going to get anyone anywhere. I agree that you should be in it to win, but that doesn’t mean that you should ignore and insult players that have a problem with their game, their self confidence, or their attitude. I’ve been to 6 or 7 sessions with you between SHGLBMX’s and Gunzablaze’s meetups, and not once did you give me any advice or teach me anything, even when I asked. Just because some of us aren’t super good yet doesn’t mean you should ignore us altogether.
In your first post you ask very clearly “How can I help the community?”, well as of right now you aren’t helping the community, you’re helping a very small pool of higher level players. You can’t tell me that when you were leveling up as a fighting game player, that you never had any doubts, that you were never disapointed in your own performance. Well some of us are going through that phase, and even worse than just ignoring us is trash talking us. Once you start, many others follow. Like someone said earlier, whether correct or not the opinion of a top player is contagious.
The bold part explains everything.
I watch the streams put on by Potatohead, I sat through the Valle speech and watching the streams I have learned (Haven’t seen many sagat players, but i still learn some of what the other players are doing) But just based off that post, its a training session, not a casuals session.
I’m not saying I know all that went down because I live about…19 hours away but watching the streams makes it pretty easy to understand what hes saying
Edit: If people wanna shit talk on me, I welcome it. Why? Because it makes me want to come back and beast on you 20 times more.
Seriously? Personally, I’ve had great teachers who would talk down to me and my fellow students every day. That resulted in the weaker students (those who couldn’t deal with the pressure and negativity) falling out and the rest of the students passing the more difficult and stressful/pressuring situations. Although I haven’t been to any tournaments (yet), IMO if you can’t deal with negative shit and bad mouthing in the training sessions, then you’ll never get anywhere when it’s time to perform.
So Valle said you’re not good enough? So what. Pass his qualifications and prove him wrong. That’s like complaining that your opponent won’t show you common courtesy and respect before a match.