I dunno with all the Kens and Chun Lis in 3s now days I’m happy as hell to get top 5 in 3s with Urien,Ryu,Alex,or Makoto. As long as I take out one “oldschool name” that does good in tournies I’m cool.
Cause if its a “Good” tourney 1-4 will be all Chun and Ken until my 5th place (insert random Nebraksa character here)
Outro
top 3 is all that matters to me. Its cool hearing about how certain people beat top players, and then placed pretty well in the overall tournament, but it wouldn’t be enough for me…u (well ok, me anyways) got to aim for the glory of it all. Thats the ultimate satifaction and reward for actually putting effort into ones game.
sure, u could argue that its hard to find competition in the area, but if one is truly serious about being the best, then they find ways to either make, bring or go towards the competition. Each tournament ive went to out of town has been a tremendous learning experience, solely because it works up the nerves of participating in a unknown territory with players that ive never played against, have no idea what their playing style is like and what not.
Why do u think Empire members such a Jwong and Ricky keep touring al over the place…sure its fun to visit different locations…but im guessing, at the end of it all, its for the love of the game.
:rolleyes: He should be writing in his blog about how badly they all dropped the ball on the EVO DVD’s. :rolleyes:
I’m a “consisten top 5” tournament player but I don’t think anyone who places relatively high in tournaments will tell you they’re happy with that situation. You don’t play for 5th, you do however play for at least 5th. If I play 4th - 1st, it’s gravy IMO. It lets me know that I was able to take down at least one person that cosistently defeats me and while that’s not a big step, it’s enough for that occasion.
Dear Inkblot,
There are other 2D fighters than SF. Please open your eyes.
Love, kugz.
I love you.
But seriously - the game has changed over the years, we’ll never get the 90’s back sadly.
I miss the days when I was 14, 15, 16 and thought the “Old Schools” were king, I mean there is just something about it that was special - it was called respect, these new dudes don’t have that.
I remember reading a Versus Books guide for Super and Super Turbo and just reading about all the Cali Greats, it was kinda mindblowing to meet these guys in person back when I was heavy in the scene.
Honestly, it’s just not like it used to be…
I think a lot of people do, the million dollar question is how is that going to happen?
Some parts arcade culture was more retarded than console ever was, the arcade players were not spoiled, fat and cocky?? bwahahahahahahaahahaha
While some arcade players choose to have a selective memory and believe that arcades were 100% for competitive players and it was all about the comp and being hardcore, that is just a subset of a community filled with a ton of other types of players and gamers. If the arcade was really just for the competitive gamers, they would still be in business.
IMO the main problem is that the arcades went away, and we never really educated ourselves about why they worked and how to replace them in our community. We were content with blaming consoles or blaming other players, and as a result there was noone left to run all the local scenes. If noone is good at the local level, there’s little drive to compete at the regional, national, or international level.
The fact that people would still even mention arcades is a testament to what they provide to the community. However if we’re going to move on, we need to look at reality, arcades sold us out, arcades left us hanging with broken controls, arcades (at least in the us) never advanced beyond 1990 or so technologically. That is why i still think we can build a superior replacement if we really wanted to.
Lets look at what arcades provided and how we deal with them today:
Equipment
A) Monitors - While there are benefits to using rgb monitors, its more of a hobbyist issue that a competitive one. The only real issue with newer TVs is lag, i think we need more definitive answers to the lag issue, maybe even a list of what setups have lag and what does not.
B) Games - I love the fact that if you need another machine you can just go to EB and get a ps2 and a game instead of dealing with distributors and extra fees and thousand dollar wooden boxes. Hopefully soon someone will bring the remaning games over and every game will be faithfully represented on console.
C) Controls - This aspect we have not competely replaced, but we have made a lot of progress since the beginning. People have migrated to sanwa controls which require less force, the recent creation of the cigarbob cab has gone over well. I’m optimistic that in the next year or two we will finally get something thats both stable and portable and put this issue to rest.
‘Enviroment’
I think there are two things that really made an arcade an arcade, and that if these are duplicated, we will have something just as good.
A) Neutral Ground: Arcades provided a neutral ground for players, you didn’t have to make sure a player was home, since arcades were there to attract people, they were often in commercial areas so most people had access to them even if they didn’t have cars. Going to someone’s house is ok, but cannot be the end solution, people have to go somewhere that is unbiased and public.
Whats funny is that people will mindlessly throw quarters throughout the machine into an arcade that doesn’t care about them, but some don’t see the value of pitching in for a 90% FGC related event once every few months. I think we’ve gotten better in that respect, but not all the way there yet.
B) Players: Here is where i'm confused, in the arcade, there were maybe 3-4 fighting game machines, and 50 other machines, yet when people talk about having 20 fighting game machines, and 5 machines for other games, everyone throws a fit. I'm not saying that we need to have mlg/evo type events again, but being 25% as inclusive as most arcades were wouldn't excatly kill anyone. If you let people in and they drop the ball and get cut thats one thing, but telling people that we don't need their support even if their willing to do the work is foolish IMO.
We need a system to get new players, and replace the players that move on. I don’t know of a good test that will tell us who’s meant to be a good player, nor do i expect to see any SF super bowl ads this year, so the only reasonable solution is to go where people are and attract them over to our side.
While i think ink’s first blog post captured one part of the story (the games and the companies), I feel this is the other part, and this part we can do something about.
What about your super-custom Son son, BB Hood, Tron Bone team?
I’d say that winning a tourney with that team takes more skill than any “common” team. So when it comes to “more” skill low tiers are where its at.
If people are gunning for number 1, then I don’t see a problem with the meta-achievements.
Take a look at Bench Pressing. The current best press is like 1005 pounds. But it isn’t something that anyone can just do. It takes practice. And if today you benched 200 pounds you’re 1/5th of the way there. As long as you continue to practice and get better, you’ll eventually get to that level.
No one can go from benching 200 pounds to bench 1000 pounds in a week. But in 10 years? Who knows, you just might get it.
What I think Alex and Inkbot were implying, was that great you got 5th place at ECC or whatever. You may not be a top player yet, but don’t stop and settle for 5th either. Keep on working on it til you get top 3.
For the golf anaolgy, it isn’t that bad of one. Par is the average amount of shots that a pro would need to get the ball in the hole. Typically 2 of them are short game (chipping onto the green and 1 putt), and the others are to get that far. So a par 4, is 2 shots to get near the green, 1 to chip and 1 to putt. But 80% of the people who play golf can’t do that. It could take them 6-9 shots to get to the green and another 3-4 to putt it in.
But not winning the tourney is ‘less’ skillful than winning the tourney. If you can already beat everyone in the tournament free than i might see taking up a challenge, but who is in that position? On the other hand if your not winning the tourney, your character choice is possibly an unneeded hindrance, preventing you from gaining actual game skills.
While I more or less agree with that blog, I do have to say one thing:
It’s easy for Alex Valle to say such things, because he’s actually that good, and he is an accomplished tournament player, and his reputation precedes him.
If he was in a scrubby “15th place” player’s shoes, for instance, then it’s not that simple.
damn people piss cuz old man telling the truth
No, people are “pissed” (verb agreement; try it, you’ll like it) because they’re tired of being told how to play and what to be proud of.
Then that makes the OGs pissed because nobody wants to pick up their old game and give them some new a$$ to beat, because we all know everybody owes it to them to get super-good at it & everything so they can keep their glory days going…
We all lose! 
There´s Tournaments in the World that: in order to get 8th place or 10th place players need to have an INSANE level of gameplay, skills, etc…
take for example Evolution in 2004 or 2005: anyone who got 8th place at CvS2 should have for sure crazy skills in this game, and if we go for the first places (Bas, Kindebu, Ortiz, Ino, etc…) it´s more than just insane, but ho well… everyone would love to be first but sometimes even the greatest players don´t reach there because there was someone even better O_O
If a player finish at 8th place at ST or CvS2 in major tournaments like Evolution then that is a reason to be proud of and here is text explaining what I´m trying to say: http://www.crazyasskim.com/cvs2.htm (It´s not everyone who can reach this level)
Damn couldnt say it better myself…
I agree with what Tom had to say… Fighting games are ment to be competitive while it might be great to placed top 7 at SVGL or even at SHGL back in the day, you were still a nobody.
It might be great that people gave u props on how u played your bottom tier character… but no one will remember who you are a couple of years from now. No one is going to be damn who were the top players in CvS2 umm… Choi, Ricky, Justin oh and that one foo that placed 7th in that one tourney using this bottom tierd character.
I hope people can read Tom’s post and be more objective and realize this pussy attitude of “hey I got top 10 and I’m happy with that placing” isn’t good enough to beat the Japanese and isnt going to help the community grow more competitivly internationally all we’re gonna see is a bunch of teens playing SF casually saying “oouuu did you see the pretty fireball I just threw…”
Lates,
RenoROB
On the subject of saying less then 3rd meant nothing, etc.
I think we forgot something, back then it was ALL regional play, National/International play didn’t REALLY happen till the late 90’s with the help of the net.
Nowadays top 10 (or hell in the case of Evo top 20) mean something now.
i thought inkblot played ggxx (your favorite game in the whole world)
or was that ponder?
yeah ok they travel for love of the game, u know how many people would if they had the chance? Cst money to travel everywhere and its so hard to get days off from work. Some gamers are growing up and have kids and married n shit. Life isn’t all about the game anymore but I sure would “like” to travel like I use to.
I dont need results to know who are top players! U think if Cole took 4th in ST I wouldn’t noticehim as a top player? I would be like who cares bout 4th that aint winning hes a nobody. Thats JASON FUCKING COLE!!
Outro
Who said anybody beyond the tight circle of “top players” was going to remember even the winners a couple of years from now? Can you tell me who used to be the shit in Champion Edition? I’ll give you an e-dollar if you can.
And what if you don’t really give a damn about that, anyway? What if that has nothing to do with why you play? What then?
What, is that going to ruin your world or something? “Shit, I wish people still rocked Karate Champ, that was my game!!1! A lot of people only want to play it… <gasp>… for FUN! What is the world coming to?” [/sarcasm]
Welcome to 2006.
Don’t be a pussy, drop your whole life like a bad habit and move to Japan so you can get beat by random junior-high kids, do single-elim tournies and strive to be “#1”. You know you want to… 
Too much, you say? Single-elim for no real money doesn’t float your boat? Oh noes, how will we ever compete? :wonder:
I said “don’t be a pussy”; of course that means you need to jump and go do it…
Co-Sign x7
How you doing nowadays anyway man?
Also to folks saying “That mental ain’t gonna beat the Japanese” - you’re right, it’s not but where they are they EMBRACE the game, when have we had a damned tourny on NATIONAL TELEVISION?!?!!? - nuff said.
Seriously - It’s a whole new mindset nowadays.
