I agree man.
I wouldn’t call Tokido cheap so much as I would call him willing to play absolutely filthy and do everything required to net a win using Akuma’s gigantic wealth of options.
He is a very well rounded player - great execution, combos, solid punishers, ALWAYS goes for the sweep knockdown, executes the vortex at every available opportunity, frame traps, counter-hit fishes, option-selects, focus dashes through projectiles, balances risk/reward well, spaces himself extremely well and has an incredible footsies game to compliment his spacing. He uses Akuma’s ultra well as an anti-air and has borderline perfect hit-confirms against both standing and crouching opponents. He’ll also tick-throw when he can.
I’m no dick rider, but the simple fact is that Tokido demonstrates the best template for Akuma’s style in Super and shows Akuma players how he should be used. Nobody else has an Akuma game as complete as his in Super right now. Not Momochi, not Eita - Tokido. I strongly feel Momochi held the crown in vanilla but it is Tokido who has wrangled Akuma the best in Super and it clearly shows in his results.
The catch is those results. While Tokido has a solid handle on Akuma, sometimes Akuma’s inconsistency comes through. We can all relate to Akuma being wiped out very quickly by way of minimal errors despite playing a solid and dominating game throughout the bulk of a match. One error against an opponent with a chunk of meter and an Ultra we’ve fed them by way of pulverising them can quickly turn the tide if we screw up and this also happens to Tokido from time to time.
This is perhaps his attraction to Akuma and its certainly mine. Akuma is tooled to justify himself as a solid character with huge potential that among good players is well utilised. When you play a solid game and don’t screw up, Akuma is revealed to be a beast still. When you net that win through a solid performance there’s that sensation of ‘fuck yeah!’ that comes from executing Akuma’s vicious potential well. When you lose, its demoralising but a lot of the time the end result could have gone differently had one not made a screw up or two. Its almost addictive to strive to get one’s Akuma perfect so you can ride that unique wave of offensive momentum Akuma can demonstrate so you’re always motivated to keep at it to achieve this.
The same could be said for anyone who wants to get better with their character but with Akuma there’s a very strong sense of satisfaction when all the pieces fall into place in a match through rewarded mix-ups, combos and wake-up fuckery that pays off.
The bulk of the cast is extremely well balanced in this game - particularly Akuma. I’d imagine Tokido knows this and due to how well he takes advantage of Akuma’s strengths I suspect he misses a lot of Akuma’s options when he uses other characters. Plus you have the fact that he’s been using Akuma for a very long time - I’d imagine it would be a very hard slog to get another character to the same high level Tokido has managed to hone his Akuma to combined with how well he knows character specific match-ups with respect to Akuma.
There’s also the simple fact that he’s his main. Many folks tend to stick their their preferred character through thick and thin despite dabbling with others and will simply strive to do as best as they can with them.
One other Akuma I would really like to see more of however is Infiltration. His performance at EVO was very impressive AND very consistent. We came close to seeing an EVO final between Daigo’s Ryu and Infiltration’s Akuma. As an Akuma player I was on the edge of my seat as this possibility was drawing close but sadly it wasn’t to be when he was taken down by Rufus.
These guys stick to Akuma because Akuma is a good character and they clearly like his style. Due to Akuma’s pitfalls (largely his stamina deficiency) you need to be an above average player to get benefits from using him. Tokido and Infiltration qualify here and as such keep smashing it out with him and I hope they continue to do so.
Like everyone else I’d love to see Momochi make a return to Akuma in Super but sadly I don’t think thats going to happen. As I said earlier, Tokido is the new high-level Akuma template for us all and frankly I’m glad he’s still repping our camp. If he felt Akuma was no longer viable, I’d imagine he’d have moved onto other choices a while ago.