US SF’s ‘Golden Era’ & best_ever player!? [TOMO NOW COMING TO EVO 09!!]
Undoubtedly the greatest Street Fighter player the US ever produced, Tomo Ohira, is almost fergoten by the SF scene today. Tomo Ohira was the Daigo of his day, a world famous player during the height of Street Fighter’s ‘Golden Era’. All the way back in 93, well before we had even heard of the internet, even the small SF scene in my English home town knew abt Tomo. I still remember first reading the interview with him in the back of the GamePro SF2: Hyperfighting guidebook.
In todays thriving competetive SF scene, with its huge online community, world tournaments and plentiful video footage, its a great shame that western SF’s Golden Era and its greatest ever player, Tomo, are so little known.
What is needed more than anything else is footage of Tomo and other great players at the pinacle of the Hyperfighting scene. This was the absolute zenith of oldschool StreetFighter skillz. Hyperfighting at its peak was as thrilling as todays Japanese ST scene. Fast and tactical, with many fergoten abt beast like Shoto killing TAP Rog, Vert Ball Blanka & Low Lariat Geif all up there battling with the trad top tier of Ryu, Guile and Sagat. And in a time before Supers, Hyperfighting was the highpoint of oldschool combo skill, with amazing, high damage, re-dizzy & ‘CPS1 Chain’ combos the likes of which are rarely seen in super_move focused ST.
To the olsschool players out there harbouring these nuggets on dusty VHS tapes under thier beds, please share it with the community.
It would also be cool if SRK did an interview with Tomo and other great players like Jeff Schaefer (who’s recent Hyper SF2 comback challenge against Daigo was a great missed opportunity for a history lesson in Oldschool skills) or invited them to make a guest appearance at Evo, giving out the prizes.
Crayfish.
EDIT: Well 4 years on from this thread and it seems like Tomo may be making an appearance at Evo 09! I don’t know if Tomo will have any official/ceremonial position as I had proposed above, but it seems he may be making an appearance in some for or another. Tomo’s long time friend Mike Watson has started a thread here to test the waters to see if there is enough interest. Ofcouse you all want to meet Tomo no? Get over there: http://forums.shoryuken.com/showthread.php?t=176784
EDIT EDIT:
He didn’t phisicaly come, but he ‘was’ there, thanks to Mike:
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?Apoc had told me before that he had hyperfighting era footage that hed had left at an ex-gf’s house, also Jeff Schaefer has footage of peak era Tomo (now if he would only contribute it). Act would also love to see good quality versions of his complete Hyper SF2 comeback challenge against Daigo. Jeff…?
There are some balance issues in Hyper esp with WW & CE characters, that I dont really want to go into that on this thread. But with regards to the Daigo vs Schaefer matches it wasn’t really an issue for me. For starters Daigo was playing ST.Boxer and ST.O.Sagat,and Schaefer was playing C.E. Guile for the most part.
imo HF charas vs most ST charas is nicely balanced. CE charas vs ST.Boxer & ST.O.Sagat is fair too.
If you watch those matches, Schaefer just knew many of the matches way better than Daigo (Daigo is the least knowlegable & most tactical limitedy of the top Jap ST players, tho I regard as the most naturaly talanted and best allround street fighter player ever). Watch the Guile vs O.Sagat matches for instance, Scheafer played that match text book, landing all the drop-down HP against low Tigers, knee after nulified Tiger counters even walk in throws. Plus Schaefer was coming back from an 11 YEAR layoff!
The point is, the players from that era were top class., they have knowlege of the pre-ST Street Fighters that is far beyond ours, and they dont get the props they deserve.
I never heard that, but I find it highly unlikely. If you speak to any of the old school players, Watson, Apoc, Schaefer they will tell you Tomo was undoubtedly the best player. He never met his match in the US, and there were no international tourneys back then, tho there was some talk I beleive of his manager taking him to Japan. Unfortunatly I dont think this ever happened tho.
It would be interesting to get Kuni’s imput on this (Yes team Japan, expert Geif at Evo Kuni). He actually used to be part of the same west coast scene as Tomo, his name is even on the ranking list behind Tomo in the Gamepro strategy guide. He is quoted as saying that Japan only had 1 or 2 players of Tomo’s level.
If you really want them, I will share them with you on goforbroke. PM me
What we really want is high quality re-captures of these movies, the ones released were terrible grainy .mov files.
2.) Yes, Schaefer didnt play competetively for 11 years. He and Tomo apparently still play eachother casual, at one of thier homes. From how well Jeff played, and the fact he said Tomo still beats him, Tomo must be damned good even now.
EDIT. IF someone, could offer capturing know-how and hosting space, I’m sure it would be a great help in encouraging Jeff and others to contribute footage.
uhm shaeffer played sf up to the a2 era. a2 came out in 1996. he competed at b3 (a2 tourney) with his ken which i think might have been in 1997 IIRC. either way tho, hes was out of the loop for a while.
i seen the tomo teaches sf tape. i know someone that still has the original. its not really that great. its just basics on how to do specials, and how to do some realistic combos. and its a really cheesy video, i cant stress that part enough lol
I stand corrected on the dates. Like you say tho Sabre, its a long time.
Was it a tape put out by Gamepro or someone, or Tomo himself? I remeber one that come with a UK magazine for SNES SF2:WW, and that was cheesy too. Which version was it for btw? Would still really like to see it, as a historical document, cheesy or not. Would there be any chance of your friend capturing it?
I heard, from this site actually, that Tomo’s “manager” paid people to lose the finals.
I don’t mean to belittle or defame him; but that’s what I heard. Anyone confirm? -
LOL
this was 1 time, and 1 time only. and it was done strictly as a business proposition and he had no idea of it. there are a few people that were witness to this and can vouch for it so dont say watson is full of shit. cole was there, grahm wolfe was there, your o-so-great mr 10th place or whatever thomas osaki was there. this was at the greatest clash of pre-internet nor-cal vs so cal tournament ever!! BAMA. stupid choi went to a wrestling tournament that day so ill keep his name out of it. the rest is in an issue of gamepro for all you hardcore SF players if interested.
my real reason to come to this thread is, no videos were ever taken back during this time. hell man, who could a afford a cam corder back then and who was strong enough to lug around a 50 portable vid cam?? ok well, to put this all at rest, tomo was hands down the best from SF2-HF. after that, im sure we all know this and that.
p.s. i have a old old school SF commercial i will try to find, im sure you will all get a kick out of it. pz
lol… That damn video is a shame to the original SNES version of the commercial. They even use SNES video clips! Electronics Boutique loaned out the SNES version of the commercial for people that pre-ordered the game. I must’ve watched that thing 20 times in a row. I should’ve just kept the tape and pay the fee EB was going to charge if I didn’t return the tape. lol.
The best part of that commerical is the “IMPROVED GRAPHICS AND SOUND” portion. Genesis version was a piece of trash.
“Dragon punches ahoy, Combos a’plenty!”