Sakura players of the world! Introuduce yourself!

Classic Fighting Games Ultra Street Fighter IV
1

Ok I may have gotten inspiration for this thread from the Gen forums :p, so credits to them

So basically, introduce yourself, tell us a bit about yourself etc.

I’m Fergus, I’m 17 and I hail from the Emerald Isle (Ireland :p). I am still in secondary school (High school for you Americans). I have one more year of school left before heading to college where I plan to do something in Computer Science.
I started playing Sakura back in October after seeing her being played at a anime convention (I had no main at this time, I was playing Ryu and I never saw Sakura being played before and it just basically clicked) When I went home, I played with her in training mode and instantly fell in love. I also have bit of reputation for maining female characters in fighting games :p. I’m one of the youngest people in my scene so that’s weird in a way lol. I’m 17 but I look 12 with the babyface/dimples combination. (Curseee youuuuuuuu)
I started playing FGs competitively back in October at that same anime convention, so I learned the game with Sakura. I played Vanilla but that was only for a month and I wasn’t playing that seriously as Cammy.

2

Hey,
I’m Ilain from Germany. I’m 20 years old, finished school and started job training as a mechanic.
I am really new to fighting games and also to this forum, it’s my very first post now. :slight_smile: I’ve started playing street fighter 2 or 3 weeks ago, because a friend told me over and over again how good it is. So I bought the game and also I instantly fell in love with my cherry blossom Sakrua. :smiley:
Sadly I don’t know other players in my area and only can play online but I got very frustrated the last few days because I loose all the time and don’t really know how to improve, but I hope I will get over my loosing streak ( I am at about 5% win rate :< ) and become a decent Sakura player. If someone have some tips for me how to become a good Sakura, you are allways welcome! :stuck_out_tongue:

3

My tale is too long. To put it short, … I’m 24 now so yeah. Getting old now. Also, Flowers is my real name.

4

Lets see I’m hornett 24 from Cincinnati Ohio. I graduated college a month ago for computer troubleshooting but now I’m studying medical massage therapy. I didn’t start playing fighter serious until Super and I use to main Vega. I got bored with him after I reached B+ then switched to Sakura and after a long road to improve I got A Rank. I’ve won several local tournies with her and um thats really it for now…

XBL: ll Hornett ll
PSN: Hornett_

5

I am 25 from Singapore. Just graduated and not yet found a job, still planing on travelling for awhile. That said, I’ve just started to get a little more serious about fighting games. I love Sakura’s design and I would love to win with with her against local competition. Uryo was the inspiration that made me decide to main her.

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I’m 25 from Brazil. I’ve been a long time FG player, and first played Sakura back in Alpha 2 when she was my main for arcade tournaments back then. I’m current an English teacher at my University. I usually pick characters I like aesthetically and that fits my playstyle (experience, patience and reaction are my strongest points). I’ll always give Sakura a try in every game she’s in as she is one of my favorite characters in the SF universe.

I’m currently trying to re-build my local community and to create a friendlier environment for the national FG scene. How? For now I’m focusing on a project similar to WNF, a simple gathering with the intent to share knowledge, educate players, to have fun and run locals with no phony rules, instead using EVO standards etc. Unfortunately a lot of the national scene is still trapped on the online mentality (with a reason, it’s a big country and getting around is hard for most players), regional rivalries and excessive showboating.

I wish I had more time to practice and competition to train properly. But I do what I can, while people waste time calling each other names I show up and take my Sakura as far as possible. And she’s usually top 3 but I have a few players I took under my wings who are now placing well. I like that! =D

Funny thing though, I gave it a little push to a friend in NYC I met through forums (and I believe even Fergus as I met him before he was too much into SF4). Shared all I could, sparred as much as the EC/Brazil connection allowed and now he goes to NYC locals like GC. =)

7

Hmm, I promised Fergus I’d do this…

I live in West Orange NJ. I’m 25 and work as an Electrical Engineer (graduated college in 2008).

My manager got me into SF4. He gave me a ride home (didn’t have a car then) but wanted to play some SF4 at a coworker’s apartment. That was my first introduction to salt. Having played a little SF2 and SF A/Z (on emulator), I thought I’d be competitive at the very least. After all, I could do shoryukens and flash kicks. My manager picks gief and goes on a 50 game streak that lasts till 4 am (I was playing Guile cos I like Charlie). Driven by the salt, I downloaded SF to practice (with Charlie) but got destroyed the every time we played. Somewhere along the line, I randomly picked Sakura. I liked her style but got owned, as usual. So I got SF4 PC to practice. Did as many of Sakura’s trials as possible, with help from this very forum, but transitioning from PC to PS3 was hard so I gave in (Dec 11, 2009 still remember the fucking date) and bought a PS3, a TE stick and the rest is history. I’ve, since, surpassed my manager and coworkers but I’m more aware, now, of how much farther I have to go.

Other than that, I’m hoping to get into the offline scene soon; I work very long hours and a lot of weekends so it’s a little hard to do that.

Always up for some matches though. Feel free to add me if you want. :slight_smile:
PSN: chaoslimits (with an s). Damn mods won’t help me edit my forum name. ;_;

8

Hmm, interesting thread.

My nickname IRL actually is Mingo. Currently dual major at state university (RI): Comp Eng and Comp Sci. I work at the university library doing systems admin work as a student “assistant.” The job title is assistant but I think I do more work than my boss.

I’m a veteran of competitive gaming. My first game I took seriously was WC3 back in summer of 2007-2008. Got good, maybe good enough to join some amateur leagues (the skill ceiling and skill gap is very very large, compared to SF) and then kind of stopped playing, slowly anyways. Right after that I got into CSS, joined some scrubby teams and then got really good at that game. I’d say I could have probably rang for main teams and joined most IM teams. Instead I only got as far as CAL-Open playoffs cuz some idiot on our team forgot to screenshot during screenshot round.

Anyways, it was somewhere around February of 2009 (whenever SF4 came out) that I first saw the game at my bro’s friends house. This was also way back when we didn’t even have a PS3 or 360. A few weeks later my bro gets a PS3 and a copy of SF4 vanilla, and I don’t really start to play until May cuz I was still at university. Started off with Ryu because he was easy to learn the game with, and he was top tier, and Daigo played him. I didn’t even bother with any other character. A year later SSF4 comes out and I switch to Ibuki because ninjas pwn and I’ve always liked using female characters. My idea is that you’d want to pick someone that looks hawt cuz you’ll be looking at them all the time, amirite? Few months later I pick up Super Cammy, then I kind of drop the game cuz school started up again. Then somewhere in March 2011 I get a 360, and a little bit later I pick up Sakura. I liked the simplicity of her footsie game, her good rushdown game, her execution requirements for 1f link tatsu combos, and the fact that her name is Sakura. Yeah I was watching a shit load of Naruto at the time as well.

Oh yeah and there was a point in time where I was considering dropping SF for SC2. But I figured SC2 would drain the life out of me like WC3 did, where I would basically do nothing but train all day every day.

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I live in the Midwest, not far from St. Louis. I’m currently in school, aiming for a bachelor’s in education (elementary). Like most people, I started with a version of SF2 on SNES (probably Turbo on SNES). Tried versions on emulator over the years and was awful, couldn’t do motions for shit. I picked up a T5 stick for $30 clearance at Electronics Boutique back in 2007 or 2008, and that probably is what initiated my “goal” of learning to play fighting games. Tried HD Remix in January 2009, sucked on stick and pad. SF4 looked awesome, but I didn’t have the cash to get it at launch. Waited until it went on sale in July of 2009 and never looked back. I was mainly a Blanka player, with a bit of Ryu here and there.

After I upgraded to better parts for my stick, I had an identity crisis. A friend of mine picked up the game at the same time I did, but didn’t get into it as much as I had. One day in early 2010 I convinced him to chill with me and play some matches, he picks Sakura. He, for whatever reason, really liked her so he decides he’s going to stick with her. He’s asking me questions and I didn’t have answers, so I looked up videos. Nothing good at the time, but I did find Valle vs. Sabre and it inspired me to pick her up as well. Never looked back.

I’ve been playing more in my local scene, trying to level up, and realize I’ve got a lot of short comings. My execution is very polished and up there with the best Sakura players, but I’ve got a ways to go in the mental game. :slight_smile:

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i’m FakeSteve, 25-year-old canadian Brood War illuminati. I got into fighting games while I was working in Singapore. When SC2 came out and was kind of a disappointment, I needed to sate my competitive thirst elsewhere, and street fighter completely took over. I mained chun from vanilla up until about February this year.

I won’t expect anyone to understand my Chun. She’s complex and beautiful, when I played her I used to see the game in a way no one else does. Low forward xx EX SBK is an anti-air. Linking super after Hazanshu is the best combo. You can beat Dudley with only s.fp and sweep. Nobody ever has to learn links. For all the wonderful experiences I had while learning this game through the capable tools provided by Chun, there were a few things missing. For starters, I didn’t win often. My Chun used to be very aggressive, and as I improved I slowly reigned in my aggressiveness somewhat, because it simply isn’t as effective as playing Chun the way she’s meant to be played.

During that time I had eventually come to the conclusion that combos are good, and I should learn how to do them. It was at this time that I started branching out, because the only combos I knew with Chun were c.fp xx hk, mk legs and jab jab jab fierce. Initially I picked up Cammy, Vega, Rose, Bison, Ken… a whole slew of characters. I was convinced that all I had to do was find a character whose combos I really liked, practice the execution, and bring that new skill set back to my lady.

Sakura started simply as a training mode baby. I’d hop on my console and use training mode to warm up before playing online, or going out to play somewhere. This is where I got to know Sakura, and the things she’s capable of. Over a period of about eight months, I slowly improved my execution through this method, but my performance with Chun continued to stagnate because I just couldn’t hold down-back often enough. Eventually I realized that I had basically learned how to do all of Sakura’s important combos, including some really, really dirty mixups. I started bringing Sakura into battle with me.

Though I vehemently denied that I’d switch main characters, I couldn’t ignore the fact that I was starting to put together some serious wins as I got more comfortable with Sakura. The catalyst was a night at our local get-together, the first night I unveiled the secret Sakura training I’d been undergoing. Though I expected to get creamed even harder than I was used to while playing Chun, I didn’t. I won. Granted, there’s a lot that needs to be said about how much easier it is to win when your opponent doesn’t understand your character. There was already another Chun in my city, far better than me, but nobody played the little girl. It was on this night that I discovered how fucking satisfying it is to run a train on someone, to nab perfects every couple of rounds against people I struggled against with Chun.

I actually had a bit of trouble with this. I still feel kinda guilty. I know I didn’t play Chun right. Nowadays I’ve got a much stronger skill set, including much better execution and a more sound understanding of how the game works, and what is required to win. Sometimes I feel like I should go back to the character that made me fall in love with this game, but the competitor in me can’t ignore the vast difference in time invested between Chun and Sakura. Sakura’s the only character I ever went into training mode with. She’s the only character that forced me to learn how to hit confirm. She showed me a completely different side of street fighter. When I play Chun now, I’m very defensive. Sakura has completely removed the urge to rush down with my Chun. If you can remember the first time you had your street fighter epiphany - that one precise moment where you ‘got it’ - you’ll understand how I feel about my character now. Coming from a lengthy competitive background, all I want out of these games are those moments. Sakura just so happens to be the perfect character for me in that sense. I’ve learned more in the last six months than in the rest of my street fightin’ “career” combined. I can’t think of a better reason to play a character.

(…i guess this is more narrative than introducing myself, oh well, hope someone enjoys it at least lol)

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Well, I guess I should write something here as well.

Most people here know me as SkatanMilla or just Skatan, but in the outside world (yes, the real one!) people know me as Niklas. For about 6-7 years I’ve been playing fighting games, starting out with Soul Calibur 2 which opened my eyes to the competetive scene we have here in Sweden during an anime convention back in 04. I decided that fighting games was where it’s at and I would learn to become good at them, I was previously from the FPS/RTS side of things where I had seen some success in the casual competetive scene (if you can call it that?). Anyway, my goal was that until the next convention I would be good enough to win, not place top8, -win-. So I started calling people over to my house for weekend sessions and started to level up and realizing basic concepts about how to defend properly, spacing, whiffpunishment and all of those things which now are common knowledge. Soul Calibur 3 was released before the next convention so I had to put a lot of time into that game to learn, back then I was using Mitsurugi and Yoshimitsu. When the convention came around again I think I placed top8 or something like that, but I do know that I didn’t win it. So I realized that I needed better practice, I had passed the people I was playing against by miles by now, so I needed to find others to play against. This is when I learned about the Lightdash-community here in Stockholm.

I went over for some SC3, but the first time I came not a single SC3 player was there, only a few Guilty Gear players. Sad I went back home, and it took a pretty long time for me to show up again. This time though there were a lot of players there, not necessarily SC3 but Street Fighter players, both ST and 3s. I decided that I would give 3s a chance and started using Elena. I was scrubbing 3s/ST for a while until DOA4 came out for the 360, and this was the first fighter that I had the chance to play online so I put my all into that game. I don’t know how many here actually know of me as doa-player, but I did quite well for myself in that game getting top3 in several national tournaments. This was the game that I actually started to become good as a fighting game player in I recon.
Anyway I got accepted for the CGS season (gaming league), playing on Stockholm Magnetix, we didn’t do too well during the tournament due to circumstances I won’t go into. After the season was over there wasn’t really much to do with Doa4 aside from waiting for the next season to start, so I took this time to improve in other games I had picked up as side-games. Virtua Fighter 5, Soul Calibur IV and ST were the games that replaced Doa4 for me. I got really good at VF5 due to us having such a strong scene here in Stockholm, we were only 4 players but even then we were still top4 in europe due to how often we had gatherings (every weekend, the whole weekend). ST I got 2nd in 2/3 of our ranking battle seasons we held at Dragon’s Lair (Lightdash HQ).
And Soul Calibur IV, well, the game died kind of quickly so aside from some, to me, empty tournament wins, I really couldn’t test myself in it.

Anyway, it was around this time that SF4 was announced and sub-sequently released on arcade in Japan, so I started downloading weekly ranking battles from a-cho and just grind those matchvids to learn as much about the game as possible. When the game dropped on console everybody and their mother was all over it, I actually did really well from the get go, a lot because I had studied matchvids beforehand and my experience with ST. I started by using Chun, since she was my ST main, but early on I tried out Sakura, Cammy and Claw. The character I wanted to play was Sakura, I found things like resets for stun setups and the like, but I decided that her execution at that point was too difficult for me to handle. Remember, this was before plinking so her loop was a 1 framer for real, and I’m the kind of player who always want to do the best, otherwise I don’t want to play the character at all (part of the reason I don’t play Chun anymore).
Anyway, so for the most part of vanilla I was using Chun, learning how to play 2D-fighters for real with safejumps, footsies and gah… there were too many things to learn and I was loving it! I remember that Yagami (Dhalsim) started to get really good a few months in on vanilla, and he was winning A LOT against me, so I really went in to the lab to bring it back, and I succeeded in that. After that we were passing one another, keeping the rivalry going and leveling up a hell of a lot faster than anyone else was doing in Sweden. By the last months of vanilla or so I decided that I would switch to Sakura, I had seen the potential in the character and decided to just go for it, she had the damage and the footsies!

I had made a name for myself in europe as a really good Chun Li player, so when the next SuperVSBattle came up and I was using Sakura, a lot of people were surprised. They were also surprised at how well I was performing with her since at this point Sakura was widely concidered to be the 2nd worst character in the game, and was only about reset shenanigans (this is what people thought here on this very forum at this time too). But I showed everyone that, no, that’s not what she was about and she was a lot better than people gave her credit for.

And yeah, I’m still maining Sakura, but I’ve picked up a whole lot of sub characters along the way too.
I’m hoping that I can keep opening both doors and eyes with this character.

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Well since everyone else is doing it I may as well too. Ok my name is Keon aka HsienKosHelper I’m 22, and like a lot of newschool players SF4 is what brought me to the fighting game scene. That’s not to say I didn’t play fighting games at all but I was super casual. So much that I thought games like Mortal Kombat armageddon, Naruto ultimate ninja series and Dragonball Z budokai 3 were the best fighting games had to offer.

But of course I was proven wrong when I decided to buy SF4 on a whim. It was only like fifteen bucks at gamestop so I thought why the hell not? (Little did I know SSF4 was only about a month away from release.) When I got the game I did the usual, ran through arcade mode to get my feet wet in the process I unlocked Sakura. Since she was the new character I had got naturally I wanted to try her. Instead of playing arcade mode again I hopped online to see if I could put some people to shame with Sakura. It didn’t turn out good I got my ass kicked by every single person I played. It didn’t make sense to me that people could be that good, and I couldn’t mash to victory.

I thought to myself this unacceptable I can’t suck this bad so the research began. I originally was just looking for tips but my eyes were opened to the larger picture. I discovered that people actually took this game seriously and there were depths to it that I never even considered existing. From that point on I wanted to be apart of it, I wanted to be good like everyone else. I started to search forums for tips and advice and watching videos, just anything that could help me learn the game. It wasn’t long after that, that I was completely hooked. I started to obsess over street fighter, I would wiki characters just to learn their history. I started playing older games too, like Darkstalkers and MvC2 to improve my fundamentals. I don’t know why I decided to stick with Sakura throughout vanilla it just kind of happened that way. Once super came out though I swapped Sakura for Makoto and made Sakura my second in command, and I’ve been running with that combo ever since. As of now I play a lot online and meet up with the local players in my area once a week.

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@Skatan

I also got recruited at an anime convention at 17 lol

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Lets start from the beginning, for me competitive gaming in my city revolved around Halo 2 and Madden Football. I actually made a bit of a name for myself on the local level in H2, though I would retire from Madden as it has far and away the worst competive community I’ve ever been a part of.
CanadianDstryr actually comes from my Halo days, because you see, when you’re in your early teens, you think naming your GT after a frontflip piledriver is the coolest shit ever. But regardless, it stuck, and despite never having set foot on Canadian soil, anybody I game with, or have ever gamed with, would use Canadian interchangably with Chris.
Anyway, while the FPS scene flourished in my city, the fighter scene was nonexistant. I’d bring SFAC, SFAA or CvS2 to the local lan center, and occasionally get some games, but they were few and far between. Even after SFIV came out, it was tough getting players away from Call of Duty. So, I started doing my own weeklys, and people started taking notice, eventually. That I guess would be when I started playing fighters “competively.” After all, you can’t play competitively with no competition.
I’ve always had an on again off again relationship with SRK, before IV came out, I used to come in here, read up on some CvS2 or A3 stuff, maybe post occasionally, but I never straight put in work like I have for the past two years.

As for how I found Sakura. It wasn’t love at first sight. I played a lot of Championship Edition growing up (and Mortal Kombat, but that’s another story), and back then I mained Ryu (I’ve since switched to Gief/Boxer/Ken in the II series). My eight year old logic was, he’s the main character, he’s got to be pretty good. So, when I was introduced to the Alpha series, I played mainly Ryu. Somewhere around the way I stumbled upon Sakura and I fell hard. She’s like the character I grew up with, but more fun to play and had an expressive personality that just brought a smile to my face. Since then, I couldn’t imagine playing anyone else.

15

Well my name is Crystal and I’m 19 oddly enough my nickname is Sakura because apparently my friends say I act a lot like her. The first SF I played was alpha 3 and she was one of the first characters and I used and I was addicted. I’ve always used female fighters in games and she just happened to the one I clicked with.