I’m Elias. I’m 29. I started lurking here when I was 15, I think I registered when I was 16 but I wound up changing accounts because my account was some random teenage shit like Boxofjello420sephiroth6969@angelfire.comXD
Guilty Gear XX was my first love in terms of actually playing competitively. I fought against Rob Plummer at PAX in #reload. I was playing Axl and I was horrible but I had a couple combos and then I hit him with a “semi-infinite” we used to call them. We used to call loops semi-infinites. That shit is so funny to me now. What a dumb term. Except my semi-infinite was a complete garbage black beat (fake) combo. It would tech trap sometimes though so Rob stopped teching and I got to loop it for a bit. He actually yelled out to his nearby friend like “whoa this kid is hitting me with a weird axl combo I’ve never seen! he’s not bad!” and then I think I maybe found out from him where people played (Lanwerx) and I got more serious. The only problem is everyone I encountered at that time was absolutely horrible at constructive criticism. Granted, I didn’t have a lot to work with as it was just one of those things where you need to play the game more and get more comfortable.
I then gravitated to third strike and super turbo. I spent an immense amount of time playing SF anniversary edition 3s on the original xbox. It actually had some of the best netcode I’ve ever played on console. I learned the game completely by playing it online there, through a converter that worked for PSX/Saturn/Gamecube to regular xbox. While I waited for my custom stick to ship I played on a saturn pad in 3s.
Other hot games at the time were Marvel 2, and CvS2. I was a low tier hero and I couldn’t hang in those games because low tier is unplayable. I also thought roll canceling was broken and refused to learn it or acknowledge it as part of the game. I was so dumb because RC is actually your only chance at playing most low tier characters. That game was tight and I wish I gave it a real chance.
I have probably spent more time in the lab in MvC2 than many actual marvel players. Unfortunately I’ve spent that time practicing all the dumbest low tier tech. I can show you morrigan infinites, charlie mixups, ways to combo into SonSon’s POW super without assists, anakaris/dhalsim infinites, glitches, how to make Jin’s machine gun super unblockable… the dumbest shit. Lmao.
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I used to always hang out with axel kelly at Preppy’s and while he always was way better than me, Dhalsim bodies Guile for free so I would always knock him out of the tournaments then lose to someone he might’ve had a chance to beat. It was a shame. :bgrin:
One time I was about to leave veteru alone downstairs with the ST prize pot nearby and he stopped me and said something like, ‘Don’t leave me alone with that money please. I don’t trust myself.’
I was like “Oh… well, okay.” And so we sat down and played ST. He was weirdly good for someone I only knew played anime games. One time in a tournament he not only knocked me out of the tournament but he did it with short short super. Which is notoriously difficult in ST. Like, I could NOT do that shit back then and I have solid execution. I was so mad.
I had just really gotten into the scene when I got to go to one of Loki’s tournaments. His apartment was a fucking arcade. Straight up. I was in heaven. I couldn’t play for shit on american HAPPS sticks and he had candy cabs with sit down Sanwa button 3s cabinets and I just about pissed myself from glee. I knew I had found a tribe to belong to at this point. I didn’t know a soul and people were still cool and nice. Unfortunately a certain someone brought some shady fucks who didn’t even play to one of those tournaments. Then mysterrrrrriously Loki got fucking robbed shortly after that and stopped hosting. I’m very surprised that certain someone didn’t get his ass beat for that shit. I ran into him at Evo this year and I felt weird but nonetheless hung out and chatted a bit. One time I brought Grey Goose to zach’s and not that many people wanted any so he and I shared most of the fifth and he beat people by yelling drunkenly and talking shit hella loud while playing. I later apologized to airthrow for my role in that.
You know, thievery is what got Preppy’s shut down for the longest time too. That’s so whack. Didn’t Dugg or somebody get his shoes straight stolen? Motherfucker had to walk back to his car in his socks. What the fuck is wrong with people? I got no tolerance for people who steal from other people.
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SRK forums closing down is hard for me. I largely hated General Discussion—hated it. I saw too much toxic homophobic straight guy locker room talk hateful bullshit. But then there was the “Ask a Gay Guy” threads.
It made some straight guys mad: “what the fuck this is stupid I want a straight guy thread then if you get this” which is hilarious and so typical. A great reply someone had was just linking to forums.shoryuken because the whole god damned forums is a straight man’s world.
It made many straight(?) guys curious: asking genuine questions. Some legit questions, some horribly offensive, some made me think they were definitely closeted gay men. Nonetheless it served a very fascinating purpose.
Most importantly for me—a young insecure gay man with no gay friends—it gave me a social circle. I went from so terrified, insecure, anxious, depressed-bordering-on-suicidal-thoughts to realizing there was a lot of people just like me. One thing I was extra insecure about was the fact I am strictly only attracted to significantly older guys. Always have been, and apparently always will be. I thought I was a freak (okay I probably am but it made me okay with it) and when you try to talk to random straight people about that sort of thing they think you have daddy issues, that you were sexually assaulted by older men and just so traumatized you don’t remember it… people say some fucked up shit to people they can’t relate to on the internet. But I found a larger social circle of gay men, learned that was a very common attraction, I made some friends and I stopped wanting to change. Really began the process of embracing myself.
I’m a socially awkward person who later realized he has Aspergers or is on the autism spectrum. I literally lived on the internet and thusly my real life social skills truly suffered & suffered as a result. I couldn’t really make friends in person. I could hardly make eye contact with people. Video games helped as a thing to focus on, a topic to socialize about. For me to find this community of people with this common hobby we were all so passionate about, this family… it was life changing. It honestly shaped me as a person.
I’m currently re-reading through one of the gay guy threads and it’s so wild to see my posts from when I was like 18. It’s like reading old journal entries. THE NOSTALGIA IS KILLING ME. Also some embarrassment, like reading old journal entries.
Anyway, I love y’all. All I do is play Tekken 7 now, and so far just online. Life is bodying me. But I’ll never retire. Stay soft, retirees. I’ll never have children to distract me from game lyfe. Having kids is whack. But I do have other hobbies now instead of nothing but gaming. I been painting. Writing. Reading. But Tekken is tight as fuck. Like damn. If Xrd didn’t have such bad netplay for me (playing strangers) I’d still play that because GG is the best 2d fighter out there. But for now it’s just Tekken. I’m almost bummed I never got into this series before.
