Evolution East 2006 Report

The setup phase for Evolution East was tricky, but once the actual event started, it ran smoothly. We had plenty of space and a pretty good turnout of players for most games.

Dead or Alive 4 had 30 players this time (same as Tekken 5!), rather than 9, so there was actually somewhat of a real tournament. I entered, again with zero practice for months. I won some, lost some, and was eventually eliminated. I don't even really remember by who, as I wasn't serious about this tournament (and had already qualified from Evo West anyway).

At the last minute before the Guilty Gear XX Slash team tournament, Tom Cannon, the original founder of shoryuken.com asked if I'd join his team. Tom had never played even one game of the Slash version of GGXX and this was just a "for fun" thing. I rounded up Mopreme, another person who had never played Slash before, and we entered. I didn't really expect to get anywhere and I had already qualified for GGXX at Evolution West anyway. Little did I realize that the Evo East competition in GGXX wasn't anywhere near the level as the Evo West competition (sorry guys, not trying to trash talk, just telling it how it is). I beat entire teams by myself, sometimes losing only 10% life per round. Note that I went back to Chipp for this tournament, who I still claim is not at all good, but the Curse of Chipp dooms me to forever be a little better at playing Chipp than anyone else.

Anyway, we eventually played "team Yaa." Their first player plays Sol, and I'm sorry to say that he is one of the worst Guilty Gear players I've seen play the game, lol. Next they had a Testament player who I beat pretty easily. Finally, they had an Anji player who totally rocked me. He really had amazing mixups and good combos. He didn't even really need tricky mind-games because his mixups were so powerful, that eventually I'd guess wrong and die.

I thought I actually had a shot at beating everyone else there except for the Anji player and Marneto, but Marneto must have scrubbed out and lost, I don't even know to who. My team then somehow had to fight team Yaa, AGAIN. I beat their first two players easily again and was double eliminated by the Anji player. What a terrible way to be kept out of the top 4 teams for Sunday. During the Sunday matches (on stage, everyone watching just one game at a time), team Yaa inflicted the Sol player on the audience again and again. It was very hard to do commentary during this. I wanted to say "uh...so...nothing good is happing at all...not sure why this is a finals match...hmm....," but I mostly said nothing at all during those matches. The Anji player went on to get 2nd overall.

I somehow managed not to qualify in SF2 AE again. It looks like I had the hardest bracket again with Chris Li, NKI, Jeron, Julian, and other known players. While at Evo West, I fought against only Ryu and Dhalsim. At Evo East, I fought against only Champion Bison and ST Chun Li. I was ready to specifically beat Champion Bison, and I was looking forward to showing that "he's not all that."

I faced Jeron's Champion Bison and beat him 2-1, where I used Honda and ST Bison. I then faced him again and lost 2-1 with the same character matchups. If my honda made him block a good jump-in, I could usually ride that to 100% damage because Champion Bison can't get out. But when he knocked me down, he was able to do the broken cross-up psycho crusher on me over and over, and I just couldn't block it. One round, I took 100% damage to repeated psycho crushers that seemed unblockable. My total record against him was 3-3.

My other loss was to NKI, who went on to get 3rd in the overal tournament. NKI's Chun Li is legit and good. I did get a perfect on him with honda and won the first game, but I lost the next, switched to ST bison and lost. Ouch.

Some of the Champion Bison players didn't even know how to get out of another Champion Bison's lockdown. They sadly demonstrated that knowledge of the nuances of the game is not really necessary if you have the unfair psycho crusher and a scissor kick that combos into a dizzy and a redizzy. I'll finally admit that Champion Bison makes the game much worse than it would be without him.

My current opinion is that Champion Bison, CE Guile, and HF Ryu are the best 3 characters in the game.

Next year we'll surely have real Super SF2 Turbo rather than AE, as ST will be part of Capcom Classics Collection 2, produced by me.

--Sirlin

Evolution West 2006 Report

Evolution West was overall a great tournament. We had a huge ballroom that might have made us "the first fighting game tournament ever with too much space." Also, our new format of doing one game at a time worked exactly as planned. If was much easier to get the players in the right place at the right time with this method. Also, it was great that we had so many casual play stations in the same room as the tournament. This allowed players to practice for for their matches ahead of time.

As for my personal performance, I wish I had done better. I got top 8 in DOA4 (qualified), but hardly anyone even entered. I hope about 100 DOA players magically show up at our Las Vegas finals, because the total lack of support from the DOA community we've seen so far means we won't be able to feature the game next year. Too bad, as I think it's a pretty fun game.

In Guilty Gear, my team got 3 place, qualifying for a spot in the final brackets at Las Vegas, but this was mainly due to my teammate Ruin's performance. (XenoTiger also did well). I wanted to play first in our rotation, but Ruin was certain that he should play first, so he did. His plan was to single-handedly beat the entire field, and he practically did. His Eddie ripped through victim after victim, including top players like Ken I (Potemkin), Justus (Zappa), and Deuce (Faust). I played Potemkin and didn't accomplish much, unfortunately, except 28 wins in casual play, lol.

Going into this tournament, I thought Eddie was top tier, despite what everyone else says. I'm more sure than ever now. The ability to lock down an enemy while controlling two characters at once (Edddie) is just too good, even with all the nerfs in GGXX Slash.

Also note that before the tournament I ranked Slayer as top tier. Paul Kugler (slayer) was on the 2nd place team in the official Evolution West tournament and he also *won* the unofficial singles tournament. Slayer just flat-out does too much damage. Aba was my other pick for top tier, and Combofiend's Aba got 2nd in the singles tournament. I know that this isn't enough data to conclude tiers, but my predictions are sure looking good so far.

I said Ky was 2nd tier (despite everyone in the world saying he's top tier) in Slash, and after seeing Heidern's Ky (wow!), I finally get it. I'll finally put Ky in the tier 1 list. Sol still seems tier 2, but Said (aka ID) puts him at the bottom of tier 1. Semantics, really.

SF2 AE was pretty disappointing for me. I'm not happy with getting 9th, as I really wanted at least top 8. I ended up losing to the 2nd and 3rd place finishers: Alex Wolfe and Alex Valle. Even though I planned to play mostly ST Honda and ST Bison, I ended up playing HF Ryu almost the entire tourament as a counter to other people's Ryu's. It worked in the early rounds, and then I faced Alex Wolfe's Dhalsim (the only non-Ryu I'd face all day). I picked HF Ryu and Alex kind of laughed. I started the round with 8(!) consecutive helicopter kicks, demonstrating that the move is too good. I gave Alex Wolfe the opportunity to throw away the game here, but he cleverly did nothing and ducked almost all of them. Anyway, I beat him decisively in the first game. He stuck with Dhalsim and he won game 2. I really should have stuck with Ryu, but I switched to ST Honda and lost. Most of the game, I couldn't get in, and I finally got one ochio throw in the corner (should lead to 100% damage), but I did stand jab too slow as he got up (Dhalsim gets up slightly faster).

Against Valle's ST Ryu, I played HF Ryu and won the first game. He then switched to CE Ryu and won the next two. I think HF Ryu is clearly superior to HF Ryu, but whatever. Valle used Valle skills and won.

Here is what I wanted to say before the tournament about character rankings:

* HF Ryu's helicopter kick is one of the best, if not the best, moves in the game.
* CE Guile might be the best character in the game. WW Guile is almost as good, but he only has one sonic boom speed and can't do reversal attacks.
* HF Zangief is "secretly" good, but nearly no one has the skill to play him. Ironically, Alex Wolfe does, but he plays Dhalsim as his main so no one even realizes the Zangief threat.
* Chamption Bison is the most overrated character in the game. He isn't even as good as ST Bison. CE Bison has faster scissor kick startup and can combo after the scissor kick, leading to a dizzy and redizzy. He also has weird properties on his torpedo that make hit randomly hit as a crossup. But ST Bison has a super (CE has no reversal attacks AT ALL). ST Bison has better crossup attacks that lead to an easy dizzy combo. ST Bison's stand short allows him to tick into throw (usually untechable, too, unless the enemy is an ST character). ST Bison had a high priority jump strong. CE Bison is a one trick pony who can't get out of traps and has no reversal. There's no need for an "I win more" button, when what you really need is a little more defense.

*ST Vega would be good, but his input recognition on the off-the-wall attacks are broken. Same goes for HF Blanka.

*ST Honda is pretty good, but he still can't beat Guile or Ryu, really.

*HF Sagat is pretty good, and straight up better than CE Sagat.

After the tournament, I still believe pretty much all of that except the CE Bison part. Even though CE Bisons lost more than they won at Evo West, I finally saw the power of "scissor kick lands = you die." It is admittedly scary. Also, a perfectly executed CE Bison trap (scissors, low strong, stand forward, repeat) is *very* hard for an enemy bison or dhalsim to get out of. Watson demonstrated this on stage in a tournament match against Dhalsim.

It's interesting that the top 2 finishers in SF2 AE (Graham Wolfe and Alex Wolfe) both played ST characters (ST Balrog and ST Dhalsim).

Anyway, thanks to everyone who came out for the event. I hope to see even more people at Evo East, and I look forward to facing the competition there.

--Sirlin

Evolution 2005 Tournament Experiences

I'm about a month late in reporting this, but better late than never. This year's Evolution tournament was in Las Vegas, and it was great. I entered the Super Turbo Street Fighter 2 tournament and the Guilty Gear XX #Reload tournament (aka ST and ggxx).

I know it's bold to say this, but going in the ST tournament I knew I had an actual shot at winning the whole thing. I have it within me to beat everyone there and I have beaten all the big names before in tournaments, it's just a matter of doing it this time. I finished first in my qualifying pool, and this included a match against the Japanese player Mester. He plays Vega (claw) and finished in top 8 before at Evolution. I told Kuni (my friend, another Japanese player) that I would play Bison against Mester even though I was playing Vega the whole tournament. Kuni said "to counter Mester's Vega?" I said "Well, this is America." Kuni nodded, understanding. (In the US, we often pick counter characters but in Japan players devote themselves to a single character.) Anyway, I completely smoked Mester and beat him 4-0 in rounds. I know that match very well and Mester didn't seem to know it at all.

I watched a very good Balrog (boxer) play another good Balrog and I would play the winner. I whispered to Kuni that I was considering playing Honda for this match. Kuni was surprised, saying "You play Honda?" I nodded. He has been my secret weapon for years. Kuni said "It can work." The better Balrog player won the mirror match, then I stepped up with my Honda. Using some "old man techniques" I won the match. My next opponent was two-time US national champion Jason Cole. I've beat him before, it was just a matter of doing it now. We did double blind select and to Cole's great surprise, I picked Honda. Cole picked his main character, Dhalsim. I beat him the first game and this put him in a very bad position. If he switched to Guile to beat me, I would easily beat his Guile with my Vega (claw) and win the match. Cole considered this for a while, then decided to stick with Dhalsim for game 2. It was a good choice because he barely won it. He also barely won game 3 and the match. Close, but the win went to Cole. He had better knowledge of that match than me, so I have no gripes about the loss. In fact, I learned a few things from it.

As an aside, I'd like to point out that I went to another player for advice before the tournament. I call him "The Ancient One," because he has secret knowledge of the ages about ST that exceeds even my own. (His actual name is James Romedy.) I asked The Ancient One, "If I have to play against a Honda player, who should I pick?" Romedy scoffed, saying that there could be no such player. Only Bob Painter plays honda of any US players there, and no Japanese players at the tournament played Honda. I asked him to answer anyway. He said "Is the theoretical player better or worse than Bob Painter?" I said "Assume worse." He said in that case I should pick Bison. The match is *hugely* in Honda's favor, but I can...rely on a certain tactic to beat any non-expert Honda. I said, "Fine, but what if he's better than Bob?" The Ancient One said "Then you should either play DJ(!?) or possibly tough it out with Vega, just don't get behind in life."

The reason I asked him any of this is that I feared losing to Honda more than almost anything in the entire tournament, including playing people like Cole or Choi or whatever. Romedy made a good point when he said that there could be no such Honda player though. So who was my next opponent? A random Honda player that no one had ever seen. I took the wise advice of The Ancient One and picked Bison and did my stuff. The Honda endured. Hmm....he seemed much better than a random scrubby honda. I could play DJ, but it seemed like too ridiculous a move. At this point, I did the losing move of the match: I hovered my character select box on Ryu but did NOT pick him. Instead, I picked Vega. I figured I could tough it out in that silly match, but Vega cannot come back from being behind. I got behind, I lost. Smoked by a random Honda out of no where. My worst nightmare realized. Why didn't I just pick Ryu to counter? That was a really bad loss. I know everyone talks about "would have, could have, should have," but I really think the tournament results would have been a lot different if I could have just avoided that one player. I'll have to actually be able to beat Honda next year. (That guy made top 8, btw.)

There was also a 3on3 team tournament in ST and I would like to point out my claim to fame here. Gian, the Dhalsim player from Japan, was on the winning team in the team tournament and he won the entire singles tournament. I was the only player this year to defeat Gian in a tournament match! I played Vega vs. his Dhalsim and won fairly easily (even though Cole gives me trouble in that match). So yeah, no one else beat him at all in the singles or team tournament except for me.

In ggxx, I got a few wins and finishied first in my qualifying pool, but I eventually lost to two solid players. One was Alex from Texas who plays Slayer. He absolutely smoked me at Texas Showdown 5, and he did very well against me this time as well. I missed a guaranteed sweep that would have won me a round, but perhaps the overall match result would have been the same. I picked Potemkin against him in game 1 for the character advantage (Alex is a known Slayer player) but he destroyed me so bad that I ran back to my main character, Chipp.

My other ggxx loss was to ID. He's one of the best ggxx players in the US and he beat me fair and square. I have no gripes, and in fact the very first thought that entered my mind when he beat me was "I really have to never play Chipp again if I actually want to win at this game." I had prepared a little bit with Faust, but I was not confident enough to actually play Faust against ID or Alex. Next time maybe, if anyone ever practices with me.

That's all for now.

--Sirlin

Evolution Fighting Game Championships 2004

I am back from Evolution 2004. www.evo2k.com. It was huge and awesome and there's so much that went on that I can't begin to convey it all here. Many of the best players in the world were there, competing in 9 different fighting games. I am one of the organizers of the event, and I ran a sizeable portion of the Super Turbo Street Fighter 2 tournament.

Anyway, here's how I did. On Day (qualifying pools day), I did not lose a single ROUND in either game I entered (ST and GGXX). This included a win against two-time US national champion Jason Cole, in 4 straight rounds. (Um...why were he and I in the same qualifying pool? I think we really need to seed by ranking, not just by region next year.) Oh, I played only Vega the whole time in ST. Cole played Chun Li against me first, then switched to Dhalsim. I played only Chipp the whole time in GGXX.

On Day 2, I won some matches in Guilty Gear, but lost (barely) to an Axl player who made top 8. I felt like that was mine to win, but oh well. I later lost to an Eddie player who trains with the great Kensao (Chipp player), which means he had plenty of practice against Chipp. I feel I must be honest here when I say that this Eddie player completely destroyed me. It was not close at all. I finished 17th.

In ST, I had been waiting all year for my rematch with Daigo. After retiring Dhalsim, setting Bison aside and focusing on Vega, I felt I was ready. I have beat both Choi and Valle in tournaments with Vega, so I was mentally prepared to face Daigo. The brackets even worked out right for me, as Daigo was on my path. I faced Alex Valle and the winner would not only qualify for top 8 (day 3) but also play Daigo on stage the next match. I wanted to win that one so bad, but Valle proved too tricky and took the match. In loser's bracket I somehow managed to lose to Jessie Howard (Jessie, you are good, but I'm coming for you next time ;) ). So two Old Ken players knocked me out of the tournament, I finished 9th. In case you think Old Ken counters me, I invite the rest of you to play Old Ken against me in a tournament and see how you do. ;)

My claim to fame was the GGXX #reloaded tournament. I have played #reloaded like 2 times ever (one of those times was when I qualified for Team USA lol). I know the differences Chipp has in #r, but since I did not play #r on purpose (since Evolution's main Guilty Gear tournament was Non-#r this year) people did not expect much of me. I teamed up with Destin and famed Japanese Sol player Miu. We faced "Dream Team USA" of ID, Ruin, and Chaotic Blue. Those are probably the #1, 2, and 3 players in the US. I personally beat ID (top Sol) and Ruin (top Edddie) consecutively, to the amazement of the crowd. Chipp power! My friend Miu was able to clean up Chaotic Blue for me. We took 3rd place.

Oh, and I shouldn't leave out Kuni. He is the Japanese liason, since he speaks very good English. He plays ST Zangief(!) and there is nothing like him in the US anywhere. He wins the unwinnable matches and managed not only to qualify for top 8, but to take 3rd place in ST! He beat down Hondas, Balrogs, Sagats and Dhalsim's like they were nothing...all considred nearly impossible matches. I hung out with Kuni quite a bit, and with the Japanese Guilty Gear players Miu (4th place, Sol) and Kindevu (2nd place, Eddie). They're all very friendly and gave me a glimpse of much higher level play than I had ever seen before in person. I will almost certainly be retiring from Chipp and taking up a new character. For sake of surprise, I'll keep that character secret for now!

--Sirlin