E3 Sony vs Microsoft vs Nintendo

Alright I feel like Sony and Nintendo performed extremely well. Microsoft is disappointing with Project Natal aka Kinect.

Kinect has a full second of lag and most of their games and demonstrations were over the top corny. The only game that stood out to me was the Star wars demo. That game looks tight! Kinect + Jedi = too good.

Nintendo should be called operation bring it back: Metroid, Kid Icarus, Kirby etc..

All these games bringing back the old style and being innovative at the same time. Too good. A true gaming console.

Sony seems to be going more the route of Nintendo with their quality of games, but they are biting off Nintendo's Wii a little too hard with Playstation move even though it is really good for how well it follows the motions of the player instead of pre made motions like the Wii. Xbox Kinect has a full second of lag behind it =\ which is very lame. Do Not Want.

Nintendo is coming in with the smart stuff. Nintendo 3DS? Too good. I was happy when I saw Dead or Alive 3D :). Actually both Nintendo and Sony are implementing 3D capabilities to their games. I know MS will be biting off them at the next E3 and just probably one up them as well.

Really looking forward to what Nintendo and Sony has to offer, but as far as the games go.

Marvel vs Capcom 3, Mortal Kombat, Metroid, Killzone 3, Twisted Metal, Kid Icarus, Gears of War 3, Goldeneye 007, Gran Turismo 5, NBA2k11, Tron Evolution, Dead Space 2, Madden NFL 11, Fifa Soccer 11,  NBA JAM, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11, Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II , Star Wars: The Old Republic, Dance Central, Halo: Reach, Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2, Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode I, God of War: Ghost of Sparta, LittleBigPlanet 2, SOCOM 4: U.S. Navy SEALs, Final Fantasy XIV Online, Devil's Third, Red Faction: Armageddon, and many more to come.


I am still waiting for my Dead or Alive 5 and Tekken 7 announcements though >_<. 

The core ways to learn a fighting game.

This is a very good article for players who are trying to get into DOA or fighters in general and for the beginners who are looking to improve their game.

Hopefully what I talk about really helps you become a stronger player. Please comment :)

In fighting games its all about controlling the pace. Whether you are controlling it on the offense or on the defense is key to winning the match.

In a game like DOA the way you would control the pace offensively is by keeping the opponent in critical state and making proper use of the environment to keep momentum. Also have to play the hit level game High beats Mid beats Low beats High. For defense its all about either crushing or holding the hit level or waiting for an unsafe attack so you can punish it on guard or if the opponent has delays in their attacks you can offensive hold them. The offense is trying to get them to hold so you can hi counter throw them or getting them to try to respond with an attack so you can defensive hold them. (Yea I know defensive hold but it can be used offensively as well especially if you know the opponent will attack). Also if the opponent starts using attacks that crouch you can perform a crouching offensive hold to grab them out of their crouching attack.

So in DOA your offense is:

Attacks, Throws, Offensive Holds (OH)
Attack to get them to try to Defensive hold (DH) you or use an attack with evasive frames usually a high or mid crush.

If they start using DH you throw them. If they start using Crush attacks then you can either OH their crush attack or you can DH as long as you know the correct hit level they will do. DH does more damage than a OH but is more difficult to use than a OH which is understandable cause the payout is higher. If the opponent is guarding a lot then you can throw them or OH them since OH acts like a throw, or you can hit them with a quick low that is hard to react to. Be careful cause regular throws loses to attacks and that includes crush attacks.

Anyway moving on. On the defensive side:

Guard, Throws (because they beat Offensive Holds), DH and Crush attack.

When opponent starts attacking you can guard because if they do something unsafe you can punish them. If you block something safe you just gained the advantage because your next attack will beat out theirs but it isn't guaranteed. You can also DH which will force them to start throwing more and you can hi counter blow their throw attempts for a lot of damage. When you use Crush attacks it will force them to want to go on the defensive and block or try to hold you (DH or OH) so once that happens you can grab them. And this is how the offense/defense game works in DOA.

As you can see from the above Offense and Defense is a big mental game and knowing your opponent and how they respond is key, but its all about knowing what option you and your opponent have to so you actually know whats going on.

Present Day SF grass roots tournaments - Attack of the Clones, and Tekken Zaibatsu website down all day?

It feels as though 90% of the EC has no personality. Most of them talk and behave the exact same as another player. I blame most of the East Coast for biting off each other and then rubbing off on most of the players in the community, but it is really annoying hearing everyone saying shout outs every 10 seconds and all the same phrases that involve monster, salty, mortons, on blast etc.

Seriously can the EC all get their own personality? Everyone is a clone of one another just a different voice tone. Also most people could care less about stories on players who aren't really known and it takes away from your events. Unless they are a good up and coming player that has been showing progress then I don't see the point.

Furthermore can we please stop with the commentary from so many people, and dropping the N word definitely doesn't help your case either. If you want sponsors and big name companies to take your game and community seriously please start acting like it, If not then well you can continue on with your circus.

Moving on....

How come every tournament has to run a team tournament at every event. Its pointless to run a team tournament because it takes too long and slows the tournament down. The entire tournament could be done a lot faster if there wasn't a team tournament. I don't know any players who actually train up and take teams serious. The only time a team tournament means anything is SBO or Tekken Crash. And SBO doesn't matter cause its single elim, and Tekken Crash is a full season so actually picking players for your team is far more important and requires a lot more strategizing.

Now the only tournaments that really don't have any of the above problems are tournaments on the west coast and the times when Seb is the one in charge of the production on the east coast, but if Seb is not around....sigh.

I really hope everyone starts to look up to the west coast as an example on how things are done.


In other news:

The Tekken Zaibatsu website has been down for an entire day! What is there a server move going on or is the Tekken community going to be in trouble? It will be very difficult for players to meet up and what not hopefully this is temporary especially for upcoming events needing to be promoted there isn't really any other way for information to move about the Tekken community.

DOA5 at E3 semi confirmation, Galaxy4Gamers, Mortal Kombat reboot!

Well I had to edit what I was writing about DOA5 because apparently it has been taken off the show floor site for E3 in the Tecmo section. Despite that I am really looking forward to DOA5 hopefully a lot of people play it! I wish we could at least get a trailer or something ah well. By the way check out FreeStepDodge.com we are building the DOA scene back up and welcome all players to come to the site and learn and help us all grow.

Also I have been participating in G4G lately. Here are the match vids from me playing Alex Valle and Justin Wong

G4G Beat a Pro Match videos:
Myself vs Alex "Calipower" Valle
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quF_ig2nPhQ&playnext_from=TL&videos=9uPJ1TljUew

Myself vs Justin "JWong" Wong
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0dkbZRFGec&playnext_from=TL&videos=rVdfuZEaWas

MORTAL KOMBAT!!!! I so cannot wait for this game. I have been saying for years they need to go back to 2D gameplay because 3D while it was ok it didn't work as good as it should with MK. Maybe if they kept the MK4 style gameplay, but the 2D gameplay is classic and makes MK well MK. Unless they used the Shaolin Monks versus mode engine. That was too good honestly way more enjoyable than the regular 3D MKs. Besides that I have noticed that the setting of the game is MK2 or a little after MK2 because I see Sektor is in the game and they also have old Shang Tsung. Maybe they are really just rebooting the series who knows cause I didn't see Liu Kang at all.

I am definitely looking forward to this.

MLG Columbus, Upcoming Events, EVO Top 8 Payout

I didn't particularly do too well. I made it to the 4th round in winners and then lost to Pat_Thai a Julia player. I lack a lot of Julia experience and it showed :(. The next day for losers bracket I showed up late because I thought start time was to begin at 1 PM but it actually began at 11 AM so I was disqualified :(. It's ok because I still had a blast that weekend because my roommates in the hotel were none other than Nin, Knee and Holeman some of the top players from Korea.

Nin taught me a whole lot about the game that I didn't know and I believe it has made me a stronger player in Tekken overall. I began to improve at a very fast rate and when I played against players in casual matches I was doing drastically better than before, so I am very thankful for their help.

This past Sunday Nin stayed up talking to me about a lot of Tekken history in Korea and just in general and we even discussed current things like character matchups and the tierlist that the characters will end up in the long run.

Top 3 characters will be: Bryan, Nina, Devil Jin and the full S tier would be Bryan, Nina, Devil Jin, Steve, Bruce, Lars, Bob, Julia.

Other than Tekken stuff. Speaking broken english is the shiznit. I can't speak Korean and they could barely speak english but we are all pro in speaking broken english. It was so fun hanging out with those guys for real.


Alright let me talk about the next upcoming events the ones I am more than likely to make and the ones I probably won't be able to.

First thing I wish I could go to devestation but too much money and too little time to make it :(. I believe I can do very well in SF4 and Tekken. If I put some time into SC4 before hand I am more than sure I can do well in that as well even if I run into a Hilde player. I'll just pick Algol like seriously. Bubbles pin hilde down and she can't really launch algol without trading with a bubble and messing up the timing for her combos.

In two weeks there will be a tournament in Cleveland with $500 payout for 1st place in SSFIV. I feel very confident that I can pull it out especially since I have tightened up my match up trouble that I initially had with Gouki. Also they will be having 2v2 which me and WolfKrone will definitely be teaming up for.

Evolution I really really want to go this year. I keep having dreams that I win it and have yet another Evolution championship title under my belt. Hopefully I will be able to make it and even if I can't win I know I can make top 8 at the very least.

Thats all for now. I will probably post more later. Also have been getting back into DOA because apparently we might be getting a DOA5 showing at E3. Keep your fingers crossed >_<

SSF4 Training Continued

Tackling Seth:

- U1 trap is gone. 

- Teleport recovery is worst

- Neutral Jump Fierce has 6 less active frames

- Dive kick executes slower so it hangs in the air more.

This means he lost a lot of his offense even though he still has a lot offense but just no more ambiguous sonic boom mixups which is fine. 

Also lost being able to make people jump with sonic booms then u1 them. Teleport makes it so its harder to follow up after legs now if opponent quick stands cause the added recovery on teleport. Absolutely must throw a sonic boom first.

Other than that he can still use EX legs to go through limbs/projectiles etc. Thats really good especially if opponents back is to the wall because ex legs to u2 is 408 pts of damage. So once Seth has an opponents back to the wall its scary even without u2 he can stomp for 255 and then go for a mixup. Opponent will probably get stunned really fast.

His zoning is still intact. He can still super trap people with sonic booms.

Normals are good or might be better. st mk, rh, fp really good. close st fp is good for anti air and far st mp is good for anti air aswell.

When you anti air someone either boom them for chip damage, or tandem engine for mixups. If opponent is antsy and tries to jump at you again use EX Tandem engine since it grabs them out of the air and pulls them towards you, but you need ex bars for that.

EX SPD is still invincible to attacks on start up so you can use that as well.

To me it looks like what capcom really did to nerf the top characters is make it so they have to use their EX meter more to stay really good but thats not bad cause the rest of the cast has to do it aswell. Look at rufus with EX messiah/snake strike etc. 

I think seth is still good.

 

SSF4 Characters Nerfs, Buffs and Placings.

Tackling Sagat:

Sagat's tiger knee damage has been nerfed and so has its safety. If you block it standing you get a free combo so its a bit risky to toss out when you are zoning now.

Angry scar is useless so far to me. Angry scar fp tu is 180 pts. EX TU is 200 pts

Angry scar however does it make it possible for you to juggle into TU after a TK but only in the corner. Also allows you to hit a TU after a TU FADC but its useless meter. 

EX TK is good still its -1 on block and does 180 pts so its good to use in fireball zoning. It seems a bit pointless to really go for a kara tu unless to anti air. On the ground its not as rewarding unless the combo will kill the opponent. Also during zoning low step kick has to be used more aswell.

st lk no longer being cancellable into stuff from a distance is a pain but just have to get used to his other normals.

Anyway as far as combos. Its best to go for EX TU (meaning you are only using 1 meter for your go to combo instead of 2) But the timing for u1 is a little strict. The trick is that as soon as you land do the command. Buffering it makes it miss sometimes.

Pretty much Sagat like akuma for extra damage has to use his EX meter.

Sagat has to use EX TK, EX TU moreso now than ever for damage.

Regular TK was nerfed but EX TK is really good. TU was nerfed but EX TU is still good. And Angry scar just enhances his EX TU but only by 40 pts so use if you feel like whatever you do will kill.

Ex TK is good for zoning cause its the only safe tiger knee now lol at -1. So if they are ducking you should be at a huge advantage.

Only thing now EX TU to U1 will be difficult for people but its not as hard as people think.

Also for akuma ex dp is the best option after a lk tatsu since it does more stun and does the same dmg as lp dp fadc hp shaku.

I still feel Sagat and Akuma are top tier as well with all these findings.

Akuma Character Specifics U2 combos

Before I go into the combos I want to let everyone know a universal way on making it a little easier when fighting bison.

1. Focus his single limbs like st hk/mk because he can't cancel them into anything.

2. Neutral jump scissor kicks then land on them and punch similar to balrog's dash punches.

3. After blocking scissors kick you are 0 on guard however since bison's cr lk is really good and has a lot of priority it will more than likely beat out your normal attack may have to do a reversal so its best to back dash away. This will force bison to have to do a unsafe scissors kick to hit you, slide or psycho crusher to chase you which are all of course unsafe.

Oh one more thing before I list the combos. The New Replay channel in SSF4 is really good especially when viewing videos from Asia specifically Japanese videos. Daigo, Mago, Tokido, Sako are all on there and with a lot of unknown japanese players (dunno their tags yet) and they are really showing how to properly play the game. Its perfect especially when you may not have someone who plays a character and you want to see how they work so you check out the vids and pick up a few things.

Alright Akuma u2 char specific combos. There are two ways to hit them either crouching fp or standing close fp.

Close fp combo works on: Dudley, Gouken, Zangief, THawk and Hakan even if they are ducking.

Crouch fp to u2 works on: Sagat, Cammy, Seth, Makoto, Abel, Rufus, Balrog, Cody, Adon, Dahlsim, Ken, Bison, Vega, Deejay, Chun Li

Thats it for now I haven't tested all the characters yet but a few I tested didn't work.

SSF4 training

Everyone knows I main Akuma so I found some good Akuma combo's to make up for losing his ability to stand up opponents and perform more damaging combos. 

I believe these combos worked in Vanilla aswell but no one even thought to use them. I found out cause I read in frame data that hk/mk tatsu stands the opponent up. So if you do like cr lp x2 then hk tatsu they will stand up. Cancelling hk tatsu allows you to do more combos.

Requires half meter:

Jump in hk > c.fp xx hk tatsu fadc > cr.mp link s.fp xx lk tatsu > fp dp 

461 dmg / 755 stun

Requires full meter:

Jump in hk > c.fp xx hk tatsu fadc > cr.mp link s.fp xx fireball fadc > c. fp xx lk tatsu > fp dp

487 dmg / 845 stun

Here is a good BNB for his ultra 2.

Jump in hk > c.fp xx hk tatsu fadc > cr.mp link s.fp xx teleport xx u2 

526 Dmg / 670 Stun

These combos work if the opponent is crouching. If they aren't crouching its best to do a poke to fireball fadc combo since if they are already standing its harder to cancel from a hk/mk tatsu into a follow up for combo because of the stun the opponent does when they get hit is different from when they are crouching.

So far akuma is still good right now his toughest match I feel will be ibuki because she can option select his teleport with a knock down and its realllly easy to do. You actually don't even need to option select the teleport you can just see him teleport and do her neck breaker.

The heck I just found out something odd. Akuma's u2 only hits characters who are standing but vs dudley I did close fp to u2 and it all connected and he was still crouching. Yea....lol

Also vs characters where you don't get a jump in you can do two c.lp's into hk tatsu and get them to stand up and go for a combo.

On to hakan:

Been messing with Hakan cause I really to believe he is bottom tier.

He has two command grabs one that works like a regular SPD where it will hit you if you are doing anything but jumping or a reversal which is performed by pressing punch. Another command throw performed by kicks which grabs standing, back dash, jumps but you can crouch it and reversal it.

So his wake up game is either tick to kick throw or punch throw. Kick throw the best one is lk so if they immediately jump anticipating a punch throw they will get grabbed. If you use any other kick you will more than likely whiff. If you think they will duck you have to do the punch throw of course.

When Hakan is oiled up he can fp slide full screen and its safe if the opponent is on the other side of the screen and they block it so in other words he can play full screen footsies with a slide. 

hp, cr mk, f+hk, cr hk are all my favorite pokes right now and I think f+mp. When oiled up he can cancel his focus dashes and immediately go into attacks which is really great for when people are trying to poke you and you focus throw it and hit them or grab them when they are out of range.

While he is oiled up he can also combo his low shorts which if you think about it in regular ways its not a big deal cause he can't combo into anything from his low shorts but its a great way to mix up the timing on when you will do one of his grabs, block, hit one of his normal buttons or focus attack. I think its great for that even his ultra 1 grab. I think his ultra 1 grab will be great for opponents he can rush down while the ultra 2 anti air is great for opponents that try to rush him down and jump in all day. 

Let me not to forget to say hakan's jump game is nice too. Jump f+strong combos to u2 and iirc gives enough time to oil up. Any time Hakan gets a knock down its time to oil up. Always use lk oil up its really useful even when spacing especially when your opponent doesn't want to get knocked down or lose a chunk of life from hp.

Thats it for now I will post more when I find out some more useful stuff.

Tekken Fundamentals

In my travels I learned the fundamentals of Tekken from legendary Tekken players in Dallas. JOP, EP, Jinkid etc and I have decided to post the very basics of what I learned. 

I have broken this up into 4 layers of yomi making it very easy to understand:

1. The object of Tekken and a lot of other fighting games is forcing your opponent to whiff so you can hit them with your most powerful attack or in Tekken's case: Launchers. That is the very first layer of Tekken's mind game.

2. Here is when it evolves from that. When the opponent is looking for you to whiff so that they can launch you this is when you move in for a quick low poke or an attack to put you in frame advantage or a throw to break their defense. After you have established this you then back away and Layer 1 restarts to form a new situation.

3. Now when the opponent knows you know that they are looking for a whiff, and they also know you are going to want to come in and hit them with a poke into 50/50 or a throw. They will use a move to keep you out once you get into that zone of space. Moves that can keep you out are say generic df+2 or magic 4 aka the counter hit 4 at the most basic level and then of course you have the all powerful EWGF.

4. However the opponent now knows you know they are looking for and whiff and they also know you are going to come in and try to hit them with something and they are going to try and keep you out with a keepout attack, but now this is when you move in and back away to force them to whiff (going back to layer 1) and you are able to launch them.

These are the very basics of Tekken. Of course when choosing a character you can go by the properties of their attacks by how much range/safety/usable launchers and lows that they have, oh yes and the damage.

Definitely big ups to the crew in Dallas for helping out.