Beaches

Thursday, August 9, 2007

Evo West Part 2

It's been almost like two weeks so my already bad memory ain't so nice right now. On Sunday, I finally found out I had to play Buktooth in winners and Combofiend had to play vs Ricky. Even though we haven't really played each other since Buktooth and I lived in Norcal, it's always annoying to have to play each other in tournaments. Considering, we use to play vs each other all the time back in the day. Anyhow..

Remembering the thrashing I took at Evo Vegas last year, I decided to make Rolento ratio 2 this time around. Oh that's something to talk about. In retrospect, in regards to my team order..my thinking has been pretty ignorant. At Evo 2004, I always chose the order C-Sagat/Rolento/Blanka. Evo 2005 was C-Blanka/Sagat/Rolento. Evo 2006 was C-Blanka/Rolento/Sagat. My logic was to figure out the best order for my team and never "need" to switch it up. So like, I mentioned earlier, that way of thinking is imo ignorant. If I have an advantage with a certain order and I'm comfortable with that counter order, I should at least consider it. It's kind of cool if you think about it, since I have so much experience with all those orders, I can now feel when a certain order would have more of an advantage.

N-Iori vs C-Sagat is even in my book. I've always thought that Iori had a hard time catching rolento. So yeah, Rolento did his damn thing and it worked. The next match he decided to change up his ratio 2 from Iori to Hibiki, but ALSO put his ratio 2 Hibiki first. I think, Buk kinda stacked the odds less in his favor by doing that, cause even though his last character(morrigan) destroys rolento, having her as a ratio 1 is a little bit too risky EVEN FOR BUK. I won 2-0. I'll always consider the fact that Buk lives in Dallas and has -2 people to play against a factor in how I won, so now that he's in Japan for SBO, I'm sure when I play him at Evo Vegas, he'll be back with a Vietnamese Vengence.

And yeah...I'm tired. Part 3 later. But watch this!

Monday, August 6, 2007

Evo West 2007 Part 1

Last weekend in San Diego was dope on so many levels. What definitely wasn't dope however, was the fucking garbage hotel I reserved. Somehow my reservation at "America's best value inn" was really one at "Padre's Village Inn". Hard ass beds ain't worth the 209.99 a day price, that's for sure. But on to the good stuff!

Last Friday was the qualifiers day for CvS2 and I started off not feeling that good. Right before a tournament, I usually feel a strong mix of nervousness, determination, anxiety, and excitement. Finally was I able to learn last weekend what fellow homie Jason Cole has been telling me all along. "The nervousness never leaves you."
Taking that into account, I agree that the nervousness never leaves you in tournaments, rather its how you are able to deal with the nervousness that brings out your potential to do well in tournaments.

That friday, after about 40 minutes of practice time, I was warmed up for the tournament. From what I remembered, I played hella matches in my pool. Like atleast four or something it seems, before I finally reach Mr. end boss John Choi. The roughest pool I think was the pool with Buktooth, Laugh, Hail and Kill, and Pigadoken. Obviously, all talented players who got that PASSION SON. On a side note, I have to comment that Laugh improved so much. It's unfortunate that he wasn't able to qualify, but he's definitely deserving of that spot. Him and Hail and Kill imo, are two players that can beat anyone.

So anyway, where was I? I finally reached end boss Choi in the winners bracket of my pool. He actually plays C sakura now instead of his usual C Guile. His order is usually C-Sakura/Ken/Sagat and he usually rocks everyone with it. I eventually win 2-1. But it was my toughest match of the weekend. Considering the first game vs him, he beat me with only a 5% sagat vs my 100% sagat. No joke. It's kinda funny, cause I'm sure its noticable, but I hella do deep breathing to calm myself down, and yeah I'm sure I probably look hella crazy sometimes while I'm doing it in tournaments. After a loss like that, I just kinda had to accept that um "it's one of those magical choi wins" and move on. I'm not sure if my sagat came in the other matches, but if he did, I was probably hella scared.

The usual suspects all qualified, with the exception of Viscant. But I don't mean that as an insult, cause I know he put the time into the game, and I'm happy his effort paid off.

I'll continue writing this in the near future, but in the meanwhile.....
"YOU DAMN RIGHT IT SOUND DELICIOUS"

<3 Kim