B3... From My Viewpoint

[jus...@pe-nelson.com]

> And indulging in nostalgia, I did appreciate the games I played on ST
>there (that, I MUST add, the Kuwatis VERY generously donated for use in
>the tournament... they were some of the coolest people I've met there and
>their generosity must NOT be overlooked... a hearty thank you to them).
>But I've discovered that SFA2 and ST are EVERY BIT as good as each other.
>No game is better because they both have such glaring problems and glaring
>strengths over the other. It all depends on the mood you're in on which
>one is better. One day, you could like ST better but then the next, you
>could like SFA2 better.

I read Toms statement about SFA2 vs. ST, and I was about to post a
scathing response, until I realized the oddity of my position.

Its hard for anyone now, I think, to really make a fair comparison.
Those Choi vs. Valle SFA2 matches were really incredible, but I had
almost as much fun watching Marwan's T-hawk vs. Finnie's Bison.

Right now, its hard to seperate the ST gameplay from the nostaligia
of finally seeing it again.
--
Justin Ratcliff: jus...@pe-nelson.com
Cranes,Cure /|\ Gods of modern music
"Home, home in the gym, we've all got more Tong Fei's again..."

[J Chensor]

In article <4t0g88$o...@elaine40.Stanford.EDU>, ink...@leland.Stanford.EDU
(Thomas Calvin Cannon) wrote:

> For Moby, Milo, and everyone else,
>
> B3 was a tremendous success. We had 64 players attend, making it
> the largest Street Fighter tournament in California since the
> Hyper Fighting tournament (over 3 years ago). While the HF tournament
> had more players total, everyone agreed that B3 had the highest
> number of excellent SF players ever assembled outside of Japan.

This was the greatest thing I have ever attended regarding video
games. I was HIGHLY impressed and although I personally performed poorly
in the tourney, I had fun anyhow (heck, how can anyone feel disappointed
getting defeated John Choi and Tom Cannon, two top-notch players?!? :-).
No, if you missed out on the B3 gathering, I can honestly say you missed
out. Even the BIGGEST haters of SFA2 came out saying that the finals
between Alex and John were the BEST Fighting Game matches EVER SEEN by
anyone there. Nothing could compare to those matches. They were worth
the whole trip up to Sunnyvale alone... but what made it better was the
fact that everything ELSE was also really cool.

> FINAL FOUR
> ---------------
> #1 Alex Valle Ryu, Sagat Los Vegas, CA
> #2 John Choi Ken Sunnyvale, CA
> #3 Jason Nelson Charlie, Ryu Sunnyvale, CA
> #4 Jeff Schaeffer (sp?) Akuma Los Vegas, CA

There is no question about it... Southern California and Northern
California are dead-even for skill-level. John was EVERY BIT as good as
Alex and Alex was EVERY BIT as good as John, it seemed. Alex seemed to
know one extra trick that warranted some early victories before John
caught on and used them back on Alex. Had John known about this trick
earlier on, who knows? Somehow, though, I doubt it would have been much
different. I bet it would have come down to the last second again.

> THE FINALS
> -----------
> The final match between Valle and Choi was quite possibly the best
> match in the history of SF on American soil. No, that is not a
> joke.
> This match had all the positional play, mind games, come-back victories,
> and technical skill of the best Super Turbo matches. It was just incredible
> to watch, and it was clear that both of these players were well
> above the rest of the field.

No, this is no joke at all. It was incredible. For anyone out there
who didn't go, GET A COPY OF THE TAPES. If you don't, you'll miss out.
But as Tom said, this proved that John CHoi and Alex Valle are far
superior to everyone else. Everyone came out of that tournament feeling a
little inferior to those two because of the precision and the skill level
displayed. A BIG congratulations to both John and Alex for some REALLY
intense and tightly fought match-ups.

As for ST vs. SFA2, I'll personally have to agree a bit more with
Justin Ratcliff here. Although the match-ups were terrific, the
tournaments DID show a MAJOR flaw in SFA2's game: the CCs. They are
simply TOO overpowered. In fact, they are so overpowered, that they will
dominate ALL future SFA2 play. No more will anyone ever not use these
things because they are just too useful.

And indulging in nostalgia, I did appreciate the games I played on ST
there (that, I MUST add, the Kuwatis VERY generously donated for use in
the tournament... they were some of the coolest people I've met there and
their generosity must NOT be overlooked... a hearty thank you to them).
But I've discovered that SFA2 and ST are EVERY BIT as good as each other.
No game is better because they both have such glaring problems and glaring
strengths over the other. It all depends on the mood you're in on which
one is better. One day, you could like ST better but then the next, you
could like SFA2 better.

But for WAY more detail, see my new (gulp) ST vs. SFA2 thread...

> Whoever posted that nonscense about LA having the best players
> had better take a look at the bracket. Two of the top three
> players are from northern California. I personally think that
> the players at Sunnyvale Golfland and Southern Hills Golfland
> stack up almost exactly equally against each other, top to bottom.
> If one area has any advantage, it is slight.

I don't think there is an advantage at all. I think this tourney
proved that both areas are dead equal. They both have a TON of great
players, including that one player who is heads above the rest... except
each other.

> One thing can be said for certain though, and that is that
> California definately has the best players. Graham Wolfe, who
> is an excellent player and took 2nd in the Chicago tournament,
> barely placed in the top 8 in B3.

I'll agree... California definitely rules SF in North America. :-)
Too many good players here... too bad L.A. and Sunnyvale are so far
apart!!! If they were closer, we'd have great matches EVERYDAY!!!

> CHARACTER BALANCE
> ---------------------
> Several threads in alt.games.sf2 have been devoted to the character
> balance in Alpha 2. Bob and Milo have asserted that the only
> hope of doing well in a tournament is to pick Ken. B3's results
> directly contradict this, as a RYU beat a KEN in the finals, and
> the top four players all played DIFFERENT characters (Ryu/Sagat, Ken,
> Charile, and Akuma)
>
> I agree with Bob's comments that it is easier for an intermediate
> player to do better with Ken or Chun Li. B3's final brack reflects
> this, as probably over 1/2 the finalists played one of those two
> characters. However, I think that the "Ken is God" assertion goes
> out the window. It just isn't true.

Well, the character imbalance is still there. You simply will NOT be
seeing Gen, Dan, or Gen winning any tournament. And without a DOUBT,
you'll have a better chance using Ryu, Ken, or Chun Li. But that's it.
All the others all have an equal chance of winning.

> CANADIANS CANADIANS
> ----------------------
> The three Chinese Canadians (David Chang, Peter Wong, and Jeffery ...)
> have been getting a bad rap ever since they posted some inflammatory
> messages to alt.games.sf2. These three are actually really nice
> guys in person, and they can actually play. David Chang's Ken fared
> the best, advancing into the final 16. They aren't better than the
> US players, as Peter's post suggested, but they aren't bad at all.

They were really cool (the last guy is Jeffery HSU, BTW). They were
all good, but David was by far the best of the three. Still, however, he
was only on par with the better players of California, but not as good as
the experts such as Tony Ngo or Graham Wolfe.

> Wow...well I guess that's it for now. All in all, I'd have to say
> that things went really well. The only hangup was that we had some
> recording problems, so some of the matches will be in black and
> white on the B3 tape. Hopefully we can have the thing edited in
> about 2 weeks (we have over 36 hours of tape to go through). A
> special thanks to Matt Taylor from Capcom for helping out with
> setup and recording of the event.

Tell us the INSTANT you've got that thing together. Then everyone
can see you thrash my Zangief. I'll get you next time, Tom!! :-)

> Also, thanks to everyone who took the time to come to the event. B3 was
> a tournament organized and run by the players, for the players, and
> hopefully this will serve as a heads up to Capcom that there is a lot of
> demand out there for an organized tournament scene.

Let's hope maybe we can get another gathering together again. I was
left with such a positive impression by the tournament that I wouldn't
mind doing it again (although a 6 and 1/2 hour drive is a pretty good
deterant from doing it often!!! :-).

One last congratulations to Alex Valle, for his tremendous victory at
the B3. Also, a VERY big congratulations to EVERYONE who attended,
especially to John Choi, for giving us all the greatest matches we've ever
seen. It could have gone either way and you two are without a doubt, the
best at SF here in North America!!!

> ---
> Tom Cannon
> ink...@leland.stanford.edu

--
- J.C.

"What's the sense in arguing when you're all alone?"
- TMBG
_____________________________________________________________________
James Chen AKA "James Chensor"
jche...@ucla.edu
_____________________________________________________________________

[Thomas Calvin Cannon]

In article <jchensor-220...@ts36-11.wla.ts.ucla.edu>,

J Chensor <jche...@ucla.edu> wrote:
>In article <4t0g88$o...@elaine40.Stanford.EDU>, ink...@leland.Stanford.EDU
>(Thomas Calvin Cannon) wrote:

[snip]

Removing reference to rec.games.video.arcade since nothing new is brought up.

>
> Tell us the INSTANT you've got that thing together. Then everyone
>can see you thrash my Zangief. I'll get you next time, Tom!! :-)
>

You know...I lost to Adam's Zangief right after that match, and I think
I finally know how I was able to beat your Zan Chensor.

You always attacked. You never let up on the pressure, which means that
you didn't give me a chance to make any mistakes. All I had to do was
keep hopping around with forward and short. Maybe you've played too
many turtlers. =) Anyway, I was terrified the whole match because I
knew that if you got that one hit up close, I was dead meat. =)

[snip]

> Let's hope maybe we can get another gathering together again. I was
>left with such a positive impression by the tournament that I wouldn't
>mind doing it again (although a 6 and 1/2 hour drive is a pretty good
>deterant from doing it often!!! :-).

Hey, I'll do it again, but not any time soon. The way things have been
going we've had one net.gathering for every version of SF. It seems
to be a good pace, so IMHO we should keep it that way. Justin, Tony,
and I learned a lot from this one, and I think we ironed out a lot of
the wrinkles. Next time it will really kick ass. ;)

> One last congratulations to Alex Valle, for his tremendous victory at
>the B3. Also, a VERY big congratulations to EVERYONE who attended,
>especially to John Choi, for giving us all the greatest matches we've ever
>seen. It could have gone either way and you two are without a doubt, the
>best at SF here in North America!!!

I second that.

---
Tom Cannon
ink...@leland.stanford.edu

[Mike Finnie]

ink...@leland.Stanford.EDU said...

>>the B3. Also, a VERY big congratulations to EVERYONE who attended,
>>especially to John Choi, for giving us all the greatest matches we've
>>ever
>>seen. It could have gone either way and you two are without a doubt,
>>the
>>best at SF here in North America!!!
>

>I second that.

Well, the matches were indeed very exciting, but there were far too many
sweep CCs in there to justify it as a skill match. IMO the most skilled
match of the night was James Romedy (Dhalsim) vs. Tony Ngo (Ken). You
could count the mistakes on one hand, plus it was a dramatic comeback
for Romedy. It was a flowing, intense fight with no spaz at all. The end
fights for Choi and Valle, were a flurry of mad CC's, and in the end I
still think both players put up prayers and VAlle won out.

chris

[Wardell Sims Jr]

I knew I wasn't the only one that thought Street Fighter Turbo
was Pound for pound one of the best if not the best fighting
game ever. If only Super could have had the same engine and
Speed.