Remembering The Past

Self reflection is a worthwhile endeavor (in moderation, of course).

Today's self reflection came in the form of a video YouTube recommended to me. It's a video I'd seen before, in a time and place very different from here and now. It was the video that made me want to play Guilty Gear, and subsequently sent me down a path that has led me to a point I never would have imagined myself at.

In hindsight, this match really isn't as impressive as it is notably ridiculous; but back in 2007, I didn't know any better, nor care. The sheer style that oozes from every second of this video was enough to have me hooked.

I've still a ways to go; but all things considered, it's pretty remarkable how far I've come since then. Things like this reinvigorate motivation in the face of all that works to waver it.

(That might be worth remembering when you read my next post)

Another Fucking Meta Post

I know what you're thinking: "Not another fucking meta post".

Well, sorry to disappoint. But this time, I'll at least get straight to the point.

As of right now, it's all but confirmed that I'll be living in Japan for the next few years. I have some lofty goals that I hope to accomplish while I'm there, both related and unrelated to gaming. So, what does this mean for this blog?

Rest assured, this isn't going to become a "Living In Japan" blog or anything like that. If anything, this will become a "Playing Games In Japanese Arcades" blog, since this blog is primarily for people who already know me through the gaming communities I'm part of (and secondarily, for people who don't know me, but happen to stumble upon this place anyways).

I'm going to be living in Yokosuka, which, according to Google Maps, is roughly a 90 minute train ride from Mikado Takadanobaba. If you're reading this and somehow don't know about Mikado, let's just say that it's the place to be if you play Guilty Gear. I'm going to try my best to make it to as many tournaments there as possible, since, well, it's fucking Mikado. It won't be easy with work and a personal life, but there's no way I'm going to be a stone's throw away from the best Guilty Gear players in the world and sit idly by.

But what does this mean for this blog? Right.

A large part of the reason I haven't finished the netplay article, as an example, is because I'm missing a critical element of it; to explain why it is necessary for players outside of Japan to play online, it is necessary to also explain why players within Japan don't. This means going arcade hopping to see what the typical Japanese arcade looks like on a weekday afternoon, and contrasting that with the days when an arcade like A-cho or Mikado is holding an event. To see just how easy it is to find competition for a game like Virtua Fighter or SFIV between train stops, compared to, say, Melty Blood or Guilty Gear. I could very easily finish the article right now without this valuable experience, but it wouldn't hold its weight over time, and I'd end up having to revise it as I learn more about how fighting games are played by those who play them best. So yeah, it's best to just hold off on it altogether until I know exactly what I want to say, and how I want to say it.

Of course, I'll also inevitably improve as a player. Which is kind of a scary thought, lol. That might mean revising everything entirely to reflect my newfound insights! But that is exactly what I should hope for, isn't it?

Unfortunately, none of this is happening any time soon. I'm going to be quite busy, you see, just getting on my feet and eventually settled in. So, it may very well be another eight months before you see a new post here. Waiting sucks, but trust me; it'll be well worth it.

Hindsight Isn't Upscaled

I was recently invited to play vanilla VF5 online. It had been awhile since I last played vanilla, so I figured; sure, why not?

Upon playing the game for the first time in at least a year, I immediately noticed something as soon as the first match started: this game looks like shit. Like, not even just a little bad, it looks fucking awful. In fact, if I had to guess, I'd say that this game isn't being upscaled at all.

How? How did Sega release such an awful looking port? How did nobody notice it sooner? I at least had the excuse of playing on various dying CRT monitors from the early 00's before now. This game was released in late 2007 for the 360, and as I recall, there were plenty of 1080p displays on the market back then. Even on a 720p display, I highly doubt it would look any better since the 360's internal resolution is lower than that.

Just to be sure, I checked the back of the case, and it does say it supports 1080p. If this was Sega's idea of support back then, I shudder to think of what other games of the time offered the same kind of "support".

Unfortunately, I don't have any capture equipment and my camera kinda sucks, so bear with me here. These pictures aren't the best, but if you look closely you can see where vanilla looks awful and where FS fixes it (Jacky's feet are a good example). It's much more prominent in person, obviously, so if you have both games, I implore you to see for yourself. This is almost as big of a difference as the PC port of Dark Souls, pre and post patch.

Sore Winning

This is something I noticed some time ago, but recently came to light thanks to this video:

As you can see, this was part of a set I played with this guy on XBL. As you can also see, I lost horribly. As you can probably see, it was very laggy. What you can't see: this was one of the few, if not the only, matches I lost in this entire set.

This isn't the first time someone's uploaded just the match where they beat me. Refer to the following:

That last one was from a Dustloop vs. GameFAQS online tourney, where I played against a guy who, prior to that set, I had pretty much bodied every time we played, lol. 

Now this isn't to say that there aren't some noteworthy quirks in these matches that make them worth uploading, but it's oddly suspicious that all of these matches just happen to be one of the few I've lost in their respective sets. It's also evident that in these videos, I'm playing pretty sloppily/greedy (though, if you notice, so are my opponents).

Is it that these people want to prove that they can beat a famous player? Obviously not, since I'm a nobody in the "eff gee see" (and would like to keep it that way). Is it that they want to learn from the mistakes of their playstyle? Perhaps, but only uploading the matches you win isn't going to be productive towards that. So what could the reason be that all of these people just happen to upload the one match where they manage to win?

It's pretty obvious to anyone with experience in this community: ego. To them, playing me is like fighting a boss; like a frustrating, hellaciously difficult boss that they can come within inches of beating at times, but continuously fall short against (think Dark Souls). Once they're able to beat me once or twice, they consider themselves accomplished. Let's of course ignore the fact that in all but the VF vid I'm on the receiving end of bad, even terrible matchups (Johnny vs. Zappa is at least 7-3, and let's not even talk about BBCT).

What makes this all the more amusing to me is that, especially when I play online (for reasons I'll have to explain in the yet-to-be-completed articles on online play), I don't care whether I win or lose. To me, it's all about getting stronger, no matter how many losses it takes to get there (or, in other words, taking losses today for the sake of winning in the future).

If you don't put your ego aside, you're never going to reach your full potential. Sure, you'll improve, and you might even get damn good! But as long as you hold the kind of attitude on display here, you're never going to reach a point where you can look at how far you've come and think: "There's no way I can possibly go further than this".

In conclusion: lol.

アニメじゃない〜

I did say I'd eventually post something not related to fighting games, right?

Now that I've moved in to a much better place than I was a few months ago, I'm enjoying amenities such as high speed internet. This would probably be much less of a big deal if it wasn't the first time I've ever had full, unabated access to it.

And what better way to take advantage of this newfound wealth of bandwidth than to download practically every anime series from the past decade you wanted to watch but never got the chance to, and many that you never previously cared about but are willing to give a shot?

Back when I was stealing wireless from my neighbors I had to pick wisely, because even a short series could take weeks on end to download. Likewise, I picked the series that stood out to me as being the most interesting (having a local library that stocked anime DVD's helped in determining this). Anyone who knew me back then will tell you that I was obsessed with anything and everything Initial D, because, well, I was. I definitely still stand by Fourth Stage as being one of the best anime ever made, but it's about time I found something at least as good to waste my time on.

So now I'm downloading pretty much every major shonen of the past decade (that I haven't already seen and already have a formative opinion on), a few of those slice of life shows, and a few shoujo/josei, even (I read a lot of shoujo manga back in middle school, lol).

In the meantime, my quest to (re)watch every UC Gundam will occupy me. I've already sledged through First Gundam (dear God, never again) and I'm currently well into Zeta, which is likely going to be a favorite of mine. I've only seen the first few episodes of ZZ, and it was a few years ago before I had watched any Gundam to completion, but I'm looking forward to it nonetheless. Late UC is probably going to be tedious as hell if the few episodes I've seen of Victory are any indication, but whatever. It's not like I'm going to be doing anything better with my free time.

I promise I'll keep any further posts about anime few and far between, but maybe if I come across a funny screencap or something I'll post it here.

Oh, and I might post about my experience at NEC soon. It was kind of mediocre, but that's why it makes for a good story.

Guess Who's Back, Back Again

I was getting burned out on fighting games for a bit. KOFXIII had already started to get a bit old even though I hadn't even entered a tournament yet, and Guilty Gear had turned into a rhythm game as far as I was concerned. I couldn't bring myself to want to play anything with two life bars. Sad times, I know.

So, I did what any sensible person would do and built a PC. Now, I was able to play Counter-Strike day and night like I did back when I was in middle school. Except now I had decent internet, a computer that could run it above 800x600, and a mouse that didn't suck. I got accused of hacking (more than once, lol), I defused some fucking bombs, but most importantly, I had fun. All was well.

Then one day, around the time I made my last post, I got a text from a guy I knew from a friend in high school asking if I wanted to play KOFXIII with him and a friend in Cupertino. Well, what better things was I going to do? Not fully knowing what to expect, I went along.

Little did I know, I was soon going to be a member of a fledgling South Bay fighting game community. One that wasn't tainted with false egos, bad attitudes or people that generally rub you the wrong way. Where people can be brutally honest all the time and it can be appreciated- met with laughter, even.

Recently, we've come up with a name for ourselves: The South Bay Cult.

It's just some guys in some guy's living room, but that's exactly what it needs to be. On the big screen, people get mad at Marvel 3 (and sometimes Marvel 2). At the kitchen table, KOFXIII and NGBC are holding it down. And last, but not least, the corner of the room has a four player SSBM setup, where "lag" means recovery.

The guy that hosts it is just the kind of guy that would host something like this; laid back but entertaining. Make no mistake though: even though it's a relaxed environment, everyone here is looking to improve and expand their horizons. Marvel/Smash players are now picking up KOF (thanks in no small part to yours truly), and I'm even thinking of putting more than ten minutes into Marvel 3 one of these days. Maybe.

If our idea for a stream takes off, I'll be sure to link it on the sidebar. You won't be disappointed, trust me.

This is all fine and dandy, but we're just getting started. The meat of this post has to do with my experience at two tournaments that were only a week apart from each other: Super Norcal Install and Norcal Regionals.

This is the part where I remember why I love fighting games and regain my motivation.

For me, SNCI was a test. I had to get as many wins as I possibly could in Guilty Gear against the best player in the room. Little did I know, the one and only Mike Z was there to promote his Suicide Girls fighting game. He seemed far more interested in playing GG, however; especially so once he started playing me.

Playing Mike Z showed me a few things. First and foremost, that American Potemkins are nothing to be afraid of, which I had already started to suspect awhile ago. None of them know the Johnny matchup (how it's supposed to be played, at least), and many of them take huge risks that they think are safe as a result. Secondly, that even the best American players lack defense in unfamiliar situations. Lastly, that you should never, ever, assume your opponent will respect you unless you have good reason to. Half of the reason I gave away as many rounds as I did was because I assumed he'd be afraid to press buttons after blocking a coin. Hah! In any case, I've learned my lesson, and I'll be ready the next time I play him.

In one of our later matches, I was able to get a reaction out of an otherwise stoic Mike Z. I had hit him with a counter hit 5K and I had full meter, so I just kept doing 5K 5HS MSDJ on him. Then, at the end, I did a Low Level 2 into TK Enkasu for corner knockdown. As soon as this happened:

Mike Z: "Was that intentional?"
Me: "Uh, yeah."
Mike Z: "That was cool as hell!"

Here I am, some fucking nobody that never leaves his house, being complimented on his Guilty Gear play by internet fanboy fap fodder Mike Z. Worse yet, for the easy part of an otherwise "match impractical" combo. What is this world coming to?

Once we sat down for dinner on Sunday night, we were able to talk for a bit. He's a cool guy; very passionate about his work yet unassuming. I had hoped for and expected as much.

Still, we weren't quite done with our hilarious exchanges just yet. Once I told him who I was on Dustloop:

Mike Z: "You're qwerty?"
Me: "Yeah."
Mike Z: "Oh God."
Me: *laughs* "What, have I made you mad before?"
Mike Z: "No, it's just that you post like an idiot on purpose."

At that point, I lost it.

There were other strong players at SNCI, but doing as well against Mike Z as I did was a rite of passage, especially considering how ridiculously hard I used to struggle in that matchup. I hope I get to play him again soon. Maybe at Frosty Faustings?

I arrived at NCR around 3PM on Saturday, not being registered for anything, just wanting to get some casuals in. I knew there would be VF5:FS there in some form, but I didn't expect five (!) setups open for casuals.

I went right in to FS having spotty memory as to how the system's changed from Ver. C. I remembered my good friend from NYC told me FS was essentially VF4's offense with VF5's defense, so I just pretended I was playing VF4 at first. And hey, it worked! I did a lot better than I thought I would, and ended up winning my first match against Dennis, who, make no mistake about it, is damn good at the game.

And I thought I was going to do bad.

It may have helped that my main, Jacky, isn't much different than how he was in Ver. C, and is in fact a bit stronger (people are saying he's high tier, which he already kind of was before). Regardless, that wasn't the only win I manged to get- far from it, in fact. The same people that were destroying me the last time I played them (which was literally four years ago, yikes) were now losing to my absolutely ruthless offense. However, the matches I lost were lost for one reason, and it's a fundamental weakness I have in every fighting game right now: defense.

Everyone that plays against me in VF tells me the same thing: "You fuzzy too much". Well, yeah, I don't wanna get thrown, dummy. I also don't want to eat a mid. So, why wouldn't I fuzzy?

Well, because if they choose to not do either of those things, you're kind of giving them a free opportunity to position themselves and at the very least put you back on the defensive. At most, they'll hit you with one of those stupid 16 frame throws that does 100 damage. Luckily, I only got hit by Wolftemkin Buster once or twice, but still.

Overall, I'm loving FS. Throws are still strong, just not in the stupid way they were in Ver. C. Low throws are way more threatening now, too. I was getting especially wrecked by Taka, who is genuinely infuriating to fight against because no canned strings score knockdown on him. I'm sure I'll get used to it once I have my hands on the game, but, you know, obligatory new game bitching.

As if I haven't already written enough, I still have to talk about KOF. I finally met and hung out with Laban, who is seriously one of the coolest people on the planet. We played some KOF98 on his absolutely shit-tastic laptop, in which he extensively bullied me with alt guard and O. Chris.

When we played KOFXIII, however, it was a different story. As he put it, I was making better decisions. I told him it was because KOFXIII is easy. And, honestly, it is. You don't have to have anywhere near the kind of knowledge to play footsies in XIII as you do in 98, simply because the hitboxes don't extend you as far (at least, that's what I suspect). Nothing against XIII, because both myself and Laban agree that it's a great game, but it really isn't as close to older KOF titles as many people seem to think it is.

During Top 8, I invited the Team Chaos guys to come downstairs and play casuals with us once the tournament was over. They came down at some point, but they didn't play as far as I know. Shame, because I would've loved to play against them all. Maybe they were tired and really wanted to go home. Maybe they didn't want to waste their time on scrubs. I'm glad they came; I just wish I had a chance to play against them. Oh well.

As for the immediate future, I'm afraid all I can say is that I will probably be attending Frosty Faustings (or, as I like to call it, Guilty Gear Christmas) since there's a good chance I'll be living in Chicago later this year. I may or may not make another post between now and when I leave. As always, I'm taking a wait-and-see approach. If I do, though, expect it to be an article about my single favorite mechanic in all of fighting games. I'll give you a hint: Guilty Gear and Virtua Fighter are the only games that have it.

Intermission

Don't worry, I'll be back soon.

Glitter Is Gold

Spreading the gospel of coinman has been rough in recent months. Between Mizuumi cutting the GG wiki on "plenty of notice" and Youtube uploads of various combo videos getting taken down, it seemed like the stars were aligning to discourage new Johnny players.

However, I was able to scour Yahoo for a cache of the old Johnny page (Google didn't have it, go figure) which will now be transcribed on the new Dustloop wiki; and for whatever reason, one of the accounts that had the best AC Johnny combo videos came back up after a few months of copyright infringement-induced time out.

So, at least for the time being, new Johnny players can watch this playlist on Youtube that I've made to make it easier than ever to learn Johnny. The goal of this playlist is to only contain relevant/recent videos; in other words, to prevent new players from picking up Day 1 strategies and combos.

KOF Training: Month 1

Well, XIII has only been out for two weeks, so I guess this technically isn't a month, but whatever.

Mostly just been grinding out HD combos in training mode like a real Mexican. I have Andy's Zaneiken -> Kuuhadan break loop down pat, as well as the confirms for it. Not terribly difficult stuff, mind you, but very useful.

For Shen I've just been practicing random HD combos, though I honestly don't think I'm even going to use most of them. I also am fundamentally against ending combos with explosion, but whatever.

I actually feel pretty silly over my troubles with Vice's HD combos because I entirely forgot that C shoulder combos into D Decide. Whoops. Well, now I know again and it's really piss easy.


I just finished playing 98 online for the first time in months. I played (and lost) about 40 games against Laban, which is typical fare whenever we play. While I know my sense of spacing is still weak in KOF (and bad habits carrying over from Guilty Gear isn't helping with that), I do feel that I am improving. I just need to play more, which isn't easy when you can't travel and your internet sucks.

After our matches, Laban told me to fundamentally change the way I approach my spacing game. This advice struck a chord with me because a large part of the reason KOF appealed to me when I first tried it last year was because it felt like a game that could change my fundamentals for the better. Of course, it would be much easier to adjust my playstyle if I knew exactly how my options were supposed to be used, but that's something I guess I'll have to work on.

It's times like this that I regret ever playing Guilty Gear. Had I started playing CVS2 when I first started playing fighting games instead, I'd not only have played against much better players, I'd be a much better player myself. Not to say that everything I've learned is fundamentally wrong, but unlearning 3.5 years of experience isn't an easy thing to do. But, if I didn't think I could do it, I wouldn't be trying. Here's to hoping I can play a lot of KOF this month.

~ KOF Is Here Again ~

Now that I'm able to practice KOFXIII, I don't think I'm going to be playing much of anything else for awhile.

Having not played it since April, I had forgotten a lot. While it didn't take me long to remember HD combos, it took me a few days to remember how to hit people. Once I went to RAMNation the gears started turning again and by the end of the night I was right where I left off months ago; mashing j.CD and hitting people out of stupid rolls.

One of the things I like about KOFXIII (and one of the reasons I fear for its life in the US) is that you can't bullshit your way out of the neutral game. It's not like UMVC3 where you just teleport or AE where you just divekick; you need to know your active and inactive hitboxes in order to win. You see a lot of CVS2-style footsies where people walk/run forward and then block low, which is exactly how I like the neutral game to be. The only real caveat to this is hops, but those are easy to beat as long as you know they're coming.

The one major problem I had with the arcade version of KOFXIII was that many of the characters simply weren't fleshed out. They had a few go-to pokes, maybe a good jump in, and one or two HD combos worth doing. What made that particularly annoying was that you had characters on the other end of the spectrum who simply had too many options (K' comes to mind) and then you had characters who were good for stupid reasons (Raiden and Elisabeth), neither of which were particularly fun to fight against.

Although the system changes made in the console version were all for the better, what really sets it apart from the arcade version is the revamped roster. So far, I can't say I've seen a single character that's as incomplete as arcade Mai or as braindead as arcade K'. The jury is still out, of course, but things are looking good.

Other significant improvements over the arcade version are the fixed width of standing inactive hitboxes and increased meter gain. Due to the width of the standing inactive hitboxes in arcade KOFXIII, crossups were particularly ambiguous and sometimes the attacking player would land on the side opposite of which he hit. This was particularly annoying for characters who confirm into command normals since, well, you don't know which side you're on until you hit the ground.

Increased meter gain is self descriptive, but it's easily the best change made to the system. Once people start doing HD combos with consistency, matches are going to be considerably shorter.


The port is arcade accurate and looks fucking amazing on a decent display, but it is lacking in features. Training mode is ripped straight from the arcade version, which is great if you want to practice combos and nothing else. However, the lackluster action settings don't make up for the lack of a record function, making it more or less useless for anything else. NEVERMIND, it does have a record function, you just have to manually map unused buttons to record and playback. I wasn't able to find it in the training mode menu and just assumed it wasn't there. I never had to set my buttons yet (just watched other people do it) so I didn't notice that the record and playback commands were there. MAH BAD.

Another annoying thing is that the game uses The Wrong Kind of button config, where you hover over a button and scroll through a list of commands to map it. The Right Kind of button config can be found in Guilty Gear and Blazblue, where you hover over a command and press the corresponding button to map it. In a tournament environment where everyone uses their own controller, this saves a tremendous amount of time and frustration. The fact that a game released in 2011 has the functionality of a game released in 2001 is just irritating and it's an appalling show of laziness on SNKP's part.

As predicted, the netcode is garbage. They announced just a few days before the game's release that it was using the same netcode as KOFXII. I was able to find one person with a 3 bar connection, and even then there were at least 5-6 frames of lag. Let's not even touch 1 or 2 bar connections.

On a final note, I'm pretty irritated this port doesn't support 4:3 native, when not only does the arcade version of KOFXIII support it, but so does the console port of KOFXII! Once again, SNKP shows just how clueless they are when it comes to porting games. At least they didn't force a sprite filter like they did with KOFXI, lol.

Shitty Blog Post #3

This blog hasn't exactly gotten off to the start I wanted it to. Between real life shit, joining the military and catching up with old friends, I just haven't had much time to play videogames, let alone give a flying fuck about this blog. I did have a small gathering at my house a few weeks back, but that's about all the games I've played since I last posted an entry.

That being said, I do still plan to pick up KOFXIII and I do intend to keep playing fighting games for as long as I'm motivated to improve; I just won't be nearly as dedicated to them as I thought I would be a few months ago. Which is fine by me, considering I have more important things to deal with at the moment.

I'm gonna try to make it to the GGAC tournaments at Southtown Arcade as much as I can between now and when I leave in May, but it's become damn expensive to get around the Bay. I may very well end up biking all the way from the bottom of the peninsula to downtown SF at this rate, lol.

In any case, stay tuned as I do intend to finish those articles I promised; it's just going to take longer than I said they would.

Shitty Blog Post #2

I don't want to give up my old consoles (namely the Saturn) once I get my new monitor. In order to use them on a VGA monitor, however, I'm going to need to get an upscaler. The more I looked around, the more the prospects of getting a SCART RGB -> VGA upscaler seemed bleak. There's always the XRGB3, but that thing costs as much as a candy cab.

Then I stumbled upon a new upscaler made by the same company as the XRGB3, Micomsoft. It's physically smaller and has less inputs/outputs, but it'll (probably) still get the job done. Price hasn't been announced yet, but they've said it's going to be cheaper than the XRGB3. The best part? It's called the fucking FLAME MEISTER.

So yeah, once I get my FLAME MEISTER, I'll be sure to let you all know just how good it is. It looks promising, though. If it upscales comparably to the XRGB3, keeps the lag below 1 frame and emulates scanlines, it'll be a winner in my eyes.

Netplay 101: Prologue

As you all know, I'm hyped for the console ports of KOFXIII and Gundam: EXVS. There is one thing, however, that is eerily looming over my anticipation of both releases. You may have already guessed from the title: I am talking about netcode.

Looking at the track records of both SNKP and Bandai-Namco, I can't help but be a little scared DEATHLY AFRAID of both games having shitty netcode. The 360 ports of KOF98UM and Garou: Mark of The Wolves have some of the worst netcode of any videogame I've ever played. If you didn't know any better, you could be forgiven for thinking you were playing them on a Dreamcast via dialup. It's that bad. Tekken 6 didn't exactly set the world on fire with its netcode, either.

KOFXIII is only a little over a month away from release, and there's still no word on how good the netcode is, or even if it's rollback or delay based. I and everyone else that's buying the game are going in completely blind as to what the online experience is going to be like. While I'll be disappointed if the netcode sucks, at least I'll still have arcades to play at. But what about the rest of the non-Japanese world?

While you may be able to live without netplay in Japan, it's essential for the rest of us. It's a good way to play with local players on short notice as well as a good way to expose yourself to unfamiliar matchups. I'll go more in depth on this at a later time, but needless to say netcode matters a whole hell of a lot if you have no other way to play.

The question we should all be asking fighting game developers is this: if I can't play my friends just 20 miles away without the game turning into a slideshow, then what's the point of even including online play? 

The excuses of "Japan has the best internet in the world" and "they're making games primarily for their domestic audience" are bullshit. First and foremost, a good connection doesn't fix shitty netcode. If you've ever watched a Godsgarden SSF4 netplay stream, you know that they conduct lag tests before every match (both players are in Japan, mind you). On average, they lag anywhere between 2 and 6 frames.

Additionally, if a game's being released in the US market, it's not unreasonable to expect netcode that performs acceptably on American internet connections. While GGPO is probably too much to ask for in most situations, could we at least start to see some steps in the right direction? Can we just phase out delay based netcode already? We won't miss it. Really, we won't.

I realize that there will always be a market for bad ports because people will always buy them, but this shit has really gotten out of hand. SSF4 and MVC3 both have bad netcode (MVC3 especially) and they're the two most popular fighting games in the US right now. This may give our friends in Japan who make these wonderful games the impression that either the netcode is fine or that we just don't care if it's bad; neither is true. If KOFXIII has bad netcode, I'll be playing KOF98 on GGPO instead. If Gundam has bad netcode, I'm going to rage because I'm getting a PS3 just for that game. Also, it's going to cost $100+ to import, lol.

Bottom line: if a game is unplayable online, it's unplayable to the majority of the world. Online play doesn't have to be perfect (nor is it ever going to be), but it should be good enough that you can still learn from it. It's clear that Japan wants to sell fighting games to the West; what's unclear is whether or not they care enough to give us a decent product we can play online. Hardcore fans of fighting games will buy them no matter what, but what reason does Joe Gamer have to play SSF4 over the latest COWADOODY if he can't even play it online? Plus, isn't Joe Gamer exactly who they're trying to win over by releasing these games in the West?

To be continued...

Shitty Blog Post #1

So I've decided on my recording setup for KOF and Gundam. It's modest, but it'll get the job done. 

• Flip camera I got for Christmas last year + tripod
• Viewsonic VX2268wm (which only lags by one frame)

While I know I'm going to rage at the colors (especially the blacks), it beats letterboxing. Also, that first part can be taken way out of context. I should be more careful.

I'll probably play my own music over the replays for Gundam, since I don't want to listen to ANIME OPS, and neither should you.

On a different note, if you're reading through the previous posts and noticing that they've been edited, it's probably because they have been. That last post in particular was a trainwreck because I went semicolon crazy for no reason.

Back in Action

I went to NCI on Saturday. While I didn't enter any tournaments for a few reasons (broke, headache, generally don't care), I did finally get my stick back. The first order of business?

The most important mod you can do to your stick.

Perhaps koogy and haunts will appreciate the free advertising, even if it means sharing space with a 90's skater brand that features ANIME GIRLS.

I hope some people laugh and give me a thumbs up, but more importantly I hope some people RAGE. Also, I'm so glad I discovered the macro lens on my camera. Not my fault it's so fucking vague! What the hell is a flower supposed to mean to me? Should've read the manual, lol.

While it was nice to play Guilty Gear with some people I hadn't played with in awhile, the highlight was easily playing Gundam NEXT on a cabinet for the first time. Oh, and Gamecenter EX is a pretty cool place. Good games, lots of space, lots of console cabs for new games that get console exclusive revisions. If you're in Norcal, you owe it to yourself to go at least once. I've still yet to go to Southtown, but I'm gonna try to make it this weekend for the KOFXIII ranbat.

Speaking of which, I did play one match of KOFXIII on Saturday — though I really didn't want to — and I paid for it dearly. I really hate going in to that game cold, lol. You think you're okay, and then the other guy does a fucking EX DP; and even if you manage to safe jump, you miss the fucking HD activation link (which isn't even hard, lol). Console release really can't come soon enough.

Now that I'm back home, I must say it's nice to be able to practice GG again. Even if I'm not really going to play the game for much longer, it's still therapeutic to be able to go back and grind training mode; I can't tell you how many lazy summer days going back to 2008 I've spent doing just that. Oh, and I'm learning a new character. I think I've already told one person, but I'll just give you the hint that he covers my two most hated matchups.

I might go back and edit that last entry tonight, maybe tomorrow. I don't know. It was something I wanted to do at the time, but now that I'm writing more important articles it's taken a back seat. If only that wretched site wasn't down when I was about to sit down and do it. Oh well.

Every journey...

I've been thinking about starting a blog for awhile now, and today I finally decided it was time.

There's two reasons I've decided on starting this blog. First and foremost: forums and the people who run them suck ass. Before now, I had no place to freely speak; on forums and in IRC channels, I always have to worry about who I'm offending and often times have to censor myself just so I won't get banned. This isn't really my fault, as most people that moderate forums and IRC channels are simply huge ass losers who will take any opportunity to exercise power over someone else, even if they didn't break any of the rules (which frankly mean fuck all on practically any forum; most of the times I've been banned from forums and IRC channels it's been because someone "didn't like me", or the catchall excuse of "trolling").

But now, I can freely respond to stupid people (and whoever else happens to catch my attention) while avoiding moderator circlejerks and the white noise of forums. The best part? I can remove their comments or outright disable comments if I ever wish to. Not that I'm planning on doing this very often; I'm reserving it for extreme cases in which the people "arguing" with me are the same type of obnoxious, know-it-all geeks that helped me develop my distaste for forums. Otherwise, feel free to leave comments on anything I post here; I'll treat you as well as you deserve to be treated.

Now don't let all that make you think I'm just a big meanie; I'm in fact a rather nice guy! The second reason I started this blog was so I could share my knowledge with the world and help promote a better understanding of fighting games. I plan to accomplish this by documenting my own progress as a fighting game player.