Month: January 2015

As one of the largest tournaments our scene has, many looked upon Super Smash Bros. Melee’s inclusion at Community Effort Orlando in 2014 as a sign the title had finally received wide acceptance from the fighting game community at large. While the franchise previously made appearances at Evolution, it’s bleeding out into other yearly staples was a good sign for its resurging community.

But that love wasn’t only shown by tournament organizer Alex Jebailey; Smash players showed up to the event in droves, giving him enough motivation to include Melee at Community Effort Orlando 2015. In his official announcement, Jebailey further states that the Smash ballroom this year will be double the size of the area it was given during Community Effort Orlando 2014 to accommodate the larger numbers he’s expecting.

When asked about Project M’s future at the event, however, Jebailey was less than optimistic.” As of now, [Project M] unfortunately will not be [at Community Effort Orlando 2015] in any official capacity. [Super Smash Bros. for Wii U] will most likely be added as well, so running three Smash games at an event with 8+ other games wouldn’t work well because of resources and time.”

A popular mod for Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Project M was developed give the slower Wii title the same competitive edge that continues to make Super Smash Bros. Melee so exciting. Sadly, due to its unofficial status, the title’s tournament support has been dropping in recent months, even at events that cater specifically to Smashers.

The organizers behind Apex, a tournament series regarded as one of the most prestigious Smash competitions around, made waves late last year by deciding to not include Project M in the Apex 2015 lineup. While no reason was given for the title’s disappearance, many surmised that Nintendo’s heightened involvement in the competitive scene may have had something to do with it.

In any case, Community Effort Orlando 2015 is shaping up to be an interesting mixture of both old and new Smash scenes, and it should be fun to see how newcomers getting their start in the recent Wii U release take to the big stage.

Community Effort Orlando 2015 is scheduled for June 26-28 in Orlando, Florida.

Source: Alex Jebailey via SmashBoards

While a lot of the discussion surrounding Tekken 7 has, for better or worse, focused on the characters that will be making up its cast, Bandai Namco Games’ Katsuhiro Harada took to Twitter recently to discuss another interesting aspect of the game that has to do with its camera.

According to the longtime director, a feature is currently being developed for Tekken 7 that will allow both competitors to play on the same side of the screen. Though still being tested internally, this mirroring of the fighting plane is an interesting addition that hasn’t seen play in fighters up until now.

As a fair majority of competitors use the single-player training mode to practice their combos and such early on, this will end worries over occupying the first player position when taking part in serious matches. On the flip side, however, it also removes some of the impetus to learn strings on the right-hand side of the screen.

Obviously, this feature will only be available on setups that utilize two screens, such as head-to-head arcade setups or online matches, but it still shows the lengths Tekken’s developers are willing to go to in order to make their titles as comfortable for players as possible.

Tekken 7 is scheduled to launch in Japanese arcades sometime this March.

Source: Katsuhiro Harada via Avoiding the Puddle