Sometimes, it’s difficult to keep track of — much less get the time to try out — all the exciting and promising FGC-leaning projects in the indie gaming world. If you’re going to Evo 2018 this year, you have perhaps the greatest chance you’ll ever have to see the world of Indie Fighting Game Development — and its all thanks to Media Indie Exchange:
— Media Indie Exchange (@indieexchange) July 24, 2018
Media Indie Exchange is an organization dedicated to promoting developers of indie games, and their presence at Evo 2018 will help raise awareness of some 20+ titles, fighter or otherwise. If you see something that strikes your fancy in the trailer above, make sure you find your way to the MIX showcase at this year’s Evo!
AnimEvo 2018 will be the site of the culmination of the Windjammers Flying Power League, the world’s most unlikely esports tournament circuit announced at the end of last year for Windjammers. It has been a wild ride for the 20+ year old NEO GEO title, which has seen unprecedented new life thanks to the league and to DotEmu’s PlayStation 4 port in August of ’17.
The free entry 150+ bracket was already set to be historic for no other reason the largest Windjammers bracket ever. (The extra $3000 in pot bonuses certainly help, too.) But WWE, DotEmu, and Franke Sisto have worked together to raise the ante by putting a $150 bracket-bounty on WWE superstar and host of popular gaming channel UpUpDownDown, Xavier Woods.
It’s no coincidence that the electrifying Xavier Woods will serve as a moving target in the tournament — he’s been a vocal advocate for the game on his channel, and Windjammers top 16 will be streamed on his channel UpUpDownDown. After that, top 4 will be streamed on the Evo side stage Twitch stream — and considering the best Windjammers players in the world will be converging on Evo 2018 to claim its top prize, you won’t want to miss this ’90s neon-colored spectacle.
Evo 2018 runs August 3rd-5th at the Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Mark “MarkMan” Julio will be showing off the highly-anticipated 3D fighter with the wildly popular Aris of Avoiding The Puddle. The stream will start at 12:00 p.m. PT on ATP’s Twitch stream. In addition to being the most well-known Voldo player in the world, Aris was the SoulCalibur II world champion — his insight and reaction should prove valuable (and interesting) in ways no one else’s would (or could).
By now, it’s common knowledge that Lee Chaolan’s toolkit in Tekken 7 is built around his wall carry potential in juggles. Where some intermediate players may fall short with the adopted Mishima, though, is how they cash out once they reach the wall.
Lee can consistently tack on 30+ damage with proper wall positioning and awareness — that’s a staggering 17% just for paying attention. And if you’re ready to put in the extra work, you can push out even more damage versus the Bears, thanks to their unfortunate hurtboxs.
Are you in the Oakland, CA region, or have the means to get there in the next few hours? The Level Up Series will be hosting some casual setups for the in-development indie fighter Punch Planet. These setups will be the first opportunity the public will get to try out their soon to be released Brawlin’ Alien, Maxx:
The ESAOakland location is located in Jack London Square at 255 2nd St. Oakland, CA. Signups/Casuals start at 6PM PDT.
If you aren’t able to make it out to Wednesday Night Fights but have a flight to Evo 2018, don’t sweat: Sector K Games will be demoing Maxx there, too.
We reached out to Sector K Games and sadly were unable to confirm if Punch Planet will get any stream presence tonight — but don’t let that stop you from stopping by WNF’s variety stream, you never know what may show up!
Sanane has emerged as a tricky powerhouse in Fighting EX Layer. Her ability to cross-up at virtually any point in the middle of her rekka, combined with her versatile grappler/zoner hybrid toolkit, makes her a huge threat — so long as you’re converting all your options into worthwhile damage.
If you’re not sure where to start with the Naginata user, though, then sadisticupid‘s latest tutorial should help you get started. These are excellent combos to jump right into FEXL with — once you get a feel for how her Rekkas and super cancels work, you can turn any correct guess into respectable damage.
Last time we checked in with in-development sci-fi shmup fighter Gravity Breakers, developers Gremlin ENT were implementing a new grappler to the demo available through itch.io. That’s exciting in itself, but the experimental indie fighter’s announcement today pushes its content to the next level: legendary composer MEGATEN, a.k.a. Shinji Hosoe, will be working to create the theme for the core game.
If you’re not familiar with Shinji’s name, don’t worry: you absolutely are familiar with his work. His work has appeared in an absurd amount of titles, including Tekken 6, Ridge Racer, Fighting EX Layer, Street Fighter EX, and more.
Gremlin ENT also announced the development of the latest version of their in-progress game, version 0.3.5. For more information on the game itself, make sure to visit gravitybreakers.com.
With the stranglehold Nintendo has on the platform-fighter market — not-to-mention another Super Smash Bros. title on the way — Smash players’ desire for GameCube-style controllers is near-insatiable. HORI knows this.
These semi-translucent designs from HORI are themed after Mario, Pikachu, and The Legend of Zelda. As of now, they are set for Japanese release in October — and one would expect the American market would soon follow, with Super Smash Bros. Ultimate due in December.
“How do you expand and add more moves to your repertoire?”
The “FiveMoves” handle is back in frame, and you know what that means — it’s time for another episode of “Think, Don’t Mash!” (This is assuming, of course, you saw episode one.)
The building blocks of episode one were there to give us the simplest game plan possible to start playing Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition. The moves added on in today’s episode help us deal with more situations than before — introducing concepts of frame traps, panic buttons, and combos in the process.
The great thing about Tekken 7 is that there is a whole world full of exceptional players, simply too many to talk about in one post. We’ve chosen two players to analyze from each region of the Tekken World Tour to highlight. Here’s some big names to consider when thinking about who might win Evo 2018:
South Korea
If you haven’t kept up too much with Tekken’s tournament scene since… ever, then the most important fact that we need to get out of the way is that South Korea runs shop. The Evo 2017 champ was Hyunjin “JDCR” Kim, and if (for whatever reason) he doesn’t win it again, then a quick glance over at the TWT leaderboard shows he has plenty of fellow countrymen ready to take his place. Globally, the top 7 players are all Koreans, 4 of which are either former TWT world champs or Evo champions. The safest bets for who will win Evo this year are, in our eyes and statistically, these players below:
Hyunjin “JDCR” Kim
The Case For: JDCR finds himself with the same opportunity he denied his teammate Jinwoo “Saint” Choi of at last year’s Evo: if he wins Evo 2018, he will be the first Korean to win back-to-back Tekken games, and only the second player to have done so at all in the world. (The first? America’s Christopher “Crow” Villarreal in ’05-’06. It’s been over a decade!) So there’s a lot of pressure on JDCR to not just win, but to make history. His robotic and calculated playstyle has frustrated players around the world for years, and when we talk about tiers, its usually been based around his tournament performance and opinions on the game. It’s hard to rule out the man that is at the very center of every Tekken conversation.
The Case Against: The longer Tekken 7 stays out, the more familiar everyone becomes with JDCR’s main weapon of choice, the tournament-standard pick of Dragunov. Though JDCR has other characters in his pocket (like Heihachi, for example), he’s been turning in somewhat inconsistent results at several tournaments lately, including a shocking 9th place at Combo Breaker and a recent complete shutout against Kkokkoma at VSFighting 2018. One has to wonder if the Dragunov over-saturation in worldwide tournaments has finally caught up with him.
Jay Min “Knee” Bae
The Case For: Knee is our odds-on pick to win Evo 2018. He’s dominating the TWT leaderboards far beyond any other player, and he’s easily the most appropriate foil for JDCR this year. Knee has the same precision and refined power that JDCR posesses, but plays a much wider selection of the cast. He’s not above pulling out a character no one has seen him play before, nor is he unwilling to take next-level risks. A grand final between Knee and JDCR, given JDCR’s victory at Evo 2017 and diminishing returns in the shadow of Knee’s TWT rise, would be the ultimate bookend to this story arc.
The Case Against: Knee’s biggest weakness is also one of his strengths: he frequently plays against other South Koreans and he’s incredibly well-traveled. This isn’t a weakness unique to him, but for someone whom is dominating the tournament scene at the moment — and for someone whom seems to live and breath Tekken to the point that he can random select against most of the world and win — it’s a struggle to think of anything other then this: the best players in the world right now are all in South Korea, and they all know Knee better than anyone else.
North America
Ah, America. Time and time again America has been hovering in the shadow of South Korea, always threatening overtake them in Tekken and always falling just short on the world’s largest stages. At one point in time this was easy to write off thanks to S. Korea getting blessed with the game two years before the West — but time has passed and America’s performance has only improved against Koreans, so there’s never been a better time for these players to prove themselves. Like Korea, America has more than their fair share of players that can jump to the top — JimmyJTran, SperoGin, Speedkicks, JoeyFury just to name a few — but these are the two we’re most intrigued to see take a win at Evo this year:
Hoa “Anakin” Luu
The Case For: Anakin has easily been one of, if not the, strongest and most consistent players in America. He has a wide working knowledge of the cast, but tends to stick with safer tournament picks (Jack, Paul). He also has wins under his belt against the Koreans — easily the most important thing you can say about any player from here on out on this list. Consistency alone will always make Anakin a favorite, but the real question is: does he have a secret weapon ready to get himself over the finish line?
The Case Against: Anakin can be a bit of a risk taker — perhaps it’s no surprise the man willing to throw away his TWT spot in 2017 to learn more about Tekken is also the same man willing to throw a debugger at point blank range. Sometimes these gambles pay off big, like when he pulled out said-debugger in his win above against JeonDDing. Sometimes they don’t. Either way, Anakin is a must watch in the tournament, if for no other reason to see this experienced veteran play from the heart.
Terrelle “Lil Majin” Jackson
The Case For: 2018 has been a fantastic year for Lil Majin. This can be most clearly seen in his unbelievable losers bracket run at CEO 2018, defeating Rickstah, Shadow, P. Ling, JimmyJTran, and Korean Pro Dimeback. Momentum is on his side — and as one of the best King players in the world, the crowd probably will be, too. (This completely unbiased author certainly will be.)
The Case Against: He’s a King main ’til the bitter end, and if his opponent has experience versus his character (or just has a pocket Ling Xiaoyu) then Majin has an uphill battle. This might be referencing 2017 Majin too much, though — if anything, his godlike run in losers bracket showed that he’s been working hard to make up for some of King’s flaws in top tier play.
Europe
Europe is the true wild card region, rarely-if-ever interacting with players in America or Korea during their tournament season. This doesn’t make them weaker — Tissuemon’s blistering performance made this incredibly clear when he took 4th at the Tekken World Tour 2017 — but it does make them perhaps the hardest region to predict. They also have the strangest character meta of any region, with several top players picking odd mid tiers like Lili, Asuka, and Akuma. Nothing makes the odd character ecosystem of Europe more clear than this fact: There are no Jack players in the top 10 of Europe’s TWT 2018 leaderboards!
Shimon “Tissuemon” Kawai
The Case For: If Tissuemon attends Evo 2018, all bets are off. He’s the current EU Points leader and a tournament veteran dating back to Tekken 5. He has defeated Korean legends Help Me and Knee in older games. There’s no reason to think he can’t do again; particularly since his main, Master Raven, is a character not well-represented in the tournament scene.
The Case Against: Tissuemon proved with his 4th place finish during last years TWT that he is above most players — but floundered when he ran into JDCR and Saint. His biggest hurdle is the same from that event — he’s got to progress past the top tier Koreans. As good as he is, part of his problem is that he simply drops too many combos — a huge minus when his character depends entirely on her absurd damage output. There’s also mounting evidence that Tissuemon, despite his point lead, is slipping in the EU as well — longtime rival Asim, for example, was finally able to overcome Tissuemon at VSFighting 2018 this past weekend.
Kane “Kaneandtrench” Heartfield
The Case For: If Kane is able to make it to Evo 2018, he will be a dangerous wildcard like no other. One of the world’s best Yoshimitsu players, he’s shown that he can handle the best players in the world, despite few tournament appearances. He has a brutal combination of wits and gimmicks that are difficult to prepare for. Kane is always my favorite for pulling upsets and blowing people’s minds in the process with his unorthodox style. And if Yoshi isn’t enough, rumour has it Kane has a Miguel now…
The Case Against: Yoshimitsu’s stock falls considerably after you know the setups that are coming, and there’s at least one Korean that Kane has famously run into and fallen against: JDCR. It wasn’t a total blowup, but you have to think that if JDCR was ready then, time has only made him stronger in this match-up.
So, are you ready to see some Tekken history? Evo 2018will take place August 3-5, 2018 at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, Nevada.
