Author: Ian "iantothemax" Walker

Two years ago, the east coast saw a new major stroll into North Carolina courtesy of some of the region’s biggest names in tournament organization. The Fall Classic served a variety of purposes, most important its filling of specific gaps across both the yearly event calendar and geographical landscape.

So, with a pair of successful tournaments under their belts, the minds behind The Fall Classic will (of course) be returning this year, and a recent announcement just made your planning a whole lot easier.

Co-organizer Eric Small took to Facebook earlier today to reveal that The Fall Classic 2015 is scheduled for September 11-13. While it’s a bit sooner than the event’s regular October spot, it will still be held in Raleigh, North Carolina, smack dab in the middle of the United States’ east coast.

More information is expected to drop soon, so stay tuned.

Source: Eric Small

Back in my day, when video game developers wanted to tease something, they usually took out a spread in some physical publication, smashed together a silhouette and possibly an unbearably awesome pun, and called it a day. It could be frustrating, sure, but the small glimpse still felt tangible somehow.

While the Killer Instinct crew adhered to this standard in their season two trailer, revealing every new fighter with converstation-stirring shadows, they also seem to have quite the fascination with the lower extremities. Back before she was fully revealed, Microsoft Studios creative director Adam Isgreen saw fit to give fans a single-leg preview of the returning fighter, and he’s repeated that strategy with another upcoming character.

Omen, who has also been referred to as the Herald of Gargos, will join the expanding Killer Instinct roster later this month, bringing with him a strong zoning game that combines unique tools with a few he pulled from Jago during his time as a possessing spirit.

But who cares about all that? Here’s his leg.

Sweet.

Source: Adam Isgreen, tip via Miguel O.

A lot of attention has been placed on PlayStation 4 peripherals lately due to their high demand, making it easy to forget that a number of fighting games will be following Killer Instinct to the latest Microsoft platform as well.

While many of the PlayStation controllers released thus far feature dual-compatibility with Sony’s previous console, we haven’t seen that function transfer to Xbox One arcade sticks like Mad Catz’ first Tournament Edition 2 or Razer’s Atrox. Fortunately, it appears as if that’s going to change in the near future.

Set to coincide with the release of Mortal Kombat X, the folks over at Performance Designed Products (or PDP) will be releasing yet another fightpad for players who prefer the more compact form they provide over traditional arcade sticks. In addition to some very competitive-minded features like the default D-Pad and microswitch buttons, PDP’s controller will also include a toggle that allows it to be used on both Xbox One and Xbox 360 (similar to the switch we’ve used in the sticks we previously mentioned).

This information comes to us from CNET’s Brian Tong, who was given an exclusive preview of the controller during his visit to this year’s installment of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. His quick video demonstration can be found below.

Sometime after the above video was released, Mad Catz community manager Mark “MarkMan” Julio jumped online to get ahead of the inevitable, “When’s Mad Catz?” questioning, mentioning that this licensing isn’t exclusive to PDP.

“We have already been working on making an Xbox One/360 compatible FightStick,” he revealed, leading us to believe an official announcement may be coming soon.

As for how soon? Julio only says to stay tuned.

Sources: Brian Tong, Mark “MarkMan” Julio

Of the numerous discussion topics inherent to the fighting game community, one of the most pressing has to be, “Is this anime?” While titles like Guilty Gear and BlazBlue are most notable for adhering to the airdasher sub-genre’s requirements (which differ wildly from person to person), some see fit to also add the Marvel and King of Fighters series into the mix on occasion.

Now, thanks to one very unlikely source, we may finally have a concrete answer to this incredibly important question with regards to one of these fighters.

As they are often wont to do, Steam recently went live with a new round of sales on their digital gaming platform. This time around, they all subscribe to a loose anime theme, from Recettear’s cutesy item shop adventure to the bird-dating simulator Hatoful Boyfriend. The aforementioned BlazBlue also makes two appearances, with older entries Calamity Trigger and Continuum Shift EXTEND available for $2.49 and $22.49 respectively.

Interestingly enough, the recent PC port of King of Fighters XIII is also included in the mix. While it may not feature a ton of the gameplay mechanics seen in typical anime titles, strong arguments can be made that its aesthetic definitely fits the bill.

All joking aside, King of Fighters XIII Steam Edition can now be purchased at the incredibly low price of $7.49, a 75% discount from its normal $29.99. If older titles are more your speed, however, you can also grab King of Fighters ’98 Ultimate Match Final Edition for $11.99.

These sales will only be in place until January 12, so be sure to take advantage before then.

Source: Steam via RPG Site

New console generations always come with the need for compatible controllers, and nothing much has changed with the release of Sony’s PlayStation 4 and Microsoft’s Xbox One.

For the fighting game community in particular, Mad Catz has been on the forefront of providing arcade sticks for these new consoles with their line of Tournament Edition 2 models, which so far have come in Killer Instinct, Ultra Street Fighter IV, Persona 4 Arena Ultimax, and Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- flavors. The latter in particular has seen incredibly high demand, making it nearly impossible for folks who didn’t pre-order to get their hands on one.

Earlier today, Mad Catz went live with a special restock of 100 sticks, sold through their online shop on a first come, first served basis. They were gone within fifteen minutes.

For a bit more insight into the mad rush that occurred this afternoon and their plans for future releases, we contacted community manager Mark “MarkMan” Julio for some specifics.

“It was insane,” he divulged. “The traffic/demand for the product due to the lack of options of [PlayStation 4] sticks on the market is extremely obvious by now. That being said, we are doing our best to make more of the Mad Catz version of the [Tournament Edition 2] and the Ultra Street Fighter IV one available again.” During the rush, which saw outages to their website from high traffic, Julio likened it to the hype created by limited edition sneaker sales.

The sticks he mentioned, which work on both PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 3, will be restocked sometime in late February or early March, depending on how their production and subsequent shipping pan out.

“We’ve ordered a lot more for that time frame and hopefully everyone will be satisfied then. We really want to apologize to everyone who tried to order and wasn’t able to get one.”

Mad Catz isn’t the only developer having a hard time keeping PlayStation 4 sticks in stock either. Similar controllers sold by companies like HORI are becoming increasingly hard to come by, though alternatives will be available sometime next month.

After the restock’s selling out this afternoon, Julio took to Twitter to talk to his followers directly, saying, “I’ll be talking to whomever I need to to try and make more Xrd sticks possible in the near future.”

With Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- out now and titles like Mortal Kombat X and Street Fighter V on the horizon, demand for PlayStation 4 compatible arcade sticks definitely won’t be slowing down anytime soon. Fortunately, these recent events have made it hugely apparent that the market for such peripherals exists, which means it’s likely that we’ll see production shifted towards making larger quantities available at regular intervals in the future.

What makes the Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- stick so great apart from working on PlayStation 4? Be sure to check out our official review and find out!