Everyone has a fighting chance
The folks over at VG BootCamp recently went live with another installment of Smash @ Xanadu from Xanadu Games in Baltimore, Maryland. These weekly broadcasts provide a great look at the region’s Smash community, with tonight’s stream focusing entirely on Super Smash Bros. for Wii U.
The stream is live below, but you can also head on over to Twitch to join the chat.
Watch live video from VGBootCamp on www.twitch.tv
Source: VG BootCamp
If you’ve yet to pick up a copy of Skullgirls Encore on Steam (and really, why haven’t you?), you can now do so on the cheap thanks to Humble Bundle. While not part of the core package, scoring Skullgirls and all of its downloadable content is as easy as meeting or exceeding the average donation, which as of publishing sits at $6.45.
Other titles featured in this bundle include Gang Beasts, a silly party brawler that was featured at Evo 2015’s indie showcase, and Sir, You Are Being Hunted, a title with so many genre descriptors that you might as well check it out for yourself and see what all the hoopla is about.
But that’s not all! Folks on Mac and Linux need not go without any longer, as Skullgirls Encore is now compatible with those operating systems. Interestingly enough, Humble Bundle themselves handled porting the title these additional platforms, so be sure to check it out.
This bundle will be available through October 13 at 11 AM PDT; take advantage before the two-week window is up!
Source: Humble Bundle
When a game has been around as long as Super Smash Bros. Melee, the community has an abundance of time not only to figure out how the game should be played at the highest of levels, but also to unearth all sorts of wacky interactions between characters, stages, menus, and more.
The folks at BandDGaming recently compiled a host of these strange occurrences, which we’ve included below. If you’ve got a good deal of Melee under your belt, you’ve probably run into a few of these at some point, but have you seen Yoshi turn pixel-height? Have you seen Link’s super jump? What about Samus’ extended grab?
If you see something that you’d like to perform at your next set of locals, the video includes details on how to do that as well.
Source: BandDGames via Smash Boards
Team Black Eye’s Nemo is arguably one of the most exciting players to watch in Ultra Street Fighter IV. His mastery of Rolento allows him to take the character to new heights, even while taking on other high-level competitors.
Latif can be described in much the same way. Back in 2011, he made a name for himself by taking out multiple top players with his C. Viper on the way to Evo’s grand finals. Since then, he’s continued to be one of the most dominant C. Vipers in the community despite a drop-off in event attendance.
These two giants have yet to clash in an official tournament setting, but Latif’s recent trip to Japan allowed him to visit Black Eye headquarters for a match against Nemo. Did Rolento roll over C. Viper, or did the latter burn kick her way to victory? Check out the video below to find out!
Latif was also able to check in with the folks at YUBIKEN during his stay in Japan, so be sure to go back and watch that footage if you haven’t already.
Source: Gostunv
While these days, a title like Street Fighter II is considered a classic, some of the younger fighting game fans out there may not know that there was a generation before even the original Street Fighter that introduced shades of gameplay that would eventually become our beloved genre. Among these was Karate Champ, itself often cited as the foundation for all fighters that would come after it.
Developed by Data East and released in 1984, Karate Champ featured elements both similar and distinct when compared to later titles. Though it boasted a wide array of moves and typical best-of-three sets, it steered closely to realistic martial arts championships by awarding points for clean hits instead of the health bar system that’s now standard.
After launching in arcades, Karate Champ eventually made its way to a variety of home platforms, including the Nintendo Entertainment System and Commodore 64. Recent years have seen ports spring up in Japan by way of the Wii’s Virtual Console and Hamster Corporation’s Arcade Archives on PlayStation 4, the latter of which just arrived in North America earlier today.
If you’re interested in checking out this unique piece of fighting game history, you can purchase Karate Champ on the PlayStation Network for $7.99. We’ve included a short gameplay video below for those of you unfamiliar with the title.
Source: PlayStation Network
If you enjoy picking apart high level play, or at least seeing high level play picked apart, there’s a good chance you’ve been keeping up with Jay Rego’s running series dedicated to the Stunfest 2015’s Ultra Street Fighter IV grand finals between Evil Geniuses’ Momochi and Daigo Umehara of Mad Catz. In this fourth video, which went live earlier today, Rego breaks down the match that forced a bracket reset at the French tournament, allowing Daigo some space to breathe.
Since Rego has already spent so much time with footage from this set, he’s able to provide a plethora of information regarding the tendencies that each player has shown so far, allowing viewers a glimpse into the minds of these two champions. The analysis also includes a segment dedicated to an option select that Momochi brings out, using training mode to demonstrate the situations it covers as well as how Daigo could have escaped it.
If you missed Rego’s breakdowns of the first, second, or third games between these titans, you can catch up on those by following their respective links.
Source: Jay Rego
Combo videos are a great for picking up new ways to dole out damage with your favorite characters, but the speed, the cinematic nature (or lack thereof), and the general level of practicality of presented combos play major parts in the amount of information that can be gleaned from these often entertaining bits of footage.
Hitbox|Dustin’s latest M.O.D.O.K. video centers around adding Sentinel’s Drone assist to extend combos in a handful of ways. Since this video aims to teach rather than entertain, viewers will find handcam footage, slow motion replays, and explanations from Dustin himself as to what’s going on on the screen during these practical strings.
You’ll quickly notice that Dustin performs each of these combos on a hitbox (which makes sense), so those M.O.D.O.K. players out there who have chosen to eschew the joystick will be able to see the exact sort of button sequences necessary to add these combos to their game, but the information should still help those who use more traditional input methods as well.
Be sure to hit up the video’s description for time stamps and transcripts.
Source: Dustin
When thinking about BlazBlue, the Middle East isn’t exactly the first thing that comes to mind. That said, the region actually has a vibrant scene for the game.
To help put a spotlight their scene, the TheBlazMeijins recently put together a fantastic BlazBlue: Chronophantasma EXTEND combo video featuring contributions from a number of regional players. Below, you’ll find some impressive work from folks like Prof.molokhia, Cerbers, Aoiken, Moom1, Meeso_bb, Llroody, Buya, Metrance, DrkSoMa, White_CloudXZA, and Crimson Kusanagi.
Be sure to keep an eye on TheBlazMeijins for more content from the region.
Source: TheBlazMeijins via huey253
Dee Jay is a characters generally considered to be on the lower end of the tier list in Ultra Street Fighter IV. Despite various tweaks across numerous patches, he’s still nowhere near the characters that typically win tournaments.
But that doesn’t mean Dee Jay isn’t capable of doing impressive things in the right hands. In his latest combo video, Ricardo Roman demonstrates some practical and damaging combos from the Jamaican street fighter for use both mid-screen and in the corner. Check it out and let us know what you think.
Source: Ricardo Roman
Super Smash Bros. for Wii U catches plenty of flack for the speed at which its matches unfold. At their slowest, these matches look something like the top 8 bout between Dabuz and Abadango at APEX earlier this year. That particular set included one round that ran to the final countdown and two more going to Sudden Death–a nearly 25 minute set altogether.
Bringing this up isn’t meant as a dig at the level of play that took place during that match, but more at the nature of that particular matchup. A character as projectile-heavy as Pac-Man fighting someone who can absorb them like Rosalina & Luma is bound to be a drawn out battle, and is certainly not for the faint of heart.
But that doesn’t mean that every round that takes place in the most recent Smash has to go to time, or even last more than a couple of minutes. Below, we’ve included a video of a recent Captain Falcon ditto played between Team SoloMid’s ZeRo and False, showing just how fast the game can move under the right circumstances.
Captain Falcon already adds an undeniable degree of speed to any match that he joins, but when he’s on both the giving and receiving end of his down-air spikes and forward-air sweet spots, an entire best-of-three set can be over in the blink of an eye.
Source: Rush Hour Smash