Last weekend saw some intense action take place during Northwest Majors 7, with the Ultra Street Fighter IV tournament in particular featuring great competition thanks to top players from the west coast, and the east coast, Canada, and Japan.
Notable players included the Evil Geniuses trio of Justin Wong, Ricky Ortiz, and PR Balrog, NYChrisG of Tempo Storm, Canada Cup Gaming’s Air, Native Impact of Always Godlike, Pandora House’ LPN, Arturo “Sabin” Sanchez of Team Spooky, and Japanese T. Hawk master KoujiKOG.
For those who either missed the tournament or who simply want to watch some of the matches again, Khaos Gaming recently started uploading top sixteen replays. You can check out the finals matches below, and then head on over to the official playlist for the rest.
As part of their new tournament-supporting efforts, the folks at Microsoft has made a special Killer Instinct bundle available to the public. For twenty bucks, players will be able to get their hands on the limited Shadow Jago skin as well as a bunch of in-game currency for buying unlockables.
All proceeds collected with this and other downloadable content will go into a special community fund with a maximum cap of $100,000, set aside to boost the prize pools of various Killer Instinct tournaments. The largest portion of this–up to $50,000–will go to Evo 2015.
Not only that, but should the community reach the upper limit of this promotion, the Killer Instinct developers will flesh out Shadow Jago’s gameplay, making him a unique character instead of just a skin.
Even though this bundle appeared a day before the fundraiser is set to begin, don’t worry about purchasing it as soon as possible; all the money collected will still go towards the community pot.
Killer Instinct’s Shadow Jago community bundle will be available until May 14.
It’s easy to slip into the habit of keeping a single punish on deck for any time an appropriate situation arises. Just because the easy, go-to punish may work to drain the health of opponents when they make mistakes by producing reliable damage, it doesn’t mean that it’s necessarily the best for every situation. Tacking, say, an extra neutral jump fierce on the front of that punish, under the right circumstances, could lead to a stun and a subsequent victory where a loss would have been the result if the standard punish had been employed.
The video below, from GroundedSF, focuses on the sorts of punishes that Cody players can use in a variety of situations. These take into account invulnerability frames, start up times, damage, and stun output–pretty much everything that could stand to make one punish superior to another. Even though this video is dedicated to Cody, this is something that every player, even those who shy away from shank-wielding fugitives, should keep in mind to help take their play to the next level.
This week’s installment of Next Level Battle Circuit is now streaming live courtesy of Team Spooky. As always, the event is being broadcast from its namesake, Next Level Arcade, in New York City. Tonight, they’ll be running Ultra Street Fighter IV and newcomer Mortal Kombat X, featuring some of the best players on the east coast.
If you would like to check out these weekly tournaments, be sure to head on over to Next Level Arcade and take part every Wednesday. The address has been included below.
4013 8th Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11232
The stream is currently live below, but you can also visit Twitch to join the chat. Full brackets will be made available through Challonge.
The folks over at VGBootCamp 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, and tonight’s installment will feature competition in Super Smash Bros. Melee and Super Smash Bros. 64.
If you’re interested in some Smash Bros. action, be sure to tune in. The stream is live below, but you can also head on over to Twitch to join the chat.
We recently learned quite a bit about Skullgirls 2nd Encore, the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita port of Lab Zero Games’ indie fighter. While fans won’t be treated to a free upgrade if they own an older version, these upcoming releases will feature cross-buy (meaning a purchase of the console title will net you the handheld one and vice versa) and cross-platform netplay, allowing even those on PlayStation 3 to enjoy the influx of new players.
But that’s not all. Earlier today, the developers updated the game’s official website with a listing of all the new features included in Skullgirls 2nd Encore. The most noteworthy in an aesthetic sense is certainly the fully-voiced story, but Lab Zero is also looking to make great strides with a brand new trial mode.
Unlike other games, which often throw somewhat obscure concepts and strings at players, Skullgirls’ trials will incorporate competition-ready combos, from basic bread and butters to more complex fare, in an effort to work newcomers into the fold gradually with useful information.
All in all, Skullgirls 2nd Encore is shaping up to be a worthy addition to the franchise’s tumultuous timeline. More details on the port’s new content can be found by following the link below.
After placing a spotlight on Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 last year with a huge exhibition between co-organizers Joe “LI Joe” Ciaramelli and Matt “Shock” Luongo, East Coast Throwdown 2015 will continue showing love to the NetherRealm community by making Mortal Kombat X the tournament’s finale.
Yes, you read that right. While nearly every other tournament across the world is scheduling Street Fighter to close out the event, Scorpion and company will be bringing this year’s East Coast Throwdown to a close.
But that’s not all. The organizers will also be providing a $1500 pot bonus to Mortal Kombat X’s prize pool, along with smaller boosts for Ultra Street Fighter IV, Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, and Super Smash Bros. Melee.
With the ridiculous number of fighting game tournaments starting to pack into every calendar year, it only makes sense that organizers are trying their hardest to craft a unique experience and identity for their events. Community Effort Orlando saw great success with their wrestling motif and ran with it, NorCal Regionals features an incredibly heavy focus on Capcom titles, Final Round can always be expected to give Tekken the shine it deserves, and now East Coast Throwdown is looking to set themselves up as the premier location for Mortal Kombat competition.
After seeing the insane amount of attention streamers received from folks both inside and outside the community upon Mortal Kombat X’s launch, it should be interesting to see how well those numbers transition to a much different setting.
East Coast Throwdown 2015 is scheduled for June 13-14 in Morristown, New Jersey. Further information can be found through the event’s official website.
Source: East Coast Throwdown, special thanks to Arturo Sanchez for bringing this to our attention.
Back during this year’s hectic April Fool’s Day, Bandai Namco dropped a video featuring popular Tekken characters joining the world of Galaga to participate in some vertical shooting instead of the fisticuffs they are known for. While many likely wrote that off as a clever joke, it appears as if the mashup is indeed real and will be arriving on mobile devices incredibly soon as a way of celebrating the fighting franchise’s twentieth anniversary.
Famitsu reports that the developers are planning to release Galaga Tekken sometime tomorrow, April 30, at the completely reasonable price of free. As the new screenshots below highlight, players will be able to control characters like Heihachi, Lili, and Asuka as they blast fellow cast members from the sky. Though the sprites are a little hard to make out, the game also appears to feature cameos from King, Alisa, Panda, and newcomer Lucky Chloe.
Galaga Tekken will be released for both iOS and Android devices, though its availability outside of Japan is still up in the air.
Back in February, we learned that the organizers behind the annual KVO tournament series had partnered with Team St1ckbug to foster a greater relationship between the Japanese and North American fighting game communities, resulting in a larger-than-usual event with an impressive eleven-game lineup. But it appears that wasn’t the only exciting collaboration set for this year’s competition.
According to new details from Alan “St1ckbug” Bakes himself, KVO x TSB 2015 has been designated as an official ARC REVOLUTION CUP qualifier for Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- and BlazBlue: Chronophantasma EXTEND, which will allow first-place finishers automatic entry into Arc System Works’ prestigious event. Due to scheduling, they will also be acting as the very first ArcRevo qualifier, kicking off what is sure to be an exciting few months of fighting game action.
The joint event will also feature qualifiers for Evo 2015’s Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- and Persona 4 Arena Ultimax tournaments and offer ranking points for Capcom Cup 2015.
KVO x TSB 2015 is scheduled to take place this weekend, May 2-4, in Osaka, Japan. More details can be found through their officialwebsites.
With BlazBlue: Chrono Phantasma EXTEND now out on home consoles, many players are trying to figure out new combos based on the many changes to their favorite characters.
For any Valkenhayn R. Hellsing players out there, South East Asian airdash wizard Gelo “McArthur” Baldonado from the Imperium Pro Team has shared a brand new combo video that takes a look at what the werewolf is capable of based on the combo routes available to him in the EXTEND update.
McArthur focuses on practical combos that players can pull off in a match and avoids anything that could be deemed too fancy. Most of these will work on any character, though some, such as the corner bread and butter combo, require adjustments depending on the size of the opponent.
