Out of all the characters in the new Super Smash Bros. for the 3DS, Mario is arguably the most iconic thanks to his longstanding position as Nintendo’s flagship character. For those interested in how he plays in the game, Brawl Karter has put together this highlight video with the plucky plumber.
The video showcases a number of matches with Mario, comprised mostly of highlights that provide a look at some practical combos used in actual competition. Much of the footage revolves around use of the hero’s improved F.L.U.D.D. special, the increased range of which Mario can now control to push his opponents around even more.
In addition to keeping enemies from the stage, it also serves as a useful way to set up combos, return to solid ground, and more. Check out the video below and see if you can add anything to your own skillset.
I’m sure we’ve all seen Ryu and his less-than-friendly counterpart tag someone with an anti-air jab Shoryuken and then follow up with an Ultra in Street Fighter IV. It deals massive damage, it’s incredibly easy to do, and let’s face it: if you’re jumping at a shoto, you deserve to be hit with it. Respect those skies.
Before now, there weren’t a lot of other options to net these fighters a meterless path into an Ultra. Below, you can see Javits Arias sticking out a raw jab Shoryuken and then promptly hitting the cornered opponent with the powerful finisher; of course, this sort of situation certainly won’t come up all that often, but it sure beats having to spend meter to get in extra damage.
As it stands, this has been proven to work against both Sagat and Poison, both of whom have rather unusual hurtboxes, so your mileage may vary against other members of the cast.
Source: JavitsArias, thanks Bafael for sending this in!
As many of you probably saw over at UltraChen TV, the folks behind the Evolution Championship Series released the very first trailer for next year’s event. While sparse on details, we now have enough to start planning our trips to Las Vegas.
That’s right, Evo 2015 will take place July 17-19 at Bally’s / Paris Las Vegas, returning to the hotel it called home back two years ago.
Details on the tournament lineup will be announced sometime at the beginning of next year, so stay tuned!
UltraChen TV is back with yet another broadcast, and a whole new slate of topics to discuss. Tonight, UltraDavid and James Chen will be debuting the very first trailer for Evo 2015, as well as discussing Capcom Pro Tour Asia’s finals, their thoughts on Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, and more.
If you’re interested in this topic, be sure to tune in and check the show out. The stream will be live in this article, but you can also visit Twitch to join the chat.
It’s been a little while since we last heard from ArmchairTitan, but their newest Ultra Street Fighter IV combo video, this time around featuring Dudley, was well worth the wait. These combos have a heavy focus on stylish juggling–something that the tea-drinking gentleman definitely does well. You’ll see roses, character-specific strings, and one combo in particular that lasts long enough to allow plenty of other activities during its duration. Need to do some laundry? You’ve got time.
Combine all of that with some of the best editing a combo video has seen in quite some time and ArmchairTitan’s special brand of humor, and you’ve got a video that even those outside of the fighting game community can enjoy. Keep it classy!
Need some more impractical combos in your life? Check out ArmchairTitan’s videos for Seth, Cody, and Oni by following their respective links.
Capcom Pro Tour’s presence throughout the year has given players from a number of unconventional locales the opportunity to throw their lot in with the rest of the world and prove Street Fighter is still the global phenomenon it was decades ago. From up-and-coming regions like Brazil, Hong Kong, and Mexico to the more unexplored talent pools of Portugal, Thailand, and Poland, competitors the world over have been able to secure their own ranking points through in-person events, likely in the face of visiting talent looking for easy victories.
Unfortunately, traveling to tournaments, even those in your own backyard, is a luxury not everyone in the world can afford. Whether it’s taking time away from your real job or just doling out piles of cash for airfare and a hotel stay, it sometimes just isn’t an option. That’s why, this year, Capcom partnered with Virgin Gaming (now known as World Gaming) to hold a handful of online tournaments for folks in the Americas and Europe, giving those who found themselves unable to get away the opportunity to earn points through netplay instead.
Though they haven’t affected the overall rankings in a hugely meaningful way, one player in particular has found regular success in these online competitions, and thus kept himself in the running for one of Capcom Cup’s coveted qualifer positions.
Eric “ChuChu” Silva, who hails from Brazil and represents CNB e-Sports Club, has competed in ten such tournaments since April, accruing 358 ranking points in addition to the 208 he earned at Revox 2014 (which was giving ranking status retroactively), FNF Championships, and Brazil Game Show 2014.
While far from a household name, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen Silva compete on a large stage and prove he has what it takes to hang with the best. Like many, I first heard of the Brazilian competitor during the lead-up to Capcom Cup 2012. He, along with other strong regional players like BrenoFight3rs (who took home first with a close win over Hajime “Tokido” Taniguchi), CNB teammate House, and Lord Saka, proved that their country’s qualifier was no fluke.
Silva also gained more recent, first-hand success playing foreign competitors at Revox 2013, where he and House teamed up to face (and ultimately defeat) visitors Infiltration and Ryan “Laugh” Ahn in a quick Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition ver. 2012 team battle. As you can see in the video below, Silva’s Sakura deservedly dispatched Infiltration’s Akuma, a feat that, no matter what character you play, is not easy.
Now, you may be asking yourself, “Ian, what prompted this ChuChu history lesson?” Well, now that Capcom Pro Tour has begun to wind down, we are starting to get a sense of the players who are definite shoe-ins for qualification through point totals alone. Silva is one of these players; after taking out competitors who have already earned a spot at Capcom Cup by winning a premier tournament, he sits at fifth in the overall rankings, nustled snugly between more well-known figures Ricky Ortiz and Du “Nuckledu” Dang. This, combined with the fact that he has earned a little over 60% of his points from online tournaments, has raised some concern as to if he “deserves” to compete at the prestigious event or not come December, mainly from eSportMax’s Dexter “Tampa Bison” Jackson.
Hopefully you’re thinking the same thing as me: “Of fucking course he does.”
I’m not going to sit here and say online play can be held to the same standards as offline, but it’s become increasingly clear that we can no longer count out netplay warriors just because of their arena of choice. When Street Fighter x Tekken was struggling to gain ground at major events around the world, its online community kept it living much longer than many would think it “deserved” to. Capcom paid their respects to that scene’s devotion by offering up half (that’s four out of eight) of Capcom Cup 2013’s spots to those who were able to qualify online. One of them, a player that will go unnamed for the time being (I have a good reason, don’t worry), was able to make his way to the grand finals and eventually take second place over players like Nuckledu and Alex Valle.
To me, this type of mentality is grouped with other sentiments that blame certain characters, archetypes, or attacks as cheap, unbeatable obstacles. It’s this type of self-defeating thinking that keeps players from achieving greatness for themselves, no matter what their definition of greatness may be. Have a tough time against Rose in Ultra Street Fighter IV? Use every opportunity to play against her not as one where winning is the only thing to achieve but also as a way to gain knowledge for future matches. Think charge characters are braindead? Pick one up to put in your own back pocket; you may learn that it takes a lot more effort to play them correctly than you thought.
The idea of not “deserving” a spot at Capcom Cup simply because you took a different path to get there is, to put it frankly, misguided at best and idiotic at worst. To put it in an arcade perspective, it’s like looking down on a player because, instead of having a full quarter to play with, they had to turn in a couple of dimes and a nickle to the cashier before jumping in line. It’s a means to an end; complaining that they were able to scrounge up the change they needed while you failed to find a quarter for yourself reeks like a weird mixture of ignorance and jealousy.
Back before Capcom Cup 2013, we here at Shoryuken put together a trio of fun polls for the community to take part in, giving us a good idea of who the favorites were as we headed into the major event. You’ll remember me mentioning that half of Street Fighter x Tekken’s bracket was made up of online qualifiers, two of whom had also found success in offline play: Sareth “Sethlolol” Sok and (gasp!) Dexter “Tampa Bison” Jackson. While the former lost out only to Infiltration in our poll, it was the latter who would go on to face the Korean master in grand finals.
And so, I have a question of my own: if Jackson deserved a spot at Capcom Cup 2013 for winning a single online qualifier, why doesn’t Silva for taking four times that many, not to mention his first-place finish at Brazil Game Show 2014?
“Good luck to you ChuChu,” Jackson quips to close out his article, “for if you lose, the viewers will quickly find out if you drop Chu Jelly upon defeat.”
That may end up being the case, but you know what we’ll find out about Jackson at Capcom Cup 2014? Nothing, because he’ll be in the audience.
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, and tonight’s installment will feature competition in the latest version of popular Super Smash Bros. Brawl mod Project M.
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.
Venom47 recently released their second combo music video for Ultra Street Fighter IV. The demonstration, which you can check out below, includes a large number of characters doing what they were meant to do: totally impractical combos. Some deal massive damage, some squeeze out as many hits as possible without regard for damage totals, and some take full advantage of the wider hurtboxes in the game–looking at you, Rufus–but they all provide an entertaining spectacle to behold.
As with most modern videos of this style, you’ll see an abundance of Psycho Stream combos. The best looking one is undoubtedly Blanka’s take on the anti-Decapre tactic, as he applies enough heavy attacks between purple-tinged hitstun to land a dizzy on the masked fighter.
If you’ve recently found yourself incarcerated for reasons that you can’t or would rather not explain, GroundedSF has the perfect tutorial to put your law-breaking attacks to good use in Ultra Street Fighter IV. This third edition of their running Notes from the Big House series features some great information that aspiring Cody players as well as veterans of the man in the striped jumpsuit can easily add to their game to make the most of any fight.
The footage here focuses on the properties of Cody’s Ruffian Kick and Criminal Upper specials and the opportunities that they afford the bored brawler in certain situations. As an example, many of the startup frames of Ruffian Kick put Cody in an aerial state, which allows for him to use the move defensively when he expects a throw. This also means that if he’s hit from these startup frames, he’ll perform an air recovery and land in a position that allows him to begin pressure on his opponent, or at the very least maintain a neutral situation.
There’s also a lengthy segment with some interesting combo opportunities against a cornered Dhalsim that will make the Yoga master think twice before throwing jumping normals.
Are you interested in adding Rocket Raccoon to your Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 squad? Well, then you’re in luck, as this video from Gbtx6 contains a great deal of solo technology that the space-faring fur ball can bring to any team.
While the damage of most of the combos deal out isn’t as impressive as what other characters might offer, keep in mind that only one bar is ever spent and there are plenty of DHC options that could easily bring the numbers up quite a bit.
Once the combos are out of the way, Gbtx6 makes a strong argument for why aerial defenders should never pushblock Rocket, as he’ll be able to go for a throw which easily converts into, you guessed it, a full combo. There are, of course, reset opportunities to be had in this situation as well, which makes the little fellow even more threatening.
As though a Raccoon with guns wasn’t already scary enough.
