Category: Fighting Games

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UDON will premiere the English version of “Daigo the Beast: Umehara Fighting Gamers!” at Evo 2017

The English edition of the famous Daigo Umehara manga is about to arrive!

A fitting follow-up to last Evo’s offer of Twitch.Hx.CYG BST|Daigo Umehara’s book The Will to Keep Willing, this year we’ll see the premiere of the English edition of Daigo the Beast: Umehara Fighting Gamers! at Evo 2017, brought to us by UDON Entertainment! From the press release:

He is the most dominant fighting game champion in the world. But before he was Japan’s first pro gamer, Daigo was one of many players battling their way through Japanese arcades during the golden age of fighting games. Now, North American fans can learn how the player became the legend as UDON Entertainment prepares to publish the DAIGO THE BEAST: UMEHARA FIGHTING GAMERS! manga series.

Daigo Umehara is best known for his aggressive play and nearly psychic ability to predict and counter his opponent’s next move. This power not only paralyzes world-class opponents, but has also led to many unforgettable comebacks from the brink of defeat. His many victories and bloodthirsty style have earned him the nickname “The Beast.”

The DAIGO THE BEAST manga explores the real-life events that built the fighting game community, and the strategies and play styles developed by Daigo and his fellow gamers. In Volume 1, Shinya Ohnuki, a gamer with prodigious talent, is drawn into the wild and wonderful world of fighting games after a chance meeting with Daigo. As they face off in iconic games like Street Fighter II, Street Fighter Alpha, and Darkstalkers, an enduring rivalry between Daigo and “Nuki” is born!

Daigo Omnibus Vol1 cover 3D

The first volume of the manga in English will be hitting stores in December 2017, but Evo attendees can grab a copy early if they head over to the UDON/NSURGO booth at the event! The new BEAST x NSURGO apparel will be available there as well. In the meantime, check out these preview pages:

Click to view slideshow.

DAIGO THE BEAST: UMEHARA FIGHTING GAMERS! (Volume 1)
386 pages, 5.75″ x 8.25″, $19.99 USD, coming December 2017
ISBN: 978-1-77294-057-2

Evo 2017 takes place at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, Nevada on July 14-16, 2017.

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Source: press release

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VSFighting gets $20,000 pot bonus as part of the Injustice 2 Pro Series

Last May, Warner Bros. and ESL announced a new Championship Series for Injustice 2. As part of this, they launched the Injustice 2 Pro series — the first event of which was Combo Breaker in Chicago, IL. However, the Pro Series will not just involve tournaments in the United States, but will also involve events across the globe.

One of the first Injustice 2 Pro Series events outside the United States will be VSFighting in Birmingham, United Kingdom. Set to feature the UK’s finest Injustice 2 players, as a Pro Series Premier event, VSFighting will receive a $20,000 prize pool bonus. For those across the pond, this amounts to about £15,500.

Of course, Injustice 2 isn’t the only game with a big tournament at VSFighting. The event is also a Capcom Pro Tour Ranking event, as well as a Tekken World Tour master event, so expect to see top Street Fighter V and Tekken 7 players in attendance as well.

VSFighting takes place on August 12-13 at Millennium Point, Birmingham United Kingdom. Interested players can register at the official site.

injustice 2 pro series 2017 logo
Capcom Pro Tour Logo
Tekken World Tour

Source: VSFighting via Test Your Might

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New “Lunar Subterrane” stage coming to Dissidia Final Fantasy

Square Enix has been pretty consistent with adding new content to Dissidia Final Fantasy with their monthly updates to the arcade version of the game. This month is no different!

The upcoming update to Dissidia Final Fantasy will bring with it a new stage, the Lunar Subterrane. Those familiar with the franchise will recognize it the area as the final dungeon of Final Fantasy IV (originally released as Final Fantasy II in North America). For those wondering how the stage will look like in Dissidia Final Fantasy, Square Enix has released a trailer for it — that can be seen below.

The Lunar Subterrane will hit Dissidia Final Fantasy in arcades on July 12. Meanwhile, the home console version, Dissidia Final Fantasy NT hits PlayStation 4 early in 2018. It will also be playable at Square Enix’s booth at Evo 2017.

Source: Square Enix

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Evolution 2017 preview: SNK’s flagship franchise returns with The King of Fighters XIV

After a two-year hiatus, SNK’s The King of Fighters series returns to the Evo main stage once again with The King of Fighters XIV. However, the road to Evo 2017 has been rather bittersweet for the community. KOF XIV’s competitive following has, at least in the West, been rather more subdued compared to its predecessor — in spite of the fact that The King of Fighters XIV is, from a gameplay standpoint, arguably the best the series has been since the Ultimate Match version of KOF 2002.

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Despite the smaller competitive scene, that doesn’t mean that the players’ passion for the game has diminished in the West. This is especially true in the series’ more traditional strongholds within Mexico, Latin America, as well as the United States. Familiar names dominate competitions in this side of the world, with players such as Arcade Shock’s Reynald Tacsuan, Ramon “Romance” Navarrete, Luis Cha, Eric “Juicebox” Albino, Team Spooky’s Josh “NerdJosh” Jodoin, Raphael “Laban” Ramos, Chris “Hellpockets” Fields, and more.

In addition to these are names more commonly associated with other games. While Evil Geniuses Christopher “NYChrisG” Gonzales competed in The King of Fighters XIII, he seems to have found more success in The King of Fighters XIV, with a recent top 8 finish at CEO 2017. Meanwhile, one of ChrisG’s rivals in Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3, Black Eye’s Nicolas “Kane Blueriver” Gonzales has also done well in KOFXIV, actually qualifying for this year’s The King of Fighters XIV World Championship in Japan.

The King of Fighters XIV however has found more success as a competitive game outside of the West, specifically in China. During The King of Fighters XIV World Championship, most of the top 8 finalists were Chinese players. First and foremost among these is DouyuTV’s Zhoujun “Xiao Hai” Zheng, who arguable be the strongest KOFXIV player in the world at the moment. Another strong Chinese player is PandaTV’s Haojun “Dakou” Su. These two are joined by a host of other top Chinese players from teams such as DouyuTV, HuomaoTV, and PandaTV.

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Of course, other countries and regions have strong The King of Fighters XIV representation as well. Japanese player M’, who is arcade hardware company Sanwa Denshi’s first sponsored player, made a name for himself by winning The King of Fighters XIV World Championship. Meanwhile, Korea has also traditionally strong KOF scene, and Evo 2012 King of Fighters XIII champion Kwang-noh “MadKOF” Lee still remains a big threat, and could take it all again if he returns to Las Vegas [and it turns out that he is – Editor]. Meanwhile, Europe also has a strong The King of Fighters XIV scene, with players such as Frionel and Alioune Camara also having strong showings at The King of Fighters XIV World Championship.

All in all, despite the low turnout, the possibility of big name international competitors converging in Las Vegas make The King of Fighters XIV at Evo one of the hypest tournaments yet. The multi-national nature of the KOF competitions at Evo has always energized the crowd — raising the stakes by unifying spectators by country or nation of choice.  At times, KOF at Evo feels almost like a World Cup soccer game, where national pride is on the line. With this in mind, The King of Fighters XIV at Evo 2017 may yet show that it’s not the size of the community, but their passion that counts!

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SRK Stats breaks down Evo 2017 registration numbers: Game entry overlap, overall growth, and more

Some interesting aspects of the players and the event are revealed.

SRK Stats has crunched the Evo 2017 registration numbers, and thus revealed some interesting statistics about what people are playing, and the event itself. To start, here’s a look at how registrants across the multiple games overlap in the games they entered:

evo 2017 player crossover

For example, you can see in the breakdown above that more than 40% of Tekken 7, UMvC3, KOFXIV, and Injustice 2 players — and 38% of REV 2 players — are also playing SFV. 16-17% of Smash competitors are playing both games in the franchise. 46% of BlazBlue players are also competing in Guilty Gear — but only 28% of Guilty Gear players are in both ASW titles!

How many games has each fighter taken on? Have a look:

We also get a look at the development of the event over past years — factoring out the massive 2016 spike, the event is still showing slight growth:

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Source: SRK Stats (Twitter)

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Slayer signed by Rouge Gaming to represent them in Injustice 2

With the release of Injustice 2, sponsorships have been cropping up for players in the NetherRealm Studios community with a steady consistency. The latest player to be picked up is Frank “Slayer” Perales, who has been picked up by Rogue Gaming as the first fighting game player on their roster. Owned by musician and DJ Steve Aoki, the organization is mostly known for their Fall of Duty, Overwatch, and CS:GO teams.

Slayer was arguably the top Kung Jin in Mortal Kombat XL, scoring no less than 17th at any Major event he attended during his time with YOMI. Fresh off a silver finish at CEO 2017, which saw him eliminate Echo Fox|SonicFox in an epic Black Adam mirror match, as well as a 2nd place finish at Combo Breaker, Slayer will no doubt be looking to make an impact at Evo 2017. Below you can see an announcement Tweet from Rouge Gaming, as well as a highlight reel of recent accomplishments to remind fans of what he’s capable of. (though be warned it is set to NSFW music).

We at Shoryuken would like to congratulate both parties on this well-deserved signing, and wish them all the best for the future!

Sources: GoingRogueGG (Twitter); Rogue.GG

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Rising Up: Ibuki character tutorial — Optimal combos, setups, & frame traps

Street Fighter V Season 2.5 is out, and I’m here with another character tutorial. I’m putting emphasis on characters whose combo options changed significantly between the updates, so today’s video is the teenage ninja Ibuki. This video contains all of her bread and butter punishes and confirms, counter-hit setups and damage optimization, tools against fireballs, frame traps listed by delay, meaty pressure, setups, and more. If you want to learn Ibuki, everything you need to know should be right here.

My own Street Fighter V bread and butter combo videos are by far my most popular YouTube videos. However, the vast majority of them were made during the third SFV public beta test. While almost no serious balance changes were made between that beta and release, certain damage values were incorrect and the players have had a lot of time to develop. The initial videos were made based on my own training mode findings and nothing else, and were fully featured around combos. I asked around, and have decided to flesh them into full character guides, now including a basic game plan I’ve summarized from watching a lot of pro matches. This is the full scope of my observations on Ibuki. As usual, I’ve included an enormous guide in the video description. This video is intended as a supplement to that guide, so make sure to check it out.

Currently I’m trying to release one of these tutorials every other week, until I’ve covered all characters. I originally intend to do the characters in order of most to least popular, however as I said, I do want to prioritize characters who were heavily affected by Season 2 and Season 2.5 balance adjustments. Remember to subscribe to the Shoryuken channel, and keep an eye out for future videos!

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Evo 2017 preliminary brackets are now posted!

If you’re signed up for any games at Evolution 2017, go check them out!

evo 2017 lineup final

The preliminary brackets for all main games at Evo 2017 have been posted on smash.gg! This is your chance to not only scope out your competition (and make sure you know when and where you’ll be playing!), but to ensure there are not any problems or conflicts with your event(s). So head over to your own tournament listing and check it out! There’s also a handy player finder to search for your favorite competitors, or rivals.

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Source: Joey Cuellar (Twitter)

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Embrace perfection: All the known anime and manga references for Perfect Cell & Majin Buu in Dragon Ball FighterZ

As you’ve seen by now, Arc System Works and Bandai Namco Entertainment have been paying homage to the longstanding history of the Dragon Ball franchise by filling Dragon Ball FighterZ with a slew of references to the original anime and manga. IKevinX has been painstakingly correlating every character animation to its point of origin, and wraps up his coverage of the current playable cast by spotlighting two of the most treacherous villains of the entire series: Perfect Cell and Majin Buu.

Despite footage being limited, we can see many of Cell’s signature poses and attacks are depicted fairly accurately from the source material, though the standout has to be an attack originating from 1993’s Super Butoden 2, which closely resembles M. Bison’s Super Street Fighter II Turbo slide. As if having the DNA of Frieza, Piccolo, Goku, Vegeta, King Cold and others wasn’t enough.

Majin Buu’s jovial chaotic nature is also on full display, with his ability to weaponize his body into traps to ensnare foes, blowing out steam to float, and of course turning his opponents into cookies and gobbling them up — like he did to Dabura — are on display here. There is also a bit more Cell footage, including his victory animation. You can catch both videos below.  That wraps all the fighters we have footage for so far, but Future Trunks should follow once more footage releases.

Interested in seeing more references to the source material? Check out IKevinX’s videos on Goku and Frieza as well as  Gohan and Vegeta. Tell us what your favorite references were in the comments!

Source: IKevinX

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Injustice 2’s July update brings bug fixes, interactable changes, and removes throw tech combos

With Evo 2017 fast approaching, NetherRealm Studios released Injustice 2’s July update last week. The patch provided various bug fixes and quality-of-life improvements, including requiring more precise buffering when Alternate Controls are turned off, the ability to decode Mother Boxes faster — as well as limiting certain interactables to a single use per combo.  Characters like Batman, Atrocitus, Darkseid, and Black Adam can no longer get upwards of 40% combos off of throw techs with their Traits active, and new DLC fighter Red Hood has seen adjustments to various attacks.

Lastly, Sub-Zero can now be seen on the character select screen for owners of the Digital Deluxe and Ultimate Editions, as his data has been added ahead of his July 11th release.

Let us know your thoughts on the changes in the comments below.

Source: WB Games Community Forums