Much like the rain that drenched San Jose over last weekend, events like Genesis 4 rarely happen. G4 was a perfect storm of emotion to kick off Smash in 2017, a weekend chock full of excitement and disappointment which will no doubt inform much of the year’s action. It was an event of the highest highs and the lowest lows, and one which no-one is likely to forget, due to some of the precedents it set for both tournament organizers and players. It is a suitable benchmark for the year ahead, providing some important measures which the community at large should try to break through in the coming twelve months, as Smash continues to climb up that esports mountain to greater things.
Traveling across an ocean in order to attend, my own personal expectations were set fairly high going into the event. With its successful revival in 2016 and the continuation of the Mango and Armada storyline, Genesis acts as a mecca for competitive Melee fans, as well as a welcome place where all Smash games can coalesce in one massive convention hall. Just from the lengthy badge pick up line on day one, it was clear that Smashers were ready to break records with this event. The actual hall was packed to the rafters with setups galore for each game, alongside artist and vendor tables, a specialist setup for the Nintendo Switch and even a massage table for those who may have popped off a little too hard in their last match. The place was buzzing, with hundreds packed in tight around monitors and CRTs to warm up and practice for their upcoming pools. For Melee, day one was fairly uneventful but Smash 4 wasted no time in causing some upsets. From PGR players like MSF|Larry Lurr, PG|ESAM and Tyrant getting sent into losers very early to low tier heroes like Sinji, Brood and Afro Smash racking up notable wins, the Smash 4 section was crackling with excitement from the word go. This electricity would carry through for the rest of the weekend, sparking off throughout day two and coming to a head on finals day.
There were a few issues on day one though, mainly when it came to running the larger crew events. Smash 4’s World Crews became a real slog for competitors, with players from Japan and the USA being forced to play late into the evening to finish the event off. It didn’t help that the team from the USA looked unstoppable in the face of the other crews, winning 9-0 and 5-0 versus Japan and decimating the combined forces of Mexico, Canada and the EU. Tweek and RNG|Dabuz took 19 stocks between them against the MexiCanEu team, eventually forcing that team to forfeit for the sake of time. The Melee Draft Crews didn’t fare much better, with multiple players deciding not to compete which caused the whole event to start an hour late. When you compound the absence of players with the fact that many of them were floated through pools in order to give them time to enter events like Draft Crews, you have to question whether these side activities are actually worth everyone’s time. The band did play on though, with the 64 combo contest being an absolute joy to watch and a testament to the creativity of that scene’s top players.
Day two saw the action intensify, for good and for ill. Melee really started to heat up, with sets like Tempo|S2J versus Armada threatening to bring the house down before finals day in the Civic Center. The Ice Climbers were on the warpath throughout top 64, with VGBC|ChuDat, Army and dizzkidboogie carving their way through bracket to defeat players like IMT|Shroomed, LG|Ice and Wizzrobe. Melee’s new generation made waves too, with 20XX harbinger Syrox taking Selfless|Lucky while SmashG0d defeated both RNG|Swedish Delight and Professor Pro before losing to dizzkidboogie. On the other side of the aisle with Smash 4, the air was thick with tension. While being in a venue like the San Jose Convention Center comes with its fair share of bonuses, it also meant that Genesis 4 was at the mercy of the city’s stringent union guidelines, which put a dampener on keeping all games running at maximum capacity. The Smash 4 area had many of its friendly setups taken away, forcing players to horde monitors for one game rotations until pools had to be played, with spectators being jammed into tight corridors if they wanted to catch the action. Combine this with major issues with certain round 2 pools which resulted in incorrect matches being played, games being played off stream, and throttled internet causing major stream problems, and you have quite the disappointing day for Smash 4 players and spectators.
Luckily, the matches themselves did not disappoint—if you were fortunate enough to see them. The Japanese Duck Hunt triumvirate were causing some major upsets throughout the event, but it was Brood’s astounding wins over TSM|ZeRo and Zinoto which brought this much-overlooked character into focus. Brood’s masterful usage of Duck Hunt’s can to create damaging throw setups and traps was a joy to watch, with both of his games having quite the explosive finish. Unfortunately, he didn’t reach the final 16 with an eventual finish at 25th but watch out for the new wave of Duck Hunts taking flight during the spring. Top 32 was full of drama, with friends and teammates being forced to battle in the journey to finals day. CLG teammates Nakat and VoiD had an incredibly close set to kick off top 32, while friends Ranai and 2GG|komorikiri had to fight in the final round of top 32 to get into top 8 on Sunday. The two were clearly reluctant to fight each other, with komorikiri looking visibly disappointed as he sent his teammate packing. Locus and Fatality’s five game series was a grueling fist fight between Ryu and Captain Falcon, while ZeRo soldiered through Losers with some close matches against MVG|Salem and NRG|Nairo. There were clear flashbacks to the days of Brawl in ZeRo’s sets, with Salem trying to run the clock against ZeRo as he almost took out the current world number one at 25th place. It is so unfortunate that many of these games were not recorded, as there were some absolute gems played off stream. Some players like FILIP and MrConCon were able to local record sets via phone cameras, but the lack of properly recorded sets is a blow.
Genesis 4 finals day was a slow burner to start, with 64 running an hour over-schedule thanks to some particularly drawn out matches in the top 6. I think the 64 community will sincerely have to consider the future of the five stock format going forward, as the non-64 faithful were certainly not sympathetic to it delaying the other games by such a long time. There are even talks of a soft ban of Kirby and Pikachu for singles play, to potentially avoid such glacially paced events. They did keep it going, with the Peruvian Pikachu Alvin eventually taking the trophy after narrowly edging out the recently sponsored PG|SuPeRbOoMfAN in the first set of Grand Finals. It was then the turn of Smash 4 to keep the train rolling and boy were there some fireworks along the way.
Following a clash between ZeRo and Dabuz to start proceedings, it was the turn of Louisiana Bayonetta CaptainZack and one of the last Japanese hopefuls komorikiri to battle it out in Losers bracket. The match was polarizing to say the least, with komorikiri’s Sonic running circles around Bayonetta, just to get clipped by an Afterburner Kick or a Witch Time and killed within a matter of seconds. The set finished at 3-1, with Zack strutting to victory and sending komorikiri out at seventh. With all seemingly being well, the finals continued and I popped to the restroom of the Civic Center in the downtime, hoping the next match would be queued up by the time I’d finished. I returned to chaos on stage, the crowd chanting “Run it back!” and general uproar in the auditorium. In my absence, players had checked the game settings to reveal that the last set had been played on a 0.9 launch rate. This meant that the knockback of every character’s moves had been slightly reduced, resulting in things not killing when they should have, and making certain combo strings harder to escape. With the initial consensus being that this 0.9 launch rate had only been in effect for the one game, a hasty decision was made by the TOs to run only the last match back, which Zack won quite convincingly. As emotions were running high on stage for everyone involved and proceedings already being an hour behind, it was declared that this rule change had only been active for one match and that things would continue on as normal.
This in turn set the Smash investigators into action, with Dabuz himself complaining that certain moves that should have killed in his set versus ZeRo did not. Further investigation proved this to be correct, as players simulated certain situations from both sets to determine whether two sets had been played on the incorrect setting. The fact that some of the world’s top players couldn’t tell for certain that the game was played on the wrong setting shows how easy this factor is to miss–but looking back on the sets, some of komorikiri’s kill setups with Sonic were not connecting in situations that they normally would. Combine this with the lower knockback setting making it potentially harder for komorikiri to escape Zack’s aerial combos, and you have a recipe for quite the controversy.
The Genesis 4 TOs have since apologized profusely for the mishap, and have promised to compensate not only Dabuz and komorikiri, but players affected by the earlier bracket problems. I appreciate the TOs’ transparency and genuine shock at the mistake, but the resulting Twitter arguments certainly put a downer on the rest of the Smash 4 finals. Zack would go onto completely eliminate Japan from the competition by defeating Abadango 3-2, while ZeRo in turn defeated CaptainZack 3-0 in Losers Semis. The Losers Finals between long standing rivals C9|Ally and ZeRo did reignite the crowd, with ZeRo switching to Cloud and almost defeating the pesky plumber. Ally continued his winning streak against ZeRo, putting up the first win on the board for 2017. However, he was unable to triumph against teams partner and his own personal demon, FOX|MVG|MKLeo in a close game 5 set in Grand Finals. South America certainly seems to be the continent to beat in Smash games ending with the number four, as Alvin, MKLeo, Ally and ZeRo all have their roots south of the border.
Mexico takes it all for Smash 4.
It was then Europe’s turn to dominate, as Melee Doubles sought to rebuild the excitement and get the crowd jumping for the main event. Doubles top 4 really showed just how advanced the Doubles meta has become, with the tech team even setting up a separate comms feed with headsets for each doubles team. While the CLG team of PewPewU and SFAT seemed like the favorites to win, they were sent spiraling into Losers’ after a swift 3-0 from Leffen and Ice, leaving them to await either the other American team of PG|Plup and Tempo|Axe or the actual Smash Brothers of Armada and Android. Plup and Axe put up quite the fight, with Arizona and Florida cheering on their boys against the invading Swedes. Unfortunately, the sibling connection was too strong and Team UGS continued onto Losers Finals to face the last American hope of PewFat. Armada and Android grow stronger when the crowd chants against them, with their Peach and Sheik team triumphing over the hometown heroes and causing an all European Grand Finals. With a quick switch to Fox for Armada, almost resulting in an entire 20XX Grand Finals, the brothers Lindgren ran to victory and secured yet another non-American win on the Genesis 4 stage. It would be up to fate and the remaining US players in singles to either defend the house, or facilitate the fabled Armada and Mango Grand Finals for the fourth time in Genesis history.
With an initial loss to Armada in Winners Semis, Mango was sent into the lion’s den for the rest of Genesis 4. He would have to defeat Leffen, Liquid|Hungrybox and FOX|MVG|Mew2King in his mad dash to Grand Finals, a task that would seem insurmountable to a mere mortal. Drawing on the overwhelming support from the crowd, Mango was able to overcome this gauntlet, with his set versus Leffen being one of the most exciting sets in Melee’s recent history. There were people crying and hugging in the crowd as Mango tore through his opponents, with entire rows popping off for their boy. With fate willing yet another Mango and Armada Grand Finals, the stage was set for another legendary battle between these friendly rivals.
The rivals meet for their fourth showdown.
However, the sheer force of will needed to complete this Losers run must have sapped Mango of his energy, as Armada absolutely demolished him 3-0. While the first game looked fairly close, the Swedish Sniper clearly smelled blood in the water and destroyed Mango without a second thought. After the sheer excitement of the past three sets, it was quite the downer to end on, with the crowd staging a mass exodus from the Genesis venue as soon as Armada won. It acted as a muted end to an otherwise fractious final, with Mango even throwing his second place medal to the crowd. Someone else is now sporting the ‘Super Mario Bros. Melee’ 2nd place title, thanks to an unfortunate spelling error across all championship medals. At least Genesis 4 can join Evo 2016 in the hall of fame for misspelled tournament paraphernalia.
Found something in the crowd pic.twitter.com/h4zlV5trf2
— Ben Swartz (@bensw) January 23, 2017
For all the highs and lows, I feel Genesis 4 accurately represents the struggles Smash has going forward. The community now has to balance their overwhelming desire for bigger and better things, with the logistical and human factors that go into running ever larger events to avoid the issues that hampered this otherwise great event. TOs, streamers and support staff are definitely up to the challenge; they just have to temper their passion with the lessons learned from this event. There are plenty of events to test the community’s mettle this year, so the only way is up.
Sources: CurlingW; BearUNLV; Ruben_dal; SuPeRbOoMfAnSSB; bensw; VGBootcampVODs.
Images c/o Robert Paul.