• Welcome to Smashboards, the world's largest Super Smash Brothers community! Over 250,000 Smash Bros. fans from around the world have come to discuss these great games in over 19 million posts!

    You are currently viewing our boards as a visitor. Click here to sign up right now and start on your path in the Smash community!

SmashBoards Writer Interview (#3) - PushDustin!

Welcome to SmashBoards Writer's Interviews! This is a series that will appear at least twice every month covering a writer. These are more casual interviews, but depending on the person interviewed, we leave it up to you whether they'll answer further questions. For all our previous interviews, check out the following links:

PopiPenguin
SmashCapps

This week we have SmashBoards & Source Gaming writer PushDustin! He may not be the most visible of the bunch, but he definitely has a specific goal in mind when improving his website, SmashBoards, and the Smash community as a whole. Give a warm welcome to PushDustin!


PushDustin did not want his photo posted because he didn't want to reveal that "PDI" is actually close to "FBI". Or that he doesn't know if he wants to link his online identity yet to his real identity. Whichever one sounds cooler to you.

Thirdkoopa: Tell us a little bit about yourself!

PushDustin:Well, I guess it's best to start from the basics. I'm 27 years old, male currently living in the Kansai region of Japan. Originally from Connecticut, I have lived in Japan for over five years and I consider it my "second home". Originally, I went abroad in high school...for a full year, without knowing any Japanese. It was also the first time I was away from home for more than a day. I encourage everyone to spend some time abroad...it really expands one's perspective and understanding of the world.

Anyway, I started playing video games at a very young age with one of my earliest memories is playing Super Mario Bros. 3 on the NES in a hospital (I was hospitalized due to surgery on my right kidney). Even though my first home console was a Sega Genesis, I always had a strong affinity for Nintendo games and products. My favorite game of all time is actually Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. I consider myself a Nintendo fanboy, which is how I first got interested in the Smash Bros. series in the first place. Battling as my favorite characters, and some I didn't know at the time (Ness, Captain Falcon) was the most fun I ever had.

Thirdkoopa: How did you get roped on board to the SmashBoards Writing Staff?


PushDustin: I've actually been active on SmashBoards for only a limited amount of time. Even though my join date is many years back, I've only been active for the past year. I actually joined the community when I was watching a GameXplain video on Smash, and they didn't know what some Japanese characters were in a screenshot. Since I understood Japanese, I sent them a message. After not receiving a response, I decided to post what the characters meant, and my interpretation of it.

Later, I joined the Smash Leaks group (headed by @BluePikmin11) where I continually posted minor translations and stuff I found -- mostly on SmashBoards itself but I also cross-posted some stuff on Source Gaming so people who were not in the leaks group could read it. After almost a year, I asked @--- if I could make a thread dedicated to Source Gaming posts, and he said he would get back to me. Later, I was approached by@thethirdkoopa to see if I could join the SmashBoards writing staff, which I gladly accepted.

Thirdkoopa: Wow, that's incredible! (It's always a pleasure to see that even when I'm behind the scenes, I can still help move the gears) Enough about that though! What inspires your work on Smashboards?


PushDustin: In general, my goal is to promote a healthy Smash community. I feel that the Smash fanbase in particular has had two glaring issues.

The first is the amount of misinformation is incredible. No one has really dedicated themselves to finding the original sources, or to question things that other users have posted. There's been a lot of the 'blind leading the blind', and fans being consumed by the 'hype logic'. Smash is very hype game, and there has only been some attempts here and there to actually collect the information and organize it. I feel it's one of the only Nintendo series (definitely one of the biggest series) to have this issue. Zelda and Mario have their dedicated fans that collect and organize information. For some reason, Smash didn't.

The second issue is there hasn't been a lot of Japanese speakers interacting with the English side. I realized this was an issue while researching information on Smash in Japanese. The quality and a lot of the content was very different. This is also related to the first point, but in general there is a lack of understanding between the two sides.

Thirdkoopa: Where do you see the community heading in the future? It's interesting to hear with someone with such a concrete goal.

PushDustin: I'm hoping to a bright future. There's a lot of fan-made divisions in the community -- what game is the best, what character is OP, hardcore vs casual, etc. At the end of the day though, these divisions shouldn't divide us. We are all Smash fans, and we belong in one community. I do wish that some of the bickering/ in-group fighting would subside, but that's not something that can be fixed overnight. Instead, I'm hoping to encourage other people to be, frankly, more mature through example. I do strongly believe helping to address misinformation is one way to help heal the community.

Thirdkoopa: Is there any personal goal you have in the Smash Community?

PushDustin: I would like to grow and improve the reputation of the Smash Community. I think the Smash fandom is looked down upon compared by the other fandoms. The best way to achieve this goal is to lead by example. I hope that Source Gaming inspires the Smash fandom to be more knowledgeable about their favorite games -- we have a lot of information on the site and we are constantly adding to it.

Thirdkoopa: How did you get into Smash Bros?

PushDustin: I originally borrowed Super Smash Bros. for the N64 from blockbuster. When buying my Gamecube (the black one!), I had to pick up Melee. I spent a LOT of hours in Melee. I literally unlocked everything, and I played many matches with my friends. In high school, I entered a local tourney and I got BODIED. It was the first time I had ever seen wave dashing. In college, I regularly followed the Smash Dojo (Japan time! Updated daily!) and bought the game on release. I skipped all my classes that day and played for 12 hours straight. Throughout college, I had a great group of friends who I would play Melee (and then Brawl) with everyday for at least an hour after dinner. We always had so much fun, and I still cherish those memories. Like I mentioned before, since I consider myself a hardcore Nintendo fanboy, loving Smash was something that was just natural for me.

Thirdkoopa: Personal favorite stage?

PushDustin: In Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, I love Gamer the most. Partly because I enjoy WarioWare representation, but also because I like that stage's gimmick. It's really fun in local multiplayer matches.

In Super Smash Bros. for 3DS, it would have to be Magicant as the music and the layout is so amazing. I also enjoy Gerudo Valley.

In Brawl, Shadow Moses (really sad to see it cut in the newest version). I'm probably one of the few people that actually liked the Mario Bros. stage. Mainly because it's so chaotic. I also kind of think it's neat when the Smash team tries to recreate a game or a level completely.

In Melee, Termina Bay (Majora's Mask rep!). I also enjoyed knocking people under the platforms. Temple is a close second.

Smash 64, it's a tie between Yoshi's Island and Hyrule Castle.

Thirdkoopa: How about favorite character?

PushDustin: Wario is by far my favorite character in Smash Bros. His play style really connects with me (relatively good recovery with a "in-you-face" attack style). I also really enjoy the Wario Land and WarioWare games. Wario Land 3 and WarioWare: Smooth Moves are my two favorite "Wario" games. For my 100th post on Source Gaming, I actually posted an epic on Wario's representation in Smash. It's over 27 pages long!

Thirdkoopa: How long have you been writing on SmashBoards for?


PushDustin: Not very long! I think I have only four or five articles under my belt. I'm interested in bringing exposure to other parts of the Smash community. I'd like to do some Japan focused pieces in the future.

Thirdkoopa: Tell us a little bit more about your website, SourceGaming, for those who don't know. - this one is a question as well

PushDustin: Source Gaming is a website that attempts to live up to its' own name. It's a source for various gaming topics. Right now, we are currently focused on the Super Smash Bros. series, where we post various translations (both old and new), gather information on various topics related to Smash (mainly development and speculation), and provide analysis that is based on more fact than personal opinion. If you've heard any news about Smash for Wii U/3DS development in the past year that did not come from an interview with Sakurai, it most likely came from us and our translations.

Thirdkoopa: How did Source Gaming start?

PushDustin: Source Gaming originally started because I wanted to build up my own translation resume. I saw a lot of sites like Kantopia and Legends of Localization, which were posting fan translations. I decided that in order to get better at translating, then I would need to actually do something...and well translate it. Originally, I was going to compare the English and Japanese versions of Majora's Mask. After a couple of posts on it, I got distracted by all the rumors and hype of Super Smash Bros. for Wii U/ 3DS. Since I joined the leaks group and kept up with SSB4Dojo.com, I started to get very familiar with a lot of various aspects of Smash.

Source Gaming didn't really find itself for awhile. After the 3DS and Wii U versions were released, I datamined the files to see what I could uncover about the development, or plans for DLC. I uncovered quite a bit of stuff. After finishing the datamining project, I kept hearing rumors about Wolf being planned for Melee and other things. I decided I would track down the original source so I could see if there was anything else missed in those articles. To my surprise (and everyone else's) those articles simply didn't exist -- they were fabricated information. After completing the Definitive Unused Character List I decided to cover various aspects of development and speculation as I felt there was a big need for it.

For awhile Source Gaming was just me. However, around March...I decided to expand the writing and translation staff with @Aeris being the first full time member if my memory serves me correctly. The Source Gaming team has been incredible and instrumental to its' growth.

Now, I'm managing a team of 19, with people involved in articles, translations, social media and videos. We try to maintain a single post every day, and have recently achieved over 100 posts in succession. It's a lot of work, and it's due to everyone's effort. Source Gaming wouldn't be half as good as it is now if it wasn't for everyone else. Furthermore, the fans of the site have been very supportive and a pleasure to interact with. I'm incredibly grateful.

Thirdkoopa: 19 is a pretty big team. What do you see/plan for Source Gaming's future?

PushDustin: Recently we started to expand into video content. Videos will allow us to reach a much wider audience than we've previously been able to achieve. In addition we are continuing our partnership with Relax Alax, and we have a couple of other interesting projects in the works. As we continue to grow, these projects grow in scope and we are very excited. I would also like to explore a press relation with Nintendo, and eventually other publishers.

The unique component of Source Gaming is that we already have authors in Japan, the Americas and Europe. That means we have someone awake and active on Source Gaming at any given moment. We are always extremely familiar with Japanese culture and language which gives us unique insights compared to other channels or sites.

I don't think we would want to compete with other 'news blogs' as that simply becomes a race to see who could post the news first. That doesn't sound like something anyone of the staff is interested in. My personal motto for Source Gaming's posts are not to be the first --- but to be the best.

Thirdkoopa: Outside of Smash Bros., what other hobbies do you partake in?

PushDustin: I'm a semi-active cyclist. I rode around the largest lake (120 KM) in Japan on a town bike in 12 hours. I'm a little out of shape now as Source Gaming has kept me incredibly busy but I'm hoping that my reorganization efforts on Source Gaming will allow me to have a little bit more free time.

Thirdkoopa: Favorite Games?


PushDustin: My favorite game of all time is Legend of Zelda: Majoras Mask (N64 version). There's something so mesmerizing about the game. The gameplay is incredibly interesting, and the atmosphere is very inviting. The game has had a profound effect on the way I view video games in general.

Thirdkoopa: Anything else you would like to tell us about yourself?


PushDustin: About three years ago I was diagnosed with type-2 diabetes. I currently control my blood sugar through exercise and diet. I currently live with my cat, Kuma. In general, I love characters and mascots. My favorite Japanese character would have to be MelonGuma, who is a the regional representative of Yubarishi, Hokkaido.

Thirdkoopa: Would you be up for answering questions in the users comment? Where can people more interested in knowing you get to reach you at?


PushDustin: I'm pretty open to questions. I can be reached via a comment below,Twitter or my ask.fm account. Thanks for hosting the interview, it's been a lot of fun answering these questions!

Thirdkoopa: You're welcome! Thank you for your time. It's been a pleasure interviewing all of you and giving some insight at the people that help the front page. Hoping the rest of these are just as enjoyable!

Once again, give a warm round of applause to PushDustin! Check his twitter out over at PushDustin and while you're at it, check out Source Gaming at sourcegaming.info - If you enjoyed the interview, contact the interviewer himself here. Stay tuned sometime over the next two weeks for an interview with... Well, it's going to be with some writer, so stick around!
 
Last edited:
Lucas "Thirdkoopa" Guimaraes

Comments

Warning Received
Like or 7 years bad luck!

EDIT: Sorry my damn cat got ahold of my phone and typed that.
 
Last edited:
As per usual, awesome fella. And I can confirm that even with the little interaction I've had with him myself. Keep it up m8.
 
Nice read, good interview as usual. I always enjoy getting a sense of the backgrounds of those that put work into the site.

Wario Land 3 holds a huge amount of nostalgia for me, it was one of my first GBC games, and I spent years trying to get all those damned music coins. Played the **** outta that game as a kid, and went back to it semi-recently and replayed the whole thing, on my game boy color, just for the hell of it. Basically I'm saying I respect your taste in games.
 
two things:

1) Thirdkoopa Thirdkoopa , bit of a formatting typo, in that there's an extra "i" in the Underline code where Dustin is explaining Source Gaming.

2) PushDustIn PushDustIn , what's the learning curve to Japanese as a whole? one person elsewhere claims the greatest difficulty is memorizing the characters involved. but actually speaking it, from the grammar, the word formation, and most importantly translating it into English... how difficult is it all for someone to learn?
 
Last edited:
Looks like you've made the big time now, if Smashboards is interviewing you! Hopefully Source Gaming can keep growing and help set the record straight on more rumors and things only assumed true. Having somewhere to go to to for that kind of thing is a huge deal in a community like this.
 
two things:

1) Thirdkoopa Thirdkoopa , bit of a formatting typo, in that there's an extra "i" in the Underline code where Dustin is explaining Source Gaming.
Fixed. Thank you very much.

Looks like you've made the big time now, if Smashboards is interviewing you!
Not that he isn't, and all the writers are certainly achieving success in some way (myself included), but this is because all of the writers are being interviewed. :p

PushDustIn PushDustIn what does the "Push" in your username mean?
questions like this (well a lot of them thus far) are stuff I love to see and I'm curious to as well.
 
PushDustIn PushDustIn what does the "Push" in your username mean?
PushDustIn is from a garbage can in Osaka. "Push Dust In". Dust as in garbage!

two things:

1) Thirdkoopa Thirdkoopa , bit of a formatting typo, in that there's an extra "i" in the Underline code where Dustin is explaining Source Gaming.

2) PushDustIn PushDustIn , what's the learning curve to Japanese as a whole? one person elsewhere claims the greatest difficulty is memorizing the characters involved. but actually speaking it, from the grammar, the word formation, and most importantly translating it into English... how difficult is it all for someone to learn?
Japanese is very difficult, and requires a different way of thinking. Like you said the grammar is very different. Not only that but there are a lot of cultural meaning embedded in the language. I really don't think you can understand Japanese without living in Japan for awhile. Kanji is not so bad as things are moving towards electronics, so it's no longer necessary to hand write Kanji really. Reading is probably enough.
 
Japanese is very difficult, and requires a different way of thinking. Like you said the grammar is very different. Not only that but there are a lot of cultural meaning embedded in the language. I really don't think you can understand Japanese without living in Japan for awhile.
different way of thinking... cultural meaning embedded in the language...? does the concept of what I read as honorifics have a part in that complexity?
 
different way of thinking... cultural meaning embedded in the language...? does the concept of what I read as honorifics have a part in that complexity?
Honorifics are only a part of it. A lot of what's said in Japanese is implied/ never directly stated. Subjects are dropped a lot of the time, so if you aren't paying attention you might get lost.

An example of something getting implied:
A: Hey, do you want to grab dinner?
B: Ummm...I'm a little...
A: Ah okay! Maybe next time!
 
Honorifics are only a part of it. A lot of what's said in Japanese is implied/ never directly stated. Subjects are dropped a lot of the time, so if you aren't paying attention you might get lost.

An example of something getting implied:
A: Hey, do you want to grab dinner?
B: Ummm...I'm a little...
A: Ah okay! Maybe next time!
hmm... so there's a great emphasis on subtlety, and quite possibly the idea of reading between the lines.

hmmm...
 
hmm... so there's a great emphasis on subtlety, and quite possibly the idea of reading between the lines.

hmmm...
The language is extremely based on context, to the point that there are many combinations of grammatically correct japanese sentences that when translated word-for-word to English would not make sense. Translating between the two languages is more work than just knowing what words mean what, moreso than for other languages.
 
Top Bottom