I.B
Smash Lord
For anyone who hasn't read/seen it yet, here Mango's Genesis 2 blog.
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Genesis was an absolutely amazing experience that made me remember how melee can make you feel so many things. Months before Genesis, I was pretty much done with the game. No one cared when I won, I would beat someone with a certain character and it wouldn’t matter cause “it’s Mango”. Made me just lose all love and motivation for the game, since apparently I had nothing to prove. But as Genesis approached..
I would read Smashboards/Facebook or wherever all the smashers were chatting. Reading that I was washed up, reading that PP/Hbox/Armada would **** me, reading that I don’t try cause I’m scared to lose. Usually I’m pretty good at ignoring that stuff, but this time it got to me. I really wanted to come back and shut everyone up. So I thought it was time to pick my controller back up and go back to work, it was time to clock back in baby.
Genesis was about a month or two away, so I wanted to get myself back in shape by making Alex and Joey play with me every day. Felt good to know I was just about ready to **** Genesis. Was pretty confident I would win, woulda bet trillions of dollars on it, I just feel that sometimes I’m on a whole different level and no one can touch me. Time was flying by and I had never felt so confident going into a tourney. It was almost time, almost time for the return of the king .
I was finally on my way to Genesis with Hugo, Gabe, Romeo and his girlfriend Kanna. (little asian girl I know you guys were creeping ) All of my closest friends. The car ride went by pretty quick. We didn’t really talk about the tourney too much, not much to talk about when we all knew I was gonna win. I was texting PP on the way up telling him I wanna play him when I get there. I brought a gamecube just so I could get a little practice in every night before I started drinking. We start playing and its pretty even, we’re making jokes and just having a good time. But I don’t want it to be even, I wanna be winning by 2 stocks every game, so me and him get real quiet focusing/trying real hard. I know he was sick but I started winning most of our matches and by a pretty good margin (from what I remember). I went to bed that night feeling really good about winning. Woke up and the next 2 days flew by, because pools are always a joke. The nights were fun though, drank with all my favorite people in the world, which made me happy and confident =].
So it was time, singles bracket day had arrived. Exactly what I wanted. I was hungry, I was ready to play baby, felt good. Also, didn’t drink too much the night before and got a good night’s rest. Then I went to check the bracket fiending to check who I was playing next. That’s how I knew I wanted to win, haven’t check the bracket in forever to see who I was playing. And it was the ONE PERSON I did not want on my side of the bracket. M2K. You can say what you want about M2K, but I will always be scared of playing that kid. Don’t know if it’s a respect thing cause he was once in my shoes as the best player, or if it’s cause that ****er can kill me in one hit sometimes. Whatever it is, I’m always really nervous about playing him. Makes me think back to my ‘07 days when I played Puff and he would just **** me with Marth. Couldn’t touch him. Then I switched to spacies only to die in one hit and get edgeguarded flawlessly.
I should have been warming up but instead I was too busy doing cutesies with Lil, but I’m usually alright playing without warming up. In the middle of my cutesies, I hear:
“Mango vs. M2K on the projector.”
Looked at Lil in the eye, asked for my controller, and took a deep breath as I walked onto the stage, took my shirt off, just wearing my wifebeater =]. I love that feeling of waiting for the other player to come, as you sit there and think and think and think about PURE melee. You forget what you did yesterday, you forget about all the good times and bad times in life, you forget how you got that scar on your arm, you forget who your mom is, who your best friend is, EVERYTHING. Melee Melee Melee Melee is all that’s running through your mind. Finally, my first big match in a LONGGGGGGGGGGG time, like a pitcher pitching for the first time after surgery.
So against M2K, I prefer going Falco and I’m hoping he goes Marth, watching him switch his character cursor from Marth to sheik hoping it lands on Marth. “Marth” YESSSS. I’m always pretty confident about playing his Marth with my Falco, and of course first match I 4-stocked him, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s never prematurely shoot your wad. He goes Sheik and now I know it’s GAME TIME and wouldn’t you know it, I’m getting 3-stocked. So I take a little moment to think to myself that I’m not about to go out like a sucker. I rally back, bringing it to one stock, high percent. He gets me off the stage, needles me in the middle of my forward-B, for most people that’s a problem. They would fall down and up-B, giving M2K the very easy, basic edgeguard but I’m Mango, I’m better than that. I react to it and forward-B immediately, it spikes him and he falls to his 0-2 grave. 3rd match he beats me pretty solid. 4th match is just like the 3rd, except I win. Felt good knowing that I could still compete like I never left. Also felt good knowing that I beat my biggest fear, meaning what can stop me now, right? Usually beating someone is just another day at the office, just another victory, just another regular fist pump after a win, but this one was more than that. Felt amazing as I rejoined my friends, everyone smiling and giving me props. Now, the only things in my way of that dumb/cool belt were Armada, Hbox, PP, and apparently Taj. Let’s go baby =]
Then I got to do one of my favorite things… Watch melee matches. As fun as it to play and have the crowd going nuts for you, it’s just as fun to watch other players. I was a little disappointed in the tourney sets that took place though. I’m pretty sure we were all HYPED for PP vs. Armada but it was awful to watch when PP played god awful. Even looked like Armada wasn’t happy when he won, which is a sign of a great player. So that set was like 10 minutes of PP getting tossed around, Not saying PP woulda won if he wasn’t sick, but he wouldn’t have gotten 3-0, tell you that.
Then there was Hbox vs. Armada. Had absolutely no hype for this set for a lot of reasons. I’m all for Armada picking a STRAIGHT counterpick to beat Hbox.. THE FIRST TIME. When I beat Hbox with Puff, people were like ooOOoOoo he can’t do it with any other character, and stuff like that FUELS me. So I went out and beat Hbox with Fox. I don’t know how Armada feels good about beating Hbox in a straight 70-30 matchup. Now this only creates Hbox having to pick up a Sheik maybe, which means it’s gonna come down to who wins the first game. Then they counterpick each other till game 5. And let me tell you something that is absolutely 0 hype: Hbox Sheik vs. Armada Young Link. So Armada, you gotta beat Hbox with Peach to gain my FULL respect with your MAIN character. After that we had MacD vs Taj which wasn’t on the projector. Really didn’t care who won, I was already thinking SWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET SEE YOU IN FINALS ARMADA. Found out Taj won, didn’t really matter to me. I was gonna win.
So once again, chilling with my friends waiting for my name to be called. Never been less nervous going into a Semi-final, even last Genesis when I had to play Scar ( ty Scar ) So once again, not warming up like I should be, until finally…
“Mango vs Taj on the projector.”
Grab my controller from Lil, and everyone pats me on the back as I walk away, heading towards the stage. So I’m sitting there waiting for Taj again, thinking of ONLY MELEEEEE and thinking about how I’m ‘bout to **** this fool.
So Taj comes and sits down, we stage strike and all that good stuff. The match begins, I absolutely destroy his first stock, and I’m thinking well this is gonna be ez pz. Then I get gimped, and Taj ties it up at 2 stocks. I’m thinking hmmm hold up lets run that back real quick, then he gimped my dumb *** again. So I raised my eyebrow cause now I’m losing, completely blowing my lead. Then we are last stock, and I’ve been in this situation thousands of times, just another day in the office. Then there’s a situation where he’s standing on the cloud at high percent (both of us), and he’s standing there and everything slows down for me. I think to myself Mango please DO NOT go out there. I knew 100 percent that I shouldn’t have, but something took took me over, and FOR SOME REASON I will never be able to explain, I go out and do a silly dair, get grabbed, dead. Things like that happen to me a lot though, and you gotta live with the choice you made and not beat yourself up about it. Yeah it was an awful choice, but I didn’t wanna think about it for the rest of the set.
So there I am, confused as to why I’m down 1-0 to Taj at Genesis 2. All kinds of things are racing in my mind, but the first one was back to Yoshi’s. We go back, and I ***** him like I should have game 1. Game 3 was almost a mirror of game one, I’m up then I get gimped, but I always nod my head in approval when I get gimped. I call it the “Proooo”. Melee is a game where sometimes you’re gonna get *****. Sometimes you just gotta tell the other player in your head “Alright you got me, on to the next stock.” Armada is a good example. If you watch the match where Hbox wins by one percent, look at Armada’s face. Doesn’t phase him AT ALL, while Hungybox is parading like a scrub-a-dub. Ask Hbox how the rest of that set went for him.
Anyways as I was saying, Game 3 last stock once again, and I blow it AGAIN. And Game 4 was just like Game 2, I ***** him like I should have. After that match I’m thinking AL-righttttttttttttttt enough of this I can’t get sent to losers by Taj. And I give myself a little pre-game plan going into Game 4 ” Shoot more lasers grab more stop going to the edge as much be smart” Game 5, fighting to get into finals. I REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted to follow my game plan, but the second I hear people cheering for me, a different Mango takes over. Cool flashy Mango comes into play. When people cheer for me, I want them to cheer while I do cool things, like playing aggro like a mother ****er. I don’t wanna be cheered for when I do laser laser laser laser grab. I want people to cheer for me while I approach and in the middle of them saying MANGOOOO they say omg WTF. The crowd factors a lot into how I play, and if no one’s there like Hugo to tell me to do otherwise, I’m gonna try really hard to please everyone. Every time I went to the EC and no one cheered for me, I did absolutely what I needed to win.
ANYWAYS I lose Game 5, and my whole little Mango world just comes crashing down. I’ve never been so shocked in my whole life, just really upset at the way I played, coulda changed so many little things to change the outcome to a 3-0. Shake hands, unplug my controller, and walk off the stage so quick, just really really upset and mad at myself. Walked past my best friend and his girlfriend, and didn’t even look them in the eye. Just stared at the floor as I walked by mobs of people, I hear my name being whispered. Had to walk outside and took my walk of shame. After 10 minutes, I’m real calm and ready to go back to my friends. Felt good after talking to them, but now I knew it was gonna be an absolute pain in the *** to win the tourney. I already skipped everybody else I would have to play next: Dajuan Hbox TaJ. Just thinking about winning 2 sets against Armada.
So after finally cooling down after losing to Taj, getting ready to make my sweeeeet comeback. I check the bracket to see who I have to play, and I see I get winner of Dajuan PP. Automatically, I’m like alright well finally get to **** PP. With the way PP was playing, I really hoped Dajuan wouldn’t win. 0 points in beating a sick PP, No one gains anything out of it. Turns out Dajuan won, so I find him and quickly 3-0 him. Was still playing a little shaky for the most part, but was still feeling pretty good.
While Armada vs. Taj was going on, M2K vs. Hbox was on a small tv in the corner. I watched that instead, because I knew Armada was gonna wreck Taj. Watching M2K vs Hbox, I was hoping Hbox would win, something about ****** Hbox just makes me really happy . Went to 5th game and M2K lost. When you find out who you’re gonna play next before your set is called, all you think about is that person and the character he plays. What levels you might counter-pick, etc.
“Mango vs Hbox on the projector.”
I’m hyped and ready to play. I decided to play Fox because I didn’t wanna beat him with Puff, I feel like it’s the easy way out. I like to challenge myself, and this guy’s supposed to be really good vs. Fox , and my Falco doesn’t shoot enough lasers, which makes it really hard on me.
We stage strike, and we go to Battlefield. Before the match starts, I have a little talk with myself. Either play really campy, lasers, grabs, safe bairs, or play like me and just go at him. I really wanted to win so I told myself I’d play campy but the match starts, I hear the crowd, and that goes RIGHT out the window at the speed of light. I decided **** IT lets dance baby. I feel that when Fox players camp Hbox it benefits him alot more. Hbox only uses one move for the most part, and when you give him the space to bair, you’re just hurting yourself. If you get in his face like I do, it takes away from his bair, since he doesn’t nair/fair as good as he bairs, he can’t get me off when I’m on him.
First match was probably the only close one. Don’t have much to say about the next 2 matches. I win those rather easily. Like I said though, beating Hbox just brings me so much joy. Watched other people have to play really really gay to even compete with him, and here I am going at him like he’s just another normal puff, feels great. Now it’s time for my rematch, NEVER WANTED A REMATCH SO BADDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD. JUST WANTED TO **** **** RAPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE Taj. I could write a whole paragraph on that set, but there’s really not much to say. He shouldn’t have beat me in winners, and I proved that in losers. Even threw in a 4-stock for good measure .
So after redeeming myself, it’s time, Mango vs. Armada, Grand Finals, Genesis. USA vs. Europe: the rematch. What everyone came to see. Mango vs. Armada Grand Finals let’s go.
I really wanted to take a break, my Fox juice was getting a little low, but I didn’t wanna make the crowd wait, so I just jumped into it. I’m feeling really good, got the crowd on my side, not nervous at all, but winning 2 sets is gay. When I think of me and Armada in terms of skill, I feel like I’m a little bit better, not a lot, just enough to give me breathing room. Winning one set isn’t a problem, winning two is gay, mostly because I’m playing Fox, and to all my Fox players, you know how hard it is to play consistent, especially against good players.
Armada is making his way up to the stage, and I’m thinking about what character I wanted to play. Immediately Puff comes to mind first. I think, I think, and I just come to the conclusion that if I go Puff, he’s gonna bust out that JOKE Young Link and I really didn’t want to give the crowd that trash again. Then I think Falco. Usually really comfortable with my birdy, but I don’t shoot enough lasers, which I feel is a necessity against floaties. Falcon comes to mind, which I’m pretty sure I could have beat him with.
The reason I feel Armada’s a little shady against Falcon is because Armada is really dependent on his out-of-shield game. You can’t out-of-shield Falcon because of his gentleman, really hard to time, and Falcon’s got COMBOS on Peach. Armada doesn’t wanna mess with me if it comes to pure combos, he can combo THE **** out of my spacies and my Falcon, but my spacies can only do baby combos on him, while he’s got death combos on me. Falcon is straight up combos vs. combos, which is fun. So I took all of that into consideration, and I realized that I just wanted to give the crowd a sweet show with Fox, and I’m like 99 percent sure they wanna keep watching it so I choose Fox based on that. We stage strike and it’s go time.
ALRIGHT, let’s fast-forward a little bit.
In the end I lost to Armada. I wasn’t upset or sad that I lost because I knew, and all the smart people of the community knew, that I could have won. Felt good though to have people cheering for me. Having people WANTING me to win brought back why I love this game. I just want to point some things out that happened in our set that could have changed the match 100 percent. Before I go into this, I want to point out I am in no way johning at all.
Armada played great and deserved to win. Should he have beat me? I don’t think so. Just wanna point out a few things.
Game one I tried to do a laser up smash which cost me my whole stock basically. NOW, why did I try a laser up smash? To be cool and that’s the only reason. I knew it wasn’t gonna hit but had to go for it, cost me my stock though. Would I do it again .. Absolutely.
Game 2, the game’s pretty even. He’s at high percent, I’m at medium percent, he’s off stage, and I’m running towards the edge, deciding what I should do. It’s either A) just walk up and forward tilt, or B) run, shine, turn around grab the edge and use my invincibility to bair or uair or do the Zhu and shine turnaround to bair. Of course I choose option B, I get up-aired in the middle of bair. Cost me a stock. No one ever said being cool was easy.
Game 3, I should have lost but I won somehow. First stock, after killing him without taking much damage, I forward-B off the level. I don’t really have an excuse for that, except that I forward-B off the stage like once a year, and it happened in Grand Finals =( . Next stock, I have him off stage and FOR SOME REASON I DON’T KNOW WHY, I try a wall-jump shine. Says a lot about the way I wanted to play, either way that cost me a stock at early percent.
Game 4, I’m down a stock after he ***** my first stock pretty solid. I have him off stage and go for a basic bair edge guard which results in me killing myself. I know people SD, it happens BUT I’m Mango and I’ve already killed myself way too many times in this set and gave away free *** stocks. I come back and I’m already really upset with myself and go for a dumb up-air which results in me taking ~40 percent. I bring it down to last stock, decent percent, but you can only give up so many free stocks/percent and expect to win.
Game 5, I take his first stock pretty nicely, he comes back and takes my stock because I miss a Dair l cancel and an up-B angle =( . At this point I’m already very upset with myself and don’t wanna play anymore. So many bad choices, but I couldn’t be mad about it, because I chose to play the way I did. A stock later, I get death combo’d because I accidentally did a get up attack and DI’d a nair awfully. At this point I already gave up and decided I wouldn’t win. Instead of slowing it down and trying to maybe make a comeback, I just keep going at him like it’s not my last stock, like it’s not Game 5 of Genesis 2 Grand Finals.
If I’ve learned anything in my 19 years of life, it’s ALWAYS AND ALWAYSSSSS GO OUT WITH YOUR GUNS A BLAZINGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG and so I did.
Like I said though, I was already really upset with myself, and recovered awful my last stock. To recap the set, I felt like I could have EASILY won if I just hit the brakes A TINYYYY BIT. I’m not mad at myself though, I’m actually really glad with the end result. If Armada gave me free stocks ( 0-60 percent ) and suicided I GURANTEEEE I would 3-0 2-stocks. I know it’s dumb to use suiciding/free stocks as an excuse but when I could have EASILYYYYYY prevented them, I will. And like I said, I’m not johning at all, just wanted to point some things out since I had your attention..which brings me to my next point about floaties. They dont have to worry about getting edgeguarded, gimped, or combo’d which I’ll talk about in my next blog ( gonna cover floaties vs. fast fallers ) like alot of people watch the set and say “wow mango looks like the better player” 1. I am 2. I feel that in playing a fast faller, you have to be better at more things, making you overall better at the game.. Like I’m ****** but I miss an L-cancel, so I take 60 damage.. If Armada misses an L-cancel.. Oh wait he doesn’t have to worry about that. Or if I accidentally kill myself that’s a stock. It’s almost impossible for Armada to kill himself.. Floaties in general .. etc etc I’ll go into more detail next time.
Overall, really glad Armada won. Brings hype back to the game, which is never bad for our 10-year-old game. So yeah, hope you guys liked this. Let me know what you think. Can’t wait to write more… I wanna try and write one every week. =] <3
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Genesis was an absolutely amazing experience that made me remember how melee can make you feel so many things. Months before Genesis, I was pretty much done with the game. No one cared when I won, I would beat someone with a certain character and it wouldn’t matter cause “it’s Mango”. Made me just lose all love and motivation for the game, since apparently I had nothing to prove. But as Genesis approached..
I would read Smashboards/Facebook or wherever all the smashers were chatting. Reading that I was washed up, reading that PP/Hbox/Armada would **** me, reading that I don’t try cause I’m scared to lose. Usually I’m pretty good at ignoring that stuff, but this time it got to me. I really wanted to come back and shut everyone up. So I thought it was time to pick my controller back up and go back to work, it was time to clock back in baby.
Genesis was about a month or two away, so I wanted to get myself back in shape by making Alex and Joey play with me every day. Felt good to know I was just about ready to **** Genesis. Was pretty confident I would win, woulda bet trillions of dollars on it, I just feel that sometimes I’m on a whole different level and no one can touch me. Time was flying by and I had never felt so confident going into a tourney. It was almost time, almost time for the return of the king .
I was finally on my way to Genesis with Hugo, Gabe, Romeo and his girlfriend Kanna. (little asian girl I know you guys were creeping ) All of my closest friends. The car ride went by pretty quick. We didn’t really talk about the tourney too much, not much to talk about when we all knew I was gonna win. I was texting PP on the way up telling him I wanna play him when I get there. I brought a gamecube just so I could get a little practice in every night before I started drinking. We start playing and its pretty even, we’re making jokes and just having a good time. But I don’t want it to be even, I wanna be winning by 2 stocks every game, so me and him get real quiet focusing/trying real hard. I know he was sick but I started winning most of our matches and by a pretty good margin (from what I remember). I went to bed that night feeling really good about winning. Woke up and the next 2 days flew by, because pools are always a joke. The nights were fun though, drank with all my favorite people in the world, which made me happy and confident =].
So it was time, singles bracket day had arrived. Exactly what I wanted. I was hungry, I was ready to play baby, felt good. Also, didn’t drink too much the night before and got a good night’s rest. Then I went to check the bracket fiending to check who I was playing next. That’s how I knew I wanted to win, haven’t check the bracket in forever to see who I was playing. And it was the ONE PERSON I did not want on my side of the bracket. M2K. You can say what you want about M2K, but I will always be scared of playing that kid. Don’t know if it’s a respect thing cause he was once in my shoes as the best player, or if it’s cause that ****er can kill me in one hit sometimes. Whatever it is, I’m always really nervous about playing him. Makes me think back to my ‘07 days when I played Puff and he would just **** me with Marth. Couldn’t touch him. Then I switched to spacies only to die in one hit and get edgeguarded flawlessly.
I should have been warming up but instead I was too busy doing cutesies with Lil, but I’m usually alright playing without warming up. In the middle of my cutesies, I hear:
“Mango vs. M2K on the projector.”
Looked at Lil in the eye, asked for my controller, and took a deep breath as I walked onto the stage, took my shirt off, just wearing my wifebeater =]. I love that feeling of waiting for the other player to come, as you sit there and think and think and think about PURE melee. You forget what you did yesterday, you forget about all the good times and bad times in life, you forget how you got that scar on your arm, you forget who your mom is, who your best friend is, EVERYTHING. Melee Melee Melee Melee is all that’s running through your mind. Finally, my first big match in a LONGGGGGGGGGGG time, like a pitcher pitching for the first time after surgery.
So against M2K, I prefer going Falco and I’m hoping he goes Marth, watching him switch his character cursor from Marth to sheik hoping it lands on Marth. “Marth” YESSSS. I’m always pretty confident about playing his Marth with my Falco, and of course first match I 4-stocked him, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s never prematurely shoot your wad. He goes Sheik and now I know it’s GAME TIME and wouldn’t you know it, I’m getting 3-stocked. So I take a little moment to think to myself that I’m not about to go out like a sucker. I rally back, bringing it to one stock, high percent. He gets me off the stage, needles me in the middle of my forward-B, for most people that’s a problem. They would fall down and up-B, giving M2K the very easy, basic edgeguard but I’m Mango, I’m better than that. I react to it and forward-B immediately, it spikes him and he falls to his 0-2 grave. 3rd match he beats me pretty solid. 4th match is just like the 3rd, except I win. Felt good knowing that I could still compete like I never left. Also felt good knowing that I beat my biggest fear, meaning what can stop me now, right? Usually beating someone is just another day at the office, just another victory, just another regular fist pump after a win, but this one was more than that. Felt amazing as I rejoined my friends, everyone smiling and giving me props. Now, the only things in my way of that dumb/cool belt were Armada, Hbox, PP, and apparently Taj. Let’s go baby =]
Then I got to do one of my favorite things… Watch melee matches. As fun as it to play and have the crowd going nuts for you, it’s just as fun to watch other players. I was a little disappointed in the tourney sets that took place though. I’m pretty sure we were all HYPED for PP vs. Armada but it was awful to watch when PP played god awful. Even looked like Armada wasn’t happy when he won, which is a sign of a great player. So that set was like 10 minutes of PP getting tossed around, Not saying PP woulda won if he wasn’t sick, but he wouldn’t have gotten 3-0, tell you that.
Then there was Hbox vs. Armada. Had absolutely no hype for this set for a lot of reasons. I’m all for Armada picking a STRAIGHT counterpick to beat Hbox.. THE FIRST TIME. When I beat Hbox with Puff, people were like ooOOoOoo he can’t do it with any other character, and stuff like that FUELS me. So I went out and beat Hbox with Fox. I don’t know how Armada feels good about beating Hbox in a straight 70-30 matchup. Now this only creates Hbox having to pick up a Sheik maybe, which means it’s gonna come down to who wins the first game. Then they counterpick each other till game 5. And let me tell you something that is absolutely 0 hype: Hbox Sheik vs. Armada Young Link. So Armada, you gotta beat Hbox with Peach to gain my FULL respect with your MAIN character. After that we had MacD vs Taj which wasn’t on the projector. Really didn’t care who won, I was already thinking SWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET SEE YOU IN FINALS ARMADA. Found out Taj won, didn’t really matter to me. I was gonna win.
So once again, chilling with my friends waiting for my name to be called. Never been less nervous going into a Semi-final, even last Genesis when I had to play Scar ( ty Scar ) So once again, not warming up like I should be, until finally…
“Mango vs Taj on the projector.”
Grab my controller from Lil, and everyone pats me on the back as I walk away, heading towards the stage. So I’m sitting there waiting for Taj again, thinking of ONLY MELEEEEE and thinking about how I’m ‘bout to **** this fool.
So Taj comes and sits down, we stage strike and all that good stuff. The match begins, I absolutely destroy his first stock, and I’m thinking well this is gonna be ez pz. Then I get gimped, and Taj ties it up at 2 stocks. I’m thinking hmmm hold up lets run that back real quick, then he gimped my dumb *** again. So I raised my eyebrow cause now I’m losing, completely blowing my lead. Then we are last stock, and I’ve been in this situation thousands of times, just another day in the office. Then there’s a situation where he’s standing on the cloud at high percent (both of us), and he’s standing there and everything slows down for me. I think to myself Mango please DO NOT go out there. I knew 100 percent that I shouldn’t have, but something took took me over, and FOR SOME REASON I will never be able to explain, I go out and do a silly dair, get grabbed, dead. Things like that happen to me a lot though, and you gotta live with the choice you made and not beat yourself up about it. Yeah it was an awful choice, but I didn’t wanna think about it for the rest of the set.
So there I am, confused as to why I’m down 1-0 to Taj at Genesis 2. All kinds of things are racing in my mind, but the first one was back to Yoshi’s. We go back, and I ***** him like I should have game 1. Game 3 was almost a mirror of game one, I’m up then I get gimped, but I always nod my head in approval when I get gimped. I call it the “Proooo”. Melee is a game where sometimes you’re gonna get *****. Sometimes you just gotta tell the other player in your head “Alright you got me, on to the next stock.” Armada is a good example. If you watch the match where Hbox wins by one percent, look at Armada’s face. Doesn’t phase him AT ALL, while Hungybox is parading like a scrub-a-dub. Ask Hbox how the rest of that set went for him.
Anyways as I was saying, Game 3 last stock once again, and I blow it AGAIN. And Game 4 was just like Game 2, I ***** him like I should have. After that match I’m thinking AL-righttttttttttttttt enough of this I can’t get sent to losers by Taj. And I give myself a little pre-game plan going into Game 4 ” Shoot more lasers grab more stop going to the edge as much be smart” Game 5, fighting to get into finals. I REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted to follow my game plan, but the second I hear people cheering for me, a different Mango takes over. Cool flashy Mango comes into play. When people cheer for me, I want them to cheer while I do cool things, like playing aggro like a mother ****er. I don’t wanna be cheered for when I do laser laser laser laser grab. I want people to cheer for me while I approach and in the middle of them saying MANGOOOO they say omg WTF. The crowd factors a lot into how I play, and if no one’s there like Hugo to tell me to do otherwise, I’m gonna try really hard to please everyone. Every time I went to the EC and no one cheered for me, I did absolutely what I needed to win.
ANYWAYS I lose Game 5, and my whole little Mango world just comes crashing down. I’ve never been so shocked in my whole life, just really upset at the way I played, coulda changed so many little things to change the outcome to a 3-0. Shake hands, unplug my controller, and walk off the stage so quick, just really really upset and mad at myself. Walked past my best friend and his girlfriend, and didn’t even look them in the eye. Just stared at the floor as I walked by mobs of people, I hear my name being whispered. Had to walk outside and took my walk of shame. After 10 minutes, I’m real calm and ready to go back to my friends. Felt good after talking to them, but now I knew it was gonna be an absolute pain in the *** to win the tourney. I already skipped everybody else I would have to play next: Dajuan Hbox TaJ. Just thinking about winning 2 sets against Armada.
So after finally cooling down after losing to Taj, getting ready to make my sweeeeet comeback. I check the bracket to see who I have to play, and I see I get winner of Dajuan PP. Automatically, I’m like alright well finally get to **** PP. With the way PP was playing, I really hoped Dajuan wouldn’t win. 0 points in beating a sick PP, No one gains anything out of it. Turns out Dajuan won, so I find him and quickly 3-0 him. Was still playing a little shaky for the most part, but was still feeling pretty good.
While Armada vs. Taj was going on, M2K vs. Hbox was on a small tv in the corner. I watched that instead, because I knew Armada was gonna wreck Taj. Watching M2K vs Hbox, I was hoping Hbox would win, something about ****** Hbox just makes me really happy . Went to 5th game and M2K lost. When you find out who you’re gonna play next before your set is called, all you think about is that person and the character he plays. What levels you might counter-pick, etc.
“Mango vs Hbox on the projector.”
I’m hyped and ready to play. I decided to play Fox because I didn’t wanna beat him with Puff, I feel like it’s the easy way out. I like to challenge myself, and this guy’s supposed to be really good vs. Fox , and my Falco doesn’t shoot enough lasers, which makes it really hard on me.
We stage strike, and we go to Battlefield. Before the match starts, I have a little talk with myself. Either play really campy, lasers, grabs, safe bairs, or play like me and just go at him. I really wanted to win so I told myself I’d play campy but the match starts, I hear the crowd, and that goes RIGHT out the window at the speed of light. I decided **** IT lets dance baby. I feel that when Fox players camp Hbox it benefits him alot more. Hbox only uses one move for the most part, and when you give him the space to bair, you’re just hurting yourself. If you get in his face like I do, it takes away from his bair, since he doesn’t nair/fair as good as he bairs, he can’t get me off when I’m on him.
First match was probably the only close one. Don’t have much to say about the next 2 matches. I win those rather easily. Like I said though, beating Hbox just brings me so much joy. Watched other people have to play really really gay to even compete with him, and here I am going at him like he’s just another normal puff, feels great. Now it’s time for my rematch, NEVER WANTED A REMATCH SO BADDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD. JUST WANTED TO **** **** RAPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE Taj. I could write a whole paragraph on that set, but there’s really not much to say. He shouldn’t have beat me in winners, and I proved that in losers. Even threw in a 4-stock for good measure .
So after redeeming myself, it’s time, Mango vs. Armada, Grand Finals, Genesis. USA vs. Europe: the rematch. What everyone came to see. Mango vs. Armada Grand Finals let’s go.
I really wanted to take a break, my Fox juice was getting a little low, but I didn’t wanna make the crowd wait, so I just jumped into it. I’m feeling really good, got the crowd on my side, not nervous at all, but winning 2 sets is gay. When I think of me and Armada in terms of skill, I feel like I’m a little bit better, not a lot, just enough to give me breathing room. Winning one set isn’t a problem, winning two is gay, mostly because I’m playing Fox, and to all my Fox players, you know how hard it is to play consistent, especially against good players.
Armada is making his way up to the stage, and I’m thinking about what character I wanted to play. Immediately Puff comes to mind first. I think, I think, and I just come to the conclusion that if I go Puff, he’s gonna bust out that JOKE Young Link and I really didn’t want to give the crowd that trash again. Then I think Falco. Usually really comfortable with my birdy, but I don’t shoot enough lasers, which I feel is a necessity against floaties. Falcon comes to mind, which I’m pretty sure I could have beat him with.
The reason I feel Armada’s a little shady against Falcon is because Armada is really dependent on his out-of-shield game. You can’t out-of-shield Falcon because of his gentleman, really hard to time, and Falcon’s got COMBOS on Peach. Armada doesn’t wanna mess with me if it comes to pure combos, he can combo THE **** out of my spacies and my Falcon, but my spacies can only do baby combos on him, while he’s got death combos on me. Falcon is straight up combos vs. combos, which is fun. So I took all of that into consideration, and I realized that I just wanted to give the crowd a sweet show with Fox, and I’m like 99 percent sure they wanna keep watching it so I choose Fox based on that. We stage strike and it’s go time.
ALRIGHT, let’s fast-forward a little bit.
In the end I lost to Armada. I wasn’t upset or sad that I lost because I knew, and all the smart people of the community knew, that I could have won. Felt good though to have people cheering for me. Having people WANTING me to win brought back why I love this game. I just want to point some things out that happened in our set that could have changed the match 100 percent. Before I go into this, I want to point out I am in no way johning at all.
Armada played great and deserved to win. Should he have beat me? I don’t think so. Just wanna point out a few things.
Game one I tried to do a laser up smash which cost me my whole stock basically. NOW, why did I try a laser up smash? To be cool and that’s the only reason. I knew it wasn’t gonna hit but had to go for it, cost me my stock though. Would I do it again .. Absolutely.
Game 2, the game’s pretty even. He’s at high percent, I’m at medium percent, he’s off stage, and I’m running towards the edge, deciding what I should do. It’s either A) just walk up and forward tilt, or B) run, shine, turn around grab the edge and use my invincibility to bair or uair or do the Zhu and shine turnaround to bair. Of course I choose option B, I get up-aired in the middle of bair. Cost me a stock. No one ever said being cool was easy.
Game 3, I should have lost but I won somehow. First stock, after killing him without taking much damage, I forward-B off the level. I don’t really have an excuse for that, except that I forward-B off the stage like once a year, and it happened in Grand Finals =( . Next stock, I have him off stage and FOR SOME REASON I DON’T KNOW WHY, I try a wall-jump shine. Says a lot about the way I wanted to play, either way that cost me a stock at early percent.
Game 4, I’m down a stock after he ***** my first stock pretty solid. I have him off stage and go for a basic bair edge guard which results in me killing myself. I know people SD, it happens BUT I’m Mango and I’ve already killed myself way too many times in this set and gave away free *** stocks. I come back and I’m already really upset with myself and go for a dumb up-air which results in me taking ~40 percent. I bring it down to last stock, decent percent, but you can only give up so many free stocks/percent and expect to win.
Game 5, I take his first stock pretty nicely, he comes back and takes my stock because I miss a Dair l cancel and an up-B angle =( . At this point I’m already very upset with myself and don’t wanna play anymore. So many bad choices, but I couldn’t be mad about it, because I chose to play the way I did. A stock later, I get death combo’d because I accidentally did a get up attack and DI’d a nair awfully. At this point I already gave up and decided I wouldn’t win. Instead of slowing it down and trying to maybe make a comeback, I just keep going at him like it’s not my last stock, like it’s not Game 5 of Genesis 2 Grand Finals.
If I’ve learned anything in my 19 years of life, it’s ALWAYS AND ALWAYSSSSS GO OUT WITH YOUR GUNS A BLAZINGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG and so I did.
Like I said though, I was already really upset with myself, and recovered awful my last stock. To recap the set, I felt like I could have EASILY won if I just hit the brakes A TINYYYY BIT. I’m not mad at myself though, I’m actually really glad with the end result. If Armada gave me free stocks ( 0-60 percent ) and suicided I GURANTEEEE I would 3-0 2-stocks. I know it’s dumb to use suiciding/free stocks as an excuse but when I could have EASILYYYYYY prevented them, I will. And like I said, I’m not johning at all, just wanted to point some things out since I had your attention..which brings me to my next point about floaties. They dont have to worry about getting edgeguarded, gimped, or combo’d which I’ll talk about in my next blog ( gonna cover floaties vs. fast fallers ) like alot of people watch the set and say “wow mango looks like the better player” 1. I am 2. I feel that in playing a fast faller, you have to be better at more things, making you overall better at the game.. Like I’m ****** but I miss an L-cancel, so I take 60 damage.. If Armada misses an L-cancel.. Oh wait he doesn’t have to worry about that. Or if I accidentally kill myself that’s a stock. It’s almost impossible for Armada to kill himself.. Floaties in general .. etc etc I’ll go into more detail next time.
Overall, really glad Armada won. Brings hype back to the game, which is never bad for our 10-year-old game. So yeah, hope you guys liked this. Let me know what you think. Can’t wait to write more… I wanna try and write one every week. =] <3
