How would Ken fare in today's metagame?

[Jackie]

Uhhhh for all who don't already know, he entered today's Kings of Cali tournament.

For the stream tomorrow: http://www.twitch.tv/vgbootcamp

Tai versus Ken was pretty hype. It was amazing how Tai has watched Ken's matches for years, maybe in a hundred times. Yet Ken was making so many hard reads on Tai. Ken's patience and spacing is still there. Waiting for second jumps... all those fundamentals. Tai managed to earn the win 2-1 with his refined ditto knowledge and combos.

Ken got 3rd in pools, so he'll be in bracket. We can finally put the hypotheticals to rest!

 

[Shadow Huan]

depends on who he gets in bracket i'd say.

 

[The Star King]

I predict, immediately speaking, he will not do that well in the beginning of his return. BUT he'll quickly get up to speed and shoot up to near/at the top again (if he sticks around like I hope)

 

[Battlecow]

I don't think he's planning on sticking around

 

[EPsilon933]

Ken only got like 4 hours of sleep

 

[The Star King]

Choice quotes (paraphrased):

"Joining me here is SJ2."
"It's S2J."

"What is Falco's side-b called again? Falco Fantasia?

"I don't love Melee anymore, I'm sorry."

"There's three gay characters nobody likes to play. Ice Climbers, Peach, and Jigglypuff."

MORE TO COME

 

[Battlecow]

"I didn't eat anything today"

Moar like JOHN amirite?

Spoiler

/saltyabouthimgoinginduringthecrewbattleandvoidingmybet

 

[The Star King]

^Yeah, there was also "I was way too tired" after vs TAI and he defended johning after Lovage said "johning sucks". 'Twas funny :D

"I made the most money from Melee. I made more money from Melee than probably the next three people combined. I made more money than people with solid jobs."

"If I survived one more day in Survivor, I would have had a guaranteed win. It was either 1st or 5th."

"PPU is using dashdancing. I invented dashdancing", and "he's countering vs Falco, I started that vs PC Chris"

"Of course I'm right, I'm Ken"

 

[Life]

I'm liking these quotes

 

[The Star King]

I'm picking stuff I thought were funny and/or interesting

Lovage: "Some people take a year to get good, some people take like 4 years."
Ken: "Yeah, it's like being an Uchiha and unlocking your Sharingan. Some people unlock their Sharingan faster than others."

"Brawl is just a different game. 64 is a different game too, though it's closer to Melee."

"Try surviving in the African jungle for weeks, then playing Smash right afterwards. I dare you. (refering to Evo 2009 where he lost at Brawl-with-items)"

"There's a reason why Marth went from god tier to lesser god tier."

Ken: "Mango dropped out of college for Melee."
Lovage: "No he didn't, he was just messing with you."
Ken: "o"

 

[Construct]

"I invented dashdancing because I didn't know how to wavedash"

 

[Archangel]

^Yeah, there was also "I was way too tired" after vs TAI and he defended johning after Lovage said "johning sucks". 'Twas funny :D

"I made the most money from Melee. I made more money from Melee than probably the next three people combined. I made more money than people with solid jobs."

"If I survived one more day in Survivor, I would have had a guaranteed win. It was either 1st or 5th."

"PPU is using dashdancing. I invented dashdancing", and "he's countering vs Falco, I started that vs PC Chris"

"Of course I'm right, I'm Ken"

Funny ****! and the Uchiha Metaphor is definitely true.

 

[The Star King]

"Everybody hates the cloud."

"Melee is 20% luck."

"I'm gonna give Isai the benefit of the doubt and say Pokemon Stadium is the most balanced stage."

Lovage: "Somebody in the stream said: 'Ken suck me off'"
Ken: "No gay things guys, c'mon"

He's gone now dunno when coming back

 

[Gea]

You are officially my favorite poster

 

[Max?]

Ken for Apex commentary

 

[The Star King]

"Pikachu vs Marth is a bad match-up for Marth" and "(as Axe is destroying PPU) WHAT DID I TELL YOU HUGS? I know this matchup! It's bad for Marth!" and "this is like 65-35 for Pikachu" and "I don't think Marth can beat a good Pikachu"

"I don't think Mango would be a good Marth player"

Hugs: "I never got a chance to shine because two of the best players of all time were from my region."
Ken: "That's a pretty good john Hugs"

"Remember old-school Socal vs Norcal? We ***** them. We ***** them so hard they didn't even release the videos."

"Pikachu is like Fox and Peach together"

"One stock is not a lead. Unless it's Brawl."

Hugs bonus quotes:

"Remember when Florida was a joke, and Husband would talk about throwing Florida into the ocean?"

"For my first tournament, I thought I was the best in the world, and I went to Ken's biweekly to beat him and walk away as world champion forever. I then lost to Ken's 14 year old little sister spamming DSmash."

 

[Gea]

Hugo with dem humble words

 

[Theftz22]

I think ken still showed remarkable talent all things considered. He held his own against Tai, PPU, and Toph, all very good players. His loss to that peach was disappointing though. And you can definitely still tell that he has the desire to do win and still cares about the game, though he wont admit it. If he didn't, he definitely wouldn't john as much as he did. His repeating the statement that he's not interested in playing or returning far more than necessary also indicates this. I don't think that ken will ultimately come back, he's definitely found enough self-control, but that doesn't mean that his will to win is gone.

Also, lol @ zhu telling ken that m2k showed marth's how to play falco and fox then walking off.

 

[The Star King]

Ken saying something like "if you're Asian, you glow?" Kind of missed it.

Ken saying "reflector" instead of "shine" in general

Hugs: "Dr. Peepee. One of the worst Smash names of all time."
Ken: "No. Sephirothken is the worst."

Hugs: "Peepee is the book."
Ken: "Is that his nickname? The Book? Dr. Book?"

"I think Axe is gonna go to Battlefield." *Axe goes to Battlefield* "I didn't ask for these powers, Hugs. They were given to me."

"Of course I'm right, Hugs. Do I need to say it again?"

Hugs: "Mango isn't even gonna be fun to drink with if he loses. That's what I'm worried about."

*Mango losing* "Hugs is getting nervous! He looks like he just went to a haunted house and somebody scared the **** out of him!"

Also Hugs meatrides Mango SOOOOOOOO hard, even for someone from Socal. Jesus.

Also, shoutouts to S2J saying "IDK why people think Axe is top 10" and then getting destroyed by him/Axe getting 3rd/Axe taking PP to last game (last stock?), may have won if he didn't SD last game (forgot to mention this)

Congrats to PP

 

[MaskedMarth]

"This could go either way"

"I dunno man"

 

[Fuzzyness]

"What did you/I say"

 

[The Star King]

One last thing

Whoever "Blessing_" is has no idea what he's talking about

 

[Captain Smuckers]

I was previously unaware that marth is incapable of beating pikachu. I mean, it's obviously in pikachu's favor, something like 65-35, but I didn't know that it was impossible.

 

[Lovage]

ken is a ****ing G

 

[KirbyKaze]

Ken hates Pikachu so much haha

 

[Habefiet]

I for one greatly enjoyed the part where he heavily implied that Marth-Peach is a 100-0 match-up in favor of Peach. Don't remember the exact words, but he basically said that Marth cannot beat a sufficiently good Peach. It was around the part where he said he didn't think Mango would be a good Marth IIRC.

ken2gud

Ah, that was a lot of fun. Shoutouts to Ken for heading to the tourney, that was extremely cool. I'll be delighted if he gets enough of the itch to come to another thing or two or even practice a little again, but he seems to feel he's done, and it's just cool that he was willing to show up again at all. Very cool stuff.

 

[unknown522]

Ken's personal vendetta with pikachu was soooo funny.

He sounded like a falco main.

Also ken winning the crew battle was kinda epic

 

[VoiD-]

Also, shoutouts to S2J saying "IDK why people think Axe is top 10" and then getting destroyed by him/Axe getting 3rd/Axe taking PP to last game (last stock?), may have won if he didn't SD last game (forgot to mention this

Was probably my the sweetest part of Axe's run for me. Whoever uploads Axe vs S2J should put that clip before it.

Also I think whoever blessing_ is was trolling me.

 

[ShroudedOne]

Yeah, he doesn't think Marth can beat Peach or Puff. Looks like the "Is Marth still good" debate has come to an end.

Seriously, Ken was very enjoyable to listen to. I'm wasn't super duper hyped, but it's always nice to see people from long ago come back, and give insight.

Crews were on stream, right? I missed those.

 

[strawhats]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ggzxInyzVE

Ken's still got it. Rusty/lack of execution but his fundamental's, reads, mindgames, and overall game knowledge are all still at a high level. So long Sir Ken.

 

[victra♥]

man ahahah those quotes are hilarious, i'm bummed out i didnt catch all of them live.

 

[knightpraetor]

from the dropped sets, I would have to say that ken strictly outplayed toph, but lost because his edgeguarding is sloppy. If i had been finishing for him he would have been fine. I think part of it is foxes are better at recovering these days.

vs peach...i honestly think he didn't know what he was doing or how to handle modern peach at all.. he would need to learn that matchup if he planned to keep playing. The marth dittos he played quite well I thought. He had a lot of creative ideas too

 

[Lovage]

ur ******** if you think toph didn't play 500% better in game 3 compared to game 1

 

[strawhats]

yeah Toph definately steeped it up after games 1 and 2. Ken still played well though.

 

[itsbme]

"For my first tournament, I thought I was the best in the world, and I went to Ken's biweekly to beat him and walk away as world champion forever. I then lost to Ken's 14 year old little sister spamming DSmash."

Hahaha, I was watching the stream when he said that. I rolled.

 

[TL?]

The tourney was mad hype. I saw that the vgbootcamp stream was active on eventhubs and randomly decided to check it out. I had no idea ken would be there, and when the stream loaded it was ken about to win the crew battles. I couldn't even believe it at first. It was really awesome to see ken play again.

 

[The Star King]

Yeah, he doesn't think Marth can beat Peach or Puff. Looks like the "Is Marth still good" debate has come to an end.

So Peach, Pikachu, and Puff? Obviously Marth gets wrecked by characters with the letter "P". Pichu hard counters Marth, take notes kids.

 

[S l o X]

toph game 1 looked like he wasnt doing anything he wanted to do didnt see game 3 game 2 was cool tho. glad he didnt play like complete *** after game 1 i know that feel.

 

[Tee ay eye]

you guys should watch my second set with ken

 

[Anand]

you guys should watch my second set with ken

What's the link/timestamp in the Twitch.tv stream archive?