Hey guys, um I'm actually not a Smash kid at all, I've in fact never played this game, I am a french Halo kid who never really placed well in tournaments despite I'm sure I had the level to...
I watched like several months ago a documentary about the Street Fighter community, actually they were following a french player named Wolmar (on of the best EU players on Street Fighter II Turbo) through the EVO 2012, and I actually loved it!
Then, like a few weeks ago, a friend of mine, another Halo kid, send me the link on YouTube to The Smash Brothers: Episode 1 - Show Me Your Moves, and said that it was a great documentary about another gaming community.
Actually, this documentary made a point in my mind that I was trying to develop for years. This point is that the gameplay of a game can be a reflect of the personality of somebody (best examples for me are Azen, Isai, M2K and Mango).
And this is what I was looking for by playing video games, just express myself and see how far it can go. Unfortunately, I couldn't seem to grab the chance to do it properly on Halo, first of all because the only competitive gametypes that players respect in terms of skill and results are in 4v4, and secondly because my best placement is 8th on 14 at my first official tournament (meaning "National-Level LAN Tournament") actually (excepted my 5th place finish on 16 during a 2v2 tournament).
I did my best to support the french Halo community (been part of the official french competitive Halo website's staff for a year, organized monthly One Day Cups for another year (my former staff KoTH Cup was the only one doing it in France) and an offline tournament (no the only one we had, but the only one I organized (not only by myself of course) and played in), but they never seemed to be thankful, instead I've been insulted on Twitter several times and attacked in forum posts... so I decided to drop off community management on Halo for a while. Now I'm just helping friends who need a pick-up on their teams whenever, not doing anything serious with Halo anymore.
I just finished The Smash Brother's documentary tonight, and it pretty much stunned me. I mean it's the only documentary in which we can learn about every great figure of the game competitively speaking, and I just loved it, I feel like these guys can be heroes for some people, and I think I'm part of them (people, not heroes, duh).
I've had that feeling on Halo when I watched Zyos play in 1v1 on Halo: CE (by the way he faced french guys two times in the WCG finals), when I saw the OGRE twins play Halo 2, the new Str8 Rippin era on Halo 3 and then Final Boss and the OGREs coming back at the end of 2010, then new solid faces showed up like Formal, RyaNoob, Lethul, Ninja... they took the game to another level and I think they could have deserved a documentary too if the competitive side of Halo had continued in 1 versus 1.
When you play in teams it's just not the same, so much factors are added to the gameplay, communication, support playing, team shot, teamwork, you can't prove your own level by winning a 4v4 tournament, and I'm not saying these gametypes are bad I love them and love everything they taught me, but I think the real way to battle through a tournament, win it and be considered as the best can only be achieved in 1 versus 1.
That's why I really enjoyed my (really) short introduction to the Soul Calibur community, before SC5 was realeased I went to Akire's house (he won the SC5 preview tournament so it was the current best french player at the time) and practiced with a friend of mine named Potemkine. Three other players showed up, Deus (top 8 french player), I don't remember the second guy's name sorry if he reads that, and the third was Scud, actually the 5 times winner of the SC World Cup in teams, and several times winner of the SC World Cup in singles (at least that's what my friend told me I didn't count but he was really one of the really best in the world). Unfortunately we had to leave before we can play him, but my friend practiced a lot against Deus, and I practiced a lot with Akire. First he took Siegfried (my main) and beat the **** out of me, then I kinda got used to his playstyle and he changed character for Mitsurugi (his main). And I actually took a round off him so I was really excited because I had pretty much never played the game before and I was already taking the best french player a round on his main character. I thought maybe he wasn't playing his best, but it may not have been the case because I barely won several rounds after that and I knew I could've won them (making way too much mistakes to beat this level of player).
Unfortunately again, I didn't really continue throughout this way because I was still in Halo and wanted to make my way on this game.
But for now, I have planned to organized small tournaments at my house here and there, monthly I think at first, and not each times on the same game, but Super Smash Bros Melee will be one of those games, among Soul Calibur IV, Mario Kart: Double Dash and Halo 3 (for the most asked games).
And after watching this documentary, I really want to get better at this game especially in 1 versus 1, and prove my real value on a video game. I hope that I'll stick to the game as I stuck to Halo and Soul Calibur, and I hope to be among you guys one day at an EVO event. ^^
Hit me up whenever on Xbox Live to play Halo 3! (my GT: Viable Claw)
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