How about since my personal story is filled with starting on the path to greatness, to falling behind, to re-emerging as a player as skilled as the middle pack of NoVA, to falling behind again, etc. etc. I just tell the sub-epic story of the little smash region that could: SoVA.
When did smash start around here anyway? Good God.
The answer? Kab00m! Collectibles in 2003.
The first marked tourney in SoVA history happened here. It was hosted by Area365, and was the beginning for many now-awesome smashers like G-reg, who showed up with Adwillia, Cow, East Coast Eddie, and a few others from NoVA. Apparently, smash in NoVA wasnt exactly on its own flow either.
This was also the beginning for the future pioneers of SoVA's scene as it is today: O-NO, Lee, CStick, and Tech. Other notables at the time included Area365, Joe C, Reggie (biggest piece of **** you'll meet in your life), Mojoe, and a few others. Joe C single-handedly ran everyone down and took the tourney. None of the SoVA vets of today made it into the final bracket, save for Tech's janky Samus. It was a learning experience for all of us. We all learned just how much we sucked. And we did suck, except for Tech, whose ******** style was just simply too good for its time...even against the likes of Falcons and Peaches that got destroyed by him at the tourney.
Time goes by, and the SoVA scene pretty much seemingly died after one 18-man tourney.
Then, out of nowhere around summer 2004, O-NO and Lee pop up again, and the five-man SoVA scene was born. Lee, O-NO, Tech, Reggie, and CStick were pretty much the only active members of the SoVA 'scene' for the next year to come. Smash was sporadic within SoVA, and most of the experience was imported by CStick and Tech as they ventured to Maryland a couple times to show their worth. At the time, both turned a few heads; Tech nearly upset Azen and Meep, and CStick earned a bit of respect for being the only person in the pool to take 3 lives off of KM, and scoring friendly wins over the NoVA players of today. Despite decent showings and commendable (but not lustrous) placings at bomb4, ACII, and College Park smash tourneys, SoVA was still a nothing region when it came to smash.
The smash scene in SoVA was still within the original five players come 2004-2005. The second tourney was held at a small place called Golf-n-Games, and was where the best of the undeclared SoVA crew was decided. CStick managed to get revenge from an eariler friendly tourney and beat O-NO in a series that went to the 10th game, but only by using a versatile line-up of chars that allowed him to trade off wins with O-NO's Falco and Marth. This was the beginning of CStick's obsessive-compulsive indecision to choose a main character, and would curse him to the present day. CStick would remain the undeclared SoVA best until he played Tech the next day and got his marth four-stocked on Yoshi Story by Tech's Samus--an embarrassment which resulted in automatic forfeiture of such a title.
After a long dry spell, a charity tourney at ODU was held. This would be where SoVA would finally grow a little. Cow, a player who was seen as the man to beat in SoVA due to his NoVA experience, was down. Other players, like KitsuneKing and Dean's rapist of a Yoshi, made their debut. Cow barely pulled a win over CStick, resorting to counterpick Shiek against Ganon. Dean took third and Kitsune's ice climbers would take fourth.
The scene continued to grow as KitsuneKing became a SoVA regular in 2005. Thanks to him, players like the soul-less NDN (Rahil) and Ivar began smashing with the other SoVA norms, while others like Mashi and Russ would later follow. The scene would see its next significant event at the second golf-n-games tourney, where the SoVA pioneers went up against Newport News' Rad, Whodat, and DragonCharlz. The tourney was intense, but CStick managed to make a comeback and massively upset Dragoncharlz in a classic example as to why battlefield is often hated and banned throughout SoVA. Although losing two sets one-sidedly, Rad managed to also show the effective gayness of stages such as PokeFloats--a trademark that would follow him and often be utilized by other smashers. Despite it all, CStick kept his SoVA local dominance with a third local tourney win in a row.
In late 2005, another tourney was held. It was the first Garage Smash hosted by CStick. 16 people crowded into CStick's garage in late September for a large local tourney. This saw the passing of the torch to Rad, who managed to get revenge and beat CStick in a close final bout. O-NO and Tech followed 3rd and 4th respectively. CStick vowed to one day beat Rad again, just as O-NO said that he would once again beat CStick (O-NO lost to CStick in the losers' finals).
The tourney scene would die again, and once again become isolated to the core members. KitsuneKing rose up to take the empty space of Reggie, who quit coming around (thank God). The group would improve while players like Tech would begin to become out of practice. The only event was Unreal's tourney, where Chozen1 came. Despite his NoVA experience, he ended up eating his overconfident words when he took damaging losses to Cow and O-NO. CStick managed to finally beat Cow for the first time in tourney, but would once again lose to Rad in a laughingly horrendous final bout.
August 2006 would be known as the birth of SoVA's actual scene, when it attracted the attention of Tope from Richmond and the YGO crew from North Carolina at CStick's second garage fest. Pac, TC, and 59JS were the three members who attended. The Hampton boys (Carlos, Boss, and Fear) also made a strong debut. Of the 24 people who attended, other players like Unreal and his brother began to get into the SoVA smash scene more and more. The tourney was won by Tope, who took out TC in the finals. Rad managed to once again knock out CStick, who managed to beat O-NO in the round before. This was also the mark of SoVA's love for crew battles, when SoVA + Tope took on North Carolina.
Later that same year, O-NO began his own smash franchise when he got his apartment. He began having multi-game fests, inviting smashers to join along with Tekken, Marvel, and SF players. The tourneys saw normal attendance from Tech, Dragoncharlz, Lee, O-NO, Cstick, Kitsune, NDN, Whodat, etc. O-NO would finally get his vengeance in beating CStick in-tourney at the first one. Players like Adwillia and Cow would also show. The mixed rankings would show that SoVA has improved alot, since players from SoVA were now routinely overtaking Cow and Adwillia's NoVA experience. Kitsune would also make a name for himself when he managed to take out both CStick and O-NO, but also made a name for being the biggest SoVA squanderer when he lost two sets to O-NO, who became the new SoVA best. Such a title was insignificant now, since most of SoVA had pretty much beaten each other in tourneys at one time or another. The unspoken title continued to be passed between CStick, Lee, O-NO, and Dragoncharlz, as well as Tech on one occasion.
But how did NoVA respond to that?
SoVA was known for always being pumped to want to enter the NoVA scene and prove their worth. However, time and time again, cocky players like Chozen1 would discard or scold SoVA's attempts to harmlessly and respectfully try to make it out to play and compete with NoVA regulars. The spark of Chozen's insults caused SoVA players to stand up for themselves, which was once again met with smirks and retorts from the pretentious lower ranks of NoVA. SoVA did realize that they were in no way capable of felling players like Chu Dat and Azen, but the quest began to get better.
At the end of 2006, CStick held his third tourney, which brought down Tope and Meep once again. Cow, Adwillia, the skilled trio from Hampton, O-NO, Lee, Dragoncharlz, Tech, Rad, Kitsune, Ivar, and several others also showed. This was also the minor introduction of Link-o-mac and Schoolie Dee, which would later impact the SoVA community in unforeseen ways. Tope and Meep took 1st and 2nd, Adwillia and Cow took 3rd and 4th, then CStick, O-NO, Fear, and Rad rounded out the rest of the final 8. This was also when Ether introduced himself to the SoVA scene. Ether was met with a skeptical sense of doubt, but turned everyone's head. Despite his lack of mindgames due to his inherent lack of experience, his fast fingers were enough to take matches from CStick and O-NO, which earned him a spot among SoVA's bests in just five minutes time. This was SoVA's most successful tourney, as the attendance leveled out at 36 players (including Ether's tardiness).
SoVA would still be subjected to disdain from NoVA, but had other things to deal with: n00bs. A gaggle of scrubs that originated from Game-On, headed by Link-o-mac's mouth and Schoolie Dee, began to dish out challenges to the other players of SoVA. Although the majority of these were harmless and done respectfully, such as in Schoolie's case, Link-o-mac's were the opposite. He viewed himself as the future crown of SoVA. After managing to take a match off of O-NO and Kitsune's low-tier and secondary chars, Link-o-mac got ahead of himself and cockily proclaimed to be 'of the best in SoVA'. Game-On would later engage in flame wars with the rest of SoVA as the backed Link-o-mac's claims; such attacks and fights were usually instigated by Link-o-mac himself. It did not take long before SoVA would later challenge Game-On's smashers in order to prove a point. The point was proven quickly, as Link-o-mac was quickly put back in his place, and the rest of Game-On learned of competitive play. Although none of Game-On stuck around to become part of the SoVA scene, players like Schoolie and Link-o-mac took it as a learning experience and began training.
2007 was when SoVA began having routine fests. low-tier fanatics like Enver and a more experienced and scarier Ether began ambitiously setting up fests and tourneys. Whodat opened his own gaming shop and hosted regular tourneys, which became known as "Ascendency tourneys", named after the store's name. Players like Blackguy, Gum, Mashi, Russ, FATS, andX-LAX would show up as regulars along with Rad, Dragon, and the other regulars. The_Doug, an English player, would later move to Norfolk, giving SoVA another great player to draw experience from. Cow was still a part of the scene as well.
In early 2007, SoVA got the chance to play against the rest of team Richmond. Nelo, Israfel, and Cyrain accompanied Tope and Meep. Although Nelo and Isra were modest in skill at the time, Cyrain, Tope, and Meep would dominate whenever they came. unfortunately, they had not yet played against The_Doug or Ether, who was ambitiously waiting for his time to play off against Tope. The time came in April, where all of team Richmond showed up along with Newport News and the rest of SoVA. Ether managed to knock Tope into losers, but Tope managed to take out Doug and make an epic comeback to bring down Ether. Sova's hope was lost in that tourney, but we quickly rebounded when we showed that at least ONE of us was skilled enough to beat Tope.
SoVA would continue to improve, but Ether and Doug were still leagues above the rest of us. Several mixed events would happen in this time. CStick would fall off of the map, and lose to players like Link-o-mac, Ether proved his worth against Chu and the rest of NoVA, and the rest of SoVA would eventually catch up to the remaining pioneer players in terms of skill. Ascendency also got shut down due to someone forgetting to pay the electric bill for six months, and the scene experienced droughts of inactivity as players had to focus on school and work.
Throughout the rest of 2007, SoVA would enjoy its active array of players. CNU and ODU introduced more players like caboose and SPD. CStick's fourth garage smash introduced Lozr to the scene, while Tope introduced Savedge to SoVA at one of Enver's nacho parties. Ether would go on to earn more recognition from attending a C3 tourney, while the rest of SoVA would remain active within itself at the very least, growing more and more as time goes by.
Today's core SoVA players:
O-NO: the most active promoting member of SoVA for smash and other fighters. Known for his relentless humor and for harnessing immense amounts of gay. He plays Peach, Shiek, Fox. See the trend?
Ether: SoVa's best player when he actually shows up. Comically known as Mew2Prince. his most notable character is Marth, although his Fox, Falco, and others are also impressive. Nobody likes playing him because it ends up with someone being on the receiving end of what Kitsune refers to as "the big d*ck". Watch out for it.
CStick: Despite squandering most tourneys he enters and having a knack for never setlling on a main, he still places fairly well in most tourneys, never falling below placing in the upper mid-ranks even in large tourneys. He's most known for consistently playing Ganon, although he has bounced around between the upper half of the tier list with other characters.
Kitsune: A laser spam master, who helped introduce several names into the SoVA scene. Play Peach against him if you want to win. He sucks in that match.
Cow and Schoolie: Both of these players are the heads of the CNU area of the scene. They are active and offer great experience for the young blood that keeps popping out in the Newport News area.
Enver: Despite being 'lesser skilled' based on tourney placings, Enver (aka Toasty) is an unbelievable low-tier player. His mains are Pikachu and Ness. If he spent the amount of time he does playing Ness and spent it on playing Marth, he'd **** all of SoVA. His two main specialties aside from low tiers include nacho-making and managing SoVA's smash vids on youtube.
Mashi: A player who started out with little experience, but grew quickly into one of SoVA's best competitors. His Marth is known for the most random tipper placements, and his strawberry colored lips stir up intense homoerotic feelings inside Kitsune for unknown reasons.
Tech: Although he has been inactive for nearly a year, Tech's janky Samus style and preference of using a broken controller inspired many to believe that there was still some innovation left in smash that did not get drowned out by statistics and conventional gameplay. He is the main reason why CStick no longer sucks horribly at this game. He plays with CStick from time to time, but has focused on shooting gams like Shadow Run and Halo 3 over smash in recent months.
Whodat: Before Ascendency became Descendency, Whodat ran a good spot for tourneys in Newport News. However, running good tourneys and paying the light bill on time aren't synonymous.
the end
