Little Tokyo

     Today was a great day off. My friends and I went to Little Tokyo, which is downtown LA, somewhere around there. It was the first time I've ever been there and it was a treat! The drive wasn't too bad but there was a lot of traffic going both ways. The first thing we did when we got there was eat at this place called Mr. Ramen, this tiny whole in the wall sort of restaurant with all this colorful artwork all over the walls. It was so colorful to the point that it looked tacky but my friends said that all the artwork was something new that they added to the restaurant recently.
     When it came to my meal I ended up getting the beef ramen. It had slices of shredded beef, cilantro, those vegetables that's always in pho (see through veggie), and noodles. The broth was so good! I ended up eating/drinking all of it. We ate a bunch of great snacks today. We got these things called Pocky's at a grocery store and there were all kinds of flavors. It's basically a chocolate/other flavor sweet cookie sort of snack. And then later my friends got tacoyaki, this fried bread-like ball with meat and sauce inside. Really tasty stuff. I really enjoy Japanese food as well as other aspects of Japanese culture-anime, gaming, waifus, swords, women, lol.
     We ended up walking all over the place. It was a little hot under the sun but we endured it. In terms of appearances Little Tokyo doesn't look very Japanese. It looks like a rundown area of LA. We saw plenty of homeless people, one guy even coming up to us and shouting,"Give me some money" lol. The shops we went to were all great but at same the time I thought I didn't have very much cash so I didn't buy anything substantial like a toy model or other bric a bracs. Instead I just got this cool black and red Japan rising sun head band that said kamikaze. I only hope it doesn't stand for kamikaze pilots lol. I won't be wearing it, its just something I wanted as a neat souvenir.
     The best part of the trip other than the great food was the anime/hobby shops we went to. I saw great anime model toys, waifu pillows(!), keychains, pins, anime, posters, shirts, manga, and trading cards. What really caught my eye was this Kirby (Nintendo's very own pink marshmallow) toy model. It was very detailed and if I knew I had the cash I would've definitely bought it. Oh well, maybe next time. It was a fun experience and I would definitely want to go back in the future, this time looking for things in particular that I can't find elsewhere.
     After we came back we played some smash. I've reconciled the fact that I'm going to be a Bayonetta main with a strong Zero Suit Samus secondary, sometimes even preferring to use Zss over Bayonetta in certain match-ups. For the time being I want to focus on Zss until I can master the Bayonetta 0-death combos that are so popular. I've got a tournament tomorrow at Fire and Dice, we'll see what happens. I'll probably use Zss if I feel like Bayonetta isn't as strong in whatever match-ups I get thrown into. I've been playing a lot of smash with my friends but they like playing free for all with the three of us, and that's just not going to help me in a tournament setting. We do have days where we just play 1v1's and take turns but that doesn't happen nearly enough for us to keep improving at the game. I've definitely got to get us out of playing those dumb free for alls.
     Hope you're all having a good work week. In other news I'm going on vacation next week but I'll probably still be blogging with my laptop. In addition, Pokken Tournament comes out on Friday, March 18 so I'm definitely excited for that. Wish me luck in the tournament tomorrow!

The competitive fighting game spirit

      This is something I've been thinking about the last couple days, the competitive fighting game spirit. What is it and how does it affect us? I would say its simply the will to win, get better, or just have fun. Everybody takes competitive gaming differently. For example, I aspire to be a great smash 4 player (get top ten at a local tournament) but my friend only cares that he can beat friends and doesn't think he has to go tournaments to prove himself. And a different friend of mine just enjoys playing the game when he gets the chance. I used to play a ton of 2D fighters on Playstation when I was a kid and I was pretty good but it wasn't until I started playing Melee on Gamecube that I became aware of the competitive aspect of gaming. I played my brother and all my friends and got really good at the game.
     Fast forward to today and I'm still a pretty good smasher on the latest version. However, my fighting spirit (ki, stand (ora ora ora ora!), mood, w/e you want to call it) has always been a bit lacking. I'm a very emotional player and that shows in my playing. Once I start to miss attacks and mess up I tend to become predictable and almost throw the match. Its happened to me countless times and I've got to find a way around it and/or just change. I don't like losing but it has occurred to me that sometimes I won't win unless I lose a lot first. It sounds stupid but not everybody started out being a great smash player. I just started playing Smash on Wii U in September 2015 so I can say that I've still got a lot of time and effort to put into the game before I can really consider myself 'good', and by good I mean tournament viable and able to take out good players in bracket. But yeah, Mew2King (pro smash player) didn't start off as a Smash god, and in smash 4 he definitely didn't start out being so great. It wasn't until recently when Cloud came out as dlc (downloadable content) did he really found his place in the big leagues with the likes of ZeRo and Nairo (other pros, the first and second best players).
      Its always hard not to be salty after I lose a match. I especially get upset when I lose to people online because they usually leave right away afterwards (can't get revenge) or they win because of lag (crappy Nintendo servers). I'm working on not taking it seriously and learning from my mistakes but it's easier said than done. The one thing that helps me from putting salt in the wound is the realization that I love playing the game. Just the mere love for the game can change your outlook on why you are playing, competing, and putting so much time into it. If you don't love it then what's the point?
     Also, I like the social aspect of being apart of the smash community. I know when every single tournament is happening because I'm in the SoCal smash page on Facebook and I know of all the players-big and small. In addition, I've met tons of cool new friends through tournaments at Fire and Dice. Meeting and playing against all these people has made me a better player, giving me different match-ups to learn and play styles to get used to.
     The one thing I would say that I need to work on in the future is to just remember that it's just a game. At the end of the day I'm playing a game that I enjoy playing. Nobody can change the fact that you're just there to have fun. If you're having fun then you've already won really. I know that sounds a bit daft but its the truth. That's the way I see tournaments. I go to a local, pay up $10, and get some great unlimited entertainment for the rest of the night. It isn't easy getting into a competitive fighting game that has like 56 characters and a ton of match-up knowledge but once you're in, you're set for life baby. Nothing compares to being apart of a great fighting game community. It will be some time before I really have that competitive mindset down for smash. Often times I'll go into a match worrying about whether I win or lose, and mid-match I just don't switch it up enough to compete with a good player from SoCal. Also, I'm still trying to find the best characters that I should use. I've got a long way to go as a player in the competitive scene but I'm already happy as a player. A year ago I didn't even know about tournaments for smash and I'd never gone to a gaming tournament ever before. You could say that smash changed my life. Lol, but seriously its been a blast!

"If you want to learn how to talk to lady, ask your mum." -Bayonetta
      

Smash tournament at FAD 3/10

      Today was another local weekly smash tournament at Fire and Dice located in Woodland Hills. Some of my friends from Simi Valley showed up today. It was cool to see DJDemon play S2H. I felt like DJ (Captain Falcon) could've taken S2H (Metaknight) but there was some highly intricate edge guarding that took DJ off guard. It would've been great to see him beat a PR player (SoCal power ranked player, players ranked by how many tournaments they go to and how high they place). I didn't play too well today but I did beat a super good player named HLB (Jiggly Puff) in one close, exciting game. I spaced super well and had a great neutral in that game with Bayonetta. I was very proud of beating him but I didn't win any other games. He plays an aggressive style jumping around a lot with Puff, and when you least expect it he jumps up and hits you. It forces you to play super patient even if that's not your thing. I also met this super cool Cloud player that gave me some great advice after I was feeling salty after losing my matches. K9SBruce also gave me some great advice when I was feeling down. It's not that I was seriously feeling upset about losing but at the moment I was super salty. It's great to know that great players have my back and will take the time to talk to me about my playing, and more importantly my mindset going in and out of the game. Thanks guys!
     My first set was against Dipper, a Fox main. As soon as I knew I was going up against him I knew it was going to be super difficult for me because he's a part of Zork's crew. Zork is probably the best Bowser in SoCal. Anyways, I started out okay but then I started to fall behind. The up-airs were nonstop (so hard to deal with as Bayonetta) and after a while I just couldn't finish his first stock. He plays a campy Fox (defensive, runs away, forces you to approach). When I wouldn't approach him right away he would just blaster fire me and then when I approached he would punish hard. He's definitely a great player. In the past he once played me as Ike and I beat him with my Veria Suit Samus. Possibly a counter-pick character in the future? But I wouldn't pick Samus versus his Fox. That would be reckless. My other option would've been Zero Suit but I'm the type of guy who sticks with his main character by any means necessary. He played a super clean set with very few mistakes and whiffs.
     My second set was against Jiggly Wiggly, who oddly enough used Diddy Kong. I went in with a lot of confidence against him because I have beaten him in the past with my Zero Suit Samus in friendlies, just not consistently. Regardless, I still went in feeling like a million bucks. I started out the set amazingly well, going toe to toe with him. But then again, just like in the first set the opponent got the first KO and I wasn't able to finish out their stock in time before they were able to take me out. It was very frustrating to deal with and I guess you could say that nerves got to me during both sets because I started going in more recklessly and getting punished for it. If I had played more patiently and wasn't fiending for the kill I would've stood a much better chance. Wiggly's grab combo game with Diddy is really good. He noticed that I was going for a lot of defensive options a lot and he started going for a lot of grabs into some cool custom Diddy combos. I definitely learned a lot from that set.
     Lastly, I ended up leaving after my sets. I had agreed earlier in the day to meet up with my friend after my matches so we ended up hanging out for a bit. We played some racquetball in his apartment racquetball court. It was the first real exercise I've gotten in months. Needless to say we were tired after forty-five minutes. After that we played some of the Overwatch beta on PC, taking turns playing. I've become really fond of Overwatch and although the game seems jank (broken mechanics and heroes) I like the idea of an arena shooter made by Blizzard. Although I didn't do well in the tournament I'm gonna keep my head up and keep trying to compete. If I really want to improve it might take me a year or even two before I start taking out some of the best of SoCal.

 “We shall heal our wounds, collect our dead and continue fighting.” – Mao Tse-Tung

Update 3.0

      Things have been good lately. You might even say great. I've been getting fewer hours at work these last two weeks but I've been using that free time wisely, getting in some great guitar practice. I'm back on the guitar grind working on jazz standards and improvising. It's been fun. Today I was working on Wes Montgomery's Four on Six. I can solo through the changes pretty well on that tune. I've also been watching a ton of anime, sleeping a lot, and just relaxing in general, sometimes even hanging out with my buddies. Life has been so good! This past Saturday I went to a fighting game event at CSUN (local college) where we played Smash 4, Blazblue, and Street Fighter V all night. It was a great night and some of the guys that go to the tournaments at Fire and Dice were there. I got to show off my skills with Bayonetta and I was able to dominate some people that were there on a big screen classroom projector. I would say that I've definitely gotten better as a player, especially my spacing and my neutral in particular but there are still people who are just more experienced than me. Meaning they've just played the game longer than I have and they know the ins and outs of more characters than I do. There were some guys there who were super good with like every character, it was cool to see. I'm more of a two main characters type of guy. If my Bayonetta doesn't stand a chance than most likely my Zero Suit Samus will probably lose and I'm more the type of guy to stick to my guns and just play the same character I tried to fight you with first. It was a great event! I just randomly hit up the guy organizing the event on Facebook and asked him for a ride, and lo and behold I got a ride! It all worked out because he doesn't live too far away from me. He's become a friend of mine that I look forward to hanging out with more in the future.
     I'm looking forward to the the end of this month in particular because on the 18th Pokken Tournament comes out and also I'm going on vacation with my family out on the ocean. I'm going to bring my Wii U so I can practice smash when I'm not relaxing out on the beach. I've been getting in some good use of my Ipod at work on my breaks listening to a lot of Coltrane. The jazz fire is still within me. I haven't forgotten about music and jazz in particular. In addition, when I went into work yesterday I saw the cover of the new Guitar World magazine and it has Dave Mustaine on the cover. He's really come a long way since Megadeth broke up twice, and now he has a new killer album with a Brazillian guitar virtuoso named Kiko Louriea. A lot of good things are coming up and a lot of good things have been happening recently. I would like to get more hours at work but sometimes its good to just take some time off and chillax. I'm planning on going to the next tournament at Fire and Dice tomorrow so we'll have to see how I do there. My record at smash tournaments is such a bad numbers game (0-2, I've only beaten two people in tournament) but when I think about how I've evolved as a player you can see that I've improved at the game so much that its incredible. At the same time though I need to have those good tournament results otherwise its just all talk. See ya on the next post where I'll tell you all about the tournament. This time I'm going to stay until the end and see who wins. It'll be great to watch the grand finals set. I want to say thank you for reading the blog whoever you are. The blog has reached 7,000 views which is just insane for a no-name music/gaming joe that's just started up their blog. I want to become bigger and reach a wider audience but this is definitely a good start. I'll definitely find ways to keep the blog entertaining and interesting. One of the things I want to get back into is the jazz album review series I used to do back in 2015. That was pretty exciting for me as a jazz fan and I believe I could go far as a music critic. The gaming stuff has taken over most of my writing at the moment but I will write about other stuff as well in the future. Thanks for reading!

Smash tournament at FAD 3/3

     Today was a great time at Fire and Dice's weekly smash tournament. There wasn't too many people at first but later more people came. I can say that I played great compared to last week although I still have a lot of work to do to prepare for the next tournament. I did amazingly well in friendlies, defeating people endlessly multiple times in a row, even with some of my off characters. But when it came to my actual tournament matches I ended up sding (suicide deaths) twice in two different matches. Sd's are unacceptable in competitive smash and I really need to work on that for the future. Part of it is that I'm still not completely sure about everything Bayonetta can do with her recovery. I still have to work that out in the lab, aka training mode. Let's talk about my sets.
     My first set was on stream (a first for me) against Pluto, my first ever opponent that I played at my first tournament. Back then he was a Captain Falcon main but these days he's rocking Meta Knight, a pretty solid switch. I started off the set with a bang, playing pretty well against him even though he's a much better and more technical player. He won game one but I like to think it was pretty close. I got the first stock with a clutch witch time but once he started getting his up-air strings everything just started going his way. Game two was more good spacing from him and me trying to get in and out with some attacks. Again, once his up-air strings started working out the game just went in his favor. To put salt in the wound I ended up killing myself on my last stock. Not that it was close that game anyways but it was a bad way to go on stream. He ended up sding himself too so its all good. I'll try to find the video of me on stream because that first game wasn't bad at all for me. I was going toe to toe with him! Lol, it was awesome. I've definitely come a long way from my first tournament days. You can watch the set here http://www.twitch.tv/fadgames/v/52214336, set the time to around 6 minutes and that's when the match starts. It looks like I have complete control of the situation but then he just comes back with the up-airs. I feel like a couple more clutch witch times would've helped a lot because he's a very aggressive heavy type of player. But it was a good set and he's a good player. I hope I can face him again on stream sometime.
      My second set was against Captain Andrew, this Sonic main. He was pretty good but I felt like I lost because I don't know the match up. Plus I never get the chance to play good Sonic players. He pretty much just ran around at the speed of sound and grabbed me a lot. Once I was in the air he kept doing a lot of up-airs and there wasn't too much I could do to get out of it. He never approached or fought me straight up he just kept running around, which I guess is what Sonic is suppose to do. It was a little disappointing losing 2-0 super quick to a Sonic main but I should've known the match up more. I shouldn't have just been playing on autopilot during that set because you really have to change your play style and go for the punishes when fighting Sonic otherwise he'll just run circles around you. He ended up losing in a close set later against my friend FuzzBallJones, who was playing Roy.
     All in all it was a good time. I ended up going home early because a lot of my friends weren't there. Its just not the same without them ya know? I'm a little ashamed of going out like that on stream with the commentators even saying "Pluto won" before the game was over and crap like that but its just a game and I can improve. Even though it looked like Pluto was all over me I would still say that I was holding my own. I've been improving every tournament I go to. My neutral game has improved a lot over the last couple weeks. I'm still figuring out a lot about the game. For example, I'm not sure if I want to keep using Bayonetta. I might go back to using Zero Suit sometime soon. There were a couple great players that I haven't seen there before. There was this kid who played Villager that took out Rich Brown convincingly. I didn't really watch too much of the matches on stream today though because I was more into playing friendlies this week. Gotta keep playing and keep improving!

Update 2.0

     This is just a general whats up kinda post that I wanted to do. I haven't written for a couple days and I don't the blog to get too stale. I gotta keep up the content to keep things interesting. Life has been good, better than usual. Last couple of weeks have been rough at work because I was getting over 40 hour weeks with one day off or no days off. It was all good though because of that money! This week is super relaxing and I've got a couple days off to boot. I even got to hang out with friends earlier this week and today I was chillin' at my friends house playing the Overwatch beta.
     In terms of music I've been listening to all kinds of stuff. I got my Ipod loaded up to the max with rock, metal, and jazz music. Right now I'm listening to Yngwie Malmsteen's 1996 album Inspiration. The album opens up with a cover of Kansas' Carry on Wayword Son, such a good song! I remember in high school doing a marching band show while playing trumpet and opening up with that tune. Brings back many memories. It sounds so much more bad-ass and neo-classical when Malmsteen solos over the changes. There's even a sick cover of Hendrix's Manic Depression on this album. Malmsteen does a sick Hendrix impersonation!
     Speaking of Malmsteen, I have his autobiography. I got it not too long ago but I haven't finished. The beginning part of it is all about how he was such a great musician but nobody noticed him in his native Sweden. It wasn't until he came to the States and played with some bland hair metal bands that his talent was appreciated. Other stuff I've been listening to is Eric Dolphy, Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Symphony X, etc. All the standards that I've come to know and love over the years. I'm always searching far and wide (through the net) for new music to listen to. It comes in any and all forms really. Lately my new thing has been electronic music, which is a little strange for me because in the past I'd always hated electronic music because I thought it sounded bland and soul-less with no musicality. But tastes change as time goes by. Who knows, maybe there will be a time when I don't really want to hear the sound of post-bop saxophones?
     Lastly, gaming has been fun. Last night we had a smash-fest at our friends house. We were playing five player smash for a bit and it was really fun! I've played eight player smash before and that is just absolutely stupid because there's too much going on and you can't even really see the screen and what your character is doing. Once we started playing 1v1's I absolutely dominated, defeating everybody in the room convincingly. I would say my neutral game with Bayonetta has improved a lot and I've learned to switch up my style mid-match more if my opponent starts baiting and reading me. The weekly smash tournament at Fire and Dice is tomorrow (today, technically speaking) and I'm excited to go and try out my newfound skills on people there. The people at Fire and Dice are really good, some of them are even way better than me but I can still beat them if I play a nearly perfect game or pull a rabbit out of my hat. It's going to be rough but I'm going to give it all I've got and see what happens.
     I've also been playing a lot of Heroes of the Storm and Diablo III. Today I got most of the set items for Immortal Kings, a good set for Barbarians in the game. It gives me all kinds of buffs, its really sweet! In addition, I want to get back into playing more Street Fighter V but I just haven't been up to it lately. Maybe I'll play a bit tomorrow after the tournament. Life just moves so fast and there's only so much gaming you can get in on a busy day when you still have other commitments. For a while I was focusing on playing only smash but I felt like I burned out pretty quick. I have to get a variety of games in otherwise I just don't feel it. I'm still working on the Fire Emblem Fates Conquest campaign and I gotta say that the game is hella difficult. Chapter ten took me three tries to beat and all it was just a hold out mission where you had to hold out for eleven turns. Doesn't sound difficult but it took everything I had just to win. Looking forward to more chapters like that lol. I've also been watching a lot of anime at night. That's it for now, sayonara!

Deadpool movie

     Today me and the lads went to go see the Deadpool movie. I was not dissapointed. This movie is terrific, action packed, and contains an origin story that leaves the watcher sympathetic to the character. Deadpool isn't really seen as a hero or a villain, he's just a guy who's out for revenge against the guy that scarred his face. He was told that they were going to cure his cancer and turn him into a super hero but instead they fucked up his face instead (they being Ajax). In the end his cancer was cured and he did have super powers.
     He decapitates guys with his swords, guns them down with pistols, and isn't a bad fighter when it comes to hand to hand combat. The cool thing about Deadpool is that he virtually can't die. There were moments like when he was fighting Colossus (from the X-Men, a cameo) and his body just got crunched and turned into a lump of meat. But then he was able to regenerate his broken bones, it was awesome! Kind of reminded me of the Pillar Men from JoJo's Bizarre Adventures if you've ever that. I guess this is Deadpool's mutant abilities at work. All I knew about Deadpool before I saw this movie was that he was a cool Marvel character in Marvel vs Capcom 3, that he liked chimichangas and Spiderman, and that Ryan Reynolds played him in X-Men first class. Now here he is with his own movie! Let me break down the movie.
     Basically the movie goes in a backwards order which reminded me a bit of Pulp Fiction because the story wasn't a linear progression. Deadpool is out to kill Ajax, this baddie that forced a mutation on Deadpool by giving him non-stop torture. Don't ask me how constant torture somehow brings out the genes for super powers but that's how they explained it in this movie. Deadpool is seen as a jokey straight up killer but he actually loves his girl friend and his whole fight in this movie was for her. The story isn't anything great but the action packed scenes more than make up for it. This is a straight up action flick with a lot going on. There are moments when people get messed up horribly but I wouldn't call this a gory movie. However, this isn't a movie you should take a young kid to. There are decapitations, torture scenes, and boobs! Haha, but seriously this is rated R for a reason. If they went with a PG-13 rating this movie would not have been as great as it was. It's great to see something from the Marvel camp that isn't just PG-13 Avengers.
     When I watched this movie there was a sense that everything just flowed well. It was like a perfect super hero movie. Although you can't really call Deadpool a super hero. He's kind of his own kind of hero ya know? I really like that about him. He's not a bad guy necessarily but that doesn't stop him from being a killing machine. Colossus even kept saying that he would make an X-man out of Deadpool yet. So there's still hope for Deadpool to turn to the light side. Things to look forward to when watching this movie; Ryan Reynolds' great acting and hilarious banter, cool action scenes, the strip club scene (which was very random), and a unique origins story. This is how you do justice to a comic book character in film form. It's just that good. Go see this movie as soon you can! 
     Lastly, I've been playing Street Fighter V and the issues that the game had seem to have been fixed. I haven't played any matches online but tomorrow I'll try to play my friend online. I've kind of found an interesting character that I like, Necalli. I thought he was some kind of vampire at first but he's actually some kind of Aztec warrior. Which seems just as awesome! He's become my favorite character just today but I'll probably play a lot of Ryu as well to learn the basics. In addition, I'm looking forward to going to a Smash tournament tomorrow. I'm going to go ham as Zero Suit Samus. I was working on my tech skill, perfect pivots and teching. I've also been working on not rolling so much. I need to completely change my style to remove all my bad habits in order to play better at the competitive level. Wish me luck!

Focus on Smash

     Until further notice, the only game I'll be playing seriously (competitively) is Smash. I'm already decent but I have a lot of work to do. I have to put in my 10,000 hours as they say and chip away at it until I've become great. By great I mean that I want to be able to place top ten (at least) at the local I go to. In addition, I want to start going to more local tournaments and trying my luck there. I think if I just keep playing everyday I will improve and just annihilate people in tournament eventually. My practice routine includes a weekly tournament, online with friends, and for glory. I also practice against cpu's and in training mode too. I'm going to focus on playing Zero Suit Samus of course, but also playing Bayonetta. I'm not sure yet if I want to pick her up as a secondary or if I'm just having fun playing as her all the time recently. It's a tough decision but the point can be made that Zero Suit and Bayonetta are very similar in their move-set and play-style, therefore it makes sense for me to play both of them. Don't get me wrong. I won't be completely quitting other games. I'll still play some PC games (on my laptop after work) like Heroes of the Storm and Diablo III but I definitely won't be as much of a PC gamer as I have been. I'm giving all that up for now. It seems like PC gaming takes too much time and console gaming just seems so much more 'natural', if that makes sense. I guess I've turned into a console guy and a Nintendo fanboy! It's been many a winding and twisting roads to have gone from being a PC gamer into a console gamer again. I believe in the end it will be worth it and better for me because I'm better at Smash than I am at PC games and the smash scene is so much more chill than the PC gaming community. I came to Smash 4 super late in the scene, I just got my Wii U in September 2015 and I didn't start going to tournaments until fairly recently. I'm tired of watching great players play on streams and YouTube. I need to be the one playing on there. Who knows maybe I can become good enough to play with a crew or team, or at least get noticed on a stream sometime when I finally become good enough to go toe to toe with great players. Time to 'git gud'!

Smash Weekly at FaD 1/21/16

     The weekly at Fire and Dice was stacked with great players tonight. I guess everyone was back from Genesis 3, where SoCal represented super well. I did not play very well tonight. I'm blaming it on mostly being sick. I have this hardcore cold where my throat and body feels super weak but I have no cold symptoms like coughing. I really just wasn't feeling it today and it showed in my gameplay. I only won one game of friendlies vs this Pac Man player. I'm pretty proud of that win though. It was awesome.....sugoi!
     My first match was against this guy I played two tournaments ago. Back then he used Mario and defeated me 2-0. This time he used his main (Fox) and just went ham. I fought back as well as I could but it just wasn't enough. He kept going for the up-airs when I was in the air and got me every time. I was pretty upset but when my friend told me that he's a pretty well established player I kinda just let it go and stopped thinking about it. I kept making a ton of mistakes and just doing them over and over again. I wasn't spacing very well. I feel like that's the biggest problem in my Zero Suit Samus play and I have a lot of work to do to make it better. Oh yeah, Game 2 I almost brought the game back with my Veria Suit Samus. Maybe I should take her up more in tournament when I lose Game 1? I was thinking about playing her in my second set vs this Game and Watch player but in the end I stuck with Zero Suit Samus.
     After I lost I went up against a Game and Watch player who didn't even have his own controller. He borrowed one from the venue. When I saw him do that I was expected for an EZPZ win. Boy, was I mistaken. Although this guy didn't own a controller he absolutely owns with Game and Watch. It was his first tournament and he played really well against me. Game 1 he beat me with a convincing victory where it wasn't very close. Game 2 was super close with both of us over 100%. Again, looking back on those matches my spacing was terrible and my overall maneuverability was just horrible. I think this is the main thing I'm lacking in my Smash 4 game right now. Just not getting hit, dodging more, shielding more, and not going go hard in the paint with the aggro style.
      Part of it is because I feel like Zero Suit Samus is a super aggressive character but also my whole style is pretty aggro heavy. Let's just say I have a lot of work to do. Part of it is that I play too many other games and need to focus on Smash 4 more if I'm going to start doing work in these tournaments. People will always be great players at Fire and Dice but I can surpass them if I train harder. I'll be like Goku in the hyperbolic time chamber! It was a good night even though I really wasn't feeling it. I went across the street to this Japanese Restaurant with this really good Rosalina & Luma player. The food was great, especially the fluffy white rice. It was also great watching some of the more established PR players play. Rich Brown vs Zenyou was pretty cool to watch. Rich's Mewtwo has transcended Super Sayian, that's how good he is with Mewtwo.
      Also, this isn't Smash related but yesterday I passed my drivers permit test! Now, I can legally drive with this piece of paper and I'll be legit once my permit arrives in the post. This is great! I can't wait to start practicing driving on our extra super old car. Eventually once I get the hang of cruising around I'll start driving to more Smash tourneys, Guitar Center, work. That will just be easier for me because in the past I've just been relying on walking and taking the bus. Having a car will just make life better.

Update 1.08

     Life has been good. I'm getting good hours at work, making that extra bread. As ZZ Top sing, "Just got payed, got me a pocket full of change", I think that every week when I get my check. As a customer at my work likes to say every time I see him, "Life is good". Usually when I say that to customers they usually say, "It's better than the alternative". It seems rather drab to say that but I get it almost every day. Here's an update on what's been up lately. 
      For one thing I've been doing my usual schedule at work working until 1 in the morning. So I've been having long nights, staying up until 3 or later. Most of the time I'm just listening to free jazz, writing for this blog, and looking up things online like email, games, and twitch streams. It's a super fun night life. At the end of the night before I go to bed I play Wii U (Mario Kart & Smash), and sometimes 3DS (Xenoblade, Monster Hunter, & Smash). I would say the best part is just listening to the music. There's something about listening to jazz that just gets me inspired. Jazz has become my favorite style of music. I would say I'm not even really a fan of metal anymore. Although I am impressed by Animals as Leader's Tosin Abasi, he is a beast guitar player. I wouldn't become better than him even if I was practicing 4 hours a day. Which leads me to my next point.
     Today I had my guitar lesson with my teacher. It had been about 2 weeks since we last had a lesson so it was a good return to learning. We jammed on John Denver's Country Road, jammed a funky blues, improvised over Four on Six, and started playing a bit of Billie's Bounce by Charlie Parker. I couldn't quite sight read it that good but I'll get there. I haven't been putting in a lot of time on the guitar but I have been playing here and there. Its hard to devote time to the guitar with all the new gaming stuff on the horizon, especially next month with Xenoblade Chronicles X, Starcraft II Legacy of the Void, and Starwars Battlefront 3 coming out. I'm going to have to start a practice schedule every day in order to keep up with my lessons. No point in taking lessons if I'm not practicing everyday. But I digress. Let's talk about games!
      Gaming has been great lately. There was a new patch in Smash, patch 1.1.2, which adds the Super Mario Maker stage and the Pirate stage from Wind Waker. They're both pretty cool. I really like the Super Mario Maker stage but I don't see it becoming viable for tournaments, although the omega version of the stage looks just fine for that purpose. Nintendo also balanced some of the characters again. Every time they do this its like Smash is becoming a different game, which is good and bad in a way. It's good because we get to experience buffs and nerfs to certain characters but sometimes its good when a game is done and completed and there doesn't have to be anymore updates. We live in an era in gaming where everything needs to be updated. Its a blessing and a curse.
     Not only was there a patch for Smash but there was a big patch for Heroes of the Storm, another one of my favorite games at the moment. They added some balance updates for the characters but they also added a new hero, Lieutenant Morales, the Medic from Starcraft Broodwar. That ain't even the best part of this story folks. They added a skin that makes Morales look like the Apothecary from Warhammer 40k's Dawn of War series! That's it at the top. I don't know how Blizzard got the licensing to do something like that but its arguably the best skin in the game. So in total now I have the Novazon Nova skin, Medic Uther, and the Apothecary Morales. Not too shabby.
     Lastly, as I sit here listening to free jazz I'm reminded that this is suppose to be a blog about music. But in some ways it has transcended music and has become an almost personal blog, something that I did not intend nor think think was possible because I always thought writing about my life and what I do was super boring and that nobody would want to read about that. And somehow I was wrong because the blog has been getting lots of views, every month, and every day. Thanks for reading folks! I will eventually make a return to writing more about music-particularly free jazz, which is mostly what I'm listening to these days. Au revoir.

Update 1.07

     

     Hey, its been a few nights since I haven't written anything so I figured I should just do a kind of update on what's been up. I know the blog has gotten a lot more personal lately and hasn't really been about music-particularly jazz but that doesn't mean that I haven't been listening! In fact, almost everyday that I'm online on my desktop or laptop I'm listening to jazz, mostly free jazz stuff. I'm part of a group on Facebook called free jazz. We currently have over 10,000 members. If you ever want to check out some new interesting music or the avant-garde side of jazz check out the page here https://www.facebook.com/groups/342186855874771/. Feel free to join if you want to listen to great free jazz. I like to post newer musicians playing on there. Its a great community with people from all over the world. I've had the pleasure of exchanging messages with other people in the group about the music they post. It's a great time. I would give Facebook a 10 out of 10 just because of this group. Anyways, what's been up?
     I've been working a lot more. In fact, this week I got over 40 hours. And next week looks about the same. It's pretty cool that I'm getting hours at my job now because before I was only getting about 25-30 hours. It's great especially with the holidays coming up and what not. I'm going to have to get my friends gifts this year as well as my family because my friends got me gifts for my birthday. Work has been hard but in the end its good for my character as well as my bank account. As my best friend from Wisconsin said today when we talked about my job,"It is what it is". Indeed my friend.
     Today was my only day off this week. It was pretty awesome. My brother woke me up bright and early (for me) at 11 am and told me he had an sd card for me because I was going to download the Super Smash Brothers Brawl mod called Project M onto it and put it inside my Wii U with Brawl-creating a great add-on. It's hard to call Project M its own game, its more like a mod made by the community for competitive gaming. It has a strong community and player base. It adds some new mechanics and more characters that aren't in Brawl, characters like Roy and Mewtwo. My brother and I looked up how to download the files and how to do it and format the sd card and my bro did all the stuff necessary and now I have Project M downloaded onto an sd card. Now I just have to wait until my copy of Brawl comes in via Amazon. My Wii Remote Plus came in the mail today so that was cool too. I usually order a lot of cool stuff from Amazon, I'm kind of a big customer online. I usually buy gaming accessories and shirts.
     In the middle of the day I practiced guitar. I figured out how to play Mr. Sandman with chords in a pretty stylized way-using sixth chords, which is how I think most guitarists play it. I just can't play it like Chet Atkins, with the Travis picking style. I leave that for the professionals. I got in a lot of good licks today and played a couple standards. Hopefully tomorrow I'll have my weekly guitar lesson. I haven't been playing as much as I should but I am playing every day at least for a little while. Recently I have been practicing improvising lines that I 'm singing in my head and thinking of the next one while playing the last one. It's quite difficult but I am getting better and sounding more melodic playing in this manner.
     In addition, my friends came over today and we played a lot of Smash 4 on the brand new Wii U. We played a couple versus matches but we spent the majority of the time unlocking stages by completing events and doing whatever else was necessary to unlock the stages that I was missing. It was cool unlocking Smashville because that's my favorite stage for fun and for tournaments. We ended up playing this mini game in Smash where you have to take turns around a grid, kind of like Mario Party. We had to do like three games of it that lasted 15 turns-all just to unlock the Pac Man stage. We ended up having a lot of fun. In the free for all matches we did I did pretty good with Ryu. Things are looking good for me using Ryu as a secondary after Fox.
     After my buddies left I played Heroes of the Storm, trying to complete quests for in game gold used to buy characters. I have 10,000 gold now, after playing a lot of games with Murky, this cute little Murloc from World of Warcraft. He's this frog-like creature that spawns an egg where he can respawn from. He's pretty weak but if played right he can be deadly and annoying. I'm starting to like him a lot. Today was the first time I really played him and tested out all his skills and best skill tree. He's definitely one of the most interesting characters in the game. His ultimate, March of the Murlocs is my favorite special move in the game. A bunch of tiny little murlocs come out and attack, slowing down enemy players and damaging them. I'm looking forward to the next patch because I heard on Tuesday we're going to get the Medic from Starcraft Broodwar. So I'm going to save my gold for that character instead of whats available at the moment. That's Murky vs Johanna in the picture. I haven't forgotten about my good ole pc master race console. Life is good. Jah is good. Keep the faith.