Most everyone is familiar with the big names among various fighting games, such as Daigo, Justin Wong, Mew2King, and many others; but the majority of the competitors at EVO are relative unknowns. Throughout the weekend I spent time following some of these lesser known players, watching their matches, and talking to them about their Evo experience.
The Evolution Championship Series is an annual esports event featuring various fighting games. As someone who has never before been to EVO, it was a thrilling experience. This year there were over 13,000 people participating in the nine games showcased at the event. The convention was shoulder-to-shoulder packed with people spectating. There were more than two hundred tournament matches going on at the same time. Skill was plain to see throughout. Some players came back to win with almost no remaining health bar through excellent execution into flawless victories. Others mindgamed their opponent by baiting them into a wrong position, gaining control of the tempo in a match and making their opponent appear outclassed.
What I really wanted to do was to ask a bunch of players who went 0-2 and 1-2 what the EVO experience was all about and why they competed. What I found out after putting this idea into practice is that I basically got two answers: (1) that they love the community and that they were there to have fun, support the scene, measure their own progress, see how well they can do, et cetera; and (2) they got terrible match-ups and the bracket totally screwed them over, and that they should have gotten out of their pool, often included with or followed by an expletive or two and the assurance that they were better than their placement deemed them to be. Since this approach to reporting content hadn’t gotten me very far, or really provided anything interesting to talk about beside these couple sentences, I began watching matches to look for interesting storylines among lesser known players who attained slightly greater success.
At this point the first match that really caught my attention, and kept me there watching more, was in the Super Smash Bros. Melee section. The players who sat down were Tonewaya (CIZ) playing as Marth and Devon (Q) playing as Fox (Beware of dubious, yet ignorantly accurate, match reporting from this point forward). The first game was intense with no clear lead held by either player. Inspired play and excellent timing from both competitors made the match intense from the outset with cheering and shouts from the gathered onlookers. Q’s pressure and aggression earned him the game one victory. Q continued his aggressive play into the second game, frustrating CIZ, and knocking Marth down to two stock with Q still fresh on his third. CIZ removed his Evo badge from around his neck and tossed it on the ground. Grabbing his controller, CIZ took Fox back into the game with an intense and renewed focus. CIZ adapted. He shifted to a slightly more conservative and calculated play, methodically bringing the stock back to parity. CIZ edge-guarded well, but Q kept piloting himself back. Both with a single stock remaining and significant damage, CIZ initiated a combo after Q recovered, completed with a smash, and took the game in an impressive comeback as Q was KO’d. CIZ maintained his regained composure into the third game, allowing Q to be the first to make a mistake. The time wound down on another close game, but Q couldn’t quite get out from being a couple steps behind in the final game and CIZ closed out the match.
I went over to look at the group’s bracket and was astonished to discover that it was each player’s first round match of the event. CIZ won his next three matches easily, none of which gave him nearly as much difficulty as the first round had delivered. He advanced out of his pool without dropping another game and I checked on Q’s progress. With a loss in the first round, Q would need six straight wins to advance to the second pool. Q had dispatched his next three opponents and was just finishing off the fourth as I came around to spectate. Q remained seated as his next opponent sat down. It looked like it would be an easy victory as Q took care of his opponent’s first stock without even taking any damage. He kept a healthy lead and closed out the game without much trouble. Q began strong once more in second game, kept his advantage, and easily took the match advancing him to the loser’s bracket finals. One more match win and Q would advance to the next pool.
Q’s loser bracket finals opponent, Paul (Kopaka), was playing as Marth. Q came out of the gates strong, relentlessly working Kopaka over. Q leapt from the edge with three stock still remaining, which would surely end in suicide, but it kept Kopaka from being able to recover himself. Kopaka was on his final stock and Q had just decisively taken the first game. Things turned around quickly in the second game. Kopaka acclimated to Q’s play and stayed on the defensive, allowing Q to make the first move toward him. Kopaka took the second game as conclusively as he had lost the first with his attuned strategy. Q struggled again in the final game of the match and Kopaka was able to seal his passage to the next pool after having won the second and third games of the match. Q was eliminated.
I asked Q to reflect upon his two match losses, what he might have done differently in hindsight, and what he had learned from his losses. In reflection he believed he played too aggressively. In the last two games of his matches his opponent was waiting for him to make a move and Q should have made adjustments himself. He considers fatigue to have been a factor as well. His pool took more than three hours to complete (when the time allotted for pools to complete is two hours) and also the nature of the bracket had him playing a couple more games than his final few opponents had played to that point. This was Q’s third year competing at Evo, and also his best finish: a 5-2 record and outlasting 13 of the 15 others in his pool, making it to the loser bracket finals.
Wandering over to the Street Fighter V section, I caught up with Jonathan (Nemonic), a Southern California player. This was Nemonic’s third year competing in Evo, his previous best finish a top 75 in 2009 playing Street Fighter IV, making it out of his first pool and grabbing a couple wins on the second day before being eliminated. Previously a Sagat player, he came to this year’s Evo prepared to fight as Ryu.
Starting his tournament off playing against Chun Li, Nemonic’s first game has a near-perfect round one into a convincing win in round two. Nemonic fell behind early in the first round of the second game. His opponent nearly let him make a comeback, but finished off Nemonic’s Ryu to snatch round one. Nemonic quickly regained his composure and easily wins the second round, and then won round three as he stuns, combos, and supers his opponent sealing a flawless victory and taking the match.
Nemonic was paired against another Ryu player, Shinji (Pink_Mummy) from Japan, for his second match. Pink_Mummy wins a close first round and Nemonic equalizes in the second. Nemonic maintains the advantage into the third, but with almost no health left, Pink_Mummy supers out of a wakeup catching Nemonic off guard and stealing the third round and the game. Nemonic cleanly wins both rounds in the next game to force a third. Nemonic carried his momentum into the first round, securing a win off of a stunned opponent. Pink_Mummy bounced back in the second round, winning a close game, before Nemonic won the third to take the match and advance further into the winner bracket.
Nemonic starts off well against his next opponent, Ken played by Phillip Shader. He dominates the first game in two rounds, with half of his health remaining in each. However, Phillip adjusts and takes out Nemonic in the next two matches without dropping a round. Dropping into the loser bracket, Nemonic’s frustration continues as he is paired up against Alexander (BeastlyBubble) playing Balrog and after two more games Nemonic is knocked out of the tournament with a 2-2 record. Both of the opponents Nemonic lost against make it out of the pool, and in the next pool they both fall early without making a significantly deep placement into the tournament.
The next day I took look at some of the Street Fighter V second round brackets. Among these players was Daniel (ItalDan) from Toronto playing Chun Li. Despite playing Street Fighter competitively for more than a decade, this was ItalDan’s first trip to Evo. ItalDan got off to a good start in his second bracket, getting a win in his first match, but then fell in two tight games against Eric (Rylander) playing Dhalsim. Each game went to three rounds and could have easily gone the other way.
ItalDan was now in the loser bracket, where he battled his way up to the loser bracket finals for a rematch against Rylander. ItalDan started off strong in the first round, but Rylander closed the gap and got the first victory. ItalDan started off strong again in the second round, but again Rylander closed the gap making it an even contest. This time however, ItalDan snatched victory in an extremely close fight and forced the first game to a third round. In the third round Rylander was the one who started with an advantage but, then ItalDan worked his way back and after making some trades in favorable spots, won the first match. ItalDan’s revenge would not come to fruition though. In the following games Rylander made a few small adjustments to his play, eliminating the some of the few careless play mistakes he had made in the first game. Rylander won the second two games in four straight rounds and was the one who advanced out of the round two pool.
I asked ItalDan to reflect upon his two losses to Rylander’s Dhalsim and he let me know that his training partner for the event plays as Dhalsim. In hindsight he believes he should have placed aside his experiences with his practice partner as the two players do not play Dhalsim in the exact same way as one another. ItalDan, having made it to the loser bracket finals in his second pool, earned a top 125 finish in a tournament with more than five thousand competitors.
Each competitor had their own goals and hopes for the event, and while realistically most of them could not expect to win the whole event, they still had their own purpose for competing. Some people got to play against one of their heroes. Getting to play against one’s favorite player is a moment likely to be fondly remembered and retold many times regardless of how spectacularly they might have lost. Maybe they even got to steal a round against them and that gives them an incredible story there as well. Some found amazing personal stories in other moments, such as the chance to play (and win) on stream, or even just the thrill of an amazing match win or comeback. Other competitors came for fun, because they just loved the atmosphere of a large event. Some battled to get a better record than previous. Another subset of players have a benchmark that they want to aim for, something that they aim to prove to themselves; whether that benchmark is a Top X ranking or just getting a single match win. Others were there to learn and improve from competing at a high level; looking back on their games to identify mistakes so that next time they might not fall in the same way and advance further.
An article by: semioldguy
Editing and photos by: itsjustatank
Editing and photos by: itsjustatank