Tuesday, October 30, 2007

10-29-2007 Saitama and Mikado quals

oh shit... its long post time! Ok so this weekend I went to Tokyo again. I left Friday after work and headed to Akihabara for some casuals. Ogawa was there again this time. He was playing against a sol player who was a friend of his and he kept winning, except this time he wasnt using eddie... Ogawa was rocking his HOS. I was a bit surprised but his HOS seemed good. I played him and beat him. Afterwords he comes around to the other side of the cab and starts talking all fast in Japanese and I couldnt understand what he was saying, but i heard him say he was embarresed. Maybe he hasnt been playing HOS very long, I told him its ok. So uhhh.... there you go George, I didnt lose to HOS this weekend so you cant bitch at me now, even though its not a "real" HOS player.... but it IS Ogawa...

So after that I head to Shinjuku cuz Akihabara was starting to die down, I went to a few arcades, it was pretty dead, so I headed to club sega to see if MIU was working but he wasnt there, they told me he would be working tomorrow morning. So I left and went to my usual Tokyo bar (Current, the rock bar) and got drunk and talked to people about metal and stuf and then I went to sleep at the Manga cafe as ussual.

Next day I woke up and headed back to club sega Shinjuku to see if MIU could team up with me for the qualifier at Mikado game center on Sunday. When I got there MIU told me he had to work Sunday night so he wouldnt be able to go. He also told me that there was another qualifier in Saitama (the prefecture north of Tokyo which is between Tokyo and my prefecture, Gunma). I totally didnt even know about it so I looked up the arcade location on my cellphone and headed out, told MIU id come back later and we could hang out after he was done with work. So I get to the tournament and start looking for a partner. Karun was there (the Jam player I teamed with 2 weeks ago) but he already had a partner. So I saw a Sol player beasting on lots of people, I asked him if he wanted to team up and he was like "You are Mike right?" im like Yea how did you know? He said that Kaqn posted about me on his mixi blog so I guess now a lot of people know who I am, there arnt that many other gaijin Faust players around so I suppose I sorta stand out. He agreed to team up with me. His name is Kishitaka and he is actually the same Sol player who I played against at the game chariot tournament.

So tournament starts and first match we fight Domi (anji) and Kazuki (Dizzy) team, and we both lose to Domi. Kinda sucks, I played casuals for most of the tournament and then came back and watched the finals and Domi/Kazuki ended up winning the whole tournament. I didnt even see Kazuki play the whole time, I think Domi might have single handedly won the whole thing himself but im not sure. So after that I asked the Sol player if he wanted to team up for tomorrows tournament at Mikado but he said he already had a partner and that his partner was just busy today and couldnt make it.

So then I left and headed back to Shinjuku and met up with MIU, he had to repair a machine so I played some casuals there while I waited for him. Eventually he got off work so we headed to Joybox which is a smaller arcade very close to club sega, its cheaper and not many people there so we could easily play a lot of matches against eachother. We played for maybe like 1 and a half or 2 hours. We went back and forth and I think in the end I was up by like 3 matches or something but I wasnt counting exactly. Either way it was good intense games and stuff. After that MIU had to go home so i said bye and headed to a few more random game centers in Shinjuku looking for some matches, most of them were pretty dead, some had like one or 2 people and then id beat them and they would just leave. At this point it was pretty late and the arcades were closing soon so I just said fuck it and went back to the bar again. This time they had a Halloween party and lots of chicks were dressed up in hot costumes. Got drunk again and had a good time and shit. Eventually left when the bar closed at 5 AM and headed back to the Manga cafe.

Next day I wake up and have some McDonalds but it tastes a little off... wasnt very good. Then I headed to Mikado but it was too early and no one was there so I went to Ochanomizu to go to the Disk Union (all metal/rock music store) and bought the new Circus Maximus CD and a Rush fly by night hoodie. Then I headed back to Mikado and people were there now. This one Faust player was there and I dont remember his name but he picks the ugly yellow color faust with the purple bag head. He was beasting like mad and had like 22 wins. after several attempts I eventually got a win on him and broke his streak. Played some more casuals, everyone there was super good. Eventually tons of people poored in and the place was fucking packed, you could hardly move. Mikado isnt a huge building, its like 5 floors but the floor space is small and theres lots of machines so theres not much room for a bunch of spectators. They only had 3 AC cabs so it took forever to get a turn in. I kept trying to sign up but they said I needed a team mate first, so I desperately asked around and resorted to asking random street fighter players on the top floor but none of them would play. Eventually I did like a double take and saw MIU just chillin up there by himself playing Marvel alone for some reason. I asked him if could team up afterall but he said he just came to say hi and had to leave for work very shortly. Before he left though he found me a team mate, a Chipp player he was friends with. The chipp player told me he was weak but I told him its ok anyone is fine and to just do his best. I named our team Japanese team Chicago and he saw I was from chicago and said how he was a bulls fan and started to name all these players he likes heheh. So tournament starts, first match we fight a team of Sol/Axl and I beat both of them without losing a round, after the match my partner says he loves chicago haha. Next match we had to fight Osaka Bs team, (Osaka B is a well known Faust player and one of the best around, espessially now that I was told that Nemo quit Faust for Testament...). His partner was a Baiken player. So my team mate went first this time, he beat the Baiken player and his chipp was quite good, I dont know why he said he was weak, just being humble I guess. He then loses to Osaka B. So me vs Osaka B... I win the first round pretty well, 2nd round is going good but close, then I teleport but in the confusion I get disoriented for a sec and I thought his faust was my faust (he uses the black faust color that I ussually use so my dumbass got mixed up for a sec) and I lose round 2. Round 3 is going close too, eventually im in the corner and he does 2k and i try to dead angle but nothing comes out, this leaves me very confused and dissoriented and I end up dying to corner pogo mixup. So yea I was bummed but oh well, he knows the mirror match better than I do. So tournament keeps going, some big names lose like Nakamura and Nanashi. Eventually the finals is Osaka Bs team vs the yellow faust players team. First match is Osaka B vs Johnny (yellow fausts partner), Osaka B wins. Next match is Faust vs Faust and Osaka B loses. I was sort of expecting this because the yellow faust seemed a bit more solid though both were very good. Then Baiken beats yellow faust ftw and Osaka B/Baiken qualifiy. So yea.... this weekend I lost both tournament matches to the winning team, how ironic. After that I began to head home and I noticed I was feeling sick, my throat started to hurt during the tournament and now I had the chills and just felt really fatuiged. I eventually got home and right now im at work and am super tired and just want to sleep. Hopefully I will get better soon.

The end

oh yea btw, I was in a super hurry on the way to the train station when I left my apartment to head out to Tokyo so I forgot to bring my camera, so no pics this time.... sorry

3 comments:

Unknown said...

hey, did you have to have an english major to get that job?

ElvenShadow said...

no, i majored in economics, you just need a B.S. in anything

Unknown said...

Hey Mike. Looks like you're having fun. I'm the guy that shared my arcade stick with you in Columbus that one time. I enjoyed reading about the tournaments and stuff, and your pictures are cool. I guess you've had a few close calls, so just stick with it and I'm sure you'll win something soon.