Drinking Battle FINISH!...with special guests, Arturo Sanchez and Render!

I had to monitor a student taking a makeup test after classes ended on Friday but luckily for me, he finished pretty fast and I made it to the train station just in time for my usual 5 pm train to Tokyo. I went right to Vegas and started off beating a random Slayer and then there was this white dude there playing Bridget. Ive never seen him before and he didnt say anything to me so I didnt go talk to him cuz I had no idea who he was. He played against me twice and I beat him. Then some random Jam played me and I won. After that, the foreigner Bridget player tried to beat me again twice but I won again. During the 2nd match against the gaijin Bridget, out of the corner of my eye, I suddenly see none other than Arturo Sanchez (a top US Arcana Heart player as well as an old school Street Fighter veteran) walk in. He saw me and we were both just like "NO fucking WAY!" I knew that Arturo was in Japan for a bit before but I didnt know he was still here. He has been in Japan since after EVO but since he didnt go to SBO I didnt see him the whole time. I actually had his contact info but I thought he was back in the US so I never bothered calling him. Anyway, we were surprised as fuck to just randomly run into eachother. This was the first time he had ever been to Vegas actually. Since I was still playing AC, he decided to go play some SFIV for a bit. I beat the gaijin Bridget 3 more times and then he eventually gave up. I had a good win streak going but eventually lost to some ABA player. Sometime around here, Matt showed up and I told him Arturo was here. We all spent a good while longer playing games at Vegas. Rod (Honnou) eventually showed up too. Osaka B came in and I talked to him a bit. I asked him if he knew of any tournaments going on this weekend and he pointed to one of the cabinets that had a tournament flyer on it which was scheduled for tomorrow. I dont know how I didnt notice it haha. After that, we played a few mirror matches but he got the best of me today and out played me. I played a few games of SFIV vs Arturo with my Blanka vs his Dahlsim. We probably played maybe 4 games total. He won all of them. I got a few rounds here and there but he is clearly a much better Street Fighter player than me (and this is nothing I didnt already know). At some point, Matt was asking me about who the random gaijin Bridget was and I said I had no idea so Matt went to talk to him. Turns out hes some guy from Indiana who has been living in Japan for 5 years and claims to play AC at Vegas often but somehow ive never seen him before even though I play there every weekend 0_o. He knows nothing of the US scene as far as players since he started playing the game after he moved to Japan.

After playing for a bit longer, Matt, Rod, Arturo, and I all went to Wendys. It was cool chillin and talking for a bit while we ate. Arturo has been here since Evo ended and said he really hasnt been hanging out with anyone except for his Japanese girlfriend who he is staying with while hes here. Shes not much into games at all (basically she doesnt like them) so he just goes and sneaks out to the arcade alone when he gets a chance. Arturo said it was cool to chill with some people he knew for a change. After getting some Wendys we headed over to Current.

There was a good size crowd for a Friday with mostly regulars. Rod invited this Korean girl he is friends with from his school to come drinking too. Her name is Mi Seon. We all sat in the back for a while and chilled and drank. Matt and I decided that tonight would be the next chapter of our drinking contest war! Since the first time was a draw and the 2nd time got canceled due to Matt pile bunkering the front door of Current, we never had settled the score quite yet. Originally we set up the score sheet for tonight with Arturo, Rod and Mi Seon's name on it. However, after about an hour or so, Arturo had to leave before the last train. He needed to get back to his girlfriend's place but said he would probly come out to Vegas again the next day.

In addition to lots of the regulars, Maiyuko and Chip were there. I bought the 3 of us a round of Jagermiester shots early on in the night to kick things off. I told Maiyuko about how I saw her friend Chris from the Dream Theater video last weekend. She said she was actually thinking of going to Geronimo shot bar in Roppongi later (the one where he works) and asked if I wanted to come. I said I would probably be down for going.

Mi Seon also taught us this cool Korean game. Its kinda like RPS but a bit different. Theres 4 stances (A, B, C, D) that you position your hands with, A is like both hands together sorta like if you were praying. B is like A but the hands are sorta both twisted to the side but the palms are still together. C is both hands apart and facing up. D is both hands apart facing down. Each person takes turns calling either A B C or D and doing the hand motion. If anyone chooses the same option as the person who calls it out, they get slapped on the hands as hard as the person wants to slap you. If you lose with an A you get one sandwich slap followed by a one handed long slap to the side of your hand. B is the same with 2 sandwich slaps, C you get 3 sandwich slaps, D you get 4. If the person calling it out gets any of the people playing, they get to keep going until no one picks the same option. It just keeps going around the circle. This game is pretty sweet and is good for mind game training lol. It could easily be turned into a drinking game too. I know its hard to understand but if you read all that and was like "WTF is this guy talking about?!?" um... try looking it up online or something heh...

As the night went on, there were lots of fail moments (moments where people would just be passed the fuck out at the bar). Among these fail moments was Rod and Mi Seon falling asleep on eachother for a good while. Looks like they were out of the contest hah. There was also this one dude like passed out all laying on a bench, I got nice pictures of both. Eventually at some point, Chip said he was going home and Maiyuko wanted to go to Geronimo but I told her I would meet her there later. As it got near closing time, both Matt and I were just fucking WASTED! We were drinking at a very strong pace all night, but I was constantly ahead by one drink due to that Jager shot and the fact that Matt cant handle shots. At some point, someone bought Matt a shot of Vodka and I guess he drank half of it and couldnt handle it so he gave the rest to me. Well, while I usually can take shots just fine (Whiskey, Tequila, Rum, Jager, whatever is all good!), if theres one weakness I have its Vodka... mainly shitty Vodka. I was already fucking wasted and the taste of Shmirnoff is just literally vomit inducing... and thats exactly what it did! I made a run for it outside (bathroom was full) and had a nice vomiting session over the balcony outside, and somehow managed to get a few splotches on the clean white pair of pants I was wearing!(though I didnt notice at the time). However, it turns out that Matt also threw up at some point in Current's bathroom, so since we both threw up, the throwing up factor no longer was a valid way to lose the contest. Im not sure who actually threw up first since we didnt find out either of us threw up till a bit later.

At 5 after Current closed, I was so wasted that I completely forgot I told Maiyuko that we would go to Roppongi and Matt, Rod, and I ended up going to PSY. (BTW, I just got an email from Maiyuko telling me that Geronimo was fun and that I missed out cuz her and Kano were there and they took their clothes off 0_o). I basically dont remember much that went on at PSY but appearently I took some pictures haha! We had some more beers and there were some people there, and thats about all I know. I do, however, know that neither of us passed out at all, and we got some McDonalds breakfast afterwords. While we were eating, Matt admited defeat, saying he never caught up with that one drink he was lagging behind. I officially have won the drinking contest! Looks like Matt cant call me a pussy anymore if I happen to randomly pass out at PSY at 6 am again in the future. In all fairness, he drank a shit ton too and it was pretty close. Its a pretty even match for the most part.

I went back to Matt's to sleep over and the next morning we both woke up with BRUTAL hang overs. We both decided to retire the drinking contest for a while since we finally managed to finish one without a tie or a cancellation. Also, I realized that my pants still had orange vomit stains on them... yum... and they didnt smell so fantastic either. I tried to wash them in Matts sink but all that did was make them wet and make his bathroom smell sorta. The solution? Uniqlo! We headed over there and I bought a new pair of pants and was ready for the rest of the weekend!

After that we headed back to Vegas to get ready for the tournament. There was a decent crowd there but it wasnt too crazy packed. Not as many top players at the last tournament I was at, but still some noteworthy ones. We werent sure if Rod was gonna make it so I just ended up signing up with Matt as my team mate, once again entering as the team "No May Please!" (hey, it worked last time!). At some point, another foreigner was there and passed by me. I didnt recognize him, but then he said, "hey you're ElvenShadow right?" Im like, "yea, who are you?" and hes like "Render!". I was like "Holy shit! Whatsup dude!". I only met Render once at one of the EVO tournaments about 3 or 4 years ago so I didnt quite recognize him, but Render is totally a cool guy. Hes a Johnny player from California and he works for HIS travel company. He said he was here in Japan on business for the weekend and just happened to stop on by here at Vegas. He didnt know about the tournament so I told him to enter. We tried calling up Rod to see if he could come and team with Render but he didnt pick up. Render found another team mate but then eventually, Rod ended up showing up after all. Rod entered as well with a Robo-Ky player on his team named Zantohei. The tournament was a total of 10 teams divided into 3 round robin pools and the winers would advance into a finals round robin pool. Since there were 10 teams, one pool had 4 teams, and 2 had 3 teams. My team was in the big pool and went first. Also in our pool was a team of KY/JO, AB/AN, and Rod(IN)/Zantohei(RO).

First was Rod team vs JO/KY. RO beats JO but loses to Ky. Rod beats Ky. Up next was my team vs AB/AN. The ABA player on the team was actually Ryokun, the same ABA that I teamed up with (though he never played the whole tournament cuz of all the Faust OCVs lol) along with Ojima when we won that one Game Chariot tournament from the "Victory at Game Chariot!" blog entree. Matt goes first and beats AN but then loses to AB. I also lose to AB. Next was Rod team vs ABA team. RO beats AN but loses to AB. Rod also loses to AB. We were hoping that Rods team could take them out cuz then it would be a 3 way tie. We had one more hope left. If JO/KY could beat AB/AN it would still be a tie. JO beat AN but then AB just beasted on both JO and KY. Ryokun single handedly beat everyone in the pool alone haha! He does have a pretty beastly ABA.

After that, I didnt really watch the rest of the tournament since I was busy playing casuals. There was this really good Bridget there who Baim told me was famous but I forgot his name. In the end, Render's team didnt win their pool either. The final result of the tournament was HEVEN(VE)/Kishya(FA) winning it all. Im not sure who the other team was in the finals pool. I asked HEVEN and he said he didnt know who they were lol. Casuals were fun and we played for a while. HEVEN actually at some point had 19 wins. I was busy playing other people for a while and when I noticed the cab was open for a sec, I got on and beat HEVEN on my first try, ending his 19 win streak. This led to me playing against various people and for a while it was a fucking Johnny fest! I think about 4 different Johnnys, including Render and Rod were just coming back for more and more but I kept taking them down and ended up getting my own 19 win streak which I eventually lost to Robo-Ky. Render was in a good form though and still has a good Johnny. I then ended up getting challenged back and forth between Matt and Rod for 19 games in a row. Eventually Rod got a win in with his Johnny and ended my streak (WTF is with everyone getting 19 win streaks? Its like the magic number of the day or some shit). Render had already left, Arturo never showed up, so Rod, Matt, and I decided to get some food.

We stopped by the cigar shop near the train station cuz I wanted one, but it was already closed. We decided to have dinner at this Korean resturaunt where Mi Seon works. She was working there and served our table and stuff. We got some bibinba and some kimchi yakisoba and Matt got ramen... plus we all got beers. My hangover went away sometime around when the tournament started so I was ok to drink again, but still felt a bit dehydrated so I drank a lot of water too.

After that, it was time for Current! Tonight started off a bit slower but in the end it was a bit more packed than the previous night. Mogi asked if I was ok saying I was fucking wasted last night haha! I told him I was fine and that I won the drinking contest haha. Antti was there this time and told me that The Snus Man would be coming soon with the goods! There were also these 2 chicks there that we had seen a few times before but never talked to, so Rod and I decided to go see what was up with them. They are both sorta thicker girls, one is white and one is Japanese but the Japanese one sounds like shes an american. Both of them are students at the same university. The white chick is named um.... Kristie I think. The other one was named Yasuka I think. I remember once, the girl Kristie threw up on a table at Current a few weeks ago LOL! They seemed nice for the most part I guess.

Nick also came with this one girl hes friends with but I forgot her name too. She was like wearing sorta like a maid apron thing. There was this funny blue stocking cap with antlers on it that said Finland and had the Finnish flag on it. It was getting passed around like a whore all night and various people were wearing it throughout the evening. I wore it over my Dream Theater cap for extra awsomeness. We put it on Korea girls head while she had another fail moment too.

Mai and Ayami showed up in these sexy dresses. They must had come from somewhere else before hand. Also, this girl Tomoko was there with her friend. I met Tomoko a long time ago but barely remembered. She was dancing all night. At one point I like touched her back as I was like sorta passing by her and it was soaking wet with sweat! Eww....

The most awsome thing about this night was The Snus Man! When he showed up, not only did he just constantly offer snus to everyone all night (I must had done like 7 or 8 of them), but once he got to the perfect level of drunkeness (around sometime after he split this giant flask of beer with Antti) he just became an all out party animal! This guy wouldnt stop dancing and going nuts, and he just wouldnt let people sit down. If you were sitting, he would make you stand up and dance too! He had like the whole bar just dancing at one point or another. I also found out that The Snus Man's real name is actually Kai (vapor thrust!), but he will always be refered to as The Snus Man, because Antti and I both agree that thats a way cooler name! Also, during this dancing fest, Rod suggested that I bust out a Faust dance montage... Basically he wanted me to dance in a way that mimicked all of Fausts attacks and win poses, and I was drunk enough so I did! I combo all sorta shit like jumping kick into crouching kick into standing slash into standing dust. I basically did all his normals and did the good ol' pelvic thrust victory dance! Good times!

The rest of the night was cool. We drank at a good pace and were buzzing like hell from the snus, but this time it wasnt like sloppy wasted buzzed. Antti's girlfriend eventually showed up and they left a little bit after together. When Current was nearing closing time, we organized a PSY after party. Myself, Matt, Rod, The Snus Man, Elisha, and this one really hot chick that is there every once in a while who just showed up like 20 mins before the bar was gonna close named Saori, all went to PSY. On the way there, The Snus Man and Saori were having the most hilarious conversation because she was speaking in all Japanese and TSM(The Snus Man) doesnt really know much Japanese at all. At one point, TSM said something and she was like "kimochi warui" which literally translates to "I have a bad feeling" or more naturally, something like "that makes me feel sick, or thats fucked up" or something like that depending on the context. TSM thought she said something about kimchi and started like naming all these asian foods he likes! Were all just laughing because the whole conversation was fucking hilarious and TSM was all wasted and had no idea WTF he was talking about LOL!

When we got to PSY, Heidi was there among some other customers. Rod spent almost the whole time talking with Saori while TSM was busy trying to get everyone all hype like every time a new song came on! Hes such a party animal haha! Also, at some point, one of the co-owners of GODZ showed up asking why I wasnt at GODZ earlier. I was like, I was at Current, and hes like, next time go to GODZ! Masami also showed up after a bit and he said to Rod "You look like a horny boy" and Rod was like "why?" and Masami said "cuz you have a Saori next to you ". The bar ended up staying open till past 7 am! After saying goodbye, we eventually left and got some Mcdonalds breakfast... again.... (I dont mind the breakfast food, the rest of it has been sucking real bad lately though). I crashed at Matt's again.

This would be the last time I stay at this apartment. Today, Matt was actually supposed to move most of his stuff out of this place since from starting later this coming week, he will be living with a host family (his apartment is small as hell and really expensive). I was gonna help him move some shit but we both over slept and the person who was gonna transport it in her car had to do it earlier. Matt said he would just take care of it later. So we woke up at like 2:30, got some Indian food, and then went back to Vegas again to kill the day playing casuals. Not much worth mentioning today at Vegas. Rod showed up at some point. Mugen was there and he had like 10 wins. I tried to beat him a few tries and eventually ended his streak at 14 wins. Also, I had a lot of good games against Pink Axl (the one that works at Vegas). I started off beating him a few in a row and then he got a few on me in a row and I beat him once more and he left. He was playing really well this day though. Inoue was also there getting some big win streak with Slayer but I didnt play him. I ended up getting 24 wins and I had to leave because it was already almost time for my train so I never got beat by anyone during the streak.

As usual I got some food for the trip home, but this time I got some good pasta from the convenient store. It was much better than crapdonalds. Slept the rest of the way home.

It occured to me later actually that I may have very well recieved an email from Arturo at some point but deleted it on accident thinking it was spam (though the spam has settled down a bit, it still rushes me down kinda bad I only had his number stored so his email would not show up as someone who is stored. ). I feel kinda bad cuz if he did try to contact me perhaps he thought I ignored him, but in any case I really dont know. Too late now. He said hes gonna try to come back again to Japan soon maybe (as hes leaving next week to go back to NY).

Next week I have an enkai on Friday night and Saturday night is the Current Halloween party... which is going to be fucking amazing im sure! I have my costume all planned out too. Also, next Monday is a holiday so... 3 day weekend! Sweet...

Loud Park and Rushed Down by Spam

Throughout the entire week, my cell phone has been bombarded with spam. I don't know why it has been getting so bad as of late. Perhaps its because I typed my email address for my phone to J1n when I gave it to him over regular email and those bastards (whoever they are) were able to pull it from there. In any case, I have been getting about an average of 30-40 spam emails a day. Most of it is like websites sending fake emails by girls who wanna meet up for dates and stuff but sometimes I just get empty emails with no subject! Why even bother sending that at all!?! BLarrgh... Every time I receive an email my phone vibrates. That shit gets annoying as hell.

Also, this weekend is Loud Park weekend. Loud Park is a huge rock/metal festival with multiple stages and bands playing all weekend. I missed out on it last year cuz I didn’t know about it at the time. I was considering going this year but tickets are kinda pricey and to be honest, there weren't really many bands I wanted to see. Most of them on there I either didn’t care for much wasn't familiar with. The only one I wanted to see bad was Sonata Arctica but since they probably wouldn’t be playing a very long set, 14500 yen seemed a bit too steep for my wallet. By sometime during the middle of the week, tickets were sold out anyway so I didn’t have much of a choice regardless.

Anyway, I had to work late this weekend to monitor the students who were taking an English proficiency test. I didn’t end up getting to Tokyo until 10 pm. On the way there, Matt sent me a mail saying he would be there when I arrived, but he was no where to be found and wasn’t replying to emails. There was a good amount of people still there playing, among them was Natsume who was playing HOS this time. I started off by playing against an ABA player and winning and then Mekemeke showed up. I played 2 games against him and lost. All of a sudden, Shouji showed up! He said hi to me and we started talking. I asked him if he has been playing lately and he says hes been kinda busy with work and that actually hes been mostly playing Guilty Gear 2 Overture on Xbox live! I didn’t really know many people got into this game but he says hes been pretty hardcore into it and that his interest in AC has been dwindling as of late. Hes excited about BlazBlue though. He sat down and started playing, starting off with Eddie and Po and losing. Once he switched to Testament he was winning a lot. During the time he was playing people, Rod (Honnou) and Nick arrived. Rod and I proceeded to take turns trying to take down Mekemeke’s Testament. We both tried 4 times each and lost. Then I decided to go have a shot at Shouji. I came within a pixel of beating him but lost. Then I decided to try again against Mekemeke and this time I took him down! Shouji gave me a thumbs up from the cabinet next to me. After that, Rod played against me and I won again, then Mekemeke came at me again with his Testament and I managed to beat him a 2^nd time! I then beat Rod 2 more times and then Mekemeke finally came back for some more but took me down. I then decided to take another crack at Shouji and this time I beat him 3 rounds straight without losing. He played me again and I beat him a 2^nd time. After that, it was already starting to get late. I beat some random Jam and some random Ky and then Rod and Nick wanted to head out to Current so I just left without losing. I asked Mekemeke if he wanted to come, but he said he had to go home early tonight since he had stuff to do tomorrow.

Upon arriving at Current, they had a brand new glass window on the front door. I entered and right away, Monty was standing near the door with these 2 dudes. He introduced me to them and told them I was a game tester (I guess he got confused with the fact that I play in tournaments). After introducing me he told me they were 2 of the members of the death metal band Obituary. I used to listen to some Obituary back in the day when I was much younger but lately they arnt exactly a band I listen to often, but I guess it was still cool to meet them. In addition to the guys from Obituary, there were a ton of other foreigners at Current, and among them were 3 of the members of the band Carcass. I know one was the singer, and one was also the drummer, and he also drums for Arch Enemy. Carcass is another band I don’t really listen to but I like Arch Enemy and ive even seen them live once back in Chicago. However, just like any other time a bunch of bands show up at Current, I don’t go out of my way to talk to them unless I have a reason to. I went up to the bar to get a drink and Mogi was pouring a round of vodka shots on the house for the drummer of Carcass and some of the people he was with. The drummer was like, get this guy a shot too, and so they poured me one as well. Sweet. I chased it with some beer and made the rounds saying hi to a few people. Most of the other people there were roadies traveling with the bands and a few regulars were there. Rod and Nick actually left pretty shortly after we got there since they couldn’t stay out all night and had to catch the train before the stopped running. There was still no sign of Matt. Kentaro had mailed me on the train while I was on my way to Tokyo asking if I would be coming tonight to drink. I told him id show up around 11 but due to playing Gear a bit longer I think I got there around 11:30. I sat with him and a friend of his for a bit and we drank a lot. Kentaro was telling me that he was working staff on Loud Park and would be starting at 7 am and would be working up until about 9 pm! In addition to that, he had been at Current since 7 pm tonight and was already pretty wasted. He said he had no plans to sleep tonight, and would stay at Current until 5 am and then head to Loud Park and start working at 7! Fuckin nuts! Dude is hardcore! He kept complaining about how Matt wasnt there cuz he wanted some snus and thought Matt had some (but he didnt). Eventually Monty and some of the band dudes left and I spent most of the rest of the night talking with Kentaro and Megu. I went to sleep at the manga kissa after Current closed.

That night I woke up to my cellphone getting spam mails about 10 times. There was nothing I could do about it since when I sleep at the manga kissa I rely on my cellphone alarm to wake me up. I didnt feel all that well rested but, there wasnt much else I could do about it. Tough shit for me.

After waking up I just headed right to Vegas. There was really no one playing Gear but a few people were playing SFIV. I had a dream during the night that I was playing SFIV and that I was getting a ton of wins for whatever reason. I havnt played the game much as of late but last time I played it was kinda ugly. I decided not to use my card because my record was already shitty and I wanted to wait until I learned the game more. Well it turns out I SHOULD have used the card because somehow I got a 9 win streak with my Blanka, and then people stopped playing for a bit and I lost to boss Seth LOL. Then I played again and got 3 more wins (and this time I used my card). After that, I was talking for a little while with the Pink Axl Player (PAP) who works at Vegas. He was still working at the time. We talked about various things. He said they will be getting one BlazBlue cap at Vegas at first and then will shortly after get more, just like they did with SFIV. I also asked him if he was going to go to the Akihabara 2 on 2 tournament tomorrow. He said he wasnt sure but that if he did show up he wanted to team up with me.

I got a mail from Matt saying he had the worst night ever and wanted to meet up for some food. I was hungry so we met up at Wendys near Shinjuku station. Matt basically told me that he went to an Izakaya with some people from his school and remembers drinking tons of sake bombs (sake mixed with beer.... WTF!) from like 9 to 11 pm, and after that all he remembers for the rest of the entire night was possibly throwing up in the Izakaya and eventually hailing a cab around 4 am. He woke up with some vomit on his clothes and almost no recollection of the night before. LOL!

After eating Wendys we stopped at the nearby cigar shop and I got myself another Cuban to bust out later at Current. After that, we pretty much just went back to Vegas to play there for almost the entire day. There was a tournament listed in the back of Arcadia somewhere in Saitama near Kumagaya station (which is about halfway between Shinjuku and where I live in Gunma, so about 1.5 hour trip). We investigated and eventually Mekemeke (who was at Vegas again) told us that he never goes to that arcade unless he drives because its extremely far from the station. He also said it probly wouldnt be very big and there were a lot of big names at Vegas so we opted to just forget about it and focus on going to the Akihabara 2 on 2 that would be taking place the next day on Sunday. It was more or less justa regular day of casuals at Vegas. I got a 17 win streak at one point. Mekemeke and Inoue (using Eddie) were battling it out back and forth for a while. At some point after that, Mekemeke also got a 17 win streak and I ended it. I also went to go play some SFIV and I got matched up against HH's Blanka (HH mains Blanka in SFIV). We played a Blanka mirror match and somehow... I won! HH has been playing this game way more than me so I have no idea how the hell I won but I did hah. After that he just went back to playing GG.

After a few more casuals, Matt and I decided to get some food. Theres actually a Mexican resturaunt right across the hall from Current. Ive always known it was there, but for whatever reason I never bothered to try eating there, it just never crossed my mind, since every time I go to Current im already usually full, and all thats on my mind is getting drunk! For once, we remembered it exists and decided to check it out. The place was sorta cool but at the same time it was really messy. They had a bar and there was just like random shit all over the place. It felt like eating in someones messy ass basement with all their old crap laying around but with tables and music. We were the only customers but eventually other people came in. The prices were a bit steep but the food ended up being good. They had a hot sauce called "Spontaneous Combustion" which I found ammusing.

After eating there we went back to Vegas for a little bit and a few more good players were there like Mugen and En-Slayer. I played against En a few times and came super fucking close to beating him like twice but somehow fucked it up last minute. Also, Inoue was beasting with his Slayer as well and got another huge streak. After a little while, Matt and I decided to go play at Alpha station in Okubo for once just to mix it up since we were at Vegas all day.

After walking for maybe 15 minutes, we arrived at Alpha station. I dont usually ever come here unless theres a tournament, so I wasnt sure what to expect. They still had 4 cabs going and there were a lot of players. None of the comp was all the exceptional. I ended up effortlessly getting 9 wins and then eventually lost to some random Sol who kept spamming stupid shit like grand viper recklessly. I could have easily beat him but we just decided to leave since it was a waste of time to stick around any longer and it was already like 11 pm and we wanted to go to Current.

When we got to Current, there were a fair ammount of people there. Antti and a Finish crew were sitting in the back and motioned for me to come over. They told me they went to Loud Park and that Sonata Arctica was great, but only played for like 45 minutes or something, which is way too short. Im glad I didnt go since the tickets were so much. He said Dragonforce had really bad sound quality and their set wasnt so good. The KISS shirt guy told me that Apocalyptica was pretty amazing though. As usual, when drinking with the Finnish, many pitchers of beer were consumed. Rod showed up wth Nick and some people from his school but Rod and most of them left early because he had plans to climb Mt. Takao the next day. Nick stayed all night.

Within like a half hour to an hour, the place just got rediculously packed. This was probably one of the most packed nights at Current ever. While a lot of regulars were there, tons of people who were at Loud Park whom Ive never seen before were there too. Mostly bands, roadies, and a bunch of random Japanese band fangirls. There was also this girl there who had quite a huge resemblance to my girlfriend Ryoko. Matt pointed it out and I said I was actually thinking the same thing. Their hair was like almost identicle and their faces were pretty similar. Its not so easy to tell from the pictures but you can see for yourself. She spent the night hitting on like every Finnish guy there and eventually left with one of them saying they were gonna get food and they never came back haha. Before that though, The Snus Guy was sitting with us all and made a comment to her that Matt and the Finish guy she was hiting on were virgins (which was a joke). The Snus Guy thought Matt was mad at him (which he wasnt) and ended up buying Matt a bunch of beer. LOL! The Snus Guy is fuckin awsome, hes always hilarious.

While sitting with the Fins I noticed that at the table on the other end, there was a dude who looked very familiar. If you recall from one of my previous entrees, Maiyuko (who wasnt at Current this night) had told me that a guy who works at Geronimo shot bar in Roppongi whom she knows, was the guy they used as the model for Dream Theater's Forsaken video, which is completely animated. I wasnt sure if this was true or not at the time, but this guy looked EXACTLY like the guy in the video. I decided to find out. I went over to him and started talking and it turns out he IS the guy. He says he does know Maiyuko and Chip and that in addition to working at Geronimo, he works for a production studio. They just ended up using him for the model but he actually has never met Dream Theater personally (though he is a fan of the band). He had a friend there with him to and it turns out that I actually met his friend before. He was one of the random foreigners that went to Current after the Dream Theater concert I was at who I was talking to for a bit, so it was cool to see him again.

Among the bands, there, once again Obituary and Carcass guys came. Also, some of the band members from Slipknot showed up, and with them was Monty, and a big huge bouncer guy. They sorta just outright jacked the table that the Forsaken dude and his party was sitting at. The guys girlfriend didnt seem very pleased. I dont know much at all about Slipknot since I never cared for their music all that much, but this one dude, I think his nickname is Seven or something, was taking arm wrestling challenges. A few people, including Monty, arm wrestled him and he just destroyed everyone, slamming their arms all hard down on the table. Then he like stood up and started yelling all alpha male-ish like "whatsup now mothafucka" kinda thing. I think he was just joking mostly but it was still pretty fucking hilarious! I suggested to him to arm wrestle the bouncer but he didnt seem to want to haha. I took a few pictures and the bouncer dude was signaling me like, thats a no-no. I went up to him and was like, "sorry dude, im not trying to be a dick, I just always take pictures here cuz this place is like my home and shit." He was like, thats cool, no problem dude. The dude Seven also had this Japanese chick sitting next to him. She had an eye patch but was pretty hot. According to Monty, this chick just follows him around everywhere around the world and hes hit that shit so many times hes bored of it. She has SEVEN tatooed across her back lol.

Eventually after Current started to clear out a bit towards the end and eventually closed, Matt, Chris (SPG) and me went to PSY. I felt absoloutly fine on the way there, but for whatever reason, as soon as we got there I ordered a beer, took 2 sips, and woke up about an hour later. Matt told me I just passed out on the bar with the beer in my hand and I spilled it and the glass broke or something LOL! I had no memory of this at all. We were the only ones in the bar, except for the bartender, who didnt seem the least bit upset. I dont know what it is, but something about the environment in PSY just makes me sleepy I guess. I think I threw up in the toilet at some point too... which is an EXTREMELY rare occurance (I think ive thrown up all of maybe 3 times total the entire time ive been in Japan). After that, I just headed back to Matts to sleep.

We woke up to the sound of some political election vehicle passing by with a megaphone, shouting a bunch of election shit. Not as annoying as my cellphone though. This time I was able to turn it off and surprisingly I only got 2 spam mails during the night. I still got a shit load throughout the rest of the day though. After showering and getting some Indian food, we headed right to Akihabara for today's big 2 on 2 tournament! It was semi packed at first but filled up quick! This tournament was one of the larger ones ive been to in a while and tons of big names were there. Among the players in attendance were.... FAB, Bleed (playing SOL!), Mugen, Masutani, Natsume, Hase, Kishya, Karun, Keba, Taku, KO1, MK, En-Slayer, Minami-Chipp, and Ogawa was there too but he just watched. PAP never showed up so I just teamed up with Matt. Before the tournament started, I beat a few people in casuals and had a small streak and then eventually lost to some pink May player. After that, Matt signed us up under the team name "No May Please" LOL! Perfect name. Luckily the tournament organizers took our name into account because we were not matched up to fight any Mays. As they were calling off the names of the entrants to take attendance and pay the 100 yen entree fee, they called my name and were like "Elvenshadow-san, hisashiburi desu" which basically means long time no see. Another thing I found hilarious is they called off Osaka B, but for some reason he wasnt there.

Our first match was against a team of Slayer and Axl. I dont know who they are but the Slayer had the handle Pekekiyau and the Axl was called Pekaru. We did RPS and lost so they chose their side. We put Matt first and he went against their Slayer. He won the first round and was kicking ass and then lost the next 2 in close games. After that I had to fight the Axl (the format of this tournament was each player on each team fights a different person and then the remaining person fights the other guy rather than the traditional format, this way everyone is ensured a chance to play which is kinda cool). In any case, I beat Axl up pretty good and I could hear Ogawa and some people making lots of noise from the other side of the cab. I then proceeded to fight Slayer. I won the first round well. 2nd round he got an early lead on me as I jumped back and got caught by a combo right off and just got fucked in the corner. 3rd round I was doing really well and then he hit me with a gold burst. However, I just played very careful and kept him at bay and killed him with a sneaky air HS ftw. After that, we had to fight team "Osaka B" which was Johnny and Chipp (so obviously Osaka B was not on the team which I found puzzling). I won RPS and chose our side. Matt went first against the Johnny player (who turned out to be MK). Just like against Slayer, Matt had a great showing and beasted on round 1, but then lost in 2 close ones for rounds 2 and 3. I went next against the Chipp player. I didnt realize it until after the tournament but the Chipp was actually Minami-Chipp! The first round I dominated him with jumping HS, I was zoning the hell out of all the space in the air and he kept getting hit by it. The 2nd round he was like one hit away from beating him but he came back on me and pulled a win out of his ass. The 3rd round wasnt so bad but I lost, he mostly just stayed on me really hard. It really sucks because I was so close and I was confident I could have beaten MK. I have no idea why they would name their team "Osaka B" but I found it pretty hilarious regardless.

After that I just played casuals until the tournament ended. The winners ended up being Mugen (Bridget) and Taku (Slayer). After that, I spent the entire rest of the time fighting against (who I am pretty sure was) Kishya in a long set of Faust mirror matches. We went back and forth but in the end I am pretty sure we were dead even! I was up by one and he won the last game and then I had to leave because the last train was coming soon. He has a really good Faust and knows the mirror match well. I went over to him and told him good games but I had to go and we shook hands.

After that, Matt and I headed out to McDonalds so I could get some food to eat on the way home real fast. I didnt wanna go there but theres not much else in Akihabara. They have that new potato bacon pie thing on the menu. I ordered 2 of those and a burger but then the guy said it would be like a 6 minute wait on the pies and I was cutting it real short before my last train was gonna leave, so I just changed the order to 4 burgers (which I wasnt very excited about eating). Matt stayed and got a pie and I headed out. When I got on the train I got an email from him on my phone saying "the pie sucks". I guess I didnt miss much. Too bad the burgers sucked too. Wendys for life. I slept mostly the entire way home and thats about it.

As of now, the cellphone spam has been still hitting me hard but it seems to be slowing down a bit. I could just change my email but thats such a fuckin pain in the ass. Next weekend theres some sorta GG tournament going on somewhere. I forgot where but I most likely will be going to it. Theres also a party hard event at Current. Should be good times as always.

Tokyo Game Show 2008, Shirtless Shinanigans, and Some Broken Glass

Well I hope everyone enjoys reading this fucking blog entree because half way through typing it which took like an hour, I hit some key on accident and it ended up highlighting all the text and deleting it, and then the stupid blog page auto updated the draft and erased EVERTHING! DLKJFOIJEOIHJEOIHD O!"O!!!!!! FUCK!

ANYWAY......................................................

I was to meet up with Jason (J1n) this weekend. He told me he was gonna go to TGS on Friday and was gonna get a press pass to get in. Since he didnt wanna stay out all night he said we could just meet up Saturday at TGS.



I arrived at Vegas Friday night and Baim was there. She told me she played against this one Baiken that was there but she couldnt beat him. I gave a it a shot and lost but I tried again and won and ended his 18 win streak. There was also some random guy walking around the arcade in a tiger mask.... and Natsume was there but he was using Sol and Millia for some reason. I got a call from Maiyuko and she wanted to hang out, but I already had plans to go to a show I bought a ticket to last week. She wanted to stay in Shibuya so we just decided to meet up next weekend instead or something. Eventually Matt and Rod (as I have stated before, Honnou's real name is Rodrigo. Rod is much easier to type and thats what we call him anyway so from now on im just gonna refer to Honnou as Rod), showed up. Some blue Eddie player kept trying to beat me but failed and then Rod tried a bunch of times with a bunch of different characters (I-no, Slayer, Faust, Johnny) but didnt beat me either and I got 17 wins. We then decided to just leave and go to Current.



We stayed at Current for about and hour. I was wearing my glasses and decided to put my contacts back in when I got there. Last weekend, Matt and I bought tickets from Piko (one of the regulars) to a show he was doing somewhere in Shinjuku at a small club/bar named Little Alice. Ayami and Mai were there and eventually Megu showed up as well and they all had tickets to go to the show as well. We decided to just go together. Megu said she would meet up with us there. There was also this really creepy random drunk guy there who was like weirding everyone out, but he was kinda hilarious at the same time. I didnt mind leaving him behind at all.




After we arrived at Little Alice, it turns out they had extra tickets at the door, so Rod was able to get a ticket too. I loaned him some money since he was kinda broke. The venue was small and the seats were all crammed together but otherwise it was cool. Megu showed up with Ayano shortly after we got there. I had no idea what this show was going to be like, but it ended up being a play and concert combined. It was called Janis - Lover Is Like a Ball and Chain, and was the story of Janis Joplin. The show lasted a little over 2 hours. Basically they would act out a scene and then play a song and then act some more and play another song and the songs kinda were integrated into the play. It started out with the band jamming and then finding out that Jimi Hendrix just died. The play pretty much was about the band dealing with that, and Janis dealing with her drug problem and her relationship problem in which her boyfriend was cheating on her with her other friend. In the end she dies of a heroin overdoes. The songs they played (to my knowledge) were all Janis Joplin covers. The band did a great job, the acting was actually really good. Piko is a great guitarist and the singer who played Janis had a very powerful voice. The whole thing was well done. The entire show was in Japanese aside from the songs but I was able to understand it for the most part. Rod and Matt said they got most of it as well. We were the only foreigners there out of about a little over 100 people or so. My only complaint was the uncomfortable seats and no intermission. My ass and legs hurt. Matt had to piss like almost the entire show but somehow held it.



After the show was over I noticed Yago was there with his friend as well. We chatted with everyone for a bit and thanked the band and Piko for a good show, and then we all headed back to Current. When we arrived at Current, Antti was there with a Finnish crew (the KISS shirt couple, Elisha, and this one big guy whos often there with them, im just gonna call him Dolph Lundgren cuz hes kinda big and oafish. The Snus Guy wasnt there this time). They were all wasted as usual. Dolph kept trying to sing along with songs but his timing was like all off. He was trying to sing Sweet Child of mine but he kept singing parts early and it just sounded fucking hilarious. Also, Mogi told us that his birthday was earlier in the week and they would be having a party Saturday night. Towards the end of the night, my left eye was hurting like a bitch again and I had to take out my contacts and put my glasses back on. At 5 when the bar closed I headed to the manga kissa alone because I wanted to get some sleep and wake up on time to go to TGS.



The next morning I woke up a little before 11. My left eye hurt like a bitch and was bright red again. The Dr told me that I can wear my lense again for a bit but after only 6 hours of wearing it, it was absoloutly red as fuck. I fear I may no longer be able to wear a lense in my left eye anymore.... I told Jason I would meet him in front of the big sentai statue in front of Makuhari Messe at 12. On my way there I notice there were 2 different stations for Makuhari on the line I was on. I asked the girl next to me on the train which was closest. She said Makuhari station was and that she would be getting off there as well. She said she was also planning to go to TGS and it turns out she was a Microsoft booth girl. She suggsted we walk there together. When we got off the train, we found out that we were actually at a pretty far station. The closest station to Makuhari Messe is on another line completely (its been a while since ive been there and I forgot). We ended up splitting a cab to get there the rest of the way. When we got to the venue she went ahead inside cuz someone was waiting for her. I checked the time and it was 12:30. I told Jason that if I wasnt at the statue at 12, to try again at 1. I also noticed the line to get tickets was long as hell and I didnt wanna make Jason wait for me to buy one so I figured I would just go buy a ticket now and hopefully be at the statue at 1. By the time I got my ticket it was about 1:10. When I went to the statue, Jason wasnt there. He either didnt wait longer than 10 minutes or didnt show up. I waited for another 10 minutes or so but he never came so I figured I would just meet him later somehow. There wasnt much else I could do. Jason didnt have a cellphone and the only way to contact him was through regular email over PC that he sent to my cellphone from the computer in his hotel room. So if hes not in his hotel room at his PC theres no way to contact him.



As I was making my way inside TGS I noticed that the line I waited in was unecessary and there was another place to buy tickets on the other side of the building that had a WAY shorter line. Fuck. I ended up buying 2 tickets because I figured Matt or Rod (who were coming later) might want it instead of waiting in line. Shortly after getting inside, I got an email from Jason saying that the place was too packed compared to yesterday and that him and his girlfriend were back at his hotel. They said they wanted to meet up later with me so I told them to meet me at Akihabara Club Sega after TGS at about 5:45. I gave him directions over the email. While I was at the Square-enix booth, I got a call from Rod saying that him and Nick were there. I thought they were already inside but they actually werent yet, so I didnt bother mentioning I had an extra ticket. Matt never showed up. I eventually met up with Rod and Nick and we walked around together the rest of the time there. The layout was just like last year with 3 main hall rooms full of booths and then 2 outside areas in between them where people gathered to hang out and cosplayers showed off costumes and took photo shoots.



Some TGS highlights:



- Square-enix had the sequel to Final Fantasy IV there called Final Fantasy IV: the After. This game, for whatever reason, is a cellphone only game, which is fucking stupid because they would make way more money on it if they released it for GBA or DS or something. They had 2 cellphones out with the game to try. I played for about 5 minutes before I was kicked off. The game supposedly takes place many years after FFIV. I dont know what part of the game I was at, but when I started off I was playing as Rydia by herself and I was in the land of the summoned monsters. Rydia had a new sprite and portrait but she looked like she hadnt aged at all which makes no sense since time in the land of the summoned monsters is supposed to go FASTER than regular time but whatever. The graphics look identicle to the old FFIV. I went and talked with Leviathan and Asura and it showed a flashback of when Cecil and Kain delivered the package that destroyed the village of Mist. I dont know what the dialogue said cuz it was heavy with kanji I didnt know. After that I made my way out into the cave of the summoned monsters. The battle system is exactly like FFIV. Rydia didnt have all her spells so I guess somehow she forgot some of them or they just took some away to make her not be broken from the start of the game. After making my way out of the cave onto the underworld world map, the Falcon (the airship) shows up and this pink haired girl gets out and starts talking to Rydia. At this point they kicked me off the game so that the next person could play. I showed my phone to one of the people working the booth and they said my phone can run the game, so I will get it for sure! They also had a Chrono Trigger museum at the booth with all kinds of CT artwork on the walls. I want to be excited for the new CT DS release but its just the same game with a new dungeon. I wish they would do a full remake like they did for FF3 and FF4.



- We found the Arc System Works booth and were disapointed to find that they did not have BlazBlue there to play. They said they had an exhibition match earlier in the day but they game was taken down after that. They didnt really have much at all there and the booth was really small. They said that if you buy a copy of GG2 overture that Daisuke Ishiwatari would sign it but I didnt see him anywhere and I dont have a 360 I didnt buy one, though it probably would have sold nice on ebay. There was also this guy there from Spain who said he was a Guilty Gear player. We talked for a bit and I asked if he knew who ElvenShadow was. He said yes and after I told him it was me, he was all excited to meet me and stuff. He said he reads my blog. Seemed like a nice guy. I told him I wanted to play him later at Club Sega but we ended up losing him after I was asking the Arc System works staff some questions. One of them was wearing a BlazBlue shirt and I asked him if I could somehow buy one but he said they werent for sale but may be for sale soon on the arc systems website. Sweet. In any case I was dissapointed that there was no BB casuals going on at all since it was one of the games I wanted to play most.



- Konami had the new DS Suikoden. Im a big Suikoden fan and will probably get this but it doesnt look that great honestly. I dont know why they are only have a 4 character party limit... boo. Also they had both of the new Castlevanias. The one for Wii looks like it could have been an early PS2 game graphically and looks like it will be fun for casual fucking around at best. The new DS Castlevania, Order of Ecclesia, however, looks fantastic and ill be getting that one for sure!



- Capcom had console SFIV there with Sakura as a playable character. They did a nice job on her design and she looks like shes really good in the game. They also had some sorta tournament going on. I dont know if they ran a full tournament earlier in the day or if they just selected a few people, but they showed what seemed to be the final 4 of a tournament played live on stage at their booth on a huge screen. I dont know who any of these guys were but they had 2 Gief players, a Rufus, and a Viper. Gief vs Gief resulted in one Gief winning obviously and Rufus beat Viper. Finals were Gief vs Rufus with Gief winning it all. It was a good match actually. Winner got a copy of the game early. They also had 2 chicks dressed as Chun and Sakura on stage. Biohazzard5 looks good, I might pick it up. They also had the Wii version of TvC there but I didnt get around to playing it (I didnt have time to play anything except the FFIV game due to there being really long lines).



- SNK/Playmore had the new KOF which looks beautiful. They also had like maybe 7 different Mai cosplayers who did photo shoots on the stage. A pack of dudes with cameras swarmed the stage to take pics. One guy was even sitting on his friends shoulders just to get a better view. Rod and I got a good amount of pics.



- There were tons of great cosplayers again this year. By the Arc booth I got a shot of a Faust, May, Bridget, Valentine group. There was also a Jam and Bridget walking around but they wouldnt let us take a picture, wtf. Outside we also saw an I-no and Bridget that let us take pics. There was also another awsome FFVI group this year consisting of Locke, Celes, Cyan. Other various awsome costumes were there too, I took pics so you can just look at them.



- They had a few booths selling merchendise. The Capcom one had an awsome SFIV shirt and TvC shirt but they were already sold out! I wanted one bad too.



- Every booth had tons of hot fucking booth girls in skimpy outfits and I got plenty of pics of that too.



As time was nearing an end, we decided we should leave a few minutes early to avoid the rush of people leaving at once. However, we were destracted as our penises took over minds as we passed by the SNK/Playmore booth again on the way out. All of the Mai cosplayers AND every single one of the SNK booth girls (like maybe 25 of them) all lined up in front of the booth for a giant photo shoot. Within seconds a fuckin swarm of guys with cameras surrounded them. Rod and I spotted them instantly and were like in the front row so we got lots of pics. Unfortunately by the time we finished shooting, the mad rush to leave already started. We followed the massive sea of people out of the venue and headed to the train station. It turns out the closest station to Makuhari Messe is actually on a different line than the one I took to get there. The station was also packed as hell and you could hardly even walk. The line to get tickets was long as fuck and it took forever to buy one.



By the time we got on the train and made it back to Akihabara it was already 6:45. I told Jason to meet me there at 5:45 but I had no way to contact him to tell him we were gonna be late. I was hoping he would still be there playing casuals but for whatever reason, he wasnt. He either got sick of waiting for me or couldnt find the place to begin with. Matt (who never showed up to TGS cuz he was busy sleeping or some shit) eventually met up with us at Club Sega. Osaka B was there and I asked him if he saw any foreigners there but he said he didnt remember seeing any. Also, to my surprise, Nerina was there! He said he was only in Tokyo for one day today to take some sorta University entrance exam and would be going back on the overnight bus (he lives in Kyushu or something like that, which is far). We got some cheap curry and waited for Jason a bit longer while playing casuals but he never showed up. Also at some point after a few tries, Rod managed to beat my Faust with his Johnny for a game. I can feel that hes already starting to get better since hes been here. Matt couldnt beat me but he seems like hes improving as well.We eventually decided to just go back to Vegas and play there instead cuz it would be cheaper.



Before going to Vegas I randomly decided I wanted to buy a cigar from a cigar shop near Shinjuku station. I got a 500 yen Cuban and we also found a Wendys near there I didnt know about so we got some awsome 99 yen menu action!



Mugen was at Vegas but he was playing Robo-Ky for whatever reason. HH was also there and had a big streak with his Dizzy and I eventually beat him and ended it at 31 wins. After playing for a while we then decided to go head to Current for Mogi's birthday party!



Current was good and packed when we got there with just about all of the main regulars and a few other random people. One of the first things I did after arriving was buying a round of Tequila shots for Mogi, myself, and Masami. Matt and I decided we would do the rematch of our drinking contest tonight. We started off going really fast and each downed like 7 drinks within the first hour! After that we slowed down slightly but kept drinking. We all made the Yago shirt bet again, but this time just for fun. He ended up taking it off at around 1, and none of us hit it dead on. However, the most astounding thing happened! I dont know if it was because of Yago or not, but it was like this chain reaction happened and suddenly everyone in the bar was infused with the soul of Yago and like half the people in the bar took their shirts off! NOT JUST THE GUYS! More than half the girls at Current spent the rest of the night in just their bras! This was like the hottest party at Current ever! Ive never seen shit at Current get this wild! People were spraying champaign all over the place, they had noise makers and shit. Mogi was standing on the bar chugging Jack Daniels straight from the bottle and diving into the crowd! This shit was just off the hook and everyone was dancing all hard and crazy! It was like that GODZ anniversary party from a while back except even wilder and bigger and more shirtless hot chicks were there!



However, after a little while, the atmosphere sorta changed a bit. I was sitting at the bar and I heard a loud noise. I look behind me to see that the glass window of the front door (which takes up most of the door) was shattered in pieces on the ground. Turns out that someone had stolen like 20,000 yen from Ayano and Matt was drunk and pissed about it so he punched the door and broke the glass. People quickly cleaned it up. Matt cooled off and felt really bad and was all saying he would pay for it and apolagizing. The Current staff said to not worry about it though, but everyone still seemed rather surprised by it. After that, given the circumstances, Matt and I decided to call off the drinking contest for the night and continue some other time maybe. After that kinda blew over everyone spent the rest of the night still having a good time. While we were dancing earlier, my glasses were in my pocket and I guess they fell out cuz Rod found them on the floor, luckily for me. They werent broken but they were a bit bent, but I was able to bend them back so its all good. I also enjoyed that tasty Cigar quite a bit and was like offering hits off it to just about everyone in the bar LOL... man I was so fucking wasted! I was talking with Chip and he was saying hes been working staff at TGS at the Capcom and Konami booths all weekend but I didnt run into him while I was there. Towards the end of the night, Matt and Ayano were sitting outside on the stairs. She was wasted and passed out since her and Megu were there drinking since 7 pm. I guess Matt was consoling her over losing her money. They ran out of draught beer at some point as well cuz so many people were getting crunked. One of the last things I remember was being outside on the balcony area near the stairs and Mogi was out there leaning over the railing telling me he was fucking drunk! Mogi usually never seems super wasted so our goal was to get him fucked up and we succeeded! I dont really remember the end of the night but Rod told me that I ended up saying goodbye to everyone and that Matt, Saeko, and I all went to get Ramen somewhere but I dont remember eating Ramen at all.



After that I went with Matt to go back to his place to sleep cuz I was fucking exhausted and we were gonna go to TGS together later. We woke up on the Chuo line at the end of the line in Takao which is WAY out of the way. Passing out on the train sucks. After we finally made it back to Matt's place, it was already 8:30 am! We went right to sleep.



We were planning to go back to TGS again on Sunday since I still had that extra ticket and Matt hadnt gone yet. However, we didnt wake up till 2 and by the time we would get there it would be too late to make it worth while so we just said fuck it (sucks cuz I bought an extra ticket for nothing and wanted to play some more games there). We also found out the next morning that Ayano was passed out at Current all night and ended up sleeping on the benches in the back of the bar. I guess she just walked through the gaping hole in the door when she woke up. Good thing she was safe, who knows what could have happened to her. Im just surprised no one helped her get home. Instead of going to TGS we got some Indian food, and went to TRF to play GG. I got an 18 win streak there and eventually lost in a close one to a Bridget that tried to beat me a few times. ABEGEN was there but he was playing #reload for some reason and didnt play any AC. The comp at TRF in general wasnt that high so we went to Vegas after that. Inoue was there and he had a huge fucking win streak with I-no! I didnt even know he plays I-no. I tried to beat him a few times but failed, as did a few other people. Eventually this one green Bridget player beat him. He ended his streak at 62 wins! I got on and played the Bridget right away and I ended up winning, and it lead to me getting 22 wins. Eventually Rod met up with us at Vegas as well. Normally I would be going home on a Sunday but Monday is a Japanese national holiday so I had no work on Monday. 3 day weekends kick ass!



As it started to get late, we decided to get some food. We went to this place called Pepper Lunch which was tasty as hell. After that I recieved a message from Liz on my cellphone. She said she had plans to stay at her boyfriend's apartment in Yokohama tonight but he wasnt answering her emails so she didnt know what was up. She said she was gonna come drink at Current for a bit until she got a hold of him. Matt had to go home cuz he had homework to do and didnt get the day off, so Rod and I went to Current.



Arriving at Current it felt funny just walking in through the big gaping hole in the door where the window used to be without having to open it. Being a Sunday night it wasnt very packed but a few people were there and Megu showed up. Eventually I met up with Liz and she came to Current as well and we sat and drank for a bit. She eventually got a hold of her boyfriend and managed to leave just in time to get the last train to Yokohoama. I spent most of the rest of the night just talking with Megu and some other people. I also got another Cigar earlier in the day near TRF at this smoke shop I found since I enjoyed smoking the other one so much the night before. This time I got one made in the Phillipines. I had never smoked a Filipino cigar till now but it was surprisingly tasty! Sometime before the last train left, Rod left because he had to study for a test that he had the next day. I was talking with Mogi for a bit and he told me he has been working at Current for 3 years now. He also says he works every single night and only gets maybe 3 days off a month. That place is his life... I wonder if he ever gets tired of it? I cant really think of many better jobs though to be honest heh. Masami has only been working there for a little over a year. I wonder who the old bartenders were... I realized actually that next weekend is the same weekend exactly one year ago that I found Current. Cant believe it went by so fast. Its all good though, lots of time ahead still.

Anyway, at around 4 Megu, me, and this one other dude whos name I forgot but is always there, went to Zin together. No one was there except for Yoshi but we sat and talked for a bit and ate some takoyaki that we got on the way and it was fucking delicious. I asked Yoshi where he worked before he opened Zin a year ago and he said that he used to work at Mother, which is another rock bar right across the street from PSY, though ive never actually gone inside. Perhaps I should visit there someday. At 5 when Zin closed, we all just parted ways and went home. On the way out of Zin on the elevator going down to the street, these 2 older Russian chicks were on the elevator with us and one of them was flirting with me and pinched my nipple. They said they were going to a disco club and wanted me to come but I wasnt really very interested. I just went to sleep at the manga kissa.

On Monday, I woke up at 11 and went right to Vegas which was dead for Guilty Gear. There were like 2 dudes playing SFIV. I figured id try out some other characters against the CPU to kill time. I tried Rufus but I honestly just dont really like the way he plasys. I also messed around a bit with Gouki and he seems alright but I dunno... I just cant seem to really get into that game. It looks nice and stuff but it just doesnt hold my interest long enough. I just find myself craving some more GG action. Cant wait for BB though.

Anyway, I eventually left there, got some Wendys and headed to Akihabara to see if there was any comp there. There were a few players at first and after like an hour or 2 it filled up quick. Lots of big names showed up like Ogawa, Kishitaka, Masutani, Inoue, and a few others. I did generally pretty well there getting a 12 win streak which I lost to an Axl in a close one. Inoue had a 26 win streak with Eddie (WTF is with him playing so many characters lately!? This guy honestly is good with so many characters....). I played him once and lost in a really close one. I played him again and won, ending his streak. This lead to me getting another 22 win streak against various people. I eventually lost to some Slayer. Then I noticed while I was getting my streak, Inoue had started another one on another cab, this time rocking his I-no again as he had been yesterday at Vegas. This time he had 15 wins and I beat him on my first try. Most of the rest of the day was various casuals against various people. There were some other really excellent players there who im not sure who they were but I had some good games. Rod was gonna come but he ended up having shit to do so I just played by myself all day but I dont really mind it. Once 8:30 rolled around I grabbed a McRib value meal from McDonalds (which ended up tasting like shit btw, im fuckin done with that place for real), and sleeping on the train most of the way home.

I woke up right before Takasaki and Cynthia was there on the train and found me sleeping. We ended up riding the last train back from Takasaki to our town together and talking. She was on her way back from a trip to Hirsohima and showed me some pictures. I eventually fell asleep again towards the end.

So thats about it. The first half of this blog entree was actually a bit more detailed the first time I typed it up but I was pretty pissed off when it got deleted so I just ended up half assing it sorta but you get the basic jist of it. Its pretty long as it is anyway.

I feel bad that I never got in contact with Jason cuz I wanted to chill with him and show him around and shit. Its basically all my fault and I planned things kinda poorly. Hopefully he had a good time and found his way around alright. I guess he will post about it when he gets back.
Next weekend theres a 2 on 2 tournament at Akihabara Club Sega on Sunday that I will be going to for sure.

Um... What?!... TENNIS?! (and Invasion of the Testaments!)

I checked the tournament schedule and there were unfortunately no tournaments scheduled for the weekend. I woke up on Friday morning with a cold but I wasn’t going to let that stop me from enjoying me weekend. I made it out to Tokyo at the usual time, but this time, instead of going right to the arcade, I went to Matt’s apartment. I brought my bass guitar and amp with me since we were planning to do some jamming this weekend, but I didn’t wanna lug it around all night so I wanted to drop it off at his place before heading out. After meeting up and dropping it off at his place in Nakano, we went to Vegas for casuals. A good amount of players were there. Among them were HH and JT who were playing against eachother over and over for what seemed to have been a long time. HH was actually getting somewhat upset and would occasionally pound on the machine when he lost… a rare occurance. I played against various people and wasn’t really watching the results in total, but eventually JT left and I found myself facing HH’s Dizzy. I beat him fairly well and after going to play some SF4 and coming back to the GG cabs, HH threw his Ky at me. I beat his Ky 3 rounds straight and after that he just got up and left the arcade and never came back. I was beating most other people pretty much, but there was this one default color Testament player there and he was really good. We were going back and forth but he was certainly a huge challenge. The hot female Sol player was there with her boyfriend who is a Jam player but I didn’t get around to playing against either of em. Once it got late we left for Current.

On the way there, Matt and I met up with Kentaro and we got some food at Sukiya. Kentaro was telling us that Monty was there earlier but he had already left because he had some stuff to do in morning. However, I was informed that he once again had a bathroom quicky with the same girl (MFS), but she had already left as well. Matt and I decided that since I had a cold, it might not be fair for us to having a drinking contest tonight, so we opted to save it for another weekend and just drink at our own leisure.

When we arrived at Current, there was a good usual amount of people there for a Friday. Mogi, Masami, and Sushi were all there working. Megu and Mai showed up. Sitting at the bar was Heidi and next to her was her friend from Norway, Anna. After sitting with Kentaro and Matt at a table in the back for a bit (and Honnou randomly showing up and leaving within like a 30 minute timeframe cuz he said he had shit to do tomorrow), we eventually moved to the bar and I found myself sitting next to Anna and Heidi. I talked with her for a bit. She was showing me her tattoos and stuff and telling me how she just got to Japan the previous day. At some point later on, Masami also passed out on the bar and people put all sorts a shit like coasters, menus, and ashtrays all over his back lol! Also somewhere in there, Piko showed up and he was telling us about some sorta music show he was doing next weekend so Matt and I decided we would check it out and bought a ticket from him for 2000 yen each, which is cheap. Looks like we will be hitting that up next weekend. At some point in there, I got an email from Maiyuko on my phone. She was asking if I was in Tokyo for the weekend. I replied saying that I would be around till Sunday night. The rest of us stayed till 5, continuing to get plastered.

Once the bar closed, Matt and I headed to PSY to continue the drunkenness until 6 pm where I pretty much don’t remember anything at all, but I guess some of the girls that often go to Zin were there among some other random people. I ended up falling asleep at some point. After that I went back with Matt to Nakano to crash on his floor since sleeping somewhere for free and being able to take a shower is good.

Matt had told me that the next day, he had plans to have lunch with this girl he has known and had a crush on for a long time from his school here in Japan. However, he said it would still be ok for me to crash there and that I could just wake up and leave and lock the door behind me when I left and then we would meet up later. I woke up at around 1 pm to find that Matt had left and I was alone. When I checked my phone to see what time it was, I noticed that the mail I made to send to Maiyoko, for whatever reason, never got sent. So I sent it again and then was planning to go back to sleep for maybe another hour as I was still tired. However, minutes after I sent the mail, I received a reply from Maiyuko which woke me up again. She said she wanted to meet up today and said she had plans to go to a Tennis tournament called the AIG open. Thats right.... Tennis... Im as surprised as you are. What's more surprising is I actually agreed to go! If you remember last time I saw Maiyuko, we talked about her plans to get married soon and I never quite finished the conversation with her so I kinda wanted to talk with her anyway. I didnt really have any plans for the day other than just random casuals and stuff. I was a bit tired and wanted to sleep a little more, but she said she wanted to get there at 2. She said otherwise if I dont go, she will go alone and it would be kinda boring. I figured... alright fuck it, ill just drink some caffiene and ill be alright. I told her give me a little time to shower and get dressed and id meet her at Shinjuku station and we could go together from there.

It ended up taking me a while to get ready and finally get there since I ran into a few delays but in the end I met her at the station. Turns out that the tennis tournament would be taking place in an arena which is in the Ariake/Odaiba area and the building is actually right across the street from Differ (the SBO venue). When we got there, there was a different tennis match going on and they wouldnt let us in until the next one started so we decided to get some food. They had various little stands with overpriced food. In the end we decided to get some tacos and nachos (yes they actually had these!). However, the tacos and nachos ended up being really crappy Japanese version of them. Like... who the FUCK puts MAYONAISE on a TACO?! NO TOMATOES? NO ONIONS?! NO SOUR FUCKIN CREAM? fuckin blasphemy I tell you... and at 500 yen each? At least they didnt manage to fuck up the Coronas that we ordered with it. Anyway, Maiyuko noticed that some people were leaving the stadium early since they probably didnt intend to watch the other matches that would be taking place (this event was scheduled to last till 8pm and would span all weekend). So Maiyuko decided to go rush random people down who were leaving and ask them if she could have their tickets so we could get in for free. Unfortunately no one wanted to be cool and give her their tickets even though they didnt need em. However, on the bright side, since we arrived sorta late in the day, the tickets we did eventually end up buying were discounted and were only 2000 yen each which isnt a big deal.

After buying the tickets, on our way into the venue, we took pictures with this random guy in a giant chicken suit and bought some more beers. I dont really know much about tennis but the match we watched was an American guy named Roddick vs some European guy (I think he was Czech) named Berdych. The set lasted maybe a few hours and we proceeded to keep drinking lots of beer the whole time. I got a nice buzz and we were talking and stuff so it wasnt all that bad. Had I been sober, I cant quite say if I would have enjoyed watching tennis but in the end I had fun. In the end, Roddick was kicking ass and had a lead, but then at some point he started getting pissed and throwing his racket and shit, and he started choking and gave up a 5-0 game lead and Berdych came back and stole that shit. Maiyuko was rooting for Roddick so she was dissapointed. After it was over, a bunch of people were crowded in the hallway waiting for the players to come out so they could get shit autographed. We waited around for like 5 minutes and the dudes werent coming. Maiyuko said she didnt really wanna watch the next game and I didnt particularly care to see it either so we just left.

From there we decided to get some food. After walking around in this shopping mall we eventually found this nice all you can eat buffet place that had various good food. They had a seating area outside next to the water and you could see a great view of parts of the Tokyo skyline, ships, and all kinds of other nice stuff. We had a good talk about her wedding plans.

In any case, after we both had 2 big plates of food, we went for dessert and this place had one of those awsome chocolate fountains and various things to cover in chocolate so I hit up some of that. After eating, we headed out. She had only gotten 1 hour of sleep the previous night, so she didnt really feel like going out to Current tonight. We rode the train back together and she was practically falling asleep. When it got to Shinjuku I said goodbye and got off the train.

I met up with Matt and Honnou at Vegas for some casuals. I played various people and mostly won and then Honnou played me a few times and managed to beat me once for the very first time, so props to him. There was this one Testament player there who uses the default color and Honnou told me that he once played against this guy like 50 times in a row until he finally managed to beat him once! At first I thought it was the same guy that was there yesterday but it was a different guy. I tried playing against the guy and we had some close games, but he beat me 7 times in a row until I finally beat him! He was very smart and good at forcing situations to make you trade counter hits with an EXE beast, which of course always means a free badlands loop for Testament. He had good zoning and spacing too. After I finally beat him we were getting ready to head out and we went over to say bye to the Testament player. Just for the hell of it, I asked him if he wanted to come drinking with us. I was expecting him to say no, but surprisingly, he was totally up for coming with! He goes by the name MekeMeke. He told me that he knows who I am, and that I played against him before. I dont remember where or when but im not surprised given how many various people I have played casuals with. He also just randomly out of the blue, congratulated me on winning the EVO tournament! I was surprised since I didnt even know most Japanese people payed attention to EVO and its already been a while since its been over.

Also, while we were walking to Current I asked MekeMeke if he knew anything about the status of this year's DF2 tournament. He said that as far as he knows, there will be no DF2 this year unfortunately. However, he mentioned that G3 is coming up and the qualifiers will be starting in November and it will take place in December. This year I believe it will be a 23 vs 23 with either 4 or 5 teams participating. You choose a prefecture you want to try for and you have to keep playing at that specific arcade. Every qual you go to you earn points, and whichever player for each character at each location has the most points, will be put on the team. This is mostly just a Kanto region thing but the prefectures that have teams for sure are Tokyo (duh), Kanagawa, Chiba, Saitama... and there might be one more but I dont remember. In any case I'm looking forward to that.

When we arrived at Current, it was a Metal Event night and as you might expect the place was packed with the usual metal event crowd! Antti and a huge table of various Finnish people were there too. Among them was one of the usual finish crew guys. Hes this big huge friendly dude who always goes nuts when they played Lordi songs LOL! He ALWAYS brings snus, so from here on out he will be refered to as The Snus Guy! In addion, a friend of Honnou's was there. Hes another American who just recently arrived in Japan to study here named Nick. He doesnt play games really, but hes a big metal head and we had lots of good talks about metal, he has really good taste in music. I also talked with MekeMeke a bit and he was having a great time drinking with us. Hes not really into metal, he actually is into Jazz. I told him thats cool since I can dig some Jazz. I asked him what he does and he said he does research work for video games. He said, for example, that he does stuff like test out games like pacman on various speed settings and has to find out which speed is the most enjoyable for players. He said he loves it so thats cool. He also said he has been playing Guilty Gear for 8 fucking years! On top of that, he says that for the entire 8 years, he has ALWAYS been a Testament player! This dude gets tons of respect from me. Sure, he plays a top tier character, but he stuck with his character the entire 8 years despite that in some version of the game, Testament wasnt exactly that great, and hes a really good player.

At one point when I was waiting in line for the bathroom, this super hot chick who was dressed kinda ....provocative... said hi to me and asked if I remembered her. I said I did but I didnt remember her name. Turns out it was Benni, a girl whos been there from time to time before who works at an S&M bar or something like that. She totally changed her hair which is why she looked familiar but I didnt put my finger on who it was. She was with this other Japanese chick and these 2 European guys. One looked like a host, and one looked like some crazy chick with his clothes all hanging off. I swear I thought it was a chick when he walked in haha! She introduced me to the girly lookin dude breifly since he was like standing right there but he didnt seem very friendly lol.

Throughout the night, the Finnish group just kept buying pitcher after pitcher and giving out snus after snus and we all got super fucked up. Matt and I bought a pitcher too. Theres this 35 year old chick who always rolls with the Metal Event crew. I forgot her name, but she was super wasted and Matt was trying to get her to go home with him. I was talking with her for a bit and she was saying how I should start DJing at the metal events too! I said that would be awsome. She brought me outside to where one of the main DJs was chillin and talked to him about it. He said he would be cool with it but that I would have to ask Sushi. So I guess maybe I will do that sometime in the future since Sushi wasnt there that night. As I was sitting outside, the weird girly European dude walked passed us towards the stairs to leave. I asked him if he was leaving but either he didnt hear me or he ignored me cuz he didnt say anything. Shortly after, Benni and the rest of her crew exited and she said goodbye to me.

Matt and I planned to go to PSY again for more late night (early morning) drinking, and Nick, Antti, Elisha, and a few of the Finnish people wanted to come as well. MekeMeke had to get up early so he left and Honnou went home too. I told Masami on our way out that we were going and he said he would meet us there after he was done closing up the bar.

When we all got to PSY it was completely empty, but since we had a pretty big group of people it worked out great since its a really small bar anyway. The dude bar tending is awsome and pretty much just played every single request we had so we just chose the entire setlist of music they played there the entire time we were there pretty much. Masami showed up eventually. One of the very last songs of the night was chosen by the bar tender and it was Megadeth - A Toute Le Monde (original version). Pretty much everyone in the bar was singing along drunkenly (except Matt cuz hes a metal newbie :P) and it was pretty awsome. After it was over it was time to go.

After leaving, we went to McDonalds for some drunken McDonalds breakfast food. When I ordered my food they said it would be a few minutes on my McGriddle so they said to just go upstairs and they would bring it to me. After I ate my hashbrown and Matt long finished his whole meal, I went down there to check out what was up. The guy was like, oh were bringing it to you now, please go upstairs. I go upstairs, Matt and I keep talking... and its like now maybe 15 fucking minutes later and the guy still hasnt come yet. Matt went down to check what was going on and the fuckers completely forgot about me! WTF!? Im never going to that shitty McDonalds again. Thats the same one I felt sick from eating at once. They didnt even apolagize on my way out. Anyway, I stayed at Matt's again.

We woke up and got some Indian food and then decided to go hit up TRF for some Gear. They had 2 AC cabs going and a fair amount of comp was there. I guess this is like the weekend of Testament beastings cuz ANOTHER default color Testament player was there streaking it up. For a while no one could beat him though I kept losing by like a pixel every round. Eventually ANOTHER Testament player showed up and picked the red color. He beat this guy in a close mirror match and then I, in turn, beat him. I was mostly beating everyone else there, losing here and there but getting small win streak every time. When 6:00 rolled around we decided to go back to Matt's to have a little jam session. We pretty much just messed around playing Black Dog by Led Zeppelin and fucked around with a couple other various tunes. Matt seems to be pretty decent at guitar but he was having trouble figuring out how to play this one part for a while. He eventually got it down. We didnt actually have the song with us since Matt has no internet so it was kinda hard for him to hear exactly how it goes. In any case, we will jam again sometime. I left my bass there.

At around a little after 8:00 I headed out to go home. When I got to Akabane to change trains, I missed the train I always take like by 5 seconds as it just started pulling away as it got up the stairs. This meant I had to take a limited express train which costs an extra 900 yen. Kinda sucks but not the end of the world. I eventually made it home just fine.

Next weekend is not only a 3 days weekend, but its TOKYO GAMESHOW weekend! You bet your asses I will be hitting that shit up to try out more BlazBlue among other various awsome shit they will have there. In addition to that, long time US Guilty Gear player Jason Kim (aka kr, J1n, dotq, whateverthefuckelseheusedtocallhimself) will be visiting Japan for a week starting next weekend! We will certainly be having some drunken adventures and epic games!