One competitor’s view from one of the world’s biggest fighting-game tournaments

I felt like death.

It’s 9 a.m. in Sacramento, Calif., and it was way too early to be awake. I kept my eyes closed to the sun to keep my memories of sleep intact. My first night of the Northern California Regionals (NCR), one of the biggest fighting game tournaments in the country, was chock full of activity. In addition to driving up to Sacramento, I met up with friends from around the world and ate with whomever was available. With only four hours of sleep, the Starbucks drink in my hand was the most important thing in the world. I came here to compete, but I also wanted to find out what the tournament favorites had to say about preparation, mental mindsets, and the entire fighting game community’s growth.

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For fighting gamers, the most overlooked activity during tournament time is sleep — even for amateurs like myself, you never have enough for proper rest. The list of activities to do at a major tournament after the daytime activities may look like this:

• Playing matches for stakes.
• Exploring the venue or the city around it.
• Finding food or a bar.
• Playing casuals or practicing for the upcoming matches.
• Sleep?

NCR is a California, and fighting game, tradition. It started in 2001 at the Sunnyvale Golfland arcade with 64 combatants. Fast-forward to this year’s version in Sacramento — the player pool has ballooned to over 650 competitors, local and international players.

Major tournaments are hosted in ballrooms, instead of arcades, with a schedule that covers the entire weekend (Friday to Sunday). Many of the long-established majors are a part of the Capcom Pro Tour (CPT), a tournament season that would eventually lead to a final playoff between 16 qualified fighting game players for a prize pool of $500,000, the largest ever for fighting games.

Getting started

A line of arcade fight stick-carrying players draped the entrance of the ballroom labeled “NorCal Regionals, Kineda.” This year’s NCR was at a Hilton in the middle of downtown Sacramento. I could hear a dull roar of cheers from behind the opened doors of the ballroom as people registered and received their armband for entry.

To the left of the ballroom, organizers stationed more than 20 monitors for “pool” play (the group stage that sets up the final bracket for any given tournament). Toward the right of the room was a large projector that showed off the “stream” matches selected by the tournament pool organizers. In the middle of the ballroom were three booth vendors that sold products such as fightsticks, bead sprites, and parts. Despite the large amount of games played (a total of five main events), the featured tournament was Ultra Street Fighter 4 — it’s also the only fighting game I participated in that weekend.

USF4 was the featured game because the CPT was for just that particular game. You could only earn the prize pool, prestige, and honor of being the best street fighter by performing well in the Capcom’s biggest game.

Into the minds of the best

Last year’s NCR champion was Team Evil Geniuses’ Eduardo “PR Rog” Perez-Frangie. He’s one of the best players in the United States, and boasts one of the best, if not the best, Balrogs (a boxer character) in USF4. He’s known not only for his exciting and aggressive play but also for a fundamentally strong ground and neutral game (his spacing of “pokes” and normal moves are on par with the best in the world).

As PR Rog sat down at the register’s table, he cracked a smile and joked with the tournament staffers. He showed no notable nerves or unease in his grin this morning, a good sign for the defending champion.

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“I’ve been practicing in a different way,” Perez-Frangie told me. “I spend most of my time studying. In the long-term, it will benefit me more. I don’t think I have additional pressure [as the defending champion], it’s a different game and a learning process.”

When PR Rog won the NCR last year, the version of Street Fighter was different — it used the “Arcade Edition: 2012.” Now, it’s on USF4 and the competition featured several more international players than years’ past. He mentioned that the tournament was a learning process simply because it was early in the fighting game season and despite wanting to repeat, the player pool for this year’s NCR would be stronger than ever.

“A lot of players are better now — newcomers and aggressive players are stronger,” Perez-Frangie said. “The Japanese players are practicing more than anyone. It will be a wake-up call to everyone.”

Right on cue, I found one of the favorites to win the entire tournament, Ryota “Kazunoko” Inoue. He had finished with his match on stream in decisive fashion, and with the help of my translator friend, he explained to me why the Japanese are traveling en masse this year.

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“Before the announcement of the CPT, you had to get top-3 for a prize. Since the announcement of more money, there is less pressure to always do well, so Japanese players will compete more often than before,” Inoue said. “Because of the number of tournaments, I won’t be satisfied even if I win.”

His words implied that the threat of international players will continue. Kazunoko posed as one of the biggest contenders for the tournament’s top place. He’s one of the most aggressive players in the world and used a character that fit the style well, Yun. He’s regarded as one of the five best players in the world.

Because of his aggressive style, he thrives in short sets of games. Players needed to adjust to his speed rather than the other way around.

“Aggression is best for a tournament, but it is just the current trend,” Inoue said. “It may be one of the better options, but players that developed a defensive and well-rounded style is the next step.”

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Just a small fish in a lake of piranhas

My pool had 16 players, and it was the last one for USF4 pool play. Every pool in the tournament was stacked with international and great local players — a guarantee that no one would emerge from their bracket without battle scars. For me, especially, I was an afterthought. Of the notable players that were in 16, my name might as well be renamed into “bye.” The tournament brackets work similar to NCAA’s March Madness, in that the top-seeded players play the lower-seeded mid-majors.

I was UC Irvine in a pool of Kentucky’s.

The end of a pool day was a vat of emotions. For every fist pound and smile, I saw five players with shrugged shoulders and slow walkers. In every bracket, only two winners emerged from the 16 participants. To be a consistent winner and contender for the main prize, it takes a special player.

I caught up with Team Evil Geniuses’ Justin “JWong” Wong after the first day wrapped up.

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“I’m so used to the tournament scene — it’s a walk in the park for me,” Wong told me. “I could be physically tired, but I’ll never be cold. I just go into it — I don’t eat during tournaments, so I stay hungry.”

Wong is a veteran of the fighting game community. A prominent player since 2003, Wong is a winner of countless fighting game tournaments and major events, and it’s no wonder his nerves in regard to the tournament grind were non-existent. He entered his first tournament ever without knowing it was a competition; he tries to enter every single match and tournament with the same mentality.

While Wong was considered the favorite to win in another game during NCR (Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3), his focus was solely on the main game during the weekend, USF4. If a non-international player was to win NCR, Wong would be amongst the favorites to do it.

He just understood what was necessary to win a major event like NCR. Despite being an underdog to the international players, his approach to learning and adapting was positive.

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“The competition is better, more players from Asia are traveling,” Wong said. “But that also means more opportunity and information for the players in the USA. It will help in the long run.”

Both PR Rog and JWong believe the long run was the key. The old adage of “it’s a marathon, not a sprint” was the message that both preached. And it’s true. With more international players traveling because of the increased pay and prize pools in the fighting game community, every tournament must be seen as a learning experience regardless of the results.

I stood in line at the crowded Starbucks on day two with my lucky Dr. Dre “The Chronic” T-shirt. It’s been a tournament staple of mine to wear it before my matches began — something about superstition and how the shirt looks on me, but also because I wore it during my first wins as a competitor. As my friend’s conversation floated by my ears, I slapped myself awake in anticipation for my turn to play.

Day two, my 15 minutes

I walked through the crowded tables that hosted four monitors each, the sound of buttons providing the soundtrack for my trance. There were drooping eyes and head nods abound with each passing station; players hoping to get some last-minute practice before their 15 minutes of fame. I camouflaged nicely as I took a seat next to a player affectionately named, Buddy. My fingers gracefully tapped each button as my mind registered my next move, my character moving with my thoughts. I needed to be sharp in as quick of time as possible.

Then 4 p.m. struck, and my pool was in its infancy. A long roll call gathered the players of my bracket together. We waited to see who would be the first victims of the last pool. “Tim, your match is on stream,” Carolyn Dao, the pool organizer, called out to me.

I walked up the steps to the main stage with my friend and first round opponent, Brian “BJ Unchained” Jeon next to me. We were schoolmates, friends, and playing partners for over six years, so this was a match and rivalry that lasted longer than the minutes of our stream match. He was one of the better players in the Northern California region, and I was the afterthought. And the match would play out like it. Not even six minutes in, it was over, and I looked over the prospect of playing every match in the loser’s bracket.

Not the greatest of thoughts.

I took my seat at one of the open stations for my next round and continued sitting until I played three opponents in a row. With each name Dao called out, I took a breath and closed my eyes. My stick plugged in, my feet slightly raised, and my back leaning forward at the monitor. All other noise around the venue were muted. The competitor’s high after a victory is an addicting feel.

Finally, Dao called out my hardest challenge, and a player that I was very familiar with would be my next opponent for the loser’s quarterfinals of my pool. He was one of the best my region had to offer, and there would be no excuses for poor play here. He took his seat and checked his character off the select screen as I did the same.

We entered the stage together and he blitzed me. My character spun in my opponent’s every direction until I blinked and the round was over. A quick breath and the heartbeat steadied — I would not go out in a flash. One series, two, and then three and the first game showed off my character’s victory pose. I was the afterthought, this shouldn’t be happening.

He made the quick adjustment, but I stood in the way again. A long drawn-out second game with exchanging blows ended in his favor, and we stood at the dreaded doors of the final decisive game. The crowd behind was quiet, my friend supporting me said no words as I snapped the rematch option. One wrong decision and he took it a quick fashion, a 2-1 victory for the favorite. No Cinderella stories here. With a smile, he shook my hand and took a deep breath — his tournament would continue where mine ended.

In order to have the correct mindset to winning a major tournament like NCR, players need an effective playstyle, nerves of steel, and a strong mental game. Despite the explosion of new players and aggressive play, it will be solid and defensive styles that reign supreme in the end. As alluded by Kazunoko before, aggression is a trend that works with short sets in tournament play, but longevity isn’t measured by one victory.

“A lot of players do not hold their ground — having great defense in this game is difficult,” Wong said. “This is the hardest game to play defense. But, solid play will win in the end.”

In the end, solid play did finish first as the most successful Street Fighter player of all-time, Team MadCatz’s Daigo Umehara won NCR. The fighting game community will always have its ups-and-downs and storylines, but it’s refreshing to see when consistency wins out. Umehara, who I didn’t talk to, was the sleepy favorite to take the entire tournament and he did so in decisive fashion.

Score one for the fundamentals.