Super Smash Bros. - The Smash Debate

So you may or may not already know but the whole concept for EGP spawned from a Super Smash Bros. Melee tournament amongst friends.  I’m very partial to this game and it’s one of my all time favorites.  That being said I was very excited for the release of Brawl on the Wii.  So excited in fact that I made my wife endure the awkward stares from fellow gamers and wait in line outside a Game Stop for the midnight release while I was at work.  First impressions were very positive but to me it just wasn’t Melee.  I don’t want to say I was disappointed because it’s a great game and a worthy successor but I knew it was missing something.  Enter Brawl Plus.        

What is Brawl+?  BP is a project spearheaded by the hardcore Super Smash Bros. community with the intent to make Brawl a deeper, more balanced competitive fighter. BP is essentially a "patch" developed within this community to offer enhanced gameplay with features ranging from the removal of random tripping to the addition of more hitstun and new character balance.  BP is literally made by fanatical SSB fans for fanatical SSB fans.  Speaking as a person who puts Melee in his top 5, I love BP.     

So why play Brawl+ in a tournament instead of Melee or original Brawl?  BP is the newest most balanced version in the Super Smash Bros. series making it perfect for tournament play.  It allows players of any game in the SSB trilogy to both enjoy and be viable with any character.  Whether you played the original on N64, got in during Melee or haven’t even heard of either one of those BP makes for very fair and competitive matches.

Is using Brawl+ safe?  Brawl+ codes are run through modifications of data in Brawl’s RAM in combination with files from the game it self. Through this method it is IMPOSSIBLE to damage your Wii playing/booting BP.

So hopefully at this point you’re asking yourself what you need to get starting on BP.  In my experience the simplest, safest and legal way to run BP is from an SD card.  This means you DO NOT have to hack your Wii and there is NO possibility of breaking anything.  This also implies that you have purchased/rented an actual copy of Brawl.  Here’s what you need to get started:

Requirements and Installation: 

1. A Wii (obviously). 

2. A physical copy of the Super Smash Bros. Brawl game disc.

3. An SD, Mini-SD or Micro-SD card with respectable adapters (the Wii takes a standard SD).  The current file set for BP is about 750MB so that would be your minimum capacity.  The maximum size SD card that BP can load from is 2 GB so I finally had a good reason to pull one of those 1GB Micro-SD cards out of that pile of old cell phones in my closet.     

4. An SD card reader for your computer.
5. Downloaded Brawl+ source codes.  Click here to download the file.

Run the installation file that you just downloaded and install them on your SD card.  While the files are installing go to your Wii and fire up your copy of Brawl.  Go to the “Vault” then “Stage Builder” and delete ALL the custom stages there or BP will not load.  If you made some stages that you really want to keep I suggest copying them to another SD card.  After you have deleted all those stages go back to the main menu.  Now the installation of the BP source files on your SD card should be complete.  Remove your SD card from your computer and insert it into your Wii.  Go back to the “Vault” and “Stage Builder”.  If you have done everything right this should take you to the “Gecko OS” screen.  Click “load game”.  BP should now load and shenanigans ensue.  

I obviously have an affinity to the SSB series, Melee in particular, and these are the tournaments I probably get the most excited about.  Now that we’re at the Frank & Son Collectible Show every Wednesday night it’s given me lots of opportunities to play and converse with many other SSB fans.  It was these conversations and Smash sessions that motivated me to write this article and both explain and promote Super Smash Bros. Brawl+.  If you're still not sure about BP we'll be playing casual matches every Wednesday at F&S so stop by the EGP setup, jump in a match and check it out for yourself. 

Visit http://smashmods.com for in depth details on Brawl+ and a complete list of specific adjustments to characters and gameplay.

Gamer Chronicles – Blacks Ops Post Tournament

What an exciting tournament!  The competition was intense which made for a very entertaining day.  As the event went on we drew in a great crowd and by the final match everyone was cheering for their favorites!

In the first round we were able to take the top 3 competitors from each bracket.  It was a great test of overall skill with some matches having a clear leader from the start and others with players fighting for those top three spots until the very last second.  My favorite killcam of the tournament came from this round when competitor John Capitulo finished his match with a beautiful tomahawk kill for the win performed ON COMMAND by another competitor!  Some of the most entertaining matches came from competitors Paul Enriquez and Derek Cota with their emotional cries of “HiiiYahhh!!” and “Not up in here!!”.  It was great to see some really young kids out there dominating the competition.  They’re the next generation of gamers and they brought it home in the end with two of the youngest players placing second and third.  Even the boys from Nerd Reactor showed up in force and put their title of “nerd” on the line.  Check out their post tournament write-up and photos here "Nerd Reactor - Black Ops gallery".  We whittled it down to the final six consisting of Lance Gabriel, Mike Meyer, Fabien Munoz, Julian Rosas, Paul Faraon and T.J. Onias.  For the final match we upped the ante from 25 kills and 8 minutes to 30 kills and 10 minutes.  It was an intense battle with the top spots flip-flopping amongst competitors even down to the last second.  In the end T.J. took first by only 2 kills with Julian in 2^nd and Paul in 3^rd.  These guys took home over $500 in sweet gaming gear courtesy of Mad Catz Inc. 

While winning is the ultimate goal that’s not what it’s really all about.  It’s about finding about how far your skills will take you when gaming is played the way it’s meant to be played; under the pressure of heads up competition.  I really want to encourage people to sign up even if you don’t think you can take first place.  You never know what can happen and you may surprise yourself.  Time after time I seep the favorites get knocked out in the first round while the underdogs make it all the way.  One of our competitors, Mike Meyer, is a prime example of this.  After speaking with him I found out that he drove all the way out from Mission Viejo expecting to be eliminated in the first round.  He actually wound up making it all the way to the finals!  Although he didn’t go home with a prize he definitely went home with a great story that he can brag about and the confidence to know that he was one of the best.     

Tournaments are only as good as the people that show up and this one was exceptional.  I really want to thank everyone who made it out and if you didn’t then don’t miss the next one.  Visit our website for photos and tournament results: Epic Gamer Productions

Gamer Chronicles: Black Ops the Beginning

Frank & Son Collectible Show

So what do you do when you hate your job and you’d rather be home playing Xbox?  You quit.  Then you go and fill up your Chevy Silverado with as many flat screen TVs and Playstation 3 consoles that it’ll hold and call it being self-employed.  Or at least that’s what I did.  Fortunately for me in the whole process I had the opportunity to meet Frank of the “Frank & Son Collectible Show” who was interested in the idea of hosting a video game tournament at his venue.   If you’ve never been to the Frank & Son Collectible Show in City of Industry, CA you need to put it on your list of things to do before you die.  I’ve been going there since I was a kid and it still blows my mind.  It’s like a mini Comic-Con every Saturday.  So Frank gave me a date of Feb. 12^th and it was on.  With this new opportunity opened up to me I knew the tournament had to be epic.  The first game that came to mind was Call of Duty: Black Ops.  Hate it or love it, it holds record launch sales and the five day sales crown at $650 million.  That’s $100 million more than its predecessor Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.  I’m just saying it’s popular.  I have to say personally I really enjoy this game.  I absolutely loved MW2 and played it for hundreds of hours but I certainly don’t miss those one-man-army noob-toobers.

COD: MW2 Tournament

     Now let’s talk tournament.  I originally intended to compete in wager match mode.  The great thing about wager matches (besides being crazy fun) is that they’re unique to the game and they really even the playing field by eliminating perks, killstreaks and other variables like attachments and equipment.  They even trim the maps to make the games more action packed.  Unfortunately this mode is not available in private match and the venue does not have internet.  Even if it did I doubt it would have the capability to efficiently run 6 consoles online with no lag.  Sadly this ruled out the wager match as an option for the tournament.  A note to Activision and Treyarch; make wager matches available in private match and lan!  They don’t have to be for CoD points so no one can boost.  I’ve found a lot of people requesting the same thing on forums so I think it would make the community happy.  So, a local lan connection was the only other option.   With this setup the important thing was to strip the game down enough to make winning all about pure skill but retain enough to still make it unique to Black Ops.  After weeks of gathering other gamers’ opinions, trying out different modes and using my past experience holding tournaments we finally came up with a solid rule set.  I’m confident that kills and wins will come by skill and everyone will walk away knowing that they either outplayed or got outplayed by their opponents. 
     I’m excited and honored for the opportunity to hold this tournament at the Frank & Son Collectible Show.  I hope we show up in masses and represent the strength and amiability of the gamer community.  2011 is the year of the gamer!    

Links:
Epic Gamer Productions Website
Epic Gamer Productions Forum
Epic Gamer Productions Facebook
Frank & Son Collectible Show