My life, as it were.

So here I am, 4 a fucken clock in the morning, doing nothing but staring at my moniter. I just spent a good 2 hours watching SF4 vids. Before that? Well, playing Brutal Legend for awhile (more on that later) but before THAT, played SF4. My days seem pretty linear. Go to class, come home, play SF4, go back to class, come home, play SF4, my brother comes home, play something else, sleep. Wake up and rinse, lather, repeat.

The only days this changes is if I have a test, or homework, in which case that takes place in either sleep time or the time inbetween classes that I play SF4. Other then that, nothing changes until the weekend.

My weekends are one of the two.

Wake up, get to bus station, sleep on bus, see gf for 4 days and what ever happens happens. I also get laid every night during this time.

Or, I wake up and play SF4 until hunger sets in at which case I play SF4 while eating.

This game has consumed me. And I blame Kyle/Jason. Lets explain why for both.

Way back when school was ending and we all just hung out for shits and giggles, one day we all went to Chilli's to see our good ole pal Chase. But whats this? Chase has something giddy to share with us (jason). A new installation to a game I haven't heard about since my days of waiting for my turn to use the Playstation is coming out. Street Fighter? Do I remember it? Oh yes, of course I do. I remember trying frantically to do a god damned fireball while my brother danced around me sending me sky high or dropping me to the floor. Fuckers. Why would I expect this one to be any different?

So the game comes out and on basically a daily basis we go over to Jason's to play. The memorys of me and kyle going at it while fucken awesome music in the background portrays the seriousness of our battles still run frantically through my mind, a memory that is just as fond as those of me hoping to get the next piece of tier 1, or me racing along with thousands of others to hit 70 first. The learning curb was.... steep. I remember when me kyle and jason went to the tournament at Game Crazy only to have our asses handed to us by someone who could actually execute the fucken moves. I remember figuring out that if I just parried kyle's fucking punch thing, I could ultra his ass and get him off my nuts. I remember when kyle learned he could combo into his ultra, so I couldn't stay near him. And I remember when everyone finally had moves down. Now it was a matter of set ups and combos. Fighting kyle just made me.... so angry. And yet, it gave me a high. Every time I lost I checked what I did, learned not to jump in, learned what moves he spammed. Every time I won I made sure not to play the same way, just incase he was doing what I was. It felt so great. I can still see that look on his face..... I just wanted to beat him, and for him to KNOW i beat him.

I think the first time I decided this was my new addiction was the fateful day we just happened to end up at Planet Zero. After so long of scoffing at the idea of an arcade stick, when Kyle and Jason kept clammering of how GODLIKE it was, I finally had it in my hands. And it was so natural. It just.... felt good. Sure, my reaction was a bit sloppy, and every now and then instead of shoryu I would hado, but either way I had much more control over what I did, and this felt great. I then made it my mission to get one of these things. Fuck, I even got a job to get one of these things (though it was really only part of the reason I got a job.)

Once again, I hit the training stage, and set off to remaster every move I had down. But something happened along the way. I learned low medium kick comboed into hado. I learned shoryu as anti air could hit twice. I learned spamming shoryu was NOT an effective way of winning a match. And cross overs made more sense. Some of this stuff I already had down, but not to the point of reflex. I had to think about it before I did it, and the stuff that WAS reflex was all bad habits, probably gained from shooters.

A few months later and I was finally feeling confident. I was winning the champ mode constantly, and I went to bed that night just feeling like I could take on Daigo himself. But when I awoke, something weird had happened. The night before I gained the title of g2B, something not any mortal man could do. But along with it came the chance of fighting more g2B and ups. And I started losing. How could I, me, possibly be losing this much. At first I was frustrated, but while I was supposed to be doing my news cast, I found myself discussing the game with others and watching videos of better people. Seeing what they could do was enticing, so I picked up the game again only to despair in my inability to even do the correct moves. It was like I just couldnt play. So, I picked up the 360 controller and started all over again. With the controller in hand, I won 4 champs in a row nonstop. What happened? I switched to stick again and could not win. I slowly transitioned myself to win a champ with controller to keep my spirits up, then use stick to not lose those timings. And within a week I hit g2A.

Once I hit G2 A I was feeling great again, but the slump hit me once more. But around that time, the Bar Fights round 2 were happening, and I could finally watch pro ken players in action, something that was just not seen since SF4 came out. I watched and then learned there combos, something that took so much fucken patience. Even now I botch them from time to time, and I'm attempting to learn to lengthen them slowly, when I'm feeling daring or when I know I'm going to lose. I'll just try and pull them out of my ass. And you know what's funny? Sometimes they work and win the match. Its awesome, that feeling of losing and then pulling something from nowhere only to have it save you. Once that happens, you feel like you can do it at anytime.

There are times when I have what I call "the zone", and I assume its what pros just have constantly. The ability to just read your player, know what they're going to do, take huge risks knowing you have a great chance of coming out on top with it, or just having a good idea of what's going to happen, so you prep mentally for it. At these times it's as if I'm seeing every frame by frame of the game, as if it has stopped completely. I can see blanka starting up his beast roll, or balrog beginning his dashes. I can tell if Ryu is throwing a fireball or tatsuing from the second I see his player make him crouch from not putting in the input fast enough. At other times I'm just playing by memory and act like a fucken tard. I'll just keep jumping in when it obviously doesn't work. I'll try the same combo and get punished horribly for it. Or, a horrible habit from Jason, really just want to end it flashy.

Week after week I can just see myself improve. I can look back and remember when I learned j.mk, c.mk, srk. And then, from that, I learned j.mk, jab, jab, srk. From that, j.mk, c.lk, jab, srk as a mix up incase they dont block low. Or even if the two jabs miss most of the time I can c.mk into a tatsu or hado.

When I'm on point I can string these things together. For ken its all about getting in close. The only reason I hate not having a working 360 is that I can't play SF4 once I wake up, or into the dead of night. But perhaps this is a good thing. I would still be playing right now, even though I have a test tomorrow.

Last weekend chels was telling me how she was going to have alot of homework, so I was going to have to find something to do while she did that. So, she said "Why not bring Street Fighter and hook it up in the lobby, that way people can see you play and come challenge you." See, this is why I love this girl. She has great ideas and she knows what I like. So thats what I did, took my fightstick and my game and while she did homework by my side, I kicked some random people's ass. I did not lose, people. Wish I had a camera to record that shit. Did. Not. Lose. Only one guy I faced actually had the game, and he was fun to fight if only because he blocked cross ups and forced me to mix up my game. Every time I won, I kissed chels for good measure, and played the next guy. There were 6 guys in all, one tekken player who thought for SURE he could beat me (he got one round on me), the other SF guy who also thought for sure he could beat me (Also got a round on me) someone who had a SF2 emu so he thought he was cool (only one I never got a perfect on) and 3 other guys who just loved playing it. Every single one said they were going to buy it and that "in a few weeks we're going to have a rematch". And to be honest? I can't wait. Just talking in between matches about strategys, showing them how to FADC out of projectiles, telling them of the whole Street Fighter scene thats out there that I want to be in. It was so fun. A few other guys who just looked on while they played magic (there was an entire group of people behind us playing magic) would also just yell with excitement when some kind of turn around happen. I'm sure a few of them will also buy the game.

I titled this blogg post "my life, as it were" and I really was going to talk about my life as it is right now. And in a sense, I think I kind of did. Me and chels are doing great, so there is nothing to talk about there. I see her every other weekend, twice in a row this weekend, and I love seeing her and love being with her. But when I'm not with her or with my studies, I'm with street fighter.

Jason introduced me into this competitive world when we saw "I Got Next". Even before that when the guy from CAD linked "Evo moment number 34", the moment I decided to buy SF4. Kyle showed me just how fun it is to have a rival, someone to just go at it with. And this game gave me what I have wanted for so long now. A good one v one competition. When Brawl came out I went with Matt to a melee tournament, and I remember how stressful, and fun it was. When we saw rich win it all, the high was just so great. A few months later at school during the Brawl tournament, I was horribly pissed that I lost, but all I wanted to do was practice and face that fucker again. Second was great and all and its something I can tell people, but first is first. I've always thought of games as the last true honorable form of 1v1 competition, and no other game has given me any substance behind that until this one. Not Smash, not Halo, not COD, the only thing that came close was, funnily enough, Tetris. I've always been really competitive, and this game has also.

Do I want to compete in tournaments? Yes. Do I hope to be the best? Not really. I just want to play. This game is so damned fun, and so much also are the interactions with people behind the matches, in between the rounds, after the whole thing is over with. I just want to go in and have some fun, get better while getting beat. Every now and then I find myself calling someone else cheap and I just have to stop, but down the controller, and go do something else. I then come back remembering why it is I do this. To have fun.

A dying art.

Seems like blogging is dying amongst our group of friends. Perhaps thats for the best. It was really just a way for everyone to make the crude jokes that they could have easily made through any other form of media.

Right now I'm at a crossroad. See, even now while I'm in college, I don't know "what I want to be when I grow up." All I know is that I want to go live with Chels. Sounds simple enough, right? But from the start, I knew I wanted to write. Just recently I've realized that, doing that in another town with out my parents is going to be not only difficult, but down right hard. If I'm going to write, we've already taken out the option of me going to the same school as Chelsea, because they have no programs for it there.

However....

Lately I've been looking at myself and what I've been doing. Every time I set out to do an assignment about halfway through I look around, and decide to blow some steam through some video games. I decided a long time ago, way back in Freshman year, that I would never try to go into game design on the count of that it's just way too cliche. A game nerd going for a game degree? But even in the midst of me having no money, going to college, whisking myself away every two weeks and attempting to have a social life, I still find/make times to set aside and just play games. And I don't mean my recent Street Fighter addiction, either. My brother moved the PS2 back in his room so I've been playing some classics. With the emulater I got, I've been playing SMRPG and I'm finally getting around to beating Chrono Trigger.

My point to that small rant was, not even a month ago I was talking about how I was feeling less and less like a gamer and more and more like someone who just really likes games (aka: Apple). But during my highest time of "stress" (It's not really stress since I have everything under control. Sort of....) I rely on games even more.

The next point to my rant is this. I've been browsing the internets, reading interviews and just looking at the stories of games. I've always said, if I can write a story and it just happens to end up into a game, great. But now I've realized that I can't do that if I don't have any game developing experience. And games offer a way into the media that movies, books, and television never will. I've been trying to convince myself to go into game design, but at the same time I wonder if my own motives are off. Do I actually want to go into game design, or am I just doing that so I can have an excuse to go to the same college as my girlfriend. Or am I just taking the easy way out of a profession that could be potentially difficult.

I'm sort of lost, battling myself. I think my one fear is that I'll get through 2 years of college, see what it is I'm doing and realize I don't want to do that and I'll look back and see what a stupid decision I've made. On the other side of that I don't want to look back when I have no real career and see the huge possibility presented to myself that I passed up cause I was confused.

Would it be too cliche for someone who has always avidly loved video games to suddenly start making them? Or would it really be better if I tried to go for a career in a dying industry that barely pays well, just to do what I love? Or even think I love? I don't know.....