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So as we gear up for the tournament in just a few days here lets take a look towards some storylines for SuperCon.

1. Mew2King vs. DEHF

With Mew2King coming off his first Brawl tournament in pretty much forever without a 1st place finish to show for it will he bounce back with a win? And what about the man himself, DEHF, he not only beat M2K at Apex but went on to win the tournament. Can he defend his title and post back to back wins heading into MLG Raleigh?

2. Ally

While 99% of smashers would be thrilled with a 5th place finish, AiB celebirty Ally is not one of those. Its a finish below his normal standards and this is a guy who takes loses pretty hard. Will he bring it back with a force in Colorado?

3. How will the bonus money for using only mid tier characters down impact the tournament?

There has never been a smash tournament that has put bonus money into the pot trying to throw the mid tiers down a bone. Taking the players that rocked the characters that were not at the peak of the tier list and tried to reward them for their efforts. But how will it impact things? Might you see Ally playing Falcon or other top players use this as an occasion to break out their lower tiered characters? Will the old guard of tried and true real lower tier mains represent and have one of their own take down the bonus? I know Hug's samus will have his eye on the prize for Melee, but with other strong players playing characters like Gannon and Luigi we will see if he can. And Axe certainly has his eye on it for Brawl. How will it all go down? Only time will tell.

*For the Record you may switch within this group, but if at any time in singles you use a character not on this list you become ineligible.*

Melee

Middle
Samus, Dr. Mario, Ganondorf, Luigi, Donkey Kong, Mario

Low
Link, Pikachu, Young Link, Roy, Zelda, Game and Watch

Bottom
Ness, Yoshi, Bowser, Mewtwo, Kirby, Pichu

 

Brawl

Middle

Pit, Toon Link, ZSS, Kirby, ROB, DK, Peach, Fox, Luigi, Wolf, Sheik, Pokemon Trainer, Sonic, Ness, Bowser

Low

Lucas, Ike, Yoshi, Mario, Falcon, Samus, Jigglypuff, Zelda, Link, Gannon

 

4. What is the Melee Tournament going to look like and how is the evolution of the metagame going to be on display?

Last, but certainly not least, is Melee. Its incredibly interesting to see the Melee scene and metagame continue to evolve and progress this far into the games life cycle. And especially coming off a massive tournament the week before where I am sure everyone got loads of smash in, how will this be on display at Supercon? Will big names represent? Will it impact character choices? Will we see some progression in play styles?

 

Its all going down in Denver Colorado August 13th-14th, with the AiB BBQ/Pool hang-out on Sunday the 15th.

Camaman interviews Hugs, Socal's best R.O.B. main.

Just read it. You know you want to.

Continue reading Interview with HugS!

You may have already heard this if you keep up with general gaming news via Joystiq or Kotaku. Bear with me if so.

It was announced today that 1UP.com and affiliated entities (EGM magazine, Gamevideos.com, and a few others) has been sold to the Hearst Corporation by their former owner, Ziff Davis Publishing. Not a huge deal; it happens all the time and business and you can't blame companies for trying to do everything they can to maintain profits in a sour economy. What sucks, however, is all the good people being laid off in the acquisition, including a few friends of All is Brawl.

I'm specifically talking about Matt Chandronait, producer of the 1UP Show, and Ryan Scott, editor of Games for Windows magazine. It was Matt's decision to do a 1UP Show segment about Brawl and bring in members of the community to talk competitive Smash with the show hosts; at the suggestion of show member Richard Li (whose fate is unknown), Matt and his team asked myself, Gimpyfish, and HugS to join them in San Francisco to film a 10 minute segment on what it means to be a competitive Smasher. The show went up the Friday after Brawl's release and was one of the few/only positive representations the competitive community has ever had in popular media. So we as a community owe a lot to Matt, Ryan (a big contributer to the 1UP Show and "star" of the Brawl segment), and their team for the exposure they brought to the community and their generosity in hosting us.

We as a website are additionally indebted to the show because it was our mention during the show -- "What's the new website? Allisbrawl.com?" -- that first brought many of our users to the site. We got thousands upon thousands of hits, and over 600 new members specifically mentioned the 1UP show as the reason they were joining. That kind of publicity is invaluable to a young site, and it's safe to say the AiB wouldn't be the same without that early boost in visibility.

So here's another "thanks" to Matt, Ryan, and the entire 1UP Show crew for that amazing video segment. Talented, intelligent people are never jobless for long, and we're sure they'll end up somewhere great soon.

The first week of Smash Trivia is over. A lot was learned from the first session held tonight at 9:00pm EST and next week there will be some changes and improvements! Here are the questions and winners from this week.

• (Q1): Who were the top 3 players in Singles at Melee FC:D in order of placements (1st-3rd)? (A): Mew2King, PC Chris, ChuDat. (Winner): Hot_ArmS
• (Q2): Approximately how many live tournaments have used the tio program for bracket management (answer within 20 tournaments)? (A): 1015-1055. (Winner): ALLSTAR41
  
• (Q3): What was the second team to ever defeat Ken and Isai in a set and at what tournament did it happen? (A): Wes and PC Chris at MLG Meadowlands (or New York) 2006. (Winner): None
• (Q4): What are the only two tournaments ChuDat defeated Ken at? (A): MLG Chicago and Super Champ Combo. (Winner): Hugs
• (Q5): How many people were at the largest Smash tournament, Axis? (A): Depending on your source, either 302 or 303 is acceptable. (Winner): Big_Black
• (Q6): Approximately how many online tournaments have been held through AiB? (A): Between 1000-1200 was accepted. (Winner): Olimarman
• (Q7): Name the first national tournament Mew2King won in singles? (A): Melee FCD. (Winner): Sean
• (Q8): When was Brawl released in the US? (A): March 9^th, 2008. (Winner): Duff
• (Q9): What move of Donkey Kong’s does not suffer from stale moves? (A): His F-Throw. (Winner): Hugs
• (Q10): Who defeated M2K at XIIesticle and what characters did they use? (A): Ninjalink with Diddy and ChuDat with Kirby. (Winner): Nintendude1189

All the winners listed here should have recieved the Smash Trivia Amatuer badge! If you for some reason did not, then please send AlphaZealot a PM to have it corrected.

Next week will be held at a different time and a different room!

For Smashers unfamiliar with the term "john," check out an explanation by HugS, Neal, and Gimpy.

My favorite quote? "No johns."

Smashers love saying "no johns." It's what we live by. When our friends cough up sissy excuses to "explain" why they got three-stocked into oblivion, we use "no johns." Its instant satisfaction and pwnage in one fell swoop.

But has "no johns" ever backfired on you? Like, you've been saying "no johns" to people left and right because they've been making sissy excuses all night, and you're pwning people left and right by telling them not to john. But then one time something slips out of your mouth along the lines of, "I lost because I'm using the Wii controller." Then you get slapped with, "No johns, you sissy." Damn.

Click continue reading for more!

Continue reading Talking about johns

HugS, Gimpyfish, and I recently visited gaming website 1UP.com's headquarteres in San Francisco to take part in their weekly video broadcast, the 1UP Show. The show's producers wanted to get opinions on Brawl from some competitive Smash players, so they contacted yours truly to round up some talent for this week's segment. We talked about the competitive scene, about tournaments, about Brawl, about Johns... you name it! We really hope the show will help introduce a lot of new players to the competitive scene and counter a lot of negative stereotypes that some players have about "serious" Smashers.

The three of us would like to thank 1UP for their generous opportunity and for their support of our community. We also encourage EVERYONE to check out 1UP more often for their video game needs; they're a fantastic company and a great source of news, reviews, videos, and community interaction about video games.

I've embedded the video after the break, so just click the "Continue" link to check it out!


Continue reading All is Brawl on the 1UP Show!