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Evolution 2002 Log
Ah yes. Evolution 2002 a.k.a. B6 came and went, and I have to say it was an incredible event. I don’t want to forget this, so I’ll give a rundown of my trip in L.A.
Thursday (8/08/02)
Getting to L.A.
So the trip starts with my parents taking my brother, Alex, and me to pick up Steven and Matt. We rented a pretty nice van. There was plenty of room, which was great considering how far we had to drive. After about 3 hours, we stop by a crowded In-n-Out for lunch. There were lots of people there...particularly girls. I saw a fat ass bus where they all went back to, so there must be something going on. Eh, whatever. Just something I saw.
We arrive in L.A. around 4:30. After checking into Del Capri Hotel, we get dropped off at UCLA. We find the Ackerman Union ballroom and get ready to sign-up. While in line, Sacramento players showed up. It was cool because they were also Nor Cal players, and they usually own my ass in MvC2 at Sunnyvale Golfland tournaments. It cost me $20 for the cover charge and $10 for MvC2 and $10 for CvS2. Why I enter CvS2 is still a mystery, considering I have not played it in a while.
Pre-tourney
After signing up with inkblot and Ponder and receiving our nifty nametags, we went straight to the MvC2 machines where there were lots of people playing. Everyone was warming up for Friday and Saturday. I decided to screw around with Strider/Doom/CapCom. I didn’t get many wins, but I didn’t care. I was just warming myself up. We left around 10:00 and went to Burger King. Then back at Del Capri Hotel, we tried to get some sleep, but all we could do is talk about random crap. We also messed around with Matt’s noisy bed that wouldn’t shut up. I suppose we were ecstatic about Evo...
Friday (8/09/02)
More Pre-tourney
We got up around 7:00 and got ready for the actual tourney to start. After a cheap ass "continental breakfast," we left for UCLA. It took us half an hour to walk from the hotel to UCLA. It didn't seem that long the night before, but who cares. Matt needed the exercise.
At UCLA, we started going our separate ways, finding some casual play for some quick practice. There was a Dreamcast set up for free play on a side table. The cool thing about it was that the jazzy MvC2 music was replaced with DDR and trance music. The trance obviously put Alex "in the zone" because he played on the console and got a hefty 8 win streak.
It’s time for the tourney to actually start. We had to get our bracket/match assignments. I ended up in the Green bracket for MvC2 and the Gold bracket for CvS2, meaning I had to play both games today. Steven got a tougher bracket and had to play today as well. Matt and Alex play on Saturday. Alex was thrown into the "Bracket of Death"...more on that later...
My first Evolution Matches
Well, my numbers were called, "Gold 65" and "Green 65," and I went to the front to find my opponent. After a couple minutes, I find my MvC2 opponent. He is known as FINAL SHOWDOWN on SRK, and I remembered seeing his posts online. Since the first round was best of one, I knew not to mess up. We got to the machine, and I picked my usual Storm/Cable/Cyclops team. And FINAL SHOWDOWN chooses Hayato/Sentinel/Blackheart. Now, for those who don’t know much about MvC2, Hayato is arguably one of the worst characters in the game. Plus, Sent/BH is a relatively trite duo. Basically, my team completely owns that team...in theory. The match starts, and things look fine. But I make a mistake and counter in Cyclops. It’s not a huge mistake, so I stay calm and continue playing. I get caught in Hayato’s super, and then SHOWDOWN cancels into Sentinel’s HSFx2…then Cyclops is dead. I’m now left with Cable and Storm. Although I could’ve still had the win, I became frustrated and made dumb moves. I then lose Cable. For the rest of the match, I did the best I could with just Storm. I believe I got close, but I ended up losing.
I got to talk to him a bit while in line waiting to report our results. He is a pretty cool guy. Although I’m angry at myself for playing so crappy, I give him credit for using Hayato in a huge tourney like this, and winning.
Immediately after my MvC2 match, I had to play CvS2 against Ed Ma from So Cal. I knew I had no chance of getting any wins at all. Watching my match on video, I actually did fairly well with Hibiki. But all was lost after Hibiki died. Oh well. That sends me to the losers’ bracket for MvC2 and CvS2. I’m a looooooser. Since I was waiting around for my next matches, I was a little “nervous” to go eat. See, I wasn’t exactly nervous, but more like I couldn’t stand still. To keep my CvS2 story short, I had to play Clockw0rk next. Yea, I lost. Pretty badly too. I didn’t care. I wasted 10 bucks entering a game that I sucked at. Whatever, it was Evolution.
Matches that I actually win
Now on to MvC2…I went up against a guy that looked quite familiar. We were standing in line and waiting our turn. I ended up beating him 2-0. I was losing for a bit in the 2nd round until I did a AHVB x 4 on his CapCom assist. I guess I was calmer, since I was reassured that the match was 2 out of 3 games. Later, I found out this guy was also from San Jose. It sucked that I had to play someone from the same division, let alone from the same city. Hmph. Oh well, I won and on to the next round I go.
I played a SoCal player named AZER next. He played Doom/Storm/Sentinel, which to me is a "one-hit-kill" team. Fortunately, that’s one of my brother’s tournament teams so I had some idea of what to expect. Regardless of that, I was a bit worried that one crouching short from his Doom would mean I lose. I played a mix of rushdown and runaway, while calling Cyclops AAA. In the 1st round, I was winning, but he came back with just Sentinel. I was getting nervous after he killed my Storm and left me with just Cyclops. Lucky for me, I blocked correctly thus not allowing him to kill me. The 2nd round was a little better for me. I don’t remember details, but I ended up winning. I talked to him a little after our match, and he came across as a really nice guy. Since his name was also Andrew, the results of our match was accidently recorded incorrectly. He noticed that and checked with the directors. And as a matter of fact, the results were wrong. Thanks to his observation, the results were fixed. What a nice guy.