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Bang The Machine
riiv writes "I saw the premiere of Bang The Machine tonight at SXSW 2002. The film is a documentary of the Street Fighter tournament scene. There's another screening March 15 so if you are near the Austin area, it is your moral obligation to watch it. I asked director Tamara Katepoo if they had a distributor lined up, unfortunely they don't. If you're looking for a film to distribute please get in touch with the film creators. The movie rocked and validated my wasted life ever since the purchase of Street Fighter 2 Japanese for SNES."
1. Read Link 2. Post 3. Smoke Crack 4. Profit!
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
I live not a 5 minute drive from this golfland (and Neutral Ground, home of the regional CCG tournaments btw.)
It is a terribly unassuming place, just a kinda shoddy mini-golf place with terrible parking. It's nestled among large apartment complexes near a diverse (ethnically) area.
I heard about tournaments there a few months back, but have still never stopped by yet. But unless you knew any better, you'd just assume the place was a little shoddy mini-golf place, fighting off the Man to keep their little place alive. (there are tons of little shoddy shops in Silicon Valley that refused to sell, even when the land prices were exorbitant)
Check out Shoryuken.com, for the latest information (tournaments/ranking) on the SF scene, as well as combo videos and recorded tournament matches.
:)
Currently, the most popular games are Capcom vs SNK 2 and Marvel vs Capcom 2. I am a big fan of the latter, and I often play at Southern Hills Golfland. The players there are incredible, and on the weekends the place is completely packed (15 minute wait for a game sometimes). I played in the MvC2 tourney last month, but lost first round.
And by original I mean Street Fighter II (the first one never really took off)
SF2 put fighting games on the map. It was a huge step toward the dominance of video games in youth culture. Whether or not this is a good thing, you can decide.
For like 3 years SF2 dominated the arcade and home console scene like nothing since PacMan. Only Halflife compares in recent times, though the PC market is much smaller than the console and arcade markets.
I don't want to think of how much money I put into that franchise during my middle school years. I was best with Ken personally, though I thought Blanka was the most fun to play. Some of the "sequels" were cool, Turbo, Special, and Super all added something. The later editions of the series, Alpha, III etc. never really did it for me.
And who remembers the huge debate over which was better, SF2 or Mortal Kombat. Where I was from the be-mulleted redneck teens were all into MK and everyone else was big on SF2. If you go back, I think it's fair to say that Street Fighter II had the better gameplay (at least compared to the first Kombat, MK2 was much better) though MK did a better job of getting itself in the news (for obvious reasons.)
Ah... memories.
3d fighters just don't do it for me, and now SNK is gone, and Capcom has been getting diminishing returns off of newer 2d fighters like capcom vs. marvel. I think we've finally reached the end of an era... oh well.
In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
Round one. Fight!
...
Ush ush ush.
Hadooooooken.
Hadooken.
Shoruken.
Ksh ksh ksh
Arooo, arooo.
Bzzt bzzt bzzt.
Shoruuuuken.
Aroo.
Ka-kumph.
Bzzt bzzt bzzt bzzt bzzt bzzt.
Hadoooken.
Ooooh - ooh - ooh - ooh
You win!
Ash OS durbatulk, ash OS gimbatul, ash OS thrakatulk, agh burzum-ishi krimpatul! Uzg-MS-ishi amal fauthut burgulli.
If I wanted to bang a machine I'd go here.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Let me tell you, the best SF2 players in the world are at a whole other level than normal human beings.
I hate the terminology, but all the players I've ever played outside of Sunnyvale Golfland are scrubs compared to those that I've played there. Good Lord. I don't know if John Choi (one of the best pro SF2 players in the U.S.) still plays there, but by God, he and those that were at his level were a sight to see. I entered a few tourneys alongside folks like them back when I went to school in the valley, and I never did better then the third round. John once handed my ass to me on a plate, double perfect rounds, then shook my hand and walked off. I didn't feel too ripped off though...we were playing SF Alpha (1), and he was taking advantage of Guy's endless redizzy combo.
I highly recommend this place to bay area locals, whether you want to play or watch, you're bound to see some of America's best playing there on almost any given night. Reeks of tobacco too, just like all good SF2 arenas.
< tofuhead >
It is still the dark of night.
Hush now scrub. Chun Li doesn't suck; the problem is that in some of the games, she's TOO good. In my own competitive SF-playing days at Sunnyvale Golfland, I used her against all those ARK scrubs (Akuma/Ryu/Ken weaklings) just to get them off the machine so I could play other players who had more interesting strategies than hadouken/hadouken/shouryuuken.
My old game of choice was Alpha 2. Three sucked balls IMO. SSF2X was cool, but Golfland didn't have a machine. Marvel...NO. Anyway, in the Alpha games, Chun Li was too fast, had the most powerful super combos (that could be linked into each other), and had chain/link combos up the wazoo. One technique in these older games is to use her crouching forward to walk up to an opponent and poke (hit or force a block), then link the hit or block tick into her overhead kick or her fireball. She also had an air throw, which put her over the top.
In my experience, only inexperienced players could be defeated by lucky button mashers, even if they were using Chun Li. With skill, she's a top bracket character, which is why lots of the best players used characters that were more challenging/less flexible.
< tofuhead >
It is still the dark of night.
Street Figter 2 was the first game with any real depth that let you play against another human. Before that, you could only show off your "skills" by beating the high score. This game significantly increased the social aspect of video gaming.
Unfortunately, it also significantly increased the actual physical violence in arcades. Now before you jump in and shout about columbine, the violence here was caused by not playing enough of the game. Most arcade fights are started by people who haven't played enough to get good at the game, resulting them losing. Like I said, this game has plenty of depth.
Street Fighter requires skill. In the beginning it was about doing those cool looking fireball moves. Then we discovered combos. Then the strategies started developing. The level it's played at nowadays involves mind games and knowing your oponent. This is not your father's video game (not that your father actually had video games). Many times, Street Fighter has even been compared with chess. I await the day when it will be an official Olympic sport. Heh. Imagine the judging disputes when one player abuses a game glitch.
That's only if you don't have moderator points. If you do, then it's:
1. Smoke Crack
2. Go buy more crack
3. Smoke Crack
4. Find secret 'emergency' stash of crack
5. Smoke Crack
6. Spray moderator points at random.
7. Smoke last rock from emergency stash to celebrate.
The enemies of Democracy are
If you're gonna be around Austin, check out "Prizewhores" -- it's a documentary about all those people who go around to radio promos just for all the free stuff. It's pretty interesting. Made in Austin too.
;)
Disclaimer: I'm not at all involved with the film, I just find it kind of funny. I guess it's a more profitable way to waste one's time rather than playing SF
--gaz
"I turn away with fright and horror from the lamentable evil of functions which do not have derivatives."
You could throw people if you were on top of them. You could play Vega or Chun Li and just leap over your opponent, hit the throw button, and toss them down. It made the game pretty simple to beat, and fun to own people who were bugging you.
more
For those who are interested, there's a short trailer for the movie on File Planet. There's also an interviewwith Peter Kang,one of the producers, on Shoryuken.com. We got a press DVD this weekend which has 4 more teaser video clips. We'll planning on capturing them and putting them up on SRK in the next few days.
Street Figter 2 was the first game with any real depth that let you play against another human.
:?)
Ahem. Karate Champ. Ahem.
I mean I know it's old school, but don't you whippersnappers know what mame is
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
I can still hear it ~15 years later:
Full point!
SRK is putting on an International Tournament! Check out http://evolution.shoryuken.com/
:: UCLA Ackerman Union
The best fighters from every continent are coming to LA this summer to battle. My friend (Sirlin) did a lot of the narration for Bang The Machine && we're working to make Evol2k2 great this year (it was called B5 last year). Please show up to compete or spectate. TTFN.
e v o l u t i o n
International Fighting Game Championships
August 9 - 11
This year, SRK's national leaves the warm nest of Folsom, CA., to take the action downtown. It's Los Angeles, CA, and the going has never been rougher. Last year's event showed that the only guarantee is that there ARE no guarantees in these events. With a powered-up Japanese contingent and new faces from around the world, this will be the premier event of the North American calendar. From rickshaw to junk, from the junk to a trunk, from your moped to MOPAR, find a way to get there. Start planning NOW to catch all the action and take your place alongside the true world warriors.
This is where the legends are born. Old-school? New-school? Doesn't t matter. It's time to put the hype down, and your fists up. Because Evolution is all about the basics: Fight. Survive. Win.
The level it's played at nowadays involves mind games and knowing your oponent. This is not your father's video game (not that your father actually had video games). Many times, Street Fighter has even been compared with chess.
This is a really interesting point. A lot of people bitch and moan about things like chess going down the tubes in favor of videogames, but I believe that top videogame players are on a par mentally with top chess players.
It's somewhat an apples vs. oranges comparison, true, since videogames and chess are emphasizing different areas of the brain, but if you've never seen "pro"-type players I don't think you can realize what another mental level these people are on. Look at an RTS game like StarCraft... they're managing hundreds of units in real-time. It's amazing to watch.
Don't flame me... I realize "thinking ahead" in chess requires an incredible amount of mental calculation and is probably more complex than any videogame out there. However, videogame players do it in real time!
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usually when i open up anything that talks about banging, it opens up at least that many windows....but that might be a little different... =]
I've lived in Austin for 27 years, and I've been watching SXSW since it started.
Unfortunately, SXSW (the music part, anyway) is somewhat of a local joke for longterm residents and some local musicians.
When SXSW started out, it was a great way to get some exposure for a struggling local band. I imagine Sundance was originally the same way for smaller indy film makers.
Now, however, if you don't already HAVE a name, you can't play SXSW. And since it pretty much takes over the Sixth Street scene, your ability to play down there is very very limited during the "festival" as well.
I've seen a number of local indy musicians wearing "SXSW SUX" shirts, and I think that sums it up pretty well. It's become too big, too commercial, and a waste of time for people that want to PARTICIPATE in the music side. The old Austin Aquafest went the same way in the last years before it went belly-up.
I haven't attended the Multimedia Conferences or the movie part of things, but I hear they're still worth doing. I'm not sure how the dot-scam bust will affect the multimedia stuff, but it still should produce some interesting stuff.
-l
(flame on...)
I dunno... I'd rather it be whispered about me, "there goes a chess grandmaster", than "there goes the best tiddly-winks player in the world".
FWIW, I don't think the comparison between SF and chess is fair. Sure, the player may be thinking in "real time", but the complexity of moves, compounded by hard-and-fast rules coded into the game means that at the highest levels, it's a test of endurance or reflex response (or both), not game skill.
Whereas in chess, at the highest levels, there can be multiple levels of attack, deception, gamesmanship, and defense.
Let me be clear, though--I find that at the highest levels of almost *anything*, the people there tend to be boorish, whether they be chess grandmasters, SF gods or Ph.Ds in French Realist poetry. The people at the highest levels of whatever dicipline tend to be one-trackers, of which sparkling conversation is not made.
Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
You're thinking of one of the hacked versions. There were ones where you could shoot fireballs while you were jumping, throw people while you were over their head, etc. In contrast, SF2 Turbo: Hyper fighting was as close to perfect as they get.
Well, they could be talking about him.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
Can't beat the original
Yes! it must defeat Sheng logn to stand a chance!
I was working at Capcom Coin-Op around the time SF Alpha came out. We had one in the showroom on free play, so I played it a bit. Never could understand the popularity of it. Or any others in the fighting genre, for that matter... The whole thing seemed to come down to memorizing arbitrary joystick/button sequences that had little or no connection to what was happening on the screen. Wanna do your super-mega-knockout move? LLLDU-sweepCCW-punch-kick. I never really saw the game aspect of it.
Now, Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo , on the other hand... There was a great game! It was so cool to see half the company lined up to play it; everyone from the assembly-line workers through the highest levels of management. Time to fire up MAME, I think...
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
Us Neo-Geo fans will always know that Garou: Mark Of The Wolves beats the pudden out of any of those capcom games. :)
After you go MOTWs everything else just seems SOOO slow. (the SF franchise included, I can no longer play any SF game on the account of falling asleep in between moves. . . . . damn those games are SLOW. I mean unresponsive type slow too.)
Need help treating your acne? Come here!
Having been a part of the Street Fighter "scene" for quite a while, having a lot of friends in it, and even being in the movie for an extremely brief period, I have to say that the Jab Strong Fierce crew did an excellent job with the whole thing. I drove down to Austin this weekend to plan in the tournament they planned around the screenings, see the movie, and just hang out with friends (some of whom I don't get to see much and flew in from Chicago, LA, and the Bay Area), and I was really impressed. To be totally honest, it's a bit worrisome when you realize they're going to open a window into the things you participate in, when most people don't even know they exist -- and I was scared about how the whole thing would come across to "outsiders".
/. article. I really hope they manage to find a distributor so more people can get a peek into the fun and insanity that is involved in a SF addiction and the world around it.
I was amazed with the results. The did a great job of capturing the events of that year and the people involved. Even people who have no interest in video games (including my friend who drove down with me) seemed to enjoy it immensely. If you have a chance to see it, go. Keep in mind, the Sunday showing was over-packed, and SXSW visitors get preference, so it may be difficult to get into, especially given the
Now I'm going to go crash since I drove all night to get home so I could make it to work today after watching the Sunday midnight showing.
-Puk
Here's what I said:
I realize "thinking ahead" in chess requires an incredible amount of mental calculation and is probably more complex than any videogame out there
Here's what you said:
Are you delusional? Starcraft requires no where near the "mental ability" as does chess.
Um, that's what I *said*... you basically accuse me of being delusional, then echo what I said. Nice. It used to be, we made fun of Slashdot readers who didn't read the linked story. Then came a new wave of readers who didn't even read the *news post* on Slashdot's front page that they were replying to. The replies to this latest post of mine are representative of the third wave of ridiculous posters- ones who don't even read the post they're flaming! Congratulations, you're are the forefront of a (not-so-new) generation.
OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
Does anyone remember all the fuss Electronic Gaming Monthly (or EGM) made over the game? They had nonstop coverage of SF2 in all their issues (and even in their spinoff, EGM^2) from 1992 to 1995!
I've got a box with a whole load of EGMs from that era right beside me now. SF2 was featured prominently in a lot of the issues, and whenever any version of the game was review, it always got high marks (with an exception, below). Granted, it deserved them at first (until it was obvious that Capcom was trying to milk the game too hard).
As a quick sidenote, there were five SF2 games:
I guess that wasn't a "quick" sidenote. Anyway, as you can see, except for perhaps the last version, each upgrade was only incremental in nature. This was probably done to keep the game fresh (apparently) and keep in the pages of game magazines and on the minds of game players. Capcom also released home versions of the games for the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis (Megadrive in Europe and Japan). They first released a port of the original World Warrior game for the Super Nintendo in July 1992. In September and October 1993, they released a combination Turbo Hyper Fighting/Champion Edition for the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis. And in July 1994 (I think), they released Super Street Fighter II for both systems.
The first two releases of the game (World Warrior and Turbo) got high marks in all game magazines, but with Super, EGM broke ranks. EGM had been one of the biggest cheerleaders of SF2, as I mentioned above, but by this point, they finally started to see the continuous upgrades for what they were, and gave the home versions of Super marks like 6/10 and 7/10. This greatly upset Capcom, and EGM's editors had some interesting things to say about this, but I don't have time to retype their interesting editorials or drag out my scanner and OCR program.
If you didn't quite understand that, let me clarify here, since it's late at night and I can't be bothered to edit. Capcom released three home versions of the game -- now if you're a kid who got your parents to buy the original, and even the second version, could you get them to buy the third? And why bother, because, when you look at the release dates, the port of Super (the 4th arcade version) was release around the same time as the arcade release of Super Turbo (the 5th arcade version). Furthermore, Super Turbo added loads more technique not present in Super! Anyway, Capcom got into some financial trouble for this and had a lot of unsold Super cartridges for the Super NES and Genesis. Yes, there were home versions of Super Turbo for the PC and 3DO, but not the Super NES and Genesis, and this is where most of the money in home versions of arcade games was at the time.
I thought all the incremental upgrading was silly, myself, but I did plunk quarters into all five versions, and I played all three home console versions (in rental form), so Capcom made money off me with the game in some form. I left the video game scene in 1995, so I missed out on Alpha, Alpha 2, Alpha 2 Gold, Alpha 3, etc. I did recall seeing a Street Fighter 3 machine once, I think around 1997 or 1998. It was just labelled "THREE" which was pretty funny, because once it was clear what Capcom was up to with all the incremental upgrades of SF2, people would make jokes that Capcom couldn't count to three.
Anyway, despite that criticism of it, I still must say that Street Fighter II was truly a landmark game, not only because it was incredibly fun to play, but also because it revived a slumping arcade industry (at the time) and gave game companies everywhere a whole new format to copy! Remember all the SNK Neo-Geo fighting games?
If I ever see a "Top 20 Games of All Time" list with Street Fighter II not in the top five or (gasp!) not listed, in my eyes, the purveyor of said list has instantly lost all credibility!
I'm sorry if all of that was poorly written or didn't make much sense, but I'm tired and want to go to bed now. Thank you for reading.
Oh, and by the way, I never thought much of Chun Li. She never seemed very cute or very strong, and Cammy, the second female character who appeared in Super, was fucking ugly. Blecch.
For those who don't know, Karate Champ was the first 1-vs-1 martial arts competitive fighting game.
Go see Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy. It's a documentary, but hilarious, and suprisingly, not raunchy. It will change your mind about documentaries forever.
Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. -- Carl Sagan
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
I'm not going to flame you, but to compare SF with chess is patently ridiculous. There is a lot more going on in chess that there is in any current game. Chess is played in realtime too, I'm not sure what distinction you're making. I'm the last person to put down video games, they are definitely good for the mind (though I don't usually include fighting games in this), but they aren't nearly the mind challenge that chess is.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
Were you ever able to knock out that damn bull?
Chris Mattern
Fighting games are the worst thing to happen to video games ever. Useless, brainless games designed to suck another $.50 from you. Wait that pretty much sums up all video games..oh well back to the arcade :)
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Here's what I said:
I realize "thinking ahead" in chess requires an incredible amount of mental calculation and is probably more complex than any videogame out there.
Here's what you said:
There is a lot more going on in chess that there is in any current game.
Sound familar? I explicity said, yeah, chess is more complex than any videogame (although I said "probably" more complex... maybe there's games I don't know about). The irony of calling my statement "patently ridiculous" while basically restating it and calling it your own is delicious.
I wouldn't call chess "real-time". True, you usually don't have unlimited time to ponder your move, but not it's real-time in the sense that most videogames are. Chess is turn-based, with distinct movement phases for each player. Unless you're playing some new version of chess where both players move simultaneously? That could be fun.
So, to restate, VIDEOGAMES ARE NOT MORE COMPLEX THAN CHESS. I was saying though, that at higher levels of competition, there is some pretty amazing thinking going on in games that goes far beyond "twitch" reflexes, and unlike chess, it's real-time.
OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
but I believe that top videogame players are on a par mentally with top chess players.
Then here's what you said:
realize "thinking ahead" in chess requires an incredible amount of mental calculation and is probably more complex than any videogame out there
Contradict yourself much. That's what I was pointing out, it's absolutely ridiculous to make the comparison.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
Agree with my point or not, but I didn't contradict myself. My original point was that top game players can be on a par with top chess players mentally, although it's a different kind of mental ability (less complex, more real-time).
It's sort of like saying that the Hoover Dam and the Great Pyramids are both among the world's greatest feats of engineering. Nobody's saying they're the same damn thing... much like I went out of my way to indicate that chess and gaming represent two different types of mental acuity.
OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
Summer after freshman year of college ... 1991 ... I was playing SF2 late one night in an arcade and some local rowdies came in. I kicked their asses one by one, using Chun Li, and eventually one of them got mad enough to sucker-punch me. I lost some blood and had to get 6 stitches above my eye.
I didn't stop playing (well, I stopped playing that night, but I didn't stop playing altogether). I loved that game, man. It was a serious addiction.