Tekken 6: BR- Rants & Raves Review

So if you have been keeping up with my facebook updates, you would know that I went to Nashville last weekend with my fellow F' Yeah clan mates Mike and Derrick to participate in a tournament and to finally play
For me and Derrick this was our first time touching the game and we completely missed Tekken Six. My first impression of the game is that it is very, very pretty. The insane amount of detail on each character's model was impressive, from the veins on Marduk's head to the ripples in Hwoarang's pants. I was also very impressed by the backgrounds. Each background had a couple nice touches. I am particular adored the 'Fountain Square' and 'Temple Grounds'. Both used some nice light tricks, especially 'Temple Grounds' which background changes from day to night to back to day.

The crowd to play was big but eventually I got to play and my first initial thought after playing it was wow... this game feels slow. It's a strange transition because Dark Resurrection feels as smooth as butter and for awhile I felt like I was playing in slow motion. The games feels alot more cinematic and epic, the sounds def give you that feeling too, their is some really 'meaty' sound effects after certain throws and moves and the sudden burst of sound lets you know when you are in 'rage'.

When I could play I picked King of course because he is my main character and tried to replicate some of the stuff I have seen in match videos whilst throwing out as many new moves as I possibly could. Right off the bat I was able to perform King's new throw (f,b,db,d,df,f+2) which he throws the opponent into the air, catches them on his shoulder and just slams them into the ground. I have re-christened this move the 'Dominator' because he just dominates the opponent. iSW combos tho were a different story. I think because King's jab has been changed to the universal 10 frame jabs that everyone has now, I couldn't seem to get the timing down. Not only that when I went for bound combos and every time I hit (b+2,1+2) to start my bound combo, on most people I would miss and get not just thrown but BACK thrown a couple times. It wasn't fun at all. I guess I will have to adapt to the new system but yep I def experienced some growing pains.

After awhile I was actually able to get iSW bound combos but only on Marduk. I was able to do it multiple times tho so I was very happy about that. In all honesty I don't even think after bound, you need to perform iSW (i.e instant shining wizard) but a standard shining wizard... i.e running 2+4. I guess my iSW skills are actually a hindrance rather then a benefit because both King's hands (the sign of an iSW) were coming out too early.

I also made sure I tried out moves I have only seen or read about like his new B+1,2. Df+4,3,d+4 and of course B+2,(CH)4 which lead to the Olympic Slam follow up which I really liked. I also perform most of his new BR moves because I consciously made a decision that I would make a New moves video for King when I got home (which I have).

One of the new moves that I did which got a massive pop (audience reaction/ wrestling term) was when I performed King's new u+1+2 choke throw and I threw the opponent into the wall and subsequently followed it with his new wall throw/ combo. The crowd went nuts and it's funny because these guys have access to the game and the same videos I have seen but it was me, an out of towner who showed it to them first. For awhile I have to answer a lot of "how the hell did you do that?" and "wow that was awesome, can you teach me" LOL.

I also played Lee but I didn't play him enough to get a good feel for him. I was focusing too much on King but Lee felt a lot more different, probably because of his shortened Mist Step and the new way of doing SS+2 combos (it is B+2,F now) not 1,2,F combos.

All in all, after a couple games I began to really like it and now I foresee myself really enjoying T6: BR. It makes me laugh that me, Derrick and Mike were able to win matches even through this was the first time playing the game. We def had a good time and the consensus was it was def worth the trip to Nashville.

I am looking forward to going back and bound, iSW peeps to Hell.

Matches: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=7267EC05D87C29A6

Get Ready for the Next Battle

pP

P.S I did decent in the tournament. I did not go two and out and I won a lot of casuals with my Lee and caught people with Mist Trap which made me smile.

KOR: a retrospective (part four)

If people do not know, I am a trekker, not a trekkie, a trekker. Calling a trekker a trekkie is like calling an Asian person oriental, it's an outdated term and some find it offensive. So now you reader is wondering what the heck does this have to do with King of the Ring? Well the very last episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation tv series was called 'All Good Things...' basically a shortened version of 'all good things must come to an end' and that was what I had in mind for King of the Ring: Requiem. It was a good thing but it was time to wrap it up and call it quits.

From day one I designed it and promoted it to be the last one, from the picking of the name 'Requiem' (it was also picked as a tribute to Dean, who disappeared from the scene). When I made the Requiem trailers I wanted an almost end of days feel. The Evanescence trailer (included in part three) ended with the scene from the Matrix: Revolutions of Neo confronting Smith and saying 'It ends tonight'. To put it bluntly the fat lady was doing warm ups.

I posted it up on TZ, I made an FAQ and people like always were signing up. I was excited it looked like we would have a good turn out. It turned out I was right. On the day we had a record 13 people signed up. Now KOR had always gathered a big bunch of people but 13 was unheard of. It was a fusion of past, present and new KOR players. Representing the past was Erks, Andrew, Henry, SEP. The present was of course me, Mario, Ric, Yous, Tara, Tim, Hussam and Alex. The new blood was Michael Jackson aka Oak (refer to my intermission 1 video if you want to see him).

The tournament started on a sour note, some people were late and therefore the tournament did not start on time. The bracket too was a nightmare, due to the large amount of people. 13 people and each person need to play every other person? That is a lot of matches. I should have realized it then and there that it was just too many and made a cut off the first 10 people and the other 3 couldn't play but I did not wanted to spoil anyones chances of particpating in the last KOR so I decided to run with it. There is an old saying "the path to Hell is paved with good intentions".

Andrew, winner of the second KOR finally made an an apperance and wanted to play, however, due to work commitments, he wanted to play all his matches in a row. I saw no problem mainly because playing all your matches in a row is usually a hindence as opposed to a benefit (saiyuk and Danis Kool both played most of their matches in a row and complained that it was too much in the first KOR), Andrew also paid his money so he deserved to play. Andrew went on to win almost all of his matches except against Erks. So what could have happened was Andrew would have won KOR without some of the people even playing all their matches. That I admit would have sucked however it didn't happen like that. Erks beat him therefore there was still a chance for someone to draw with him and force the tournament into a tie breaker. Someone could also beat Erks and win all their matches and make it a three way tie. However intend of rising to a challenge, people seemed to lose interest in the tournament and behind the back bickering started. Coupled with a long tournament (4 hrs), most people left the tournament early and worst, upset. In the end, Erks won most of his matches except one against Michael Jackson (it still blows me away to this day) so Erks had to play a tie breaker with Andrew the next time we had a chance. KOR: Requiem was not over yet.

Now I am going to man up and say, yes the tournament was too long. Yes I should have made a cut off 10 players. I admitted that in my post tournament post and I will admit it again now, years later. I however will not admit that I did anything wrong by letting Andrew play his matches in a row, he paid his tournament fee, he obviously couldn't stay due to work. If anyone else asked me to play all their matches in a row then I would have let them because I was trying to make everyone happy. It was a tournament by us, for us.

However in the aftermath of Requiem, a dark cloud started to form and people decided to critique everything and anything about the tournament. Now for me, this was a slap in my face. I ran this tournament with help from others, with money from my own pocket, I did the promotion and built the name of KOR to the point where even people who didn't play in KOR were looking at it and saying that it looked fun and wish there was character tournament for their own main characters. So for some people to express their opinions on a public forum and not had the decency to talk to me about on the day (SEP I am looking at you) or in a private message I felt like I was being spitted on. I knew before I ran it that Requiem was going to be the last KOR tournament but this cemented it. I went out of my way to run a tournament and just have fun. This tournament was never for me, I won two and each time I accepted it with humility. I created KOR for the people and the four other near perfect KOR's wasn't good enough for them, they just wanted to bitch about the one 'bad' one.

I went on to say that I would never run a KOR ever again and I was surprised by the reaction from some people. Aken, a person whom I can't say was ever a good friend of mine said

"man u dont have to stop running KOR coz of this.....even tho I never enter KOR but I like how alot of ppl are in galaxy during the tourni during KOR... just dont give up man let just say I am one of the KOR fan"

LOL spelling errors and all. I was happy to see someone people appreciated the effort me and other put into it but I was done.

An ironic post script, a couple weeks later we were able to run the tie breaker match between Andrew and Erks to decide who won KOR: Requiem and it was

Good on you Turk :D and Crimson joined previous winners, that included me, Andrew and Kaz King. So for everyone who was bitching about Andrew having it in the bag or that Andrew and Erks were friends that they would never play each other, in the end there was a clear cut winner and it wasn't even Andrew.

What makes me laugh to this day is something Snap wrote, Snap always wanted to participate in KOR but never had the chance due to scheduling. He is a rather well know King player. What he said was

"I think KOR is a great idea too. I really regret not being able to come to any. They usually sound like alot of fun.If Phil is a little hesitant to host again, I'm sure someone else would be willing to step up"

The thing is, in the couple years I have been gone from the scene, no one has. No one wanted to put in the same amount of work, the money, the promoting that I did. I wonder why?

Part four I must admit was the hardest part to write mainly because the fact that the last KOR was not a success... it made noise but it wasn't the noise that I wanted. When I started writing this retrospective, I wanted people to see how something that started so well ended up the way it did. I wanted people to know what I thought about it and how I currently feel. One of the things that has happened to me since the end of KOR is that I have became more involved in religion. I am living a transformed life now and praise the Lord as my shepherd and my Savior. I look back now and I realize that my feelings can be summed up by the Lord's Prayer

"And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive them that trespass against us".

Is is the past now and I am done looking back and now ready to move on. The last King Of the Ring did not ended well but I am ready to take it back to it's glorious days. With T6 released and heading to console, KOR will be back and like always I already have a name picked out for it.

"King Of the Ring: Redemption."

pP

Intermission 2

Never before seen footage post KOR: Return of the King.

My thoughts.

I recorded this and gave the interview hence the extreme close up and shaky cam.

pP

KOR: A retrospective (part three)

(NOTE: this was originally intended to be the final part in my KOR: A Retrospective series. I have now decided to extended it by one more part)

The scene was set, I was coming back to Sydney after my first visit to the states and my future wife. It was also around this time Lord of the Rings fever was going on so I decided on a perfect name for our fourth KOR. Return of the King. LOL not trying to sound full of myself but I did actually win the last one so it felt appropriate. I would also be the first winner of KOR whom actually returned to defend his crown.

The prizes were offered up again and this time we had a decent turn-out. We had 8 people which include the usual bunch of Me, Mario, Yous and Tara and Tim. New to KOR were Hussam, Alex (Tim's little brother) and my protege Teddy. I also made sure this time around most of the matches were capped and I had access to it (thanks to my investment in 'Pinky' aka my digital camera) because I had definitely had something in the mind to do with the footage.

The eventually winner of the tournament was me and I was able to win it in the very first tie-breaker in KOR. It was the classic comeback story, Mario beat me in the round robin part of the tournament but he lost to Tim. I beat Tim therefore we both needed to play one more match and I won that match. It was a moment of triumph that I won two King Of the Rings back to back. More highlights was Alex the shining protege and at the tender age of 14 doing iSW combos on people, like WTF man. He also beat his older brother LOL.

I was also happy that we had enough footage that we could make a highlight reel. After the tournament and I uploaded all the matches (which can be seen at www.youtube.com/group/kingoftheringbish along with matches from most of the KOR tournaments) I then went to work on the highlight reel. The highlight reel (which was included in the first part of my retrospective) is a crowning achievement for me as well. Never had a song and theme for a video came to me so easily. It even gain props from people like Cyrax a renowned King player from Melbourne who said

"Nice, I like your style and the idea all together, maybe I can make it in there one day"

It was also during the KOR: ROTK highlight reel that I announced that we will be throwing one more KOR. It's name would be King of the Ring: Requiem and as the name implied it would be a farewell to KOR. I did not know at the time, how right I would be.

In the final part: KOR: Requiem and its aftermath.

Plus the future of KOR? Is there one?

Above is the first KOR: Requiem trailer. I am especially proud of this trailer, even through certain people didn't like it as much as the hip hop one. I picked the song because I love Evanescene and I like how I editted the song, anyone who has actually heard the song, know that I editted a whole part of the song out but to me it sounds so natural.

LOL a not so proud moment was when I messed up and on the scene where I put all the previous King of the Ring titles, I accidentally put Return of the King not once, not twice but three times. Oops.

An intermission

Moments before King of the Ring: Return of the King kicked off, I decided to harass as many people as I could.

Classic moment: 'cha mon Michael... cha mon'

Ah the good ol' days in G Dub

pP

KOR: A retrospective (part two)

'In the end, there can only be One'

LOL Highlander quote for the win. Post the first King Of the Ring, the buzz was pretty big. It went down well and it had a better showing then I ever expected. There was buzz about other character tournaments (none which ever came to fruiton). Because of the demand I said that I would run a second KOR and this one would be called King Of the Ring: Nemesis.

I posted on Tekken Zaibatsu and the hype was building up again. The prizes were back, the guaranteed $50, the trophy, the IC card and the right to be called 'The King'. This time we had a even bigger turnout. New people were added to the mix and ironically some people who attended the first one didn't come out, our reigning champ Kaz King included. However we still had 12 people attend this time. We had more then 70 matches played. It was crazy and I will say it would have been impossible for me to run without a little help from Tara. It was a testament to KOR with the diversity of people attending. Everyone wanted to get in on the action. We had Kei who was a Lee player, Spike who was a Lei player, Erks who was a Nina/ Anna player. King was not their main but they still came and played and enjoyed themselves.

In the end, the winner was Andrew (or as he is known as now, Lucky Strikes), who anyone in the Sydney Tekken community knows to be a beast. Props must be handed out to Mario (MMT) whom came in second and was the only person able to defeat Andrew and stopped him from being undefeated. Me, lol, I did worse then last time and came in equal sixth with Genxa. Definately not my proudest moment. I was happy through, KOR wasn't a flash in the pan tournament. It was a success and people were enjoying themselves. LOL even Hwan (quote from TZ)

"Thx to : Everyone at the KOR last night. Enjoyed a LOT! Special Thx to : Drago and Tara. thx again!don't know why, but somehow, i have this farking tendency to be SO excited! "

And he wasn't even playing in it!

I knew then, that we had to have another one.

This tournament also stood out for me because of the post dinner celebration. A lot of us got together and we had a ball at a chinese resturant, it was the best of times, I wish I still had that photo that was taken by that off kilter waiter. Also another personal highlight was it was the first tournament where my clan Pigeon came together and came out in force.

A couple months later, I made the announcment that again due to popular demand that I would be running a third KOR tournament. KOR: Vendetta would be it's name and this time I was determined to make my mark.

So by now you know the drill. I offered the prizes, set the date and once again the people came out. We had our usual suspects of me, Dean, Mario, Genxa and Tara but we also had the =NOT= guys come through as well in the form of Tim and Yous (Liger 7). Once again the tournament was run extremely well, it seems that me, Yous and Tara were getting the hang of these things. And for me, it was a moment of celebration. After placing 4th in one and 6th in another, I finally won a KOR. The trophy picture is actually the trophy I won. I was humble and thankful and I was just happy I was able to celebrate it with all my friends. This tournament also stands out because it was also the very first tournament in which Tara won a match and it was against Tim, LOL poor Tim. The dinner I remember wasn't as epic as the last one but we still went out and had a good time.

Whilst I was happy I won the dang thing I was also happy that an idea that me and Danis Kool had over a dinner session at Burger King had got to this point. It was soon that not only the Sydney people were talking about it but people outside of Sydney as well. People wanted KOR to be run whilst they were in town so they had a chance to prove themselves and win the crown. It was becoming a phenomeon and I was happy to be a part of it.

I knew for sure that we would have to have another one but it would have to wait because I was going overseas. I figured we would have it when I got back and I also had the perfect name for it picked out 'Return of the King'.

So concludes part 2.

In the final chapter, I will discuss Return of the King and Requiem and how something that felt so right, went so wrong.

Above is the trailer for KOR: Requiem. It was to build hype for it. I actually made two trailers, I made this one mainly because a good friend of mine, mention no names *cough* yous *cough* didn't like the 'emo rock' I used. I am also uploading it here also because Warner Music Group made a music claim on the youtube one and it annoys me that the video is now out there but not the way I intended it to be.

In closing... Fuck YT and WMG.

pP

KOR: A retrospective (part one)

Ahh the good ol' days. Above is the King Of the Ring: Return of the King highlight reel. I must admit I edited like a madman for this one and it came out really well. It was on youtube for the longest time but then it got music claimed and it was pulled off. I really like this video, so I originally just wanted to post it up here, where it can still be viewed and not 'violate anyones IP' (lol not bitter, not bitter at all). As I uploaded it tho, I got caught up and thought about KOR and it has now become this, a King Of the Ring retrospective, from the person who actually conceived and ran it.

Way back in 2006 (really? was it that long ago) when I started playing King in Tekken seriously, me and a fellow King player Danis Kool came upon a random idea whilst we sat at Burger King. We said to each other we should have a King and Armor King tournament and we should call it King of the Ring (after the wrestling event known by the same name).

I posted this idea up on Tekken Zaibatsu and it drummed up some interest. One of the earliest thing I remember doing for it was asking my future wife to design a banner for it. She did a great job I believe.

Anyhow on April 22nd, 2006, King Of the Ring went down. It was a success and 9 people attended. LOL even people who did not even play King as a main played in the tournament and the end result was a big victory for Kaz King (a Korean King player, maybe one of the first serious King players in Sydney at that time). I ended up coming 4th. No excuses I thought I was going to do a lot better. The tournament had some funny moments, the actual winner of the tournament actually didn't come for the tournament, he was actually there randomly playing and we pulled him in. I also remember yelling out the first person to get an iSW would get a dollar (which saiyuk won) and some very random matches. None of it was capped which we would remedy in future tournaments.

KOR stood out from other tournaments from the get-go. First it was purely a King or Armor King tournament, second, it was run round-robin style, so that everyone would actually have to play everyone, to really figured out who was the best at King/ AK, third there was an incentive cash prize that no other tournament in Sydney was offering at that time and fourth, the winner would get other prizes as well, that being a IC card and a converted KOR trophy. Now not blowing my own trumpet but the last three things were provided by me, the cash prize, the trophy the IC card I brought and paid for with my own money, because any money gained from tournament entry was actually put into the machines because it wasn't run on console. All in all, it went down well. So well in fact that there was talks about a second tournament. A second tournament called King Of the Ring: Nemesis.

In the second part, I continue to walk down memory lane and revist KOR: Nemesis and KOR: Vendetta

'The Mansion' 2nd teaser (with directors commentary)

A teaser trailer for 'The Mansion' a novella included in my "Hauntings: An Anthology".

Video edited by Me for Apocryphic Visions.
Music: Slipping Away- Michael Andrews (Donnie Darko score)

Directors Commentary:
The scene in the hallway was filmed at the Gaylord Hotel in Nashville, the place is enormous
The picture of the door is actually from the original 'Mansion' teaser and is actually the door into my house.
The gun-shot sfx is taken from Eminem's 'Encore' unedited song where Em kills himself at the end.

Shadow- AudioVisual Poem

Some poetry I wrote awhile back. Might do another one of these soon.

Hauntings: Casting- Homecoming

It's a little trick I use when I write. I usually cast the actors/ actresses whom I would like to see play my characters if the story would be made into a film. Think of it like how a artist uses photos for reference. These are the people whom I had in mind as I wrote 'Homecoming'.

Jacque:

Jacque would be protrayed by Daniel Henney. His is a relatively unknown actor tho he does have a role in the upcoming X-Men Origins: Wolverine playing Agent Zero. Daniel like Jacque is bi-racial.

Patricia:

I actually wrote Patricia with Bahar Soomekh in mind. She first caught my eye in

Saw III and Crash. Her exotic beauty and resume of films helped make my decision. She also guest starred in 'The Ghost Whisperer' in a story about an haunting. Everything is connected indeed.

Tim:

The final part of our love triangle, Tim would be protrayed by Tim Hendricks from the recent season of Miami Ink. He has the 'look' I felt that summed up Tim.

Jackie:

With Bahar's exotic looks, I felt I needed a person of similar looks who could be her mother and thanks to the film Crash I was able to find a perfect candidate. Marina Sirtis of Star Trek: The Next Generation actually played her mother in Crash so it felt like kismet. Marina's character in Star Trek was also a caring and considerate person and I felt Marina would be able to bring the motherly figure of Jackie alive.

Melissa:

Since I established that Jacque's sir-name was Jameson, I knew therefore by default his mother would be Asian. She plays a small role compared to the others but it's still a big role and as if by fate, one of my fave shows casted Tomlyn Tomita of Karate Kid II fame as Hiro's mother and I was like I found my Melissa. The fact she also turned in such a great performance made my choice easier as well.

Samantha:

Another one of Jac's lost chances at love, like Patricia, I actually had Samantha casted before I started writing her. I picked Maggie Grace from Tv's Lost and 'Taken'. I liked how she first came off as superficial on Lost but as the show continued she became a much deeper character. Plus it never hurts to have some eye candy LOL.

Hauntings: An Anthology featuring Homecoming

Everything is Connected... 2009