How I beat Chibita

Or "Zero-chan's Firsthand VF4 Event Experience"

I had been planning all week to attend the VF4 Event that was being held at the Kanayama Club Sega, the place where earlier had I engaged in some excellent competitive FV2 bouts. Saturday afternoon, I went to the bookstore, picked up my Green Books (only two copies left), realized I forgot my camera, ran home, came back, and hopped the subway down to Kanayama. I got there at 5 PM - later than I wanted to, but still early...

Or so I though. The event wasn't scheduled to start until six, but already the place was jam-packed with people. Many of the arcade machines had been moved downstairs simply the make room for the massive crowd. When I first got up to third floor, I saw a guy I knew from bouts in Yagoto, Gorilla-kun (not Gerira, mind you). He told me that tournment registration was already over. Dammit! But, he, said, most people weren't going to participate in the tournament anyway... they were here to play against others and to watch.

A guy is running around, passing out slips of paper with numbers on them. He hands me one with number 89.

I strapped the Usagi a teammates had given me onto my shoulder in a display of dorkdom, then went over and grabbed myself a Dr. Pepper out of one of the vending machines. I then caught glimpse of a thin young man in a red sweatshirt, sporting a hairstyle I could recognize even from behind. Taking out my camera and moving to an area where the crowd was small, I carefully intercepted him.

ME: Ahh, Chibita-san! Can I get a picture of you?
Chibita: A picture? Sure.
ME: You know, you are very famous among VF players in the States, too...
Chibita: Oh? I am? (laughs)
<CLICK>
ME: Oh, thank you very much. I'm sorry my Japanese is so bad...
Chibita: It's OK. <points to my Sonic shirt and Usagi> You are quite a fan, aren't you?
ME: Yeah, I love VF!
Chibita: <laughs> You have any of these? <holds up the little Dr. Pepper fastener with Lion on it> Oh, wait, you do, on your bag. <looks> Oh, Vanessa! Nice.
ME: haha! I use Vanessa mostly.
Chibita: <smiles with the famous Chibita Grin>
ME: I shouldn't keep you. Thanks for your time.
Chibita: No problem.

Yes, Chibita is quite an amicable young chap, at least from my experience. Although I should have asked him if he uses Vane to any degree in Evo, since he did in the days of Ver. C.

Anyways, shortly afterwards, I find my teammates Risu-san and Smile, and we all sit down in front of the huge display where the tournament will be held. In front of us sit four linked cabinets, and two giant screens. Off to the left is another huge screen, and to the right are tournament flow charts and a smaller display monitor. A huge crowd has already gathered in front of this, and a line is off to the side of the people who will participate in the tournament. Preparations run a little long, and some people who signed up were not present (boo), and the seatings need to be made, then afterwards, the players need to meet those who they are playing against in their first match. It is a single elimination affair with two branches. The winners of the branches will proceed into the final match.

As preparations are being made, Chibita and a Kage player (possibly Kyasao, but I'm not sure as the ring name was different) start running a few exhibition matches to keep the crowd entertained. Though the event officially started at 6, the tournament finally gets going at about 7. The announcer stands up, welcomes everyone, and introduces the special guests Chibita and Kyasao. They stand up, make a few comments, then hand the mike back over to the announcer. From there, things finally get moving.

The four cabinets host two matches. One comes from the first block, and the other comes from the second. They run these matches at the same time, so whichever one proves to be more interesting is the one you usually end up watching. The characters who we involved consisted of the following:

Lau was the most common, followed by Kage.
Wolf was also fairly prevalent, as was Lion.
Surprisingly lower than average amount of Jacky and Akira.
A few Pais, Sarahs, and Jeffs.
2 or 3 Leis and Aois
2 Vanessas
2 Shuns
1 Goh
A partridge in a pear tree

The early matches went by pretty fast, but there was some very entertaining stuff. One thing I immediately noticed about JP tournaments was that the observers, while still fairly loud (this is a big tournament full of people, after all), do not heckle, criticize, or yell comments at all during the matches. They talk amoungst themselves and sometimes whisper hushed comments to teammates and friends, but they only really react when:

1. Somebody does something really cool (The Vanessa doing Heaven's Gate always got cheers)
2. Major upset (A 6th-dan Pai beat a Tsuwamono Jacky early on, IIRC, which caused gasps of disbelief amongst the crowd)
3. Somebody has a really cool win (One match featured Vanessa hitting a Wolf that had just dodged with for the win. Seriously, it didn't even look like it hit, but everyone cheered and applauded, just because it was so cool and unexpected.)

You won't hear anyone yelling things like "JACKY SUCKS" or "WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU DOING?" during the matches - I have seen this sort of "color commentary" fairly commonly in US gatherings and game tourneys. There's a sense here of politeness, respect, and ettiquette in even these large-scale gatherings, and I must say I like it very much. The only person who makes any sort of commentary is the announcer, and even he never says anything disparaging.

From the semi-semifinals onwards, they switched to using just one cabinet and showing the match on all the monitors. It made it run a little bit slower than before, but it was good that you could finally focus on just one match at a time. (It sucked for me that the two Vanessas tended to play at the exact same time... I wanted to see them both!)

So who wound up in the finals?
This is part of what made this tourney so damn cool - it's a matchup nobody would have ever predicted.

There was a Tsuwamono Vanessa vs. a Tsuwamono Lion.
The winner was Lion, a guy who plays under the name [pi] who is one of the better players in the area. The Vanessa was incredible, though... that guy is my new idol. He had so many majorly cool wins and interesting strategies that I'd love to learn. If they don't put up any movies of his Vane play on the event report at Sega-AM.com, I will cry.

The 3 top players got little victory plaques and other prizes, as well as some complimentary words from the Guests of Honor. Afterwards, there would be a short recess for people to get up and move, because having sat for almost 2 and a half hours everyone's legs were near jellylike. Afterwards, the Event Quest raffle would begin!

And what was this event quest raffle?
Well, at most of these Sega-sponsored events, they hold a raffle for players to get a chance to battle with Chibita and Kyasao. If you sign up for this event quest on VF.net and you beat them, you win a special prize!

... but beating Chibita and Kyasao? Seriously, how many people could do that?

Then I heard them starting to call out numbers. They were spouting them off quite rapidly... I almost couldn't keep track, but I kept my ears perked for mention of number 89.
After about 50 calls, they stopped. Did this mean I didn't get picked? Damn it! I was incredibly disappointed.

Then the announcer said "The aforementioned are going to be fighting Kyasao. Now we're going to call for Chibita."
I moved up through the tightly congested crowd next to the table, where the raffle box was held, watching them draw up numbers. in a handful of paper slips, I could make out what I wanted to see - number 89. I was getting the chance to fight Chibita! Now I could brag to everyone how I got my ass kicked by him, as I knew I stood no chance against him.

Or did I?

I remembered something Heruru had said to me earlier. "Chibita is truly the god of VF... but if you attend one of these events and win a chance to play him... he will be kind to you."

As I was soon to see, this is indeed the case. The guests of honor have specially made cards specifically for this time period in which they are doing the event quest prize battles. If you attend one of these events, and you do the Event Quest, once Chibita or Kyasao see this, they will deliberately play far weaker than they should. They will, of course, get in a round or two against you, just to show you that if they were playing for real, you would be absolutely annihilated by their VF Power. They may, however, choose to play at their full skill if someone isn't doing the quest, or if they notice the guy is actually really, really good.

One thing I saw that made me feel warm and fuzzy was a young mother and her two kids all playing against Chibita with Jacky/Sarah. She thanked him nicely afterwards, and he had some good words for the youngsters. Remember folks, the family that plays together, stays together!

Finally, it was my turn to go up. Being the only foreign person there, I had to try and be a good representative of every VF playing country outside of Japan...

ME: I'm sorry I'm not very good.
Chibita: It's OK. <grins>

We pick our characters (me w/Vane, and him with Lion, of course) and start our play. I notice immediately how he is humoring me, delibarately starting combos that leave him wide open to various forms of painful retaliation. He also chats a little during the match. (I like his reaction to Vanessa's mount hits. ITAI! ITAIIIII!)

The second round is where he shows his true self. I think I got in maybe two hits. Most of it is like a blur, he hits fast, hard, and leads you into all kinds of mind traps. Even though he had never played me in his life, it was like he knew my reactions and thinking. It's almost frightening.

The final round he was indeed toying around, sometimes doing the "Chibita Special" just to make you a little bit scared that maybe he won't let you have it after all, but then leaving himself open for you to pummel him at your mercy. The last bit of the round was a tad embarassing for me... I wanted to get off a cool finish with a low throw, but he could see that and just kept changing his position from standing to crouching, leaving me a bit dumbfounded. Silly boy! But, in the end, I won, and now I can say in complete honesty....

I BEAT CHIBITA!

And for that, I got a Bob Haircut for Vanessa. Whee!

Everyone on the team was exhausted, so we went home shortly after my play finished. There were some real matches afterwards but it was getting quite late and we were all quite tried from the excitement and the cramped, heated atmosphere of it all. But this has truly been one of the best VF experiences - nay, one of the best gaming experiences of my life.

So, in short - if you come to Japan, and you love VF, you absolutely must attend one of the various tournement or 100-man kumite events that Sega puts on. You will begin to see and understand more fully the amazing atmosphere that the VF culture and community has here. It has truly opened my eyes to just how different this is compared to the states... and it makes me rather sad, to be honest. If only my fellow VF playing friends had the opportunity to enjoy something of this magnitude, their play and outlook of the game might never be quite the same again.

 

Great post. I get jealous everytime I hear of one of those events. /versus/images/icons/frown.gif Is this what you were referring to? : http://am.sega.jp/utop/news/event/evoote_42.html

 

good job!
hope you had fun!!!!!!!

 

That was a superb report Zero-chan, your account of the tournament depicts an amazing atmosphere. The way you describe Chibita and your match with him, it's like he's a hero. Kudos.

 

aww,... i can't even beat Ryan Heart under pressure let alone Chibita!

i hope twas fun anywayz, though i probably would have feared kyasao more coz i've seen him slaughter chibita's lion 3 rounds to 0 once ...

 

sounds like he let you win instead of you beat him. put on your panties and go home already.

 

fantastic report... wow it sounds really really fun.
I wished I can attend such a function. But it is hard
as I seldom have the chance to go Japan for long period
of time and it is hard to join this kind of stuff if you
are there for like one week.

anyway, err... if you can remember anything of the really
strong Vanessa, perhaps you can mentioned what is the
most common moves he used in Evo for Vanessa.

 

well, obviously! if chibita played properly, he would have mutilated him (no offence /versus/images/icons/wink.gif )
he was just peeing about, i mean, it would've been a crap prize to win if he just annihalated him in one go...

 

sorry to act annoying, but zero-chan's a "she"... (juust for future reference)

 

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
"sounds like he let you win instead of you beat him. put on your panties and go home already."

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After much consideration, I've decided to respond to this. Out of all the topics to flame on this board, you chose to flame this. You must be kidding....right? Please tell me this is a joke.

 

Shang's the kind of guy who can say "man you suck!" with a big grin on his face in real life, and you couldn't possibly take it to heart... but it comes across much differently on the board. A common gripe about the internet right?

Still, being as shang'n'devilrei are not good real-life buddies, he should probably have thought twice... then again maybe he takes exception to the phrasing of 'I beat chibita'.
Anyway, I guess shang can speak in his own defense.

 

You go girlfriend

 

Since I don't know shang, I guess I viewed it as an insult. I wouldn't be surprised if Zero rips him though. /versus/images/icons/grin.gif /versus/images/icons/grin.gif

 

We can hope, I for one hope she does /versus/images/icons/smile.gif

 

I have a nice little "delete" button (mod perks, ya know) but I feel too nice today. Besides, I still don't know the context.

But as I said... in Japan, you never get this sort of "color commentary" (^^)

BTW, I can't seem to find any mention of the event on am.sega.jp . I really, really hope they post something about it soon. (._.)

 

Congrats Zero-Chan on beating Chibita /versus/images/icons/laugh.gif. Its good to here you are having a fun time in japan. Your report was well done, and really makes me wish i could experience some fighting game competition of that size, with that kind of atmosphere.

 

Congrats on the victory, Zero-Chan!! You did a very good job on your report also. Wish I can see some good VF action when I go to Japan.

Off Topic: About those sticks? ^_^;;

 

Well, there's Evo in Toronto now, so I hope you Ontarians can have some fun with that. Maybe even with cards.

BTW, did anyone attend E7? About how many people were there? I'd say that this event had as many attendees as E6... and E6 is a national gathering. This was just a Nagoya area thing. It's not just this way for VF either, gathering for other fighting games get pretty sizable, though VF is by far the most popular. (KoF2002 came out recently so right now that's getting a heavy amount of play)
You might not think fighting games are dying in the west, but compared to here, they are indeed severely hurting. They just aren't the same draw to arcades anymore, like they were even 5 years ago. The only major recent western fighting-game success has been MvC2 (pretty much the only fighter the west dominates... in fact, you don't see it anywhere here. It really is a game catered towards non-Japanese tastes.).

One thing I forgot to mention: The announcer makes some really goofy comments from time to time. Nothing really disparaging, but good for a laugh. I remember what he said when I went up to play: "From the foreign land, she has travelled for the purpose of defeating Chibita!" (^^)

AkiraZero: I still have it. Drop me a PM, please. XD

 

I'm still laughing that Shang's joke sounded so damn stupid to anyone that know's Zero-chan. Hehe. A

Anyways, congrats. Chibita, as quite and reserved as he is, is quite kind to us white-folk. As is Kyasao (who I think was the other guy at the 100-man Kumite). I didn't know either of them from Adam, but both will get going if you talk to them.

Congrats on the new do as well! I've played Vanessa all of like 30 times. Need to practice. /versus/images/icons/smile.gif

 

Thanks for your post /versus/images/icons/smile.gif
I really to go back to Japan again!!

</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
One thing I forgot to mention: The announcer makes some really goofy comments from time to time. Nothing really disparaging, but good for a laugh. I remember what he said when I went up to play: "From the foreign land, she has travelled for the purpose of defeating Chibita!" (^^)


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These sort of extras really add to the fun factor of those events, Plain good fun ^_^