Category: Uncategorized

Community love: “Hugo, the boy from Chicago” by Tones

Guest article by Anthony Albert Schweitzer Ducusin aka “Tones”

Hello everyone. Tones here, I’m out in Chicago lining some things up for myself.

The other day I was walking through the Harold Washington Library when I noticed in the people in the teens’ chillax area playing smash.

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Top floor of the Harold Washington Library. Such a beautiful building

Talked with the staff there and when they tell me about this Hugo guy, a local teen that has been organizing regular competitions and how “he’s extremely passionate and outgoing, we let him run and lead things.” So I talked about how the scene is back in Melbourne Australia, about how I’ve part of this group called Couch Warriors and how we’ve been doing events since 2007.

They invite me to the “Library of Smash” tournament where Hugo will be doing his thing.

Here is his story…

Like a lot of us Hugo has always enjoyed playing video games, he got involved with the offline Smash scene. Found it fun, awesome and hype and all that cool stuff but was put off by how salty rude it can get.

So what does he do?

At the age of 16 he goes out and creates his own scene with the culture he thinks the scene deserves – a positive and friendly competitive environment.

Library of Smash 6. Events have been going for about a year now

Library of Smash 6. Events have been going for about a year now

Now they are frequenting 50 a tournament, he has single handedly TOed a 74 man tournament all the way through despite a fire break out in the middle of it. Sounds pretty serious yeah? Well, he calls it semi competitive.

What it is though is just super hype and friendly. He understands the importance of building community.

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Hugo: “My main objective for my tournaments is to show people that a video game tournament isn’t all about winning. It is about having a good time with others. ”

One thing that stood out to me was how people are competing, lounging about to socialize or playing friendlies; Competitive, friendly and casual.

Taylor works at the Library and is Hugo’s right hand girl for tournament duties.

This is his final year at this location because he’s finishing his senior high school year, so he’s looking to duplicate – to create a self-sustaining system while he moves off to further himself, leaving his mark with the scene no matter where he goes. As for what he wants people to take away from his work:

Hugo: “I wanted people to see that if you have the passion and effort, you can do so much for the things you enjoy, no matter what it is”.

Be sure to send him some love if you’re in the area. Hugo is a positive ball of energy doing good things for the e-sports scene on the ground level. Was a pleasure to meet him in the area of Chicago at Library of Smash and to send him some love.

Anytime Hugo buddy. Cheers, Tones.

Sharing some Esports love

Sharing some Esports love

 

For details on the space and their social media: http://www.chipublib.org/hwlc-youmedia/

[Melb] CouchWarriors June Ranbats – 18th and 25th

 

CouchWarriors Ranbats are back in June after a massive BAM8! We have traditional fighters and Melee: SF5, GGXRD, DOA5LR, MKX, Smash Melee and Project M on Saturday the 18th of June and Smash 4 and Rivals of Aether on the 25th of June.

Be sure to check which weekend coincides with the games that you play:

Dates: Saturday 18th and 25th of June
Time: 10:00am – late
Location: 6 Davies St, Brunswick North, VIC 3056
Entry Fee: $10 plus tournaments

Official event pages and pre-registration: 

CW Traditional Fighters+Melee June 18 Ranbat – Preregister by making a Smash.GG account and visit here to register.

CW Smash 4 June 25 Ranbat – Preregister by making a Smash.GG account and visit here to register.cw_sf5_ssb4

 

Update:

Hi guys, we’re very pleased to announce a partnership with Royal Stacks Brunswick- a joyous burger joint less than 300m (3min walk) from our ranbat venue on 6 Davies Street.

The good folks at Royal Stacks Brunswick (800 Sydney Road) will give any of our ranbat attendees 25% off their order – simply show them the CouchWarriors ranbat event page on your smartphone-https://www.facebook.com/events/1612921805686485/ and they will apply the discount to your order!

A big thank you to Deniz and the rest of the Royal Stacks staff, we know a lot of you guys already frequent this place for your ranbat sustenance so please make use of this offer and show your appreciation to the staff over there with a thank you if you have the chance!

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[Melb] CouchWarriors December Ranbat- FINAL 2015 with all games at CQ!

dec ranbat

CouchWarriors is bringing home 2015 with a huge final event at the CQ hotel in the Melbourne CBD running all games on the same day!

There will be prizes for every game, and we will award our ranking battle winners for 2015!

Dates: Saturday, December 12
Time: 10am-10pm
Location: Event Room #2: CQ Functions, 123 Queen Street, Melbourne
Entry Fee: $10 Entry + Tournaments (Expected pot fee is $5 per tournament)

For the full details, check out the Facebook event page. Read more

Stuff Yo’ Couch Episode 2 – October Ranbat

Hi guys, welcome to the second episode of Stuff Yo’ Couch! It has been a busy month for CouchWarriors with ranbat action galore and a full 3-day schedule at PAX with tournaments and Learn to Play sessions at our booths.

Filmed at the CouchWarriors October ranbat we return with more action footage and flavour and with interviews of two pillars in the community: Jack Gorman aka Pudge from Smash @ Swanston and Edison Nguyen aka GooGieMonA of MKX and poker fame.

Coming up we have the CouchWarriors AGM this Saturday at CCH: https://www.facebook.com/events/1482381598738088/ If you feel like you would like to be a part of CouchWarriors and to help out with tournaments and building up the fighting game community in Melbourne, please feel free to come along!

And we have the Adelaide FGC major called SXC2015. https://www.facebook.com/events/922092641163432/
Run by Troy “Mooseking” Nelson and the SAFGC crew. I always have an awesome time there, so hope to see you guys there.

Hope you guys enjoy the episode!

Stuff Yo’ Couch! Episode 1- August Ranbat

 

Hi guys, This is Muttons here. Welcome to the first episode of Stuff Yo’ Couch!

I originally envisioned this show to be a Couchwarriors ranbat recap, in the vein of the old X report (shoutouts to Ali and the Abdos) Where we could go over all things CouchWarriors; go over results, give you guys a peek into the action and sights to be seen at the ranbat, and maybe get a few interviews with important faces and figures in the Melbourne community.

I’m still ironing out what I want to do with the show, so I apologise for any roughness or inconsistencies – please let me know what you guys think or what to see in the future and I’ll be happy to use your feedback to smack the show more into shape.

In this episode we interview Philip John Pretty aka Redact, who’s recently joined team Exile5 in light of his stellar work at BAM7 which turned out to be massive with 500 plus registrants- huge kudos to the Smash community for really blowing up the event with their international guests and hype. And we also have Darren Taing aka Dreadtech- the hardest worker in the Smash community right now, and a deserved winner of the Community Award at BAM7. The August Couchwarriors ranbat had a welcome guest in the form of an SFV preview build courtesy of Capcom Australia, so thanks very much to them- so we have a brief section of some quick opinions from the players. I had a pretty good section of Somniac breaking the game down from a technical perspective- but the audio was lost. Go me.

Other things to mention:
We have the CouchWarriors AGM on November 21st at CCH, so if you guys are interested in helping out with CouchWarriors and building up the Melbourne fighting game community, come down – everyone is welcome to come. https://www.facebook.com/events/1482381598738088/

Also we have the Adelaide major on November 28-29: SXC2015 (Southern Cross Championship) run by Mooseking and the SA crew. I always have a blast at SXC, the first year I went they hired the entire floor of a Thai restaurant and everybody went after the tournament and ate together and told stories, which was awesome. We tried to blatantly rip it off at BAM this year but with mixed success 😛 we’ll see how we go next year. https://www.facebook.com/events/922092641163432/

Hope you guys enjoy the episode!

 

CouchWarriors 2015 Annual General Meeting

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URGENT: Sorry guys, the Collingwood library has just let me know that there is last minute renovations at the Collingwood library so we will have to move to the Richmond Library at 415 Church Street. We will start at 3PM. Apologies for the late notice.

It’s time for the CouchWarriors AGM. Official Facebook event found here.

Since we are a non-for-profit organisation, we are required to run this every year and to give one month’s notice to board members and the public.

At the AGM we will discuss an agenda of the following:
-Review of events done this year such as BAM7, ranbats and convention activities
-Financial review
-Review of mission statement and strategies/plans moving forward
-Election of board members: President, Vice-President, Secretary, Treasurer.

Our secretary Rory Betteridge will add a detailed agenda based on last year’s AGM agenda soon.

Our AGM is open to the public, if you feel like you would like to be a part of CouchWarriors and to help out with tournaments and building up the fighting game community in Melbourne, please feel free to come along. Our scene is built on the passion and dedication of volunteers and organisers, we couldn’t do it without you guys.

The AGM will be held at 415 Church Street, Richmond, in the community room of the Richmond Library. (Basically it will be held at CCH:http://couchwarriors.org/wp/cch-casual-play/

Hope to see you all there!

BAM7 MAJOR SPONSOR: WB Games Australia and MORTAL KOMBAT X

wbgameslogo mortal-kombat-x-logo

CouchWarriors is exceptionally proud to have partnered with WB Games AU and Mortal Kombat X in support of Battle Arena Melbourne 7.

Like WB Games AU on Facebook and Follow WB Games AU on Twitter

Presenting the first major tournament for MORTAL KOMBAT X, we previously announced three major features of the event:

– Two time World Champion, PERFECT LEGEND, appearing as a guest of BAM7,  and competing in the tournament and exhibitions.

– $1,000 Pot Bonus to the Tournament adding to the pool generated by tournament entries. This will be split across the Top 8.

– Qualifiers for Mortal Kombat X Asia Championships with a flight to Bangkok for the top ANZ player, to compete in the top four of South East Asia Majors

Now, we reveal the amazing general prize offering for BAM7! Read more

July Ranking Battle Results

A good time was had by all last Sunday the 13th, at the July CouchWarriors Ranbat.  Primarily a Smash event with players keen to practice ahead of this weekend’s ACL Sydney event which features Smash for the first time in many years, the Smashers turned out in force.

Two friendly tournaments and plenty of casual matches were also played for other games.

Here are the results!

Read more

Melbourne BAM qualifier April 5th

Quick Details:

When: April 5th – 1pm-10pm
Where: Abbotsford Masonic Hall
141 Gipps St, Abbotsford, 3067
Cost: $10 Entry + Tournaments (Expected pot fee is $5 per tournament)

Schedule
2pm – Late – Super Smash Bros Brawl, Melee and Project M
3pm – 6pm – Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition
3pm – 6pm – Dead or Alive
4pm – 7pm – Killer Instinct
5pm – 8pm – King of Fighters XIII
5pm – 8pm – Injustice
6pm – 9pm – Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3
6pm – 9pm – Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown

BAM REGISTRATION
Come down and register in person if you haven’t already registered online.

BRING YOUR OWN CONTROLLER
Since we’re no longer in the Shadowlogic venue, there aren’t going to be a list of Sticks for people to borrow, and while we should have enough equipment to run the tournaments, everyone will appreciate anybody who can bring setups for casuals and DIYs.

HOW TO GET THERE
Park or get off at Collingwood Station…

Walk either down the alley, or down the main street

We hope to see you all there on Saturday and we can’t wait to see who’s in top form leading up to BAM!

Community: The Australian FGC Episode 01: Mike “The TV” Skolnik

http://dustycartridge.com/videos/community-australian-fgc-episode-01-mike-tv-skolnik/

Communitye01

Hi guys this is my new video series for Dusty Cartridge. I originally intended to do some player profiles as pre-BAM media, but I was lying in bed thinking one day…

Generally in Fighting Game Community (FGC) media you see the top players get most of the camera time, but in my eyes, a community is not simply made up of top players.

A community consists of so many different kinds of people. Intellectuals, staunch regulars, streamers, tournament organisers, anime lovers, commentators, retro game enthusiasts and those dudes that go 0-2 and keep coming back(me). Everybody is an equally important part of our community, without these guys there wouldn’t be a community for the top players to be the faces of.

I wanted to do these 5-10 minute player profiles (Mike’s one went quite long, future eps will be shorter) to shine some spotlight on these less heralded guys, and to also let the greater public know about all the different personalities and figures we have in our local FGC.

I wanted Mike The TV as the first guest because he’s a game academic, a commentator and has a unique perspective on the scene- having a bit of an e-sports background.

Hope you guys like the series!

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