JOURNAL: ErMaC

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  • MCWagner... 2002-10-20 04:01:19 You're my hero.
    Best journal entry EVAR. 
  • Stuff and Junk and Stuff 2002-10-07 07:14:23 First off, I put up my other AWA Pro video, Just Can't Take It, which you can get here:

    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/legacy/video.php?v=11485

    It's an Eva video (*GASP*) done to Michael & Janet Jackson's "Scream" (*W-GASP*).

    Comments welcome.

    Now I figure I'll write a bit more about what happened at AWA and what I've been up to lately.

    Well, AWA itselt was just way too much fun. Seriously, meeting all the creators there (far too many to name, they all know who they are and they all rule) was the best part of the trip. Now I have faces and voices to go with all the online personas that I've talked to or emailed over the years, and it's really great. Cons are the best part of the AMV community by far - being in a room with all the other creators and just chatting and having a good time can never be replaced by anything online.

    Since everyone else has really covered the AWA video competitions pretty thoroughly, I'm not going to repeat all of it again here because they've said all that really needs to be said (see MCWagner's entry for an inside rundown of the whole competition).

    What nobody has done is covered the DDR competition! So that's what I'll do now.

    Friday I show up in the Game room because the previous night I was told that there was going to be a Perfect Attack DDR competition and that signups would be out that day. Well they weren't until later that afternoon, and it conflicted a bit with the Pro video showings, but such is life. They had two custom made hardpads hooked up to a home 5th mix game running on a PS2. Not a terrible setup - the pads were actually pretty nice when they were working correctly. The problem is that the home versions of the games grade perfect steps much more leniantly than in the arcades - on Saturday I got 472 perfects and only 26 greats on So Deep (once they changed to DDR MAX) which is just freaking unheard of. It was the best score ANYONE there had ever seen - that's ~95% perfects on an almost 500 step song.

    Anyways, the prelims were held later that night on 5th mix. They made us dance Absolute, Sana Molette Ne Ente, and No Limit and then counted the # of perfects we had. I knew all the songs almost by heart - especially No Limit which I can complete with only around 20 greats - so I did really well. I would've been the first seed if it wasn't for the fact that the pad started getting unreliable during Sana Molette Ne Ente, at which point they stopped and tried to fix the pad. I wound up with 954 perfects, the first place guy (also named Justin) wound up with 958. If the pad wasn't weird I'm certain I would've been first seed, but I think I fared better facing off in the lower brackets in the finals so I won't complain.

    The finals were held during the Masters video showings, which really was the worst possible conflict of the entire con except maybe for the DDR2 showing. I really wanted to see reactions to my masters video... but sadly it wasn't meant to be.

    On Saturday there was this whole big screwup with new 6panel pads that were supposed to be good but wound up sucking so the finals were held on the custom pads anyways, which was fine by me as I preferred them to the other pads.

    The finals start, and since I'm the 2nd seed I have my match last amongst the first round. All the higher seeds win, although the other Justin wound up winning by default since his challenger didn't show up.
    First a little explanation. DDR tournaments are often held by what are called "battle" rules. Basically, you have two people dance in a best of 3 match based on # of perfects. There's a coin toss or equivalent, and the person who wins gets to pick whether they want to pick the song or pick the modifiers first (modifiers are things like 1.5x arrow speed, sudden arrows, flat colors, reverse direction, boost, etc). Then for the second song the choices are swapped. If it goes to a third song the judges pick. In this competition the judges would just choose roulette (random select) and have the options on Shuffle.

    When my match comes up, I win the toss and make my opponent choose song first. He picks Healing Vision Angelic Mix - a song I've been playing for close to a year now. While I was in Japan, the closest machine was a 6th Mix machine and Angelic Mix is one of the hardest songs on it so I got a lot of practice. I knew this guy couldn't match me in standard perfect attack, so I just picked Flat options since I knew the beat of the song by heart. I got 300 something perfects, he got 200 something - no contest. Then I pick song - I choose So Deep. The other contestants know what's coming since they've seen me play this song in the practice time that was given to the finalists. The other guy chooses no modifiers, which basically means I win. And I did, hands down, although I performed far worse than I thought I would due to fatigue from the previous song. Normally I don't miss a single step on that one. Oh well, musn't be piggy :)

    Next round is the matchup I'm watching closely. It's between the guy who I don't want to face because he's good at crazy modifiers and the #1 seed, who is a straight out awesome dancer but I doubt will pick the super crazy modifiers against me (which I hate). The #1 seed (Justin) winds by a small margin.

    My round comes up and I go up against a guy who did pretty good in the first round. I make him pick, he picks Candy, another song I know like the back of my hand. I pick the options 1.5x flat hidden. I win handily. Then I pick Witch Doctor as my song. He does Sudden Shuffle Reverse. Blech - I am not happy. I'm convinced at this point it'll go to a third round which I do not want since I'm worried about my stamina at this point. The dancing begins and I'm not doing very well, but I win anyways because I've got better timing than the other guy so while I have more misses and boos, I have more perfects. I have a D on the song and he has a C, but I still win based on # of perfects.

    Then comes the final round. I'm at a disadvantage because I've just danced, but they gave us a short break which I was very thankful for. This time, I'm forced to pick the song first. I'm nervous - I'm pretty sure the other guy is better at modifiers than I am, but from the earlier playtime I know he can't handle the pure speed of the gargantuan task that is MAX300. Muhhaha. The crowd is chanting and chanting for MAX, so I happily oblidge. They go nuts - it was awesome. This is what they'd been wanting to see. The other Justin picks modifiers - 1.5x. That's all. I know I have this one in the bag, but at what cost? I have way more perfects than him - he gets a D on the song and I get an A (might've been a B, I was very very tired). I collapse on the floor after the song is over.

    For those who don't know, when DDR MAX (6th Mix) came out, MAX300 became the hardest song EVER in the history of DDR. It's only now been surpassed (and debatably at that) by MAXX Unlimited which is in DDR MAX2 (7th Mix). MAX300 is 300 BPM - insanely fast. It also has over 500 steps. It is absolutely grueling not only in it's blinding speed and complexity but also the fact that until MAXX Unlimited it was the greatest test of DDR Endurance ever. After the song both of us were completely exhausted. I literally fell down on the floor and layed there for about 15 seconds until someone brought me some water.

    At this point the AMV competition had ended and a bunch of the AMV creators started coming in, including Brad DeMoss. He caught the very end of Max300 and came up and was congratulating me and stuff. I don't remember exactly what he said or much else of what went on right then.
    I do remember walking over to the other Justin and talking to him. He said he had planned to do sudden shuffle reverse blah blah on whatever song I picked, but he didn't do it on MAX300 because he knew he wouldn't stand a chance of even surviving then. Looks like I read the situation right and made a good call (whoever says there's no strategy to DDR is an ignorant fool).
    After the break they gave us (because we needed one, badly) he picks Firefly - a fairly easy BeForU song. I pick Solo, because I really don't know the song terribly well and I don't want to try going up against him on modified steps. I know he knows the song really well, but I just hope I can beat him based on pure precision.

    WE TIED.

    We both got 254 perfects on the song. Granted, he got a much better score than me (I had a lot of boos and misses) but that didn't matter. So the judges at this point decide to pick a song and modifiers since there's the potential of going to a forth round. They pick Orion 78 Civilization Mix with Shuffle Boost as the modifiers. I know I can win at this point, and my biggest motivation is to win this song so I don't have to dance again because I'm completely exhausted at this point. My shirt is totally soaked, and the sweat is starting to run into my eyes it's getting so bad. I win by a decently sized margin, but I was still nervous about the whole thing. In the end I go undefeated (danced 7 times, 6 wins and 1 tie) and I get my choice of the Kimagure Orange Road TV DVD Boxset, or the Macross DVD boxset. Since I already owned the Macross one, I took KOR even though I'd never seen it.

    No I have no video plans since I haven't even watched the damn thing.

    A bunch of the creators who came in after the AMV contest congratulated me. Some people took pictures with me - one girl asked me to sign her bra (I kid you not). I think she was joking, but she laughed at my response:
    Her: "Will you sign my bra?"
    Me: "Now?"
    Some girls took a picture with me afterwards saying that they wanted a picture with me so they could show me to one of the girl's boyfriends because he thinks he's good at DDR and they said that I was SO MUCH better than he is. :D I think DDR attracts women even better than AMVs. Course that isn't saying much. :)

    At that point I sit down for a much needed rest, eventually lurch back to Ian's hotel room to change my shirt and take a shower, and then go have dinner with some folks at Ruby Tuesday's and then catch the end of Iron Chef (which was just great).

    So there you have it. I come home with a brand new DVD boxset. Bet I wouldn't've gotten that for winning the AMV contests. :D :D :D But in all honestly I'd rather have won Masters, but I knew it wasn't going to be me so I hedged my bets. And this time I had better luck than last year at AX (where I thought I wouldn't win anything and ran between the Karaoke Contest and the AMV contest - I lost in the Semifinals at karaoke but missed my standing ovation in the AMV contest - AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA).



    As for what I'm doing now? Well, I'm far happier than I ever was in Japan. I'm getting back into school, I'm hanging out with friends and trying to furnish a new apartment while also getting broadband (f@#$ing DSL install times, it shouldn't take Covad 2 weeks to flip a f@#$ing switch) but I'm back where I feel like I belong. I've been playing lotsa DDR, lotsa video games, watching some Anime, getting back up with my Anime Club, and just having a good time. [fishstick voice]Life is goooooooooooooooooood! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY![/fishstick voice].

    Unfortunately my computer is being really flakey so I'm just gonna have to reinstall everything fresh on it. Oh well. I want to upgrade my computer but until I have a steady income again I'm gonna hold off for now.

    Peace out. 
  • Post AWA and new video 2002-10-02 04:13:55 Well AWA was tons and tons of fun. I got to meet almost all the con-going creators with only a few exceptions since practically everyone went to AWA, so it was definately a worthwhile trip. Got to hang with Ian and Molly, and got to meet people like Hsien, Will, Nate, Jason, the MTT crew, Jeff, etc. Was lots of fun.

    I've also put up one of my Pro videos, titled "Tsugaru". This was the speed video that was mentioned in my journal several months ago. Go have a gander. The other two videos from AWA will be put online soon. 
  • Oh yea 2002-09-17 22:17:31 And I have a new video up - My AWA Expo entry (other than Go Speed Go). It's dumb, but take a gander if you're bored.

    More videos will be up later. 
  • September 18th, 11:12AM 2002-09-17 22:16:26 This is gonna be short and sweet.

    It's official - I'm withdrawn. That's it, done deal. I fly home TOMORROW. w00t. That means I'm back in the states Thursday morning, I move down to SoCal over the weekend, and try to get into UCI for fall quarter either as fulltime student (after applying for exemption from the one term penalty) or as a UCI Extension student.

    That means I'm almost totally packed, I'm just waiting to get some things back from a few other people. Tomorrow at 11 in the morning I go in a car with Fumisan to Saruhashi and then take the train to Shinjuku and through to Narita airport, where it's back to San Francisco I go.

    I'm so happy I could almost cry, and that's no understatement. My only regret? I won't get a chance to go to Yokohama and see Muthos or go back to Akihabara and spend more money I shouldn't be spending. 
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