Last weekend was the conclusion of Sajam Slam 2. If you don’t know about the tourney, Sajam (one of the FGC Goats) hosted a Tekken 8 tournament, inviting a variety of streamers and personalities to learn the game through a dedicated coach. Each coach got 4 streamers on their team, and the teams would play against each other in a round-robin format. The 4 streamers would be organized from best to worst, and (theoretically) during the tournament, they would only play against other people at their level. The first team to get 3 players wins to get the team wins. If the players go 2-2, the coaches play for all the marbles. After the round-robin, there was a double-elimination bracket with one team eventually winning. The winners get a trip to EVO, the largest Fighting game tournament of the year. This time around, it was Brawlpro’s team, which included Lazymattman, Slime, Coney, and Dokibird.
Congrats to everyone on Brawlpro’s team. Tekken isn’t an easy game to pick up and play, but they were able to clutch out and defeat all the other teams.
The tournament does something really important: make fighting games fun. This comes in 2 parts. 1. Having a resource to learn the game available. 2. Having a group of friends/friendly people to learn with.
Having a Coach
Each team having a pro player as part of the learning process makes the game less intimidating. It takes a special type of human being willing to read/watch all the information to try and apply it to your gameplay. Talking to a coach to help you makes the process much easier and less stressful. Knowing you can lean on an expert’s shoulders while you are learning the game is a luxury that most people do not have. Especially in an environment where they are only expected to beat someone at their own skill level, unlike a normal tournament where you will play versus a variety of players.
Learning with Friends
1v1 games are the loneliest. When you win, you win alone. When you lose, you lose alone. But if you have friends around, the game becomes more fun. Motivation is a contagious feeling, especially when you are able to win together. Knowing that people are looking at you to win, knowing that those people sincerely want you to succeed, is a feeling that will light the fire in anybody’s heart. Having other people celebrate you is a high that I hope everyone gets a chance to feel. The largest barrier to entry to most competitive games is getting excited when nobody else is enjoying the game. You don’t get a chance to show off what you learn; you don’t have friends to talk about the game.
Sajam did a wonderful job introducing Tekken to many streamers. Many would never have picked up the game and their communities to the magic of Fighting games. The good, the bad, the weird, the hype. All of these exist within most fighting games, but the barrier of “fighting games are hard” is hard to overcome. This format really lowers that barrier of enjoyment, and I hope everyone goes back and at least watches the highlights. Really get a feeling of what fighting games have to offer. I hope I get invited to the next one (I am probably too small, though.)