#evo2018

But he was never playing the most-entered game. He won in Mortal Kombat and Injustice, and he’s won tons of other games at other tournaments, but never the main event, never the hotly-contested one. He was always the clear favorite. Some looked at this and thought that meant he wasn’t as good as he seemed, and they’d say “if he’s so good, why is he only playing the smaller games? why isnt he playing street fighter?” The answer of course is that he only plays the games he likes, which until now haven’t been the most played games. But when DragonBall FighterZ came out, he was (as usual) widely considered the best in the country. Go1 (pronounced Go-ichi) though is a similar case, he’s a player who dominated some of the smaller games in Japan, though in the last couple years he’s been one of the best Street Fighter players in the world. Go1 and SonicFox were clearly number one and number two, though the order wasn’t clear, until Final Round in Atlanta that took place in March, when they finally played each other. It wasn’t really close, Go1 demolished SonicFox. Many people have said this, but looking back, that was maybe the most significant moment of SonicFox’s career so far. It showed him that he can’t just win for free in this game. There’s too much competition, too many of the “best players of x game” have taken to playing this game too, too many people on his level or higher are playing this game. He really had to sit down and practice, and practice hard. And it paid off. 

Winning this Evo was not easy for him. He couldn’t coast his way to Grand Finals, he had to fight. He almost lost in Grand Finals when it looked like Go1 was on fire. Sure, some people (including me at first) criticized when Sonic asked to switch sides between sets, but honestly he had every right to do so, and Sonic said that it wasn’t just to kill Go1′s momentum (though even if it was, it would have been within the rules too). Besides, that set after the side switch wasn’t free for him either, you could see how evenly matched the two were. But SonicFox won, for once not because he’s just a genius, but because he’s a genius who fuckin worked his ass off preparing for this. Now nobody can say he’s overrated, he gets by on being more naturally talented than his opponents, none of that. Go1 might be more “naturally talented” than SonicFox haha, but in the end it was SonicFox who worked the hardest and out-maneuvered his opponents the most. 

So yeah, I’m glad SonicFox is getting attention from non-fighting game people for being the best in the world and tweeting out “I’m gay”, and while he certainly is a prodigy and stuff, it’s remarkable how much he really earned this win. 

Fighting games are so cool you guys, it takes so much skill to win. It’s like chess if chess didnt have turns and you had to adapt on the fly and also instead of just like six kinds of pieces there were 30 characters, each with unique traits and abilities that you just have to memorize even if you don’t play them yourself. It takes so much dedication, so much knowledge, so much skill at reading your opponent, having an answer for any scenario they can throw at you, not being caught off-guard, being able to make adaptations to your gameplan in fractions of a second, etc. If you get a read on your opponent but pause for even a moment it can be death and suddenly it’s your opponent tweeting out “I’m gay”.