Evolution 2010: The Miracle Man with Zangief
Monday, July 12, 2010 at 8:40PM I want to tell you about Snake Eyes. To me, he really was the most interesting story this year at Evolution 2010. Everyone was talking about him the day or two before the tournament, and how great he was. Snake Eyes is a pretty new player (strike one) who plays Zangief (strike two) on a pad (strike 3). "Real" players play on a joystick, and it's rare for pad players to do well. It's also rare for Zangief players in ST/HD Remix to do well, not to mention players who are unknowns on the tournament scene.
I played Snake Eyes a long time ago on Xbox Live, and I didn't think a lot of him. Yeah he's good, but so are a lot of other players. Zangief has a lot of bad matchups, so I can counterpick and be fine, whatever. But people told me "no really, this guy is GOOD." AquaSnake claimed Snake Eyes would make top 8 "for sure, guaranteed" and that he would probably make top 2. This seemed crazy to me. Another player told me there was some casual play of Street Fighter HD Remix with about 20 known players, and Snake Eyes beat all of them in a row with no losses, then beat all of them again. (What??)
Another thing to factor in was the other tournament he attended. Yeah "the" other because he had only ever been to one: West Coast WarZone 2. He lost to AfroLegends there (winner of last year's Evolution), but he had an incredibly good showing. He beat superstar player Alex Valle...twice in the same tournament. I didn't see the first time they faced each other, but the second time Snake Eyes won 6 rounds to 0. Pretty much no one beats Valle like that. Even a hero like Valle can have a bad tournament or a bad day though, so maybe that's all it was?
Snake Eyes was in my pool, along with Kuni the famous Zangief player, John Choi, Pete Talley, Masaka, and some other good players I'm probably forgetting. Incidentally, I double eliminated Kuni (I played Cammy both times), but I lost to Choi. I was too busy playing to see much of Snake Eyes play, but i saw a couple rounds where he just stomped whoever it was. At some point, he beat Choi but that might have been in the semi-finals, I'm not sure. By that night, Snake Eyes made top 8 (winners side, so no match losses yet) and he would face Tokido the next day. If he won, he would face the winner of DGV (Ryu) and Jason Cole (Dhalsim) for the top of the winner's bracket. If he won that he would need only one more win to win Evolution 2010.
He seemed like a nice guy and all, so I made sure he understood some facts of the match, such as how useful low fierce is against a far-away Vega wall dive, and how good lariat is against a crossup dive. We decided to go practice for his sake, because I had made top 8 at Evolution with Vega before, so he could at least prepare for his match against Tokido a bit. After a bit of Vega, he said to play whoever I wanted so as I usually do, I picked like 8 different characters against him.
In casual play, I do fine against even top players. The one player who has beat me worse than anyone ever in casual play was AfroLegends. Like 25 to 3 or something once, just destroyed me. Now I have to add Snake Eyes to that list. I think the score was about 40 to 8, it was brutal. It's actually nothing like being beaten by AfroLegends though. Against Afro, I struggle to even play my game because he controls the whole match, and he sets the pace. Against Snake Eyes though, I can do whatever I want. I'm in control and I keep him out...and then suddenly I lose. I knew all about this phenomenon from Kuni's Zangief. He taught me long ago that Zangief can literally win the entire round off one of your mistakes, but somehow Snake Eyes implements this even better than Kuni. It's all well and good, then suddenly he gets in, and that's it. (Safe jump, some unknown number of force blocked jabs into spd or bait your reversal then sweep, repeat).
I started keeping track of just how Snake Eyes managed to get in each time. I played my impenetrable wall of Cammy stuff, thinking "seriously, how can this go wrong?" Or just stand there with Blanka doing stand strong (beats all Zangief jump attacks) wondering what he could possibly do, even theoretically. Remarkably, I lost several rounds without even KNOWING what went wrong. SweetJohnnyV was watching and he didn't know either half the time. The times I did keep track of it, the critical mistake was when he a) got a jump in I didn't counter, b) snuck in running grab, c) did walk up sweep, d) did walk up spd, e) hit a random move of mine with lariat for the knock down, f) hop into spd...and so on. The point is that there was no single thing, it was a whole lot of different things. Too many things to think about avoiding at any given time.
I now realized...he could actually win this thing. Judging by how he fought my Vega, then adjusting for the Tokido-factor, I thought he had advantage against Tokido. I also thought he actually had more advantage vs Jason Cole (Dhalsim), if they were to play. Could Zangief actually win a tournament though?
I asked Kuni (remember, he's the Japanese player who's famous for Zangief) about the upcoming match and told him how good Snake Eyes was and how soundly he beat me. This was after I had double eliminated Kuni, ha. I asked if Tokido has any special training in this particular match, because I remember I picked Blanka against Tokido before as a surprise, only later to find out that Tokido had recently lost a big tournament to a Blanka and practiced for days and days that match only, vowing never to lose it again. Kuni's response was "hmmmmm....could be an upset." Ha!
Finally the time for the tournament came. Snake Eyes was so far undefeated, in the winner's side of of top 8 with a match against Tokido. That's the exact same situation I was in two years ago, but I lost to Tokido. I told Snake Eyes it was up to him to do what I didn't...and he did. He beat Tokido, but he then lost to DGV's Ryu (barely!!!) and was sent to the loser's bracket. He fought his way all the way up, beating AfroLegends along the way. Remember that Afrolegends won last year's Evolution tournament and also beat Snake Eyes at the only other tournament Snake Eyes attended. Afterwards, Afro told me he really underestimated Snake Eyes and had no real "plan B" approach to the match because he didn't think he needed one.
Snake Eyes made it to the top of the loser's bracket and into the grand finals with DGV (Ryu). Snake Eyes had to win two sets of 3 out of 5, and he did. DGV did well but it was a pretty convincing win. A Zangief just won Evolution. On a pad. And it was his second tournament ever.
I thought it was a pretty interesting development in the metagame, something that was kind of begging to happen if only a Zangief player ever appeared to do it. Balrog is certainly one of the best characters in the game, probably THE best, and we all know that Afrolegends has the ability to win (and he plays Balrog). We also know that Ryu is strong, and that regardless of how good he is, there are several top players who will play him almost no matter what (Choi, Valle, DGV to name a few). Then there's Daigo who plays Ryu and Balrog. But the thing is, Zangief is good against both those characters, so even though he has bad matches against several other characters, he just happens to have an edge on the two characters that are most likely to show up at the end. If only there were some Cammys, Blankas, and Fei Longs to take him out, maybe it would have ended differently?
Those characters would have made it tougher on Snake Eyes, but in the end, let's be real. He played the best of anyone this year, hands down, no question. And as if all that wasn't enough, the night the tournament ended, about 15 or 20 of us were in a hotel room for HD Remix casual play. Snake Eye's Evolution 2010 first place trophy was right next to the TV. He dominated us all for hours on end as we all looked at each other, confused. Two-time Evolution champion Jason Cole was there too, and when Cole played him, we were all ok with stopping to rotation to let them get in several games. This was the match they *almost* had to play on stage, after all, if only Cole had beat DGV. I don't know the actual match score here, but it was a massacre. I'm guessing like 8 games to 0 or something (correct me if I'm wrong, Cole).
Snake Eyes, the Miracle Man of Evolution 2010.
Reader Comments (59)
Just wondering if Snake Eyes played any good Blanka players? I still think that the match is heavy in Blanka's favor so I'm wondering if anyone even tried to counter him with Blanka? Obviously since he won EVO nobody was able to stop him but I wonder if anyone gave him a run with Blanka?
Just hearing about how he smoked even Honda players makes me cringe. lol
Real Decoy: I think Blanka definitely has an advantage over Zangief. I was really curious how Snake Eyes could possibly even beat my Blanka in casual play...but he did. I started trying to keep track of how he got in each time. Half the time I didn't even know. The rest of the times, it was always some different thing.
odog: I made it out of the pools. I played 5 characters in the tournament this year: Sagat, Fei Long, Cammy, Vega, and Bison. I lost to Choi though.
Real Decoy / Sirlin: Is anyone playing Blanka at the Top 8 tournament level? I would guess that would be as surprising as Zangief wining EVO. ;)
Daigo this and Daigo that is making a mockery of Snake Eyes' achievement. Snake Eyes showed up and beat everyone that played him. And barring a hiccup here or there he was just stomping people: ~not close~. That, and he does it with a pad? That, and he does it with Zangief? This is the legend right here everyone--you got to see and read about part I. Feel proud.
A Blanka in top 8 would not be surprising. It's more surprising to not see a Blanka in top 8. I think people are used to Blanka being bad, and not many have explored him in HD Remix for some reason. Yes, a few players have and they are very good. Blanka has a lot of good matches, such as vs Zangief, Guile, Sagat, BIson, Dhalsim to name a few. Look out for DeeJays and Balrogs though (damn you Afrolegends!).
And yeah, beating basically everyone you face in tournament and casual play is pretty much all you can possibly ask from someone. If that's not enough, why do we even have tournaments.
That's the rub, then. Someone needs to put in the time and dedication to really get into HDR Blanka and then actually stick to that during a tourney when the go-to guys like Balrog, Ryu, and Vega are all there for the taking. The fact is, Blanka has -terrible- matchups against tourney stalwarts where Zangief has good ones. That's why you'll need some kind of Zangief revolution before Blanka starts popping up. The metagame doesn't support Blanka. That's how Snake Eyes can come out of nowhere like this--he wasn't -in- the tourney metagame. He's like Dick Fosbury.
I'm kind of curious who Dr. Chaos beat to get the placement that he did. Not saying he's bad, quite the contrary actually. To even make it out of a 128 man pool just to make it to Semi's makes a strong case for a person's ability.
I only ask because you were able to list some of the notable people that Snake Eyes beat.
Either way, both would have been great candidates for the Rising Star award. Maybe, regardless of whether Snake Eye's feat was better, they made the choice by having it be a consolation prize?
I'm sure if you ask any player to choose between winning an EVO tournament or getting a Rising Star award, everyone would pick winning EVO.
Hey Sirlin, i know you're probably pissed off with people dickriding Daigo all the time but...What do you think that would happen if Snake Eyes and Daigo faced each other; i mean, you said in your casuals you always get the control of the match, but lose aniway; what about Daigo, do you think that the kind of match control that he employ would be enough to defeat Snake Eyes? Also, how developed are the mindgames/footsies/etc of Snake Eyes?
It's too hard to guess how Daigo vs. Snake Eyes would go. They're both so good, so I will not even try to guess. As for Snake Eyes's mind games and spacing, that's too hard to answer, too. Like I said before, I often thought I would be able to keep him away, and then he got it anyway, and sometimes I didn't even know exactly how, or which mistake or wrong guess lead to that. I mean, I won some too, but he won more.
"That's how Snake Eyes can come out of nowhere like this--he wasn't -in- the tourney metagame."
Doesn't "Snake Eyes made a great metagame call" make more sense here?
@Othartheom, I am not sure there is a difference. It's a metagame call if he's just as awesome with Ryu or some other (understood) high tier character and he went with Zangief because he thought he'd wipe everyone out. This is a question he can answer. I'll try to find him and ask him.
people dont understand the miracle snake eyes pulled off, a friend of mine who came back from evo said snake eyes was the best zangief he had ever seen.
Wow finally someone is able to show that arcade sticks don't always mean advantage because it really REALLY depends on the player. I said it a long time ago that there are people out there similar to Daigo who just haven't made themselves known yet. With him being new and already running through everybody you can tell he has be studying, practicing, and learning. Just amazing!
@Icegoten
Truly agree with what you just said. It's honestly amazing just how many non-known players there are who are really good. Just the other day I was playing SC2, and encountered someone who was playing just like Liquid'Nazgul, who's known for being one of the top players. Seeing as how we were rated high on Battle.Net, it'd be odd if Nazgul made another account (in other words, it wasn't him). I lost due to making mistakes here and there (he had the better micro for the most part; trade-offs were on his favor, but not by far), but whatever.
My point is that the guy has never entered any tournaments, unless he was lying after we decided to play 2's for a bit. Personally, I've never been to a tournament, at least for gaming. That said, there are A LOT of people who are good, yet they're not known. Sure, we're rated high in SC2 (last I checked, we're both in the Platinum league. Diamond's the highest, however), but meh -- if you're not going to tournaments and/or not placed on Diamond, who the hell is going to know you?
Oh, and I call shenanigans on the whole "Pad is for nubs" crap. I used to play 3S on pad, and was able to pull out whatever could be executed on stick (I stuck w/ shotos, however -- mainly Ken). That said, if I ever failed to parry an obvious d. WHATEVER or missed a hit confirm (e.g. standing MP --> SA3 with Ken -- it's honestly quite easy to "rainbow" on pad. If you can't do it, then obviously you're just not used to it), then that would be my fault.
Of course, I've moved on to an arcade stick -- they're easier to play on for longer durations, and you get the whole "arcade" feel, which is perfect for when you go to an arcade (haha, where can you find one of these nowadays besides Cal, Texas, and New York?).
A supposed low tier char winning Evo w/arguably the best players in the world there is the reason we should all be competing in tournaments. No top players making excuses, just respect to the new guy. I wish other communities were like this and that's why I'm now going to pick up this game.
Sirlin, this is unrelated to the direct subject of the article and I don't know if you have answered this before, but will there be any new moves/changes to HD Remix ever? I really like SSF4 Honda's neutral jumping fierce:(
For a minute, after reading the posts, I got the impression that Daigo didn't play the HDR tourney at Evo. But after checking the Evo site I realised that Daigo did play and he came 4th. Snake Eyes came 1st.
So obviously Snake Eyes beat whoever beat Daigo so its definitely a "legitimate" win. If Daigo were the best player in the tournament, he would have won. Simple. Saying that Snake Eyes has to play Daigo to prove himself after winning a tournament that Daigo was a contestant in isn't fair. The best player usually wins the tournament.
the internet breeds a lot of silly hatred sometimes.
I play neither ST nor HD Remix, but I thought this was a really awesome story. impressive as hell. by the way, when did Snake Eyes start playing? was HD Remix his first foray into fighting games, or what?
Snake Eyez told me that he dabbled in Street Fighter HF a long time ago, but that HD Remix was the first fighting game he played "for real."
Sirlin, I read your articles long time ago, and it changed my thoughts about playiong - I dare to say I really enjoy gaming now, seeing the challenge in mindgames, planning threats and measuring strengths with opponents, not only in electroning gaming but in other games like chess, TCG, soccer, basketball etc. Thanks for your "Play to Win" series!!!
Now, about Snake Eyes.
Man, he's a beast! I watched the Evo 2010 Finals at Youtube, against Afrolegends (a lightning-speed Balrog player) and DGV, and I loved how Snake Eyes controls their matches.
One thing I noted, Snake Eyes uses medium kick to control space and hit by far, just like Pony's Zangief. They share some things in common, maybe Snake Eyes learned one thing or two seeing Pony videos. Well, as for me, I learned to play w/ Gief seeing Pony, and I learned how to play with Sim watching "80 arts of Yoga" in a japanese site (can't remember which, I think I saw the hyperlink in your page).
So, regards and keep the good work, here's a fan of yours from Brazil.
Thanks PoMbO! Yeah Snake Eyez probably did learn some things from Pony (and good for him, Pony is amazing).