By Derek Daniels

June, 15 2000 |

So after much arguing with not only my friends, but myself as well – I decided to bite the bullet and go to ECC this year. ECC4 last year was just insane – a little too big and too unorganized for my tastes and this year seemed even worse – with more people attending and fewer cabinets and what not. For some unknown reason, maybe people didn’t want to deal with it all over again or something – but the attendance was lower which was a good thing all around IMO. But before we delve into all of that nonsense – lets start at the beginning.

I spent a lot of time and money on phone calls trying to get everything organized the last 2 weeks – everyone was lagging and relying on me to get everything done. Bah. I think between me and John Choi, we organized half of the people getting to ECC. On Thursday night I hop on irc and get everything settled – call everyone that needs to know whats up and get sleep for a hange. I get up around 6:00 a.m. and get ready when my friend Tin shows up to take me to the airport. My flight leaves at 8:30 a.m., his leaves around 5:00 p.m., so he just drops me off and does whatever. This is when my first big obstacle with ECC must be overcome – the fact that I arrive into Laguardia airport – whereas everyone else arrives into Newark it seems. My friend Tony Carmona from Wisconsin was arriving into Newark at noon – remember I arrived into Laguardia at one. Thankfully Jef Pearlman (crowbait) and Scott Bradburn (scottb) were able to not only pick Tony up – but they also drove into NYC to pick me up! They were running a tad bit late – I waited around 45 minutes wondering where they were – but the A-team minivan showed up and everything was good to go from there.

We were now in NYC and had no idea what to do really. I called my friend Tamara – who is doing the Street Fighter Documentary and she said she had to finish up working on some stuff and that we should go to the Soho area and wait for her. So after getting lost, we finally found a place to park and walked around NYC. As soon as we left the car, we started heading North on Broadway and ran into one of the guys from Onyx – you know, ‘Slam! Let the boys be boys! Slam!’ Not quite as cool as running into Missy Elliot last year, but hey, I’ll take what I can get. We eat at some mediocre diner and by then, it’s time for Jef and Scott to pick up everyone else – David Sirlin, John Choi, Alex Valle, Thao Duong and Tin Ang all needed to be picked up at Newark around 7:00 p.m. We decide that we should stay in pairs – so me and Tony attempt to find Chinatown while Jef and Scott head to Newark. I try calling Tamara a few times – but get no answer and just leave a message telling her to meet us at Chinatown Fair – the main arcade in New York City where Eddie Lee, Henry Cen, Arturo Sanchez and others play at.

Me and Tony have NO idea where we are going – I suggest we find a subway station and ask which subway we should take, he agrees. Not knowing where a subway station is either – we just pick a random direction to start walking in. We are walking south for like 2 blocks when I turn to my left and run into this kid I went to middle school and high school with named Jeff, which was hella random. We talk about how we haven’t seen each other in like 4 years, catch up, exchange numbers and he tells us that Chinatown in only like 5 blocks south, 5 blocks west – so we start walking. Chinatown always makes me laugh – because it is so bootleg. On Friday they were already selling copies of Mission Impossible 2 on video with nice color covers and everything for !! Keep in mind the movie had only been out since Wednesday. Also every other person was trying to sell you bootleg versions of mainstream cd’s – all with bad covers. I saw so many copies of Britney spears looking orange and stuff.

We finally get to CTF (Chinatown Fair) and I find Rob Ingrim (calisean), George (lustedg), and some other people – like Amir, Eddie, Henry, etc. Me and Tony try to get some practice in on Alpha 2 – but the right side is all jacked, so we went and played Alpha 3 instead. Tamara shows up quickly and we decide to go walk around some. It is now me, Tamara, Tony, Rob and George – so we decide to go to Times Square since we haven’t been there yet this year. I don’t really remember whose idea it was –but we ended up going to the Marriott and went to this restaurant on the 48th floor that rotated to get our drink on. I paid sooo much for a coke – like I think. After about an hour – we basically got kicked out for not spending enough money – but it was okay because we had contacted Jef who told us that he had everyone with him and meet them at CTF. We went to Union Square to pick up Tamara’s friend – Cadence and we hung out at the Virgin record store there. That place is sooo big – I think we all got lost. I could have spent days in there, they had so much stuff. After rounding up the gang – we headed back to CTF to wait until the rest of the cali crew showed up.

Everyone finally shows up, we all say hi and what not and head to Cha Cha’s something or other – some restaurant in little Italy. Team Uncivilized got all loud over some Lakers basketball game, got ripped off on our bill – somehow we still owed 0 but no one knows how – Choi said screw this and paid for it so we could get out, something I didn’t know until we left or I would not have let him do it. We go back to CTF and play games til they close – around 2 in the morning. By the time we got home, it was near sunrise, but that did not stop everyone from playing mvc2 on the Dreamcast. I finally got to see that game and decided that it was just too broken for me and went to bed.

Next morning, Saturday, we all got up and headed to the break around 11 a.m. I think. As soon as we got there, everyone registered for whatever and we started to play. This was my first main complaint – all the a3 cabinets were already sectioned off for tournament play – I had no time to get warmed up. Bah. Somehow Choi managed to sneak his way onto the one of the Alpha3 cabinets and got some play in. I looked over and saw that he was challenging a few people with V Ryu and it was not pretty. The one time I did stop to watch he was doing Ryu’s infinite on some poor kid – which was banned during the tournament.

I opted to play Super Turbo and Alpha 2 since I was also entering those tournaments as well. I played a lot of Super Turbo against this kid named Collin from Virginia. While playing him, they called my name for Alpha3. Since I have only played once versus people since ECC4 and since I got no time to get warmed up – I went out without even putting up a fight. I don’t even remember who the first person I played was – all I know is that he destroyed my weak V Zangief and V Sakura. I was trying to Jab Roll, throw with one button, forgot to tech hit in the air, blah blah. Game just feel hella foreign to me. Taking my loss like a man, I went back to playing Alpha2 and ST. I think it was around this time that I heard them call Valle’s name, so I walked over there to watch him fight. This is when the money fiasco happened – which I’m sure everyone has read about – so I am not going to comment on it. Once all that is resolved, the alpha 3 tournament begins again.

Since I had already lost one game, I was in the losers bracket and I think my next match was against Mike Creque (masaka). Once again – I went out without even putting up a fight. His A Karin rocked my pitiful V Zangief and V Sakura. With my head down, I walked back over to the Alpha 2 and ST cabinets and played those until I heard them call John Choi versus Alex Valle – which Choi won with V Sakura versus V Ryu and sent Valle into the losers bracket. I didn’t watch a lot of matches that perhaps I should have, but I know Valle beat Eddie somewhere around here also (before he fought Choi?), Henry Cen beat David Sirlin, Jef Pealman’s V Charlie beat Thao’s A Charlie, etc. The only matches I watched was Choi versus Henry – V Akuma versus A Bison and the finals between Choi and Valle. Umm…no comment on the finals either. Oh yeah, how could I forget the match with Arturo versus someone (Jef Pearlman maybe?) where his runaway V Vega activated VC to get away and hung onto the wall to kill even more time. East Coast Baby!!!

Third Strike either started around this time or had already started, since I didn’t enter this tournament I paid no attention to it. I was too busy playing Alpha 2 and Super Turbo the entire time. Somehow, Choi got third and the finals consisted of Valle versus Eddie Lee with what seemed to take forever. It was nothing but Valle Kara throwing the hell out of Eddie with Ryu and Eddie throwing the hell out of Valle with Chun Li. In between the throws, the matches consisted mostly of Valle building up meter so he could ex red fireball Chun Li to death. This is where Valle implemented his advanced Valle-only technique of where he would either throw out fireballs nonstop in the beginning of the round so that Eddie would use Chun Li’s super to go through them and or he was doing low roundhouse nonstop so that Eddie would block it and super back. Granted he was going to lose half of his life by eating the super – but he doesn’t care – because now Eddie no longer has meter, and Valle is free to ‘rush that shit down’.

Marvel versus Capcom tournament started sometime – since it was another game I decided not to enter – I paid zero attention to it. No one can touch Eddie Lee in this game, I know he won the winners bracket and for the finals, he played Red Venom and Strider and took the series 4 straight. By the time everything ended, it was 4 a.m. We had been in the arcade since 11 a.m. mind you, so that is like 17 hours we were there. Ack. I’m sure Todd, Gina, John, and Pete were there even longer than we were.

We get back to Jef’s house, the sun is up, and I don’t know about the rest of those fools, but I went straight to sleep. This is when the main problem of ECC arises – the two car scenario. Originally we were going to have a, ‘lets get up early and practice’ car and a, ‘I wanna sleep in some’ car. All good right? Ha! Someone, we won’t say who, left the key to the ‘I wanna sleep in some’ car in the ‘lets get up early and practice’ car. I woke up around noon, got Thao up, got Jef up, etc and we were all set to start driving when we realized we had no key!! So we had to call the break, track down someone from our group, wait til they showed up, and drive to the break. Woo hoo! Got there around 1:30 or so and was barely allowed into the ST tournament.

The ST tournament started off fun, but went downhill from there. My first match was against Kenny Davis (gyl) who was also my first match last year. Since he beat me last year – we had a little rivalry going on and we were both talking hella smack on irc. I tried Old Ryu first against his DJ, which he beat me in the third round. I switched to Balrog since he is my main ‘bidness’ character. I beat his DJ and I’m pretty sure he switched to Guile, which I beat also. Happy that I won my first match, I looked to see who I played next and was not happy to see that it was Collin – another member of Team Virginia. Since me and Collin played ALL day long yesterday, I was not looking forward to this. I was having a hard time beating his Dhalsim and he knew it. When our match was up – he picked Dhalsim and I picked Balrog. I quickly lost the first match and couldn’t decide what to do next. I tried Bison but I forgot that Collin plays against Gary who also plays Bison all the time, so I was quickly peaced out. Put into the losers bracket, I was thinking my next match shouldn’t be that hard. Ha! My next match was against Alex Valle – which presented a problem. I figured that he was going to play New Ryu against me – so I didn’t want to play him shoto versus shoto as no matter what game it is, he knows that shit too well. I figured if he plays N.Ryu my chances with Balrog are good, so that is who I decided to play. Well, that chump busted out Old Sagat on me! I lost the first game and was really stuck on what to do next. I wanted to switch to New Ryu, but even if I won – he would switch to Ryu and we would be back to fighting shoto versus shoto. So I stuck with Balrog – and barely lost the second game, which means I was out of the tournament for good. Bah.

Choi went on to beat everyone up in the winners bracket until he faced Omar. Omar beat him 2-0, I think, with Old Ken versus Choi’s New Ryu. From there it was bidness time and Choi picked on everyone with Old Sagat. The finals were Choi versus Omar, with Choi playing Old Sagat versus Omar’s Old Ryu the first set. I think the score was 4-1. For the second set Omar switched to Old Ken – which was a mistake IMO, he should have either stayed with Old Ryu or switched to New Ryu. The score on the last set was 4-1 in Choi’s favor.

Oh yeah, while all this was going on there was a Tekken Tag Tournament I guess. All I know is that Shauno from LA got second and that Alex Valle got first. I know that someone put Alex into the losers bracket, but I forget his name. I watched when they played again and the poor kid got rushed down, I don’t think Alex even lost a round. This tournament was quite funny – I could always tell when Alex was winning because it would be quiet, but every time he lost a round the whole arcade erupted with fools going nuts.

The last tournament for ECC was Alpha 2. The main thing that sucked about this tournament was the fact that it was the last one. Alpha 2 is a really fast game and requires a ton of energy to play – at least for me. You have to do jab rolls all the time, look out for CC’s, try to dragon punch everything – and just doing repeated fireballs in CC’s takes a lot out of you. Shrug. My first game was against John Crespo – I played Ryu and he played Sakura. I won the first game and the second game I started getting a tad bit nervous – because A2 Sakura was finally starting to come back to him. If we would have kept playing, I don’t think I would have won – but he just didn’t get warmed up those first 2 games so it was gg for him. My next match was against Scott Bradburn – which I thought was going to play Sakura as well, but he pulled out Chun Li on me. Argh! I forget if it was 3 games or not, I just remember winning with Ryu and wanting to collapse afterwards. I had to save my meter and do nothing but counter custom every single time he customed me. Chun’s CC is too deadly to get hit by – something I had totally forgotten about. My next match was against Eddie Lee’s Rose. I tried Ryu the first game and got beat and instead of changing characters like I should have, I tried Ryu again and lost. Shrug. Now in the losers bracket, I had to fight against some random person – I forget his name. I played Ryu and he played Ken. I don’t remember much about this matchup either – I just remember winning. They called my name again and it was against Jae, a good Ken player. He totally rocked me with Ken’s kick Alpha Counter – another thing I had totally forgotten about. By this time it was near midnight I think and I just didn’t have the energy in me to try to Alpha Counter Reversal everything and so it was ggpo for me.

By this time, I was out of the tournament, exhausted and not wanting to play another video game. I watched some more matches as I sat there and wanted to go to bed. I watched Omar beat Thao with Rose versus Chun Li. Sirlin turned to me and goes, ‘Wow – maybe I should try Rose too huh?’ I didn’t watch it, but Sirlin told me that he didn’t have the same success as Omar. I know Choi put Omar into losers bracket, and that Omar beat Sirlin in the losers bracket also. Choi also put Valle into the losers bracket and went on to win the winners bracket. The finals were Choi versus Valle and after poor Choi getting raped 0-4, which allowed Valle to win the first set, he switched from Ryu to Ken and beat Valle to win the whole thing.

ECC was finally over!! Woo hoo! Somewhere along the course of the night, we made plans with Pete Talley to meet him at some diner in New York. I have no idea when we got there, around 2 or 3 a.m. I think. It was me, Choi, Valle, Tin, Jason Cole, Thao, Andrew Ward (blt), Adam Jennings (kikin), Jef Pearlman, Scott Bradburn, David Sirlin, Shauno, Tony Carmona, Rob Ingrim (calisean) and Arturo Sanchez (sabin), Eddie Lee met us there halfway through. After getting food – we decided to split up again – the people who wanted sleep went back to New Jersey while Valle, Choi, Thao, Rob, Jef, Shauno and me went into the city to find some rave and meet up with Pete Talley. We got there around 4:30 a.m. and stayed until 6:30 a.m. or so where we had to take off like the A-Team so both me and Rob could catch out planes. They dropped me off at Laguardia and from what I hear they barely got Rob to JFK in time.

In case no one has noticed – I still had no sleep at this point and I was on a plane back to Indy. I got home around 1:30 or so I think. I talked to my roommate and decided to take a nap. I woke up and it was 7 a.m. in the morning!!! I slept like 17 hours or something insane like that. I got up, called into work and said I couldn’t make it, got some water to satisfy my dehydrated body and tried to recover the rest of the day.

I had a lot of fun this year actually. The actual tournament was okay at best – the main fun came from hanging out with everyone and seeing New York City again. I would REALLY like to thank Jef Pearlman – the unsung hero of ECC this year. You have NO idea how much he did for all of us. I would also like to thank Pete Talley for showing all of us around for being a good guy all around, Tamara for explaining the subway system to me (finally!), and everyone else that was involved and made my stay enjoyable – you know who you are.

Derek Daniels