And so another year begins

Finally summer is over and school at USC has started up again. I had a fun filled summer experience. For those of you that don't know I had the opportunity to volunteer abroad over this summer in Uganda. It was quite an amazing experience. But before that I had a 3-day vacation in Dubai prior to arriving in Uganda. I met Chris, Kristina, and Nicolette on the way to Dubai and we were the four brave souls to step into Dubai and come out alive (with all our money).

Dubai is Dubai, and there really isn't that much to talk about. I am sad I didn't make a travel blog due to my laziness, but sometime in the future I will re-write my journal entries. Here is a video I took of the AGYA house in UGANDA




Anyway after Uganda I had to prepare for Evo and shortly after school started. I am excited for the next big tournament though which is West Coast Warzone. Everyone should attend whether you like street fighter or not.

I'm Back

After a long break from updating my blog, I think it is time that I start this up again. I will update things within the next few weeks of my adventures over the past few months. Includes: Lots of SF4, Dubai, Uganda, and Evo!

Slowly improving

I can only visit the arcades during the weekends because of school and so every weekend when I start playing I am a bit rusty. But I am slowly improving my game in TvC and SFIV. I am starting to get the hang of being patient and turtling with Ken even though most people would probably find it annoying, but it is a style that works for me. As for TvC, I am finally getting used to that game and I find it more enjoyable than SFIV. I may perhaps make it the main game I play and my main team right now is Hurrican Polymar/Morrigan. There is some good competition at Super and I got owned a few times by some pros. Anyway I got some good games in this weekend. My schedule goes like this: Friday I get off class at 12, head to super, then to AI, then to Vid94. A full day of gaming in. On Saturdays I go study at Starbucks a bit then head to super for the rest of the day and then possibly to AI and then Vid94. On Sundays if I don't have meetings I will head to super at night until it closes then head back to USC. So only three days in the week I get to practice some moves, not bad.

So with school starting to pick up, I may be limited on some of these weekends since midterms are coming soon and I will have to sacrifice a weekend or two to get some studying in. I am determined to get the best grades this semester since I suffered greatly last semester. Some good news though is that I will be going to Uganda this summer on a volunteer project through the volunteer center here at USC and so that will be a short break from gaming. I plan to go to Evo2k9 and this will be my first time going to Evo. I am really excited that the lineup is finally out and that it will be hosted at the Rio from July 17-19. Hopefully I can get better by then and be a formidable opponent for the pros.

Anyways ggs to the guys at super, ai, and vid94 this weekend. Hopefully I will be able to put a challenge in the near future, especially with SFIV coming out in two weeks. I will definitely be practicing throughout the week!

Eventful Week

So after the first week of the semester I decided I would hit up UCLA on Thursday night and stay there for Friday. So I headed over to UCLA stayed at Serena's place for the night since the arcade on campus doesn't open til 8 AM or something. So I stayed up the whole night watching videos and stuff on youtube and took a 15- minute nap. When Serena woke up we finally headed to campus and she had to head for her virology class. I walked her to class and I saw Jenn on the way there, that was pretty cool, she was confused at first, but I told her I was just visiting campus. Anyway I headed to Ackerman soon after and hit up the arcade for some quick SFIV play time. I had good practice that day as it was one of the times where I can keep constantly playing without waiting for eight other people in front of me. Anyway after a day of SFIV I went to a potluck with Serena and some of her friends, it was pretty cool. Serena kept kicking my ass at Tetris Attack, and so now I am back into Tetris Attack and will practice to get some revenge.

Saturday was good as well. Got to go snowboarding with Serena, Evelina, Jeanny, and Julie. Yeah I was the only guy, how awesome is that. Anyway it was a good day of snowboarding except for the icy snow. I fell hard for the first time and I felt like I destroyed my knees so I had to call it a day an hour early, so I chilled at the lodge for an hour until everyone else finished up. I can't wait to snowboard again, it is so much more fun and fulfilling when you can carve down the mountain. Sooner or later it would be time to conquer the jumps!

Sunday is usually my relax and do homework day, but since it was a long weekend I decided to hang out at the arcade. Hit up Super arcade in the afternoon and stayed there for a while. There was a new game there called Tatsunoko vs Capcom and it looks hella fun. I've decided that I will start getting into that game when I get the basics down. But for the time being I just played SFIV all day! Got some good practice in and I can finally connect some of Ken's combos such as lk, lp, lk, mk, ex-hurricane and mix it up a bit. There were a bunch of scrubs playing for their first times or something and I was able to get a 16 win streak going. For some reason everyone who is new to the game either uses Ken or Ryu. Oh well, that was fun while it lasted. Someone who eventually knew how to play came and beat me with Zangief. I hate Zangief because he is so monstrous and intimidating that I really can't do much to him, so I was just grabbed to hell. Anyway after that I headed to Olive Garden with the guys and had a good dinner.

Video of Tatsunoko vs Capcom!

Schools starting

So school started on Monday. I am taking Marketing, Corporate Finance, Business Statistics, Science of Human Performance, and Advertising. The business classes simply all suck, but on the bright side I do not have any classes on Wednesday! Today was club fair day and there wasn't anything interesting...again. I have been deprived of playing SFIV being stuck at this school so this Friday I'm headed to UCLA to get some playing time in! I think that is the closest arcade to me with SFIV. I heard there is an arcade in Little Tokyo and I might go and check it out someday. Just about a month before SFIV comes out on consoles and then its time to practice my Ken all day long. I ordered a PS2 -> PS3 converter for my fight stick and it is on its way from Korea. I won't slack off this semester like I did last semester though because I will have a hobby this time. I usually do bad when I have absolutely nothing to do and just waste time. All the years I have done well in school seemed to have involved me gaming or hanging out all day, how strange huh? I really wish there was an arcade on campus like they do at UCLA. Hopefully when the student center place gets built we can get one!

Anyway snowboarding this weekend, I am excited! Got my goggles back from Riley and I have my USC beanie to sport!

One of my favorite matches!

College Football Bowl Games

Most of you know I love college football. It is probably my favorite sport and I follow it religiously. This year I totally owned at my picks. I went 28-6 in straight picks which is tied for FIRST place among 5 other people on EPSN. But confidence picks are where you truly have to shine and I broke the top 100 this year. I'm ranked 89th out of everyone on EPSN that participated. Woot!

SFIV Practice

So throughout my winter break I have been playing Street Fighter IV on and off. There was this one night where I was playing at Arcade Infinity and it was the night before a big tournament there. I was playing Ken as usual and I don't think I ever won a match. I was playing this guy who was really damn good with Balrog and the next day my friend told me he was called gootecks and he was really good. Turns out he won the tournament and I didn't feel too bad losing so many times to him the night before. Ken seems to suck and I can barely win with him. I might reconsider using a new character, but I am not sure yet. I pre-ordered the game at EBGames after trading in some DS games and I plan to trade in some of my Wii and PS3 games to put toward Street Fighter IV. The collectors edition of the game is $79.99 and I am also planning on getting the tournament fighting stick which is $149.99.

This is the collectors edition of the game!



This is what the fighting stick looks like!