Welcome to a feature I’m testing out on In Third Person that I like to call “Jett Vs.” (no relation to that Shaq show). For now, I’ll probably use this as a place to post some of my Street Fighter match videos, talk about Street Fighter knowledge and what happened in a particular match. I guess with a name like “Jett Vs.”, I can use it for basically anything related to competitive gaming. Apologies in advance the poor video and audio quality; it’s the best I can do with the on-board camera on my laptop.
For episode 1, I chose a battle I recently had with a Ken player whose cocky play cost him the match. Click through to the rest of the post to see the video and read my match commentary.
About Akuma vs. Ken
According to IPLAYWINNER’s tier list, Akuma vs. Ken is a 5-5 match-up. What that means is, neither character has a distinct advantage against each other. Akuma may have more special moves than Ken, but Ken’s ability to rush down can really hurt Akuma and his low stamina.
Where this match really boils down to is in the play style, particularly with Ken players. People who play as Ken are notorious in the Street Fighter IV community for a number of reasons:
1. Ken is newbie friendly.
2. Ken is insanely popular in online play.
3. Ken’s move set works well with reckless play.
4. The person playing as Ken usually sucks. Bad Ken players often think Ken is the best because it’s easy to make something flashy happen, but in the Street Fighter IV series, he’s low-mid tier at best.
When I play this match, oftentimes it boils down to just punishing reckless mistakes that Ken players often make.
The Match
To my opponent’s credit, he’s not a scrub. In this match, he makes it clear to me that he understands more advanced tactics such as cross-ups, tick throws, block strings and mix-ups. For much of this fight, he even has the upper hand, particularly at 0:51, where he counters my Raging Demon setup with a Shinryuken.
However, his reckless play and cocky attitude really come to haunt him starting at 1:30. He did back-to-back wake-up shoryukens (a classic Ken mistake) and I punish him with back-to-back Akuma bread-and-butter combos. At this point, I don’t really know what he was thinking, but he threw the round by taunting.
This didn’t really help his cause in round 3, where I was able to come back from a major life deficit by capitalizing on his reckless play. He was so focused on ending the match that he wasted his super and opened himself to big combos.
I know I’m not a Street Fighter expert, but do you find this feature interesting at all? Would you like to see more of these? Tell me what you think!
In Third Person 