zachd.com: curly mustaches all around
Brought to you by Preppy. The discussion thread for this site.
What's new
* 06/10: More SF4 footage up. Cody came to town but we didn't end up taping anything. =\
* 06/10: Lots of rumors, but Capcom says MvC2 has no set release date yet.
* 06/09: Kotaku reports that there's a MvC2 hip-hop mixtape coming out.
* 06/08: TvC is coming to the US in January. Too bad it's only for the Wii. :)
* 05/17: Magnetro and BlackHeartKing put out a pretty incredible Blackheart Explored advanced tutorial. Watch it. If this doesn't step your game up with every character, my name is not John Preppard III.
* 05/12: There's a preview video of the new update of Marvel vs Capcom 2 up now, an interview with interview with producer Rey Jimenez, and a very cool look at Bengus' Street Fighter art.
* 05/04: Footage from the latest Seattle Marvel tourney is now up - enjoy! (Discussion thread.)
* 05/01: Marvel news: It won't be rebalanced - it'll be the classic Dreamcast version ported with game-crashing bugs (Ruby!) fixed and online play added (much like the old Japanese Dreamcast version in the ST:HDR style). You want this to succeed. The rumored MvC2 sticks were a hoax. And the PS3 demo is local-play-only. XD
* 04/27: The top is popped. Capcom in-depth announcement. tu4ar revealed (hi-def trailer, link to Capcom-Unity forums) Hands on review. PSN demo coming April 30th.
Gameplay videos from GameTrailers.com (taken at the initial demo of people that don't know what they're doing, but it shows how the constrained widescreen works). Gameplay demo (shows game menus, etc).
* 04/17: More rumors.
* 04/13: Some people have way too much time on their hands. (Not gaming related, really. But don't we need a combo/music video like this?)
* 04/07: Khaotic sends in a nice Sentinel combo montage video from NeoPhase Productions.
* 04/24: All the matches from Seasons Beatings III in Ohio are up now. Seasons Beatings discussion (lots of good info there, actually). Fugees special footage release plans.");
* 02/02: You should have already seen this, but Evo2009 is in Vegas July 17th-19th. With Marvel. Full of win. See you there.
* 01/27: Fugee reports that he's still working on the Season's Beatings footage, so look forward to that when he finishes. :)
* 12/24: If you're a Premium member on SRK, this thread has a special Christmahanukahanzaa goodie for you brought to you courtesy of MrWizard. *thumbs up* If you're not a Premium member, happy holidays regardless! Enjoy the nine new Season's Beatings matches that went up today. :)
* 12/14: TvC is pretty cool. And SF4 is now available for preorder if you're interested (Xbox 360 and PS3 collector's edition).
* 12/10: Hamm finished encoding six matches from Season's Beatings: they're up now. Thanks Hamm!
* 12/02: Marvel technical warrior Joo has released the DVD trailer for his master project. This reaches towards the pinnacle of what is possible, and should be required viewing. =]
* 12/12: PalMod Version 1.22 is out now! It's still a little rough, but should be an incredible leap forward from the old version. Should make editing extras a snap.
* 11/26: Super Street Fighter II HD Remix is out now! It's great. Buy it, play it, love it. Support Capcom's love for core fighting game franchises. My review is that this game looks fantastic, the music is generally top-notch (! in a fighting game?), the net code on the 360 seemed like they were in my house, and on a Hori EX2 stick it felt arcade-a-licious. Most highly recommended. The few uneven spots (win/loss totals currently lagging) are more than made up for by some serious excellence here. (ALSO: you can buy it directly online for your Xbox here so that it will autodownload to your Xbox when you get home and turn it on. How sweet is that?)
* 11/21: Thanks to SIN and Nestor, here's about 80 matches from Japan: Set 1 and Set 2 of post-ranbat casuals, mostly of Japanese players vs Nestor. :)
* 10/28: The Oregon Fall Showdown footage is now up.
* 10/21: Today is officially Chris Schmidt Appreciation Day. At the most competitive Marvel vs Capcom 2 tournament ever, Chris took it home. There were no free victories or Pink Brackets of Love For Marn - it was entirely the Black Bracket of Death and everybody got destroyed. When Justin Wong gets 17th and Sanford has to beast out of Losers just to get 9th - legendary. You should have been there. Rumors of Marvel's death have been greatly exagerated. Rumors of East Coast supremacy have been rebutted by Team Three with vigor.
* 10/20: I'm looking at a site revamp. Ideally I'd like this main page to have a blog-like feel so people can put up comments. I'd like the videos to be rateable, and maybe have a picture gallery. Maybe have pages for top/interesting players with links to their videos. Let me know if you have good ideas for this. *thumbs up*
* 10/01: Risu's Basic Chun Li video is now up - some pretty killer tricks to make Chun much much more effective.
* 9/15: DJ-b13's Tricks of the Trade Volume 5 is out now! Tons more tricks for people to steal. :)
* 9/07: OK, FlashGet users will now find themselves failing. Please enjoy the redirection URL. We'll see if this increases the site speed at all.
* 8/12: InventiveFlow's Advanced Tactics II combo video (as premiered at Evo) is up now - discuss here. Tons of interesting tricks, plus there's a nice explanation of how/why it works.
* 8/08: More from the Bernie DVDs: lots of ECC4 footage and Eight on the Break Street Fighter 3: Second Impact tourney footage.
* 7/25: From Strider_zero: FFA 7/19 tourney footage
* 7/25: From the Bernie DVDs: ECC3 and Evo2k2 footage.
* 7/25: If you're into editing colors, here's my mix: just colors or colors and colored moves. Thanks to many people who helped with that.
* 7/16: The Pacific Northwest Majors footage is up now. (Thanks to RayBladeX for the Direct Capture footage - there's even SuperTurbo and CVS2 footage here. :D ) I'll now go back and encode the DVDs from Bernie.
* 7/01: Bernie was beautiful enough to drop off 15 DVDs worth of classic footage. For starters, here's a new capture of the 1998 Street Fighter Alpha 3 World Championship (previously found as a RMVB or on YouTube): about the matches,
US Championship: Graham Wolfe and Valle,
World Championship: Valle vs Daigo, and
Post-Tourney Exhibition: Daigo vs Valle. (SFA3 discussion thread.)
* 6/25: The Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix Beta is now up! Get at it. You can only play as Ken or Ryu and there ARE a bunch of beta bugs, but it's still great fun. Ryu's fake fireball and Ken's Rainbow hurricane kick are fun.
* 6/23: The Snakeshotpeople vs Infinite money match footage is up now thanks to Amir.
* 6/22: The June 6th Seattle Marvel tourney footage is up.
* 6/22: As a small reminder: don't rehost footage I put together on YouTube (a commercial site). If there are matches you feel should be on YouTube, ask me to put them up there. I strongly dislike that YouTube doesn't support fellow video sites, which is why anything *I* put up there will point you to the site that it comes from. I realize the video site community has kind of withered from where it once was, but we don't need to encourage further decay. Thanks for your understanding.
* 6/03: The latest Seattle Marvel tourney footage is now (finally) up. Camera assist here and there from Theo, thanks. =)
* 6/02: Joo released a sample video filled with clips he is using in a combo dvd. The combo dvd is filled with his best combos for every character.
He is uncertain whether he'll release the dvd publically , however if he does, it'll be up sometime near the end of '08. You can view this clip here. It requires the X264 codec to play it back because Magnetro is a bad man. The video is great.
* 5/23: Another SF gem from NKI: TZW's Information High - an hour of crazy Street Fighter Alpha, Super Turbo, and Street Fighter THE MOVIE combos, focusing on Charlie.
* 5/08: For SF2 fans, thanks to NKI: TZW: One More Blue Nightmare. This is a two hour long SF2 Guile combo-fest and is 500MB so probably not for everyone.
* 5/08: If you're a Premium member on SRK, this thread again has a special goodie for you brought to you courtesy of MrWizard. *thumbs up*
* 4/18: All my Final Round XI footage is now up. Enjoy!
* 4/05: Good news, bad news: got some more Seattle Marvel footage up now - enjoy!
* 3/14: Some pretty great footage of Josh360's IronMan vs SnakeShotPeople in New York. (The files use the DIVX AVI codec.)
* 3/01: Magnetro put up a nicer front-end to the various "hidden" files in the archives here.
* 09/29: A guide to building your own Custom color Marvel is here and has pictures of what was debuted at Evo. Hope you all enjoy Suupabuu's work here.
* Thanks to Gandido, Bernie, Eidrian, Jacob, Chris, Irvin, Steven, aziz, and Toan for their support. *thumbs up*
* About links at top: logos courtesy of those sites, Magnetro, Master Chibi, and Diego. If you have a better logo, please let me know. If you want a link down in the Links section, let me know. I'll probably write a rotating link bar when I get a chance, or at least scroll it or something interesting.
Other stuff/older videos:
This is the usually out-of-date-but-fairly-accurate list of the 300+ GB of match and combo videos I have. You can use the Search page to sort through it. Literally everything is up.
Please do not put stuff I recorded up on YouTube. That is a commercial site and I do not support it. The quality is abysmal and it locks you into using that site (and Flash, which I also hate). The entire point of this FREE site is to let you guys grab great quality footage. I have my own YouTube and SoapBox accounts and if I want to put stuff up there, I could. But I don't usually want to, so please don't do that for me. If I see you do that without asking, I will have your content removed. So again: please don't.
Tourneys
Tourney announcements are made on SRK here. Check to see if there's one upcoming in your area.
Unlock All MvC2 Characters
The official CapCom document on how to unlock all characters on US MvC2 arcade board is here (my easier summary of it is found here. (Obot just pointed me to the Japanese codes here - big thumbs up for that reference.)) Text write-up of the Japanese steps.
How to play the files back:
WMV files can be played back most easily using Windows Media Player, although other players play them too. Most of these files use the WMV9 video codec. There's info on getting the right WMV9 pack for your player here if you need it. If you're on a Mac, the Flip4Mac plug-in should be what you want.
If it uses AVI, I typically ensure that the file includes the name of the codec in the filename. Most AVI codecs are still under development/not ready for prime time, so I REALLY prefer not to use AVI for any reason. I've just seen too many (quite literally millions, as I work in multimedia for a living) of systems crashing due to bad AVI codecs.
Further links:
Gaming: Shoryuken. The granddaddy of fighting game sites.
Gaming: SRK Radio by Bunkei. New goodness.
Videos: GoForBroke News. Well maintained list of what's new in the video world.
Art: Street Fighter Galleries. Good stuff.
Gaming: Dark Knights Clan. Kaillera and XvSF nuts. =)
Gaming/Videos: Tokyo Game Action. We like these guys.
Gaming/Videos: Denjin Video. They're back! These guys definitely helped build my early interest in Marvel.
Videos: comboVideos.com. They've really trimmed back the ads on their site, which is great.
Videos: Obot64. Good stuff.
Videos: Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 videos
Gaming: Boston Fight Hub
Gaming: Central California Marvel
Gaming: Long Island Gaming
Gaming/Media: Hardcore Gamer Magazine. Nice mag.
Gaming/Videos: Colorado Fusion Colorado gaming site, with Third Strike videos over at ExtraFresh.
Videos: Carnevil is sharing random MvC2 footage.
Gaming/Videos: Speed Demos Archive: non-tool assisted gaming speed runs.
Videos/etc: ComboAdictos. Mexican game fans.
Videos: Gamevideos at GodWeapon. Various collections of vids from all sorts of games. Has the Meikyousisui vids, which are damned hot. Doesn't seem to have anything original these days, but still alive.
Gaming/Videos: Chile fighting site. With pointers to videos.
The following sites are mostly defunct, but usually have some goodness left.
Videos: Forgo has a huge amount of MWC6 footage. (Not updated since 2003)
Videos: Taiji's videos. (Not updated since 2004)
About me
I'm an amateur (middle tier in the local hierarchy) player in the Seattle area. I prefer to use low tier (AKA 'amusing tier') and play because I enjoy friendly competition. I ran the local tournaments for a while, and own two cabinets myself, but our arcade died, so we're generally doing home/console play these days. I personally strongly prefer MAS Systems joysticks (p360s, for PS2 ONLY (you'll want to use an Innovations adapter (Evo-standard, but you can also use a Total Control adapter - don't get a TC2 though) to connect to the DC - if you put DC support in your MAS it can cause problems/blue screens), convex (Japanese-style) buttons). Note that calling MAS Systems is the only reliable way to get one, it really does seem to be run out of that woman's house, and yes the kids in the background are always noisy. =) I use a custom Marvel disc (although I do have a valid copy for DC and XBox): your other option is eBay, since the game is no longer being produced.
If you want to reach me, I'm 'zachdms' on AIM, 'zachdms' on MSN Messenger, and 'Preppy' on Shoryuken. Please don't ask for video downloads - I do not have those on the computers I run AIM on - you can get the old footage here. If you're interested in playing, I sometimes show up at GameWorks on Thursday nights after my soccer games, and otherwise I try to run a twice-monthly Poker and Marvel night that's pretty much an open invite for non-freaks.
If you're curious about the teams I use (?), I prefer Cable/Tron backing either MegaMan (anti-Mag/Storm), Sabretooth, Magneto, or Chun Li on point. If I'm feeling like changing it up, I'll put Thanos, Ken, or Morrigan in there, or play Captain America/Cable/Zangief-AA. I don't like how CapCom-AA or Cyke-AA based teams play, but will play them if I have to. I strongly prefer to play Tron on point, but that requires a lot of concentration.
About hosting
This site is now hosted by FDCServers.net. I pay $160 per month for a dedicated system with a 1TB hard drive and unlimited bandwidth.
I am willing to host any interesting footage of MvC2 that people want to throw my way. I figure this is a way I can give back to the community, as it has provided me with a lot of fun and a lot of great friends. It is easiest to send me the files via AIM (ONLY AIM, fake AIM clients won't work) as a RAR or ZIP of all the files, or send me a URL to download it from YouSendIt or that sort of thing.
As regards combo videos, here are "my" rules for hosted combo videos (as suggested by combo video experts):
In-game sound if you want it, no sound if you want none. But for sure not controller noise only.
Non-annoying choice of music.
Nothing rollable if it's a "how to play this character for use in actual matches" video.
Before you start a combo you're filming, DO NOTHING for at least 2 seconds. Same when you (finally) complete a combo. Use that time to fade or whatever between cuts, but cut off those 2 second pauses so that the combos flow nicely. NO MOVEMENT before or after.
NO TAUNTS afterwards.
If a super is ending your combo, don't let it finish and wait for the combo counter to go away while you do nothing. Cut it off during the super or right after, and continue the video.
DO NOT show all 3 AHVBs if you are Cable, unless there is a reason to. Generally unless you're going to do some follow-up, there's no reason to show all the super anyways.
Make sure you know the audience your video is for. Useful stuff only if "how to play".
Progressive scan end product only. If we can see the interlacing, it's going to look horrible.
Encoding:
* Encoding tutorial from Magnetro. MPEG-centric, but helpful.
Please try not to use MPEG1: MPEG1 is just terrible inefficient compression. Use either WMV or AVI with a good codec. (MPEG2 decoders are for pay, which is annoying.) Please also try to keep the bitrate around 1Mbps at most, since I only have a finite amount of disk space for videos.
I prefer to host WMV9 files encoded at 500kbps, up to a maximum of 1mbps. MPEG files are WAY too disk-space piggy, MPEG2 files require a for-pay decoder (and older MPEG2 decoders are pretty buggy). I will NOT host MPEG files. DivX/XviD and so forth is just a mess of Microsoft-derivative code and buggy decoders, QuickTime locks you into QuickTime, and likewise with RealPlayer. So: .wmv and .avi files would probably be my preferred formats if you would like me to host your stuff. To clarify: Do not use MPEG1. It sucks. Do not use MPEG2. It's much better, but you screw people playing it back. Don't encode under 300kbps and
try not to encode over 1MBps (there shouldn't be enough difference to make it worthwhile).
To minimize the scanline (very important since the black scanline is soooo annoying), set your shutter speed manually to the highest value - I use 1/60 with my (now old) Canon Optura 20 for video game filming, and put it back onto Auto for non-game footage. (Good camcorder information/reviews can be found here.) With my new Sony HDR-HCR3, I simply turn off steady-cam to get rid of scan lines.
I use a tripod to get the steady shot. The downside is that you can't move as easily to get a shot of the player's faces, but ... I think it's worth it, since you avoid CrazyCam and nobody bumps you when you have a tripod. If you're hand-filming, people jostle you all over the place. Plus at ECC9, the tripod let me raise the camera over people's heads easily for filming, letting me film stuff I could not otherwise have had a clean shot on.
I capture the videos to my computer using Windows Movie Maker 2.0 (part of Windows XP) via a IEEE 1394 (firewire) connection. Very much worth it, and a surprisingly easy process. Average total time spent is about 2.5 hours or so per hour of tape, with an hour of that simply being getting the video captured onto the computer in the first place. If it's interesting Marvel footage, I may be willing to encode it for you if it's on miniDV.
I would also heartily recommend a camera backpack. They're too bulky to really be stolen easily, so it provides me a handy place to keep everything in (the camera, tripod, batteries, tapes, back-up switches and buttons, brackets, etc) that I'm not likely to forget and that I feel fairly secure about. I use a TamRac CyberPack 8 and adore it, even if it is a zillion dollars.
I also can't recommend enough the biggest possible battery for your camera, and having at least 3 extra tapes beyond what you think you'll need. I went with BP-535 (which lasts me through the tourney), and use at least two tapes every tourney, even when I'm not taping much. One big battery saves you the hassle of swapping out batteries and worrying about charging each one in preparation for the next tourney. Spending the money here is really worth it, more so than on almost any other accessory, I think.
Tiers
A lot of new players don't know the tiers. Marvel is a pretty complex game, but this very handy Frame Attack Data page does divide up the tiers almost perfectly. I realize that most people these days actually haven't seen top quality play of the non Top 4 characters, but ... yeah, those tiers are really accurate.
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