The G2 bracket is quite a challenge, its only the my second night in it and I have a feeling I’m going to be here a good, long while. The matches are usually really close, , though I wish it was best of 5 or 7 to allow for adjustments in playstyle.
I ended up in a match with EMP Sabin (Arturo) from Empire Arcadia; he was playing around with El Fuerte. He recently placed 2nd to clan mate and US champ Justin Wong. Basically, I got stomped out. I froze up, and he beat me down with normals as opposed to the seemingly usual random Fuertes out there. He reacted to anything I tried, on point, and it was quite a humbling match. Was it intimidation? I don’t know, but I was outpoked and out classed for sure.
Justin Wong vs Arturo Sanchez: Finals
Looking back, I should have backed off and tried to toss out a few fireballs or a focus attack at the end of a blocked pressure string… I was too afraid to try to advance; I need to toss out some more jab and short tatsu’s, and overall experiment in staying in close on top of people. I notice I’ve been relying on jumping short cross up, and on some ducking opponents its just not hitting, and as a result I end up eating a shoryuken, throw or worse. I’ve been thinking of poking with cr. forward and inputing a short tatsu as if it were to cancel. If I’m correct in my assumption, the short tatsu will only come out if the opponent blocks or is hit by the cr.forward; and will result in me closing the gap.
Later this week…Hopped on again, and I feel like I’m developing more consistency against certain match ups…I had a Chun Li taunt me after he won the first round as she is one of the match ups I let come to me, I ended up winning the match though. Its a great feeling when you defeat a cocky player like that. I made it to the 2nd and 3rd round a few times before winning a tournament. Still going slowly with the points, and trying to stamp out bad habits. I need to stop relying on cross up j.short.
I uploaded my replay of the last match in the tournament I won vs Sagat, I messed up some execution and got lucky a few times. Its nice to be able to go back and see where I can get better. I also scoped out some other replays to see the technique of any other winning Sakura players…I didn’t see many, and the 2 I did watch, I think I’m a better player than them. One of them had the short tatsu link crouching fierce>EX tatsu that I need to work on a bit. The damage isn’t all that much more, but I’m sure the stun is nice as well as hit confirm before blowing the EX meter. For now cr. short>jab>fierce~EX tatsu is doing the trick.
Less scared of Blanka now, need to get around Bison/Dictator’s amazing pokes though…
G2 Grade E still…
Tags: Sakura, Street Fighter 4, tournament, Xbox Live