Step Up Your Game: Chapter 5 - Juggling multiple games

As everyone knows, there are so many different types of fighting games, and its hard to play all of them. It is difficult to change from a fast pace Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 mindset to an Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition v2012 mindset, etc. The most common flaw is that many people leave traces of their SSF4 AE v2012 gameplay in their UMvC3 gameplay (I won't blow up any names *laughs*).

You can tell when you see someone just sit there and try to block a dangerous mixup in UMvC3. In my opinion, when you are playing a game like Marvel, I believe that you should always be moving with your character as fast as possible. Mobility is super important in Marvel, while in SSF4 AE v2012, sitting back and defending is far more important.

When you watch UVG|Noel Brown play, he is always holding up back (Chicken guarding) to avoid potential ground mixups from Magneto, Wolverine, etc. This is definitely something that's hard to fix for many players, but it can easily be worked on. Some tips would be try to play one casual game to get yourself situated in the zone, so you can play the game how it's suppose to be played. I also believe that this flaw is very common due to players not having an arcade environment.

When I was growing up in Chinatown Fair, I would always put my token up on multiple games such as Marvel vs. Capcom 2, Capcom vs. SNK 2, Street Fighter 3 Third Strike, Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo, etc. A lot of arcade veterans who enter multiple games in today's tournaments also did this while they were growing up in their local arcade such as FC|NYChrisG, EG|Ricky Ortiz, EG|fLoE, LU|Alex Valle, TS|Arturo Sanchez and many more.

This is why in the beginning when a game comes out, you see the same multi game top players always win in the beginning. The only downfall is that its hard to be a master of a game when you are juggling other games you wish to compete in, "jack of all trades, but master of none." I believe I am amazing in Marvel but I do admit that my spacing and fundamentals gets me by a lot more than my overall knowledge of Marvel 3.

What my recommendation is for players that do not have this type of access and can only rely on online play or community sessions is to try to coordinate the games you do want to take seriously. Meaning, play a quick set of Marvel and then jump to Street Fighter X Tekken and then jump to SSF4 AE v2012 and so forth and so on. This is basically giving you an opportunity to play in an mock tournament in your mind.

What I like to do to that helps me not mix and match games, such as SSF4 AE v2012 Rufus and SFxT Rufus, is to establish that there is a difference in certain properties on a lot of Rufus' moves.

For example:

• SFxT Rufus EX Messiah Kick will not go over the opponent's head as easily compared to SSF4 AE v2012 Rufus EX Messiah Kick.

• SSF4 AE v2012 Rufus Dive Kick can be cancelled in the air at any point while SFxT there is an height restriction.

• SFxT Rufus Dive Kick has more hit stun on hit and block compared to SSF4 AE v2012 Rufus Dive Kick.

There is nothing wrong if you want to main more than one game at all. At the moment, I have 3 main games. Street Fighter X Tekken, SSF4 AE v2012, and UMvC3, and I also practice a little bit of KoF13, MK9, SoulCalibur 5 and now Skullgirls.

Fighting games are overall really, really fun and learning all of them makes you a better player and it helps the learning curve for future releases of fighting games. Don't be discouraged that you cannot juggle a lot of games, it takes time and commitment and an awesome community!

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Justin Wong is a member of Evil Geniuses, you can find more information about this organization at http://www.myeg.net.