Goodbye Mikado Z2 tourneys～

Today was the last Street Fighter Zero 2 tournament ever to be held at Mikado in Shinjuku. Apparently they're closing down and moving activities to another location. They'll still have tournaments there (today there were 22 entries!), but this was the last one at "Mikado".

I almost missed it. Today's the middle day of a three-day weekend, and I stayed in bed the whole day. I messed around with ImageReady, making a fake avatar for Campbell:



and crunching (i.e. watching a video on crunchyroll.com) a subtitled version of "Say Hello for Me", my new favorite Japanese movie. At 6pm I remembered there was a tournament. Since I live on the line that goes to Mikado, I hopped on a train and got there at a little past 6:30, and the tourney was scheduled to start at 7. I rushed up to the tourney floor, but no one had signed up yet. I decided to get some practice in, since I hadn't played since last month's tourney (taking 3rd by losing to Leonhard's Gouki/Akuma - he took 2nd that tourney). I didn't do too well with Gief, and seriously considered using Dan this tourney, but I decided that I have a much easier time with Gief all across the board. Ken is the only matchup I'd rather have Dan (besides Rolento, but I'd rather have ANYONE but Gief against Rolento). I paid my entry and signed up with Gief. When I drew my lottery number, I got 17. That resulted in me having a first round match (most people got byes). It ended up being against Ranran, my first ever tourney opponent at Mikado. In that tourney, we were both using Dan and I lost the last round by time. This time I had Gief and took him out. My next opponent was against some Birdie player. There were actually TWO Birdies in this tournament, and they were both pretty good. Birdie is the worst character in Z2, but in a single-game, single-elimination tourney, anything can happen. I won the first round, lost the second, and then dug in and convinced myself there was NO WAY I was getting peaced out by Birdie today, and won the last round fairly convincingly.
My next opponent was some Nash/Charlie player. Most people not in the know consider this to be Nash's fight. Those in the know put Gief over Nash. I am in the know. I actually almost jinxed myself by looking ahead in the bracket to see who my next opponent was. You should never really do that in a tournament. You should only care about the current opponent. You can't get to the next opponent without beating the current one. But I saw that if I won this match, I could likely face Yosaku, a Rose player that I faced at the last tournament and won easily against. Anyway, against Nash, I won the first round, lost the second, and won the last. I don't really remember details. All the matches should be up in a month or so. I think I got a lucky CC in. I ended up facing Yosaku and won easily, which put me in the finals against Leonhard.
Leonhard is easily the best Z2 player at Mikado. He uses several characters. Last month he went on a 30 game win streak with Ryu before the tournament, but used Gouki/Akuma in the tournament (and as I wrote above, he took 2nd). This month he was using Gen. In his first match, he took out the most dangerous (and ONLY!) Sakura player in the tournament - Nazo no Otoko (the Spiderman guy). He also took out a couple(?) of Kens, and BBC - the most illogical Rolento player ever (but even an illogical Rolento player will destroy Gief). Anyway, I haven't faced a good Z2 Gen in years (actually never - the only good Gen I ever played was Choi's on Alpha 2, which is basically the same thing, but with an extra character), so I didn't know what to expect. I decided to play it safe and do standard footsies, hope to get jumping knees to SPD, and try not to get crossed up into super. I won the first round with a CC I think, and I think I lost the second (I believe I got crossed up into super!). In the last round, I got supered again, but he was going for a level 2 rush super into a level 1 airthrow super. Apparently, you can't get the second super against Gief. I overheard him talking to someone else after the tournament, and he said he remembered that as soon as he pressed the button. I was alive still, and he was in the corner. I snuck in a jumping hit (either knees or splash, I don't remember), and because I figured he thought I was going to go for a SPD, I inserted a c.short before that. Z2 being the great game that it is and ticks actually being effective, the SPD connected for the win.

I am the last-ever Street Fighter Zero 2 Champion at Mikado!