Endgame, a video game bar on Mill Avenue, hosted a 128-player Smash Bros tournament on Saturday, Jan. 24, 2015. (Ryan Santistevan/The State Press)Enthusiastic and talented players from all over the country came together at Endgame, a video game bar off Mill Avenue, on Saturday afternoon to participate in the largest Smash Brothers tournament in Arizona. Players from Maine to Colorado to Arizona came to the tournament. Games were streamed all day on Twitch, Most Valuable Gaming's television channel website.
For those of you that don't know the difference between Melee and Smash 4, Melee came out in 2001. It was played on a CRT TV, an older model of television that works better with Melee because it doesn’t lag when playing. Lag in this game is detrimental because of its quick pacing.
Smash 4 is played on the LCD screens. Seeing as the game was released at the end of 2014, it's up to date with current programing.
At the end of the night, two international ranked gamers were playing to win. Mew2King is one of the gods, meaning he is within the top five ranked nationally. His opponent MOR | AXE is close though, being ranked no. 7. The intensity in the air could have been cut with a knife.
Fans of both gamers chanted, cheered and even booed at times. AXE needed to win three out of five games against Mew2King in order to have a chance to equally beat his opponent in a subsequent five rounds. After much action, AXE was victorious. He is from Arizona, so his winning caused a lot of hype and celebration.
Mew2King ranked no. 1 but players SS and K9 were also given prize money because they couldn’t continue to play because the internet in Endgame had disrupted and the tournament couldn’t run past 10 p.m. because anyone under 21 needed to leave.
The crowd chanted “One more stock” during this final round, as a reference to 2013’s gaming tournament called EVO when there was controversy with Melee being denied as a game streamed. It ultimately was, and the crowd chanted, "One more year" because 130,000 viewers watched the stream for Melee. They wanted to send the message that it is important.
Gregory Mondesir, founder and CEO of Most Valuable Gaming talked about his international company and their impact on students who are doing poorly in school.
“I know for me, that I would have never graduated high school, I would have never went to college if my parents didn’t use gaming to get me to do my homework,” Mondesir said.
“MVG started up in New York. We expanded as an international company," he said. "The way we expanded to Belize through Brazil throughout the Caribbean to expand education. We went to the top 25 high schools and colleges and approached about 100 at risk students with a C and below average. We used our gaming program as an incentive for them to maintain a certain GPA. With last quarter’s report card, 85% of them are now B+ students and the remaining 15% are now A and above students. When we started we didn’t start it to make money, we started to help.”
The event was successful, a line of gamers stood with their systems just after 12 p.m.
“We were only expecting about 220 players to come out and play," he said. "Two-hundred eighty-six were allowed to play, as we had to turn away about 94 people. Throughout the day, we had around 200 spectators.”
These numbers made history in Arizona, as the last big gaming event like this racked up to only around 170 people. Endgame did a great job throughout the day holding everyone. There was a smooth run of food and drinks available. After 10 p.m., those 21+ were allowed to stay, as the younger gamers/spectators were made to leave.
Even when people were not playing competitively, casual games expanded throughout the restaurant from Super Mario 64 to the featured games of Melee and Smash four.
Mondesir and Most Valuable Gaming have a goal for 2016 and beyond for an event like this to hold 2,000 players. Planning is in place and if interested, you can keep up with the progress at MVGleague.com.
Reach the reporter at ryan.santistevan@asu.edu or follow @ryanerica18 on Twitter
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