There is only one Justin Wong | Trash Talk - Trash Talk

Episode Transcript
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(00:05):
The first time I won was at 14. Then I became the second
sponsored American fighting gameplayer.
At this point I was like thinking, did I get kidnapped in
2008? I was actually thinking about
retiring. I literally get Adm.
They're like hey we want to signyou.
We will give you 12,000 a month.You guys talking shit?

(00:28):
Tell me the money match for any amount of money.
It was also the first time I heard the crowd cheer for me.
I'm used to the people booing me.
Oh my. God, depending on your
definition of what counts as an EVO title, Justin Wong holds
either 8 or 9 championships, andby any definition you choose, he

(00:51):
has the most. While there is no debate
regarding Justin Wong being the greatest Marvel versus Capcom
two player of all time, his accolades span countless titles
and iterations in the world of fighting games.
If there was a tournament to be found for a fighting game,
Justin Wong would find a way to win.
So I learned how to play the game literally like 2 days
before. Who's the best character?
What's the meta? And I won.
A champion competitor, successful content creator, host

(01:13):
and commentator. Many may look at Justin's
illustrious career today and assumed that he was destined to
be a professional fighting game player.
But when Justin began, the concept of a professional player
had not yet even been conceived.The first time I won a
tournament they gave me $50.00 worth of Fun Time USA tokens.
In this episode of Trash Talk, Isit down with Justin Wong to
discuss his foundational years in the world of fighting games.

(01:35):
How playing these games professionally eventually became
a real possibility, a detailed inside look at the business of
being a pro fighting game player, numbers and all.
And what's next for Justin Wong and the fighting game community
as a whole. Please enjoy.
Well, hey there, we're going to get right back to Justin Wong
and discussing his fighting gameJordan.
But before we do that, I wanted to present you guys with a great
opportunity and thank the sponsor of this episode of Trash

(01:56):
Chalk Tesseract. Tesseract is actually launching
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(02:17):
up and put it on your laptop in play it has some heft to it.
Old heads like myself can probably relate to that feeling
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body weight to it on your lap and it just feels terrible.
And a lot of level less controllers I think of the
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this thing solves that problem entirely.
And for Street Fighter Six players this layout is very
forward thinking. I personally now use the right

(02:39):
thumb button as a Perry macro, and I instantly saw my success
rate for Perry skyrocket. And maybe one day I'll use DI
with my pinky one day. And if you're interested in this
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Just head to the description forthis episode on either YouTube
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(03:00):
have an exclusive discount with coupon code Trash talk at
checkout for $30 off your next order.
Thanks again to Test Track for sponsoring this episode of Trash
Talk. And back to the discussion with
Justin. Justin Wong.
OK, eight, maybe nine time evil champion I was.
We'll get into the debate about the the number of titles soon.
The possessor of the Wong factor, possibly the first ever

(03:20):
American professional fighting game player, content creator,
influence for Mega *, and now evil finalist, commentator and
to many, the GOAT of fighting games, period.
How you doing Justin? I'm doing good, Brian.
I got to, I got to correct you. I am not the first American
professional fighting game player.
OK, let me know. Let.

(03:42):
Me know, I wasn't the first. It was actually Martin.
Martin was on Evil Geniuses one month before I joined because I
was on a reality show so nobody could contact me for six weeks.
So literally frame one, once I got out there, like, yo, I got a
meeting with you and Alex Garfield, who was the owner of
Evil Genius, is like frame one. And then I became the second

(04:05):
sponsored American fighting gameplayer.
Yeah, that's how I started. Were you first on the list but
they just couldn't reach you or like, what do you guys debate
about that? We never talked about it, but
like I, I, I wasn't there when he when when he went to
devastation, he won the tournament as like, OK, he just
got signed everything. Like I was literally off the
grid, no Internet, nothing. So maybe they were contacting

(04:27):
me. I never asked.
I at that time I was like what? They try to pay me to wear a
shirt instead of like joining like a clan or friend team, you
know, stuff like that, right? Like an EMP or or DMG, like I
didn't know that was a thing. So it was like I was like, yeah,
sure, no problem, right? Interesting.
Yeah, I guess the the concept ofa professional gamer wasn't

(04:49):
really ironed out at that time because to me you have always
been a pro gamer, right? I'm an O niner, but more like a
20 tenner, right? By the time I started to digest
and understand what the FGC was,it was around 2010 and I saw you
guys get signed in that era. I saw those tournaments occur.
Those were like my first ever broadcasted tournaments that I
actually watched live post that 2000 9 EVO.

(05:12):
So I was like, Oh yeah, these guys are just, they're pros.
Like this is their job. They're pros.
They, they get a salary, they, they live a normal life.
And it wasn't till like over theyears that I, I retroactively
pieced together what life was like for pro fighting game
players. And I started to realize, like,
oh, this, isn't that not as glamorous as it looks at first?

(05:34):
Yeah, it, it looks like it from the perspective of the people
wearing jerseys, it looks all professional.
But a lot of time people we're getting, you know, like
contracts, like they're like, hey, we will give you a shirt
and you can prep our team. And maybe sometimes we'll pay
for your entry fee or send you aflight or a whole, or you got to

(05:55):
spend hotel rooms with like 10 other people.
You know, that was very common from the start of during the
sponsorship days. Interesting.
Yeah. And even before that, so you
were you. You witnessed every era of
fighting game E sports from its inception to what where it's
gone today. And even before that era of even

(06:17):
someone trying to give you a crappy sponsorship and just put
their name on a shirt and put onyour back and throw you to a
hotel room with 10 people, you were on the grind making money
back before the concept of making money from video games is
even a thing, right? So I know you've been
interviewed to death about a lotof your history, so I do want to
go into some of it and maybe getsome of the sides that we

(06:39):
haven't heard too much about. But as far as your origins in
the arcades, when was the first time you realized that beyond
just beating up people twice their age and arcades and, you
know, spending your time after school there, that there was a
potential to start winning moneyand getting a return on
investment with your time there?So the first tournament I ever
played in was called East Coast Championship Five.

(07:02):
It was in the at the break, 8 onthe break and Marvel 2 like was
was officially out, but all the characters weren't unlocked yet
so they didn't run a Marvel 2 tournament.
They ran like everything else like Third Strike, Marvel 1A3
St. and I got 5th place at the tournament.
Over like 400 people showed up across the East Coast, northeast
coast, even people from Florida.Alex Vaya and John Choi came out

(07:26):
to this term as well too, and I didn't know who they were at the
time. And I lost to literally in New
York, I lost to the people that I lose to at the arcade.
I lost to Eddie Lee Henryson, Arturo Sanchez.
Those are the literally three people I lost to A tournament.
And ever since that tournament Iwas like, man, I want to go to
more tournaments, I want to experience it.
Then this is before I had like ataste of oh, I could win money.

(07:48):
I didn't have a taste of money. There was no top 8 payouts right
at the time. They were like, hey, you got 5th
place. That was pretty good man good
job. The first time I won the
tournament with money, I guess not money on the line it was
this is like turn arcade called Fun Time USA in the ghetto in
the in Brooklyn random arcade and I beat a top New York City

(08:09):
Marvel two player that was considered top tier in the
Chinatown fair and they gave me $50.00 worth of Fun Time USA
tokens. That was my first time ever
winning anything. So I'm like well this is not
real cash. What do I do with this?
Right. So I, I brought back the tokens
with me because I'm like, OK, I'm going to go back to
Chinatown Fair and I tried the Fun time USA token in the

(08:33):
Chinatown Fair arcade and it worked.
It registered. So because they didn't figure
out like how does it like how tochange how tokens work?
If you put 1/4 in it the quarter, the machine will spit
out the quarter. But if you put some type of fake
token in that's not Chinatown Fair, it still worked.
So I started selling these Fun Time USA tokens, 5 tokens for

(08:56):
$1.00. So once I once I sewed all my
tokens away after winning that tournament, I was like, wow, I
can win some cool prizes and make maybe make some money from
it. So that's kind of what got me
started into playing more tournaments.
And anytime there was a tournament like in the local,
like in Queens or Brooklyn or even New Jersey, I went, I went

(09:19):
to all of them because they werejust, they're really fun.
I guess I didn't think too much about the money aspect.
I was, it was more of like, I want to play different people.
I want to play people that I don't fight regularly.
And that's, I would say that wasmore of my thing versus the
money thing. I think the money thing came
later when I became more established, probably like year

(09:41):
2, year 3. But would you say that stoked
you're like entrepreneurial spirit a little bit because I
didn't know that part of your story that you actually took the
tokens to sell them for a return?
And I'm assuming this is like when you're what, like 1516
because you started winning these tournaments or doing well
at them very young, right? So so I won B5 at 15 years old,

(10:03):
but the first time I won was at 14.
OK, right. And then there was this, I guess
the time when people and realizewho I was was before I won like
B5. And I guess that year they had
this tournament in Virginia called game time.
And game time was a tournament that a lot of New York players.

(10:26):
I, I want to, I don't this is, this might sound mean, but they
farmed them. Yeah, they every time they have
their monthly, they farm them because they had so many players
come out and the payout was pretty huge for during that
time. It was like, if you win Marvel
2, you get like 400 bucks. If you win CVS 1, you get
another 400 bucks. If you win third straight, you
get another 400 bucks. So if you're like a multi

(10:47):
fighting game player, that's nasty.
Everything like you could win close to like $2000 just cash
now because everybody just showed up to that tournament and
everybody played. They just wanted to get better
at $10 entry fee. So it was a long tournament.
So I went to that tournament at 14 years old.
And the problem, though, was that I did not know the

(11:08):
tournament was in Virginia. Some dude was like, hey, man, I
want to take you to this tournament and I think you'll do
really good kid. So I was like, sure, how far is
it? They're like, oh, it's, you
know, it's just we're going to I'll drive you there.
It'll take you. It'll take a few hours.
And I was like, OK, cool. You know, I've done this whole,
you know, lie to my parents and golden, New Jersey thing.
I didn't know in the map where was Virginia?

(11:32):
So I was like, well, yeah, I'll go.
I took a nap in the car, wake up.
It's dark outside. And I'm like, why would you not
turn me? There's traffic.
There's so much traffic. And at this point I was like
thinking that I get kidnapped, you know, because there, there
was no cell phones back in the day.
Like, I guess maybe there was, but I couldn't afford it.

(11:52):
I had a beeper. So I had to call, like, my dad
and tell him, hey, man, I'm not going to come home tonight.
I'm going to be staying at my friend's house in New Jersey.
He was pissed, right? I already knew what was going to
happen when I get home. Regardless.
He was pissed. I was like, oh, yeah, I can't
get home. I don't have enough money to
take the train. So I have to wait for the
parents to drive me back home. That's kind of like, that's a

(12:14):
sad excuse I gave them. But when we finally showed up to
this tournament in Virginia, game time, it was like 9:00 PM,
and they waited for me. This was like the first time I
experienced top player privilege, but I wasn't even a
top player right? They waited for me because I
guess they, this guy Alex was like yo this kid is good, trust

(12:36):
me you want to wait for him, blah blah.
But they got to the point where they couldn't move forward to a
tournament so they put me in losers bracket in both games.
So I showed up. Finally it was like I think 9
PMI showed up and I had to play both Marvel 2 and CBS one
starting from round one losers and I made it all the way grand
finals and I won the tournament right?

(12:56):
And that's when storyukin.com wrote an article about me like I
think the title was like wonder kid from Chinatown fair destroys
everybody in Virginia, some typeof line like that right.
But the crazy part was I won like 800 bucks.
That's that wow, that was reallycool.
That was the first time I tastedreal money at A at 14 years old,

(13:18):
winning 800 bucks in one night. That's like something big.
But the problem was, was that after I win a tournament, I was
like, all right, it's time to gohome now.
But Alex was like, the car brokedown.
So I, I, I got to fix the car and then you can't get home
until Tuesday. So I'm like, oh, hell no.
Right. I'm still in like, yeah,
freshman year of, of high school.

(13:39):
So I was like, I can't just not go to school and stay in
Virginia for two days. And you know, at this point, my,
my dad is going to just lose hisshit at this point, right?
So I took the Greyhound from Virginia to New York and I got
back New York at 5:00 AM and I had to take it by myself at 14
years old. You know, there, there was no
like I guess checking ages back in the day for, for flights or

(14:02):
buses. So they let me just take the bus
just straight solo. It's weird because it's my first
time taking a bus like from thatfar by myself.
So I was a little worried. I was scared, but I got home
safely and then, yeah, I got my ass beat afterwards.
But hey, I mean, I, I came out with $800 richer that day, so I
guess that was kind of worth it.And from there I, I wanted to

(14:25):
just go on to more tournaments, more tournaments, more
tournaments. So yeah, that's, I think that's
what really started the you knowwhat that that ROI really paid
off that from starting from thatday.
How much of your prize winning went into that Greyhound bus
ticket? How much survived having to pay
that trip back? Well it was a one way bus ticket

(14:45):
so I believe it was only like 40-50 dollars.
OK, because I mean, buses are cheap.
Right. And before I do want to mention
the, the, the bus error a littlebit, I did have some questions
about that specifically. But with this specific instance,
did you explain to your dad at all what you were up to?
Like I, I understand he was pissed you got, you know,
probably rightfully reprimanded a little bit.

(15:08):
I, I mean slapped up a little bit, you know, it's a different
error back in the day, you feel.Me different error also you kind
of almost volunteered yourself to get kidnapped across state
lines. There might have been some
felonies along the way. I don't know that sounds that
can't be legal whatever just transpired I don't think was
totally kosher in the eyes of the law either.
So I understand being pissed in that moment for your safety if
anything. But did you try to soften the

(15:29):
blow a little bit? Like, did you go, hey, I, I went
to this tournament, I won, I made this much money?
Or is this something you still kept like hush hush?
I I wonder what that relationship was like at this
time. Was this kind of like your
secret hustle at the time or were your parents aware of this?
Like how was that relationship like?
It was very secretive. They didn't know what I was
doing. They didn't know where I was

(15:50):
going. I used the excuse of hey, I'm
going to go stay at my friends house in New Jersey for years,
literally. Years.
Did you specify the friend? Like did you did the friend of a
name? They never asked.
They never asked like hey, can Italk?
To a parent or a friend. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Like I, I grew up in a family where we, we didn't really have
the closest relationships, so wedidn't ask anything.

(16:13):
We didn't ask specifics. Like that's kind of it.
Like as long as you're come homeat this time, you go to school,
you do your you know, you do, you get, you stay out of
trouble, then that's kind of like what Asian parents back in
the day asked for. But for the most part, they
didn't know about my me playing in tournaments since 2001.

(16:34):
I think the first time they figured out that I was like
doing this gaming thing and I would been doing it for years
was they found out by accident where they were watching cable
TV and they just saw me on the World Cyber Games Ultimate Gamer
show. And that was in 2010.
So for 10 years, yeah, swear to God, for 10 years they didn't

(16:57):
know I was this pseudo professional gamer that was
traveling around the world and playing in video game
tournaments because cell phones didn't exist.
There was there was no way for you to find out what I was
doing. The Internet didn't really
existed. So and when it did, it's not
like they know what showyoucan.com is.

(17:18):
So there's no YouTube, there's no Twitch.
So it's hard to know what somebody's up to during that
time frame, right? No social media for them to
check. And they found it by accident
because they just were flipping the channel.
They saw me on the Sci-fi Channel, and that's kind of when
they called me like, hey, I justsaw you on the show.
And they said you've been playing video games

(17:39):
competitively for all these years and you won tournaments
and blah, blah, blah. How come you never told us?
And I told him straight up. I told my dad straight up
because you would say no and youwould not let me go.
So I just chose it on my own accord that I would do it, you
know, very sneakily, very just very sneaky.

(18:01):
And as long as I'm not taking money from your pocket and I'm
not doing anything that's hurting the family, I feel like
it's not a bad thing. Maybe the line parts bad, but
everything else in terms of the financial department, I, it was
just me making money by myself. And they thought that all the
time that when I didn't ask for money, it's because I had, I was

(18:24):
working at Circuit City or Dave and Buster's at the time.
And I was like, yeah, that's true.
But you know, I was doubling up with all of these tournaments
where I'm traveling to. Interesting.
I knew they didn't know for a while.
I had no clue. It was not until 2010.
Because by that time, like I remember that reality show, and
by that time you were known. Like this wasn't this was

(18:45):
because 2009 occurred? That's the Street Fighter 4 era
where everything exploded. The FGC.
That's when I got into the fold.And people who are outside of
the court, like you didn't have to go sureyoucan.com to know who
Justin Wong was at the time, maybe an event hubs, but there
it was slowly breaking that containment.
So to hear that it was cable TV,that it's, it's what is what

(19:07):
reached them. That's that's, that's
fascinating because I had to have imagined there must have
been questions at this time because I mean, in high school
you started traveling all this time.
Like were you thinking already at that early age like this
might be a career option for me?Like how is that like leading
through your education about to graduate high school?

(19:27):
Like where was your mind at? Because you said you were
working like Dave and Buster's other jobs on the side, but was
this something that you were like, I'm going to make this
happen? Were the ideas of being a
professional gamer reality or isthis kind of like a day by day
side hustle? Just get by and make do what I
can situation. Yeah, I would say it was a day
by day side hustle thing just because like I would I would

(19:50):
work, I would work like Circuit City at the time and then move
the Dave and Buster's And I would also be going to school,
finish high school, then do Community College.
And the whole time I'm just like, OK, if I have a free
weekend, I can go to this tournament.
And it's not like, OK, during the shoot fighter 4 shooter
fiber, there was majors like every week, right.

(20:11):
You remember that there was thismajors every week, every week
you're traveling to something. There wasn't like that during
that time. It was only like.
ECC final round Midwest championships and evo SO4
tournaments a year and then random like Virginia monthlies
or random like Big E tournamentslike NEC winner ball start

(20:32):
coming up as well too. But there wasn't like a lot of
tournaments. And because of that it was
actually more doable because I'mlike it's easier to take time
off from like work or I can likemiss a day of school.
So it wasn't like every single week there was a major
tournament with qualifiers on the line.

(20:53):
So I, I guess I didn't, there was no way I was thinking at the
time, I'm going to be a professional fighting game
player and this is where I'm going to just like make like all
the money and become successful.None of that was happening in
2008. I was actually thinking about
retiring and that was this was actually what most people we're

(21:15):
we're also thinking the same time because 2000 and six 2007
EVO was had their their sponsorship of Toyota.
We're like first place is $5000 and we're all losing our shit,
$5000. Oh my God for winning a
tournament. 2008 happened. There was no more Toyota
sponsorship. They kind of just lost it and it
became kind of like, yeah, the numbers are all time low.
Nobody's coming to the tournament.
No new fighting games are comingout.

(21:36):
And then Seth Killian, he actually texted me.
He said, hey, you got me to thisEVO and I was like, no, I'm not
man. Like it doesn't look too good.
I feel like if I go, even if I win Marvel, I would not win.
I would only barely break even. That's what I did straight up,
right? And he said, well, I can't tell
you, but you should come to thisEVO and it'll be really good

(22:00):
because it might help like for the the future of the direction
of the FGC. So I took the gamble.
I took the wrist. I went to EVO and that's when
they announced Street Fighter 4 and they had the Street Fighter
4 exhibition and everything likethat.
At the time, I did not know whatto think about it.
I'm just like, oh OK, it's cool.It's a new fighting game, right?
That's that's just how I was thinking about the last time a

(22:22):
new fighting game came out for the FTC during that time frame.
It just failed Capcom Fighting Jam.
Everybody just shit on the game and it just just did horribly
right? I won Marvel 2 that year.
I broke even. And then that's when all this
advertisements of Super Four start popping out with like
GameStop and like how big it blew up.

(22:42):
And that's kind of when I thought, oh, wait, hold on.
I can maybe do something with this, right?
Maybe I could go to more tournaments.
I can travel a lot more. But I didn't think about how big
it was going to be from the social media perspective or the
streaming perspective. Like still, I was like a little

(23:04):
fledgling think about how am I going to get the next the next
food? How am I going to eat for the
next winter? Right That literally day by day
winning a tournament, going to my job, going to school.
And it still never changed for me until I would say 2010 when I
got sponsored by Evil geniuses. But even during 2009, just

(23:25):
experiencing Street Fighter 4 atits biggest, I was still
thinking like, what am I going to do still?
OK, cool. I'm I'm I'm going to more
tournaments. I'm winning like a few more
bucks less. I would say.
Like, I guess Street Fighter 4 did pay well, pay out well
because winning final round for Street Fighter four, that was

(23:47):
like, I think like two $2200 around there while winning
Marvel 2 and Dirt Strike is like300 four $100.
That was kind of like that that that that the amount that you
would get and even at the highest attendance for Marvel
Two and 3rd Strike, only for EVO, you would get into

(24:10):
thousands because everybody goesthere, right?
But at the major tournament likea final round or ECC you you
barely make over like 5 hundred $600.00 for first place.
Yeah. And for people who don't know
how the pricing structure works at these tournaments, it's all
based on the the number of players who enter, right.
So players pay the entry fee to go to the the event and then you

(24:30):
put into the pot itself to enterthe actual individual game
tournament, like 10 bucks, whichhas been the same price for two
decades at this point, which is wild.
And so it's completely correlated to the number of
players who enter. So more players, there's more
money to win from and that. But you have to but you have to
think about this, right? But you have to think about
this. There was no start Gigi or

(24:50):
Chalonge back in the day. You pre registered when you show
up to the tournament. So nobody would know who's
showing up to the tournament until like the day before.
You could spend all this money of going to like flights, your
hotels, you, you know, you splitwith your friends and you show
up to your third strike tournament, Marvel tournament
and only like 40 players showed up, right?

(25:10):
And then you get, if you win theterm, you get 70% of that
$400.00. The only way you could tell how
popping the tournament is, is how many pages it has on the
sureyoucan.com forums. If it's like a two page, three
page and I'm like, oh, this is amajor tournament, it's going to
be a bus. But if it's like 10 page plus,
then you know everybody is goingto show up.
So that's how we we're gauging how we.

(25:32):
Were going to show you're sayinglike the actual thread
discussing about the tournament.So people were hyped and talking
about it. That was that's how you judge
the buzz around a tournament, was the thread for the
tournament. Interesting, that's how I
decided which terms to travel to.
There's a whole meta behind thatas well, because I got to see
the tail end of this farming era, right?

(25:53):
It was not national or international as it is right now
where everyone's connected. It was regional, regions were
connected. So you can kind of get more of
an idea of within a region, whatwas happening, what was buzzing,
but there was still this air, this mystique, or you weren't
exactly sure where all the events or terms were happening.
And there was still that, that bus era, right?

(26:16):
Even Automatic had a recent tweet, which is very timely.
He brought up Jippo Man Justin Wong really used to get on a
bus, show up to a city and beat everybody from that state and
their favorite fighting games. And from what I hear, because I
I didn't partake in that too much, I just went to the big
ones. In Florida, the ideal situation
was there'd be a tournament witha large prize pool and it was

(26:36):
usually thrown by some kind of organization or store or some
kind of organizer who wasn't firmly connected with the FGC.
So it it kind of did not follow maybe the exact rule set or
didn't have the same exposure orlike a shore you can form or a
Facebook group. So it was less known.
And they would often put up moremoney than the known events.

(26:57):
And you would try to go to thoseevents and not tell anybody to
make sure that it's like more ofa guaranteed win.
And that was like the most profitable, like least most
return, for least amount of effort.
What strategy for top players atthat time to do?
Was that something that you werepartaking in?
I only did that one time, and that was in a tournament in
Brooklyn called Bulletproof Comics, and they were running a

(27:19):
Mars CAC on two. It was on post on Facebook.
They're like $500.00 for first place, and it's local to me.
So I'm like, OK, it's a $2.00 train ride and I'll just go
there and I'm not going to tell anybody, right?
But the funniest part is when you go to these tournaments and
you see somebody, you're like, oh, you know what you're doing,
You know that type of thing because they didn't talk about

(27:40):
it at all. And we're, and literally I
talked like I talked to this person the day before and they
didn't tell me that they're going to a tournament, right?
But I would say for me, if you're running more than eight
games at your monthly, then I will probably be there because
then my goal is to win literallyevery tournament on the list.
So I think like the one that Jibbo was talking about in

(28:02):
particular because he was from North Carolina.
There was a North Carolina tournament, right?
They ran Marvel, two third Strike, CVS, 2ST bunch of other
games. And the one thing, the one thing
that stood out to me was every game was $10 entry fee, you
know, 70% payout. But then they had the special
one where I guess North Carolinais very famous for playing a

(28:23):
game called Neo Geo Battle Coliseum, right?
Nobody in nobody in that time frame like that error, nobody in
America was playing that game except for North Carolina.
And they're saying that, oh, if whoever wins this tournament
gets like an additional 500 bucks, right?
And the the top two players in the tournament will not enter,
you enter into a secret boss battle after you win the

(28:46):
tournament where if you win one game, you get 100 bucks.
If you beat them in the set, youget the extra $200.
So I'm like, oh, so you telling me I could win $900.00 for a Neo
Geo Battle costume tournament because they're so confident
that they're the best at it Because nobody plays the game.
So I learned how to play the game literally like 2 days
before I looked on the show. youcan.com forums, who's the

(29:09):
best character? What's the meta?
And it was like Kim and Mr. Big,right?
That was a it was a 2V2 game. So I learned how to play the
game. I went down to North Carolina.
I won all the Capcom games and Iplayed in that Neo Geo Battle
Coliseum tournament. And I won, right?
I won the tournament. So I got an extra 500 bucks.
Then I fought the secret boss battles and then I beat both of

(29:30):
them, both of the players that they had there.
So I I kicked out hard that North Carolina tournament.
But yeah, I would say that's kind of what Gibbles tweet
reminded me of was that tournament in particular.
That's so interesting. It really speaks to the
difference in the era of the preInternet, pre international and
pre tour competitive era becausewe were all so isolated and it

(29:52):
was so hard to gauge who was actually good at anything.
The world was so much bigger back then and we did not know
anything like we didn't know we.Didn't.
Know how to play the games. We didn't know who was good, we
didn't know where the good players were.
The, the games were less explored.
And so just like that, that that's like microcosm right

(30:14):
there where those two players were seen as gods of the games.
You spend 2 days, you learn it and you destroy their whole
reality. Right now we have tours that
literally rank you globally, like one through 100.
And, and also there's like online tournaments with the
whole nation every single week, multiple times a week.
You know exactly where you stand.
Like there's no mystery anymore.There's no east versus West,

(30:37):
There's no Florida versus Texas.There's no, there's no regional
rivalries. Not because like the hype or
anything is gone, but I just think the barriers have been
broken down so much where it's like there's very little to
discover in that sense. And you have to just be
completely self motivated to getthrough any plateaus because you
will get ego checked so quick. Like, yeah, you are here on the
totem pole and there's no mistaking it back then.

(30:59):
You can be like, I think I'm thebest in the world.
I don't know. Even though you've only played
the handful of people in your state, you could at least have
that fantasy. So you are breaking the world
for them. I do miss the rivalries between
kind of like that state, state, stuff like that.
It still happens here and there,but yeah, like you mentioned,
it's not as common anymore because online tournament is so

(31:21):
popular now everyone can just play punk or do let's say for
street verse 6 every almost every day.
They can play them right or run into them in bracket.
I would say back in the day, like it was harder to get good
because it's if you don't have the resources compared to now
that I guess that's the harder part, right?
But if you had a really good flow chart, a really good

(31:42):
gimmick back in the day, then you you're you're pretty you
were pretty much kind of unstoppable at that time, right?
That was that was the only hard part.
While gimmicks now can be brokendown within like a a few minutes
because now like a new DLC character comes out, Twitter's
already on it, right? All the Twitter FTC people

(32:03):
optimal combo in the one hour frame one, everything like that.
So it's definitely a interestingerror.
But I mean, I like, I love it now because it's so much easier
to learn fighting games. It's way faster compared to back
in the day where it took a much longer to get to get good in
fighting games. So you think overall it's
better? Because I feel like a real big
reason why we see so many peoplecomplain, even though I think

(32:25):
things are actually pretty good.That ERA of discovery, that
period is shortened from years to minutes now and coupled a
little bit with like game designwhere games I think are a little
bit more streamlined and execution barriers make things a
lot quicker. But on top of that, just we have
the entire world all that once collaborating to solve fighting
game problems where that didn't exist before.

(32:48):
I think that's what a lot of people love is figuring a game
out, because I think most fighting games are actually just
kind of bad, like like coming. Out of the way.
Is what I mean, Yeah, I because imagine if a game like NBC2
dropped today as it is today, that game would get torn to
shreds so quick if the entire planet was was working on it.
And you know how people would complain like, oh, you have to

(33:09):
play XY or Z meta. Like I, I think people would be
super negative about it if ThirdStrike dropped today.
How many people would be like, oh, Sean Lee's broken this and
that? I think people love that.
That period of like figuring things out as you go and the end
goal, the end state is not really what people love about
most fighting games. It's the journey along the way.

(33:30):
As a as a perspective I have, I don't know if you feel that way
at all and the difference of theeras.
I guess maybe for me because I played it like arcades for my
whole life and I had to spend money to to learn how to play
the character. I think my the way I learn a
game or a character is just faster than than most.

(33:51):
So I feel like me learning a game back in the day versus me
learning the game now. The time the timeline is still
pretty similar in terms of I'll I'll be able to figure out a
flow chart on how to win in likethe same time, because anytime a
new fighting game did come out into Chinatown Fair, I would
still be one of the only people that would have like a large win

(34:11):
streak because I already kind oflike can guess on how do I make
a character work because it's just based on fundamentals
right. You might not know using the
mechanics or anything like that,but you you, you always know how
to anti air right, You always know like a fireball DP.
You always know like, OK, this is how sweeps are always going

(34:32):
to be broken during time frame. Like our sweeps good, our throws
good. Are is your dashes and how's
your mobility or like how's yourair tires?
Like those are the things that Ialways kind of like use when I
learn a new fighting game. Are these all these five things
good? If they're not, then replace it
with like a different button or like what's my far range button

(34:53):
or what's what's a a good abusable button?
Do I have any light strings or anything like that?
So I kind of run the same flow chart even from back in the day
to now and it still gives me kind of like similar results.
Obviously it's easier now because I did I I'm not known to
have optimal cobbles now. I can do optimal combos if I see
something on Twitter, but it's very easy for me to make up my

(35:16):
own combos that can really get me.
Still, I would say the win at the end of the day.
Do you do you feel that as the meta evolves though?
Like when I look at you, I mean you I, I went to Liquopedia to
crunch the numbers a little bit just on Liquopedia, which I'm
sure is completely missing probably 75% of your history of
fighting games just based on, you know, how long you've been

(35:38):
doing it. You've had first place major
wins and at least 19 titles fromLiquopedia alone.
And I don't think they tracked anything pre 2008 really.
Yeah, I don't think they trackedpre 2008.
As well, there's close to like adecade of results missing there
and you're someone I I like you mentioned there, you're always
on the forefront of any fightinggame release.

(35:58):
It doesn't matter which game youpick and Mortal Kombat, killer
instinct, whatever it is, if a new game releases, you are a
likely candidate to be winning early tournaments in that game.
As the the the metas develop over time.
Did you feel yourself being squeezed or pushed to a certain
direction to hyper optimize in one game and kind of abandoned
others? And what was the difference in

(36:19):
that competitive meta between farming estates, showing up,
beating them in 20 different games versus suddenly like, do
you? Did you feel like he had to
start focusing on individual titles more to maintain that
level of success? I think for focusing on
individual titles became more popular because obviously you
have people, other players that played multiple fighting him as

(36:41):
well to only focus on one right.My my prime example be like
Tokido and he would only focus on the OK, only three first
five, but then only three first six.
I would say for me, it was definitely pressured based off
the sponsor. They're the ones that were like,
OK, you can, you, you should only play Street Fighter 5 or

(37:01):
you should only play whatever main game that we signed you
for. So that kind of sucked because
I, that was the, the period where I only had to play Street
Fighter five. And you know, I, I, I enjoy
playing Street Fighter Five, butI just couldn't stand online.
You know, that's just the one thing I, I just couldn't stand
it. It was driving me insane and,
but traveling to all the tournaments to play street for

(37:23):
five and, you know, getting these points because of the, the
Capcom cup, all that type of stuff.
It was still really fun, but I, I felt like it wasn't me
anymore. I, I would say during that time
because I, I love playing every fighting game and I get kind of,
I would say bored if I only justplay one fighting game at a

(37:45):
time. But I, I did feel like I was, I
had a good amount of success in street fair 5 just because like
I did really well getting points.
I always qualified for Capital cup when I like only focused on
street fair 5. And I would say even the non CPT
tournaments, I would be able to travel to them and win most of

(38:07):
them. There was a period, I mean, I
was still far. I was farming a lot of the
wizard world street fair 5 tournaments.
They had a really good payout. I think it was like $2000 for
first place. Like they pay out extremely
well. And you know, there was just a
lot of tournaments that had Street Fighter Five as like
their main title and you know, they had like really good
payouts for it. So besides that, I and I think

(38:28):
what's really helped me with Street Fighter five as well,
too, the blessing was that a lotof the international
tournaments, they wanted to fly me out to their country and play
like with their locals. And you know, and then it was a
it was a points thing, right? So I just, I don't think I ever
said no. I always went to every 345 like
tournaments when I got invited because it's like free flight

(38:52):
hotel. I check out the country, you
know, and I play in a tournament.
And most of the time I would sayI won every international
tournament that I went to. I think the only one I did when
it was when I went to Spain, I think I got like second or third
or something. But when I went to South
America, I think I won every like South America CPT

(39:13):
tournament when I was invited. And I even won the the Manila
Cup 1 when I got invited to thatthat one as well too.
So even though I only was only focusing on one game at the
time, I feel like everyone else was also pressured to only play
Street Fighter 5, right, Becauseall the sponsors only cared
about Capcom Cup. So I guess after I left Evil

(39:38):
Geniuses and I joined Equifax where there's a little bit more
freedom and I could play other games again, that's kind of
where I was like, OK, I am more back in my happy state just
because just playing one game was just was brutal.
Just because it's like, I don't know, I guess I get kind of
bored just waiting there becausethe flow chart of playing only
three or five was you show up toyour pools, 10.

(40:00):
Let's say you got 10 AM pools. You finish at 12.
Even earlier, if you just be, ifyou stay in winters the whole
entire time, your day is done until Saturday.
I hated that. I was so bored.
I just went back to my hotel room.
It was so boring during that time frame.
I completely hated it. So yeah, that would say, I think
that's kind of what made me stopbecoming a one man game

(40:23):
specialist type of guy. That's interesting because I've
always just played one, one gamein tournament.
I've always just played street. But I so when I look at someone
like a, like you, maybe like a Pierre Rogg or Chris G,
whatever, like some of you guys who are known for playing a lot
of games, I'm like, what the hell, Like, like, how are you
doing this? I, I think I would be so
exhausted because you know, you're, you're waiting in one

(40:44):
bracket. Sometimes you have to tell the
bracket runner for the other guy, Hey, sorry, they're playing
in this tournament right now. Hold that match for a few
minutes while they play that andyou're switching gears between
games. You didn't find that more
exhausting You you preferred that to having more of an open
day. I prefer this constantly playing
and playing, I guess because it's what I've been doing since

(41:04):
2001, so it's kind of like I'm used to that.
I think it's also because if I'mnot doing anything, then I'm
like, I'll get hungry and I'm like, what do I do?
Just go get food by myself or, or something like that because
everyone else pools are just different and everything.
I, I kind of just don't want to just sit there and stand around.

(41:26):
Or if I'm watching another tournament and I see and I see
the top 8 and I'm just like, damn, I would have won this
tournament if I, if I participated.
That's got a lot of times I havelike that thought in my head
because I'm like, OK, this person can do this and then I
would respond with this and it kind of usually happens the way
I I guess foretelled in my head.So it makes me a little bit

(41:50):
salty. So that's why I kind of like
enjoy playing the multi fightinggames just because one, I've
been doing it forever and two, it's just like I just love just
playing in general. Like if I if I if I can't play
then I'm just like why am I hereor what am I doing?

(42:10):
Because I just can't stand waiting.
I hate waiting even though I wait in game, I hate waiting in
real life. It just drives me insane.
I think that's the mark of a good fighting game player.
I I feel like that's the main motivating factor.
I I hate waiting in games too. That's why I can never play like
a MOBA or League of Legends. Whatever, just give me the game
and let me start playing right away.
And it sounds like your main motivating factor though is you.

(42:30):
You just didn't want anyone to think they were nice.
Oh, you, you won that tournament.
You think you're nice. If I, if I was allowed to enter,
you know, if these sponsors tookoff the shackles on Mioda won
that tournament free. It's, it's possible.
I, I mean there's times I, I didthink like, you know, I, I could
have been the, the 1st place guyfor sure.
A lot, a lot of times. I, I thought about that when I

(42:51):
was only playing Street Fighter five.
But I think I, I'm, I'm, I'm, I don't think I'm the only person
that ever that thinks about stuff like that.
I think a lot of other multi fighting players right that's
that's normal. If I watch any random
tournament, even if it's not true, you know, like even if I'm
watching Punk playing, I'm like,man, I wouldn't want, you know,
I think if you're a competitor, you have a little bit of that in

(43:13):
you, a little bit when you're like, oh, I'm going to sit this
tournament out. And then you watch it, you still
feel like low key, like, oh man,I could have beat these guys.
Like that's just being a competitor.
So I can imagine you being in every game all the time and then
stopping that. You're surrounded by that
feeling. So I can see how that can be a
constant source of of struggle for you.

(43:33):
It, it definitely is, but I likeI said once, once I left the the
sponsorship with the teams, I was able to play a lot more.
So that made me a bit more motivated to play even more.
I see. But even to to take it back a
little bit to get into that era,you know, you started talking
about Street Fighter 4 a little bit when things started
changing. Before that occurred, though, we

(43:55):
have to touch upon it. I know they've been talked to
death a million times. There's two big moments from
your career that happened in that pre O 9 era before
everything blew up. Of course, there's there's Evo
moment 37 and then there's the the Justin Wong comeback in NBC2
in 2007. Now we don't have to go into too
much detail about them. I feel you've talked about this

(44:16):
a billion times. But you know, of course, even
moment 37, probably the most historic comeback of all time in
E sports period. Yeah.
When did you know that that moment was going to become
something or it was going to become a moment?
Because from my understanding ofthe timeline, it wasn't really
till like post 2009 that that started to pick up Steam

(44:40):
retroactively and become something that the greater
gaming community took note of. So what, what did you notice
about the explosion of that? Or how was the time frame when
that started to come back? And people would be like, hey,
you're that guy from Evo Moment 37.
So evil evil moment 37. I mean, you're right, it didn't
officially pop off until after the 2009 during the pretty much

(45:04):
the streaming and YouTube error during the 2004 to up to 2009,
nobody at tournaments would comeup to me and be like, yo, how
did you feel about Evil Woman 37?
Nobody. There was no like interview or
anything about like what are your thoughts about it until
afterwards? So it really became more of a

(45:24):
popular thing way down on the line.
But the one thing that evil moment 37 did help with the FTC
during that time frame was that it brought back it it brought
life back in 3rd strike in the world because third strike was
also kind of like a a dying gameoutside of Japan.

(45:44):
Nobody really liked their strikeor everybody was kind of like
giving up on playing third strike.
But once moment 37 happened, it actually replaced Marvel 2
because Marvel 2 would be the close out of every evil.
But then it became third strike closing out every evil after
2004. So I would say for for that it

(46:06):
helped to see just becoming moreof a a third strike.
I would say centered community where now we have 2 main games
that people play Marvel two and 3rd strike, right.
But then afterwards moment 37 really became it just really
became streamlined. I I don't even know when or

(46:27):
which event it happened, but it was some maybe it was like one
of those like old live on three streams that like slasher and DJ
weed and Sir scoots did where they started bringing on how you
know the FTC is going to be the new thing where Street Fighter 4
is going to pop off. And I think that's when they
start doing more research and talking about like yo, like evil

(46:50):
moment 37 was this like crazy thing that nobody really knows.
And then Pi guess after that people start knowing about it.
But I would say the yipes come back.
Nobody. I would.
It's not as influential comparedto even with Dirt 7.
I think only people in within the FTC talks about it, but they
don't really talk about how likecasual people talk about it, you

(47:13):
know, because now even even to this day, people would be like
Yo, Justin Wong, Yo, I love thatcomeback that you did against
the Chun Li player. Sometimes people think of the
Ken. I don't I so it's like they
know. Let's go, Justin.
Right? And it kind of makes sense.
Yeah, they they know it. It exists, but they don't know
like like the the lore between it right and I don't think the

(47:34):
me versus Yipes like it was a really great comeback.
But when you think, when you compare the two, the two
comebacks, I would say the marvel 21 is a bit is definitely
harder, but it's too long. You know, it's, it's like a,
like a 2 minute video or whatever, while even when
Thursday was like the perfect length for the, for the casual
human brain to not be like, all right, I'm tired of watching

(47:58):
this right? So it it really is the the
perfect comeback. I would say those two though
were still very influential evenback when I was joining the
community because maybe the justthe the Marvel comeback was a
little bit too long. But I think what sticks out is
just that. Why?
I mean. The The commentator Lawrence.
Yes, Lawrence, thank you. I, I know you and Yipes recently

(48:19):
had the video posted with the Evo squad reviewing that moment.
I, I didn't know the commentator's name, but that
sound bite I think just sticks in people's minds.
It's stuck in my mind from the time I I heard it.
And the interesting thing about those two moments is you know
you didn't win any of those tournaments, right?
Like you, I did not. The Yipes ended up winning that

(48:41):
EVO and you only got 2 games on him.
I I was checking the numbers. So that was winners finals.
He beat you 21 and he beat you 3-1 in grand finals.
Yeah. And then neither you nor Daigo
won that EVO for 3rd strike KO won that kind of free over all
of you. And that was losers finals.
And so looking back at it, the winner of these tournaments

(49:02):
almost, it didn't survive history.
And so it kind of brings into question like what is greater?
Is it the moment it's literally in the name or like the
championship? And for you, you've won so many
Evos over the years, especially during this era, the pre 2009
era. What do you think about that?
Like when you think about legacyor like what has the most

(49:22):
impact? Is it these moments or the
championship? And what do you value more
looking back? Oh man, it's tough.
Just because I do think the moments over shine the winners
of the tournament, like there was an evil FTC interview I
think they did a few months backwhere they asked the question of
who won third strike in 2004. And literally most people did

(49:45):
say Daigo. Most people did say Daigo,
right? And you know, it's just like
they have like a lot of people are just so focused on the viral
moment. And but there I would say it
really comes down to the commentators giving an amazing
storyline which might which the 1st place champion can override

(50:07):
the moment because then the champion becomes the moment
itself. Like I think the perfect example
is like Arsenal and Ash winning Tekken, right?
Because that's like a crazy champion win and all crazy
moment because he's this guy from Pakistan who had the the
most biggest struggle to try to get a visa to compete and

(50:29):
everything, right. So you're so the commentators
consistently telling this story.And I guess that becomes a
moment itself because when you think about 2007 me and Yipes,
right, Yipes 1 Evo, I did not win, but people talk about that.
There was no commentators like that.
There was just like sound bites here and there, right?
But there was no official like broadcast team that's like, hey,

(50:51):
we're going to compensate this tournament or whatever, right?
2004 Same thing with Seth Killian, my man.
He had the the big camcorder. He just, you know, really just
talking like here and there. But there was no like top 8
storyline the whole entire time.It's not like he recorded the
whole top 8 and was like KO fromJapan is like the best in the
world and nobody has ever beatenhim or anything like that.

(51:14):
That all that storyline is like not said during that time frame,
while now I think you don't really get that many moments
anymore, but the commentators does do such a great job at
bringing that or so it's really hard for a moment to kind of
like override the champion. I would say now the only time I

(51:34):
could think about it when a moment was greater than the
champion was meme moments. For example, will she gay
standing up and guilty together,right.
I don't even know who won the tournament.
Actually, I, I, I, I don't even know who won the tournament, but
I remember when she gets standing up and you know the
what are you? What are you standing up for?

(51:54):
Really smoked in that tournament.
And that was really funny for, for for me, that was really
funny. But I for 2000 and for 2015, I
know KBR won Marvel 3 just because I feel like his story of
coming from Chile, him grinding all these tournaments and him
fighting F champion winter ball and just getting disrespected,
that was already a big storylineand and it that becomes a moment

(52:17):
itself, right? So I think like it's really up
to the broadcast team to really push those stories on to the
Champions. That's true.
I think we're, we're all gettingolder than the FGC.
And I think we've come to realize how important it is to
tell these stories as they're happening and and retroactively
capture them because so much of this is been left to like the

(52:38):
footage graveyards or all these stories have been left behind
because stuff like that pains metoo.
When they ask the audience who won that evo, nobody knows.
Yeah, nobody knows. Yeah.
Now as I'm getting older, I'm seeing it in real time for my
era. And I'm like, oh, God, I got to,
I got to step in and do something about this.
The the kids need to know what what went down here.
But I still feel like moments still occur.
I mean, blah's getting 2nd place, a Capcom Cup that might,

(53:02):
that's probably going to outliveKakadu getting first, you know
what I mean? I I feel like we're, we're still
seeing that to this day. That's that's tough because I
feel like Kakaru winning is like, I don't know, I think that
was really cool that he won. But yeah, I think I do think
blah's a storyline was really, really that important.
But I mean, if you look at the previous Capcom Cup, I mean

(53:23):
everyone still remembers Uma winning right?
Well, like what was the the storyline besides that from
besides Uma winning from last year?
Exactly. I don't want to get in.
Yeah, I don't want to get into last year.
I don't. Know everyone.
Everyone knows Uma won. Yeah.
But that's that's, I think the storyline is what was the
storyline. Yeah.

(53:44):
I mean there, I guess there wasn't really storyline.
Everyone just got bodied in the.I think that's the problem.
Sometimes our stories don't cometogether.
I mean, I, I, I hate to talk like I'm ragged on Uma every
time it comes up. I, I tend to have a negative
tone with that one. But I feel like the big take
away was a big question mark. Like like what?
And then it was over. So we, we still have some

(54:06):
ironing out to do to, to highlight our players because it
would have been much better, in my opinion, if we knew about Uma
ahead of time, right? If we could have done something
better with the format to make it so that it wasn't an unknown
player to the casual audience completely winning.
Because Uma was not unknown due to any lack of effort.

(54:26):
He was going to tournaments and entering and trying he did.
There was, the format just didn't give him any exposure.
I, I guess that makes sense because he qualified off points
and only time I know Uma is because of the, the online
tournament that ICFC did, the pedal media they did right.
That's the only time I know about Uma and I just see F Champ
destroying Uma every week. That was literally my known

(54:46):
knowledge of Uma is like, I justsee F Champ just smoking this
jury player, right? And I'm just so when I'm seeing
him winning Capcom Cup, I'm like, wow, that was that's
crazy. Everybody just has a great day.
That's what it comes down to. F, Champ said.
They're like, just like you. All those other tournaments I
could have won a million. Yeah, I could have won

(55:06):
$1,000,000. I beat this guy every week.
That's quite what he would say. Exactly.
Yeah, well, you know, like I said, we we still have some to
iron out to make sure these moments are preserved.
But you did have a big moment going from, you know, the the
pre 2009 to 2009 era. You already you already
mentioned it a little bit ahead of this.
So I'm going to go ahead and do something interesting here.

(55:27):
So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to play a clip for
you, Justin, and then I want youto describe for the audio
listeners at home what's going on in this clip.
So I'm going to share my screen here.
So this is 2009 going 2010. Things are things are changing
in the FGC. So can you describe what's going
on in this clip, Justin? You know, I got into a car and I

(55:51):
got yeah, don't look at the way I hope.
I put on the seat belt, but justknow that my windows are tinted
so it's completely black. So I'm driving a a car
completely blind, sort of not really blind, but there's at
least A6 frame delay from the the camera that they have
installed on the top of the hood.
And I crashed the whole set. But just know that I don't have

(56:14):
a driver license and they actually made me drive a car
without a driver license, right?That's all I'm going to say.
And just notice Brian, I did notget last place on this
challenge. I actually got second to last.
So, you know, you got to, you got to, you got to take that
into account that I wasn't the worst driver.
I was not the worst driver. The person they got last was I

(56:36):
believe Vanessa and she lives inCalifornia.
So that means she is, she has tolearn how to drive.
So I beat a seasoned driver in adriving challenge.
So A6 frame delay on the camera.I see, I see you have the OSS
ready after a a decade plus herebecause I didn't know you had to
drive in the reaction to the camera delay.

(56:58):
I, I as a gamer, I understand now.
I understand. Yeah, Yeah, yeah.
So this was the game show I'm assuming that your parents saw
that exposed the fact that you were a professional, semi
professional gamer on the weekends for years leading up to
this point. And also the game show that you
were disconnected from the worldwhen you were going to become

(57:20):
not a semi pro but an actual sponsored professional player.
Yep, you're you are correct. This is the same show.
Wow. So how did how did this show end
up? Did you end up winning the whole
thing or what was the actual conclusion?
No, I actually got 5th place on this show and you know, 5th
place didn't get anything. We pretty much it's either you

(57:42):
get first place which gives you the the 100 grand, 100 grand
win, or you're also paid like per day.
So I was there for at least likeI think 28 days.
So I got paid. I during that time, I think like
two $300.00 a day. It was really cool.
I mean, I had, I had a blast. It was just, the only problem

(58:04):
was I just lost the dumbest way possible, right?
So I got to the final, final four and it was me playing
Forza. And the reason why I, I lost was
we had to drive with our feet. We had, we were put in straight
jackets like, so I'm covered, I'm in the straight jacket and I

(58:25):
have to use my left foot to likesteer the wheel and my right
foot to use the gas pedal and brake at the same time.
So that was the challenge. And yeah, I got eliminated in
that one and I was just so pissed.
I was just like, God damn it, I lost because I was in a straight
jacket. It was a driving challenge.

(58:45):
Again, seems to be your. Weekend Dumbass driving
challenge, but I I don't think Iwould have won the 1st place
anyway even if I got through that challenge because the 1st
place was like you have to win athree games.
It was like blah blue which I would have won.
Then there was Rock Band which II think I would have won that

(59:06):
because I'm good at rhythm games.
But then the third game was Haloright?
Because the new Halo game is coming out.
So if you so there's a so if youtied because it's like 1.1 point
and Halos 2 points. If you tie, then you do a sudden
death match in Halo again. So I wasn't going to win against
I would say the person that won cat gun because she is a

(59:29):
professional FPS player at during that time, during that
error, I don't think I would have won regardless because I
would have won blog Blue potentially won Rock band, but
would have lost the Halo both times, right.
So yeah, it kind of sucks that Ilost though.
I I was sad, but it was a reallygood experience.
I never, I never was done all these challenges before and I

(59:52):
was on TV, right? I was on TV, so that was really
cool. Right.
And your life really changed after that because suddenly
you're coming clean to your parents about your history of
being a competitive fighting game player, and now you're
getting the call to become the second.
Officially professional Americanfighting player signing with

(01:00:13):
Evil Geniuses, which kick startsoff the era of like EG, Justin
Wong and the EG fighting squad, which I think is super iconic to
to many people from that era of all the the top level EG
players. Like if you're on EG that was
like the pinnacle there. Was.
There was nothing greater, no greater achievement you could
have in that E sports sense at that time in the FGC.

(01:00:35):
So what was the difference between the pre EG era and post
EG era? And can you describe like how
your life changed for that moment?
Because I'm assuming now you went from working part time or
maybe full time at your, your, you know, Circuit City and Dave
and Buster's and doing the random tournaments.
Did you go immediately then at that point to full time gaming

(01:00:57):
with a salary, go to the tournaments?
What was that transition like and how do things change?
I guess I didn't really go full time yet because I think during
that time frame sponsorship was still kind of like the money was
pretty low, right? It's a new thing and we don't
know how much we were worth backin the day.

(01:01:17):
And I was I was only getting as my first year player contract.
I only got like 1000 a month. So I didn't know if that was
like reasonable if that was goodor whatever.
Thinking about it now, it would I guess I could have probably
argued for like maybe 2000 as asas a start from that time frame
2010. But in my head I was like, wait,

(01:01:39):
he's they're trying to pay me 1000 a month and they pay for
flying hotel to every tournamentI go to.
Yeah, I mean that was a no brainer at the time because I
literally didn't have to pay outof my pocket to go to these
tournaments anymore, right. And I got a free hotel.
I didn't have to split room of like 50 other people.
So to me that was like instantlyyes, because I, I would say I, I

(01:02:04):
was working at the family fun arcade in California.
This is when I moved to California.
So I worked at family fund arcade as like the token guy.
So I, I would say gradually I, Iquit once I like was able to go
to so many tournaments because this is when more tournaments
started becoming a thing and they started having majors

(01:02:25):
everywhere. They had like those evil points
where you get like first place seed because at that time it was
still like important to win evos, right?
It still is important to win evos, but there was no like
there was no tours yet right? There was just EVO and a bunch
of other tournaments like ESWC trying to like put in big prize
pools for street front of four. And I went to all those

(01:02:46):
tournaments and that kind of where it changed a lot where I
was like, OK, I'm going to travel as much as I can.
And it's just free travelling. So that it was instantly a
profit for me just because it's like, even though 1000 month
doesn't sound I, it's, it's not as a salary.
But if you had the power to likewin every tournament and travel

(01:03:09):
for free, then that's where the big profit really comes in.
Because they didn't take a cut. Because I know some other
contracts, player contracts, they take like 15 percent, 20%.
They were like, yeah, we, we won't take a cut from you like
at all. So I kept all of the prize, all
the prize money in there. It was all cash too, right?
So it just makes it even easier.So it was like, yeah, such a

(01:03:32):
huge win. I would say the second year, I
think that's when they offered me like 3000 and that's kind of
where it started to be like, oh shit, 3000 What what a come up,
right. And I go to travel all these
services about you and there wasno restriction of like you only
focus on one game. So I still played like every
game and I still was winning like majority of tournaments or

(01:03:53):
at least getting 2nd. And yeah, I was, I was, I felt
like I was cashing out huge during that that era where just
travel around all over America, sometimes around different
countries and experiencing all this type of stuff like I was
doing really good for myself. Right.
It seems like that was kind of the peak balance between the
esports era and the the farming era, right, Because I, I just, I

(01:04:15):
just don't think that exists anymore really like the ability
to farm so many tournaments. It's just like, especially the
big ones, it just doesn't exist.Like the only people who are
able to win the big ones. First of all, it's so
competitive and you're competingwith the international audience.
It's like it's a, it's 30 players that are fighting for
first place really. So your odds are really bad to
to win the big ones for the the prize pool and then you're

(01:04:36):
putting all your energy into that.
But that era was like the sweet spot.
You're starting to get the contract, starting to get a
salary position and you can still now farm, but it's all
profit because you got rid of the big expense, which was
travel, the flight, the hotel and everything.
So it's all gravy at that point.And that was a really
interesting time for me. That's when I enjoyed the scene.
I could see you and other peopleevery weekend, every other

(01:04:58):
tournament doing that at the same time.
There was all the people who weren't sponsored doing the same
thing, which was always a mystery to me.
I was like, I was like, yeah, yeah.
This was when the the concept ofprofessional player was really
fuzzy, which is still is today. It's something that I talk about
a lot. People call anyone who shows up
on stream a couple times a year like.
A pro player, Yeah. Right.

(01:05:20):
So I I see it too, I get it. Right.
And so back then I thought that too.
And until eventually the illusion was destroyed when I
started going to tournaments andI'm like, what do these guys do?
How are they alive? Like there's no money anywhere.
How are they surviving like this?
People were like, like, hey man,like how can I get a
sponsorship? Like I wish I'd get a
sponsorship like I'm 1800 Mr. 2000 Mr. like, how can I get

(01:05:42):
people to notice me, right? I'm like, well, you have to
invest in yourself, right? They're like, you know, what if
I'm broke? What if I don't have money, then
go get a job and do that becauseI tell them like I I used to
spend my own money to go to these tournament.
So I tell people you need to invest in yourself as well too.
Go determine pull upset, you know, get experience.
Like it's not just like you're good at online and make 2000 Mr.

(01:06:03):
every time the point to reset and be like, hey, I deserve a
sponsorship, right? And don't you think the model
has changed entirely? And this was a big topic I
wanted to get into you into withyou the the concept of being a
pro versus being like a constantcreator or influencer and how
those lines are very blurred right now.
And what is even worth it? Because what does it even mean
to be a pro player? I think is a very ambiguous

(01:06:27):
designation. And there's a handful of people
on the planet that could look tobe like, that's a pro player,
right? You look at like a Taquito.
I think Taquito is the prototypical to me pro player.
Like if you want the, the, the gold standard, you look at
Taquito. And then even I look at Punk and
I'm like, Punk's a pro player tome.
But also he's like a really, he's like really a content
creator streamer personality as well.
Like a big part of what he does to me is being content creation.

(01:06:50):
And there's also eras where it feels like he's more focused on
streaming versus competing. And then he gets back into
competitive mode and wins EVO when he wants to, right?
So I, I think that's very ambiguous these days.
And what is even like worth pursuing?
And like, if I was that Dalsam player, I would, if I were
talking to them, I would say like just start doing YouTube

(01:07:11):
and streaming and make money, make buzz organically online and
get your name out there. And just, if you're good enough
online right now, you'll get into Capcom Cup.
Like if you're actually that good, there's no barrier to
entry. So.
Yeah, for sure. What?
What do you need to be sponsoredfor?
First of all, there's even that question.
What is even the? Point the easiest way to get

(01:07:31):
sponsored now it currently is ifyou qualify for EWC right?
That's kind of like what last year showed us was if you
qualify for EWC, your DMS will instantly start hitting like
once I was this is this is funnybecause it was so fast Lex last
year he got third at EVO Japan, right?
Qualify for EWC, amazing placement.

(01:07:52):
Evo Japan. We went to have dinner the same
day, right? And and I told him like, yeah,
you're probably going to get Admlike pretty soon just because of
how big EWC it seems like it's going to be with the team
championships. Literally once I said that
during dinner, he had like 5 DMS, Hey, we will
congratulations Evo Japan. We would like to talk to you

(01:08:13):
about joining our team and blah blah blah.
So it literally happened the same, same timing as he
qualified, right? So I would say I don't, I would
expect similar situations to happen for this year for EWC.
But I guess like, and the craziest part for me is that

(01:08:33):
these teams don't care about Capcom Cup.
They only cared about EWC because we noticed last year a
lot of players got dropped rightafter EWC finished even though
they qualify for Capcom Cup. And I guess that's kind of what
makes it hard. I was like what makes a
professional fighting game player because these are short

(01:08:54):
as contracts. I think Broski also talked about
how he got offered a sponsorshipand it was like very short and
instead of like a investing 2-3 years, it was like kind of like
a six month thing and he just turned it down.
And I mean, I guess this is quick, quick, big money for a
lot of people just get it, but it just kind of hurts like
you're, I guess your future in terms of like, you should fight

(01:09:17):
for longevity. And you're right, you should
start doing YouTube, You should start doing streaming.
You have to be a multitasker. And that's also what I learned
as well as like, I can't just only be a professional fighting
game player. I think what really made me
change my attitude was the, the,the pandemic, COVID, because

(01:09:38):
during that time frame, I was still only focusing on
tournaments. I didn't really focus on YouTube
that much. I did like YouTube videos here
and there, but not serious. But during the pandemic, I
realized, all right, everything is canceled.
There's no more tournaments online sucks.
There was no rollback for lots of the big games yet.

(01:09:58):
Or if it was Super 5 didn't do agreat job with rollback.
I had to like see, I had to see what can I do?
How can I change it up right? So I think that's when I really
put all my eggs in the basket and I was like, all right, I'm
going to just focus on just upping my social media game up,
doing YouTube streaming a lot more on Twitch because there's

(01:10:19):
nothing else to really do. You can't really travel right?
And it really was the, the biggest payout I ever had in
history was literally just putting my eggs in the basket
and just making a big YouTube channel.
And like, it really was like themost, the best thing that ever
happened, I would say. Interesting.
I do think COVID was a huge wakeup call to pretty much everybody

(01:10:41):
in the FTC, myself included, right?
That's also you. You were leaving the forefront
there. I went really hard on content
creation at the time, Punk. A lot of the people in the FTC
made that pivot because you werekind of forced to.
But I think there might have been a bigger payout you had
before that. Hold on.
I got another another thing I want to share with you.
Give me. AI don't think so to be honest.
Let's see, let's see. Let me draw your memory real,

(01:11:01):
real quick one second here. Can you describe to the people
what we're, what we're looking at here, Justin?
The Bud Light. I thought this might have been a
pretty good payout. I don't know it was.
OK, It was a really good payout.What was it?
It was like $25,000 I believe itwas a 20 five, $25,000 like

(01:11:23):
sponsorship for like 1 year. So that was really cool.
Yeah, what $25,000 sponsorship for one year.
But no, we didn't really have todo anything.
It was just like you've given them the rights to put you on
their website or whatever, right?
I would say, but I, I, I felt like I worked pretty hard on
that, like in terms of just marketing and pushing the, the

(01:11:44):
numbers and everything like thatto make sure I get voted in as
like the FGC person for Bud Light All Stars.
But yeah, I would say that's not, I mean, OK, 25,000.
It's, it's, it's a lot of money for sure, right.
I'd put on a bloodline hat for 20. 5K.
But I think, I think compared tonow, it's like I actually I make

(01:12:07):
a lot more money based off just content creation, right?
Right. But I guess I I brought that up
because I brought that up because that's my favorite
Justin Wong meme of all time. I have a real soft spot for that
photo. But also how you were even then.
Then I was 2017, right? You were in the influencer game
even back then pre COVID, like you had started to dabble in

(01:12:28):
this world and that's still whenyou're heavy competing.
I mean, you got like 5th place in Captain Cup 2018 and you're
on Echo Fox, which I this is like the gilded era is what I
describe it as that 2017 to 2019era of especially Street Fighter
5 and especially when Echo Fox is active.
E sports was the bubble was as big as it ever got.
That was right before it burst. People were getting insane

(01:12:51):
contracts. It was, it was crazy because I
remember that same exact day, OK, I was in the, I was in the
Philippines. I was like, you know what, I'm
going to go on a vacation and this is where I was like, all
right, I'm going to leave Evil geniuses and I'm going to do
solo and do my own thing, right?Get my own sponsors and
everything like that, which I did in 2019, but 2017 I was

(01:13:15):
already thinking about stuff like that, right?
And I literally get Adm from Echofox and they're like, hey,
we want to sign you and we will give you 12,000 a month.
And I said all right, I'm joining Echofox just straight up
right. And so I did that for two years
and obviously I was able to do alot more with Echofox and get a

(01:13:36):
lot more brand deals like Bud Light and everything.
So it was really definitely a crazy year before the esports
FTC bubble popped where they're like, yo, we're paying people
too much. But that was pretty much where I
would say Aquifax kind of started the trend of just like
paying people way too much. And every other team had to
follow suit because all the other players were like, they,

(01:13:58):
they were realizing how much players were getting paid.
But then I think it normalized like now it's like very
normalized, very averaged out. Right, right, yeah, I just
remember looking back to that era and just being like what was
going on, but everything post that time shrunk and then COVID
accelerated. But you could even see post
2017, the scale of things was starting to shrink.
Even Captain Cup, right, because2017 when men on one was at the

(01:14:21):
PlayStation experience, that Convention Center, biggest stage
I'd seen Captain Cup ever, right.
And then 2018 when you had your your top eight run was just at
the Luxor like the the E sports.Arena.
The tidy ass arena and I was like, this is just not the same.
Like and then 2019 and beyond was in LA and and like random
clubs and it just wasn't quite, quite there.

(01:14:43):
And the E sports org started pulling out and then COVID
accelerated that. So the writing was on the wall
that, you know, everything had kind of downscaled at that time.
Yeah, but I would say the info me becoming some like already I
was in the influencer market, itwas because of the teams,
because if you have a really good E sports team, then you

(01:15:04):
would have to do sponsor activations like do a beta pro
at like a PAX or Witchcon or something like that, right.
So if you have a good team to put you on for stuff like that,
it really already puts you in that market because you're going
to meet people that doesn't go to your major tournaments, that
doesn't go to EVO and everythinglike that.

(01:15:25):
That's kind of how I guess I gotinto it because you would genius
would send me the packs to do like be the pro for like a hyper
X for like many of years. But then that's why I met people
from like Logitech. I met people from like razor
like, and then I work with them in the future.
It was because of those opportunities of me have me

(01:15:48):
being blessed on joining a really good team and giving me
those opportunities to go to these trade show events where I
met all these people at like those Twitch parties, right?
Where like, Hey, I work for thiscompany.
I know who you are. I'm a big fan and I'm like in my
head, I'm like, I've never seen you at FTC tournament.
But you know, like if you're a big fan, like I've never seen
that big FTC tournament. But I mean, if you know who I am

(01:16:10):
and you know about the scene, then sure, maybe we could do
something, right? And that's kind of how it all
turned out for me in 2019, whereI was like, you know what, I'm
going to get my own sponsors andsee how I can make this work.
Right. And it's, it's interesting to
see that because you were just describing how the Street
Fighter five era like a tour era, I would also say, right,
like focusing on one game as things bigger and bigger, more

(01:16:34):
global and the competition kept increasing you, you had a zoom
in on one game that kind of burned you out where like you
what your actual passion is to play in many different games.
Really what we're seeing now is that you're able to capitalize
on this like 20-2 decades of expertise you've built across
the genre. And now you can cash in on that
to a degree. But hey, I'm the guy who won a

(01:16:57):
million fighting games. Any new fighting game comes out
like I will have a valuable perspective on it because I've
established this expertise over years.
So it really, I feel like workedout greatly in your favor to be
able to get back to those roots to a degree via content creation
in that sense. So when it came like post COVID
and even now with like Street Fighter 6 coming out this time

(01:17:18):
where you like, really solidified yourself as I'm going
to focus more on exploring fighting games as a whole, as a
genre and more of the content creator influencer space.
Or was there a part of you that I was like, oh, maybe I'll lock
in for Street Fighter Six and buckle down.
What was your mindset going intothis, this new era we're in?
I think COVID really killed my, I would say my aspirations of

(01:17:42):
just becoming the best just because it's like literally the
whole two to three years. It was like me, me turning on
the stream and then turning thatstream into a into like a
YouTube bod. But like the content was like me
playing all these old games or me playing these old games I
never played before and seeing how people thoroughly enjoyed

(01:18:05):
watching it, But also I also enjoyed the stupid brokenness,
non QA tested games as well too.And it really showed how much I
love fighting games, right. And and now, and this is not
even just a competitive level, just like a casual level,
because I'm sometimes I'm playing these games where
there's no online multiplayer. It's just me playing against the

(01:18:26):
computer, me going through what the game has to offer me in
arcade mode or story mode or whatever.
And I'm just thoroughly enjoyingit.
Even to this day, anytime I never played a fighting game,
I'm excited to just see how I can break it down.
What's the ending of it? Or can I learn something from
it? I feel like I guess maybe it's

(01:18:46):
because I'm comfortable and stable where I don't really have
to think about playing competitively because I can go
to like a tournament and be like, hey, hit up the tournament
organizer. Hey, can I get a boof?
I'll come to your tournament andeverything.
Like will commentate your tournament and I would make more
money having a booth, just creating content versus winning

(01:19:08):
the actual tournament itself. So I feel like the stress is
like, I guess it's not stressfuland may I guess I'm I'm just
really complacent. That's what it comes down to.
And I know a lot of people wouldsay like, Hey, you know, I'm
going to come back and play professionally or whatever.
And a lot of times they don't, Idon't want to say I'm going to

(01:19:29):
or I want to lock in to play competitively.
It's more of just like I'm in such a very comfortable spot
where I know what works and what's, you know, getting the
bills done, what's going to the savings for for my daughter.
And I think that also plays a factor where it's like if I go
to tournament and I like suck ass where I don't even like win
anything, I would feel very bad just coming home where like,

(01:19:52):
damn, I wasted the whole weekendand I didn't I didn't get
anything done and it didn't really help Harper out, you
know. So I guess that's kind of where
I also come from because I kind of, I would say I'm not the
biggest risk taker in in game, but also in real life.
So I try to play everything super safe.
It's it's so interesting you saythat.

(01:20:13):
I I see that. I definitely see that
perspective in what you just described, right.
You're you're focusing on stability and now at this point
in your career and you put in your 10 billion hours, right,
you've already you've won all the tournaments almost.
I mean they've created new tournaments beyond since since
you're you're prime that so maybe like an E sports World Cup
or a Capcom Cup would be like the last remaining titles you

(01:20:33):
can even get, which I guess is also unfortunate.
I feel like the big money titlesall came after you've won so.
Many, right? Like what?
Like looking through Liquopedia,your your winnings for winning
so many titles are less than onecap and cup.
I don't think it's it's obviously not counting your your
millions of small tournaments and other things.

(01:20:53):
But like of like the, the modernera tournaments, official evos
because you won so many evos with the prize pools for those
were so low. And now one cap and cup is like
so $1,000,000, right? It's like this.
You were in your prime in a different era.
But it's funny you say that you weren't taking risk in real life
because like 1 common theme whendoing all these discussions with

(01:21:15):
people who've had a great success in this area, they've
all dedicated their lives from avery young age.
And, and I mean you, I guess to be, to be fair to you, you had
the most balance. You had a day job while doing
all this. You did split your attention.
I listened to to, to your episode with Punk and you know
how Punk told you how he quit his job to, well, quit his

(01:21:38):
school to, to play fighting games?
I didn't, I, I was like, I couldn't do that.
Like I, and that's not to say like that's bad on Punk.
It was just more of like he feltthat he could do it without
going to school and like everything was going to work out
for me. It's also a different error, a
different time frame where therewas no way it would have worked

(01:21:58):
if I would just like drop out ofschool and didn't have a part
time job. There was like, how would I get
to the term in the 1st place, right?
So like cuz at least for him, you know, he, he was
automatically pretty much sponsored by Panda pretty early
on, right? And then streaming was also a
factor where his streams were really like popular even before
it got to this point where he's doing really good for himself.

(01:22:20):
So he had a good amount of resources for him to make a
decision to quit school. I would say for me, there was
not enough resources for me to even have that consideration in
my mind to take that risk. No, it didn't exist.
And like he he was competing when he did that.
That was 2017. There's $250,000 for first,
right? There's sponsorships.
Like there was a there E sports was proven to exist at that

(01:22:44):
time. So it was completely different
eras and like, yeah, I imagine like if you were, if you had
just were born a decade later, you would have maybe taken a
similar, similar path. Yeah, I I could see that.
I could see that for sure. Right.
It just, it just didn't exist. So you had it, you did play it a
little bit more lame, I guess, alittle bit more lame and safe in
your approach even in real life to to achieve greatness in your

(01:23:05):
own era. But I, I wonder like how do you
reconcile that with your inner competitor?
Because your, your last EVO win EVO 2014.
I imagine that's a big one because that's the one that you
got post 2009, right? You're winning so many, all
these NBC2 Evo titles with a handful broken up in between

(01:23:27):
with people trying to break yourstreaks.
Make sure you don't win 10 in a row pretty much.
And then 2009 era Street Fighter4 comes out.
You get second to Daigo and you get close in a couple all other
games, but there's a clear difference I think in the eras,
right The post 2009 Evo. Maybe you can expand upon it if
you don't feel the same. I feel they're completely

(01:23:48):
different in terms of scale and comparison.
And then coming to 2014, you finally get one.
Yeah, it's, I would say it's definitely different in terms of
number wise and scale, but I felt like it was still kind of
similar to like before pre 2009.I think things got a lot harder

(01:24:09):
I think after 2016 personally. So I think before 2016 it was
still pretty, pretty consistent how my results were.
Like I won Marvel two in 2010. That was like the last Marvel 2.
Then I think, yeah, me and Isay won the 2 V 2 third strike,
which was like they had an official third strike 2V2.

(01:24:30):
They tried that format. So we won that one as well too.
And I got second and third a lotof the other evos for other
games like Killer Instinct and Cross Tekken as well.
So I think the results were still pretty similar.
But 2014 I would say was a huge win because that was where I

(01:24:51):
didn't really play the meta. I just kind of played how I felt
like playing. And it was also the first time I
heard the the crowd cheer for mebecause I'm used to the people
booing me because that's how it was back in the day.
But people were just chanting myname and everything like that.
And they wanted not a Virgil or Morgan or Zero team to win.

(01:25:11):
So I think that really made me really happy.
I would say for sure. But then I think it definitely
got a lot harder after 2016 where I think that's when all
the games started getting a lot more serious, a lot more
competitor. That was all.
That was also the tour error forall these games.
Like start, every company want to have a tour, Tekken world

(01:25:32):
tour, arcs as a world tour, whatever world tour.
Like they were just mashing world tours at that point,
right? Though competitions was a lot
more steeper during that time. And I think the last time after
that I did well was 2019. That was like for Sam show.
I got third at Evo. I was trying to win Sam show
hard because I was like $30,000 prize pool so I got so I was

(01:25:54):
really sad I got there that thattournament.
But yeah, even now I think therewas a 2016 error till 2019.
But now it's like even harder, like cuz now a lot much more
players are better at fighting games now because of, of,
because of post COVID, everyone had no place to go to travel.

(01:26:16):
So everyone's just grinding at home.
So everyone just got a lot better of like how to understand
fighting games. So literally.
And it's not even just a, a hugegap anymore because before it
was like Japan's the best. Right now it's like everyone is
like on a similar level or at least close to Japan.
It's actually the closest that has ever been where in the

(01:26:39):
global scale where all the countries are super close to
each other in skill. I see.
Yeah, I forget about your, your Sam show 3rd place win because I
guess I'm thinking about your career and like your choice to
pursue stability and content creation.
Like like what? At what point in your career

(01:26:59):
were you like, I am satisfied with the number of EVO wins I
have and I'm OK. Like once you hit that 2020 era
and the world said, hey, this isprobably the best chance for you
to pivot to something else. Like how many EVO wins would it
take? How how did you know you were
satisfied with your performance?And.
The fact that you're OK with it.Yeah, it was really during COVID

(01:27:22):
because we were stuck at home for three years.
And my drive for competitivenessis kind of just, it just went
away because because then I havea new passion of like just
upping the YouTube numbers. That was like my next passion is
like, how do I keep getting bigger and bigger on YouTube?
It's even my passion now. It's like, what can I do to get

(01:27:43):
to a higher subscriber account or anything like that?
Like cuz I look at like Maximilian, he's like the person
that you want to chase, right? In terms of like content
creation. And I was like, Oh, I always
tell people I just want, I just want to be 15% successful as
Max. I don't want 100% cuz that's
just, you know, not realistic. I'm always trying to be

(01:28:04):
realistic with numbers. So I want to be like at least
15% of of what he's doing. So definitely during the
pandemic, it really changed my perspective.
If there was no pandemic, I would say I would still probably
be competing, playing in tournaments even to this day
because the because the pandemicdomesticated me to stay home.

(01:28:27):
It changed my whole perspective of like what I want to do now.
OK, interesting. That was another thing I was
curious about because you know, I'm always interested in
perspectives on like the industry of esports and all that
because I feel like especially like the North American scene,
we've had a talent drain for forever where all of our best
players eventually age out and they go, OK, it's not really
necessarily my skills diminishing relatively, it's

(01:28:48):
that I need to pay bills like I'm getting older, I have
responsibilities, I have a family starting whatever I got
to get out of here. But when you look at Japan like
Diagos 43, Tokitos 39, Sakos 45 and Abashi 43, you're 39 as
well, right? That's what liquid PDA says,
right? You're in that age group and all
of them are active, professionalsponsored players still.

(01:29:10):
And you're more in the content creation route.
And I just wonder what your perspective is on that.
I'm like, how like the Japanese scene has kind of found more
stability and these players are still playing versus NA where
how many top level pros are still competing?
And, and is it just because of them falling off?
I don't really think so. I think there's economic forces

(01:29:30):
at play. It it really comes down to the
culture. I'm always impressed and
intrigued of like how how all inJapanese like people are as like
like as their upbringing, because I think their whole
saying is like once they want todo something, they really see it
to the end. And I think that's what we see a

(01:29:52):
lot versus comfort to Nana is like kind of like, or maybe the
rest of the world. But at least I could speak for
NA is when I see people wanting to do something, if it's not, I
guess given to them, they don't want to pursue it or like, you
know, it's kind of like they need kind of an option select to
kind of like help them out to gofor that.
And that that's the hard part, because sometimes you have to,

(01:30:16):
you have to put in your, you have to put your own money, you
have to put your own time to actually get those type of
results while waiting for a possible DM or an e-mail to be
like, Hey, we want to sponsor you for anything like that.
While Japan, they're going to chase it.
They're going to get people to see who they are, see them, and
then they will get that opportunity.

(01:30:36):
They'll get the offer. And if you look at how before
the whole, you know, Street Fighter Six blew up with the
whole V tubers and everything like that, they were, they were
already doing so well with Street Fighter League, right?
There's a, there's a thing whereif you were really good in
Street Fighter Street Fighter 5 or Street Fighter Six on and
you're, you're doing amazing stuff online, people will seek

(01:30:58):
you out to join their team, right?
To do like all this type of stuff.
When I talk to a lot of like proplayers, I would say like last
last year or two years ago, their main focus was playing
Capcom games. They didn't want to play, I
would say a lot of other games anymore because they know that
they do well, they might get picked up for Street Fighter

(01:31:20):
League Japan, right? And which is I would say for
them, it's like a real job for them, right?
And I I think the prime example was when I asked when I talked
to someone, it was like Goichi'slike, yeah, no more under night,
no more Dragon Ball, only StreetFighter, right?
And Goichi, I mean, he's a God. And so many of these like, you
know, I would say Kusoga games and he obviously won EVO for

(01:31:41):
Dragon Ball and now he's like chasing the Street Fighter dream
as well too, right? So it's just Japan just has a
lot, I feel like a lot more opportunities.
And even when I talked to Memochi like years ago, he's
he's at the only reason why he'sso successful now is because he
moved from Nagoya all the way toTokyo.

(01:32:03):
If he didn't move to Tokyo, the success would not be there.
But he made like that big move to be like, hey, you know, like,
I know I'm good enough, I can beat all these players, but I
just need to experience and exposure where everyone is
living in Tokyo, Daigo, Tokyo Fudo, all these guys live in
Tokyo. I need to make the move and see
what happens. And you know, like, it's not

(01:32:25):
like somebody paid him to move to Tokyo.
He did it on his own accord because he felt like he could do
it. And I think that's also like
what I did as a kid is like, I believe that if I go to this
tournament, I'm going to win. And I just kept having results
and results after results. And I think that's like the
really big difference. A lot of people are just waiting

(01:32:46):
to be signed, but they're not putting an effort to get signed.
Interesting. Well, Speaking of opportunities,
I do have one more thing to to show you.
Let let's see if I can pull thisup.
Can you describe what we what you see here on on the screen?
The Street Fighter League. The first season of Street

(01:33:07):
Fighter League for Street Fighter Five.
Yeah, it was me, yourself, BrianF and Psycho, who also was a
finalist for this year's Super League World.
Yeah, at least one of us is still cooking, right?
One of us still cooking. Psycho's doing work out there.
Yeah. So it's, it's funny, we were
actually on the 1st US Street Fighter League where it was far

(01:33:32):
away from what it is today. I would say yeah, there wasn't
even, we weren't even getting paid at all.
I think you might have been, I think the captains had some kind
of appearance fee, but originally.
Yeah, there was some drama between that because the
captains got paid and then the other players didn't get paid.
But I think after the first day,then they paid the the other

(01:33:54):
players if I if I can recall. Correctly, yes, they I think
there were some arguments being had and and Rob was speaking up
pretty loud. I mean we were taking like one
to two weeks like at least 1 1/2two weeks off work and stuff
like that. Like we were flying away from
our jobs in real life as all amateur players and for zero
pay, which I think was probably just illegal.
Like I don't it. Was pretty bad.

(01:34:16):
Yeah, I. Think there might have been some
California labor laws that probably applied there to give
us some kind of money. But it's interesting how like
how far it's come. But you brought up like street
for League Japan, right? So I, I feel like the
opportunities compared to even today where St. for League USAI
think was very underdeveloped back then, St. for League Japan

(01:34:37):
is just so far ahead. I mean, it's like an actual
sport there in Japan. It is.
It's like a job like you. If you're a sign, you're like,
you're super happy. You're like Lashar.
I think he lived. He moved to Japan for a whole
year to play in Tokido's team, so it's like super huge if if
you are selected as a Street Fighter League like player.
Yeah, to me personally, it feelslike if you're going to be of

(01:34:59):
actual pro player and your focusis being a pro player, I still
feel like the only real place ofopportunity is Japan right now.
I I feel like that more and moreas as time goes on.
Yeah, I, I believe you're right because even recently when while
I was in Osaka with the family, after everyone's like tired,

(01:35:20):
they're dumb for the day to go to sleep.
I just jump online just playing like hitting up people.
Hey, do you want to play me in this first attend set?
You know, I just want to post onYouTube blah, blah, blah and
they're down right. So I in my head I was like, man,
I wish I could just live in Japan for like a month, right
and then just like find the content and everything like

(01:35:42):
that. I, I even got hit up to go to
like like different offices fromlike S&K and Capcom to buy, hey,
you know, like let's maybe do something a blah blah.
So it's just like it, it really is.
I would say that's the land of opportunities if you're a
fighting game player, like you can get a lot of stuff done.

(01:36:02):
Even if you're like, I would saynot as famous or whatever.
Like if you have an active YouTube channel or if you want
to stream like it's just so worth it because you all the
rewards are there. You get better at fighting
games. You get to see how how, how fun
it is to play fighting games in Japan.

(01:36:23):
And I mean, you could might you might be able to create some
cool ass content like and it's all from your hotel room.
The hotel room Internet is so good.
I was on Wi-Fi. I was on Wi-Fi in my hotel room
and I was playing online this this past week in Osaka.
So it's just like it's I I wish I could stay there longer just
to only focus on content and noton like not explore Japan, but

(01:36:46):
just literally like, OK, I want to play against all the best
players in these games, go to the arcades against play as
these players and just have a shit ton of recordings or even
do something where I collab withlike other like Japanese
fighting game players or Japanese fighting game
streamers. Like all that type of stuff is
like literally at the at your fingertips, right?
It's just it's such a great opportunity there.

(01:37:09):
Right. Yeah, That's why I always bring
up that contract because I feel like in in America and
everywhere else in the world, you're really going to have to
spread yourself thin doing YouTube and Twitch and
concentration to get your name out to get an income stream or
in Japan, even doing content I think would be easier.
But on top of that, there's avenues for employment as a pro
player with Street for the League where employment doesn't

(01:37:29):
really exist in in other places in the world.
So we're still in that infancy where but the way I see it,
unless something changes, which rumors aren't mights in other
places in the world. But other than that, I see like
a another a second talent drain occurring where our best players
end up moving to Japan. I can see a future where this

(01:37:50):
starts happening possible. I mean, I could, you know what
they call, they call Taquito thethe FG scout, right?
That's what they call it right now.
They got the birds. They got the birds feel like
punk. It's Aikido.
They have a great relationship. He might be like, hey punk, you
want to be on Team Reject for next year for Street Fight
League Japan? I I could see that as a
possibility. I could see that as a

(01:38:11):
possibility for sure. And I if I was punk, I would say
yes in a heartbeat. If it's not a conflict of
interest with Fly Quest or whatever, just because it's like
if you can spend a whole year inJapan playing for street fair
league, you're getting paid every episode and like you're
literally streaming from Japan playing all these best players.
The the amount of content he canget from it is like completely

(01:38:34):
endless and everyone will want will want to watch it.
Right, that's what I love to watch it.
Absolutely. We'll we'll see how that comes
to be. I'm very interested in, I feel
we're at a pivotal point again, another inflection point with
the, the industry for, for Street Fighter E sports, cuz
things are growing in Japan, buteverywhere, what else?
It's a little, it's kind of stagnant right now.

(01:38:55):
So I was interested to hear yourperspective there.
I would say the only thing that really has it going outside of
Japan is obviously the recent with sage and Slam, right.
Sage and slam, they did such a great job with just connecting
all these like people that didn't really play fighting
games with other with like captains like yourself.
You were on sage and slam as well as well.

(01:39:16):
Like they he did such a great job with that, but that's only
for Street Fighter, right? Obviously he did for Tekken, but
he's the only person that has something related to that.
Everyone, I think everyone else,you know, they just kind of
doing their own thing, which is fine for sure.
But I would say collabs or like I said, just 15%.

(01:39:38):
If you get 15% what Japan is doing, I think everyone will be
completely happy. That's just how I see it.
Very true, very true perspectiveon that.
I'll try to keep that in mind aswell.
Before we close this out, I wantto tap into your knowledge of
fighting games because I'm I'm in my I'm one of the people in
my Street Fighter bubble, right?You're kind of one of the the
bridges I have to the rest of the the fighting game world,

(01:40:00):
really when I watch your contentand and see what you're putting
out there on YouTube and everything.
So I wanted to understand your philosophy on this.
Do you believe? There is such thing as a scrubby
fighting game and across all thefighting games you played.
If So, what is the scrubbiest game you have ever played?
Oh scrubbiest fighting game. Oh man.

(01:40:23):
Do you believe there is such a thing?
Like what is your philosophy on that to begin with?
And if so, which one fits the OH?
I mean, there are, there's obviously scrubby tendencies
that a fighting game can have, right?
Every game has something scrubbyabout it.
I think there are scrubby fighting games, like, for sure.
Like if I had to name one on thetop of my head, I think.

(01:40:45):
I think Marvel 3 is scrubby. Yeah.
I think Marvel 3 is pretty scrubby with X Factor.
You know, Virgil's kind of a scrubby character as well.
To the fact that you just swing and shit just works.
Like I think that's a pretty scrubby way.
I think the beginning of Guilty Gear strive season 1 was pretty

(01:41:09):
darn scrubby as well too. Obviously game balance.
They changed it. It's all it's less scrubby at
the time. I mean talk of the town, Tekken
8, Tekken 8 is a really scrubby game.
Actually. Dude, I I like, I know they have
a new season with like defenses like the thing, but I think any
games that prioritize yeah, that's what they said.
I don't know, I I didn't watch the Tekken talk.

(01:41:31):
But I see the reactions. But you know, when Tekken eight
first came out and once like howaggression is the key, it was
pretty scrubby. I mean you do a combo, you go in
the heat, like every character had the same flow chart.
You go to heat right, you you doa massive amount of chip damage,
you put them in the corner, you spend your heat burst and now
it's guess her game. I feel like that's literally the

(01:41:51):
story of Tekken 8. And a lot of people, I think the
season players will can tell youthis like it's a that's a very
similar story that most rounds will probably, you know, happen
and end. But I think, yeah, the beginning
of Tekken 8 was pretty darn scrubby for sure.
Interesting. You're sticking to mostly modern
games. I I expected to hear like.

(01:42:13):
Some kind of? Listen, no, I'm not.
Listen, let's pretend we're let's pretend we're, we still
got some spring in our step. OK man, to me Marvel 3 is still
sparkling new. So I think old game is The thing
is defense was so strong back inin old fighting games where

(01:42:33):
where there were there weren't enough mechanics in the game
where offense was stronger. Now fighting games are made with
lots of mechanics where offense is stronger because if you look
at let's say, if you you know how people had the argument on
Twitter where like if street fair six got rid of drive rush
in perfect parrot, it'll be a good fighting game.

(01:42:54):
Like like I see people talk about that and I'm like, no, it
would just be literally a old ass game and eventually there
will be less people playing it because they can't get in force
their force their fifty 50s. That's what it would it would
really be because in that situation, if you can't just
recklessly Dr. rush against somebody, then the person with

(01:43:15):
the better fundamental then you would you would you would just
cook you every single time. It kind of feel like cross
Tekken where defense was so strong and cross Tekken, and
that's kind of how like now we're modern fighting games.
You need some type of oppressionin order for people to feel, I
guess feel good about themselvesplaying in modern fighting
games. But back in the day, if you lose

(01:43:36):
in the fighting games, you can'tblame anybody.
It's just like, oh man, I reallystuck.
I didn't never got a chance. At least with now if you lose
you're like man, I was 15050 away from winning this game.
That's true. So I.
Guess that's like that's the biggest difference.
So yeah, for me, a lot of modernfighting games have, I would
have, would have to be more scrubbier than games back in the

(01:43:59):
day. Okay, I, you know, I didn't
expect this answer, even though I don't necessarily disagree.
I just expected there to be something like some broken mess
of a game from, you know, 1993 that some obscure developer put
out that you would have played that was completely busted and
scrubby. But.
I see your point. There is fighting games that are

(01:44:21):
completely busted, but I feel The thing is it's like I don't
even think it's just scrubby. It's usually the only one
character would be the scrubby part.
It wouldn't be the fruit game. If a game is scrubby, it has to
be like a mechanic that caused that makes every character play
kind of like a kind of in a scrubby in a scrubby way.
And it really comes down to heating, just activating heat in

(01:44:46):
Tekken that's it's pretty scrubby because it just gives
you so much plus frame and so much offense opportunities where
defense just has to hold that shit pretty much.
I I really do think it's just more modern fighting
independence used to be more scrubby than back in than older
games. You're allowed to get away with
this because you're Justin Wong,I hope.
I hope you know that. I I think people would agree

(01:45:06):
with me though. Some people will, some people
will let it pass because they'llcount your evil wins and be
like, all right, you get a pass.I mean, I, I, I just look at
Twitter and I see that literally9099% of people are complaining
about what I'm saying. But when I think of when I look
at like the little discords or the fight caves, they don't

(01:45:30):
really complain about the old broken stuff.
I think it's because maybe they accepted it because it's a old
ass game and there's no way you will get a update for these old
ass games. Because even if you look at 3rd
Strike, people can tell you like, you know, you, you, you
might not have have too much experience playing third Strike
Ryan, but you, you know that Chun Yun are the 2 broken

(01:45:52):
characters in the game, right? But they don't say they're
scrubby. They just say they're broken,
right? This.
And it's because the there's notenough mechanics in the game
that makes the character really scrubby.
They're just top tier because there's not enough mechanics to
stop them from being top tier. Right, that makes sense.
I do agree there's a difference between broken and scrubby.

(01:46:13):
There's a also some characters are scrubby but low tier.
That's definitely a thing. Like there's a clear difference
between top tier broken and scrubby.
I definitely agree there. I would also say maybe that's
that's survivor bias, right? Whoever survived and fight Cade
is they're going to they're committed for life, whatever it
may be. And then whatever if it was
popular like I listen if third strike was released today dude,

(01:46:37):
do you not think the complaint would be insane it.
Would it would it would be the same, but I don't think the
metal would have would have changed at all.
It would still be the same because even now people are
still figure out like stuff. And well, even now with Japan
Third strike being so popular, like we talk about Street

(01:46:57):
Fighter, Street Fighter 6 is so popular.
Japan where I think Daigo's recent tournament, they had like
over 1000 players in that 3V3. Third strikes has that as well
too. Even even to this day where they
have all these 55 teams in cooperation Cup and they're
having like 1000 people tournaments, like that's still a
thing. Even this most recent weekend

(01:47:19):
they had a this of North Star Hakuda know Ken from big world
like nationwide tournament and that's a broken ass game.
I wouldn't say it's scrubby but it's a broken ass game and.
It's the. Broken game.
Yeah, It's the broken game. And people still come out, they
still grind. They still play that game.
So it's just, yeah, I, I, I don't, I, I they're just, it's

(01:47:41):
just broken. Old games are broken.
They're just not scrubby, I think.
Got you. It's, you know, Sanford, like
Sanford says it, it's scrubby. Like 345, it's scrubby, right?
But it's I don't think it's broken.
I see, I see. Interesting, interesting.
I agree with a lot of that perspective for sure.
I just, I just I'm not sure if we wouldn't hear the same
complaints if those old, old games were new today.

(01:48:02):
I think humans just like to complain and I think to me, I
think a lot of what we see is just the numbers game.
This this is the price we pay for fighting games being more
popular. It's just part of the the game.
I do have one final game question for you.
So I'm going to ask you, what doyou think is the greatest
fighting game of all time? But I'm going to give you 3

(01:48:22):
categories so hopefully make it easier.
The greatest fighting game ever for casual play, the greatest
fighting game for competitive play, and the greatest fighting
game to spectate. So that way you can, you can
break it out, you can repeat thesame game if it fits the
categories. But I I to me, I feel like it's
it's easier to to break it out into those different categories.

(01:48:43):
All right, let's see, the greatest game for casual play
and you said the greatest game for competitive play and the
greatest game for spectate. Yeah.
All right, the greatest game forfor competitive play, it's
really hard to argue of it. I I personally love Street
Fighter 6. I think Street Fighter 6 is it,

(01:49:04):
is it a state where everyone is so close to the skill level that
it's a really good competitive game and I would say the best
spectate game. Man, Capcom Cup was really good
to watch. It was like I was my eyes were
glued the whole time during Capcom Cup.

(01:49:28):
It's so hard because I do think it's between it's a toss up
between Super 6 and Tekken 8 forfor best spectate game.
You think ever though of those two even of past generations or
is that just because of the the tournament formats and the
stakes I think. It's the players, the players
that they make the the matches more exciting because I play so

(01:49:48):
much older games and everything like that.
But I never felt that thrill of like, I would say people come
competitive competitively playing and people and also
watching compared to like when you want to compare it to Street
Fighter six and Tekken 8. So I think for Street Fighter 6,
for me, it's the best competitive game because it's

(01:50:11):
kind of like the amount of mechanics that they have in this
game where it just revolves around drive system.
You have to think about so much things besides character matchup
and player matchup. You have to think about just
like kind of like the use of like meter management and not
even just your super, right? It's just your drive gauge
management because that's like that.

(01:50:32):
I will say that's more of your lifeline than your the actual
health itself. So the amount of different play
styles that you can kind of incorporate in terms of just
like, are you going to be a person that is a a person, a
person that fishes for perfect Paris, or are you a person
that's going to try to be a withpunish person?
Are you going to be a madman that just drive rushes every
single time? Are you good at using Dr. rushes

(01:50:54):
at the perfect opportunity? Are you going to force yourself
on a burnout because you have nochoice?
Like all those decisions being made in street fire 6 is like
really good. I, and I think it's at this, at
the at the best competitive place currently at the moment,
especially with this past CapcomCup, I'm going to say Tekken 8

(01:51:15):
for me is the best spectate because watching Pakistan versus
Korea last week was really, really good because of the, I
think the storyline between the storyline of Pakistan and Korea
is the best storyline in FTC at the moment.
Obviously you have the blah storyline, everything like that,

(01:51:36):
but before blahs, there was no Street Fighter six storyline.
It felt like. I think the storyline for Street
Fighter six didn't really exist until Capcom Cup happened and
everyone from the South America region just kind of like hooked
that tournament. I think a lot of people kind of
like, I know you obviously did your, your, your series of like
what players are should we watchout for?

(01:51:58):
But I think most people would like, they didn't think that
blobs wouldn't do well or they didn't think Salvatore was going
to beat punk or they, you know, stuff like that.
A lot of people just thought like the easy favorites would
easily win the tournament and everything like that.
And Capcom, Capcom club did sucha great job with with that.
But when you think about storylines, that's been there
since the previous game, that was Paxton versus Korea, right?

(01:52:22):
So I think for me, I'm more invested in the storyline of
like Pakistan versus Korea because like Pakistan, I think
Arsenal Nash was like the goal of Tekken 7, right?
Tekken 8 came out he didn't he didn't do so well in the start,
but then he won Evo, but then Korea won E Sports World Cup,
then Korea won Tekken World TourFinals right.

(01:52:45):
So now Pakistan came down as a force.
Literally all the players came down from the Korea to play in
this like long ass, like round round Robin set and Pakistan
won. And it wasn't just Arslan or
Attif that carried. It was no man and the John like
people that they they they they probably didn't expect to carry,

(01:53:06):
actually carried. So I think that was the best so
far. That's the currently the best
spectate for me. So I would say Tekken is the
best spectate. Street Fair 6 is the best
competitive casual. Casual is kind of hard because I
feel like casual, if you have tocompare the current active
player base, then Street Fair 6 would be #1 for best casual.

(01:53:29):
But if in my heart I'm going to say Marvel 3 Marvel three, I'm
going to say I'm going to say Marvel three my heart because
it's I think it's it's one of the only games where if I if you
wanted to play at the event, I'mgoing to sit there.
I would love to sit and play hours with you.

(01:53:50):
Right? That type of thing.
Well, I feel like if I was casually playing at the at a
venue, playing St. far 6, I might get up after five games.
Right. Right.
So I think Marvel, yeah, I'm going to be yeah.
It's just too, too, too much stuff and a lot of a lot of
risk, a lot of like different decisions are being made while

(01:54:11):
Marvel 3, even if you're not on your game, your you know, your,
your muscle memory, the flow chart will just take over and
you're still having a fun time and it's and it's a broken ass
game. Then I think both people know
they can't. You can't be mad at just getting
like I would say Virgil or whatever.
Well, street fair 6. If you get hit by if you didn't

(01:54:34):
check the drive rush, you're going to get mad, right?
Well, Marvel three, I don't you don't really get mad at playing
Marvel 3. So I'm going to say Marvel 3 is
the best casual game. I agree, I think Marvel 3 is
the. I never played the game
competitively like that, but that was always my favorite
spectator game, my favorite casual game.
I think it's beautiful the moment you open it.
The opening cutscenes, the music, the graphics, the

(01:54:55):
character select screen, the roster.
To me, Marvel 3 is the greatest fighting game of all time.
I would never compete in it ever.
But everything else around it I think is like, that is the gold
standard for fighting games. I I definitely preach the gospel
of NBC3. What is your your top three in
those regards? Best spectate, best competitive,

(01:55:18):
best. And you already met you probably
I mentioned best casual. I guess best casual would be
Marvel 3 maybe? For yes, best casual be Marvel
three. I think spectate would be
between Marvel 3 and Tekken for me as a series, just because I
think they're the best casual fighting games.
But for me personally, I still have to go Marvel 3.
But I recognize Tekken has the best appeal universally just

(01:55:39):
because it just looks so visceral and it's so easy to
follow. But competitively, I can't say
Street Fighter Six, I can't. You can't.
I don't know. I don't agree with your logic on
that. To me, that sounds like the
opposite. What you describe to me
describes the opposite of what makes a good competitive game.
To me, a good competitive game is a very stable competitive

(01:56:01):
environment where there's less variability.
That to me was a good competitive game.
So what would you? What would you choose then?
Maybe I would put four or five above 6 if I had to choose
between the street fighters. If I had to choose from the
Street Fighter series, yeah I like the End Game 5 a lot.
I think end Game 5 besides it had it took.

(01:56:22):
You a long time to get to end game five.
That's the problem. It took a while to get there.
Yeah, it was. Yeah, it was bad up front.
But you got to think about this,right?
Five eventually became a Luke fest and then three or four
became of a a later fest. I guess right now Street Fair 6
doesn't really have that at the moment, even though you say all
these, there's all these cans, but.

(01:56:43):
It's not like that. These cans, yeah, yeah, none of
these cans really showed up that.
Yeah, I guess you could argue Street Fighter Six.
Street Fighter Six has so much going for it though.
It has the the the internationalcompetitive base, the formats,
the tour, the $1,000,000, that does all bring it to another
level. I do have concerns about some of

(01:57:04):
the mechanics of the game like you mentioned before, so that's
a tough one. Now I realize how hard the
question is, maybe it'd have to be a tech in the game then I
really love the aspect of havingthe game be consistent for so
long where you can have these legacy storylines.
And I like, I kind of like from a distance, these legacy

(01:57:24):
mechanic things where it's not reset over and over every couple
years. So I'd probably go with a Tekken
actually, maybe not a Tekken a like a Tekken 7 or earlier.
Yeah, maybe because that those are things that I value
competitively. But I understand that doesn't
make the best spectating experience or the best playing
experience, which I think is where Tekken 7 would have
suffered was casual play, right?So I think Street Fighter six to

(01:57:47):
me is probably the best all around game ever for those
things. But I'd maybe give it like a
Tekken some some prime Tekken entry for best competitive game
because I I value those things competitively personally.
All right, Justin, I think that about wraps up all I had for
you. Do you have any closing thoughts
for the people before we close this out?

(01:58:08):
No, just thank you for having me.
It was really fun. I I really enjoy watching that
the trash talks, especially withthe the punk episode was was
really, really good. So I hope you keep doing more of
these and I hope you get like bigger names like a what if some
you get like a taquito or a diagonal in the future or you
know, stuff like that. I think that would be really fun

(01:58:29):
to watch, just because I think you asked really good questions
and also your flow of conversations also really
awesome. Well, thank you.
We'll we'll see. Those are those are big, big
targets to aim for. We'll see if we get there one
day. Well, Justin, thanks again for
coming on. I know this was super busy time.
I think you might have to go react to Cristiano Ronaldo.

(01:58:51):
I did that earlier. I did that earlier before,
before I came on, but there we go.
It's a busy week just because wecame back recently from Osaka.
But you know, I know we, we weretrying to plan this for a few,
few weeks now. Right, it's glad to finally have
that conversation. All right, Justin, thanks so
much for hopping on and thanks everyone for listening.

(01:59:12):
Peace. And that concludes this episode
of Trash Talk. At the end here, I just want to
take a moment to thank our supporters over at
patreon.com/brian under score F.Your support is what makes this
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You should be seeing your name scrolling by on the screen right

(01:59:33):
now. If you'd like to see your name
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episode. Peace.

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