Kindle Notes & Highlights
A decade ago, the game’s greatest competitors played for pride, often in people’s homes, dusty arcades, or stuffed lecture halls, frequently for little or no money at all.
But Melee’s impact transcends sales. To its most hardcore fans, Melee is more than just a game. It’s a source of self-discovery, a way of unlocking hidden potential. Through playing Melee, a meek student by day can don a secret alias by night, transforming into a fearsome competitor.
The drive to keep Melee’s competitive community alive has faced many challenges over nearly two decades, and not just from concerned parents of its initially young fan base. The scene’s greater enemy and shadow lurking over its shoulder was Nintendo, its creator.
“Very few people try and break the friend barrier and find outside competition. I urge people out there: host tournaments, go out and meet other people. This will build a community,”
Because of Melee’s immense popularity and competitive appeal, tournaments could be hosted anywhere. In the early days, smashers held tourneys at their homes, dormitories, the grubby backrooms of local game stores, and restaurant basements. No external resources existed to sustain the competitive Melee scene, so the onus remained on players to run their own events.
Poetically, the two even played opposite color Marths; Azen chose the cool blue palette, while Ken played with the crimson one. It reflected their differences in personality—Azen was collected; Ken was brash.
To start the year, MLG dropped Melee from its official pro circuit, another sign of a community in decline. The longtime Smash ally created an underground circuit dedicated to Melee as consolation, yet its previous decision still started rumors about Nintendo trying to kill Melee’s competitive scene behind closed doors, potentially in order to maintain hype for Brawl.
On the other side of the winners bracket, Armada waltzed through his opponents, sweeping Dr. PeePee in winners quarters and defeating Hungrybox, 3–1, in a Young Link–Jigglypuff set that lasted over thirty minutes, referred to by HMW as “the wackest fucking set in the world.”
In the final game, Armada finally held on, snuffing out Mango with a last-stock edgeguard. Europe’s pride and joy had finally his first-ever supermajor victory, one that he still claims as his proudest accomplishment.
Nintendo was stealing a long-suffering community of its biggest moment in years. Two days afterward, MrWizard revealed that the company’s attempt to cut the event’s Melee stream was just the beginning; Nintendo initially wanted the Melee event entirely shut down.
He played a mid-tier character and used a tag that came from “pluplue,” a nonsensical word that Plup said sounded funny to him.
For instance, Plup opted to play Luigi at CEO Dreamland, still finishing an impressive but underwhelming fifth place.
Before each set of the Top 8, Genesis 5 broadcasted quick interviews with each player remaining in the tournament, both on-stream and on the projector within the theater. In Hungrybox and Leffen’s cases, their interviews were legendarily bad blooded. Leffen stated that he wanted to “save Melee” from his rival. Hungrybox started his by saying their set was “the reason I came here today.”
