Saturday, April 16, 2016

4/16 - First Look: Round 1 Pump It Up Pre-Tournament Thoughts

By Ann Nakamura

Arcade Tournaments. If you are an active arcade-goer, you have probably seen a tourney of some sort happen at your local arcade. Whether it was Providence at Round 1 Eastridge, Best of the West at Sunnyvale Golfland or the well-famed and known EVO in Las Vegas, tournaments are everywhere regardless of their genre. Today at the Arcade Hub, we’re taking a look into the first music-game tournament that will be held at Round 1 Eastridge on April 30th. And what better way to ring in the first music game tourney than with Pump it Up?

Pump it Up is a dance game created by Andamiro in 1999 - 2000. This game is equipped with a dance pad with five panels and the premise of it, if you are familiar with music games (in particular, Dance Dance Revolution), is that the player steps on the corresponding arrow panel that is displayed on the dance screen. This game has had many upgrades and versions over the years, and with the latest iteration of Pump it Up called “Pump it Up Prime”, players from all over the Bay Area have been coming to practice their skills, master songs, unlock new content and build a community. On April 30th, the very first Pump it Up Prime tourney of the Bay Area will be taking place at Round 1 Eastridge, led by Kevin Tan, a big community advocate and leader of the Pump it Up community. He has been running Pump It Up tournaments since 2013, and has led the United States Pump Festival, a national tournament for players all over the USA. We took him aside to get a couple of words from him.

The official banner for the PRIME tournament at Round 1 San Jose.

This is the first music game tournament to be held at Eastridge Round 1. How’re you feeling about it? Enthusiastic? Worried?

Kevin Tan (herein “KT”): I am absolutely excited that I had the privilege of working with Eastridge Round 1 to organize the very first music game tournament in the location.  Obviously, as with any tournament, there is always a worry about problems arising, but I’m also excited because there has been a lot of interest in a tournament at Round 1 from even when the location first opened!

What are we going to expect from this tournament? New and old players? Different brackets? Anything in particular?


KT: I’ve invited a lot of players who have attended previous Pump It Up tournaments in California and Las Vegas, and I am hoping to see a lot of the new and upcoming players who started playing at Round 1 and have made astounding progress.  The brackets for this tournament are the same as the previous FanimeCon tournaments.  First, I will talk about the speed divisions, the divisions in which players compete for the highest scores.  There are two speed divisions, one for players at the intermediate level and one for players at the highest level or the international level.  There is also a freestyle division, a division with less of an emphasis on pure score and a strong emphasis on presentation and looking good while still hitting the arrows.


Pictured is Tim Bolosan, playing Prime during the first months of Round 1 Eastridge's opening.

How has the planning been in comparison to other tournament locations? (working with Round 1 to put on this tournament)


KT: The staff at Round 1 has been easier to work with than I initially expected.  There are still certain details that are being discussed, but it is extremely exciting that Round 1 Eastridge is willing to make the process of organizing tournaments easier.


Is there anything you would like to tell to potential spectators? Potential Entrants?


KT: To players thinking about entering, please do not hesitate.  One thing I like to emphasize is that, although players are competitive, players should not feel embarrassed about their tournament performance, nor should stronger players look down on the less skilled.  No matter how you do in this tournament, the most important is to simply do your best and try to have fun doing it, because tournaments are not only about the competition but about meeting great people.  To the spectators, I hope that the performance of the spectators will be entertaining enough to impress you all.  I also want to emphasize that, although the game can look extremely intimidating from watching the tournament, please remember that the game itself does have beginner modes for you to enjoy, so the game is not only it’s hardest skill levels.  I hope you will be encouraged to play and to play together with us.



---

Interested in the Tournament? Want to get more information? Visit the Tournament's Facebook Page at: https://www.facebook.com/events/806301666141956/

No comments:

Post a Comment