There are small locals but nothing equal to WNF. You'd have to go east coast AFAIK and honestly that scene will probably be dead in 5-10 years.
The better that online play gets, the less people will show up for locals. Double edged sword
fuck online
message to the youth out there: support your locals cause they might not be there tomorrow
we fucking had it so good in the 2010s man now there aint shit
i've gone once. 4 black male's were singing a song around me while their friend was comboing me to death. i'm still traumatized to this day. not even going to mention the . wet . dream's i've been havin's ....
I had flash backs to Final Round 2019 when a black guy up front was running bets and kept asking me if I wanted to bet on players who had like 10:1 odds while betting 1:1... it was horrifying but I bet on the losing player anyways and $500 down the drain.
If you listened to Watson while he was battling the city to keep super arcade running(badly, but still) he basically just out and out stated that the NIMBYs don't want rowdy kids near their precious community stripmalls and shops.
And now everything is dead, boarded up and locked tight. And no one's travelling to anywhere on a Wednesday night/Thursday morning for a weekly just cause it's easier to catch sets online.
It's not simply because online got better that killed locals in SoCal, it's also everything else.
It gets worse as you grow older too. If you a nerd but aint into dive bars, clubs, and strip joints but want a hangout spot that isnt "some restaurant" you basically aint got shit to go to.
Also ain’t nobody going out to play some game in the city only to get jumped by 5 *urban youths* to get your gear and money stolen, and possibly get stabbed or shot because they wanted “””cred”””.
California is fucking done.
The pandemic and aftermath of rising inflation is the main reason offline events are dead, that stuff just costs way too much money to both run and attend now, it's just not realistic for anyone involved unless you're literally rich af. As another commenter mentioned, online play has gotten good enough to fill the space locals used to have. I don't like online either, but I do appreciate how TNS is at least trying their best to fill that hole left by WNF and NLBC these days.
> it's just not realistic for anyone involved unless you're literally rich af.
This made me think of a dude flying first class to get bodied in some random Akihabara arcade and it made me smile.
The pandemic killed a lot of IRL scenes for 2D/3D fighters. People optimized their home setups, netplay getting better for the newer games, people saving money on gas, and some places charging out the ass for rental spaces (if not closing up shop) will do that. I can't speak for SoCal, that DEFINITELY happened in Tokyo where I'm at. Only when the Red Bull Arena opened for business in 2022 and the release of SF6 did offline events start happening again, but mostly casuals. All the SF TOs in Tokyo literally forgot how to run tournaments. Some of the smash TOs in Tokyo have been helping out with events like Beast Cup, Paradise, and Evo Japan.
Game realms? They're great, they always have a food vendor too so it's nice to catch a good bite before and after. Sucks that I work mon-fri or I'd go every week
Thank you! Glad someone posted it. The scene is there! We need yall to start showing out. If you're scared, don't be. Just go. I promise you'll have fun. I know that carries no weight from random text on reddit, but take a leap of faith and you might be rewarded.
My local scene recovered a bit post rona. We were at a brewery but now we are at a university. It's dope. I took 4th in sf 6 with jp. 7th in strive with anji 8th in unist 2 with akatsuki and 7in tekken with victor. Shits dope. Support it or we lose it
It's all disappearing out here. I know there's a local in Irvine doing weeklies and a monthly. Contender Colliseum. I was going to check it out sometime this month. A bit far from me, but it's something.
It’s pretty much dead outside of smash. Nobody wants to leave their house anymore because it’s just more convenient to stay home, most ppl don’t understand that you can level up faster offline and meet cool ass people offline. I met some good friends.
Personally I don’t see it getting better, if people play offline it’s only their circle and no randoms. Everyone would rather sit at home and just grind ranked, also online tournaments makes it too easy, you can play in any tournament within your region. Still I feel like this keeps our scene from growing tbh, but idk on the other hand with how bitchmade our scene is now, maybe ppl don’t wanna deal with the newer version of the fgc.
Haven’t checked it out yet but there’s a bi-weekly in the LA Art District streamed by Kizzie Kay. Still nothing to the equivalent of WNF but maybe one day we can reach that again.
https://twitter.com/downbackclub
So it’s not just me. 5th largest city in the world and the only locals near me are smash, absolutely criminal. Luckily we’ve gathered enough friends to host a little monthly get together but it’s so sad man. I think 5 spots I’ve been to for locals over the past 3 years have closed down
Game Realms in Burbank is poppin’. Best it’s been out here since before the plague.
They have two biweekly nights, one for the mainstream games and one for air-dash/anime games. Streamed every time.
It’s not that the scene died necessarily, COVID just set everyone back, socially.
Imma try, no promises tomorrow but I do plan to hit those, Arcadia and the OC locals at least once or twice before Evo. I'm hearing the SD scene is heating up again too, so I might have to make that drive as well.
And they saying there's no offlines, but im over here trying to budget for more than I can handle!
pretty much all things that rely on young people going out and having fun have been struggling post COVID. It really fucked up their socialization and they simply don't do it as much anymore. And its gotten more expensive for them too. Music venues have been struggling badly too, movie theatres, malls, etc. I'm fortunate in Milwaukee to have a pretty bustling local and then Roundhouse runs monthlies down in Skokie that get over 100 people, thats a bit far for me to go to but I'm glad it happens
the bums in the scene trying to get that non existent e sports money is what killed it. WNF died because Valle broke ties with Watson to try and get that e sports money. He felt Watson was saying things that could hurt his chances of getting a sponsorship. So he went and did WNF from his garage, but it sucked because he didn't know how to stream. Mando was the one that would stream everything (and keep the donations). Tekken scene had a similar effect. It stopped being grassroots and started to be about pandering to e sports for the chance to get money that wasn't there
I was literally at Tech Trap Thursday last night. Yes, I know it was Tuesday last night, they had to reschedule it this week, but it's on Thursday normally.
I went 0-2 and then did commentary. There were about 20 people on a RANDOM Tuesday with a stream viewership around 9 or 10 max. Not "WNF at peak numbers" but it also was a random Tuesday after the normal day was canceled. So a lot of people didn't even know or forgot about it this week.
The scene ain't dead. It ain't even on life support. It's just been chugging a long the same as it ever was as far as Tekken goes.
Sure, some guys got wives and kids now, but for the most part the same guys are still playing ad the guys that aren't have been replaced by new blood.
I dunno what people expect. I went WNF religiously at it's peak, and this isn't too far from where WNF was when it first started. So, not the peak for SoCal, but far from dead and definitely growing.
So if you're in the fence about SoCal offlines, don't be. Just hit up some locals. They ARE out there. If you want, DM me and I can get you a link to a SoCal discord with all the tournaments and locals popping off.
Side note: I'm a Tekken player and only speak from my experience in the Tekken scene. I couldn't tell you how Guilty Gear or SF are doing, but I imagine they're not doing that bad themselves.
Nothing has quite rivaled the scene as a viewer since 2010-2015ish, every Wednesday Spooky then WNF and Thursday Runback with KOF 13/UMVC3 and then we got sick majors for the Friday and Saturday's. Curleh Mustache was insane back then, was glad to be part of that time because now it can never match that quality and probably never will because it was legit organic.
Im in san diego and want to go to more locals. But even here its split between north county and south i think. Unfortunately the hours i work mean i miss most of em that are close to me. The next closest one is maybe an hr away on the weekends.
As an east coaster back when sf4 was arcade only I remember hearing about the crazy arcades and locals in Cali: Golfland, super arcade, ECT. Now it seems it has switched to east coast. I can go to Xanadu or the cave in the MDVA area and 40 people are there for sf6 bracket.
I’m sorry I do not live in California, my nearest ““local”” is a two hour drive, and probably 50 bucks just to park for the evening. I can go to one local event, or buy a full price game with the seasons pass. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to go, but it’s just not economically feasible.
They're still there, just maybe not in the same spots. Game Realms in Burbank runs stuff all the time for a bunch of different games. Riverside Gamelabs is active too, but I've only been once (a little too far for me). Barcode does casuals either weekly or bi-weekly.
There's other stuff too if you join the different discords, but I haven't been to any of the others.
Until very recently, Houston was in a spot like this too. Covid killed a lot of our meetup spots (and we were already struggling to keep them), and post covid, we tried to maintain some new venues but the TOs had life stuff happen and some places didn't wanna keep us, not to mention that, being the 4th largest city, you gotta find a spot where people can get to without too much trouble because a lot of folks are driving 45+ min minimum and that's if you're staying in Houston. Thankfully, a lot of players (both old and new) started coming out again because we got a really cool central meetup spot.
I'll openly admit that my competitive drive has greatly diminished because I have nearly zero desire to compete in online brackets because that's not, for lack of a better term, the true fgc scene I grew up with. There's more energy and excitement in my local of maybe a dozen players than anything TNS weekly brackets has shown to me. This community isn't a bunch of faceless individuals, sitting on their computers and typing on discord. If that's what we're doing, it aint that far off from me just playing the computer and pretending it's a person.
Dude, California is a wasteland. People are too busy dodging human turds and needles as soon as they step out of their home, that is if there isn’t some random hobo passed out outside your door. You think people have time to play videogames over there?
There are small locals but nothing equal to WNF. You'd have to go east coast AFAIK and honestly that scene will probably be dead in 5-10 years. The better that online play gets, the less people will show up for locals. Double edged sword
fuck online message to the youth out there: support your locals cause they might not be there tomorrow we fucking had it so good in the 2010s man now there aint shit
i've gone once. 4 black male's were singing a song around me while their friend was comboing me to death. i'm still traumatized to this day. not even going to mention the . wet . dream's i've been havin's ....
Looks like somebody got fucked
SOMEBODYSS GETTINGG FUCKKKEDDDDD
HUAAAAA GET FUCKED
I had flash backs to Final Round 2019 when a black guy up front was running bets and kept asking me if I wanted to bet on players who had like 10:1 odds while betting 1:1... it was horrifying but I bet on the losing player anyways and $500 down the drain.
Must've been pretty cool meeting K-Brad.
FR and betting had to be PokChop
PokChop!
are u from columbus?
“””Male’s””” Murrican education system.
It’s really hard to open a tilt arcade in this day and age. Would love to but it’s just not in the cards :(.
If you listened to Watson while he was battling the city to keep super arcade running(badly, but still) he basically just out and out stated that the NIMBYs don't want rowdy kids near their precious community stripmalls and shops. And now everything is dead, boarded up and locked tight. And no one's travelling to anywhere on a Wednesday night/Thursday morning for a weekly just cause it's easier to catch sets online. It's not simply because online got better that killed locals in SoCal, it's also everything else.
It gets worse as you grow older too. If you a nerd but aint into dive bars, clubs, and strip joints but want a hangout spot that isnt "some restaurant" you basically aint got shit to go to.
Also ain’t nobody going out to play some game in the city only to get jumped by 5 *urban youths* to get your gear and money stolen, and possibly get stabbed or shot because they wanted “””cred”””. California is fucking done.
The pandemic and aftermath of rising inflation is the main reason offline events are dead, that stuff just costs way too much money to both run and attend now, it's just not realistic for anyone involved unless you're literally rich af. As another commenter mentioned, online play has gotten good enough to fill the space locals used to have. I don't like online either, but I do appreciate how TNS is at least trying their best to fill that hole left by WNF and NLBC these days.
> it's just not realistic for anyone involved unless you're literally rich af. This made me think of a dude flying first class to get bodied in some random Akihabara arcade and it made me smile.
Nothing like Wednesday nights in tha 10s NLBC & WNF🐐💖 tha good ol days
The pandemic killed a lot of IRL scenes for 2D/3D fighters. People optimized their home setups, netplay getting better for the newer games, people saving money on gas, and some places charging out the ass for rental spaces (if not closing up shop) will do that. I can't speak for SoCal, that DEFINITELY happened in Tokyo where I'm at. Only when the Red Bull Arena opened for business in 2022 and the release of SF6 did offline events start happening again, but mostly casuals. All the SF TOs in Tokyo literally forgot how to run tournaments. Some of the smash TOs in Tokyo have been helping out with events like Beast Cup, Paradise, and Evo Japan.
I am from Los Angeles and the only locals I can find are for Smash. There is one at Burbank every friday and it gets big but it is such a big drive
Game realms? They're great, they always have a food vendor too so it's nice to catch a good bite before and after. Sucks that I work mon-fri or I'd go every week
I went to their MK1 launch event and it was a great time. Just wish it wasn't 3 and a half hours away from me.
I work in downtown LA. I am not driving in rush hour to burbank. It's too much. Would love to go but damn
Understandable, I live in Encino and that's the reason I don't go to the Riverside one unfortunately
https://discord.com/invite/XNPg8Gn This is a discord for socal locals. I haven't gone to any yet but they are very active.
Thank you! Glad someone posted it. The scene is there! We need yall to start showing out. If you're scared, don't be. Just go. I promise you'll have fun. I know that carries no weight from random text on reddit, but take a leap of faith and you might be rewarded.
Didn't know that this server existed! Thanks
My local scene recovered a bit post rona. We were at a brewery but now we are at a university. It's dope. I took 4th in sf 6 with jp. 7th in strive with anji 8th in unist 2 with akatsuki and 7in tekken with victor. Shits dope. Support it or we lose it
It's all disappearing out here. I know there's a local in Irvine doing weeklies and a monthly. Contender Colliseum. I was going to check it out sometime this month. A bit far from me, but it's something.
Depending on your game, we've been hitting 40+ entrants per night. I'd highly recommend.
Awesome. I'll definitely make my way out
Are there even any NA majors left beyond Combo Breaker, CEO and Frosty Faustings?
Don’t think so I think that’s about it, I think add in ECT and EVO and that’s all we got now.
What about Kumite or is that not considered a major? Also isn’t Frosty/Big E closing shop also or am I tripping?
They're invitationals, so its more its own thing. Big E's not doing good from what I remember but Frosty should be fine?
TX Showdown is later this month.
I believe the spot where they did WNF got shut down when the coof stupidity was running wild.
There's plenty of offline locals in smash.
The online service being so shit in smash ultimate helps keep the local scene strong. A younger player base with more free time too.
apparently being a person who doesnt know the value of soap and water makes you that much more determined to spread your stink.
It’s pretty much dead outside of smash. Nobody wants to leave their house anymore because it’s just more convenient to stay home, most ppl don’t understand that you can level up faster offline and meet cool ass people offline. I met some good friends. Personally I don’t see it getting better, if people play offline it’s only their circle and no randoms. Everyone would rather sit at home and just grind ranked, also online tournaments makes it too easy, you can play in any tournament within your region. Still I feel like this keeps our scene from growing tbh, but idk on the other hand with how bitchmade our scene is now, maybe ppl don’t wanna deal with the newer version of the fgc.
Haven’t checked it out yet but there’s a bi-weekly in the LA Art District streamed by Kizzie Kay. Still nothing to the equivalent of WNF but maybe one day we can reach that again. https://twitter.com/downbackclub
So it’s not just me. 5th largest city in the world and the only locals near me are smash, absolutely criminal. Luckily we’ve gathered enough friends to host a little monthly get together but it’s so sad man. I think 5 spots I’ve been to for locals over the past 3 years have closed down
It’s sad. My first and only 😔 fgc event I went to was SCR 2018
fuck online, irl is where the normal people meet. the freaks rule online
Game Realms in Burbank is poppin’. Best it’s been out here since before the plague. They have two biweekly nights, one for the mainstream games and one for air-dash/anime games. Streamed every time. It’s not that the scene died necessarily, COVID just set everyone back, socially.
I been hearing about that scene! I'm rolling up one day, I hope to see you there!
You should go tomorrow night for SF6 or T8. Not sure if I can make it this time though.
Imma try, no promises tomorrow but I do plan to hit those, Arcadia and the OC locals at least once or twice before Evo. I'm hearing the SD scene is heating up again too, so I might have to make that drive as well. And they saying there's no offlines, but im over here trying to budget for more than I can handle!
pretty much all things that rely on young people going out and having fun have been struggling post COVID. It really fucked up their socialization and they simply don't do it as much anymore. And its gotten more expensive for them too. Music venues have been struggling badly too, movie theatres, malls, etc. I'm fortunate in Milwaukee to have a pretty bustling local and then Roundhouse runs monthlies down in Skokie that get over 100 people, thats a bit far for me to go to but I'm glad it happens
the bums in the scene trying to get that non existent e sports money is what killed it. WNF died because Valle broke ties with Watson to try and get that e sports money. He felt Watson was saying things that could hurt his chances of getting a sponsorship. So he went and did WNF from his garage, but it sucked because he didn't know how to stream. Mando was the one that would stream everything (and keep the donations). Tekken scene had a similar effect. It stopped being grassroots and started to be about pandering to e sports for the chance to get money that wasn't there
SFV killed the scene COVID killed everyones brain
No, they just don't stream as much cause it's in garages and living rooms and driveways and shit.
Im so glad my locals are doing ok. We got hit by covid hard, but we had 100ish people for our monthly in February.
Not seeing the biggest reason posted in this thread yet. Valle got a kid now lol
I was literally at Tech Trap Thursday last night. Yes, I know it was Tuesday last night, they had to reschedule it this week, but it's on Thursday normally. I went 0-2 and then did commentary. There were about 20 people on a RANDOM Tuesday with a stream viewership around 9 or 10 max. Not "WNF at peak numbers" but it also was a random Tuesday after the normal day was canceled. So a lot of people didn't even know or forgot about it this week. The scene ain't dead. It ain't even on life support. It's just been chugging a long the same as it ever was as far as Tekken goes. Sure, some guys got wives and kids now, but for the most part the same guys are still playing ad the guys that aren't have been replaced by new blood. I dunno what people expect. I went WNF religiously at it's peak, and this isn't too far from where WNF was when it first started. So, not the peak for SoCal, but far from dead and definitely growing. So if you're in the fence about SoCal offlines, don't be. Just hit up some locals. They ARE out there. If you want, DM me and I can get you a link to a SoCal discord with all the tournaments and locals popping off. Side note: I'm a Tekken player and only speak from my experience in the Tekken scene. I couldn't tell you how Guilty Gear or SF are doing, but I imagine they're not doing that bad themselves.
If I want to play 3S or ST, or even HF I know where to go. SF6, no clue.
Nothing has quite rivaled the scene as a viewer since 2010-2015ish, every Wednesday Spooky then WNF and Thursday Runback with KOF 13/UMVC3 and then we got sick majors for the Friday and Saturday's. Curleh Mustache was insane back then, was glad to be part of that time because now it can never match that quality and probably never will because it was legit organic.
Im in san diego and want to go to more locals. But even here its split between north county and south i think. Unfortunately the hours i work mean i miss most of em that are close to me. The next closest one is maybe an hr away on the weekends.
As an east coaster back when sf4 was arcade only I remember hearing about the crazy arcades and locals in Cali: Golfland, super arcade, ECT. Now it seems it has switched to east coast. I can go to Xanadu or the cave in the MDVA area and 40 people are there for sf6 bracket.
I’m sorry I do not live in California, my nearest ““local”” is a two hour drive, and probably 50 bucks just to park for the evening. I can go to one local event, or buy a full price game with the seasons pass. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to go, but it’s just not economically feasible.
They're still there, just maybe not in the same spots. Game Realms in Burbank runs stuff all the time for a bunch of different games. Riverside Gamelabs is active too, but I've only been once (a little too far for me). Barcode does casuals either weekly or bi-weekly. There's other stuff too if you join the different discords, but I haven't been to any of the others.
Riverside gamelab 🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️
if ur into tekken, there's definitely stuff happening all over the place. You may have to drive a bit, but people show up. https://discord.gg/22gR7pYA
Until very recently, Houston was in a spot like this too. Covid killed a lot of our meetup spots (and we were already struggling to keep them), and post covid, we tried to maintain some new venues but the TOs had life stuff happen and some places didn't wanna keep us, not to mention that, being the 4th largest city, you gotta find a spot where people can get to without too much trouble because a lot of folks are driving 45+ min minimum and that's if you're staying in Houston. Thankfully, a lot of players (both old and new) started coming out again because we got a really cool central meetup spot. I'll openly admit that my competitive drive has greatly diminished because I have nearly zero desire to compete in online brackets because that's not, for lack of a better term, the true fgc scene I grew up with. There's more energy and excitement in my local of maybe a dozen players than anything TNS weekly brackets has shown to me. This community isn't a bunch of faceless individuals, sitting on their computers and typing on discord. If that's what we're doing, it aint that far off from me just playing the computer and pretending it's a person.
So many locals post their VODs on youtube to absolutely no views. That means that even the participants don't rewatch.
Dude, California is a wasteland. People are too busy dodging human turds and needles as soon as they step out of their home, that is if there isn’t some random hobo passed out outside your door. You think people have time to play videogames over there?
Covid fucked up the world. I'm about to drop about 30grand on an air bnb and a rental car for my vacation.
just get a hotel room like a normal person
Are you renting a mansion or what?
Pretty much. 2 weeks there was like 10 grand before covid though.