Yutaro was confused at first at Tomoko's response. So she picked the wrong character... even so, why was she just sitting there instead of playing the game? However, the deluge of information that the girl released during the loading screen followed by the flawless execution of her theory proved that he had misjudged her. In fact, she seemed to know even more about the game than he did. He let out a whistle, impressed with her skills at the game, but couldn't help but comment on her strategy. "You need more tools than a 50-50 mixup, though, especially when playing as such a commonly used character. A mixup is only a guess when one's reaction time is slower than the character's animation; true pros know all of the characters' options and animations, and have the reaction time to deal with a tactic like that rather easily. People who win fighting game tournaments have two things: strong fundamentals, and a strong metagame."
Yutaro stopped himself there before he delved into a long lecture about strategic analysis, baiting, and yomi ("mind-reading"). In his high-school days, before he had a job to eat up all of his free time, he had won quite a few local tournaments in games like these, though he never responded to the invitations to regional tournaments. His reaction time was still superb, but he didn't have the time anymore to learn every matchup for every game, binge-watching videos of pro players and analyzing why they lost. No, if he challenged this girl now, he would most definitely lose, but Sun Tzu himself advised that one must know when to fight. Besides, it looked like the girl was getting "in the zone" with her high score run, and it would be bad manners to interrupt it.
"Anyway, my name's Yutaro," he said; he would have offered her his hand, but she wasn't likely to take her hands off the machine. "I'm sure we'll run into each other around here, so feel free to chat or challenge me; I'd have to be in a pretty bad mood to say no to either." With that, he gave her a wave that he was sure she wouldn't see, and headed over to Galaxian so he could try to take ASS off of the high score board.
TIME SKIP
It was a busy night at the casino. Nobody had to get up in the morning, and tons of patrons seemed to be in the grip of the holiday blues, which sucked for them but was good for business. Few people gambled as frequently as depressed single folks; they had the mindset that they had nothing to lose, and nobody to stop them. Fortunately, they had Yutaro to cheer them up, and his specialty was making people feel good even as they lost their money. "Hey look at it this way," he said to some surly middle-aged man who was ranting about how his ex-wife left him for some nerdy programmer. "At least you're appreciated here." Yutaro timed the consolation to arrive just as the man's "free" drink was delivered for maximum impact. Funny how people thought the drinks were free; he had lost sixty dollars in the time it took that drink to arrive.
He finished out the deck without any noteworthy incidents, and then it was time for the dealers to switch. Yutaro stretched as he walked over to the next table, and checked his phone. One message? He quickly opened it up, only to find that his mom had just sent him a picture of her dog in a Santa hat... though Yutaro wasn't exactly sure why he found that disappointing. The holiday blues could certainly create some unreasonable expectations.
Yutaro stopped himself there before he delved into a long lecture about strategic analysis, baiting, and yomi ("mind-reading"). In his high-school days, before he had a job to eat up all of his free time, he had won quite a few local tournaments in games like these, though he never responded to the invitations to regional tournaments. His reaction time was still superb, but he didn't have the time anymore to learn every matchup for every game, binge-watching videos of pro players and analyzing why they lost. No, if he challenged this girl now, he would most definitely lose, but Sun Tzu himself advised that one must know when to fight. Besides, it looked like the girl was getting "in the zone" with her high score run, and it would be bad manners to interrupt it.
"Anyway, my name's Yutaro," he said; he would have offered her his hand, but she wasn't likely to take her hands off the machine. "I'm sure we'll run into each other around here, so feel free to chat or challenge me; I'd have to be in a pretty bad mood to say no to either." With that, he gave her a wave that he was sure she wouldn't see, and headed over to Galaxian so he could try to take ASS off of the high score board.
TIME SKIP
It was a busy night at the casino. Nobody had to get up in the morning, and tons of patrons seemed to be in the grip of the holiday blues, which sucked for them but was good for business. Few people gambled as frequently as depressed single folks; they had the mindset that they had nothing to lose, and nobody to stop them. Fortunately, they had Yutaro to cheer them up, and his specialty was making people feel good even as they lost their money. "Hey look at it this way," he said to some surly middle-aged man who was ranting about how his ex-wife left him for some nerdy programmer. "At least you're appreciated here." Yutaro timed the consolation to arrive just as the man's "free" drink was delivered for maximum impact. Funny how people thought the drinks were free; he had lost sixty dollars in the time it took that drink to arrive.
He finished out the deck without any noteworthy incidents, and then it was time for the dealers to switch. Yutaro stretched as he walked over to the next table, and checked his phone. One message? He quickly opened it up, only to find that his mom had just sent him a picture of her dog in a Santa hat... though Yutaro wasn't exactly sure why he found that disappointing. The holiday blues could certainly create some unreasonable expectations.
