The Malaysian Fighting Game Community (MyFGC) has been gaining momentum as of late with more events happening this year. But that doesn’t mean they can’t go out to compete. Eleven players from Malaysia made up of sponsored players from team Flash Vision as well as unsigned players competed at Abuget Cup 2017 held in Jakarta, Indonesia this past weekend. Five different game tournaments were held which includes Street Fighter V (part of the Capcom Pro Tour as a Ranking event), Tekken 7 (part of the Tekken World Tour as a challenger event), King Of Fighters XIV, Guilty Gear Xrd Rev 2 and BlazBlue: Central Fiction.
Our Malaysian players competed mostly in Street Fighter V, with Arenz competing in Tekken 7 (alongside his teammate Meat from Indonesia) and the appropriately named Kofmaster competing in King Of Fighters XIV as well as Street Fighter V.
It was a tough campaign for the Malaysian contingent this year. There were many strong players in attendance, including the legendary Daigo Umehara and the up-and-coming Moke, who had a surprise breakthrough this year by reaching the top 8 at EVO. On the Tekken side there were many seasoned pros, including two top players from Korea, Saint and Knee, as well as the players from the Philippines who are on a completely different level than the players in Southeast Asia. For King Of Fighters XIV, there were two international players, one is Kofmaster and the other is the reigning EVO champion: ET from Taiwan.
For Street Fighter V, there were promising results. Chuan and Kofmaster made it out of the pool stage on winners side. Two players finished third in the pools, which meant there were one match away from going to the top 16. One of that was Nekoxx, who lost twice to the same person in the pools- an unfortunate repeat of what happened at Thaiger Uppercut. Jbt st also fell into the same situation, as he couldn’t get pass Moke’s explosive Rashid play.
JandaHunter had to settle in fourth in his pool after losing to Jbt st and HandsomeJoJo made it to fourth place despite losing his first match of the day. The biggest highlight during the pools was Hentai Tail having to face Daigo. The shock reaction by the provoking in-game name was enough to get Twitch chat to pay attention, though it was later proven that Daigo is better than Hentai. Hentai Tail also finished fourth in his pool.
https://youtu.be/rncdy8FgLIk
Both Chuan and Kofmaster won their first match in Top 16 but both were sent to the losers side by Taiwan’s Oil King and Daigo respectively. Chuan then won against China’s Jiewa to reach top 8 but lost to Moke, who had beaten Kofmaster in his previous match. Daigo eventually emerged the Winner of Abuget Cup 2017, the beast’s first tournament win for the year. while Chuan finished 7th and Kofmaster at 9th. Here is the full results.
While Kofmaster couldn’t repeat his third-place finish in Street Fighter V last year, he did however managed to place third in the King Of Fighters XIV tournament. His only loses were to the Indonesian player Kentut Berdahak, who eventually finished second behind ET.
For Tekken 7, Arenz managed to blaze through the pools but lost in his second top 16 match against AK from the Philippines. Dropping down to losers, he had to face Meat to reach the top 8. Meat prevailed and reached top 8, the highest finishing Indonesian in the tournament.
While our Malaysian contingent did well against the local competition, we still need to catch up with the other international pro players out there. The results weren’t as headline worthy like last year, and it goes to show that the competition is getting stronger each year. However, it’s not all doom and gloom, as our Malaysian players showed good potential. All they need is more tournament experience so they can perform better at high pressure moments.
Later next month, the annual FV Cup will be held here in Malaysia, which is part of the Capcom Pro Tour as a ranking event. It will also play host to various fighting game tournaments including Tekken 7 and King Of Fighters XIV. Maybe with the home advantage we can see more of what the Malaysian Fighting Game Community is capable of.
(Header image by Suk Tuck Ng, via Malaysian Fighting Game Community Facebook page)