Virtua Fighter dot com

To commemorate the 20 years of Virtua Fighter, Sega has started a new website - http://vf20th.sega.jp/ From the first blog post of the site (rough translation) - "20 years have passed since the release of Virtua Fighter. Thank you very much to our fans." This special site will be sequentially updated to celebrate this milestone, looking back at every step of the path to present day. From AM2's website and Famitsu's article, the anniversary site will subsequently give a glimpse to the development of the games in the series along with tournament history, something for both new and old fans.

Update: Article edited to reflect the discussion to be more retrospective. On December 26th, 2013, 7:30 PM JST, the Kurokawa School hosted by Fumio Kurokawa will feature a round table discussion called “Virtua Fighter, Twenty Years Later" (“バーチャファイター/20年後の未来”). Discussion about this event have already started here. We will update this thread with more information as they come. Below is a rough translation of some portions of an article from Famitsu:

The Kurokawa School series are group discussions on topics looking back at video game entertainment history and looking positively in the present day future.

Note: The first part is a translation of Kame's VF5FS Beginner's Blog Post by Modelah. The 'Attacks from Stance' section was written by @VFnumbers, with 'moves that will keep you in stance' added by Modelah.

Author: Kame
Years playing Lei-Fei: 11 (note: as of June 2012)
Years as a fighting game cameraman: 2

Lei's Characteristics, Strengths and Weaknesses
"Use your unique stances to bring opponents to their knees!"
Lei has 7 unique stances at his disposal, far more than any other character. With a wide range of attacks from these stances the Lei player can create a variety of offensive and defensive patterns to suit his or her playstyle.

Interview by Kingo, November 6th, 2013- In my opinion, Italy carried on the shoulders of G0d3L & Mister is becoming a major representative of the European VF scene. With a solid core of players, online & offline, these two good VF players actively contribute to the VF community's growth. Not only do they have their own website (http://virtuafighter.it) catered toward the Italian VF community, they also share their experience and knowledge on VFDC. They maintain a strong competitive spirit through their participation in different offline tourneys. Let's get to know more about these guys through this interview!

I know this isn't a new thing, but I want to do it anyway. In here are videos to teach new Wolf Players on how to punish the entire cast of characters after blocking their unsafe moves. Keep in mind I'm posting the max damage combos. However,in a tournament or an actual fight I also like to use safer combos or combos that lead to some wake up game.

Note: This was written by Kissa and translated by Modelah.

Kissa's VF5FS Beginner's Blog post

Hi, I'm Kissa, a Shun player from Tokyo. I played Lau in VF4 but have mained Shun since VF4Evo.

Shun's Characteristics, Strengths and Weaknesses
Some of Shun's basic techniques are poor when compared to other characters. For example, Shun's 'elbow' attack is a disappointing -3 frames on hit. It's also slower at 15 frames rather than the standard 14 frames. Another example is the punisher, which is -1 on hit (though to BT is +3).

Though some of his basic moves are poor, Shun has many unique stances and because there are many ways to transition into them, you'll never be short of choices to dazzle your opponent. Among them is the Chōkarō stance (entered with etc), a powerful tool for leading into damaging setups.

Note: This was written by Amuzan and translated by Modelah.

Amuzan's VF5FS Beginner's Blog post

Hi, I'm Amuzan. I've been playing since VF1 and have been using Shun since VF2. I pop into busy Tokyo arcades from time to time so hit me up for games if you see me around!

Shun's Characteristics, Strengths and Weaknesses
Shun is the only member of the VF cast that has a drinking system; the more drinks he has, the stronger he becomes. The number of drinks you have is displayed on the screen as drink points (X) during the match, and new moves become available as you drink more. Other characters have moves that will strip you of drink points, so managing your drinks is very important for Shun's game. As you start out with 0 you should focus more on getting drinks than damaging your opponent. This means that as Shun, not only do you have to have a sound nitaku game but you've also got to have a strategy of getting more drinks during the match. I think this extra depth makes Shun a very rewarding character to pick up.

Once in a while, it's refreshing to see unique events such as this: a 3on3 team event pitting Pai players against Lau players in Japan! This combined Pai-Lau Off event will take place on Sunday, November 3rd at Akihabara, one day after the first Railway Series team event of the 15th VFR Season on Saturday. As of now, the family feud is leaning toward Team Pai with 31 players compared to Team Lau with 27 players. Before the event begins, the 3-person teams will be randomly made before the start of the tournament. You will see the regular Pai and Lau players in the event--Shiwa and Yuutenji, for example--but also well known players of other characters participating! Team Pai has Demae and Aki (normally uses Wolf and Lion, respectively) and Team Lau has Joseph and Yogo representing (normally uses Akira and Kage, respectively)! Will Pai's Ensei-ken finally be enough to defeat her ailing father? Or will Lau's Koen-ken still be the stronger fist!?

Even though the 14th Beat-Tribe Cup ended earlier this month, the march toward next year's Beat-Tribe have started! The first event of the 15th VFR season is the 9th team battle of the 2013 Tokyo Bay Area Cup series. 93 players in 31 teams competed in the event. Below are links to the video archive and winner of the event is in the spoiler.