Gaming Trends TV 03.14.07: The Championship Gaming Invitational 2007

Posted by Vincent Chiucchi on 03.14.2007

The champions from last year come back to defend their titles in Dead or Alive 4 and Project Gotham Racing 3 while two new teams face off for the Counter-Strike championship. Find out where everyone stands after Part 1 of the series.

Welcome to this weeks Gaming TV. Usually it would be "Gaming Trends", but with my news report full of stuff from the GDC, I decided to move this week's CGI recap here.

Direct TV Championship Gaming Invitational 2007, Part 1 (originally aired 2/10/2007)

Your hosts are Stryker, Tommy Tallarico, and Jonathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel. This year, the games played are Dead or Alive 4, Counter-Strike, and Project Gotham Racing 3. The champions from the previous year are back to defend their titles against new competitors.

We go into our first match for the DOA4 Tournament, where just like last year, first to 5 wins the match, winner of the tourney gets $10,000 and the Mountain Dew trophy

DOA4 Quarterfinal: Ryan "Offbeat Ninja" Ward (DOA4 Cybergames Champion) vs. Vanessa "Vanessa" Arteaga
This match is interesting because these two are actually very close. Love hurts. Offbeat Ninja chooses "Ein" and Vanessa chooses "Hitomi", who storyline wise trained with Ein. The stage is the Crash Club.

Round 1: Ninja starts off with a quick hit, then arm throws Vanessa into the wall and unleashes a barrage of punches, draining her health quickly. Ninja does a couple kicks but Vanessa hits a counter throw. She then hits a counter blow and a 3-hit combo. She corners him into the wall and hits a 7-hit kick combo that drains his health to nearly the same level. She knees him in the gut and wins the first round in an amazing comeback!

Round 2: Both are blocking each others attacks until Ninja kicks Vanessa into the wall. Vanessa counters Ninja's attacks as they both continue blocking. Vanessa counter-throws but Ninja hits Vanessa with the judo chop. Vanessa repeats her counter-throw but Ninja kicks her into the wall and uses a quick combo to finish her off.

Round 3: Both hit quick critical hit combos as Vanessa is getting close to the wall. Vanessa trips Ninja and hits an 8-hit air juggle that knocks Ninja into the wall and low on health. Ninja strikes back with an air juggle of his own, but he's still lower on health. Ninja tries blocking Vanessa's attacks but she just keeps coming and eventually scores the win.

Round 4: Ninja hits the judo chop to start it off. Vanessa is knocking Ninja back towards the wall but Ninja stops her with a counter hold. Vanessa goes for a throw but Ninja counters that as well and hits a finishing combo.

Round 5: Judo chop again to start off and then he hits an air juggle knocking Vanessa into the wall and taking half her health. Vanessa hits her counter throw and the 7-hit combo that knocks Ninja to the electric floor, now taking half his health. She another 8-hit combo that knocks Ninja into the wall, but Ninja stomps Vanessa to the ground and makes a comeback with a combo of his own. A quick 2-hitter to the legs and Ninja wins.

Round 6: Vanessa is hitting a series of short combos knocking Ninja back to the wall. Ninja counter throws her but she keeps using her quick combos and takes the round easily.

Round 7: Ninja knocks back to the wall and pulls off an air juggle to drain over half her health. Ninja keeps fighting aggressively and is about to win until Vanessa suddenly counters and whips him into the wall. Another comeback? Nope, she's just too weak and Ninja wins.

Round 8: Ninja starts with a counter hold combo, Vanessa tries striking back but Ninja blocks everything, and then punches Vanessa halfway across the stage taking a lot of her health away. Judo chop and a quick combo later, Offbeat Ninja wins the match. Some of the guys really liked Vanessa and start booing him.

At the CGI, they do this test to decide how good the pros are called the "H2i", a program to measure the level of a gamers hand to eye coordination. On a scale from 0 to 100, getting an 80 would be very good. All the athletes competing take this test. Some get as high as 89.0, some as low as 49.2. Fatal1ty took the test and scored a 98.1, higher then everybody else. Stryker scored a 59.4.

DOA4 Quarterfinal: Emmanuel "Master" Rodriguez (the defending CGI Champion) vs. Katherine "Optimystik" Gunn (reached the final 4 in the Cybergames Western Regional)
Master chooses "Ryu" and Optimystik chooses "Ayane". The stage is the Seaside Market.

Round 1: A couple punches from both sides to start and Master knocks Mystik across the stage. Master hits a counter blow and strikes with an air juggle. A critical blow hat leads to a combo and a slam into a fruit stand finishes Mystik quickly.

Round 2: Mystik starts off very strong, constantly knocking Master into a wall multiple times and draining 80% of his health. But Master fights back right away with many critical blows and multiple air juggles. Mystik gets weak but counters his attack and wins the round.

Round 3: Both stall and then Master hits a driving kick. Master knocks her into the air and does the always awesome to watch Izuna Drop (spinning pile driver). Mystik does a 3-hit combo but Master quickly does a 4-hit combo and finishers her off with another air juggle.

Round 4: Master starts with a combo, then hits an air juggle, then uses a counter hold and kicks Mystik right in the back of her head. He hits a driving kick that knocks Mystik into a fruit stand, and is almost going to score a perfect but Mystik does a counter hold. Master does a quick teleport and strikes from above for his 3rd win.

Round 5: Master once again starting off his strong combos. He misses with the air juggle and Mystik counters. Mystik tries to pull off a combo but Master blocks it all, trips her and hits his air juggle. Kick to the back of the head and Master shows why he's the champion around here.

Round 6: Mystik gets the first hit but Master is knocking her near the stairs. Mystik does a counter throw and tosses Master down the stairs, crashing down to the lower level. Master is fighting back but Mystik drill kicks him into a pier. Master slams Mystik's face into the sand. Mystik hits a flip kick and only needs one more hit to win, but Master kicks her into the pier and gets aggressive. Mystik's down to less then 1% health when she suddenly counters Master's attack with a throw and wins the round!

Round 7: Mystik hits a roundhouse kick, Master jumps over and strikes the back of her head and then drive kicks her into a fruit stand. Master does a counter hold and once again uses the Izuna Drop. Master brings her down to low health, Mystik tries to grab but counters it and wins the match.

After the break, we get a look at the upcoming "Direct TV Championship Gaming Series", coming this spring. I wish they actually gave dates for this.

Next game up is...oh no, Project Gotham Racing 3. BUT...this time, we've got 5 people driving in one race instead of 2 or 3, so it could be more exciting. Also, the tournament is set up different: There are two heats with 5 people each. First two to make it across the finish line move on to the final race, and the fifth wild card spot is given to the best time from the non winners. Winner of that final race win $10,000. And just like WSVG, just about everybody is either from the clan TTR or R1R.

PGR3, Heat 1: Sean "Max1mus" Heffelfinger vs. Brian "Bboyle" Boyle (15-yrs-old) vs. Ed "Helmakr" Cochran (non-TTR or R1R member) vs. Wesley "Ch0mpr" Cwiklo vs. Winfield "7humbs" Hill
It's One Lap in New York City.

Race begins and Bboyle is in the back of the pack along with 7humbs. Max1mus is in the lead followed by Helmakr and Ch0mpr close behind. Ch0mpr hits Max's back wheel but Max recovers and keeps his lead. Bboyle has caught up with Ch0mpr and Max and the three leave everyone behind going into the Brooklyn Bridge. The three come to the wall that they need to ride well in order to keep their positions, and they all do. Ch0mpr gets a small opening but loses it and the positions remain the same. After the second part of the bridge they ride the last wall and Max1mus takes first, Ch0mpr takes second, and Bboyle gets third, thus thrown into the wild card.

PMS V3nus is here to give us a tip on how to power slide. To power slide, hit the A button when your about to turn, then accelerate right away to keep on going. But I remember Fatal1ty saying from WSVG to never use the power slide because of the risk of crashing. Hmm...

PGR3, Heat 2: Caitlin "V3nus" Buckshaw vs. Joe "Phantom" Tackett (returning champion) vs. Erika "Sk1ttl3s" Galegor vs. Christopher "McLaren F1" Hogfeldt vs. Christopher "Shancus" Speck
Once again, one lap in NYC.

Race begins with Venus in the back and Shancus in front, but Phantom suddenly takes the lead. McLaren goes around the outside to pass them heading into the sharp turn, but gets bumped by Venus and Shancus and crashes badly into the wall! Sk1ttl3s capitalizes and takes third as Shancus is in the lead. Shancus slightly bumps a wall and swerves (not to mention swears), taking him down to 4th place! Phantom takes the lead and McLaren passes Sk1ttl3s for 2nd heading into the bridge. Phantom rides the walls and takes first place with McLaren in 2nd and Sk1ttl3s in 3rd.

Between Sk1ttl3s and Bboyle, Bboyle had the better time by two seconds, so he'll be taking the wild card spot for the final race. Now it's time for the Counter-Strike Source tournament...or rather, just the final. Just like last year, it's 5 vs. 5, 9 rounds per half, first to 10 wins, winners gets $50,000. And I assume like last year, the teams don't know the map until the minute before the match begins.

Counter-Strike Source Final: EF Gaming vs. Hyper!
The map is Dust 2, Hyper! starts as the terrorists.

Round 1: Four from Hyper with the bomb head to Area A where two CT's are waiting. EF Gaming immediately kills three of them. The fourth ducks back and then throws a grenade, taking out one CT. Fourth member of Hyper throws a grenade, it misses, but still kills the CT with gunfire. In the middle of the map, Shredder of Hyper kills a CT in the hallway and we're down to 2 vs. 2. Shredder finds Brown of EF and kills him too, leaving only Moe of EF. Moe throws a grenade but is soon killed by Shredder and Hyper take the first round.

Round 2: Three men from Hyper head to Area A with only one CT (Rockstar) guarding it. Two from Hyper show up and Rockstar throws grenades. He takes down one but he's quickly taken down afterwards and Hyper plants the bomb. But meanwhile, the rest of Hyper have been getting killed, so now it's 4 vs. 1 in favor of EF Gaming. P.O.S kills TN from long range, giving him enough time to defuse the bomb.

We're jumping forward where Hyper lost three rounds in a row, basically by playing horrible and EF Gaming doing some good sniping. But by Round 6 Hyper started getting back in the game. In Round 7 Hyper took out EF Gaming easily. So after 8 Rounds, the score is tied 4-4.

Round 9: Hyper heads into Area B, leaving one member behind to cover for them. A firefight breaks out killing two CT's and one Terrorist. Foerster from Hyper snipes a CT, and then another, but he gets sniped himself by the last EF Gamer, who can't hold his own.

So the half ends with Hyper in the lead 5-4.

We get a look at last years's CGI when Swoozie lost to Kasumi Chan. Swoozie was so embarrassed by losing Kasumi Chan that he started training underground for this tournament. Yeah...this looks totally fake.

Here were the highlights of the Kasumi Chan/Swoozie rematch:
-Both were playing as Kasumi.
-Round 1, Swoozie dominated throughout most of the match. He also dominated in Round 2, Round 3, Round 4...AND Round 5! Swoozie won with a shutout, a very big step up from the very close encounter they had last year.

Here are also the highlights of the King/Perfect Legend match:
-People thought Legend had the advantage, but it turned out to be a very close match. Yep, so exciting and yet we didn't get to watch any of it.
-After 8 rounds, King won 5-3, going into the Semifinals against Offbeat Ninja. Master, the one who taught King how to play, will take on Swoozie.

And now we get up to speed with the 2nd half of the Counter-Strike tournament, where we're about to being Round 13, with the score tied at 6 a piece and EF Gaming as the terrorists.

Counter-Strike Second Half

Round 13: EF Gaming take two different paths heading towards Area A. One of Hyper's men is killed and another is sniped in the head. The bomb is now planted and only two Hyper members remaining. Foerster takes out one but traps himself in the hallway and is killed as the bomb goes off, giving the win to EF Gaming.

Round 14 would be won as EF Gaming with another bomb explosion, and Round 15 ended the same as well. It's now point-game for EF Gaming.

Round 16: Moe from EF goes into sniping position and takes out a CT from across the map. Hyper is going on the retreat as EF Gaming goes to Area A. Another snipe attack on Hyper, TN from Hyper takes out a terrorist, Klown kills a CT and kills TN, so now it's down to one member of Hyper. He gets killed from behind and EF Gaming are your CGI Counter-Strike 2007 champions.

EF Gaming are presented with the Mountain Dew trophy and $50,000 as the CGI Part 1 ends. Part 2 has the DOA4 and PGR3 finals, and a special Quake 4 match between Fatal1ty and the challenger Stermy. This should be awesome.