The Big House 10 was a historic tournament. Of all the tournaments this year, it has probably been the most discussed, the most reported on, and the most memorable. I’m not sure if I can say anything new about the event itself that hasn’t been said already.

For my 2 cents, the scheduling at BH wasn’t awful, but it could have been a little better. Singles I think was fine, no one was playing at 10pm into 10am the next day, but the way doubles/singles were scheduled in relation to one another left something to be desired. I had a block of doubles at noon Friday, a second block at 4, a block of singles at 6, and my singles wave 2 at 8. I was the last set on stream Friday at almost 10pm and began at noon. That’s not quite on the level of Riptide’s bonkers Sunday scheduling, but it was far from ideal. Furthermore, the people who made top 8 of doubles had to play at 11am the next day, which was early enough and in an inconvenient enough slot stream-wise that None didn’t even bother to show up. I really do feel like TOs this year have been almost conspiring to kill doubles with the way it has been treated, and I wish more of the community would be vocal in opposition to that. I was told by someone at the event that “No one is pointing a gun at your head and making you enter doubles”, but honestly, we shouldn’t have to choose between entering doubles and being exhausted. We can and should do better.

I must of course also beat my unfrozen stadium drum here. I don’t have anything new to say about it (you can read my Riptide writeup if you’re interested), but it does indeed suck.

Other than those two points, I can’t really think of anything “wrong” with The Big House. It’s hard to find a setup when R1 pools are going on, but that’s really just the nature of a supermajor. Everything ran smoothly and on time, there were plenty of volunteers/staff available, and the tournament didn’t try anything particularly wacky in the way it was run. It was a classic supermajor experience and they pulled it off without a hitch, which is something to be applauded. There is a reason why TBH is the mecca for MW Melee, and I see no reason why it shouldn’t continue being so as long as Juggleguy wants to run it.

As for the bracket, I’m not going to say anything about amsa, Soonsay, or Leffen. Those have already been discussed to death, and one more person saying “Wow Leffen did bad” or “amsa cool and good” isn’t really going to accomplish anything. I will say though that amsa’s victory did end up overshadowing Soonsay’s spectacular run somewhat, and while understandable, that’s still unfortunate because it was a truly fantastic performance.

Outside of the titans, there were interesting happenings throughout the bracket. Franz very notably made it to 17th, getting revenge on BBB and beating a red hot Azel, who was coming off upsets on both me and Krudo to make it to the top 24 qualifier round. Duck and Morsecode notably outperformed their seeds, but in truth I don’t think those really surprised anyone. I still think Morsecode is the best active Samus main and Duck is an all-time great who has had plenty of time to acclimate to his new mains, even if he hasn’t been entering as much. If you were too surprised by either of their runs, I think you probably just haven’t been paying attention. TRT also had a nice run to 17th, beating Squid and Lunar Dusk while being the beneficiary of the Plup DQ. I was surprised to learn he was seeded below Squid for this, and while I totally understand due to his lack of activity, it was hardly a shock to see him take that one. Still, the Lunar Dusk win is nice.

On the flipside of notable performances, CPU0 got 256th. Yeah. Not sure what to say about that one. Everyone is allowed a bad day, and I’m sure he’ll bounce back. Magi getting 49th is also notable, although given her bracket I am not at all surprised. Sirmeris is a beast and I’m glad he’s finally starting to get recognized as such, and Ginger is a bad loss for almost no one. Skerzo at 65th is also a little surprising, but given that he ran into Colbol and the aforementioned Morsecode, hardly a big deal in terms of blemishes on his resume. Slowking at 96th is also certainly an upset, but when your losses are Franz and Majersk for that spot it speaks more to how stacked BH is than anything else. Honestly, looking back, other than CPU0 having a very bad day, all of these definitely speak more to the talent depth present than anything else. Big House is just that tournament.

PERSONAL

Firstly, can I say something weird? I actually just kind of like Detroit. I like how stellar the hot dogs are. I like that you can walk to places downtown. I like that it isn’t ridiculously expensive. I know the smasher mantra is to say “Ewww Detroit…but hey it’s Big House!” but I just don’t really agree. Detroit has been good to me every time I’ve been there for Melee. The food is good, the downtown area is walkable, and I’ve never felt unsafe despite the lingering reputation the city has. It’s easily up there with Worcester for my favorite area of the majors I’ve been to this year. The only downside was how expensive lodging was, but with the help of a few (five) friends even that wasn’t too bad.

I would also like to take a special section to thank Melee Stats for helping me get there. I was planning to do BH without any help from them, but at the last second (Monday evening) my ride fell through and I started to have car troubles. They came in lifesavingly clutch and provided me with a plane ticket…which I proceeded to promptly almost squander by missing my flight. It couldn’t be helped; there was over a full hour of slowdown on I-65 on the way there (on a route that typically takes less than an hour to begin with), but thankfully as a reward for listening to the Southwest Airlines hold music on speakerphone in my car for 40 minutes they let me change the flight for less than 10 dollars. Still, nothing like a big dose of STRESS to start your major trip.

BRACKET

For doubles, I finally had a decent performance! Falling to None/Spud in winner’s and Faceroll/Zamu in loser’s, Majersk and I got 17th. For once, I thought my new teammate and I had pretty good synergy off the bat, and he did a phenomenal job of finding the kills I as Marth could not. Even the sets we lost felt doable, which is an awesome thing given the caliber of our opposition. Our wins against Paladin/Ambisinister and Lord English’s team were particularly gratifying, as the former was a double Fox team whose members I have a lot of respect for, and the latter were unseeded killers who washed us game 1 and we got to showcase our adaptation. We did benefit from the Aura/Nut DQ in winner’s (they were supposed to play us in the round Ambi/Paladin did), but we also had to play Faceroll/Zamu early in loser’s so I think it balanced out. No complaints here, and I’d run the team again in the future (still going to learn Fox for dubs though). .

For singles, I played a little bit shaky all of Friday, but for the most part kept my composure and was able to lean on my punish game/make critical adaptations when the base level of my gameplay wasn’t up to snuff.

My first set was against a box Falcon who wasn’t bad but made the rather unfortunate choice of counterpicking me to YS. I had a chat with him after the set about that decision and hopefully was able to change his mind, but in part because of that I won the set 2-0. My next and last set in R1 pools was against up and coming Marth player Zam, who actually managed to get a game. I was a pretty heavy favorite going into the set, and in spite of that it probably looked dead even to onlookers for the first two games. Marth dittos are truly terrifying, and Zam proved to be a competent player who was just winning a great deal of the initial mixups. Still, game 3 I was able to cash in on some movement reads and clean up my edgeguards enough to win a bit of a blowout, and so made it out of R1 pools in winner’s.

In round two, my first set was against strong Cali Fox Casper, who very nearly took game one before I made a comeback with a big 0-death stock at the end, and managed to beat me on Stadium game two. In game three I deliberated very hard where to take him (FoD or back to Stadium), but eventually chose FoD since I had just lost on Stadium and didn’t want to risk double rock/fire. The story of the set til that point was Casper going for safe damage and finishing his combos early with upsmash, and me going for longer extensions/techchases and missing a good deal of them. In the FoD game, I was able to cash in on some neutral reads and tighten up my punishes and really turned things around, nearly going up four to one at one point. This is actually a really common issue I see from players coming up in really stacking regions: playing for the upset/not to get upset rather than to win the tournament because Fiction or some titan like that is at every local and beating them consistently feels so out of reach. It’s a problem that tends to work itself out in time; people aim one upset higher until they’re trying to beat (insert top player) and need a style that will do that, but for the most part I think it’s a mistake long term to play for stability over correctness/getting the utmost on your openings. Still, it’s tournament and things are loose and weird, and Capser is a very good player and I don’t mean to critique him too harshly.

My next set was against my Melee Stats teammate Pipsqueak (wow…another tournament where I’m seeded to play my MS teammate from Sweden, very cool). This set was really really frustrating for me because I take an enormous amount of pride in not losing to people’s soulless counterpick secondaries (which I absolutely saw the Pip Falcon as at the time even if it isn’t), and I felt like I got preparation gapped. Pipsqueak’s neutral defaults just seemed to hard counter mine, and he played a very weird, Gahtzu-esque game where he eschewed “normal” neutral in favor of basically only looking for options that would lead directly to a kill regardless of percent. I wasn’t prepared, and I suffered for it big time game one where I just got crushed. I had a better handle on things games two and three (and of course, YS is amazing for Marth), but I just did not have the execution to close things out. I techchased fine, and hit my combo links reasonably well, but my spacing was just off and when that happens Falcon kills you, simple as that. I do feel as though the spacing being off (Pip was just always landing in a slightly different spot than I was expecting him to be, especially off being hit and then drifting/jumping away) was influenced in part by his being on an all digital controller. Instant 1.0 cardinal direction switches go kind of crazy. But still, I don’t want to take too much away from Pip. He is obviously an amazing player who made quality decisions to get the win, and even taught me about a new jab/stomp interaction on shield from talking to him after the set. That interaction and failing to understand it was pretty big in the set (getting stomped at low percent is arguably Marth’s biggest “avoid at all costs” in the MU, in contention with getting grabbed in the corner at 50-60), but other than that I felt like my problems revolved around getting outplayed/outprepped/and especially out executed rather than flaws in my basic gameplan.

My set in loser’s to make top 64 was one that I knew I was going to have to play and was VERY unhappy about, which was against Paladin. We weren’t technically seeded to play; he was supposed to to lose to Erik and then even if he won play and lose to the loser of ROM/Eggy. However, I knew Paladin would beat those players. Don’t get me wrong: those players are all good (shoutouts to hidden boss among hidden bosses ROM), but Paladin is just that dude. This was his first major in years, and I don’t blame the seeders for not realizing how good he’s gotten, but I’ve spoken before about how I think he’s the actual second best in TN, and if we were stricter about geographical requirements for PR I think he’d be the uncrowned king. He’s the only guy in the region that has me really looking over my shoulder because of his combination of not just skill, but work ethic, main, and youth. Unfortunately for him, I don’t really get nervous playing with my homies/training partners in tournaments. I’ve talked a lot about how it’s the pressure of being in competition that gets to me, not being on stage or the size/name of the tournament, or even the opponent, but Paladin is just someone I’ve played against so much now that I can’t really get nervous against him. I think it showed in this set where, while game one was close at first, I kind of just kiss of death punish gamed my way to a pretty dominant victory. It was easily my best played set of the weekend, and I’m glad that it was on stream, but I was extremely frustrated to not only have to play a sponsor teammate but someone from my region who I play with very regularly to make it out of pools at a supermajor. We both deserved better. Looking back at the VOD, my movement was pretty choppy even if most of the decisions were broadly good, so even when I perceive myself as playing well I need to remember to review the VOD and critique myself with clear eyes.

My first opponent on Saturday for top 64 was Azel, who beat me 3-0 with his Sheik. I don’t remember anything about this set other than being consistently off on punishing his rolls/descent, and I don’t think I’m going to review it either. The story of my Saturday at TBH was honestly dominated by receiving news that a close family friend had passed away, and my memory of the day as a whole remains a bit clouded. I did a good job of keeping my spirits up before the set/going into it, but once I hit the first bit of adversity in the set, it was just too much. I couldn’t handle it. I’m fully aware that this is an excuse, and that every loser has an excuse, but I do feel the need to justify why I don’t really have anything to recount about this set. Hats off to Azel: he’s a great player, underrated if anything, and it’s extremely possible (likely even, given his victory over Krudo in the next round) that he would have just beaten me anyway, but this is one I think I’m just going to write off in my personal memory because I don’t think I was myself and I don’t want to remember the experience.

So in summary for my bracket run it was going fine until tragedy kinda took everything off the rails, and I don’t have as much to say about as I normally would. I had a good time on Sunday watching top 8 and hanging out with my friends playing Melee.

My takeaways for things to work on

  • Navigating the Falcon shield pressure situation Pip taught me
  • Managing making spacing adjustments more quickly A way to readjust to broken expectations faster. When someone throws the whole playbook out the window, you have to be ready to do the things that beat what they’re doing IMMEDIATELY, not the things you expected them to do.