Day 1 - 6/27/14 (Dance Game Anniversary!):
Today was my 11 year dance game anniversary - 11 years since the day I first set foot on DDR Extreme at the Oh Wow! Nickel Arcade in Merced, CA and started playing dance games! It was also the day before the Super Groove Tournament 2 (ITG tournament) at Super Arcade in Walnut, CA. What better way to celebrate than by driving out for the tournament?
I'd been to Super Arcade once before, back in '06 or so. It'd been so long that I wasn't even sure whether the location I pictured when I thought of the place was Super Arcade or some other arcade but when we arrived I was pleasantly surprised to see that it WAS the place I had in mind and that it didn't seem much different to how I vaguely remembered it. I remembered the old ITG upgrade I'd played there, long gone now and replaced with an ITG dedicab which belongs to our friend Shawn/Silk. They had lots of other music games too including DDR 2013 (switched off for some reason), IIDX Spada, IIDX Lincle, Drummania V8, and Pop'n Music (not sure which), though I'm not sure which, if any, they'd had back in '06 or so because I only cared about 4 panel dance games then and they only had one of those at the time - the ITG upgrade.
Sean, Danny, and I left Vegas around 6:30pm or so. At 10:40pm, we arrived at the hotel we'd booked:
Days Inn West Covina
2804 E Garvey Ave S
West Covina, CA
We checked into our surprisingly large and really nice room, dropped off our stuff, and drove 4.1 from there to Super Arcade.
Super Arcade
1211 N Grand Ave
Walnut, CA
Seth and Sappy were there when we arrived and a few other friends showed up while we were there. Sean and I played a few credits together and traded off on a couple for a total of 4 credits each. I intentionally quit every song over a 13 or so, I believe, but only for the sake of preserving my legs for the tourney the next day. I didn't want to make the same mistake I make in every other tourney and destroy my legs before even getting a chance to compete so I fought and forced myself to go easy, only doing bits here and there in the tough stuff to adjust to the pads and playing through the easy stuff to get my FA as solid as possible. I actually didn't have any trouble adjusting to the pads, actually, though the brackets were off on the machine (unlike ours) and the 1P side was giving random way offs and other nc's on occasion. The screen was very slightly discolored, making it tough to tell the difference between 16th and 64th arrows (green and teal) and there was lots of other, very loud noise in the arcade but surprisingly I still didn't struggle to play there.
Around 1:30am, Danny, Seth, Sean, and I went to get a little food at McDonald's just down the road.
Then Sean, Danny, and I went back to our hotel where we showered, watched some tv, and finally tried to get some sleep at 3:35am. Despite being exhausted, it took Sean and me another hour to actually get to sleep because we were still sick and couldn't stop coughing our lungs out. :(
Day 2 - 6/28/14 (Tournament Day!):
Sean and I woke up in the middle of the night a few times, continuing to have trouble sleeping til we finally got out of bed at 9:20am. Danny was already awake so the three of us went to get continental breakfast (served from 7-10am) in the hotel lobby. There weren't many food options - just breads, starches, apples, oranges, apple juice, orange juice, milk, coffee, and tea. We ate a bit though and took a bit back to our room for later. Then Sean and I went back to bed and FINALLY fell asleep again til 12:10pm, getting about 5.5 total hours of actual sleep for the "night" max.
Seth had picked Danny up while Sean and I were sleeping and the two of them had gone to do nerdy Yu-Gi-Oh things before the ITG tournament, I believe, so it was just Sean and me in the hotel when we got out of bed. We were still SO tired but we forced ourselves to get ready for the day anyway.
Around 1pm, Sean and I drove back to Super Arcade for the tournament. Tournament qualifiers were supposed to start at 12:30pm but the owner was late and hadn't even opened the place yet when we showed up. Alex/figgies, a friend of hers names Erika, Avery, Avery's little brother, Naomi, Danny and Seth, were already in the area, hanging out in Lolicup (the boba place two doors down from the arcade), drinking boba and playing Yu-Gi-Oh. Calvin showed up with No Bar Alex while we were there. I'd waited a long time to introduce Sean and Calvin!
Sean and I got hungry so we walked to Yoshinoya in the same parking lot and shared a tasty combo bowl for about $6. By the time we got back, Super Arcade was finally open!
Qualifiers started soon thereafter. People were allowed two warm up songs before playing their choice of two qualifiers. Sean and I, like most people, chose the easiest songs to qualify on. The songs: The Original You (10) and Space Dog Escape Pod (10). I didn't do my best on either of them but I was surprised I didn't do worse, considering my usual tournament performance. I always get so damn nervous! Anyway, I seeded 8th out of 14. Sean seeded 9th and Danny 5th.
I ended up playing my first match against Sean but we both just decided to call a draw on our first two songs (no point in playing each others' picks since we each knew we'd lose the other person's) and skip to the random. In the entire pack, there was only one song I'd never seen and one I'd seen but was too annoyed with to finish and walked off halfway. The rest I'd played through once or more each. Sean and I randomed the one I'd walked off and won, sending me straight to the losers bracket. x.x
My next match was against Ervin. I can't remember what song he picked on me but I think it was an 11 or 12. I lost 97.28 to 97.73. For our second song, I picked Dreamer (15). I got a lot of pad way offs but FA'd it really well til I guess Ervin got too tired and quit around 22 percent or so. We randomed a 9 or 10 called Can Can World, I believe. We both tripped up and broke combo but I somehow got hella lucky and won by both score and excellent count.
Sean's next match was against Sappy. Each of them won their own pick but Sean lost the random (some technical song, maybe an 11 or so).
My next match was against Calvin. I picked a 9 called Roly Poly and did really badly but Calvin did slightly worse and ended up quitting. He picked a 14 called Policy In The Sky. I was winning all the way up til 42 percent or so but I couldn't tell (I couldn't look at the scores while playing without messing up) so I quit. My legs were slightly tired and I didn't want to put in a bunch of effort just to possibly lose. We randomed a 13 but I vetoed it, figuring he'd out FA me on something that technical. Then we randomed U Got To Know (12) but Calvin vetoed it. We randomed another 12 after that but the song was the only one in the pack I'd never seen - an extremely technical, somewhat footspeedy, 1 minute long 12 called I Got Fucking Nothing. I almost won til the very last moment where there was a footspeed section and I went from winning 78 percent to 80 percent to losing 83 to 84 percent. :/ I was out of the tournament then. Honestly though, Calvin had improved (at least FA-wise) A LOT since I'd last seen him play and was a very solid match for me.
Sean's next match was against Danny. They each won their pick. The first random was a 14 but Danny vetoed it, knowing Sean would out stamina him on anything over a 13 or so. Unfortunately for him, their next random was a 15. Lol Danny ended up getting too tired and quitting and Sean won the match.
Sean played Avery after that. Sean put up a really good fight on the 17 he picked against him but Avery still managed to win 2/2 (both his and Sean's) songs, eliminating Sean from the tourney.
Overall, I believe Sean placed 5th in the tournament and I placed 8th right after Danny (7th), taking seeding/qualifiers into account for exact places.
Once we were out of the tournament, Sean and I borrowed Danny's car to go back to our hotel room. Danny stayed to hang out and watch the rest of the tournament. Ervin came with Sean and me to use our shower and generously gave us a $25 AMC movies gift card to pay us back! (He said he doesn't go to the movies often.) Then the three of us went to relax in the hotel's hot tub for a few minutes til they closed the pool and hot tub area at 9pm.
We hung out in the hotel room for a little while after that and then went back to Super Arcade to regroup with everyone. Avery had won the tournament with No Bar Alex, Thomas, and Sappy in 2nd, 3rd, and 4th places, I think. Miguel showed up while we were there. He'd been at work earlier but finally came to hang out with everyone. A few others showed up too. Then we all drove down the street to Applebee's for the traditional post-tourney dinner.
There were about 19 of us at Applebee's. At first, everyone was chatting in small groups but I came up with some simple ITG games and got everyone playing. :p Sean and I shared a 2 entree and 1 appetizer for $20 meal deal. It was pretty decent but not something I'd spend that much on daily.
A lot of our friends went home after dinner but some of us went back to Super Arcade. Sean and I dropped Danny off at the hotel because he was sleepy. We were planning to get some games in with Miguel, an Asian stamina player we'd met named Jun, and each other but when we got to Super Arcade there was some misunderstanding between Seth and the arcade owner about the tournament venue fee so the arcade owner wouldn't allow anyone else to play for the rest of the night. Lame.
Sean and I hung out at the arcade for a little longer before heading back to the arcade to hop in bed and watch some tv. Danny was already sleeping. We tried to just go to sleep too but got too turned on by each others' bodies and wound up having to quietly do each other. Lol It felt AMAZING. Feeling satisfied, we finally got to sleep around 3am.
Day 3 - 6/29/14:
Sean and I woke up at 9:30am. Danny was already awake. The 3 of us went and got some breakfast in the hotel lobby and then went back to the room to wash up and check out.
We left the hotel for the last time at 10:45am and drove an hour or so south to Murrieta, CA to meet up with Seth at a comic store that was hosting a Yu-Gi-Oh tournament in the afternoon. Danny and Seth both entered the tournament but Sean and I weren't really interested so, instead, we went exploring!
On the opposite corner from the comic store was a former dance game machine location I'd visited a couple years back:
Mulligan Family Fun Center
Amusement Park
24950 Madison Ave, Murrieta, CA
(951) 696-9696
Sean and I walked over to take a look. It was cool getting to show the place to Sean and they had a lot of fun - looking, though a bit kiddie, things to do there (ie: an indoor climbing wall, go karts, a tiny water park, a decent number of arcade games) but they'd removed the old ITG upgrade they used to have rather than fixing it. :( Yet another ddrfreak deletion..
Down the street from there, Sean and I went to the 99 Cent Store for some drinks and treats.
Then we drove 15 minutes north to:
Trevi Bowling Center
32250 Mission Trail
Lake Elsinore, CA
When I'd visited with Ervin a few years prior, it'd been called Trevi Entertainment Center and had been an awesome, old school music game location. I'd been wanting to show Sean for quite awhile now but when we arrived this time the place was temporarily closed, under new management, and in the process of remodeling with plans to reopen soon. No way of checking what'd become of the music games there, whether they were still there, or whether there would be any when they reopened. Guess we'll have to make another trip to check one of these days.
Another short 15 or so minute drive from there was a spot by the lake in Lake Elsinore where Ervin had taken me when we'd been in the area those few years ago. The spot was in the back of an rv park:
Roadrunner RV Park
32500 Riverside Dr
Lake Elsinore, CA
When I'd been there with Ervin, it was late at night. It's hard to remember but I think we'd driven in quickly so that we wouldn't get caught by whoever was working in the office and have to pay the entry fee. It was broad daylight this time so I figured we'd get caught but just wanted a quick look so we chanced it, deciding we'd just come up with some excuse or something once they caught us. We drove all the way up to the water, parked, got changed into our swimwear, and went for a dip! The water was a little smelly but felt amazing. It was hot outside (Lake Elsinore seemed like a very hot part of socal) but we expected the water to be cold, as lakes usually are, though when we got in the water was nearly as warm as the air around us! There were some random cool patches in the water that continued to catch us off guard but even those were warmer than most lakes and overall the water was MUCH warmer than any lake or natural body of water either of us had been in before! The bottom of the lake wasn't super squishy and gross or covered in painful stones or shells either. Though we spotted a couple of fish jumping out of the water, the only thing we actually found on the bottom of the lake was stinky black mud that smelled a bit like old eggs and was spotted with glittery gold flakes that made it sparkle in the sunlight.
We were only in the lake about 20 minutes when someone who worked for or maybe owned the rv park came up and told us politely that we either had to pay $10 to be on that part of the beach or leave. Apparently that particular area was private property but the lake itself was huge with lots of other access points, many of which were open to the public and free. Sean was already a bit sunburnt anyway though and we'd had our fun so we decided to continue on to new activities!
On the way back to Murrieta, we passed back across Lake Elsinore's Main St, which appeared to be the center of town, and stopped for a look around. It was tiny and very old school in style (very comparable to Old Sacramento or Mariposa, CA). It took us about 5 minutes to looked around the place thoroughly and we quickly noticed a few funny things about the place: most of the shops and even pubs there were closed down or had VERY short hours, there were a lot of antique shops, and there were very few people out and about. We stopped in a Mexican food shop there (one of the few places actually open) and bought some very tasty puddings and cookies.
Danny called while we were there and said that he and Seth were finishing up with the Yu-Gi-Oh tournament. Sean and I drove back to meet with them and some of their Yu-Gi-Oh friends and we all went to eat at Taco Bell down the street.
Sean, Danny, and I drove home after that, finally getting back to our driveway around 10 or 11pm. Now, time to start practicing for our next ITG tournament..or Yu-Gi-Oh tournament in Danny's case! Lol
