(Part 2) Top products from r/SSBM

Ah yeah, you’re in a tough part of the melee journey. Serious enough to be invested in results, not good enough to get a ton of positive feedback. Good enough to identify weaknesses, but you don’t quite yet have a framework to solve these problems. Good enough to have others put expectations on you / talk about your play style but not quite good enough to refute haters or have your point of view heard. You’ve been playing long enough that you can see how far you’ve come but you also start to realize just how far you really are from the top.

It’s easy to get discouraged from here, especially with what seems like a decently large skillgap between you and the next guy up and what seems to be a fairly toxic community wherever you are. At your skill level it seems like you can grind out tech skill and still see a million errors in your play. You can improve a bunch and not really see progress in how far you place in bracket. Even if you do really want to put in the effort to improve it doesn’t seem clear where exactly you should focus these efforts.

My advice is to start to really appreciate the journey every step of the way. Yes, this is a tough part of it, but learning to overcome this spot you’re at both skill wise and what you have to admit has become a bit of a mental barrier will provide tremendous benefit to you. Learn to focus your effort to be more productive, to see benefit in your training in ways other than counting how many times you SD in a match. Hard work pays off. Not always in the most obvious ways, but trust me when I say that if it feels like you aren’t benefiting from practice you need to either re-evaluate how you practice or re-evaluate how you measure progress. Enjoy the process of practice, finding things to work on, improving those things and repeating the process. Enjoy the journey of self improvement that this provides you.

I can tell you that you have nothing to worry about in terms of “learning the game backwards,” I’ve personally always been a proponent of focusing on tech skill first before neutral game but at the end of the day there is no roadmap to getting good and there is no easy way to reach the next step. The only universal truth is that you get out of it what you put into it.

And don’t worry about people calling you lame. “Playstyle” is something people obsess a lot that isn’t a very useful thing to think about when gauging your improvement. When I was quite a bit worse than I am I was called campy, reliant on lasers, I used to be called the backwards facing Falco cause I “only use Bair / Utilt.” People like to assume that your playstyle in a certain way because that’s how you intend for it to be but in reality these are all just steps on your way to having a more robust style. There are a LOT of things to learn about this game and if you’re getting pretty good at a certain style that they like to call lame then feel free to take pride that you’ve got understanding in one part of the game but remain humble in that you know there are many other parts of the game to learn. Not because they’re “less lame” but because you need to expand your knowledge base to improve. Next time you get called lame just say "that's ok I'm just trying to get better." Honestly style is overrated at low levels cause realistically nothing is cool at low levels, just get good then you can shut em up later.

Lastly I can’t overstate how helpful these two books are relating to this type of stuff. If you’re dedicated to sticking to it and seeing how far you can go / what you can get out of melee then I highly suggest you read both of them!

Good luck dude.

Inner Game of Tennis by Timothy Gallwey

Online pdf:

http://www.tinapse.ro/home/coltul-indrumatorului-coach/resurse-materiale-instrumente/W.%20Timothy%20Gallwey%20-%20The%20Inner%20Game%20Of%20Tennis.pdf

Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Inner-Game-Tennis-Performance-ebook/dp/B003T0G9E4

Art of Learning by Joshua Waitzkin

Online pdf:

http://www.nordiccentre.org/downloads/The_art_of_learning_waitzkin__josh.pdf

Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-Learning-Journey-Performance/dp/0743277465

I know it's not what you meant, but this ps1/ps2 controller to gamecube adapter is very good and I would highly recommend it + a ps1/ps2 controller for playing on console if you're already used to ps3. Here is an in-depth review I did on it if you're at all interested.

 

It even has some advantages over using a gamecube controller imo, with dual Z buttons (R1 and L1 are both Z), face buttons that are much easier to slide across, circular stick gates being amazing for SDI, and amazing ease of use for "piano-style" playing being the main ones that I'd cite. It's also a lot cheaper to get a good ps1 or ps2 controller than it is to get a good gamecube controller in general.

 

EDIT: Looks like the price of the adapters went up on amazon. Here's an ebay one that looks good

Squid and Dr. PP both recommend the art of learning, and the inner game of tennis and they're both godlike so I'd take their advice. Flow is really good too.

Something cool you could do is get into chess. I only played chess seriously for a few months really, but I feel like it gave me another angle to think about tactics and strategy in. Chess is really fun and it'll give you that same competitive brain feeling melee does without killing your hands.

/r/chess has lots of guides about how to get into the game and stuff. There's lots of cool websites now like www.chesstempo.com where you can do tons of tactics training puzzles that are really fun and make the learning curve for beginners a lot less steep than it was back in the day when chess books were the only option(which are great, but it's really hard as an absolute beginner to sit down with a chess book and actually make it through it).

If you're already like 2100 fide rated or some shit then just ignore this lol.

That sounds cool and all but I don't think you're really getting to bottom of what's happening when you say stuff like "on-the-fly adaptation can become one and whole as part of the subconscious flux." The act of adapting during a match, a verb, becomes part of what, now? A subconscious flux, what is that? "Flow" is a state of mind, we are trying to understand, describe, and be able to reproduce this "optimal experience."

Galeway and even Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi the guy that popularized the concept fell short, as Flow reads like a self-help book.

Anyway, cognizance is directly opposed to subconsciousness. They cannot "become one," since by definition subconsciousness is not being conscious or cognizant.

You are also not going to have "cognizance" at the speed of subconsciousness. Conscious thought takes time, and that slows you down. Speed of decision-making is directly tied to the consciousness of an action. Action is a part of a complete reaction, and quick, effortless reactions gives you that thrilling feeling.

On the one hand, you need reasoning, conscious thought, to solve complex problems, but on the other, you need reaction speed and fine motor control. But, you can't have both. So, the only way "self 1 and 2" working together makes sense is if you are constantly switching between them. Or, if you are riding back and forth along the sliding scale between thinking a lot and thinking next to nothing if that is the subconscious/conscious dichotomy's true nature.

This "self 1 and 2 switching" is different from both Galeway's "inner game" and Csikszentmihalyi's "flow" paradigms, as they focus on primarily on activities where you need to consciously adapt very little. Because in reality, that breaks flow. But in Melee and many other competitive games, conscious adaptation is necessary. If you're in the zone and you're fucking LOSING, do you really want to stay in that mind state? No. You want to identify the problem, solve it, and get back in the zone as quickly as possible.

If you want a spiritual-sciencey metaphor summary, you want to relieve the inertia that resists your atemporal transit. You want graceful hardware and software interrupts. You want to be able to repeatedly jump in the lazy river, adapt to the current, and jump back out, walk to another point of the river, and jump back in without it, like, feeling weird, or something. I don't know.

Yeah sure man, either get the Mayflash adapter (which I'd recommend because it has "native" mode, and PC mode, so you can freely use it with other games besides dolphin):

https://www.amazon.com/Mayflash-GameCube-Controller-Adapter-Port/dp/B00RSXRLUE/

Or you can get the official Nintendo adapter, which looks better and also works (and you've got the official Nintendo quality):

https://www.amazon.com/Gamecube-Controller-Connection-Wii-U-Nintendo/dp/B00O9GPB00/

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00B2HH7G0/ref=psdcmw_1292115011_t1_B01F9UC20Q?th=1&psc=1

This monitor does 144Hz natively, and is usually touted as the best budget 144Hz monitor for the price point. There are other brands like BenQ with a reputation of being tournament standard monitors for games like CS:GO, but honestly I don't think anyone's been critical of what this monitor does.


I don't have personal experience with this model, but I do own a 60Hz monitor from ASUS that has served me very well for a good 4 or so years.

And check out the link Poison posted.

No. Depending on the console you're using, you need either

https://www.amazon.com/Nintendo-Cable-Composite-Yellow-S-Video-Stereo/dp/B007NNDKFY/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1483340956&sr=8-4&keywords=composite%2Fs-video+cable+wii

or

https://www.amazon.com/Cinpel-S-Video-Cable-Nintendo-64-GameCube/dp/B00KZLEHL2/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1483341056&sr=8-3&keywords=s-video+cable+gamecube

Plus one audio splitter cable, like this one

https://www.amazon.com/CableWholesales-Audio-Piggyback-Cable-Female/dp/B000I94FAE/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1483343243&sr=8-2&keywords=piggyback+cable+rca+audio

Basically, these console cables have two video outputs. You plug the Composite end into your TV, and the S-Video end into your capture card. Then you use the audio splitter cables to have audio on both your card and your tv. It's pretty easy to set up on any CRT using composite

Another book to add to this list is [The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance] (http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Art-Learning-Journey-Performance/dp/0743277465)

Fantastic book about using previous learning and incorporating it into your new smash learning through cycling/funnelling information.

You can get an easy cap or something similar for like $8 and a couple splitters that came out to ~$15 in my case. Recorded these matches with this card.

Get yourself a capture card, RCA splitters, and a double-sided RCA cable. The capture card I linked is extremely cheap but does its job for the most part. The quality is by no means great but it's watchable at least. Use that to record your matches instead of VHS, it's much simpler to handle in the long run.

No $200 laptop will be good. However, for $150 more you can find good deals like this laptop. It's got the latest i3 processor, a backlight keyboard, and can upgrade the RAM up to 32 GB. It's not even the best deal you can find, but if you want a cheap laptop that can be decent for mid-range gaming then this should be fine.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00KSTFH3I


These are the splitters I'm using. The quality on the tv is fine, it's the quality of the of what the elgato is capturing on my pc, it doesn't look nearly as good

You should buy either the 4 port mayflash or the official wii u gamecube to usb adapter. Both of these make dolphin feel just like the gamecube in terms of controller inputs.

4 port mayflash: https://www.amazon.com/Mayflash-GameCube-Controller-Adapter-Port/dp/B00RSXRLUE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1487737578&sr=8-1&keywords=4+port+mayflash

Official Wii U: https://www.amazon.com/Gamecube-Controller-Connection-Tap-Wii-U/dp/B00O9GPB00/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1487737600&sr=8-5&keywords=wii+u+gamecube+adapter

I have the 4 port mayflash and it works flawlessly. A guide to setting them up in dolphin is found here: https://www.smashladder.com/guides/view/26oz/controller-guide-2-0

I can't believe no one gave you a real response. Buy this and this. Plug the S-video part in to the capture card and the yellow cable in to your TV. Use these to split the audio. Easy cheap recording setup for melee.

So I figure if I'm gonna be coached I may as well do it like the real pros. Catch yall at evo with my new equipment.

This one? it's advertised as a dvd recorder? is it good?
l
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EAS14KI/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_DsDqxbC6NT8SK

Don't listen to the other 3 people this TV should be just fine.

It looks like it has an S-video input (labeled Y/C-input on the TV in this picture) they make wii output cables with those like this. Then there's only one audio input below it, so plug in the white audio cord into that and you'll be set.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01K1IO3QW/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&linkCode=ll1&tag=bkadamos_test04-20&linkId=8440181d1290fef7d94e1a1645fc0bea

anything that can play league of legends will run smash fine. check out /r/suggestalaptop

Which netplay adapter do you guys recommend?

http://www.amazon.com/Mayflash-GameCube-Controller-Adapter-Port/dp/B00RSXRLUE/ref=sr_1_3?s=videogames&ie=UTF8&qid=1451370655&sr=1-3&keywords=gamecube+adapter

http://www.amazon.com/GameCube-Controller-Adapter-Wii-ports/dp/B00YH2TGYS/ref=sr_1_6?s=videogames&ie=UTF8&qid=1451370655&sr=1-6&keywords=gamecube+adapter

>Good composite setup - Avermedia C039, use a S-video cable for wii that has S video and composite. Plug the S video in to the capture card and the composite in to the TV and use splitters for audio. OBS has built in deinterlace software that works well.

https://www.amazon.com/Wii-S-Video-AV-Cable-nintendo-u/dp/B001B0A3A0

https://www.amazon.com/AVerMedia-Standard-Definition-Composite-C039/dp/B00603S1OS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1485960536&sr=8-1&keywords=avermedia+c039

So these?


I got a component capture card a long time ago for Wii; if I wanted to use it, should I try to buy a component to composite converter?

Try something like this instead, it works much better.

Finally a question I can actually answer. For just normal Red/Yellow/White A/V cables I use this setup.

Option 1

1. Go from your console to a splitter such as this. Doesn't have to be exactly this splitter but it does have to have external power or you will have signal degradation.
   
   
2. You will need extra cables so pick up a couple of these. One cable goes directly to the CRT the other into an adapter.
   
   
3. Here is one I have used a lot it is a solid adapter for the price. They can range from cheap to really expensive so it's whatever you want to put into it.
   
   
4. From HDMI out go into your method of capture I use this. If you don't want stretch for the El Gato, AverMedia is also a reputable brand. Then just USB from the capture card into your PC.
   
   Is there any reason you want HDMI? You can keep steps 1 and 2 from above and use something like this instead.
   
   I can also answer any question you have.

This is the 144hz brand that I own, and constantly see recommended

https://www.amazon.com/VG248QE-1920x1080-144Hz-Gaming-Monitor/dp/B00B2HH7G0

> A big life philosophy of mine is rhat people are too accepting of being okay with saying incorrect things.

I responded to the statement "2 port is cheaper and has direct." When I search "mayflash 4/2 port wii u adapter", they are both listed at $15.99: 4 port, 2 port

Ususally when people say "2 port" without any further clarification, they are referring to this piece of garbage. If you find a listing for this, it probably would be cheaper, because it's obsolete. But it doesn't "have direct", because at the time there was no official Wii U adapter to copy.

https://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Speed-Nintendo-GameCube-Feedback/dp/B00006HMPP/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

Turn that aerial drift into some Tokyo Drift nom sayin bro? vroom vroom skrrrrrr

Anyone have experience with this?

Can I use it to stream a tournament?

Also does anyone have a link to that overlay software that had character icons and stuff? I don't remember what it was called but it was posted here at one point.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0135NUBQQ/ref=pd_sbs_107_1?ie=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B0135NUBQQ&pd_rd_r=86D8PTMZQEATV9MY9CVR&pd_rd_w=zaju7&pd_rd_wg=r332A&psc=1&refRID=86D8PTMZQEATV9MY9CVR


This says ps3 but it's the link in the reddit post

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0135NUBQQ/ref=pd_sbs_107_1?ie=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B0135NUBQQ&pd_rd_r=86D8PTMZQEATV9MY9CVR&pd_rd_w=zaju7&pd_rd_wg=r332A&psc=1&refRID=86D8PTMZQEATV9MY9CVR

Non-mobile: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KSTFH3I

^That's ^why ^I'm ^here, ^I ^don't ^judge ^you. ^PM ^/u/xl0 ^if ^I'm ^causing ^any ^trouble. ^WUT?

What type of monitor would be required to get minimal amounts of lag with a sewell converter? Would either of these two monitors be viable for tournament play?
http://www.amazon.com/BenQ-GL2460HM-24-Inch-LED-Lit-Monitor/dp/B00IKDFL4O/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1453238828&sr=8-2&keywords=2ms+monitor

http://www.amazon.com/VS247H-P-1920x1080-DVI-D-Back-lit-Monitor/dp/B005BZNDS0/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1453238828&sr=8-5&keywords=2ms+monitor

Actually, would it be possible to use this:

http://www.amazon.com/Dazzle-DVD-Recorder-VHS-Converter/dp/B00EAS14KI

Without a laptop? I can use a desktop at home, and I plan to use this to record videos from locals.

The only elgato that seems to have A/V inputs for melee is the standard model.

Looking at it, it seems I need an adapter or something extra to hook it up to the console.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ec26gjrlL._SL1500_.jpg

Don't know if this is what I need. Not sure what the USB end is for

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003L14VWS/ref=s9_simh_gw_g504_i2_r?ie=UTF8&fpl=fresh&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=1BJXQD85BWCAZZZGWVVR&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=2079475242&pf_rd_i=desktop

I'm not positive, as I've never used anything like it before, but I imagine you would need something like this: http://www.amazon.com/RCA-Compact-RF-Modulator-CRF907R/dp/B0014KKV7W

No idea about any potential lag.

How does this monitor look for netplay? It has a 60hz refresh rate, will I be able to get it to mirror my consoles lag online?

Has anyone tried to use one of these with a PlayStation fight sick?

https://www.amazon.com/Wii-GameCube-Converter-PS2-Dance-Support/dp/B000F7B516

Seems from the reviews that it is a good product. All of these people who are asking why didn't they make the smashbox with a stick could have something to try out.