Fighting Stage Edition #1

This time, i write article about some places where heated battle occurs between two fighters for justice/fame/revenge/survival/fortune/other motives, in Video Games by the way. Certainly normal places can't be qualified as fighting stages, right?! There must be some kind of certain criteria to make anyplace to be interesting for fighting place. Or is it? We will see through these examples.

Larcen's Stage - Eternal Champions (Genesis)

It takes place in front of a Chicago theater (or cinema) in 20's where many men dressed in trenchcoat and wearing Fedora, it's Mafia's era is what i imply to. As you can see that the ticket-booth lady over there busily takes care of her fingernails and ignores a fight between a man that follows this era's fashion and a man in tight suit and wears futuristic visor. The mafia-looking man is Larcen himself  (the one i'm playing as). He is a mixture between Black Cat^tm and anyone who wears trenchcoat (could be mafia, the untouchable, or anyone who has sensible fashion in that era). That's pretty much the reason, he is my favorite in this game.

I can tell that this place is really belong in Al Capone's domain, with nōir atmosphere and occasionally a car that looks like the one that is gangster's property, passes near the fighters. Also, there is the parked one on right corner. I kind of curious with "Air Raider" movie that is posted there. Is it as good as "Top Gun"? Or better? By the way, do you know that every fighting stage in Eternal Champions has stage-fatality likes called overkill? This place is no exception. Can you guess what violence hazard fall upon the poor loser? 

If you guess he/she will be gunned down by local gangster. You're right. Congratulation! It's kind of ordinary to kill a man by emptying entire gun's magazine. But thanks anyway, pal!

Oh, you back with second magazine! That's really overkill him, lad! As you can see that nowthe lady is giving a glance with what happen in front of the cinema she works at after someone being beaten and gunned down, twice! She is more careless than Squidward Tentacle. If he's in the booth, he will go home immediately with lazy expression as always. 

One day your carelessness will backfire you, ignorant lady. I really hope so.

Mr. Bear's Ring - Battle K-Road (Arcade) 

Let's move to recent setting albeit still bit unreal. Please ignore a bout between Sylvester Stallone-like with a Grizzly bear (which is reasonably awesome) and concentrate to the ring instead! As you expect from a ring that designed by a bear, you will see bear-related stuff here. Such as: corner's decoration in blue and red color with empty-minded expression. And my favorite is the picture of adorable & round-y bear's head in the center also with writing "Teddy Bear". I assume Mr. Bear design it in order to comfort his victim who falls in the center of canvas with several broken bone and lots of bruises. How kind-hearted he is. Or should i say: He bears (*sic*) such a kind heart.
 

Magma Ocean Planet - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - Tournament Fighters (Genesis)

Here is Raphael's stage which reflects his personality (hot-headed and such). Also his move is like M. Bison's Pscyho Crusher but without pscyho power only his sais and his raging personality. As you can see this fighting stage consists 80% volcanic rocks & lava. And worth to mention is that big chap in the center. He looks so excited with the fight. Why?

Oh, i get it now. Besides the fight serves as his afternoon-bath show, he also will get after-bath snack. So the loser will not only receives heavy-beating but also becomes spa-boiled snack for this guy. Speaking of the Magma Cyclops here, his eyes looks belong to cartoon character or sort of that. I mean his sclera should be red instead of white. See what i mean?
 

 River Kombat - Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (Arcade)

Now we move to peaceful part of this town until two fighters, uhm i mean kombatants disrupt this place. It's pretty dull place for fighting but i like shiny part of this river. It's beautiful. But i wonder if this pretty river lies a danger that serves as stage fatality.

Here goes nothing.

Nope! It's just for sweet scenery only. Here is your grief sin, Midway (now named as Nether Realm Studio)! Beside making Scorpion absents to burn his victim as main Fatality in one or two Mortal Kombats. 

Earthquake's Stage - Samurai Shodown II (Arcade)

In case you don't know about any of Samurai Shodown, Earthquake is baldy fat ninja on the rightside. You probably said "No way he is a ninja". Well, he wields scythe with chain for starter. Also (you probably won't believe this) he can vanish in a smoke and suddenly re-appear then attack his opponent like any ninja in Samurai Shodown including my favorite here, Galford. By the way, this place reeks crime. I mean Earthquake and his fellows look like bandit. He uses ninjutsu to rob anything lucrative like that train over there, i think. Some of his fellows are smoking! That's kind of bad guy's doing.

The one who is under train's light, thinks he is smoking bad-blood. You just pollute your own lung also other's around you, simpleton!

Finally, i cut him down along with his snacks. The eating guy over there will be happy that soon he get extra consumption without having quarrel with (now late) Earthquake. I bet his fellows don't hesitate to steal from other. They're rotten criminal afterall.

Ukyo's Stage - Samurai Shodown II (Arcade)

It takes place in rocky shore with array of Torii (red japanese shrine-gate). Most of them are sunken. And there is this lady in blue who look worried as Ukyo is currently hacked by Galford (controlled by me). I assume she is his girlfriend. Her worrying is well-founded because Ukyo fight a blonde ninja (who looks as fierce as his wolf pet. Hint: clenched teeth) in the middle of the night while Ukyo occasionally coughs (my elder brother told me that he gets TBC/Tuberculosis).

On the rightside, we got sunken/drowned shrine. Why would you build a shrine that has potential being eroded by waves also can only be accessed via boat or during low-water-level period? To worship Leviathan?!

Sniper_award14.wav. No! Wait! I'm so sorry that i killed your lover here, lady. Perhaps Poppy's pups can make you feel better. They are tame. I swear.

Haohmaru's Stage - Samurai Shodown II (Arcade)

Let me be honest, Haohmaru's place is the same as Ukyo's albeit in sunset time. Also his girlfriend isn't timid like Ukyo's. She is cheering Haohmaru and has strong faith in his capability to defeat the blonde ninja. By the way, that's nice armlet/arm-protector there, lady in red.

But, Haohmaru's place is better than Ukyos's because of sunset coupled with that mountain. Lovely scenery, isn't it?!

Then Galford kills Haohmaru in front of his girlfriend. As if i make Galford dons "Widow Maker" title beside "Ninja-Weeabo with Wolf Pet". As token of apology, how about i lend you Poppy's pups for comforting session, ma'am? No need to quickly return them! Just take your time as much as you want!

Under-construction Dojo - Capcom vs. SNK Millennium Fight 2000 Pro (PSX)

Next is in crossover fighting game between Capcom and SNK. No! This is neither bootleg game or MUGEN. It's official though it only release in Japanese version because 2000 is PS2's era. Anyway, here is a fight between Kyo Kusanagi and Ken Master in a Dojo that is not constructed yet. The dojo owner is certainly look pissed and occasionally tell them to go away. If i'm not mistaken, the dojo owner is Takuma Sakazaki, Ryo's and Yuri's father. While he is angry with fight on his "premature" dojo, the builders look relaxed and enjoy it. "Not bad for lunch break's sideshow. And it's free!" they think. I have no idea what with that American Flag. Maybe it something related to Takuma's (late) wife that is American, or maybe this dojo is in America.

As any King of Fighters's fans know, Iori Yagami is Kyo's mortal enemy. Takuma says "Now that you defeat your rival. Get out of here at this instant!". Actually, i'm not done yet with this place, Mr. Sakazaki.  

I pick training mode this time so i can take picture easier. On the left side, there is SONSON, 24 hours mart. That mart's name is originated from Capcom's 1984 game title. The game is basically adapted from Chinese classic legend "Journey to The West". You know? It's about journey of yōkai monkey named "Sun Wukong" along a Buddhist priest and his other companion to obtain a Holy Book in the west.  By the way, here i pit an Australian Wrestler, Raiden with (everyone know) Brazilian Beastman, Blanka.

Why i choose to play Raiden? Because this place has unique feature: it's bouncing whenever a fighter is slammed to this planks floor. Who else can slams someone to the ground better than a wrestler? Beside bouncing, the premise will lose its integrity if someone is rammed against the floor so many times. As you can see that ceiling's/roof's frames collapse and right wall's frame also has failed. Takuma will get really bad headache for this and also the builder will be employed longer (which means more salary for them). Ok! I'm done. Have a nice day, Mr. Sakazaki!

Well that's the end of today's article. Bear (another pun!) in mind that there will be episode #2 in future! Just wait and see!

Cooking Collab 1 (Video)

Do you like good culinary experience? I bet you do unless you're obsessed with being skinny as living skeleton. I apologize if you're in the middle of fasting and this prologue may jests you. Actually i'm currently fasting for one month (now is Ramadhan month, you see). Anyway, can you cook? I can. Only a bit though. If you have any proper cooking facility in your house/homebase/lair, i suggest you try cook even for a bit. What with the easiness of finding cooking recipes by internet browsing. Also not all them aren't as hard to understand as nuclear reactor manual. So, it's worth giving a shoot. Anyway, here's cooking contest video that are meant to be funny entertainment not for cooking lesson.

Here we can see the (helmet-less) red soldier who act as jury in this cooking contest (let's just call him jury soldier from beyond this point), scolds a red spy who is one of cooking contestants for his failure. Spoiler: every contestant fail in this collab video. In case you don't know what collab video is, it's video that consist of qualified video entries that is made by other people other than the host. In this case, the host are the ones who name Psycho and Olu. I review some of the entries in this video to make this article not too long and comprehensive. So if you want to see all of them, i suggest you view the video here and leave a like if you're willing to. By the way let's get started!     

Here is an entry by LAZAA4567. 2 odd things that i see here: First, (obviously) the scout's head shape. Second, his position. I mean how can you turn on the stove when you are behind it?

Oh, yes! Put lighter (that is presumably lit) on the pan to cook. Brilliant! By the way, before he put the lighter, he poured some water from a jerry can. So you just cook some water?

 

The result: a cabbage?! That was not ordinary water, then?!

After he ate it, he frown and give the scout a middle finger gesture. That's really rude cooking assessment there, soldier. Failure factor: strange ingredient.

Now is entry by xXLazyMoonXx. Pyro here got strange cooking recipe. I mean look at the ingredients that seems not right such as: sawblade, Jarate(!!!), and a Baby?

Thankfully, the baby is just a doll. But that's still inedible ingredient like other. How he cooks all this ingredient?

He put them all in a pot then burn them using flamethrower. Is he laughing maniacally while doing so? Of course! He is sensible pyro, afterall.

The results is: a pack of cookies. That seems legit.

Then, the jury soldier sucks it. So far so good, huh?

But the pyro remember about something. And that is: small writing on the cooking recipe that say "Remember unwrap before eating!!!" It goes without saying that you must remove the wrapping of any wrapped food first, soldier!

The jury soldier screams painfully then give the pyro thumb down. In my opinion, this entry here is the best Cooking Collab entry for category: Pyro contestant. Failure factor: jury's stupidity lack of normal sense and weird cooking ingredients.

This time is DR. GAUGH's entry. As the sniper looks a kettle, he thinks to make tea party course. That doesn't sounds bad, right?    

But The jury soldier doesn't look happy. Oh, come on! The sniper gave you the party hat. You should smile a bit there.

The sniper even go far persuades the jury by wriggling his eyebrow and staring at the soldier in adorable manner. But the result remains the same. Failure factor: culinary that doesn't match well with jury's taste, perhaps.

Next is Sanches's entry. The pyro told the jury soldier that he will cook sandwich. How he cook it? By smashing a beef and a cabbage with french bread so hard that resulting explosion and of course, a sandwich. No doubt, it's this pyro inner ability to make explosion like this. Fire and explosion are quite close related, aren't they?!

While the pyro got distracted, a scout look at the sandwich while laughing. As if he has an evil plan.  

He ruins the sandwich with a bottle of scrumpy. That looks bad.

Yes, indeed. By looking at the jury soldier's expression, you can guess that the sandwich turns really bad. Then he throws it to the pyro.

The pyro response with wildly moving his head and point a middle finger to the jury soldier. Watch your manner, pyro! Failure factor: food sabotage with alcohol substance.

This is entry by PROPMINGE. Now, this is really ludicrous yet stupid. The scout contestant puts a fish to a junk boot then grills them together. What's the result?  

A well-done fish in a boot. What else? The jury soldier looks unimpressed by this obnoxious mess. Nonetheless, he still eats it and his reaction is obviously not well. Failure factor: stupid contestant being stupid.

Next is RANDOMGAMER159's entry. Look likes The red spy can cook well until a blu sniper "seasons" the meat loaf with a jarate. Yuck!!!  

The result of his cooking is: perfect-love sandwich. The jury soldier mumbles that he never like it but he still munch it down.

Then he pukes. Luckily, there is a bucket falls to his position. That's convenience! Failure factor: culinary that doesn't match well with jury's taste, also urine poisoning.

Next is an entry by Inspector Heavy. The heavy roast a Dalokohs bar, a pack of Toblerone^tm, and a medical pill tube (small health pickup) on frying pan. He roasts them on top of oven not on stove besides it. But he manages to cook something by this strange way.

The result is: medical cupcake. Looks nice and healthy.

But, the jury soldier gives him thumb down while boo-ing. Failure factor: using medical pills as cooking ingredient or contestant's inability to properly process them.

Now is time for Spiké èkipS's entry. The sniper here boils a jarate (eyuck!) in a sauce pan. That ain't good.

But somehow it turns into a (water)melon as the jury soldier's request. Then he gobs it down.

Obviously, it's not good for his taste. He is asking for (water)melon not (urine)melon, dolt! Then he tells the sniper to go (away). Failure factor: using a jar of piss as cooking ingredient.

Here is an entry by eyen22buck. He makes his cooking ingredients & utensils by magic simply pointing his finger. You're not wearing a chef hat, there?

Well that's a boot but whatever. He put all of the ingredients in a pot then cook them by magic again simply wink his eye. What's the result?

A burger! But i don't like the color of its patty. It looks no good.

Then the jury soldier violently screams as his reaction to that burger. The spy is upsets not because he fail at cooking contest but most to his "chef hat" flies away from his head presumably because of big force from soldier's loud scream. In my opinion, this entry here is the best Cooking Collab entry for category: Spy contestant. Failure factor: incorrect magic application way to cook.

Next is SkyTrees55's entry. The contestant here is this idiot-looking demoman here. Nice wolf skin there.

His cooking ingredients: a bottle of scrumpy (as every demoman has), a can (that he pick nearby *uugh!*), and a head. Isn't that demoman's head?

Yep. To be more precise, it's his own head. Whatever *sweat drop*. You're the chef here.

Then he puts all of the ingredients to this medical concoction and call it "Scrumpy soup".

From how wide the jury soldier's mouth opens up to scream loudly (after he taste it), you can guess that the soup is really horrid. Thus, the demoman fails at this cooking contest even though he has sacrificed his own head.

Suddenly his head pops up from the soup and screams to express his depression toward his failure cooking effort. Failure factor: indecent cooking ingredients.

Here is an entry by Ronald369. The cooking ingredients: a watermelon, a beef, a bottle of drinking water (i hope), and....that's a window cleaner, right?!

Then the contestant put them in a cooking pot along with other ingredients (such as lemons and a doughnut) and mix them. From his expression, you can see that he is seriously stirs them like legit chef.

The result is this soup or whatever this food is. It may looks good but the jury soldier says "This is s**t.". I like Ronald369's idea, making shovel's size small that it can be a substitute spoon. Failure factor: using a cleaning product as cooking ingredient.

Next is collab entry by DEADLINECLOCK. This time, the contestant is a robo-scout and he said he want to cook robo-sandwich. How he does that?

By altering an already-made sandwich with his fellow's (mangled) heads. That's kind of cannibalistic cooking method. Even though the one who eat the robo-sandwich is the jury soldier not himself.

Of course the results is terrible. Poor jury soldier vomit badly after consuming said sandwich.

Then he gives the robo-scout an old-school bomb. BOOOM! Failure factor: using robotic heads as cooking ingredient.

This time is DamashiDX's entry. Heavy here seems confident with his cooking skill and his cooking ingredient: ham shank, Dalokohs bar, buffalo-steak sandvich, mad milk, and fishcake. So far he is quite convincing chef or at least he is sensible enough to not include a jarate as ingredient.

Look at how shiny the sandvich that he cooked! As finishing touch, he add some sauce on it.

After the jury soldier eat it. The heavy realizes that the sauce that he poured it is: Papriko De Diablo with (small) warning words "Warning is very hot!" scribed on its bottle. Oh uh!

Like many in many cartoon, the jury soldier turns red and burps a long fiery jet as reaction for eating very hot/spicy food. Because of Heavy's hot mistake, he fail the cooking contest and change his profession from professional chef to computer operator. So sad ):. In my opinion, this entry here is the best Cooking Collab entry for category: Heavy contestant. Failure factor: cooking contestant's clumsiness which is not checking sauce that he uses.

Here's the video's epilogue. The jury soldier complaint to these 8 mercenaries (as representative of all cooking contestants) that they're disgrace because they can't cook well. The red scout replies with "Why don't you cook yourself, soldier?". Then the jury soldier accepts that challenge.

After some ruckus cooking process, the jury soldier throws his creation (the eggplant there) to the scout. Then he eats it.

But then he pukes so hard toward the jury soldier and stating that "that was the most disgusting thing that i ever ate".

After that, the scout got fed (*pun intended*) up to the jury soldier's further complaint and shoot his head with scattergun.

Credit to Psycho, Olu, and this video collab's participants. Overall, it is fantastic and funny thanks to weird things happen in many cooking (such as: strange cooking ingredient, the jury soldier's reaction, unusual cooking process). Worth to mention that many of entries using nice music and sound effects especially the sad violin music at the last part. Also, cooking collab series are the best GMod/SFM collab video ever, in my opinion. By the way, everytime i play at cp_gorge map, i spontaneously think "Well, this is the place where cooking collab happen. I wish i cook something instead of fighting over control points". Nice thought, huh?!