This weekend brought some of the best Street Fighter V players in North America to Boston to compete in one last Pro Tour event before Capcom Cup next month. While there wasnât a whole lot on the line for many of the attendees, the matches still proved to be fast and furious, with one notable veteran falling victim to a young upstart in one of the most surprising ways possible.
Justin Wong, a fighting game community legend, found himself on the wrong end of a thrashing at the hands of Derek âiDomâ Ruffin. iDom doesnât stray from New York City locals to compete at major events that often, but when he does, he tends to shineâat Defend the North in July, he beat Victor âPunkâ Woodley, who is arguably the best Street Fighter V player in the United States.
Upon improving the score to 2-0, Ruffin showed just how much space he was taking up inside of Wongâs head by landing six straight Sunset Wheels, a special move thatâs unique to his main character, Laura. He won that round with a single attack, going on to take the entire set by a score of 3-0. The fighting game community would say that Wong was âmindfuckedâ in this situation, or so shocked by Ruffinâs choice to continue his single-move onslaught that he wasnât able to come up with a viable counter-strategy
(via r/StreetFighter)
Sunset Wheel is a special kind of attack known as a âcommand throw.â Like normal throws, command throws canât be guarded by blocking, but they differ in that theyâre performed with a special input (in this case, a half-circle backwards on the joystick) rather than a combination of buttons. Oh, and the opponent canât break them with a throw of their own. Command throws are typically harder to land than their regular counterparts, though, so the Sunset Wheel isnât just an example of a overly powerful attack. Ruffinâs match against Wong was the perfect showcase of just how debilitating it can be to face off against a strong Laura player.
Ruffin is a relative newcomer to the world of Street Fighter competitionâbut, then again, everyone is when compared to Wongâs decades of experience. Still, Ruffinâs victory highlights the steps heâs taken to excel in Street Fighter V, using the tools provided to make even a fighting game legend second-guess himself over and over and over and over and over and over again.
Ian Walker loves fighting games and writing about them. You can find him on Twitter at @iantothemax
