Get your popcorn ready because we are in for some good ol’ run & gun action over at SpeedGaming for their Resident Evil 4 Tournament. The first race in Bracket 1 saw Almightymandals go head-to-head with Top_Tear_Waifu, two really strong contenders that are already packing some impressive personal bests. This tournament of RE4 takes place in the New Game category, on Professional difficulty at 60 FPS on PC – so, no pre-saved games or broken weapons to give an advantage, and the enemies stay at their maximum difficulty with no fluctuations. We get to watch all the nitty-gritty from the very beginning, oh yess!
Now, RE4 is known for having some optimization issues, even while running the Ultimate HD version at 60 FPS versus the standard 30 FPS of the older versions. Right off the bat, we see that Almightymandals has faster loading times because they are running on an SSD, which offers a minor advantage but shouldn’t affect the fact that these two competitors are very evenly matched. Interestingly, in the first race, both Almightymandals and Top_Tier_Waifu save the dog, an unorthodox and unnecessary move in a race – but c’mon, who could resist saving that cute little pup? Only a monster, that’s who.
The game took an unexpected turn when both players paused 20 minutes into the run and saw Top_Tier_Waifu reset and reload the save. This doesn’t seem to be a known strategy and the announcers — veteran RE4 World Record holder JC and Trichael Man, another competitor in this tournament– seemed at a loss as to why this action was taken. Things don’t start off great for Top_Tear_Waifu and they fall behind after some missed-chance encounters and inventory management.
However, as with most races, things can always turn around. Almightymandel lost the lead in Chapter 5.1 because of his previous choice to upgrade to full TMP when he missed ammo grabs. Again, in a game like RE4, one of the most important aspects to consider is management and consistency. Lots of precious seconds can be lost when you have to resort to Plan B. This allowed Top_Tear_Waifu for take the lead and come out victorious.
In comments afterwards, Top_Tear_Waifu expressed that it was “the dumbest race” while laughing with the announcers, likely referring to all the missteps that, in all honesty, made the race that much more fun to watch. He explained that his computer was running slowly which prompted the reset early in on the game; both players paused the race to wait for each other.
Now, that’s true sportsmanship, ladies and gentlemen!
If you’re hoping to catch the next race, you can check out details on the rest of the tournament on here SpeedGaming’s website. Also, be sure to check out the tournament brackets!
We here at The Frame Gaming can’t wait to see how the rest of this tournament will go — and if this race is any indication, it is going to get pretty heated as we see old-school tactics in the same arena as the modern day tricks.
A big thank you to SpeedGaming for hosting this event and to JC and Trichael Man for their in-depth analysis of the race. Of course a final thank you and good luck to those participating in the tournament. Until next time!
Alice is a writer, gamer, creator, and organizer.
Yo, JC here, great article. Alice did bang up job on the coverage, and delivered a good read here. Thanks a bunch.
Hey JC! Thanks for the awesome feedback. You guys were great casters, it made watching the run a pleasure! If you have a Twitter or Twitch channel, let us know so we can link it in the article. Cheers!