KOFXI Sawakoro Festival 2023
Tournament Report by ATG
Preface
Sawakoro Festival is the biggest annual KOFXI 3on3 tournament in the world, hosted by the famous Nagoya-based player of the same name. The German community has strong ties with the Japanese KOFXI player base since years now, with annual visits to Japan and even visits from Sawakoro to Germany. My group of players, based around the Mad Gear club in Frankfurt, finally decided to participate in the festival for the first time:
- ATG: Oswald/K'/Vanessa(L)
- SenseiEnrique: Kensou/Oswald/Gato(L)
- Arit: Clark/Ralf/Jazu(L)
- AD_Ryan: Iori/Kula/Ash(L)
We left for Japan in late September and first stayed in Tokyo, where played twice at (Good Day 21[1][2] and once with Ryoji and Ryumi at Shinjuku Sportsland[3][4]). We also got to meet none other than kofxi_bot for the first time, who I have known and worked together with for years - I was very happy to finally have met him! We then flew to Fukuoka and visited (G-Stage Nanakuma[5]), whose players are very strong and had an interesting character variety. After a stay in Hiroshima where we didn't play, we finally arrived in Nagoya on Friday, October 6th.
2023/10/06
We arrived at port24 in Nagoya on Friday, the arcade legendary for KOFXI in Yagoto (south-east Nagoya).
A lot of players from all over Japan and Taiwan were already present and going at it at several XI-Setups. We were warmly welcomed and brought (and received) our first batch of (personal) presents with us. Sawakoro gifted me this awesome Geese that was a KOFXV random preorder bonus (hard to get):
...and then came a surprise delivered by Miekazu, from all the Yagoto players: each of us got a custom mug representing our teams!
They were crafted by yusuke, who also made really cool Griffon stickers that were distributed during the after-party (more on that later).
I almost took no fotos on that evening, there was just too much excitement to play, and we went at it immediately, until closing time.
This is the tournament key art - above it you can see a custom artwork gifted to port24 by Kingcar a few years ago, the leader of the InsertGame-Dojo in Solingen, Germany, who also play KOFXI:
These were taken by Sawakoro:
senseienrique & atg playing / miekazu & yukito / adryan & atg
Here is a link to the livestream for that day, feat. players from Japan, Taiwan (Yukito) and us:
2023/10/06 KOFXI Casuals with Germany and Taiwan(TW) (KOF11 野試合 ドイツ勢 &台湾勢襲来!!)【ポート24八事】
2023/10/07 KOF11 野試合 (ドイツ勢 &台湾勢襲来!!)【ポート24八事】
2023/10/07 - Team Battle Day
Saturday was the first official day of the Sawakoro Festival, with the big east vs. west team battle taking place. The vast majority of players had already arrived, and there were a full 7 versus setups for XI, with fierce casual matches between top players going down without any breaks.
We arrived around noon, and were immediately met with a big surprise - none other than legendary Vanessa player TORI has come out of retirement! I talked to Sagawa later, who also commented the Sawakoro Festival and teamed up with Tori and Yamate, and he intentionally kept it a secret!
I challenged him to a (semi-) mirror match of course, since we both use Vanessa leader. Every Vanessa player that was present (TORI, Toru, Yamate, miekazu & me) all have a totally unique style, so it was super fun to compare strategies and setups. TORI used a super interesting trick against me - when he had meter with Vanessa and my character was on low health, he used her leader activation while I was jumping - that gave him time to assess the situation during the super freeze and time an anti-air 2141236P!
morning casuals:
2023/10/07 KOF11 野試合 (ドイツ勢 &台湾勢襲来!!)【ポート24八事】
East vs West Team Battle
Video: 2023/10/07 KOF11 東西戦 (KOFXI East-West Battle)【ポート24八事】
Eventually groups were drafted for the big East vs West team battle, with the Germans being part of the East Team:
We more or less volunteered to go at it first as a group. Rukkora defeated arit, AD_Ryan and SenseiEnrique, until i finally defeated him (check the vids for my approach on how to play K' vs Gato - jump up E all day and pray). I then lost against Kurocha's Adelheid by failing my (unnecessarily ballsy) 5E>623C incoming okizeme with Vanessa - i expected him to LDM on incoming, which he did, but I mistimed the guard point. The hype was insane, everybody was screaming their lungs out the whole team battle, cheering on their team mates until the end. My personal highlight was the match Sawakoro vs Yanjirou, who are among the best players right now. The way how effectively and cleanly Sawakoro played neutral with Mary against Yanjirou just left me speechless, make sure to check the match out! Another great performance was Kentucky's play - he uses Kensou/Whip, Yuri / Leader Athena and despite this seemingly weird team is so strong he can easily keep up with the top players.
Evening Casuals
We continued playing casuals, and I got to talk to many players, including u-rasia. We talked about Whip and her matchups, among other things. U-rasia said they found out that Duck vs Whip is actually an even matchup now because they found out Whip's 2D beats all of Duck's air attacks except j.E, which greatly helps in this otherwise very difficult matchup.
Evening Casuals:
2023/10/07 KOF11 Casuals (KOFXI 野試合）【ポート24八事】
2023/10/08 - 3on3 Main Event
An unexpected guest
The day of the main event had arrived, and the last players had finally arrived. Among them was a surprise, at least for the Japanese players: unknown to them, German player Kingcar was in Japan with another group far away in Fukuoka, and decided to hop onto a train at 6 in the morning to make it in time for the tournament. Since Kingcar had visited port24 before and since Sawakoro met him in Germany, everybody was really happy and surprised to see him.
Drawing of teams & start of tournament
There were two consecutive livestreams for the tournament, divided into A-Block and B-Block. We were placed in B-Block and had to play and lost right away. The best team of both blocks automatically qualified for the top 4 tournament, and the other teams had to play a loser's tournament to determine the other two teams.
The drawing of the teams was incredibly hype - it was done by Sawakoro and he used actual straws with team names on them, everybody was cheering and getting fired up already for what was to come.
This is what the Blocks looked like after the drawing was done:
We got eliminated quickly in the loser's tournament, but personally I didn't feel too terrible about it - it felt nice for once to be the underdog, in Germany everybody expects me to win anything I touch in any game, and that can be stressful at times - here I was able to just enjoy myself and have as many casual matches as possible, which was my goal right from the start.
The tournament progresses
Warning: spoilers from here on out! Skip to the video links if you want to avoid them!
Since we got eliminated, we were free to play casual matches on the many versus setups against other players who were waiting for there matches. There were also a few teams I definitely wanted to see every match of (TORI/Yamate/Sagawa team, and of course Rock/Sawakoro/U-rasia), so I made sure I was always aware of who was playing currently.
Meanwhile, there was an early highlight of the tournament: two of the strongest teams had to face off right away, as the very first match of A-Block: Gian/Everest/Shingo had to face team Yanjirou/Zakuroman/Tobidogu-san right away. Yanjirou took the whole team out, showing how frighteningly strong he currently is - many consider him the best player next to U-rasia currently. Both of these teams are strong enough to easily win the whole tournament, so this was a bit of an "early finals" moment that left everybody really hype, and then in awe as they saw how it played out.
I made sure to watch all of the team Rock/Sawakoro/U-rasia matches in B-Block. Observing them as a team when they were gathered around the cab made it very apparent that they were hell-bent to win the tournament: their body language and the excitement they expressed made that abundantly clear:
The teams that eventually made it through A-Block and B-Block were no surprise: Sawakoro's & Yanjirou's teams stood undefeated in the semi-finals and were waiting for their opponents to be determined through the loser's tournament.
The Top 4
video of top 4 with timestamp
The two teams that emerged from the loser's tournament, defeating scary teams like Gian/Everest/Shingo or Miekazu/Makotsu/Nori were Kyuntakuya/Yukito/Uguu and Kodzuka/Kentucky/Shou.
Sawakoro's team had to face off against Kyuntakuya's, and threw in a curveball: they sent in U-rasia first, whereas he would usually go last in most matches, and he chose to play Whip instead of Oswald. The strategy payed off and U-rasia beat the whole team.
After that, Yanjirou's team sent in Zakuroman, defeating both Shou and Kentucky, with Kodzuka taking a match before losing to Yanjirou. Both of these teams play at game in good day 21 regularly, so they knew each other's playstyles very well.
Grand Finals
The grand finals were two battles at once taking place. Not only did the strongest teams finally meet to determine the outcome of the tournament, but U-rasia was expected to play against Yanjirou in this 3on3 at some point. Lately there has been talk that Yanjirou might be the best player currently just ahead of U-rasia, so as an observer, I felt there was also that on the line to settle.
All the players watching were incredibly hype and cheering the teams on. That changed at the beginning of the very last match, U-rasia vs Yanjirou - the tension in the air was so high, everybody fell silent as the match began, not wanting to disturb the players in these crucial, early stages of the match, where the outcome of the neutral game can already often determine the winner early. When Yanjirou missed a C-Crow Bites with Kula and U-rasia got the full punish with Oswald, I couldn't contain myself any longer and I started cheering and shouting, with others joining in, realizing that the finals are getting close to their end.
Rock, Sawakoro, U-Rasia
U-rasia got the crucial win against Yanjirou, and was celebrated as a hero by both his team and the crowd. For Sawakoro, winning his own tournament was an important goal, and he was incredibly happy. While Rock didn't manage to defeat a player in the finals, his performance with Ralf in particular was absolutely stunning and left me laughing in disbelief as he read Zakuroman like a book.
Overall, the tournament was absolutely incredible, but there were more highlights to come...
The after-party
Miekazu had planned a big party in a restaurant around the corner, with all you can eat-and-drink for several hours. Most players joined, the few that didn't remained at port24 and used as much time as they could to get more casuals in - I can't blame them, but on the other hand I knew what was coming at the party and absolutely didn't want to miss out!
First of all, I was asked by miekazu to deliver a toast before the drinking began - so I prepared a little speech, in japanese (thank you google translate) to kick things off.
After everybody was comfy, Toru played a game with the crowd: first, everybody was separated into two teams: team Duck King and team Kim. Why? well, there's this certain ending where Kim is clearly drunk, and Duck is sober... so all the player who drank alcohol during the party were team Kim, the others team Duck.
Then everybody had to do a reaction test on their phones, with the best averages getting prizes. It was hilarious, and there were also a few top players among the winners, confirming more or less that reaction speed is quite important on high-level.
I also contributed some of the prizes: stickers with the Hardedge Wiki logo:
After that, it was time for Shingo's quiz.
Shingo contacted me earlier and told me about the quiz, and asked me whether somebody could translate the questions for us into German. I suggested Kingcar since he speaks some Japanese and I didn't want to spoil myself. Little did I know he would be part of the party and would have to shut up the whole time, and I also didn't expect there to be so many questions - thanks for the work, Kingcar!
The questions ranged from super difficult system questions to player trivia - there were a few incredibly funny ones that were about old stories and got a good laugh out of the crowd:
It was again time for surprise gifts, and we received a very unexpected one for our Mad Gear club in Frankfurt: An Atomiswave game! What would it be? when we unpacked it and saw the red tell-tale casing we got excited, maybe another XI, an (expensive) Hokuto No Ken? Or a (hard to get) Samurai Spirits 6?
Well...
The after-after party
The German players had about 7-8 drinks at the party over 2 hours, we really felt like unwinding since we were in such a good mood and still hype from the tournament. First I asked sawakoro to order for us, but after a while I figured it would be faster if I wrote down the orders myself, in my child-like katakana scribblings, which got me props from everybody.
After everything was over, we returned to port24, with a good amount of players being quite drunk - I could hold my own quite well (probably better than when I was sober...) and got a drunk winning streak with my Duck King, which I had saved up all weekend, and even won a match against miekazu, who plays all of my characters, including Duck King, just miles better.
2023/10/08 - Shingo vs U-rasia ft10
The last day had arrived, and we initially intended to return to Tokyo early in the morning. What we didn't know was that there were actual events planned for that day, and many players were still present, so we decided to simply bring all of our suitcases and bags to port24 and take a Shinkansen as late as possible.
The main reason was the ft10 that went down between Shingo and U-rasia, with the latter using Whip throughout the whole set.
The ft10 was super hype, and I had great fun commenting it together with Sana, taking turns after each match, with a mix of English and Japanese.
[2023/10/09 KOF11 FT10 Shingo vs U-rasia (KOFXI 10先 しんご塾長 vs Uラシア)【ポート24八事】] <- video link
ATG & Sana, with arit & Yukito in the background
The end came sudden - we played until the very last minute, quickly said our goodbyes and rushed to the shinkansen - off we were to Tokyo. In a way, the weekend had already sunk in, with the after-party as the true conclusion of the event, and Monday being an encore - we were all tired and happy, and incredibly motived to come home and train like hell for next year.
We also heard the same from the players that were present - events like these really motivate everyone and show them that the game and its players are alive and well - there is something to fight for!
3on3 Main Event Results
| First Place | Rock, Sawakoro, U-rasia |
| Finalists | Zakuroman, Tobidogu-San, Yanjirou |
| 3rd place | Kyuntakuya, Yukito, Uguu / Kodzuka, Kentucky, Shou |
3on3 Main Event Videos
2023/10/08 KOFXI 3on3 Tournament Sawakoro Festival RE （Aブロック） 【ポート24八事】 <-A-Block & Play-offs
2023/10/08 KOFXI 3on3 Tournament Sawakoro Festival RE （Bブロック） 【ポート24八事】 B-Block & Losers' Tournament
3on3 Character usage
Overall Character usage
Leader usage
3on3 List of all Teams & Characters
19 teams, 57 players
Mount Everest
Everest
- Oswald
- Kula
- K'(L)
Shingo
- Kula
- Ryo
- Gato(L)
Gian
- Kula
- Ryo
- Gato(L)
砂町リベンジャーズ
Yanjirou
- Kula
- K'
- Gato(L)
Zakuroman
- Ryo
- Kula
- Gato(L)
Tobidogusan
- King
- Kensou
- Jazu(L)
∞Shadow
千国/Sengoku
- Silber
- Ryo
- K'(L)
わかほう/Wakahou
- Ralf
- Kula
- Gato(L)
ヤスダのダチ/Yasuda no dachi
- Duolon
- K'(L)
- Duck
- Kensou
おれも
Makotsu
- Eiji
- Oswald
- Ash(L)
- Gato(L)
Nori
- Ralf
- Kula
- Gato(L)
Miekazu
- K'
- Kula
- Duck
- Oswald(L)
シン石間幕府
Ryotsu
- Ryo
- Jazu
- Kula
- Gato(L)
Tetsu
- Gai
- Gato
- Ryo(L)
GRID
- Maxima
- Ryo
- Gato(L)
殺法
Ryumi
- Terry
- Yuri
- Ryo(L)
Tennkawa
- Shen
- Oswald
- Ash(L)
Zorbon
- Kula
- Iori
- Kyo
- K'(L)
パチンコ
Rukkora
- Kula
- Ryo
- Gato(L)
Aoi
- Kula
- K'
- Gato(L)
MAVEN
- Terry
- Duck
- Malin(L)
Random Team 3
TSR
- Maxima
- Kula
- Gato(L)
Yakimeshi
- Kula
- Ryo
- Gato(L)
Seikindorobo
- Gato
- Maxima
- Adelheid(L)
ブレイキングダウン１１
Kyuntakuya
- Eiji
- Oswald
- Kula
- Kim
- Gato(L)
Yukito
- Iori
- Griffon
- Duck
- Kyo(L)
Uguu
- Ralf
- Gato
- Malin(L)
遊びにきた
Tacchi
- Momoko
- King
- Malin(L)
Operaza
- Whip
- Adelheid
- Elizabeth(L)
Ayuri
- Kula
- Ryo
- Gato(L)
MAD GEAR
ATG
- Oswald
- K'
- Vanessa(L)
AD_Ryan
- Iori
- Kula
- Ash(L)
SenseiEnrique
- Kensou
- Oswald
- Gato(L)
RATE'S
Kani
- Kula
- Oswald
- Adelheid(L)
Gori
- Kula
- Gato
- Ryo(L)
TORU
- Gato
- Kula
- Oswald
- Vanessa(L)
幽✩遊✩白書 炎（テリー）の絆
Kodzuka
- Eiji
- Oswald
- Terry
- K'(L)
Kentucky
- Whip
- Kensou
- Yuri
- Athena(L)
Shou
- King
- Gai
- Gato
- Oswald(L)
ちっすジャーさんです。
SPOOKIE
- Ryo
- Kensou
- Gato(L)
Ozuma
- Oswald
- Gai
- Gato(L)
Roger
- Maxima
- Kyo
- Ryo(L)
Random Team 4
Arit
- Clark
- Ralf
- Jazu(L)
Kingcar
- Maxima
- Oswald
- Adelheid(L)
Zone
- Kim
- Ryo
- K'(L)
Random Team 1
Hokuto
- Kula
- Kim
- Gato(L)
Kenoh
- Ralf
- Oswald
- Ryo(L)
Saginomiya
- Iori
- Kula
- Ryo(L)
サワコロック大陸
Sawakoro
- Griffon
- Mary
- Silber(L)
Rock
- Ralf
- Ryo
- Gato(L)
U-rasia
- Oswald
- Whip
- Kula
- K'(L)
Random Team 2
Sana
- Kula
- Oswald
- Gato(L)
Arata
- Kula
- Gato
- Ryo(L)
Kurocha
- Duck
- Kula
- Adelheid(L)
生交代推進委員会
Sagawa
- Kula
- K'
- Gato(L)
Yamate
- Vanessa
- Oswald
- K'(L)
TORI
- Kula
- Oswald
- Vanessa(L)
- Sacred Treasures Team: Kyo | Iori | Shingo
- Hero Team: Ash | Oswald | Shen
- Fatal Fury Team: Terry | Kim | Duck King
- Agent Team: Vanessa | Mary | Ramon
- Art of Fighting Team: Ryo Sakazaki | Yuri Sakazaki | King
- Rival Team: Elisabeth | Duo Lon | Benimaru
- Team K': K' |Kula | Maxima
- Garou Team: Jenet | Gato | Griffon
- Ikari Warriors Team: Ralf | Clark | Whip
- Anti Kyokugenryu Team: Malin | Kasumi | Eiji
- Psycho Soldier Team: Athena Asamiya | Sie Kensou | Momoko
- Time Unlock: Adelheid | Gai | Hayate | Jazu | Silber