Disclaimer: Nugget Bridge was created by a few friends and I. I link to it throughout this because we've made it the best place to learn about this sort of stuff and sending people to worse resources to avoid plugging it seems counter-productive. Also I'm lazy and know our content better than others. I don't and never intend to make a profit off it if that helps.
As PokeGAF knows, I'm fairly involved in the competitive Pokemon community and this weekend will play host to the largest event of the year - the 2012 Pokemon World Championships. For the first time ever, The Pokemon Company International (TPCi) and Nintendo will actually be streaming it live as well (well, at least the finals match of the oldest age division).
I know there's a fairly large gathering of fans for more well-known competitive games like League of Legends, Starcraft II, and of course the fighting game community, but I don't think many people know much about the Pokemon scene - much like most of GAF either didn't know about or scoffed at competitive gaming of all sorts just 5 or so years ago. I'm here to help educate!
So what are the Pokemon World Championships?
The World Championship is an invite-only Pokemon tournament held annually in August since 2008. Players earn invites by winning national tournaments held throughout the world in a given season. These national tournaments were just held in United States and Japan at first, but have since expanded to Canada, South Korea, the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Germany, and Italy as well - although those of any nationalities can play. It is the most prestigious title in Pokemon.
This year's Worlds tournament is held in Waikoloa, Hawaii. The top four from each European country and the US, along with the top two from Canada and Japan, as well as the top player from South Korea won invites and free trips to compete. Additionally, a last chance qualifier tournament was held today to pick four more players to join the fold.
The prizes aren't amazing compared to other games with a large audience, but it's enough to want to win. The winner gets a $3500 scholarship with the runner up receiving $1500.
So you beat up on children?
There are three age divisions in Pokemon.
Those about 12 and under belong to the Juniors Division. They're adorable and use adorable mons.
Those around ages 13 to 15 belong to the Seniors Division. Their raging hormones make them super competitive and cereal business.
The rest belong to the Masters Division and although there are a good number of great Seniors, it's this division where most of the action is. The older players belong to it and due to the large range, it's by far the largest division made up mostly of post-secondary students who grew up on the game and even quite a few PokeDads/Moms.
But what type of depth could Pokemon have?
The fact there's a competitive side to Pokemon at all often comes as a shock to people. To be honest, it's deceptively deep. I've heard many fighting game players who pick it up compare it to a fighting game where you remove the muscle memory and reaction time. It's pure mindgames / test of knowledge once you get into the battle. Before that, there's a tremendous amount of effort and customizability with regards to picking who you'll use for your team and stat distribution. In fact, I wrote an article to ease people into it that I'd love for people to read and give me feedback on (it's aimed at those who've never been exposed to competitive 'mons before).
Format
As I explain in my intro article, tournaments use the doubles ruleset that's used in the Battle Subway and Global Battle Union modes in the game. The games have been increasingly geared towards doubles in multiplayer and all official tournaments since 2006 have been in the doubles format. It can be a little jarring coming from the single-player campaign which is dominated by one-on-ones, but it's not too hard to adjust and a lot of fun when you find out how many options and cool tricks are available to you.
The actual tournament formats can differ from level to level and country to country. The Worlds Competition runs a best of three swiss tournament on Saturday with the top 8 players moving on to a best of three single elimination tournament on Sunday.
Upcoming Events
Yeah so you've definitely missed your chance to compete this season, but for North Americans, we know most of the regional locations for the next season and it begins just a week after Black & White 2 come out (although rumours currently indicate only Black & White will be allowed to be used)!
Regionals are smaller tournaments in North America which grant the winners either fully paid trips or subsidies to the Canada or US National. You also earn byes which are insanely helpful at Nationals.
VGC ’13 Fall Regionals (October 14th, 2012)
• Ft. Wayne, IN
• San Jose, CA
• Toronto, ON
• Philadelphia, PA
• Houston, TX
VGC ’13 Winter Regionals (January 20th, 2013)
• Lake Buena Vista, FL
• Salem, OR
• Sandston, VA
• Likely St. Louis, MO area
• Likely Colorado or Utah
VGC ’13 Spring Regionals (April 14th, 2013)
• Vancouver, BC
• Southern California
• Athens, GA
• Foxborough, MA
• Madison, WI
The National competitions have not been announced. If we follow a similar format to previous years, Europe's will be in either March or May/June with Canada and the United States having their Nationals in the first week or two of July.
How can I follow the World Championships?
I'll be livetweeting results although they may not mean much until you get to know the players' names. If you're looking for names to look out for, two of my friends wrote great articles on the favourites to win both the Masters and Seniors division that I'd recommend reading.
I'll also be trying to stream matches as much as possible although that's going to depend on the internet situation and power situation. At the very least I should be able to grab iPhones from American friends and stream using the app or something.
And of course, as I mentioned earlier, Nintendo will be streaming the finals at 3:30 PM on Sunday for Japanese players on NicoNico while TPCi will have a stream available for English players on the Pokemon World Championships website.
Now, I'm in Hawaii and wrote this on the plane over so I would love to answer questions but may be a little late what with being at a resort on the Big Island surrounded by dozens of friends from across the world I've met playing this game and all. The competitive Pokemon community is extremely friendly and hopefully I'll get to meet some of you at an event in the future!
