I still haven’t recovered from the last one, but the Shadowloo guys have announced the date of Shadowloo Showdown 2011: June 25th-26th. Considering the fact that these guys will be going off to EVO a few weeks later, organising SS and getting ready for their trip is going to be a herculean task. But if anyone can do it, it’s my honey bunnies from TEC.

SS 2010 was one of the best times of my life and I wonder who the guys are going to bring over this time. I’m sure with much more time to plan this time around the event will be that much more mind-blowing.

Be sure to check their site as more details are released and check out their trailer.

And another resource which I’m sure won’t need anymore publicity but I will mention because I’m finding it so useful is the SRK MVC3 Hyper Guide.

The amount of work put into it by Keits, Inkblot and James Chen is pretty mindboggling.

I am finding it extremely useful is to scout the whole cast, to wrap my head around their playstyles and core strengths.

I am a complete Marvel noob, and with a cast that big, oftentimes I feel a little lost when it comes to character selection. What does Tron Bonne play like? How do I utilise Amaterasu’s multiple weapons effectively? How does She Hulk’s command run work? Meanwhile everyone around me is playing Dante and Sentinel.

So many questions run through my head when I look at the Marvel character select screen. So by going through the basic video walkthroughs of all the characters in the SRK guide, I now have a much clearer understanding about each character.

Even basic things like whether the character is rushdown, mixup or zoning, I couldn’t really tell until I went through the guide.

A lot of small things were very helpful.

For example, at Ali’s house I saw Toxy trying to use an assist to lengthen a combo off an air juggle. But he had trouble with the timing to get the assist out.

He looked at Sol and said; “Can you not call an assist in the air?”

And Sol said, “I’m not sure, maybe you have to do it just before you land.”

I was listening, and thought; hm that must be it.

But after watching the basic team tutorial I now know that you can only call an assist on the ground.

I know people must think I’m a mega noob now, but hey! Now I know. A lot of little things like that were very helpful to know.

I’ve also wanted to play some of the more esoteric and quirky characters like Amaterasu, Arthur, Tron Bonne, Hulk, Viewtiful Joe, She-Hulk etc.

It would’ve taken me forever to get a sense of how to play the character, but now after watching the videos I can say I like the playstyle of Amaterasu and She-Hulk a lot…but not so much the Hulk, Viewtiful Joe, Tron, Trish etc.

So props to those guys and I hope MVC3 breaks street date in Australia soon!