With 574 entrants, The Big House 4 was the 4th largest Melee tournament in history. What began as a regional can now be considered an international tournament with out-of-region talent from all over the world.
Phase 1: Round Robin Pools
On Day 1, the action started with round robin pools in which the top 3 in each pool of 8-9 players advanced to the next phase. Not too many surprises happened, as the top seeds for the most part went unscathed in their pools. A few upsets did occur: NorCal Falco, Anson, managed to defeat Midwest Falcon, Jiano, and TheCrimsonBlur defeated Vaccine. Other interesting matches included The Moon edging out Anther and Chicago player Vro going toe-to-toe with Hax. The novelty matches, such as Leffen vs. his ego and Scar vs. Mufasa were comical, but the results were typical with Leffen and Scar soundly defeating their respective opponents.
Phase 2: Bracket Pools
The bracket pools in Phase 2 featured 24 players with eight #1 seeds from Phase 1. With only 4 advancing, these were some of the most difficult pools for players to advance from. All of the 4 “gods” (Mango, Armada, Mew2King, and Hungrybox) made it out of their respective pools with ease. On the VGBC stream, there was an amazing amount of hype matches that went down to the wire. NorCal’s Shroomed faced off against Midwest’s Dart in an exciting set that had Shroomed on the brink of defeat in several matches. Shroomed’s Doctor Mario managed to survive the attrition battle against Dart’s Marth to take the set. Ohio Peach player Hanky Panky also managed to take out HugS to advance into top 32. Perhaps, this was a pre-cursor to everyone that the Midwest should not be ignored. As the field shrunk from 192 to 32 players, the bracket showed great representation from all regions.
Phase 3: Top 32 Bracket
With Day 2 ready to go, there were 16 left in winner’s and 16 left in loser’s. Every match was archived thanks to VGBC, MeleeMilwaukee, and an additional offline recording setup. Titans, Axe and Colbol, faced off once again with Axe coming out on top in a close 3-game set. Mango awed the audience with his exciting Falcon and Marth to defeat both The Moon and Hax to advance to winner’s semis. Mew2King and Armada effortlessly advanced in their sections of the bracket to advance to winner’s semis. In a small rivalry, Leffen once again defeated Hungrybox to be the 4th member in winner’s semis. The loser’s bracket was an onslaught with several top name players losing early to place 25th or 17th. After a questionable Day 1, LuCKy finally was able to put the pieces together to defeat DJ Nintendo, Colbol, and Hungrybox to advance into Top 8. The 9th place finish by Hungrybox was the lowest placing by him in over 6 years, and the lowest placing by a “god” since Mew2King finished 17th at Apex 2012. Westballz managed to defeat Plup in an amazingly close set, full of awkward skirmishes, nerves, and botched edgeguards. Kels, the Midwest Fox hero who is known for not performing well at nationals, pulled off a historic upset against the spacie slayer, Axe, to get into Top 8.
The Super Sweet Notebook
At a Midwest regional earlier in the year, Bobby “Scar” Scarnewman called out Kalamazhu on stream in the audience as he was writing notes in his notebook when Armada was playing his matches. Little did we know that Kalamazhu’s diligence would pay off. In his round 2 pool, Kalamazhu managed to defeat LuCKy and VaNz to make it into the top 32 bracket. Kalamazhu tore through his bracket, beating Porkchops, KirbyKaze, and MacD. He finally made his way on stage to play his last match against Hax, with the winner advancing into top 8. Channeling his inner Armada, Kalamazhu leveled up significantly with his excellent use of float-cancelled nairs, down-smashes, jabs, and grabs to keep Hax on his toes. In an amazingly close 5 game-set, Hax narrowly clutched the victory over Kalamazhu. Although Kalamazhu fell short of reaching the top 8, he left an impression on everyone in the audience and the 35,000 who were watching on Twitch. “I played out of my mind,” he claims, “hopefully I can keep it up.”
Top 8 Finals
Loser’s Top 8: Kels vs. Hax
The crowd excitedly supported their local hero with chants of “Kelly! Kelly! Kelly!” in the background, but Hax silenced the noise quickly with his precise play, immaculate punishes, and shine spikes. Kels showed flashes of brilliance on Final Destination, but Hax’s punish game was much too overwhelming for him.
Loser’s Top 8: LuCKy vs. Westballz
The two SoCal locals can be seen duking it out on a regular basis at “Super Smash Sundays” and “Mayhem.” Westballz has had the recent upper hand, but at Big House 4, LuCKy was on a mission to destroy everyone. Right out of the gates, LuCKy seized control of the matches with quick zero-to-death combos and high-octane pressure. Westballz wouldn’t go quietly, and surmounted some great combos of his own. For this day, Lucky was out of control and won the match convincingly.
Winner’s Semis: Mew2King vs. Mango
A classic matchup between the two American powerhouses. Not wanting to start with Fox, Mango played Falco to combat Mew2King’s Sheik. Mango’s flashy play netted him early leads in both games 1 and 2, but Mew2King’s patient, defensive play and timely gimps yielded him the victories. In game 3, Mango switched to Fox, but Mew2King’s punish game was too much for him to overcome.
Winner’s Semis: Armada vs. Leffen
On the other side of the bracket, the two Swedish powerhouses played against each other. With the added boost of NTSC, Leffen was able to kill Armada at lower percentages with upsmash, and also survive at higher percentages, thanks to extended recovery on Fox’s UpB. Leffen took the first two games in close matches. With a 0-2 deficit, Armada adjusted his spacing to take the next two games and tie the set. In game 5, the stock counts and percentages were close the whole way. At the end, another up-smash from Leffen sent Armada off the top and into loser’s bracket, concluding perhaps their most intense tournament meeting yet.
Loser’s Quarters: Mango vs. LuCKy
In the most exciting friendly set of all time, Mango and LuCKy gave an insider’s look as to what used to happen on a typical Tuesday night in Norwalk (Mango and LuCKy’s training grounds). They wowed the audience with flashy punishes and off the wall edgeguards. Mango took the set in an amazingly close 5 games. Although Lucky lost, the audience applauded his efforts and strong play.
Loser’s Quarters: Armada vs. Hax
Now it was Hax’s turn to see if his Fox was good enough to beat Armada’s Peach. Coming off a very shaky performance against Kalamazhu, many doubted that Hax could do it. In game 1, Hax used his great tech skill to punish Armada’s whiffed grabs and over commitments to take the game. Not wanting an early exit, Armada adjusted to defeat Hax in 3 consecutive games to move on.
Loser’s Semis: Mango vs. Armada
To the shock of many, Mango and Armada played in loser’s semis and not in winner’s/grand finals. Fully warmed up, Mango looked unstoppable with his amazing reads and restricting shield pressure. Despite dropping Game 2 with an interesting Captain Falcon counterpick decision, Mango was able to bulldoze Armada in the set with several stylish edgeguards, moonwalks, and shine spikes to advance to loser’s finals.
Winner’s Finals: Mew2King vs. Leffen
In a rematch from Apex 2014 and MLG, Mew2King and Leffen faced off for the first time in over 3 months. Although Leffen has shown strong proficiency against spacies and floaties in general, Marth has always been Leffen’s Achilles heel. To no surprise, Mew2King’s Marth with its amazing stage control and punish game destroyed Leffen in a quick 3-0.
Loser’s Finals: Mango vs. Leffen
After his quick losses in winner’s finals, Leffen’s Fox competed against Mango’s Falco in loser’s finals. In the first couple of games, Leffen’s patience and great use of shine out of shield limited Mango’s shield pressure significantly. However as the set progressed, Mango crushed Leffen’s defenses and even pulled a 4 stock in game 4, a repeat of Apex 2014, to advance to grand finals.
Grand Finals: Mango vs. Mew2King
Fully warmed up from loser’s bracket, Mango started with Fox this time to compete with Mew2King’s Marth. On Fountain of Dreams, Mew2King had several moments to win the set, but unfortunate phantom hits gave Mango the opportunity to snatch the victory. On Final Destination, Mango, never winning as Fox, switched to Falco to stylishly take a game against Mew2King’s Marth. Mew2King managed to win the run back to bring the set to 1-2. On game 4, Mango defeated Mew2King to force a bracket reset.
Set 2 was similar to set 1 with Mango winning on FoD, splitting games on Final Destination, and then taking game 4 to win Big House 4.
Full Results
1. C9|MaNg0
2. P4K|EMP|Mew2King
3. Leffen
4. P4K|EMP|Armada
5. VGBC|Hax
5. LuCKy
7. IPG|Kels
7. Westballz
Full results can be found here.
Relive the action on VGBC.
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