Tonight’s episode of the Championship Gaming Series (CGS) featured the San Francisco Optx vs. reigning world champions Chicago Chimera and Los Angeles Complexity vs. Carolina Core. Both competitions featured one hitherto undefeated team facing another with at least one loss.
San Francisco Optx vs. Chicago Chimera
The Optx came into the match with a flawless 2-0 record. Meanwhile Chimera’s players were looking for a victory after their defeat at the hands of the Carolina Core on Monday night.
First up was the Dead or Alive 4 (DOA4) female match between Vanessa of the Optx and Kasumi Chan of the Chimera. The match started out evenly with both women scoring a round each. This changed when Vanessa won the third round. From there on, Vanessa demonstrated why she is undefeated by dominating Kasumi Chan for the remainder of the rounds. Vanessa won a substantial victory for the Optyx with a score of 5-1.
Forza 2 was the next game in the pipeline. Chicago Chimera’s players, Jason-X and Ch0mpr, reportedly had some trouble adjusting from last season’s Project Gotham Racing 3 to Forza 2. Their loss on Monday night gave further credence to this statemment. They faced Optx and CGS newcomers Miximup and Sackamanjaro on the Diamondback racetrack.
Both teams immediately tried to ram each other off the track. Miximup slipped by the two Chicago players and took the lead. Jason-X was hot on Miximup’s tail the entire race, always looking for an opening to ram him. Nevertheless, Miximup maintained the lead and crossed the finish line with little resistance, winning the race for Chimera. Sackamanjaro placed third and Ch0mpr came in last. This won the match for Optx, bringing the overall score to 5-2.
Both FIFA 08 players came into the match undefeated. Eafra of the Chimera scored a goal on Optx’s player Stermy early in the first half. Eafra tried to follow this up with several more close shots that either missed or Stermy deflected. Stermy scored in the second half, bringing the game to a tie. Neither player managed to score additional points before time ran out, thus forcing the match into a shoot-out. Eafra scored three points to Stermy’s one, thereby acheiveing Chimera’s first win of the night with a score of 4-2.
The Counter-Strike teams faced off on de_nuke. Chimera played as Terrorists in the first half. Even though the map is considered favorable to Counter-Terrorists, both teams managed to tie 4-4. The Chimera’s team changed strategy in the final round of the first half, taking Optx by surprise and pushing their lead 5-4. Things were not so even in the second half. As the counter-terrorists, Chimera totally shut out the Optx, bringing the overall franchise score to 21-16 in Chimera’s favor.
For any possibility at victory the Optx’s DOA4 player Ninja CW needed to defeat Black Mamba of the Chimera five times in a row. This would tie the overall match and force a tie-breaker. NinjaCW, playing as Gen Fu, was able to win the first round. However, Black Mamba (playing as Helena) took the second. Even though NinjaCW still won the match, 5-2, this was not enough to push the Optx to victory. At the end of the night the Chimera barely squeaked by the Optx, 23-21.
Los Angeles Complexity vs. Carolina Core
FIFA 08 opened up the second franchise match of the night. The Core’s player Anomaly faced off against KreeganBG of Complexity. The first half flew by with no one scoring. This changed in the second half when KreeganBG made the mistake of goalie rushing, enabling Anomaly to knock the ball into the net from afar. By the end of the second half, Anomaly had won, 1-0.
The DOA4 female fight again took place on Tritower Heliport. The match was extremely one-sided, with the Core’s Mystik dominating Belle of the Complexity. While Belle put up more of a fight in the last two rounds, she was still unable to achieve victory. Mystik won, 5-0.
Next up was DOA4 male fight on the Seaside Market stage. This pitted Complexity’s Perfect Legend against OffBeatNinja. Many will remember the Core’s OffBeatNinja as the nearly undefeated DOA4 player from the first season. This Hayate mirror match led to one of the biggest surprises of the night. Through his aggressive playing style Perfect Legend managed to make a dent in OffBeatNinja’s record with a 5-3 victory.
Perfect Legend’s victory finally put Complexity on the board, albeit four points behind the Core, 5-9. Clearly the team hoped that a good Counter-Strike showing would be the equalizing factor. These hopes seemed initially seemed well-founded as Complexity dominated the Core the first three rounds on de_nuke. However, the Core managed to come back in later rounds, bringing the Counter-Strike score in the first half to 5-4 with Los Angeles barely leading. Much like the previous franchise match, the second half was extremely one-sided. The Core won each of the nine rounds as the Counter-Terrorists. The Core were the overwhelming victors by the end of the match, 13-5.
The overall franchise scores were now 22-10. These numbers made it impossible for Complexity to achieve victory. Nevertheless, the Forza 2 race remained. All four racers immediately clashed together at the beginning. General E. Live of the Core managed to weave through the vehicular mayhem and into first place. GTO of the Complexity followed. GTO shadowed General E. Live for the rest of the race, but was never able to overtake the Core player. General E. Live crossed the finish line; further cementing the Core’s victory and bringing the overall franchise score to 26-13.
