LUDOWICI -- The Long County Blue Tide esports team’s inaugural season has begun. The Super Smash Bros. Ultimate team, also known as ‘Splash Smash,’ played their first scrimmage on Wednesday, Feb. 17 against defending state champions East Paulding High School.
In a typical regular season match, three players from each team will face off against each other in best two-out-of-three, one-on-one sets. The first team to win two sets will win the match.
In the games, players select from over 70 characters from the Nintendo, Capcom, and Square Enix world of games. Players then face off against each other in a platform fighting game, trying to knock each other off the platform with each having three lives.
In the first game, freshman Patrick Mcclennon chose his primary character, also known as the “main” in the Smash world, Pokemon Trainer, who utilizes three different forms of popular characters from the Pokemon series: Charizard, Ivysaur, and Squirtle.
Mcclennon finished off his opponent, winning 2-1 and giving Splash Smash a 1-0 lead.
Junior Jimmy Barreto was on the sticks next and chose his main Isabelle, a character from the popular game Animal Crossing. He dispatched his opponent two games to none, giving the Tide the official 4-1 victory.
With this being a scrimmage, teams agreed to allow all players on both teams to play. Sophomore Tristan McNeal was up next and used Sora, the main character from the popular Disney-Square Enix Sony crossover game Kingdom Hearts.
Sora was also the last character added to the Super Smash world in the latest round of downloadable content and McNeal used his opponent’s lack of familiarity with the character to win 2-0.
Freshman Benjamin Stokes was last up and used Steve, the main character of the popular building game Minecraft. He went up against a character he was unfamiliar with fighting, Hero from the Dragon Quest games, and lost the set 2-1, but showed promise and will look to improve.
Splash Smash will open the regular season on Wednesday, Feb. 23 against New Manchester High School.