Official Sayonara PC time attack contest this week; Twitch stream with Mr Kondo

[KawaseFan]

Degica have posted an announcement on Steam, primarily about a Sayonara time attack contest centred on stage 6, which will run from March 27th to April 3rd.  Contestants will need to upload their fastest replay in which they also collect the stage's backpack.  The top five players will win prizes:

(copied from the announcement)
1. Umihara Kawase exclusive T-shirt + $10 Steam wallet credit
2. Original wrist rest pillow + $10 Steam wallet credit
3. Original Notepad + $10 Steam wallet credit
4. $10 Steam wallet credit
5. $5 Steam wallet credit

See the announcement for detailed instructions and conditions.

The announcement also reveals there will be a stream on Degica's Twitch channel on March 29th at 6:00 PM PT (March 30th 1:00 AM UTC), in which fans will be able to ask their questions to Toshinobu Kondo.  I unfortunately won't be able to watch it live as I'll be at work at the time, but it should be interesting!

EDIT: The stream time has been updated; it will happen at 6:00 PM PT, an hour later than originally announced.  Also the announcement has been updated with an extra rule for the contest: you must use the game's default character, adult Umihara Kawase.

[nathan]

The biggest news from the stream is that apparently they're working on a new game, and there's supposed to be an announcement this summer. I'm trying not to get too excited

[KawaseFan]

I'll be looking forward to seeing what it is in any case, but hopefully it's a new Umihara!

There was some pretty interesting information from Mr. Kondo -- both Umihara-related and not.  In particular, it was interesting to hear that he is most proud of Shun, specifically noting all of his hand-drawn animations.  Fair enough, too, it looks fantastic. 

Some other interesting bits of info:
- Physics differences between games: Mr. Sakai saw replays of super players and the techniques being used, and adjusted the physics in future games to encourage those techniques he liked and remove those he didn't want players to use
- Unused enemies in SFC Umihara: ran out of ideas to use them

There's also a sale on Studio Saizensen games on Steam until April 3rd -- the Umiharas are 60% off individually, the trilogy pack is 70% off, and Code of Princess and Blade Arcus are 50% off, so if anyone has been waiting for a chance to buy one or all of these, now's a pretty good time.

Anyone else who didn't watch it live can check out the video here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/132164326

They showed my stage 3 replay

EDIT: updated video link.

[KawaseFan]

The contest results have been announced.  Here are the top five:

4.15 - 子人
4.18 - guterham
4.30 - gori.sh
4.30 - cos
4.31 - わあい

Enjoy the notepad, gori.sh!

[gori.sh]

Thanks, yeah!

[Alc]

I'll be looking forward to seeing what it is in any case, but hopefully it's a new Umihara!

There was some pretty interesting information from Mr. Kondo -- both Umihara-related and not.  In particular, it was interesting to hear that he is most proud of Shun, specifically noting all of his hand-drawn animations.  Fair enough, too, it looks fantastic. 

Some other interesting bits of info:
- Physics differences between games: Mr. Sakai saw replays of super players and the techniques being used, and adjusted the physics in future games to encourage those techniques he liked and remove those he didn't want players to use
- Unused enemies in SFC Umihara: ran out of ideas to use them

There's also a sale on Studio Saizensen games on Steam until April 3rd -- the Umiharas are 60% off individually, the trilogy pack is 70% off, and Code of Princess and Blade Arcus are 50% off, so if anyone has been waiting for a chance to buy one or all of these, now's a pretty good time.

Anyone else who didn't watch it live can check out the video here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/132127610

They showed my stage 3 replay

That's pretty fascinating. Thanks, KawaseFan!

Anyone want to speculate which techniques he liked (and which he didn't)?

I don't suppose anyone ripped the video, did they? It's down now. Be a real shame if that's lost.

[KawaseFan]

For some reason they had the video on their channel twice; it looks like they've removed the one I had linked.  The other one is still up: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/132164326