Setting the stage at Mainstage

At 1,745 attendees, and with Ultimate Summit 4 spots on the line, Mainstage reinforces the idea that, after a long grueling online era, Smash is here to stay for the long run by statistically setting the bar higher than ever competitively. The Smash Community hasn't had an event of this size since Riptide in September and it's safe to say they've been long overdue. Luckily enough, the community has a trusting relationship with Beyond The Summit that has allowed them to innovatively push the envelope on what hosting an event is all about.

Day 1

It’s 10:00 AM and despite Melee doubles, Ultimate doubles and Nickelodeon All-Stars Brawl all being run simultaneously, Nickelodeon All-Stars Brawl has to lay the foundation for how the rest of the event will play out competitively with it being on the main channel. With this in mind the question at hand isn't “can Nick All-Stars deliver?” because we've seen it once before in an offline format during SmashCon, but more so “will it deliver?” It’s no secret that the viewership for the game has been on the decline since SmashCon FallFest. Plus, history has shown that it isn't the easiest feat in the world to not only run another game alongside Smash, but another platform fighter at that.

With Androovii, Squible and many other top level Nick All-Star players in attendance bright and early, the competitive environment is thicker than ever. We had an opportunity to chat with Port Priority Champion Max Ketchum about his thoughts on the current state of the game, Void not playing, and what we should expect for the future.

Other notable performances were Shroomed and S2J taking Melee doubles over Panda Global's iBDW and Fiction.

Day 2

With Nickelodeon All Stars Brawl Top 4 set in stone for championship Sunday, Saturday gave the die hard Smash Bros Ultimate purists exactly what they were looking for: High octane matches, upsets upon upsets, and the proper storytelling to carry over to day 3 efficiently.

One of the many highlight performances came at the hands of Florida native Muteace with his legendary losers bracket run. It goes without saying that losing early in pools against someone you were slated to beat can certainly light a fire under you to persevere and we saw just that from him. After losing he had quite the uphill battle facing off against Goblin, Panda Global’s Marss in a tense Game 4 finish, and Mythra extraordinaire Cosmos to round out his night.

Another match to highlight is Moist Gaming’s Kola vs Maister in top16.

We had the small opportunity to interview him and get his thoughts on the weekend.

Lastly we have Armada | Elegant vs the Super Smash Con FallFest champion himself, Moist Gaming | Light. The two character loyalists slugged it out and gave us just the right amount of back and forth exchanges to get your heart beating right out your chest. As talented of a player as Light is, the Fox vs Luigi matchup has proven to be so difficult that it even forced him off of Fox over onto the criminally underrepresented Sora. Armada | Elegant was able to take the set in a solid 3-0 fashion.

Day 3

It's what we had all been waiting for, the meat and potatoes portion of the bracket. Championship Sunday was here and it did not disappoint!

With the format only being Top 4, Nick All-Stars Brawl’s return to the stage was short but certainly sweet. The players were set, it was ThundeRzReiGn vs Squible in Winners Finals, and Androovii vs RoseJ in Losers Semi-Finals. Having not dropped a set so far the person to watch out for in bracket was without a doubt ThundeRzReiGn and his stellar Leonardo play. As things kicked off in Winners Finals, ThundeRzReiGn handled Squible’s Lucy Loud pretty handily in a strong 3-1 finish. Over in Losers Semis RoseJ’s Aang proved to be too much for Androovii’s Lucy Loud as well, continuing the 3-1 victory tradition. Lucy Loud returned once more to the stream at the hands of Squible who had been waiting patiently to play.

Grand Finals proved to be no different with ThundeRzReiGn shutting down any idea of a potential reset with a commanding 3-0 win over Squible.

To round things out we had the first full top 8 courtesy of Smash Ultimate. This brought us many of the usual suspects for this level of play with DaBuz, Elegant, Tweek, Tea, and many others ready to show up and show out. It was Sparg0 having to defeat Light, Chag, Tea, and Elegant that truly crafted the perfect storyline leading into the Grand Finals where he faced off against T1 | MK Leo.

Most importantly both sets of Grand Finals helped disprove the negative narratives attached to their work competitively. Set 1 showed us that Sparg0 is no longer the “underdog”, not only beating Leo 3-1 in a moderately convincing manner, but the long list of players leading up to him as well. Set 2 showed us that Leo’s clutch factor truly makes him the scariest player on any given day and the gap between First and Second best in the world is wider than we think.

From Summit to Mainstage, Beyond The Summit’s ability to create top of the line events puts them in a league of their own. Let us know your thoughts on the event in the Shacknews chatty!

Rodney Conyers Jr.

Host

Rodney is the current co-host of Wide World of Electronic Sports as well as an interviewer and journalist.

His fiery passion for all things gaming was initially sparked by his father –who at the time worked the electronics section at Walmart– purchased him and his younger siblings Pokémon Gold and Silver for the Gameboy Color.

As a natural performer you can find the majority of Rodney's work in gaming in front of the camera in esports. He's worked in commentary, interviewing, and hosting positions for various companies such as AT&T, Red Bull, Amazon Prime Video, CEO Gaming, and NXNE! When Rodney isn't doing something gaming related you can find him writing theatre music, hosting sneaker conventions, and much more!

Rodney can be reached at rodneyconyersjr@shacknews.com and on Twitter @rodneyconyersjr.