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Super Smash Bros. players don’t think or play outside the box

Press photo by John Burbridge Though they eschew Internet interaction, the Super Smash Bros. players at the “For Glory in North Iowa VIII” tournament are not completely averse to technology as they set up a public view monitor as well as miniature cameras to fully display and record the battles.
Press photo by John Burbridge
Though they eschew Internet interaction, the Super Smash Bros. players at the “For Glory in North Iowa VIII” tournament are not completely averse to technology as they set up a public view monitor as well as miniature cameras to fully display and record the battles.
By John Burbridge sports@charlescitypress.com

CHARLES CITY — Three-dimensional TV is not dead.

Sure, they stopped making sets exclusively for 3D viewing more than two years ago. It didn’t help they came out (circa 2010) right after people had already made the switch from analog to digital and didn’t want to incur another expense.

And that’s not including the need to purchase special viewing glasses and a 3D-compatible Blu-Ray disc player as well as finding an internet service that offers 3D streaming.

But what about TVs that themselves occupy three dimensions? You know, the ones that are vertical, horizontal and deep … box-shaped to encase a picture tube.

“They’re still out there,” Caleb Williams said of Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) television sets that have stubbornly survived in a world gone flat-screen.

“You can find them on the Internet for a good price,” Williams said. “Some used electronic stores still have them. And many are still in good shape.”

One of the reasons CRT TVs are still around and are still in demand is because of serious video gamers like Charles City resident Williams.

“The game is meant to be played on these type of sets,” Williams says while showing several CRTs that he owns while explaining they provide the proper battlefields for Super Smash Bros. wars.

“The more square-like screen works the best,” Williams said. “You try playing it on a wide flat-screen … it’s not the same.”

Late last month, Williams hosted a Super Smash Bros. tournament at the Bethany Alliance Church Shack entitled “For Glory in North Iowa VIII” indicating that it’s the eighth such tournament held at the BAC Shack.

“It has been one of the more popular video games for some time,” Williams said of Super Smash Bros., a crossover fighting video game that features characters — or avatars — from the Nintendo universe.

Other than hand-held versions, the game can only be played on a Nintendo system.

“It’s fun to play, and it’s even fun to watch,” said Williams, who did utilize a large flat-screen TV for spectator viewing as part of a four-player game-control center at the tournament.

“It’s a super fast game and the graphics are spectacular,” said Williams, who has played in national and regional Super Smash Bros. tournaments, and usually tries to organize tournaments in Charles City about three or four times a year.

Super Smash Bros. tournaments not only go back more than several past “lives” ago to when HD-technology didn’t exist — or wasn’t in the average household — it goes back pre-Internet era.

“This isn’t like HALO where you can play with or against players online,” Williams said. “This is not Internet compatible.

“It’s for players who like to play against players in the same room. That’s why we get people coming all the way from Cedar Rapids to play here. It’s a chance for players and fans of the game to get together.”

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