You know you're bad at AAA'ing when it takes you 3.14 years to get your first double-digit difficulty AAA. Well, I finally put that behind me today with a perfect run on Johto Wild Pokemon Battle Remix... which is only a 10. Yaaaay.

Knowing my luck, that'll get bumped down when the transition is made to the 120 difficulty scale, but whatever. I usually try for SDG's anyways.

Not sure why I haven't done this earlier, but I just wanted to thank reuben_tate for the profile background! It looks really good. :D

Alright, time to find out if I've actually improved any over the last year and a bit since the 10th Official. Given how much I've played lately... eh, we'll see.

Round 1 - Pink Cloud (feat. Max Collins) - (5-2-0-0) - 5th place in round
Nothing too challenging about this file, really, although the hands are kinda different. I'm not used to hitting those, but they're not the problem. I just need to get better with the file and more familiar with the rhythms.

Round 2 - Boooring! - (32-0-2-0) - 4th place in round
Huh... Well, it definitely feels like a lighter file, but it's faster as well. Tricky patterns and awkward combinations are gonna make this one a challenge, and this is only the second round. I can only imagine what the later rounds will be like.

Round 3 - Dating Start! - (54-2-2-4) - 7th place in round
I'll be honest, I didn't really play this round a lot, and when I did play, I can't really say I was trying. Life getting in the way and all that. File was fun though, definitely challenging. Wish I could've played more and gotten a better score. On the plus side, Fractured Sunshine get!

Round 4 - A Happy Day in Funtown - (65-3-2-2) - 7th place in round
Oh god the tournament just got hard. Help.
But seriously, this file is kinda ridiculous. So many colors, so many different patterns, with a mixture of music genres to boot. It's a fun and playful file, but it'll be a while before I feel comfortable playing through this one.

Round 5 - Fall Memories - (73-7-10-14) - 2nd place in round
Not gonna lie, this file was definitely a challenge for me when I first started playing it. It was a bit too fast for me to hit correctly, and the patterns were pretty challenging, at least for D1. I thought that I was going out this round for sure. After upping my speed mod from 1.55x to 1.8x and abusing rates, I think I'm in the clear. Only time will tell. [vROFL get!!!]

Round 6 - All is fair in RAGE - (58-3-2-3) - 4th place in round
It kind of amazes me just how much I've improved from Round 4 until now. Don't get me wrong, this file is hard, and I'll be having trouble on it for a while, but to think that I could make it this far in the tournament... I never would have imagined it when I first signed up. And now here I am, fighting for the last few spots. I just hope I can keep it up and push myself to the limit.

Round 7 - Azure Emotion - (82-12-13-17) - 1st place in round
Geez. Way to step it up, guys. The ending on this bad boy is dumb as hell, haha. I'll admit, I've had a lot of stuff going on this week, so I haven't played this file as much as I would have liked to. Seems like I didn't need to play it a lot, though, since it looks like everyone's sticking around their sightread scores this time around. Still, can't help but be nervous about a possible snipe. I just hope that it doesn't happen, because I really want to get Top 3. Then we'll see if I really am the Top D1 Lizard.

Round 8 - Artificial Intelligence Bomb - (235-37-34-67) - 2nd place in round
Hahahahahahaha... Fuck this file.

Damn... 2nd place, huh? Well, I may not be the best, but I sure gave nighdragon a run for his money there at the end. And honestly, I did a lot better than I expected to do. I went into this tourney with the goal of getting vROFL, and I did that. Still, I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't a bit upset that I lost. Oh well. Congrats, nighdragon. Enjoy your victory.

(Also, I'd like to thank reuben_tate and portalbob340 for helping me out during this tournament. You guys are the best.)

So, I'll be attending Anime North this year. I've been looking forward to it for a while now! If you're looking for me, just find Bmah. I'll probably be tagging along with him for a while.

Also I need to practice this game just in case people challenge my dumb D1 ass to a round of multiplayer. ;_;

Been working on playing songs I haven't played yet, and I'm actually getting better while doing so. I'm in the top 2,000 global Average Rank and almost in the top 1,000 US Average Rank.

Hooray for improvement!