Nearly one year ago, Rivals of Aether crowned its first RCS champion, Fullstream, at Genesis 4. As one of the most high-profile events in the Platform Fighter community, Rivals’ inclusion at G4 marked the beginning of a truly remarkable year for the game. With Genesis 5 a month away, it seemed like a good time to take a moment and reflect on where Rivals has come in such a short time.
Today, we continue with Part 2 of your responses. These questions focused more on the competitive side of the game as we lead into our world finals.
What was your proudest moment in Rivals?
At their core, fighting games are about growth, about constantly aiming for a larger goal. Every player has a different goal, but your constant pursuit of success is what keeps the game growing and moving forward.
For some, it was about reaching a benchmark:
A few weeks after the full game was out my hard work paid off and I got the best time for story mode boss (36s) I was so excited I couldn’t contain myself
-Adam Thomas (daybs)
So, I’ve had this game for, no more than 2-3 months now, and I would say my proudest moment in RoA, was winning my first Ranked match. Now normally that wouldn’t be a big deal, but managing to stay ok in Puerto Rico after 66 days without any power (so no way of playing or practicing) I felt really proud of myself that I could still put up a challenge
-Jazzy
Any time I get destroyed in the first game of a set, make an effort to understand/fix what I was doing wrong and can come back to win or not lose as badly in the remaining games I’m pretty proud.
-Zak “ZephyrEagle” Eidsvoog
So it was my first time playing rivals, I had seen it thanks to Alpharad in its early stages so I got it in game preview on Xbox as a birthday present. I remember saying let me play Zetterburn cuz he seemed pretty good. I then proceeded a match or two later to 0 to death someone with a flashy Nair to Fairs to Dairs combo. I was so hype and I’d say it gave me a taste of the fun and relief this game brought. Thanks to everyone who has made this community and game what it is today.
-Robin
I’m really proud of the speedrun story mode achievement that was fun to get.
-Codiferus
My proudest moment in Rivals of Aether was finding my main, Clairen. I know it sounds sappy, but picking up Clairen was one of the best experiences I’ve had playing a fighting game. With Rivals, every character caters to a different playstyle, be it hard zoning (Absa), hard rushdown (Maypul), and a whole host of satisfying heavy characters. That satisfying feeling, when a character fits you like a glove, is a feeling I’ve only felt playing Rivals of Aether.
-Lance Smith
Scoring gold medal in Forsburn story and achievement “The Lone Rival”.
As for the online matches… I think it will be revenge on my friend that bought me the game, he beat me very hard at the beginning and settling the score was a nice one!
-CelestialDrago
Having joined the Rivals Community a bit late, I was always losing to everyone. Everyone I knew had played the game a lot more than I had. So, beating my friend who have had tens of hours of experience over me was an amazing feeling and my favorite moment to date.
-Luke Weaver
Many of our competitors thrive off the thrill of victory:
My proudest moment in Rivals of Aether is when I won my first local tournament a couple months ago, Smash Hut XX. I went in with a good mentality and was determined to win. And sure enough, I did. I only dropped one game, and it was in grand finals.
-Scootch
Proudest moment was either winning MSB Amateur Bout or seeing my improvement through winning 3/10 games with Dbrick
-STRAVoS
Proudest moment was the RCS in November. I seriously played my best during that tournament and felt so good after the win! I had won an RCS last year but it wasn’t the same since most of the top players were at Garden of Gods.
Definitely a turning point for me and I proved to myself that I can win tournaments still.
-AZCards
I won Genesis 4.
-FullStream
While many others relish the chance to test their skills against the very best:
My proudest moment in rivals was when I went head to head with Windows in a Wrastor ditto, and felt like I really stood a chance. He is a person I look up to and it meant alot to me, I could feel myself progressing.
-The Clownster
Top 8 at CEO Dreamland baby! When RoA top 8 got moved from Saturday night to Sunday morning I had already made flight arrangements to head home Sunday morning. So when I won my match to make top 8 I was like YES!! … … No!
That night the only affordable flight I could find for Monday morning was for Tulsa (2 1/2 hrs north of my car parked at my home airport) but I was very lucky to have amazing friends back home who were stoked to hear about my placement and willing to drive all the way out and back on a Monday evening to pick me up.
Receiving a medal was really really really cool.
-Solar
Taking a stock off of Ralph’s Maypul on Exhibition with Kragg
-Crim
My proudest moment in Rivals is going to the Bigger Balc. You’d probably think “so what it’s just going to a tournament” but I never get the opportunity to go to tournaments for Rivals since they aren’t close by. I got to experience a competitive Rivals environment for the first time and met some amazing people (one who became my mentor). Since then I’ve continued to play and improve with a passion I never realized I had. That passion shall never perish.
-SpykerFX
Taking one stock off Gabe at shine
-ssssnek
When I took a game off of Dolphinbrick’s fraudulent Ranno :^)
-Koji “K-Munny” Tilley
My proudest moment would probably be getting 5th at CEO Dreamland. While the people I faced might seem like getting 5th was a task that wasn’t too easy, this was my first major tournament and not only was I battling the others in my bracket, but I was also battling an immense amount of nerves that presented themselves to me. Being up on stage caused me to feel incredibly nervous but I fought through the nerves and got as far as I did. A close second proudest moment would be when I see the improvement of the people in the local scene I have created. It makes me incredibly proud to see that people are improving in Rivals and that I have created a local South Florida scene to help them with that.
-Renzo
It’s hard to pick just one moment. When Rivals released in early access, I remember running into Jtails (the well known Smash 4 player) in an exhibition match. I remember having some good matches with his Orcane and it was all on stream, and getting compliments from him and others in his stream chat. I think that’s what convinced me to stick with my Maypul. Now I have hundreds of hours on the character, and I don’t think I’ll be stopping any time soon.
-Rabspat
i beat ralph
-cake
And for one of our own, it was all about getting a chance to create something:
It’s a tie between being hired, and making Ori. Getting hired was a big thing, because Rivals was pretty much my first real gig as a freelance artist; I had just quit my normal job, and the project I was going for died immediately, so I’m glad Rivals came into my life. But the proudest moment was making and releasing Ori, because it was a big jump in quality for me. I started animation with Rivals, so seeing Ori in action, and the community’s reaction, made me realise how much I had learned and grown as an artist! And it’s also around that time that I started interacting with the community, which is a huge boost to confidence and self-realisation. So, thanks a lot to Rivals and its player for all you brought in my life. <3
-Ellian
What is your favorite part of attending Rivals events?
All in all, you’ve shown us how important this community is to you, and what makes it so special. This is why we’re so excited to see you all at Genesis 5. In addition to connecting with all these amazing community members, there are a few things that make attending a live Rivals event truly special:
Attending Rivals tournaments means meeting new players and friends or even old ones. It’s the best way to communicate with the community and enjoy learning from them. Meeting and competing against these people is my favorite part of tournaments because I won’t ever feel pressured playing against friends. A Rivals tournament environment is very friendly and is without pressure to win, just to have fun!
-SpykerFX
To money match better players knowing you’re gonna lose
-Koji “Free-Munny” Tilley
How friendly people are and the fierce competition I get. I’m always thankful when people don’t get short with me because I thought I screwed up some tourney rule like stage selecting and ask if I did, but then I didn’t, but then I feel bad for potentially inconveniencing the other player.
-Daniel Hardy
FRIENDS
-Solar
Talking to devs/friends, travelling around U.S., and learning/getting better from local play. Winning is cool too.
-FullStream
When nature decides to cooperate and allow me to actually go to them, the best part of events for me is capturing memories of everyone I can at the event through photography! The smiles, the focused looks, and all the stirring emotions I can capture in images make for amazing memories to look back on. Viewing as a spectator and making/capturing moments is just as exciting to me as actually playing and competing.
-Zam
Competing with real people. I’m not able to attend events outside of like 1-2 every summer, so actually playing locally against real people is a really nice change of pace to the 4000 matches I play against random people online who I’ve never met before.
-Prime
Thank you again to everyone who contributed to this project. Special thanks to TrentEsports for putting the articles together and combing through the hundreds of responses we received.
If you’d like to join the rest of the community at the RCS finale at Genesis 5, sign ups are still going on over at smash.gg!