That. Was. UNBELIEVABLE.
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen yoyoing moved forward this much in a single freestyle.
It’s like he is from the future and came back here to show us what 3A looks like nine years from now.
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Absolutely, happens all the time.
Binds that don’t bind up, knots, flying yoyos. Stuff happens all the time.
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This whole topic implies the judging system is seriously broken.
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I think it’s one of the those things that people consider broken, but there’s no real good way to fix it.
Giving the award to whoever had the “coolest” freestyle would make it way too subjective, because everyone has a different opinion of what’s the coolest. The current judging system gives a system by which you’ll be graded, that allows you to create a system that will score high.
Without rules saying “we score points for this but not for this”, the competitive nature would take a hit, because people wouldn’t know how best to construct their routines to place at the top. Any good competitive contest needs objective rules by which someone can be measured.
I’m not saying the contest system is perfect by any means; I was very surprised that Nate didn’t win 1a after being there and witnessing the crowd reaction. I don’t really know personally how it could be improved though. Maybe extra points for elements that involve more risk? That might be awarded already, I’m not sure.
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The full soloham freestyle has never been done before so I’m not sure if I would say it was broken but he might’ve just done it yesterday in 4a 
As for 3a he still won by a good margin even though he wasn’t as clean as Alex who was near perfect so there wasn’t really an issue with that.
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Already done. Higher risk tricks click +2 instead of +1. I haven’t seen Nate’s FS so I can say anything about that specifically. I’m sure it was great but just because it got the best reaction doesn’t necessarily mean it was the best freestyle. Watch Yukis FS. Insanely crazy stuff, plus a rather unique style, but he doesn’t usually get as good crowd reactions as some of the American fan favorites.
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I know they do an extra click or two, but I’m not sure that’s enough.
I’m totally aware of this, it’s what I was saying. Even though the crowd loved it the most, it wasn’t the highest scoring because of the click/competitive system.
It goes to show how different what the system values is compared to most casual observers.
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What I was saying is crowd reaction doesn’t necessarily equate to player skill. Just because a FS had the biggest crowd reaction doesn’t mean it should have won. Examples include crowd favorites likePaul Kerbel and Ben Conde in years past vs. “boring speed player” like Shion.
Much of the crowd are more casual players that aren’t as capable of fully comprehending and judging a FS. A flashy trick will get more hype even if it’s not necessarily as difficult.
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I wasn’t saying it does.
The whole “should of won” thing is subjective, that is based off different things to different people.
I thought Nate was going to win because being there and the energy during his performance was so crazy that I was expecting him to take it.
Watching back the freestyles without being there in the moment I can see why Gentry won.
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YOOO Hajime almost has more views than Evan and almost as much as Gentry that’s crazy.
1a usually gets way more views, especially with those crowd favorites.
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Sakata also performed a full 3 min soloham routine at that years world yoyo contest in the 4A division :3
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Very cool!!!
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I keep seeing you post things like this. Saying people don’t understand or don’t comprehend… it comes off as a bit condescending in my opinion. Just my two cents.
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I don’t see it as condescending. I have only a moderate idea of how freestyles score, nothing close to judges or high level competitors, so I wouldn’t pretend to know why out of two equal looking freestyles one would score higher. I think that’s true of a lot of contest spectators.
Most of us don’t care enough to learn the intricacies of the scoring system but we know when a freestyle looks good to us. But if you’re not familiar with the scoring system you might not know what a high scoring good freestyle looks like.
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Being a world champion requires more than just insane yoyo skills. It also requires a full understanding of the scoring system and an ability to craft a routine designed to earn as high a score as possible. Because if you don’t, you can be sure one of your other competitors will and they will win instead of you. In fact, I recall plenty of commentary to this effect last year when Evan Nagao won the 1a title, and people wasted no time in pointing out that an important component of his winning strategy was in selecting high-scoring elements at the expense of groundbreaking ones.
And so, Hajime’s 4a freestyle may have been groundbreaking (from a 4a perspective anyway; someone on Facebook stated that his routine consisted of relatively “simple” diablo tricks merely performed with 4a yoyos, but I’m not in a position to judge, figuratively or literally), but if his routine was designed to excite the crowd or shove forward the boundaries of the style rather than earn “max clicks” then I’d argue he failed in his preparation as a competitor. That’s not a knock on his exceptional skills as a player, but a sobering reminder that there’s more than one game being played here, and “playing the system” like a master is as much part of being a champion as playing the yoyo like a master.
Of course, routines like Hajime’s will often be the catalyst for changes to the scoring rules. He and others who follow in his footsteps will benefit in future contests, but not here. Evolution is slow and sometimes painful, but it is ultimately a positive force in the long run. We have to take a long view of this and realize that while he didn’t take home the title this year, he may have had a more important impact on things by redefining what 4a can be, now and for all time.
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Facts! The system is not broken if someone doesn’t pay attention to it and doesn’t win. Hajime broke the 4A sphere, but definitely not how it is scored by any means. Anyone who takes the time to read the rules would realize that soloham can be kind of detrimental to scoring due to the amount of set-up time it takes to execute combos, the amount of ‘variations’ instead of completely different tricks, and more. Don’t get me wrong, Hajime’s 4A routine was groundbreaking and I think it will spark a change in judging in some capacity, but I definitely would call ignorance on someone saying the system is broken because he didn’t win.
Hajime’s 3A was interesting to me. So many amazing tricks, but he put himself in a position where he wasn’t really technically ahead scoring wise, just like his 4A. Tomoya Kurita ended up winning tech in 3A, and Hajime won by a smaller margin than he usually wins by. With that being said, it really seems like Hajime is really focusing on pushing the level of tricks and not winning, which is even better.
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Well put Colin. This was my thought also. Not broken, but Hajime just showed that there needs to be adjustment now.
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Do you know what yoyo he used? Phaser?
Phasers
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