Yoyoing....has changed

[Yo_Yo_Ma_X (LookAYoYo)]

@Jayyo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNFey7V6hno
I miss freestyles as such.

ok, i think i saw that guy in that movie… what was it again?  oh right.  MATRIX.

but my yoyo philosophy is that there are 4 types of yoyoing.  preformance, practice/having fun, contest, and video. 
Preformance is where there are people who dont yoyo watching you.  these would be like talent shows and yoyoing on the street for money.  you would do slow, easy to follow tricks that are not too complex and it requires a lot of showmanship.  some of these people are the ones that go on news, like dryoyo, zammy, and kstrass (jk lolz)
Practice/having fun… well, this is when you are yoyoing… to have fun… or to practice…yeah.  basically everyone does this. 
contest: basically, POINTWHORE.  almost any person who has ever gotten first in the past 3 years of yoyo contests (besides a select few)
and Video:  showmanship and cool tricks-combined with some complex tricks.  also some video editing, effects, and having fun.  guy wright rocks this area, cool smooth tricks, some complex, some just fun.

[Reokie]

IMO freestyles should contain great showmanship, Smoothness, Risk, And Originality. Anyone can go fast. It should be more like a “show”, like the one in jayyo’s post. I woulndn’t care if you are 2x slower than the last guy, If all he did was go super fast yet just stood there like a soldier at salute, compared to someone who has slower, very refined and artistic movements, then I believe the latter should get the higher placement.

[Ibanez_Guy88]

@mista8eight8

@Ibanez_Guy88

I say it’s all about a balanced player. Just because your fast doesn’t mean your the greatest yoyoer but it’s a tool to your arsenal of play. Originality, speed, accuracy etc combined gives yourself the
ability to achieve a unique style of yoyo play. That’s why JD won but yeah it’s come a long way since
then. lol same could be said about skateboarding/guitars/bmx/ well just about everything haha.

Are you, in any way, related to Ibanezcollector?

Nah hahah but we both like the Ibanez guitars

[pickle24 (M²)]

@Q

Let me introduce you to a word.

It’s pointwhoring.

Instead of going up and playing and having fun, people on the teams go up to get as many points as they can, this includes getting as many tricks in as they can. And eliminating tricks that aren’t technical enough, or that might cost them a point because it isn’t a seven minute combo. They want every point they can get to win. Not saying that point whoring is a thing to be ashamed of. I mean, when I compete, I go and have fun, which is why I placed fifth, to last. You can’t win without getting 100 string hits in three minutes. It’s just the norm now. I know what some of you will say… “John Ando”. Yeah, you’re right, he didn’t go 5000 mph. But he introduced tricks that had never been seen. He was original. He isn’t the WORST pointwhore.

Sorry to those of you who don’t see competitions this way, but that’s how I look at it. And no, I’m not calling out all of the YYF or YYJ team, I’m friends with some of those guys, great guys to meet and talk to. But when they go and compete, it’s different.

Again, sorry if you don’t see it this way, or like what I say, but that’s just my opinion

I see what your getting at Q, but it makes me wonder, why does it have to be at the contest. In my opinion, performing, or playing with friends, is just as fun as competeing. So if you just wanna have fun, and competeing isn’t your idea of fun, why compete? In my opinion, seeing how the judges score you and trying to impress them is fun. And as samad said, the idea that speed has completely taken over contest is over estimated.

[Sammy]

@Samad

There is so much false information in this thread… I hope to clear some up. Heck, even some of my information may not be 100% accurate, but I’m going off of what I have gotten from talking to judges.

@Sammy

are you guys serious speed is only like a third of the competition the rest is showmanship, music integration, style and how well you perform your tricks

No, it isn’t. Showmanship is a small part of competition, and music integration isn’t all that important. Many judges don’t often look for showmanship in preliminaries, so much as originality and string hits.
And sorry Q, but you had a lot of false info.

@Q

Let me introduce you to a word.

It’s pointwhoring.

Instead of going up and playing and having fun, people on the teams go up to get as many points as they can, this includes getting as many tricks in as they can. And eliminating tricks that aren’t technical enough, or that might cost them a point because it isn’t a seven minute combo. They want every point they can get to win. Not saying that point whoring is a thing to be ashamed of. I mean, when I compete, I go and have fun, which is why I placed fifth, to last. You can’t win without getting 100 string hits in three minutes. It’s just the norm now. I know what some of you will say… “John Ando”. Yeah, you’re right, he didn’t go 5000 mph. But he introduced tricks that had never been seen. He was original. He isn’t the WORST pointwhore.

Sorry to those of you who don’t see competitions this way, but that’s how I look at it. And no, I’m not calling out all of the YYF or YYJ team, I’m friends with some of those guys, great guys to meet and talk to. But when they go and compete, it’s different.

Again, sorry if you don’t see it this way, or like what I say, but that’s just my opinion

I’m going to go in order from the bolded parts in the text.

1. Even if a trick isn’t technical, people don’t necessarily throw them out. From talking to Anthony Rojas and Brian Calbido (Glasseye), judges often actually look for a variety of tricks.
2. Look at John Ando’s 2008 Worlds Freestyle. Yes, he had quite a few string hits, but not as much as many other players. Yet, he still won. However, John Ando is the subject of my next point.
3. Many of these tricks had been seen, in a sense. He wasn’t actually original. Body tricks were around since the old-school days, something a lot of people don’t know.

So I hoped that shed some light on stuff.

my point was speed is the only thing that can make you win

[quinton (Q)]

@M²

@Q

Let me introduce you to a word.

It’s pointwhoring.

Instead of going up and playing and having fun, people on the teams go up to get as many points as they can, this includes getting as many tricks in as they can. And eliminating tricks that aren’t technical enough, or that might cost them a point because it isn’t a seven minute combo. They want every point they can get to win. Not saying that point whoring is a thing to be ashamed of. I mean, when I compete, I go and have fun, which is why I placed fifth, to last. You can’t win without getting 100 string hits in three minutes. It’s just the norm now. I know what some of you will say… “John Ando”. Yeah, you’re right, he didn’t go 5000 mph. But he introduced tricks that had never been seen. He was original. He isn’t the WORST pointwhore.

Sorry to those of you who don’t see competitions this way, but that’s how I look at it. And no, I’m not calling out all of the YYF or YYJ team, I’m friends with some of those guys, great guys to meet and talk to. But when they go and compete, it’s different.

Again, sorry if you don’t see it this way, or like what I say, but that’s just my opinion

I see what your getting at Q, but it makes me wonder, why does it have to be at the contest. In my opinion, performing, or playing with friends, is just as fun as competeing. So if you just wanna have fun, and competeing isn’t your idea of fun, why compete? In my opinion, seeing how the judges score you and trying to impress them is fun. And as samad said, the idea that speed has completely taken over contest is over estimated.

I’m not saying that speed is the only factor in pointwhoring, or that speed is the problem in modern contests, I don’t have the insight to say that, I’ve only been around for like seven months yoyo time. If speed is what makes you proud of yoyoing, go as fast as you want, go ahead, I don’t care a dang bit.

I’m saying that any winner nowadays wants to go fast, so that they can get an amazing amounts of tricks in the one or two or three minute time frames, which is a part of pointwhoring. They get string hits, and tricks that go absolutely nowhere. As Samad said, that’s not all of winning a contest, but it’s a fairly largfe part of it.

[Aero_Ace_HU]

@Reokie

stood there like a soldier at salute

;D don’t know if you are referring this to someone ;D

[Kristiawan]

samad and Q already made a great point, i will try not to jump on samad train. . .

IMO, speed just an element of freestyle.
string hits will give you point, some other will give you 2, or even 3 point, like hooks or body trick.
there also minus point if you repeat some specific trick over and over, got a jam and change your yoyo, got a knot, etc. etc.
there so many element to concern on a freestyle. like other says.

just be your best at a contest, have some fun, you will be awarded the best you deserve.

guy wright never win with his slow and beautiful style, yes. but he had many fan, and get sponsored by SPYY.
really, is winning a contest the only thing fun with yoyoing?

[x52]

Yeah, it’s not all about playing fast, just your style is your style.

[JUMP]

Apples.

That’s pretty much the most relavant thing I can say without making everyone really, really angry.

~Jump

[AFrozenYetiBaby]

Evrybody has their opinion but in all honesty all that matters (in competition) is the judges.

[JRam]

I don’t think you get points from string hits.

Gentry wrote:
That was funny, but sorry man, yoyou get clicks for elements, not string hits.

yeah i know that. It bugs me that people think otherwise.

from the Onedrop forum

[dcs937]

@Ibanez_Guy88

I say it’s all about a balanced player. Just because your fast doesn’t mean your the greatest yoyoer but it’s a tool to your arsenal of play. Originality, speed, accuracy etc combined gives yourself the
ability to achieve a unique style of yoyo play. That’s why JD won but yeah it’s come a long way since
then. lol same could be said about skateboarding/guitars/bmx/ well just about everything haha.

i agree i play bass and guitar… all ibanez aswell and speed really isn’t a huge factor at all its the flow and how good it sounds.

[RecRev_Anthony]

There were some good points made already, and there’s a whole bunch I can talk about, better to talk in person really. And sorry if I’m restating stuff already mentioned, I tried to scan through what was posted already. I just want to throw out some thoughts…

Don’t think judging as just string hits or just elements and variety. They kinda play of of one another. You do get points for string hits, but you obviously won’t score as high doing stuff that looks the same the whole time, that’s where the variety comes in. Pointwhoring isn’t a bad thing if you want to win Top players who know how the system works will play to the rules and win because of it. Doesn’t mean your the best yoyoer either. Just the best at playing the “game” on that given day, under those circumstances. I do have creative ticks I could do in competition but don’t because of lack of speed and points, but right now in my life I have good chances for placing high, and save the experimental stuff for offstage. Do I find competitions less fun because of this? No. Instead of thinking of this as a hinderance, think of it as a challenge. True, not everyone can do it, but as mentioned winning isn’t everything, and players like Guy, Sid, spencer berry, Paul escolar are still well respected for what they do. And for people who think these are the types that should win instead, then that would cause everyone who doesn’t have a smooth creative style to now be the underdog. Judging isn’t perfect, but the people know what’s what, and I think respect goes where it’s deserved regardless if you won worlds or never competed.

Creativity and originality still plays a factor in todays contests as well, as discussed already about John ando. Which leads me to something I hear online at times. Which is, doing the same tricks year after year scores you less points. This is false. Judges are unbiased and don’t reference previous contests. Mickey won 3x in a row cus he was the best. Then yuuki comes back and changes the game, and wins. Then Ando changes it again, and guess who won. Of course there are other factors in play, you can’t just have the concept of the year and win. But if judges see something so amazing and new and you’re racking up points, then you’re on your way to beating the guy who is also racking up points, yet doing those tricks from three years ago.

As for speed, you definitely need it. Ando and Kimmit aren’t the fastest but they make it up in other areas and transition so well that time isn’t wasted. It can definitely be the difference in winning and not because with speed comes more tricks which means more points (and more chances for mess ups too, which is another story…) What if two players technically did everything the same except one person went a little faster and threw in five more tricks without mess up. The faster one wins. Yet again, there are so many variables though. You can be slower and beat a faster person, but speed still plays a role.

I know I may be saying you need speed, pointwhoring, and whatnot, but it doesn’t mean you have to yoyo this way. I’m just stating some things how they are and by no means am saying all this is the correct way to play. There is no correct way and everyone should enjoy yoyoing the way they want. There is a criteria to judging though, and for those that seriously (or maybe not so seriously) want to try and win, there is a way to do it.
Dang, I spent to much time typing…back to practicing for worlds!

[Samad]

I don’t want to quote the post, but this is one of the reasons Anthony Rojas is one of my favorite players. He’s an amazing yoyoer and a great, helpful, friendly guy to boot.

[mattsk8nike (Yo!It'sMatt)]

Woo. Rojas.

[issuzark]

@Jayyo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNFey7V6hno
I miss freestyles as such.

Wow that was awesome!!! D:

[Tagori]

point whoring is as much a part of winning contests as the judges are. when i went to a contest we asked the judges how they score, you know what they said? “if we know they’re good and are going to do well, we start them off with a higher score”. what does this mean? it means that if you don’t get to know the judges beforehand then you will have to go much MUCH faster to place higher. i’m going to go to as many contests as i can because i have fun being around the players and i love showing what i know and can do. what im saying is that if you aren’t known, you’re out of luck.

[mista8eight8]

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