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A Viewer's Guide To Kagaribi 4

By Joshua "Barnard's Loop" Craig | 06/25/21

Eighteen months ago, Frostbite 2020 concluded with Leonardo Perez finishing one of the greatest modern losers bracket runs. Afterwards, the COVID-19 Pandemic struck, effectively ending most Super Smash Bros. Ultimate major events globally. 

After CEO Dreamland, the last notable event of the pre-COVID era, tournaments were infrequent and smaller in scale. Most were variably held in France and Japan, with some small Sumabato series events in Kansai making up the most significant tournaments. 
Kagaribi 3 represented the beginning of a post-COVID era. Designated as a major, it featured an all-Kansai top 3 in the Kanto region. While Takuma Hirooka won, there was a sense the meta had changed in the last year, as and Towa Kuriyama rounded out the top 3. 
Now, Kagaribi 4 stands as the next evolution. 
Click to expand. Kagaribi 4 starts at 8:00 PM ET for East Coast viewers on Day 1, which is tonight. Top 64 will begin on Saturday night at 9:30 PM ET for East Coast viewers. The event can be viewed on VGBootCamp's Twitch (English) or East Geek Smash's YouTube (Japanese).

A New Supermajor 

Kagaribi 4, as of this writing, handily cracks the 4000 point barrier on OrionStats, making it the first designated Supermajor in a year and a half. It is the most significant meeting of Kanto and & Kansai, Japan’s two best regions, since EVO Japan 2020. 
Kansai’s advantage going into Kagaribi 3 was its infrequent regional events held throughout 2020. It was the most active region during the pandemic, which may have helped prepare them for the first new-era major. 
Going into Kagaribi 4, local events and weeklies have largely resumed in Kanto, with the bi-weekly series WINNER! Concluding with an unexpected win by former Wifi player “Chicken”, a Diddy Kong and Wolf main from Kanto. 
The playing field is even in concept, although Shuto Moriya and Akakikusu are now both Kanto residents. As a result, Kanto should - on paper - be heavily advantaged at this event. 
Out of the 20 Japanese players on the Fall 2019 PGR, 18 are in attendance, with only Isami Ikeda and “Ron” absent. Out of those 20, 17 are now Kanto residents. The only exceptions now are Ron, Tea, and Seisuke Komeda. 
Atelier, once known as one of Japan’s best Rosalina players in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, and now a top Pokemon Trainer player, has surged into Japan’s upper echelon since Quarantine began.Possibly the best active Trainer in the world, Atelier crushed expectations at Kagaribi 3 by placing second. At Kagaribi 4, he is the fourth seed. 
Unlike Evo Japan, every set at Kagaribi 4 will be best of five, making it one of the biggest skill tests to date for the numerous top attendees. 

Depth in Bracket 

Japan’s seeding is often based largely or even exclusively on prior event iterations. This has resulted in bizarre seeding historically, and Kagaribi is no different. With Kagaribi taking place as a Kanto event, numerous Kansai players have found themselves woefully underseeded when based on Kansai results from the Sumabato event series. This is because many didn’t attend Kagaribi 3.  
, an Inkling main noted for his upset over Tea at Sumabato SP 17, has found himself as the 121st seed. While the event is deeply stacked, this places him against Shuton in Round 2 of Winners Bracket, giving an immediate upset watch very early in the bracket. 
Pool B1500 is a doozy to look at. Shimizu Masaki is seeded to win this pool, but he’ll have to face Eita Hoshi. , an in-region Luigi main known for his ability to upset players, is directly in HIKARU’s path. Their last set ended in a 2-0 victory for Yamanaction, though HIKARU has since expanded his roster to include Roy and former Smash Wii U main Donkey Kong, alongside his Pokemon Trainer.
In another potential consequence of Kansai’s underseeding, we see Pool B1200, where historic top Zero Suit Samus main Toshimasa Hayakawa will be facing off against , Kansai’s best Yoshi player and a contender for best Yoshi worldwide. With Choco’s recent lackluster performances and Yoshidora’s stellar in-region runs, this is one of the more likely seeding upsets we could see in the bracket. 
In an interesting case of quarantine underperformance, we have Yutaro Nagumo seeded in the low 40s against , a Tokyo Pokemon Trainer main. If you followed Paseriman in early 2020, he was noted as a massive rising star that managed to shut out GENESIS 7 winner Tyler Martins at Frostbite 2020. 
After Quarantine hit, however, his attendance became sporadic and his performances were limited in achievement. As a result, he’s seeded quite low. If he regains the fire seen early in 2020, he’s likely to upset Natsu in pools, which would place him against Takuto Ono in Top 64, a matchup he has won in the past.
, a candidate for best active Toon Link, was also quite underseeded as a consequence of his residency in Chubu, making him an infrequent Kanto attendee. He’s seeded to face off against (pronounced “Takumi”) in Pool B1600, a set that could go either way. Tk3 is a top 12 seed and Japan’s top Chrom & Roy main, but he is far from invulnerable, and Sigma is a very difficult opponent top face in pools. 
Another potentially upset heavy pool features , the other candidate for best Toon Link, against Yuta Uejita. Nietono has struggled to find a character since Pichu was nerfed in 2019, but he has remained in his arsenal nonetheless, with him seeing success at Frostbite 2020. 
Lv.1, a lesser known Chubu resident, is one of the region’s best players and often carries outstanding loss records. His frequently low seeding owes itself to difficult brackets, resulting in few wins, but high quality losses. Most notably, Lv.1 suffered a double elimination at the hands of MKLeo at Umebura Japan Major 2019. 
At Kagaribi 4, the set could be considered a tossup. The winner will likely face Kome in top 64, an extremely difficult follow-up given how competitive pools already are. 
“Tet”, Japan’s best active Pit main, is seeded ahead of Takeyashi Okamoto. While Tet’s Kagaribi 3 performance was impressive, the bulk of Takera’s recent results suggest he is strongly favored for an upset in pools. 
Pool B500 will feature Chicken as the favored player to win the pool. However, , an upstart Captain Falcon main from Kansai who had many successes during the Quarantine Era, is seeded to fight him in the finals of pools. The winner is likely to fight Tsubasa Takuma in Top 64. 

Late Bracket Sets 

One result of the chaotic seeding is that players such as , who has been very successful offline, will be seeded into very hard opponents. Specifically, ProtoBanham will have to face off against Shuton in round one of Top 64, assuming both clear their pools. Predicting a set like this is difficult; Matchup dynamics would favor ProtoBanham if he still mained Lucina, but top level Min Min - his new main - is less tested. 
While not entirely in the late bracket, the culmination of Pool B1400 will be interesting to watch. The pool final is set to be newly minted Pikachu main Yuki Kajihara vs. Noriyuki .” Etsuji’s past potential has been incredible, with him once dominating the Kansai region in early Smash Wii U. 
Kirihara’s history is more well known to the states through his various stellar performances as Japan’s top Rosalina main. He remains the best Rosalina main in the country for Smash Ultimate, but he has additionally picked up Sheik as a character. 
Sota Okata, the event’s 1st seed, is favored to coast into Top 64 Winners. His bracket could be made somewhat more difficult if HIKARU was to upset Umeki, but his first serious challenge is likely to be Gakuto Ito. The two have only squared off at weekly events in the distant past, where every set went to the last game. Zackray won all three sets, but he seems vulnerable in this particular player matchup. 
Conversely, Zackray could have an easier bracket should Ishiguro Tetsuya upset Gackt. Zackray’s set record over Raito is the same, but the set wins have all been at regional or major events, and every win was a 2-0 victory. Raito, however, might have a difficult challenge early in pools if Wifi Hero main “Re: SHUNP” turns out to be a hidden boss. 
Kengo Suzuki is one of Japan’s most iron-willed players. While he has faltered early in bracket before, he often picks things up even in the case of early pool losses and puts up incredible Losers Bracket runs. His first major test will likely be against Yuta Kawamura, now a Pikachu main looking to have a breakout event after struggling with character picks for quite some time.
, the best active Greninja in the world, is seeded under , whose current character picks aren’t well known. Lea historically should be favored in this set, which would lead him into either Abadango or KEN in Winners Round 2 of Top 64. 
Huto has mained a large number of characters over Smash Ultimate’s lifetime. Starting with Mario and Luigi, he eventually integrated Wario and Shulk before dropping all of them in favor of Banjo. As of late, he appears to have brought his Wario back, making him one of Japan’s best Wario players. 
Akakikusu quickly became the best Hero player in the world after months of good smaller event performances culminated in his stellar run at Kagaribi 3. There, he defeated Raito, Zackray, Lea, , and more. Here, he’s set to fight , a successful Wifi Young Link main that performed very well at Kagaribi 3. 
One of Akakikisu’s wins, Shky, is a top 8 seed at the event. Currently Japan’s best Zero Suit Samus by recency, he’s no stranger to upset performances. At this event, his bracket may be seen as favorable. He’s first set to face Bowser main in Top 64 Winners, followed byTsu. 
HERO is likely to be Shky’s hardest opponent until he reaches Kome, but Tsu having a career defining run isn’t out of the question now that he’s spent a significant amount of time on Pyra/Mythra and had over a year to refine his Terry. 

Conclusion 

The sets and players I’ve mentioned are only part of what’s set to be the most significant event in well over a year. This event will almost certainly be impossible to fully predict, especially after Kagaribi 3 shattered all expectations. Much like with InfinityCON, we can expect Kagaribi 4 to be an early snapshot of what the new-era metagame will look like offline.
Joshua “Barnard’s Loop” Craig is an amateur data collector & analyst involved in Super Smash Bros. statistics since late 2015. His most notable work is his co-ran algorithm, OrionRank. Follow him on Twitter @LoopBarnard.