I honestly enjoy watching documentaries in general and getting an indepth understanding of topics which are generally unknown to mainstream society. A little while ago when I watched King of Kong, about the quest to achieve the highest score in the classic game, Donkey Kong, I was definitely fascinated by the culture and lives of the people who seem to be devoted to an unusual hobby.

Ever since the release of Capcom’s Street Fighter IV fighting game, it has somehow rejuvenated the fighting game genre and culture and it looks as though gamers are taking notice and underground tournaments and competitions are now brought to the forefront. I got a chance to watch some of the IGotNext movie on UfragTv.com and I never realized the whole East vs West competition and how gamers actually make a living playing a simple videogame. One of the pro-gamers, known as Gootenks puts it, I can definitely see similarities between videogame competition and professional sports and I wouldn’t be suprised if pro-gaming will be elevated to that level in the near future.

At the present time, the documentary is only partially completed and it looks as though the creator of the documentary, Ian Cofino will continue to take footage on the upcoming EVO 2009 Championship tournament, where gamers from around the world will compete for the coveted world title. Gamers around the world know that the Japanese are THE nation to beat at this game (since they actually created Street Fighter), and so international tournaments like EVO will definitely help gauge their level of skill in relative to “the best”.

The first part of the documentary was fairly well done, hopefully we’ll see more interesting stuff when the entire movie has been completed.

-Stephen