Early this morning the XBox Live Dashboard was updated with next weeks “Play The Pros” event which features StarSlay3r playing Super Street Fighter 4! Some of you may be wondering… “Why Super Street Fighter 4? Isn’t she a pro rhythm game player?”. Well here’s why… The XBox Live events coordinator talked to StarSlay3r about trying to play a game that would get lots of people in one session at a time and where everyone can talk to each other. Unfortunately Rock Band/ Guitar Hero is only 4 people at a time and no one can watch and you can’t exactly hear people talking over the music. For this reason Super Street Fighter 4 was chosen. StarSlay3r will be playing Endless Battle mode so that she can get a chance to talk to as many people as possible at once and also those who are waiting their turn to play can watch the battle in progress. Seems like a much better idea eh? Plus, we all know Super Street Fighter 4 is a much better game than Rock Band and Guitar Hero combined… so no complaints right?

Also… Thanks to Gunnar Optiks they will be giving away a pair of Gunnar glasses to one lucky twitter user. For more details on how to win, check your XBL dashboard!

To all participants… have fun and good luck!

CTA Digital and @GameMarketing Partner on E3 Twitter Event

CTA Digital, a leader in innovative accessories for digital entertainment, and Mary Kurek (game marketing guru) will co-host a first-ever Networking Tweet-up at E3. This unique endeavor will include prize drawings, game demos, pro gamer guest appearances, and an interactive networking opportunity for game industry pros…all headquartered at the CTA Digital vendor booth. Here are the details:

Event: Wednesday, June 16th 1-4 pm PST
CTA Digital E3 Booth: #4500 West, LA Convention Center



–Visits by Pro Gamers: Rob Paz (Prodigy) World Record Holder for Rock Band 2 and recently featured elite gamer on XBox Live Dashboard. Ciji Thornton (Starslay3r) has amassed a total of over 30 top 5 finishes in 9 games in 3 genres. She ranked 7th in the Pan American region of the world for Guitar Hero: World Tour in the 2009 WCG Pan American Championships in Guadalajara, Mexico and also claimed 1st place for Rock Band 2 at the 2009 Pan American Championships.



Gaming “challenge” between Prodigy and StarSlay3r and prize giveaway. Photo/media opps with pro gamers. *If you are media and wish a few minutes one-on-one with pro gamers,contact mary@marykurek.com

–On site promotional support provided by Ryan Thompson (Gaming PR/Marketing pro) and SFX-360.com, [Mission Design | Facebook] producers of the now “infamous” Gamers Gone Wild events.

–During event: Hot new racing accessory demonstrated by 8 yr-old Kids Are Heroes own Ricky Springer, founder of Racing for a Cause.

–Prize giveaways throughout event. Register at the booth by checking in and grabbing your Twitter tag. We’ll be flashing event activity info on a large screen and tweeting random Tweep checkins throughout the event.

–Demo your favorite new gaming accessory at the CTA Digital booth for a bit of “personal gaming fun.”

Make sure to stop by the booth and say hello and enter for your chance to win some cool prizes!

StarSlay3r will be making an appearance at this years SXSW in Austin, TX to talk about her adventure on the run on the official REPO MEN panel.

Director Miguel Sapochnik joins Wired’s “Vanished” writer Evan Ratliffe and Double Barrel Motion Labs CEO Jeff Krelitz for a conversation about how REPO MEN has moved into the virtual and real world. Highlights include the worldwide debut in RealD 3D of the original motion comic “Remy’s Favorite Organ,” featuring Jude Law, and a panel discussion with Sapochnik, Krelitz, Thornton and Ratliffe, whose article inspired the hunt currently taking place as part of the film’s promotion. www.wired.com/repomen

THE REPO MEN PANAL CONSISTS OF:
Miguel Sapochnik – Director, REPO MEN
Jeff Krelitz - CEO, Double Barrel
Evan Ratliffe – Writer, Wired
Ciji Thornton – Repo Men/Wired Contest Runner

Date: Monday, March 15th
Time: 11 a.m. on
Location: Exhibit Hall 1

Make sure to stop by to get all the info about the REPO MEN movie, to learn more about the REPO MEN hunt and more!

StarSlay3r is currently in New York gaming it up! Make sure to catch her at Chinatown Fair for some casual matches.

Well, as everyone already knows… this year Shoryuken announced that they would be having an all female Super Street Fighter IV “Femme Fatale” Tournament at this years EVO. The responses have, not surprisingly, been very negative. From people being upset that Marvel was replaced with an all female tourney to people feeling that this is just WRONG to put females in a different group then males for SSF4… the overall community just really believes this is a horrible idea. I’m still a bit undecided about this whole situation.


Mid last year I competed in a tournament called the “Ladies of Street Fighter” tournament in Rowland Heights, CA. The turnout was pretty good and a couple of the girls really impressed me with their skills. A few of the girls were really taking SF4 seriously at the time and even AFTER the tournament was over a half dozen or so of the ladies who entered decided that they liked competing and continued to enter tournaments mostly dominated by men. Many of the girls used LOSF as a way to show people that they were serious about Street Fighter and they were recognized for their skills in a way that they wouldn’t have been if they had competed in an event as large as EVO for their first tournament. In short… LOSF was a great “welcome to the street fighter competitive scene” type of tournament. The tournament was less aggressive then your average tourney to a certain extent. There wasn’t as much crap talking, there was no entry fee so there wasn’t the thought of “I don’t want to lose all my money” and there were coaches by their side to help when the stress got too intense… the tournament was a very comfortable environment to start off in.

I believe all female tournaments are good when they are small and local. These tournaments are good for helping females to start in the competitive scene because, as everyone knows, males are very harsh and a lot of times are non-supportive of females being in the SF4 scene. While they SAY they want more females, a lot of them just want eye candy and don’t really encourage females to compete. It’s tough when competing with men having them say “everyone knows girls SUCK at SF4″ and a lot of times girls can’t handle the pressure. I’m not saying ALL girls can’t handle the pressure, I’m talking about girls who are new to Street Fighter, new to competitive gaming in general. Street Fighter 4 has the most rude community I’ve ever met, so having these little Female Only tournaments are definitely nice for not scaring them away, HOWEVER, I do NOT think that a large tournament like EVO is a good place to hold a Female Only SSF4 tourney.

I think that Jared said it best in his blog “But discouraging these women is exactly what the girls-only tournaments tend to do. While I can sort of understand the idea of nobility behind wanting to open the door to female Street Fighter players by giving them an accessible taste of what competitive play is all about, at the same time you’re essentially regulating them to a sideshow in the worse sense of the word. You’re saying that because they were born with a vagina, they’re clearly inferior and not competent enough to compete with the boys and this type of thinking — whether its intended or not — is bullshit and a slap to the face to all the women currently playing the game to even suggest this.”

I personally am leaning toward the side of not competing in EVOs all female tournament at this point in time. Basically with EVO being the LARGEST fighting game tournament in the US this is going to be an opportunity for these girls to be put in the spotlight for all of the SRK community to see and ridicule. Basically while many of the girls entering will not have been playing for very long… maybe even as little as a month or two since they could have heard about this last minute, there’s a very good chance that they could… well… “suck”. While they could be playing well for someone who has just recently picked up the game, the other players don’t know how long anyone has been playing… they don’t know how much time and dedication went into practice… all they see is “she can’t FADC into Ultra so she sucks” and that is a shame. I don’t think that any good will come out of this tournament. I’m being told that I should enter since there’s a very good chance I will place high, but I would rather play with the guys in the normal SSF4 tourney and go 0-2 then place top 3 in another female only tourney. Many of the guys competing in EVO are 2-10 year veterans of Street Fighter so beating any of them is a great accomplishment.

The last LOSF tournament also had some negative results. Yes, a good amount of the females who competed continued to compete but many also began ganging up on each other in a strive for attention. Rumors spread, alliances formed, people started turning on each other. What was supposed to be a tournament to bring together the female players ended up resulting in being the very thing that would prevent these people from becoming good friends. Jared writes, “The previous events were rife with high school-esque in-fighting amongst some of the competitors and brought out the worst amongst others, even those who weren’t even involved. Can anyone even remember who won the first “Ladies Night” tournament? Despite her being a very legit player, the internal trash talk ensured that it didn’t matter. “

I am still playing SF4 9 months later because I strive to be better. 2D fighting games were a weakness of mine and I’m working hard to level up in Street Fighter 4 specifically. I hope that the females who enter the SSF4 tourney at EVO are prepared to be put under a spotlight and a microscope and to deal with the negative comments that they most likely will receive. I also hope that some good comes of this tournament otherwise it’ll be a shame to lose the potential to have more females in the community. Best of luck to all of you girls who enter. Most likely I will just be entering the regular SSF4 tourney, but if you guys can convince me something good will come from entering this tourney I might do it. I’m still leaning toward no right now though.

Well thanks to my awesome networking skills days 4 and 5 were busy ones for me and I’ve kept myself quite busy for me!

Day 4-
I spent walking around ALL of CES. I got to check out the oh so sexy cars and audio system section. I spent a good hour or so drooling over the cars and equipment and headed over to the Sony area where I played some games in 3d and watched some movies and tv shows in 3D as well. I have to admit, I think 3D gaming is by FAR the best utilization of the 3D technology. Watching tv in 3D was rather boring, however if they had Avatar in 3D I think that would have made me ate my words. After the 3D area I sat in line for a bit and managed to sneak my way into a spot ahead of people to play with the EYEpet. I’ve been looking forward to this moment since I saw the game so I was going NUTS waiting to play. After I sat down I pretty much only got to do a few basic things since the game is still in it’s early stages. I bathed my pet, gave him some xrays to see how he was doing, then drew a robot and played with him for a bit and before I knew it my time was done. I have to admit I was rather disappointed since I had already seen the same routine several times and was hoping I’d get to do something new. I still think I’ll buy the game when it comes out however. I’m just waiting for them to progress into the later stages of the game so I can do more!

After playing some games I decided it’s time to network some more and I got a lot of really good connections going. This is the best part of CES for me. Why? Well because of one of these new connections I get to give you guys cool new swag every week! You’ll have to stay tuned for more details on that one though!

After walking around and playing Guitar Hero at every booth that had it on every peripheral made by every third party that was at CES I got a bit bored and found myself back at the Flick Truck to pass some time. Before I knew it the owner of the truck came up to me and asked me if I’d work at the truck for the rest of the day and the next day. I had so much fun playing on the truck and hanging out with all the cool people that stopped to watch me play that I agreed and rocked out for the rest of the day.

DAY 5-
Day 5 I was at the Flick Truck for most of the day. I took a short break at 12:30 to meet with GamBridge about their new midi Guitars that are compatible with Guitar Hero. The guitars are pretty epic since you can use them to learn how to play REAL guitar since they have REAL strings where you strum and a shit ton of buttons all over the headstock so you can play all the normal chords and such without it hurting as much as real strings. While the guitar that I played on was still an unfinished prototype, I was pretty excited with what I saw. I think if I had a good month to sit down and play with that guitar specifically I could play Expert on Guitar Hero with it no problem!



In order to get more people to come over to the truck and check out it’s epicness we decided to do a little mini tournament. I brought my laptop and hooked up the ustream and Flick Truck was awesome enough to give away a $50 gift certificate to the winner. We had a decent amount of people join the tournament and it was set up round robin style. In the end it turned out that the winner knew who I winner knew who I was and used to work with me. Small world! I played a little joke on him and said “Now, if you want that gift certificate you have to beat me!” and we battled. He lost, but we still gave him the gift certificate.. it was all in fun! Everything went over so well that I was asked to do future events with the Flick Truck so prepare to see me rocking on a 119” screen more often because I can’t get enough of that truck! If you’re curious to see what I’m talking about check out this video!



I had a TON of fun at CES and I’m so glad I got to go! It was great hanging out with all of my buddies and seeing the Ultimate Gamer crew again! Stay tuned for news about the new partnerships I’ve made thanks to CES and for news on Ultimate Gamer 2 also! I want all of you to audition this time. See you all at CES 2011!

Hey everyone! I’ve been in Las Vegas for 3 days now and I’ve been having a TON of fun!


DAY 1-
I came to Las Vegas a day early to sneak in an interview with WCG and get the dirt on WCG Ultimate Gamer 2, and get some news about the WCG in general. After the interview I used the opportunity to check out the still under construction CES floor to check out some new games! One of the first games I played was HEAVY RAIN for the PS3 which is BAD ASS let me tell you! The creators of Indigo Prophecy come back to do this game and it’s basically the same type of game but a LOT more interactive and it gives you a LOT more control over the story. This is one of 2 games I saw that made me want to buy a PS3 finally!

After playing HEAVY RAIN I moved over 5 feet to play the game MAG. While the game can have up to 256 playing at once, I played vs about only 20 or so people. The game is very call of duty ish but the thing I hated the most about the game was the controls. I think I’m too used to using RT to shoot thanks to Halo and COD and in this game you use the ps3 equivalent R1 on the PS3 which was very awkward and L1 to steady your gun. This wouldn’t have been a major issue if it wasn’t for the fact that you CAN NOT change the button configuration. I’m hoping that this is just because it’s not a finalized version or something because if you can’t change your button configs for this game that is a HUGE downfall. Graphically…this is an amazing game however and the massive multiplayer factor is just going to be interesting to see in action.

After MAG I jumped on Gran Turismo 5. I have been a fan of the series for a while but due to the stupid wheel setup they had there I found myself too frustrated to play the game much longer than 1 track/ 3 laps worth of time. I honestly HATE the Wheel/pedal config and prefer to play with a ps3 controller and they didn’t have any regular controller set ups for the game.

At night I did all my networking with companies and hit up some after parties. Got a headache and had to crash early though (by early I mean like 1am)
Read the rest of this entry »

Make sure to stop by Ustream.tv to check out StarSlay3r’s live gaming stream! This year StarSlay3r has teamed up with comedian Sam Cohn to bring you a more entertaining gaming experience. Make sure to stop by and check out one of the live shows for real time game reviews, gaming chats and to challenge her or Sam on Xbox Live, PSN or on the Wii! Also, make sure to subscribe to get updates as to when StarSlay3r will be doing her next live stream!

To game with StarSlay3r send her a game request to one of the following Gamer Tags:
Xbox 360- StarSlay3r
PS3- DeathTemptress

If her friends list is full you can add her as a friend on Raptr to find out when she’s playing and to challenge her!

Live video chat by Ustream

Well, The Rock-A-Thon is over… and boy am I tired! I’m still trying to recover from the crazy marathon… but we did well! Here’s the details:

We rocked out for 92 Hours to over 1,057 songs scoring 315 gold stars and raised over $5,000 for Child’s Play Charity! I personally played seven 50 song setlists and participated in 2 round robin’s which means I played over 300 songs and I averaged 99% accuracy on my songs even though I sightread 100% of all DLC songs! Oh, and I also passed on my guitar to a very happy fan named Drew after I was done playing. hehe Enjoy the guitar!



This was a crazy 4 days and I’m so happy that I got to rock out for such a great cause! We have to wait a while now for the 1 terabyte hard drive to be sent to Twin Galaxies Texas judge to be reviewed to ensure it complied with all of the rules. If we get the thumbs up from the judge then we also score a spot in the Guinness World Records – Gamers Edition book for setting the first world record for the Longest Relay Rock Band concert! We are also going to be eligible for records for each individual rock band song so we may just have scored ourselves a TON of world records in the process!

Thank you to everyone who helped to promote the event and to everyone who donated. There’s a TON of kids who are going to benefit from your donations, and I’d like to thank each and every one of you on their behalf. A very special thank you to Energizer for sponsoring this event and for your very gracious donation! Now… for some pics that were taken at The Rock-A-Thon!

1st pic is one I had to have separate because it was my favorite FC from the 4 days. (I’m not sure how many FCs I got in total but I got a LOT!)

The time has come! My bags are packed, my guitar is ready to go and I’m heading off to Houston to prepare for a 4 day long Rock Band marathon!

What is The Rock-A-Thon?
The Rock-A-Thon is a multi-day event where gamers from around the country will be coming together to put on a 4 day Rock Band concert, playing every song in the Rock Band catalog back-to-back to raise money for Child’s Play!

I’m told that the Rock-A-Thon will have live UStream footage available to watch through the official website http://www.therockathon.com so tune in and watch us rock out starting November 27th at midnight and for the next 100 hours straight!

I’m so excited! Be back on Tuesday!