Being a scheming Chinese, I got the travel agent to include a bonus round trip to Taiwan together with my Singapore air ticket. Wheeeeee 2 trips in 1. Although gaming wasn’t a priority I still somehow managed to locate where their local 3rd Strike scene was.
It was as though some divine being led me to that spot.
This place was called ‘GM’ which is located in an underground mall/subway called the Taipei City Mall. This place is a freaking maze I kid you not. In fact I spent one whole day wandering aimlessly around and stuffing myself full of Taiwan delicacies.
GM as it is affectionately known, is a shop that sells gaming merchandise such as magazines and music. Their 3S setup was basically superguns with console controllers at a corner of the shop. You can see someone playing a mile away if you are walking towards the shop as the players are seated outside. First up I met DA who was using Dudley. I casually asked whether the game is free to play since I see no coin slots and such. DA was very friendly and we got talking after a few games when he realised he’s not playing with a passer-by scrub.
The next few trips I got to meet many of Taiwan’s 3S players and I have to say I was very impressed with their standard of play. As I was able to speak mandarin, there was no language barrier and I thoroughly enjoyed their hospitality. 3 players stood out in my opinion, Larry(CH) ylc(HU) and Kasumi(YU). At the time my knowledge and comprehension of the game was still lacking, so my judgement might be flawed. One characteristic I notice their players had was eagerness to learn. Closely-knitted was the term best to describe their community. In one instance I witness their Ibuki player lost a close match bcos she fucked up a command dash -> supercancel jump into kunai super, then went to practise that very move in the other supergun setup. The winner actually went over and discussed the proper execution techniques and became the test dummy. 3rd Strike mooks (The 3S bible) was also glanced over after matches to check on frame data etc.
I didn’t impressed much as I lost a lot, but overall I was extremely happy I found their scene as I was able to share and learn some tips which I still apply today. Mayy (DU, UR) thank me profusely for sharing Urien tips and although it wasn’t much it was my way of thanking them for being such gracious hosts. I was also informed that I wasn’t the first overseas guest they had at GM, apparently a fellow Singaporean visited about 4 months before me … none other than Tin 
Through some googling I finally found my Taiwan friends again and their 3S scene is alive and kicking. Check out http://nlp.cs.ntou.edu.tw/sf33rb/ for their ranking battle news and videos. If you can’t read Chinese just leave me some comments and I will translate it for you. The blurb below is for them:
台湾的朋友你们还好吗？谢谢您在2005年的热情接待,我是那个Urien跟Dudley的菜鸟，来自新加坡的建达(Cody)。这是我个人的日记，描述新加坡跟澳洲雪梨的3.3玩家。希望你们有很好的成绩，有缘再碰面玩3.3。
Asahy posted this link for everyone to see in Taiwan, although it is really late to be posting this, just wanted to say hi and it was really good meeting and playing you. I didn’t know who was it at first place until I read some more of your blog and realized it was that annoying (by annoying I really mean good) Urine player who everyone here in Taiwan played last summer.
Hopefully in the future there will still be players from other countries coming to Taiwan and enjoy the 3S scene. The players here are pretty hardcore, so you guys won’t ever have to worry if no one is here to play you when you visit.