How Googers became BUSTER_JR

Once upon a time, I travelled to Adelaide and stayed in a hotel room with the user formerly known as Googers.

Upon meeting Googers at the airport I liked Googers, which probably wasn’t difficult considering he was next to boozer. They got to know each other during and the day while adventuring for Aerodrome’s jumper and later that night were able to play some Smash together in real life for the first time.

I was anxious about playing Googers. Googers was and is still a bad player (evident by his current username), however the night before he met me he managed to 2 stock him on Wifi for the first game and then again randomly in the same session. Losing to Googers is damaging for a Smash player’s reputation, so it was imperative that this trend did not continue into real life.

That night Googers continued to not only be able to 2 stock me, but all of the QLD players in the room.

The kills were coming thick and fast. Repeatedly Googers was racking up damage with Bowser Jr’s side-b to dair to fair combos. He was using advanced Bowser Jr tech, such as placing a mecha koopa on the Smashville platform I was trying to camp on, and using lots of fsmash on the edge. Then just when you’d think it was all safe he would land a spammy up-b hammer KO on anyone who’d dare to challenge his space.

It went on.
And on.
And on.

And so did his trash talk.

“Yeah man I’m totally gonna knock Kira out tomorrow she’s got no chance. Can you believe that post she made? What was she thinking, this isn’t Perth. Actually you know what, nobody in NSW has a chance when Googers is on fire.”

“This one time I knocked out Ignis and he just had no idea it was coming. That’s what it’s gonna be like tomorrow. These people are just gonna play me and out of nowhere get Googed and then before you know it I’ll be carrying Victoria through the tournament.”

“I can’t believe people actually use the shield button in this game. That’s the real fun cancelling button right there. When I win this tournament and everyone realises that you should play like me then people who use that button will finally realise how much of a dick they’ve been this whole time.”

All this talk was quite amusing coming from Googers the night before a major event, but it was made a problem due to how loud it was and how late at night it was. We didn’t want to get kicked out of the hotel, as this had nearly happened a number of times to some of the QLD Smash players. We wanted to appease our neighbour Tony who we had spoken to earlier and had indicated he didn’t like loud noises late at night. If Jezmo can shit talk in a whisper at 3am then there’s no reason that Googers also cannot do this –he simply chose not to be quiet and continued to be a noisy little brat.

After a late night of Smash it was finally time to go to the big SXC tournament, so after a ceremonious breakfast at Maccas we made our way to the event, silently in fear of young Googers.

This fear ended up being completely unfounded.

Googers got an easy bracket; there were people who he was meant to be play but either didn’t turn up or make it on time so he got a lot of free wins. In the end all he had to do was beat a local Adelaide Falco player but this proved to be too much of a feat. There were plenty of opportunities that Googers could have taken to close out the game, but he was too concerned with his grand plan for knocking Kira out of the event that he just didn’t focus enough on what he thought were plebs and ended up scrubbing out of the tournament before pools was even over.

Eventually the bracket was boiled down to the top eight players and left until the following day, so we all headed out to grab a bite to eat in the city. Aero has a tradition in QLD of going for pancakes after a tourney, so when Google Maps presented me with the opportunity to continue this tradition I took it. This is despite the fact that I hate pancakes.

At the long table of Smash players Googers and I were at opposite ends of the table. I was grateful to be near Rhyno and Bijou. Bijou shared his epic Japan journey itinerary that was making me both excited and jealous. We discussed Googer’s bustering and Rhyno suggested that as punishment we change Googers name to BUSTER on QLD Smash. I quite like punishing players who trash talk and can’t walk the talk. I saw this moment as an opportunity. But there just wasn’t something right. BUSTER was a nice name but there’s many busters; mainly Mang0 Nation and Shulk / Megaman players, so how would we differentiate Googers from all the other busters out there? After thinking about which character Googers played, the answer became clear.

“Googers, are you a buster?”

“Oh yeah man I’m the biggest buster on this side of Smashville, yada yada yada yada (other things I don’t remember)”

“I love you Googers”.

“I love you Shitashi”.

And with that, I smiled, looked and Bijou, and then changed Googers name to BUSTER_JR on QLD Smash.

I had wanted BUSTER_JR to see his new name quickly but I was unaware at the time that his phone battery was long gone, preventing him from noticing the change. I decided to tell everyone else in the group one by one just to be rude and judging by the reactions I received from everyone there was much approval. We then had to find a way home and after a rather hallowing experience trying to get a taxi as well as various forms of public transport we were saved by Khoa, a literal knight in shining armour (if you consider his car shiny and him a knight).

We got home and played more Smash, but BUSTER_JR didn’t seem to be bothered by the fact that he hadn’t checked QLD Smash for hours. This irritated me. He continued to be very noisy and got louder every time I tried to shush him. I wanted to see the moment he realised that he’d lost his identity with my own eyes. Googer’s identity was central to his existence, so I knew it was the one way that I could mess with him. Unfortunately we ended up both back in bed at our room without him noticing at the end of the night and thankfully somehow without disturbing Tony.

“Googers there’s an easter egg for you on QLD Smash but I can’t tell you what it is”

I foolishly told BUSTER_JR this before I thought we’d be able to go to sleep. It was late. We were tired. But this was the wrong thing to do, as it set BUSTER_JR off on a mission to find what had been changed. Fortunately the username change had corrupted his cookie, so he was unable to view any page on site due to a cryptic error message that made perfect sense to.

“I’ll figure this out! You put my face on the home page didn’t you?”

“No.”

“Well you must have put my face in the nav bar then!”

“No.”

“OK so you’re confirming that there’s a big picture of my face on the Online page then!?”

*facepalms*

Every single thing BUSTER_JR could conceive that I had possibly done to the site revolved around his face, thus confirming his love of his former identity to me. What started out as a bit of fun before bed ended up turning into an all-out mission to discover what hidden secret had been embedded in the site for him at the expense of any remaining chance of sleep we had. He wasn’t bothered by the sunlight slowly creeping into the room.

Eventually BUSTER_JR figured out that clearing his cookies would grant him access to the site. Actually what am I saying – he didn’t figure this out, he just kept trying random shit until something ended up working; just like how he plays Bowser Jr. This was originally only going to be a temporary thing for the lols which we had a few of and finally managed to get to bed. At that point I was intending to return his username after our little holiday was over.

The next day, things changed.

Unfortunately I managed to wake up the next day to a horrible feeling in my throat. I should really have had my tonsils out by now but I’m a sook with surgery so I started to pay the price for this on my holiday. Having been through this sickness countless times before I knew that my best bet was to see a doctor, but this was out of the question due to being in the city of the weekend. My alternate plan was to stay as hydrated as I could and dose myself up on over the counter medicines until I could return to QLD where the weather isn’t influenced by icebergs. I made sure to bring with me a water bottle and a tub of gum for after dinner so my mouth wouldn’t go dry. I put this safely in Aero’s bag before leaving the hotel assuming all would be safe. Then BUSTER_JR got his hands on the gum and it all started to go downhill from there.

As soon as he saw there was gum in Aero’s bag I could remember seeing BUSTER_JR grab the gum out of Aero’s bag and start taking some. Then, he started offering it to everyone else around him. Surely this won’t be an issue I thought, as there’s fifty pieces in there and I’d hardly had any. Oh how wrong I was.

When I got to SXC for day two I ducked out quickly during the first matches to find a chemist. I got something that was anti-inflammatory and didn’t make me drowsy because it was important that I was alive and lively to cheer on the QLD boys Jaice and Jezmo who made it to the finals. These seemed to work, and I was able to enjoy the top 8 which I got to see in the end despite not feeling the best. The top eight was great. It was actually kind of strange cheering on Jaice seeing as I’m normally hoping that he’ll get electrocuted or spontaneously combust before I have to play him. Overall I had a good time and destroyed my vocal chords for the good of QLD. No regrets.

Doubles was then due to start soon, so I decided to pop out to get some food. After getting food I returned to the venue looking to expunge the chilli and garlic taste from my mouth. I found and Aero and got into his bag but was unable to find the gum. This was baffling. Surely it hadn’t all gone within a few hours? I asked Aero if he knew where it was and he just shrugged, completely uninterested as far as I could see. I don’t blame him.

I told him “It’s important”, to which he replied I should go see BUSTER_JR.

“Oh yeah I had that, I ate the whole thing there’s nothing left”

I could feel my blood vessels in my head tightening up at this. How could he be so inconsiderate? IT WASN’T EVEN HIS GUM IN THE FIRST PLACE.

I was mad.
So mad.
Madder than I’d ever been at BUSTER_JR in the entire three days we’d known each other.

I tried to stand over him and yell at him but it was no use. He’s a giant and I’m not. Acknowledging I couldn’t compete with people whose diet consistent of lots of hormone-pumped KFC chicken, I decided to take matters into my own hands. I found a chair in the venue and proceeded to stand on it so that I could tower over BUSTER_JR and express my disgust with him. I didn’t tower over him much at all, but it was enough to drive my dissatisfaction with him like a stake straight into his heart.

If this experience has taught me one thing, it’s that BUSTER_JR has a heart. He instantly became extremely apologetic and I could see in his eyes that he legitimately regretted what he had done. I’m savage though – all I wanted was something which he couldn’t provide, so I decided that he must be punished like a dash attack on shield (unless you’re Jaice). The rest of the night is a bit of a blur to me, but it ended up back at the hotel with a number of other Smashers from the venue where we were discussing his punishment. I was looking for the simplest and most effective punishment possible when I realised that I’d already punished BUSTER_JR by changing his name. I made it known that I intended now to keep his name as BUSTER_JR, but fearing he’d be known as this until the end of time, BUSTER_JR began trying to figure out under what conditions he could earn his former name back.

“Why don’t we make it that I get it back when I beat SpaceJam next” was one of his responses.

I quite liked this suggestion for a number of reasons. BUSTER_JR had spent a large part of his holiday bitching about his dear friend SpaceJam, specifically about his Pac-man. Apparently he used to enjoy playing SpaceJam, but that all went down the drain when he started doing things like shielding and camping. Now he had come to a point where he could no longer defeat his partner in crime, and confided in me that Pac-man’s hydrant would shut down his side B approach which was literally all he had. I liked this. I like people that camp, that is unless they’re assholes like Dean or boozer and camp me. Not only did it seem like a good challenge for this reason, but due to him being a repeated buster I theorised that it would be many weeks before they ended up meeting in bracket to even have a chance at getting his username back.

And with that, BUSTER_JR’s fate was sealed. Will BUSTER_JR get his name back at GUF Geelong? Will it require a trip to QLD to meet in bracket? Will SpaceJam just get campier and campier to the point where BUSTER_JR is stuck with this name forever?

Stay tuned to QLD Smash.