title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie came up with his famous "pencil-neck geek" catchphrase early in his career to describe a fellow carnival performer known as "The Geek", who bit the heads off chickens and snakes. Blassie described this geek as having a neck like a stack of dimes, and that he was a real pencil-neck geek. He soon got work from more established promoters: Tom Packs in St. Louis and George Simpson in Kansas City.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: After the US entered World War II, Blassie enlisted in the Navy and served in the Pacific Theater for 42 months. He married a Jewish girl named Nettie Needles in California while on shore leave. He achieved the rank of Petty Officer (Second Class) before he was discharged.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Upon Blassie's return from the war, he was billed as "Sailor" Fred Blassie to capitalize on the wave of war-time patriotism sweeping the country, but that gimmick was unsuccessful. He worked for Jack Pfefer, who he claimed would only employ people who looked like sideshow freaks at his shows, and whose wrestlers included Tor Johnson, who made movies with director Ed Wood, and Lillian Ellison, the Fabulous Moolah. During this time, he went to New York City to work for promoter Jess McMahon.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In 1952, Blassie moved to Los Angeles to work for Jules Strongbow. He teamed with Billy McDaniel as the McDaniel Brothers, but when they went east, they were known as the Blassie Brothers.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In 1953, he worked in the Atlanta, territory for Paul Jones (the wrestler of the 1930s, not the wrestler/manager of the 1980s). While there, he won the NWA Georgia Southern Heavyweight Championship, the holder of which was generally first in line to challenge the NWA World Heavyweight Champion whenever he passed through the territory. It was also during this period of his career when he dropped his babyface gimmick and became a full-fledged heel. The fans consistently booed him because he was considered a "Yankee". He also bleached his hair at this time, as many of the other stars of the era did, such as Gorgeous George, Johnny Valentine, and "Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers. He was often billed as "The Vampire" during this time for biting his opponents and filing his teeth during interviews and promos.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In 1960, Blassie returned to Strongbow's promotion in Los Angeles, where he was a big star for Worldwide Wrestling Associates (WWA) of southern California, drawing many fans to the Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles. He was so hated there that uniformed police officers were regularly brought in to protect him as he made his way to and from the ring. He had main event-level feuds against stars such as The Destroyer.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: On June 12, 1961, Blassie defeated the "Flying Frenchman" Édouard Carpentier in a best-of-three-falls match for his first WWA World Heavyweight Championship. On July 7, Blassie successfully defended his title against the former NWA World Heavyweight Champion Lou Thesz. During that same title reign, in a match against Lord James Blears a fan threw acid on his back, and he had to return immediately to the locker room to wash it off; he was also stabbed 21 times and lost vision in his right eye after being hit with a hard-boiled egg over the course of his career. Blassie lost the title to Rikidōzan on March 28, 1962.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie claims that he made Regis Philbin into the celebrity he is today. When Philbin had a late-night weekend talk show in San Diego, Blassie would routinely show up to yell at the audience, throw furniture, and threaten Philbin; the confrontations were wholly kayfabe and both of them were friends when the camera's weren't rolling. In later years, Blassie also appeared on "The Mike Douglas Show" when Philbin was a guest host.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: After regaining the WWA Championship from Rikidōzan on July 25, 1962, Blassie lost the title two days later to the "Masked Destroyer" Dick Beyer. In 1963, Bearcat Wright defeated him to become champion, and it was quite a statement during the fight for civil rights that an African-American had won such a title. In 1964, Dick the Bruiser defeated Blassie to become champion, and Blassie headed east to work for the World Wide Wrestling Federation (WWWF).


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie returned to WWA in 1968 just as promoter Mike LeBell decided to rejoin the NWA. In the early 1970s, Blassie "turned face", or became a good guy, since so many fans were cheering his famous antics. While there, he feuded with Soulman Rocky Johnson, The Sheik, and "The Golden Greek" John Tolos. One of his most famous feuds took place in southern California in 1971, against Tolos. The final match of their series took place in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, and set new California records for both attendance and gate.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In 1962, Blassie had a feud with Japanese wrestling icon Rikidōzan that established his reputation in Japan. After Blassie lost the WWA World Heavyweight Championship to Rikidōzan in Los Angeles, the two had a rematch on live Japanese television. Many of the viewers were horrified by Blassie's treatment of their hero. One of Blassie's gimmicks was to file his teeth, and draw blood from his opponents by biting their foreheads. The sight of the Japanese legend covered in his own blood gave several viewers heart attacks, and some reportedly even died.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie divorced his wife after leaving on Christmas to wrestle in Knoxville. He claims he isn't sure if she knew of his philandering ways, but Blassie had repeatedly bragged of his infidelity to his ex-wife Nettie. As a result, of his three children Gary, Cheryl, and Ron, only Ron ever spoke to Blassie on a regular basis.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: While touring Japan in 1965, Blassie met the woman who would later become his third wife, Miyako Morozumi, at a train station. However, later that year Blassie suffered from kidney stones and had surgery to remove them. While recuperating the following year, he sold cars and married a second time to a woman whose name Blassie claimed not to remember.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In 1968, Blassie returned to Japan and was reunited with Miyako. When he asked for her parents' blessing, they were unsure of Blassie because of his reputation with Rikidōzan and because he was 28 years older than she. However, he eventually got their blessing and took her home to the United States; they were married on September 30, 1968.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In 1964, Blassie feuded with Bruno Sammartino and Bobo Brazil. Blassie came into the WWWF with his own world title belt, claiming to be the Pacific World Champion, and was coming to Sammartino's "back yard" to unify the world title. The series began at Roosevelt Stadium, Jersey City, New Jersey in 1964, with Blassie winning on a technicality, but not a pin. The rematches were held at Madison Square Garden in New York, with Sammartino winning out. He returned to the company in 1971, reaching the final of a tournament in January for the vacant WWWF United States Heavyweight Championship before losing to Pedro Morales. Blassie later challenged Morales for the WWWF Championship, but came up short. During this stint with the company, Blassie was managed by his future nemesis, "Captain" Lou Albano.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie retired from active wrestling in 1974, due to a California law that prohibited anyone over 55 from getting a wrestling license. His knees were also in terrible condition, which also contributed to his retirement. Afterwards he became a manager in the World Wide Wrestling Federation (WWWF) and its subsequent incarnation the World Wrestling Federation (WWF). He performed for that promotion until his full retirement from professional wrestling in 1986. Blassie, Lou Albano, and The Grand Wizard were named "The Three Wise Men of the East", as the top three heel managers in the company.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Among the men he managed were Nikolai Volkoff, The Iron Sheik, Blackjack Mulligan, High Chief Peter Maivia, "The Crippler" Ray Stevens, Adrian Adonis, Jesse Ventura, Dick Murdoch, Swede Hanson, Killer Khan, George 'The Animal' Steele, Professor Tanaka, Mr. Fuji, Ivan Koloff, Tor Kamata, Masa Saito, Lou Albano, Victor Rivera, Kamala, Hercules Hernandez, and Hulk Hogan. Blassie also managed Muhammad Ali in his boxer vs. wrestler match in 1976 against Antonio Inoki. Blassie also publicly represented Ali for media events and interviews for a period in the mid-1970s.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: One of Blassie's most famous proteges was The Iron Sheik. Blassie led Shiek to the WWF World Heavyweight Championship over Bob Backlund on December 26, 1983, in Madison Square Garden. After Sheik lost the belt to Blassie's former managed wrestler Hulk Hogan, Blassie managed Sheik in various rematches around the country throughout the first half of 1984, culminating into another major televised rematch on December 28, 1984, once again in Madison Square Garden. In this match Hogan was once again victorious. After managing Sheik through a brief feud with Andre the Giant, he also became the manager of Nikolai Volkoff, with Sheik and Volkoff later becoming a tag team. Blassie would gain even more gold when Volkoff and Sheik defeated The US Express for the WWF Tag Team Championship at the first ever Wrestlemania. Blassie got involved when he threw his cane into the ring, with Sheik and Volkoff using it to their advantage to gain the victory. When Gene Okerlund confronted Blassie in an interview after the match, Blassie said, "what cane, I didn't have no cane!"


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie would continue to manage Sheik and Volkoff even after they lost the tag team titles. Blassie unsuccessfully campaigned along with the other managers to manage "Macho Man" Randy Savage when Savage first entered the WWF in June 1985. Blassie would continue to interfere from ringside in matches, especially during Volkoff's feud with Corporal Kirchner. Blassie's interference at Wrestlemania 2 cost Volkoff his match with Kirchner, when the cane was grabbed by Kirchner instead of Volkoff. In the summer of 1986, Blassie started to slowly phase himself out of the WWF and into retirement.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: On an episode of "WWF Championship Wrestling", Blassie barged into the announcer booth to proclaim that he had sold half of the contracts of Sheik and Volkoff to a mysterious benefactor for a large sum of money. This benefactor was later revealed to be Slick. Blassie appeared alongside Slick to co-manage Sheik and Volkoff for a few television appearances before finally bowing out in November 1986, with Albano, the final member of the Three Wise Men, retiring a few weeks later.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Because of his close relationship with Vince McMahon, Sr. and his family, Blassie remained on the WWF payroll until the day he died. He would sporadically return to make brief appearances following his retirement in 1986, mostly in produced video packages hyping the "new generation" of wrestling. He was given a commentary tryout in 1986 and 1987 for "WWF Wrestling Challenge", calling a few matches with Gorilla Monsoon. He briefly turned face in 1989, making an appearance on "Prime Time Wrestling" angry with Bobby Heenan over money Heenan hadn't paid him back. He returned again in 1990 briefly to do color commentary for "Prime Time" in April with Vince McMahon, as an emergency fill-in after Tony Schiavone quit, playing a heel once again.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie was inducted into the WWF Hall of Fame in 1994 by Shane McMahon. In 1998, Blassie was the winner at the fourth annual Cauliflower Alley Club East Coast Banquet. In 1999, he was shown making the opening narration of WrestleMania XV. In 2000, Blassie made an appearance at the Royal Rumble as a judge in the Miss Rumble 2000 Swimsuit contest, which was won by Mae Young. Blassie also appeared in the SummerSlam opening video. In 2001, Blassie appeared in a special July 16, 2001 "Raw is War" segment for the Invasion storyline, wherein he exhorted a gathering of WWF wrestlers to stand tall against The Alliance – and later got mocked by Alliance leaders Shane and Stephanie McMahon. Because of this, Blassie is one of, if not the only man to have worked with all four generations of the McMahon family. Images from his WrestleMania XV promo were also included in the opening of the 2001 Survivor Series. Blassie also appeared in a segment at the Vengeance pay-per-view event in December 2001, where an "undisputed" champion would be crowned. His final wrestling appearance was May 12, 2003 in Philadelphia on "Raw", three weeks before his death. The segment featured Blassie, his wife, and Raw co-General Manager Eric Bischoff, who was about to allow 3 Minute Warning to attack him, until Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Dudley Boyz stepped in. His final words on WWE television were "D-Von, get the table!", to a monstrous applause. His book, "Listen You Pencil Neck Geeks", was released on May 13, 2003.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: On June 2, 2003, Blassie died of heart and kidney failure at the age of 85. His death was announced by Jim Ross, 20 minutes into that same day's episode of "Raw".


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In 1975, Blassie recorded voiceovers for the songs "Blassie, King of Men" and "Pencil Neck Geek", which were performed by Johnny Legend, featuring Billy Zoom on guitar, Jay Phillips on guitar, Lon Osgood on bass and Steve Clark on drums. They received acclaim on the Dr. Demento Radio Show, and the latter song was featured on several albums, including Dr. Demento's 20th anniversary collection, "The Very Best of Dr. Demento", and "Dr. Demento Presents the Greatest Novelty CDs of All Time". In 1983, Rhino Records released a 14-track album by Blassie, titled "I Bite the Songs".


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Blassie appeared in an episode of "The Dick Van Dyke Show" that featured a new dance craze called The Twizzle. Rose Marie's character Sally Rogers brought him on at the end of the episode claiming to have discovered another new dance sensation. In the demonstration of the dance, Blassie picked up Rob Petrie and twirled him over his head.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: Filmed in 1982, "My Breakfast with Blassie" featured Andy Kaufman and Freddie Blassie eating at a Sambo's in Los Angeles. (The film was referenced by American rock band R.E.M. in their 1992 song about Kaufman, "Man on the Moon".) The movie’s title and premise are parodies of the 1981 art-house classic "My Dinner with Andre".


title: Freddie Blassie

text: "Classy" Freddie Blassie appeared in a live-action segment of the cartoon "Hulk Hogan's Rock 'n' Wrestling." In the segment he is interviewed by "Mean" Gene Okerlund when the two are interrupted by a little old lady in a housekeeper outfit that Blassie claims to be his own mother.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: "Classy" Freddie Blassie also made a cameo appearance as himself, along with "Wrestling's Living Legend" Bruno Sammartino, and Ric Flair in the 1986 film "Body Slam" starring Dirk Benedict, "Captain" Lou Albano, and "Rowdy" Roddy Piper.


title: Freddie Blassie

text: In the early 1990s, the wrestler starred in a documentary directed by Jeff Krulik, titled "Mr. Blassie Goes To Washington". In it, Blassie is picked up at the Washington, D.C., airport by a limo full of young women, escorted around the nation's capital, gives his opinions and confronts tourists. When meeting someone, he would ask where they were from, and no matter their response, he would reply with, "Oh, that's God's country!"


title: Asher Grodman

text: Asher Chazen Grodman (born July 28, 1987) is an American actor and producer who stars in the CBS series "Ghosts".


title: Asher Grodman

text: Grodman was born in New York City. His father, Marc Grodman, an assistant professor at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, is the founder of BioReference, a biotech company and led several biotech companies including GeneDx and Genosity. Grodman attended Newark Academy and graduated from Columbia University in 2010 with a degree in film and English. He was a member of Columbia's varsity fencing team. Grodman also holds a MFA from the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco.


title: Asher Grodman

text: Grodman is of Jewish background. He is a self-described 'life-long fan' of the Jacksonville Jaguars of the National Football League.


title: Asher Grodman

text: Grodman wrote, directed, and produced "The Train," a short film starring Academy Award-winning actor Eli Wallach"." The film has been featured in many film festivals such as the Cleveland International Film Festival, Vancouver International Film Festival, Sedona International Film Festival, and the Rhode Island International Film Festival.


title: Asher Grodman

text: Grodman stars in the CBS series "Ghosts", where he plays the character of Trevor, a Wall Street stockbroker.


title: Asher Grodman

text: Grodman is an adjunct lecturer at Hunter College and he also taught acting to inmates in Rikers Island.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: Cléo from 5 to 7 ( ) is a 1962 French New Wave film written and directed by Agnès Varda. The film follows a young singer, Florence "Cléo" Victoire, at 5 p.m. on June 21, as she waits until 6:30 p.m. to hear the results of a medical test that will possibly confirm a diagnosis of cancer. The film is known for its handling of several of the themes of existentialism, including discussions of mortality, the idea of despair, and leading a meaningful life. The film has a strong feminine viewpoint belonging to French feminism and raises questions about how women are perceived, especially in French society. Mirrors appear frequently to symbolize self-obsession, which Cléo embodies.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: The film includes cameos by Jean-Luc Godard, Anna Karina, Eddie Constantine and Jean-Claude Brialy as characters in the silent film Raoul shows Cléo and Dorothée, while composer Michel Legrand, who wrote the film's score, plays "Bob the pianist". It was entered into the 1962 Cannes Film Festival.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: Singer Cléo Victoire is having a tarot card reading with a fortune teller, who tells her there is an evil force in Cléo's life, and that she sees a doctor with a hazardous task. She also sees a meeting with a talkative young man in her future. The fortune teller then pulls the hanged man card, meaning that a change to the worse in Cléo's life is about to happen, and asks if she is ill, which Cleo affirms. She then proceeds to pull the death card. Although the fortune teller emphasises that the death card can also simply mean a profound change in the person's life, Cléo believes that she is doomed. She asks the fortune teller to read her palm, who rejects her request.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: While distraught from her visit to the fortune teller, Cléo meets her maid, Angèle, at a café and recounts the results of the tarot card reading, claiming that if it's cancer, she'll kill herself. Cléo cries and the owner of the café gives her coffee to calm down. Cléo and Angèle proceed to go hat shopping, where Cléo buys a black fur hat, despite Angèle constantly reminding her that it's summertime. Cléo wants to wear the hat home, but Angèle reminds her that it's Tuesday, and it's bad luck to wear something new on a Tuesday. They have the shopkeeper send the hat to Cléo's home, and Cléo and Angèle take a taxi home in time for Cléo's rehearsal.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: On the ride home, one of Cléo's songs plays, and they listen to the radio, hearing current news coverage including the Algerian War. They have a conversation with the female taxi driver as she muses about the dangers of her job. Towards the end of the taxi ride, Cléo grows nauseous and attributes it to her illness. Upon returning home, Cléo cannot breathe, and Angèle tells her to do some exercise. Before Cléo's lover, the man whom the fortune teller mentioned earlier, enters the building, Angèle tells Cléo not to tell him that she's ill, because "men hate illness". Her lover, a very busy man, tells her that he only has time to stop by for a kiss and can't even go on a vacation with her, but will try to take her out on Friday. Asking Cléo if she is ill, she replies that she is, but he doesn't take her seriously.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: Once Cléo's lover leaves, Bob, a pianist, and Maurice, a writer, arrive at her home for her rehearsal. Bob and Maurice perform a spontaneous comedy routine pretending to be doctors once Angèle tells them that Cléo is ill, because "all women like a good joke." However, Cléo does not find their joke funny. Bob goes to the piano, and they begin to practice some of Cléo's songs. As they practice, Cléo's mood quickly darkens after singing the song "Sans toi." Cléo feels like all people do is exploit her and that it won't be long until she's just a puppet for the music industry. Saying that everyone spoils her but no one loves her, Cléo leaves everyone behind in her home.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: On the way to a café, Cléo passes a street performer swallowing frogs and spitting them back out on a huge wave of water. She plays one of her songs at a jukebox in the café and watches if the people around react to it, but no one does. She then goes to a sculpting studio to visit her old friend Dorothée, who is modelling nude for a class of sculptors. After the modelling session is over, Cléo tells Dorothée that she couldn't pose nude because she would feel exposed, while Dorothée claims that her body makes her happy, not proud. Dorothée picks up a package for her friend Raoul who lent her his car to take it to the cinema where he's working. On the way, Cléo tells Dorothée that she is waiting for a test result and afraid of being terminally ill. At the cinema, they watch a silent comedy film from the projection booth, starring Jean-Luc Godard and Anna Karina. In the film, Karina topples over a hose pipe and dies, leaving behind a grieving Godard, but after he takes off his sunglasses, realising that it was only his dark glasses which made the events appear so gloomily, the scene repeats in a much lighter tone. Leaving the cinema, Cléo accidentally breaks a mirror, which she claims is a bad omen. Together with Dorothée she passes the café that she visited earlier, learning that a man was killed there. They enter a taxi, and Dorothée tells her that the broken mirror was meant for that man, not Cléo.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: After having dropped Dorothée off, Cléo has the taxi driver take her to Parc Montsouris. In the park, Antoine, a soldier on leave from the Algerian War, addresses Cléo and tells her that today is the longest day of the year. During their conversation, Cléo tells him that her real name is Florence, and that she's afraid of her illness, while the sensitive Antoine reflects on the war, where people die for nothing, and that this scares him. He asks her to accompany him to the train station to return to the war if he accompanies her to the hospital to get her test results. At the hospital, the doctor whom Cléo had her appointment with for her results has already left. While sitting on a bench outside, the doctor rolls by in his car and tells Cléo that her condition is not too serious and that two months of radiotherapy will help her to get better. Cléo says that her fear seems to be gone, and she seems happy. Antoine says that he hates to leave, and that he would like to be with Cléo. She tells him that he is with her at this moment, and they smile at each other.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: In 2019, "Cleo from 5 to 7" was voted the second greatest film directed by a woman in a poll held by the BBC, questioning 368 film experts from 84 countries.


title: Cléo from 5 to 7

text: On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 92%, based on 50 reviews, with an average rating of 8.6/10. The website's critical consensus reads, ""Cleo from 5 to 7" represents a beautifully filmed highlight of the French New Wave that encapsulates the appeal of the era while departing from its narrative conventions."


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel is a free-to-play digital collectible card game based on the "Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game", developed and published by Konami for Microsoft Windows, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Android, and iOS.


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: It was initially released January 19, 2022 for consoles and PC to positive reviews and rapidly climbed to the top of the Steam charts. On February 6, Konami announced the game had been downloaded over 10 million times. The game would later on be released in a few regions to iOS and Android January 26, 2022, with many more regional launches on February 2, 2022.


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: The game is a direct translation of the Yu-Gi-Oh! card game, maintaining all newer mechanics introduced up to 2021. The game follows its own list of forbidden and limited cards, independent from those of the Asian OCG and western TCG.


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: Like the real life card game, Master Duel also follows the gachapon format of gaining new cards in set packs, which can be purchased via task-rewarded gems and legacy tickets or though purchased gems that share the same pool as free gems. Gems can be exchanged for different types of Booster Packs; one Booster Pack contains 8 cards, and by purchasing 10 Boosters at once a Super Rare card or higher is guaranteed, and if none is an Ultra Rare, then the next 10-pack roll of the same booster is upgraded to a guaranteed Ultra Rare card. Structure Decks containing fixed card lists are available for purchase for 500 Gems, up to 3 times per account. Bundles also allow the player to buy Booster Packs with a set card as a bonus, such as the Ash Blossom & Joyous Spring Bundle. Gems can also be spent on items to customize the gameplay experience, including Mates (animated 3D monsters that stand next to the playing field during Duels), field designs, card protectors, profile icons, and background pictures for the main menu.


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: Unlike the real game, cards can be dismantled into craft points categorized by the card's technical rarity (Normal, Rare, Super Rare & Ultra Rare) and the amount imbursed determined by visual rarity (Basic [x10], Glossy [x15] & Royal Finish [x30]) which can then be used to craft cards (and by extension, decks) a duelist actually prefers, costing 30 craft points per card. Obtaining certain cards of SR or UR rarity (either from a pack or by crafting them) can unlock hidden booster sets called "Secret Packs" containing most, if not all, cards of the same archetype or theme, which the player can then purchase with gems for the following 24 hours, allowing one to very quickly complete the deck that Secret Pack is based on.


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: Deck building is also streamlined, with a searchable glossary of pre-made community decks available, although traditional "hand picked" deck building is also available as an option. Opponent's decks may also be saved as one's own after dueling in competitive modes, though missing cards will make the deck an unplayable reference guide until the player owns the missing cards, either through crafting, rewards, card packs or an alternate promotional means.


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: Development of the title began in 2019 as a follow on from Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links, released in 2017. Konami wanted to develop a new game that would appeal to more experienced players, as opposed to Duel Links which was for more casual players. During the development of the game, the idea arose of implementing a game mode that could be played alone, participating in duels against the AI. This eventually led to the implementation of Solo Mode in Master Duel. The game's music was mainly composed by Yasunori Nishiki.


title: Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel

text: "Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel" received "generally favorable" reviews according to review aggregator Metacritic.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords, also known as the Young Lords Organization (YLO) or Young Lords Party (YLP), was a Chicago-based street gang that became a civil and human rights organization. The group aims to fight for neighborhood empowerment and self-determination for Puerto Rico, Latinos, and colonized ("Third World") people. Tactics used by the Young Lords include mass education, canvassing, community programs, occupations, and direct confrontation. The Young Lords became targets of the United States FBI's COINTELPRO program.


title: Young Lords

text: In party platform points, the Young Lords may spell "American" as "amerikkkan" or "Amerikkkan"—expressing, among other things, opposition to U.S. military presence in Puerto Rico and suggesting that America's success is rooted in white supremacy. The platform follows the mission clearly, stating: "We demand immediate withdrawal of U.S. military forces and bases from Puerto Rico, Vietnam, and all oppressed communities inside and outside the U.S. No Puerto Rican should serve in the U.S. Army against his brothers and sisters, for the only true army of oppressed people is the people's army to fight all rulers."


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords started in 1960 in Chicago's Lincoln Park neighborhood as a Puerto Rican turf gang. On Grito de Lares, September 23, 1968, Jose Cha Cha Jimenez reorganized them and formed the Young Lords as a national political and civil rights movement. The new community-wide movement then spread to nearly 30 cities, including three branches in New York, which at the time served as the entry point for 90% of Puerto Ricans. In addition, the Young Lords began operating free programs for the community. In addition to their support for Puerto Ricos' independence, all Latino nations, and oppressed nations of the world, the Young Lords also supported neighborhood empowerment. The radical movement of the Young Lords modeled themselves after the Black Panther Party, calling for a vanguard of revolutionary minority parties coming together that felt oppressed by a system that wasn’t designed to be of assistance to minorities.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords' focus remains self-determination for Puerto Rico, other Latino and Third World countries, and for neighborhood-controlled development. The movement expanded from Chicago to include a broader audience and chapters in 30 cities, including three branches in New York City, the port of entry for the majority of Puerto Rican migrants.


title: Young Lords

text: During Mayor Daley's tenure in Chicago, a program of urban renewal resulted in Puerto Ricans in Lincoln Park and several Mexican communities being evicted from what became prime real estate areas near the Loop, Lakefront, Old Town, and Lakeview neighborhoods. The rationale was to increase property tax revenues by luring White, middle-class suburbanites and creating a suburb within the city. Some Young Lords were involved in the Puerto Rican June 1966 Division Street Riots in Wicker Park and Humboldt Park.


title: Young Lords

text: The 1968 Democratic Convention protests in Grant Park and the adjacent Lincoln Park Neighborhood, resulted in the Young Lords, under the leadership of founder José Cha Cha Jiménez, to join with others to form a broader civil and human rights movement. Puerto Rican self-determination and the displacement of Puerto Ricans and poor residents became the primary issues of organizing. The Young Lords organization also began to train students and youth to take on the leadership to organize the Latino community on a national level.


title: Young Lords

text: Multiple chapters formed nationwide based on the original Chicago chapter, including several branches in New York City and along the East Coast. The National Headquarters in Chicago asked the loose coalition of chapters in New York to unite as a single regional branch. All chapters considered neighborhood empowerment and Puerto Rican self-determination as unifying missions.


title: Young Lords

text: The Great Migrations of the late 1940s resulted in many Puerto Ricans coming to the mainland for opportunity and settling in the Midwest, Florida, and on the East Coast of the United States. Chicago, one of he most populated center of the Puerto Rican diaspora, took on a significant role as a regional headquarters of the movement.


title: Young Lords

text: The office in Chicago attempted to construct a nationwide grassroots movement within the U.S. barrios to unite Puerto Ricans, other Latinos, and carry out its mission for Puerto Rican independence. The New York City regional chapter formed July 26, 1969, ten months after the Young Lords Movement began in Chicago. The National Headquarters in Chicago had gained national prominence by leading protests against conditions faced by Puerto Ricans in the U.S. Because most members in New York were students with a middle-class income, who were media-savvy, the New York chapter flourished. It provided needed support for the National Headquarters then under surveillance by the F.B.I. and the Chicago city government.


title: Young Lords

text: The National Headquarters' first action was to ransack and close the Department of Urban Renewal office in Chicago. The Young Lords attended an Urban Renewal meeting and told the panel of the local neighborhood association that no more meetings would be permitted in Lincoln Park until people of color were included on the Urban Renewal Board.


title: Young Lords

text: On July 27, 1969, the chapter office in New York City mounted a "Garbage Offensive" to commemorate the 1968 Sanitation Strike and to protest the substandard garbage collection service in East Harlem. The event also promoted the opening of the Young Lords' New York City office. The offensives targeted local city services and were aligned with the National Headquarters mission to develop neighborhood empowerment. In Chicago, the Young Lords occupied local institutions in the Lincoln Park neighborhood to support low-income housing for working families.


title: Young Lords

text: The New York members had first read about the Chicago Young Lords in an issue of the Black Panther newspaper. It reported actions for Puerto Rican and Latino self-determination and publicized the increasing repression of Jose "Cha Cha" Jimenez and the Chicago National Headquarters. The New York office followed the actions of the People's Church in Chicago and took over the First Spanish United Methodist Church in East Harlem. Over 100 members were arrested in the two-week takeover. National Headquarters members encouraged the New York members not to resist arrests, in order to avoid bloodshed.


title: Young Lords

text: The New York occupation of First Spanish United Methodist Church in East Harlem took place on December 28, 1969, after several similar actions in Chicago: the sit-in at Grant Hospital, the take-over of People's Park, the occupation of McCormick Seminary, and the occupation of Chicago's People's Church (Armitage Avenue United Methodist Church). In several cities, the Young Lords set up free community programs, such as breakfast and classes. United Methodist Pastor Rev. Bruce Johnson, of the North Side Cooperative Ministry, worked to obtain funds to support the Young Lords programs. Rev. Sergio Herrera, a Cuban assistant pastor of the Young Lords People's Church in Chicago, did not initially agree with their occupation of the church, nor of their murals of Che Guevara and Pedro Albizu Campos. Later he participated in all the neighborhood events.


title: Young Lords

text: Occupying the Armitage Avenue United Methodist Church in May 1969, the Young Lords set up programs inside what they called the People's Church. The building remained a church but also served as the Young Lords National Headquarters for nearly two years. UMC Bishop Pryor was pressured to oust the two UMC ministers and the Young Lords from the People's Church by Alderman George Barr McCutcheon and members of the Lincoln Park Conservation Association. The Court fined the People's Church $200 each day the free daycare center remained open.


title: Young Lords

text: On September 29, 1969, the church's pastor and his wife, Reverend Bruce and Eugenia Ransier Johnson, were stabbed to death, killed in their home. The case remains open and has yet to be solved. The assistant Pastor, Rev. Sergio Herrera, was transferred soon afterward to Los Angeles, where he was also murdered. The murders occurred while the two ministers were working with the Young Lords in those cities. That is also a cold case.


title: Young Lords

text: Hampton had created an alliance with the Young Lords via the Rainbow Coalition. Two months later, Chicago police killed Black Panthers Fred Hampton and Mark Clark in a raid on Hampton's apartment, on December 4, 1969.


title: Young Lords

text: The Puerto Rican nation's diaspora has been divided and has created multiple neighborhoods or barrios in Florida, along the East Coast of the United States, New York City and Chicago. These Puerto Rican mainland communities developed across the U.S. during Operation Bootstrap which gave way to the Great Puerto Rican Migration of the late 1940s and early 1950s. In 1968, branches of the Young Lords sprouted up in Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Connecticut, New Jersey, Boston, Milwaukee, Hayward (California), San Diego, Los Angeles, and Puerto Rico.


title: Young Lords

text: The organizations' newspapers, "The Young Lord", "Pitirre", and "Pa'lante", reported the increasingly militant activities of the Young Lords. Over 120 publicly accessible oral histories, "Young Lords in Lincoln Park" are curated at Grand Valley State University in Michigan.


title: Young Lords

text: Besides the coalition with the National Black Panther Party Office in Oakland and the Black Panthers in Chicago, integrated into by the Rainbow Coalition of Fred Hampton, the Young Lords also participated in coalitions with groups of the Puerto Rican Independence Movement, Northside Cooperative Ministry and the Lincoln Park Poor People's Coalition.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords grew into a national movement under the leadership of Jose Cha Cha Jimenez which also included Angela Lind Adorno, Alberto Chavarria, Marta Chavarria, Andres Nunez, Edwin Diaz, Jose (Cosmoe) Torres, Eddie Ramirez, Raul Lugo, Juan Gonzalez, Felipe Luciano, Iris Morales, Judy Cordero, Denise Oliver, Pablo Yoruba Guzman, Hilda Ignatin, Maria Romero, Omar Lopez, David Rivera, Tony Baez, Richie Perez, and Juan Fi Ortiz.


title: Young Lords

text: By May 1970 due to infiltration by the local Red Squad, the Gang Intelligence Unit, Chicago Patronage Machine and COINTELPRO, the New York regional office broke away from the Young Lords National Headquarters and formed the short lived Young Lords Party. The separation also resulted from rapid development, growing pains, and a friendly competition between U.S. cities. The infiltration and divisions created conflict between the chapters and division of the Puerto Rican Independence Movement. Branches on the east coast were forced to remain affiliated with the New York regional office. Most other chapters remained loyal to the Chicago National Headquarters. The separation was a major blow to the liberation movement in the U.S. The separation occurred in other movements such as the Black Panthers, Students for a Democratic Society, The Young Patriots and the American Indian Movement, as revealed in COINTELPRO documents.


title: Young Lords

text: Women in the Young Lords participated in community organizing and wrote newspaper articles against sexism and patriarchy including the "Young Lords Party Position Paper on Women", published in 1970, and included in "" (2010), edited by Darrel Enck-Wanzer.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords in New York and Chicago continued to grow in numbers and influence from 1968 to 1983. Jose Cha Cha Jimenez introduced the newly elected African American mayor of Chicago, Harold Washington, to a June crowd of 100,000 Puerto Ricans that the Young Lords helped organize in Humboldt Park, Chicago.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords were a target of the FBI's COINTELPRO program that targeted Puerto Rican independence groups. The New York-Chicago schism mirrored the divisions within other New Left groups including the Black Panther Party, Students for a Democratic Society and Brown Berets, often as a result of COINTELPRO activities of police infiltration by informants and provocateurs. The Young Lords leaders were framed and discredited by both Mayor Richard J. Daley forces and the FBI. The entire Chicago leadership of the Young Lords was forced underground to reorganize and avoid complete destruction. COINTELPRO tactics used against the movements such as the Young Lords included rumor campaigns and pitting groups against each other to create factionalism, distrust, and personality conflicts. In Chicago, COINTELPRO created an anti-Rainbow Coalition component. The Red Squad also monitored the Young Lords National Headquarters 24 hours a day. Jose Cha Cha Jimenez became a main police target and was indicted 18 times in a six-week period on felony charges including assault and battery on police and creating a mob action. The intent of the police action was to cripple the organization. While the Young Lords advocated armed strategies similar to those advocated by the Black Panthers, the basis was as a right to self-defense. Such self defense was advocated after the shooting of Manuel Ramos, the suspected police involvement in the death of José (Pancho) Lind, the alleged suicide of Julio Roldan while in the custody of the New York Police Department, the fatal stabbings in Chicago of the United Methodist Church Rev. Bruce Johnson and his wife Eugenia, and the murder of Assistant Pastor Sergio Herrera shortly after his transfer to Los Angeles. The Young Lords accused the FBI CointelPro of a conspiracy to murder Young Lords and Black Panthers.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords worked in their communities to provide resources, similar to actions of the Brown Berets and the Black Panther Party. A goal was to raise awareness of the oppression and educate on the history and struggle of the Puerto Ricans. "The Young Lords: A Reader" (2010), edited by Darrel Enck-Wanzer details the purpose, goals, and tactics of the Young Lords New York chapter. He wrote, "Puerto Ricans have suffered as a group, racially and culturally, not as individuals. Therefore the fight for self determination must be a group struggle." Enck-Wanzer's book details that every Puerto Rican has suffered and felt the pain of their fellow Puerto Rican brothers, sisters, friends, and relatives. His book argues that Puerto Ricans must fight for their nation against American colonialism by organizing and educating in the barrios and raise awareness of the repression since the creation of the Young Lords as a movement in the Lincoln Park neighborhood.


title: Young Lords

text: By 1973, the Young Lords and its leadership were in disarray. Jose Cha Cha Jimenez along with many central committee members set up an underground training school at a farm near Tomah, Wisconsin. Some members continued independent efforts around self-determination for Puerto Rico and neighborhood empowerment. In Chicago, the Young Lords resurfaced after two and a half years. The New York Young Lords and other chapters also continued to function.


title: Young Lords

text: After Jimenez served a year in prison, in 1975 he ran for alderman of the 46th Ward against Mayor Daley's machine candidate. He garnered 39% of the vote against the Democratic candidate, Chris Cohen. The election re-energized the symbolic Rainbow Coalition formed by Black Panthers, Young Patriots, Young Lords and other groups and communities.


title: Young Lords

text: In 1983, the Young Lords organized the first major Latino event for the successful campaign of Chicago's first African-American mayor, Harold Washington. After Washington's victory, Jiménez introduced the mayor to a crowd of 100,000 Puerto Ricans in Humboldt Park in June 1983 where the Young Lords distributed 30,000 buttons inscribed with "Tengo Puerto Rico En Mi Corazon." In the fall of 1995, Jose Cha Cha Jimenez brought together Chicago Young Lords' Tony Baez, Carlos Flores, Angel Del Rivero, Omar López and Angie Lind Adorno to form the Lincoln Park Project to collect the history of the Young Lords movement. They curated the history and documented the displaced Latinos of the Lincoln Park Neighborhood. In support of the Puerto Rican Vieques campers, the struggle for Puerto Rican independence, and against the displacement of Puerto Ricans in the Diaspora, the Young Lords organized the Lincoln Park Camp near Grand Rapids, Michigan, on September 23, 2002.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords supported freed Puerto Rican nationalist leaders and urban guerrilla groups such as the Macheteros. Other Young Lords members joined Maoist formations such as the Puerto Rican Revolutionary Workers Party or provided the leadership of the National Congress for Puerto Rican Rights (NCPRR). Some Young Lords worked in the media, such as Juan González of the "New York Daily News" and "Democracy Now!", Pablo "Yoruba" Guzmán at WCBS-TV New York, Felipe Luciano and Miguel "Mickey" Meléndez of WBAI-FM New York.


title: Young Lords

text: The National Headquarters Young Lords' mission called for self determination for Puerto Rico, all Latino nations, all oppressed nations of the world, and for barrio empowerment. The Young Lords also created a 10-point program modeled after the Black Panthers 10 point program. The New York office created a 13-point program after they split from Chicago National Headquarters as follows:


title: Young Lords

text: In November 1970, that platform was revised. The revised 5th point called for women's equality and opposed male chauvinism. The revised 6th point focused on community control of institutions and land. The revised 7th point demanded education of the Afro-Indio culture and the Spanish language. The revised 10th point called for freedom for political prisoners. The revised 11th point focused on the group's internationalist perspective.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords' mission supported self determination for Puerto Rico, Latino nations, all oppressed nations, and also supported neighborhood empowerment. The mission is reflected in the Young Lords logo of a map of Puerto Rico, a brown fist holding a rifle, and the words "Tengo Puerto Rico en mi Corazon" ("I have Puerto Rico in my heart"). The Young Lords envisioned themselves as the vanguard of a people's struggle as they initially fought against the displacement of Puerto Ricans from Lincoln Park.


title: Young Lords

text: In New York, the Young Lords followed the lead of Chicago related to city services with the "Garbage Offensive" as a preliminary action. Organizers spent weeks cleaning up garbage in Puerto Rican communities. In need of additional cleaning supplies, they asked the New York City Department of Sanitation for assistance and were refused. Disgruntled, the Young Lords blocked 3rd Avenue traffic at 110th, 111th, and 112th Street.


title: Young Lords

text: The original urban renewal campaign was framed by the Chicago office as the modern day land question inspired by Emiliano Zapata who said, "all revolutions are based on land."


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords created community projects similar to those of the Black Panthers, yet centralized around Latinos. The programs included free breakfast for children, the Emeterio Betances free health clinic, community testing for tuberculosis and lead-poisoning, free clothing drives, cultural events, and Puerto Rican history classes. In Chicago, the Young Lords set up a free dental clinic and community day care center and worked on solidarity for incarcerated Puerto Ricans and the rights of Vietnam War veterans. The New York female leadership advocated for women's rights. In Chicago, women advocacy was led by Hilda Ignatin, Judy Cordero and Angela Adorno, in a subgroup known as Mothers And Others, that also helped to educate the male members and the community at large.


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords carried out many direct-action occupations of vacant land, hospitals, churches and other institutions to demand programs for the poor. The direct actions included a campaign to force New York City to increase garbage pick-up in Spanish Harlem, and in Chicago the seven-day McCormick Theological Seminary take-over that won Lincoln Park residents $650,000 for low-income housing, and the four-month People's Park camp-out/take-over at Halsted and Armitage Avenue by 350 community residents that prevented the construction of a for-profit tennis court on land used for low incoming housing. In New York, the local health-care activism was carried out with the Health Revolutionary Unity Movement. In Chicago, the Young Lords' health program was coordinated by Jack Johns, Quentin Young, Ana Lucas, and Alberto and Marta Chavarria who also worked with a Black Panther-led coalition to recruit medical-student organizations like the Medical Committee for Human Rights (MCHR) to advocate for health care for the poor.


title: Young Lords

text: In their position paper, the Young Lords asserted that colonized women (Puerto Ricans, blacks, "Third World") were oppressed within society and their homes due to their sex, race/ethnicity, nationality and class. Thus, activism among these women was understood as "the revolution within the revolution." The Young Lords recognized that "Third World women have an integral role to play in the liberation of all oppressed people."


title: Young Lords

text: The Young Lords inspired young community leaders, professionals, and artists, forming part of a Puerto Rican cultural renaissance in the 1970s. In New York City, the renaissance was called the Nuyorican Movement and became a nationwide development including poetry and music. Felipe Luciano, a poet in Harlem's black nationalist circles, became the Deputy Chairman of the New York regional chapter. He was expelled for male chauvinism and opportunism by the Young Lords Party, though the Young Lords National Headquarters never recognized the expulsion. His poems written while a member of The Last Poets, including "Jíbaro", "Un Rifle Oración" and "Hey Now". The poet Pedro Pietri wrote and recited his poems "Puerto Rican Obituary" and "Suicide Note of a Cockroach in a Low Income Project" at New York Young Lord events. Alfredo Matias wrote poems about Afro-Boricua pride and David Hernández recited "La Armitage" about the Chicago street that became the downtown for Puerto Ricans and the Young Lords. The song "Qué Bonita Bandera" ("What a Beautiful Flag") was written by Pepe y Flora in Puerto Rico and adopted by the Young Lords as their anthem.


title: Young Lords

text: The documentary "Palante, Siempre Palante! The Young Lords", produced by Iris Morales, aired on PBS in 1996. In 2015, a retrospective "¡Presente! The Young Lords in New York," was held in New York City.


title: Young Lords

text: In 2001, Omar López, Minister of Information of the Young Lords was asked to donate by the Lincoln Park Project archival material that had been used in the Young Lords newspapers. The materials are now curated in DePaul University's Special Collections and Archives Department and a portion digitized as part of DePaul's Digital Collection. In 2012, 120 oral, audio, and visual histories were collected by Jimenez. They are currently online and are housed at Seidman College of Grand Valley State University.


title: Young Lords

text: Many books have been published by the Young Lords including in 2010 New York University Press "The Young Lords: A Reader," edited by Darrel Enck-Wanzer with a foreword by former Young Lords Iris Morales and Denise Oliver-Vélez. The book primarily covers the Young Lords New York chapter through documents such as speeches and articles from "Pa'lante", the Young Lords Newspaper, interviews, posters, and photographs.


title: Young Lords

text: Artist Sophia Dawson created "Women of the Young Lords", included in the 2015 Bronx Museum exhibition, ¡Presente! The Young Lords in New York.


title: Young Lords

text: Darrel Wanzer-Serrano's account of "The New York Young Lords and the Struggle for Liberation" authored in 2015 characterizes the roots of the local chapter.


title: Young Lords

text: The Puerto Rican activist group El Grito de Sunset Park, co-founded by Dennis Flores, had ties to and was influenced by the Young Lords.


title: Street Fighter III

text: "Street Fighter III" was followed by two updates: "" in 1997 and "" in 1999. A single home version of the game was released for the Dreamcast in a two-in-one compilation titled "Street Fighter III: Double Impact", which also includes "2nd Impact".


title: Street Fighter III

text: Like its predecessors, "Street Fighter III" is a one-on-one fighting game, in which two fighters use a variety of attacks and special moves to knock out their opponent. The gameplay of the original "Street Fighter III" has several new abilities and features introduced. Some abilities are also taken from other Capcom fighting games, such as players being able to "dash" or "retreat" like in the "Darkstalkers" series, as well as performing "super jumps" and "quick stands" after falling from an attack like in "". The game also introduced "leap attacks", which are small jumping attacks used against crouching opponents. As well, the player cannot perform "aerial guards" like in the "Street Fighter Alpha" series, but instead is replaced by "parrying" ("blocking" in the Japanese version).


title: Street Fighter III

text: The 1994 SNK fighting game "Samurai Shodown II" is often credited with introducing the first Parry system. The main new feature is the ability to parry an opponent's attack, by deflecting any incoming attack without receiving damage. At the exact moment an opponent's attack is about to hit his or her character, the player can move the controller toward or down to Parry the attack without receiving damage, leaving the opponent vulnerable for a counterattack. Additionally, this allows the player to defend against Special Moves and even Super Arts without sustaining the normal minor damage that blocking normally would incur. However, parrying requires precise timing.


title: Street Fighter III

text: The other new feature introduced in "Street Fighter III" is Super Arts. This is a powerful special move similar to a Super Combo in "Super Turbo" and the "Alpha" games. After selecting a character, the player will be prompted to select from one of three character-specific Super Arts to use in battle. Like the Super Combo gauge in previous games, the player has a Super Art gauge which will fill up as the player performs regular and special moves against an opponent. The player can only perform a Super Art once the gauge is filled. Depending on the Super Art chosen by the player, the length of the Super Art gauge will vary, as well as the amount of filled Super Art gauges the player can stock up. The players can now cancel a special move into a Super Art, a technique borrowed from "Street Fighter EX".


title: Street Fighter III

text: Among the elaborated sprites include multiple hit stun sprites, including a new "turned-around state," in which a character is turned around (his or her back faces the opponent) after being hit. Only certain attacks can put characters in a turned-around state, and grabs and throws can now be comboed, as it typically takes longer for an attacked character to recover from this new type of hit stun.


title: Street Fighter III

text: Capcom announced that "Street Fighter III" was in development during a March 27, 1996 meeting in Tokyo. They later stated that development took more than two years.


title: Street Fighter III

text: The game was first unveiled at the September 1996 Japan Amusement Machine and Marketing Association show, in the form of a few minutes of footage incorporated into Capcom's PR demo tape. In an interview shortly before this show, Capcom senior planner Shinji Mikami stated that it would be impossible to convert "Street Fighter III" to any of the home consoles then on the market. This prompted rumors that it would be ported to the then-upcoming Panasonic M2. In January 1997, IGN witnessed a demonstration of the game in development on Nintendo 64 and 64DD, so IGN and its anonymous insider speculated that the game might join the launch of the upcoming 64DD peripheral in Japan, which was scheduled for late 1997. Capcom referred to the Nintendo 64 release as "just a rumor", and Nintendo would coincidentally delay the launch of the 64DD peripheral until December 1999 anyway. Amending Mikami's earlier statement, in late 1997 Capcom said it might be possible to port "Street Fighter III" to the Sega Saturn if one of the console's RAM expansion cartridges were used.


title: Street Fighter III

text: Because this and the next two "Street Fighter III" games run on the CPS III engine, more elaborate 2D sprites were created. Each character is made up from approximately 700–1200 individually drawn frames of animation, with the game running at 60 frames per second.


title: Street Fighter III

text: General producer Noritaka Funamizu explained the controversial decision to keep the series in 2D: "We feel that 3D is not really suitable for the head-to-head fighting ... and, to be frank, Capcom doesn't really have the techniques to display high quality graphics in 3D."


title: Street Fighter III

text: In 1999, Capcom released "Street Fighter III: Double Impact" ("Street Fighter III: W Impact" in Japan) for the Dreamcast, a compilation containing the original game and "2nd Impact". The compilation features an Arcade, Versus, Training, and Option Mode for both games, as well as a "Parry Attack Mode" in "2nd Impact", where the player can test parrying skills in the game's bonus round. This compilation also allows players to use Gill (in both games) and Shin Akuma (in "2nd Impact" only), who are exclusively computer-controlled characters in the arcade version.


title: Street Fighter III

text: The soundtrack to the first game in the series was released on CD by First Smile Entertainment in 1997, and the "3rd Strike" original soundtrack was released by Mars Colony Music in 2000 with an arranged version afterward. The soundtrack to "3rd Strike" features three songs and announcer tracks by Canadian rapper Infinite. The themes for the games are predominantly drum and bass, with some jazz, hip-hop, house and techno elements. Yuki Iwai worked on the soundtracks for "New Generation" and "2nd Impact", and Hideki Okugawa worked on all three games.


title: Street Fighter III

text: "New Generation" was re-released in 2018 as part of the "Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection" for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, and Nintendo Switch.


title: Street Fighter III

text: In Japan, "Game Machine" listed "Street Fighter III" on their April 1, 1997 issue as being the most successful arcade game of the month. However, the game struggled to break even in Japan, with a high budget of 1 billion yen ($8 million), while only selling 1,000 cabinets. Worldwide arcade sales estimates range from between 1,000 and 10,000 units sold.


title: Street Fighter III

text: "Next Generation" reviewed the arcade version of the game, rating it four stars out of five, and stated that "The great mystery is why Capcom called this "SFIII" instead of leaving that honor for a more powerful and revolutionary 3D title. Gameplay in the "SF" series reached the ceiling of 2D possibilities a while ago, and as good as this game admittedly is, besides the stunning graphics there's little to distinguish it from the 11 games before." "GamePro" similarly remarked that while the graphics are outstanding and the controls are flawless, the game lacks the innovation and series evolution that players expected it to deliver. They also said the new characters are a mix, with some of them seeming like they would be more appropriate for the "Darkstalkers" series, and concluded that the game "makes you look forward to the next "SF" installment rather than getting you excited about playing this one repeatedly".


title: Street Fighter III

text: "Famitsu" magazine scored "Street Fighter III: Double Impact", the Dreamcast version of the game, 31 out of 40.


title: Street Fighter III

text: Jim Preston reviewed the Dreamcast version of the game for "Next Generation", rating it three stars out of five, and stated that "It's a no-frills port of the arcade game that is great at a party but pointless for single players."


title: Seismometer

text: A seismometer is an instrument that responds to ground noises and shaking such as caused by earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and explosions. They are usually combined with a timing device and a recording device to form a seismograph. The output of such a device—formerly recorded on paper (see picture) or film, now recorded and processed digitally—is a seismogram. Such data is used to locate and characterize earthquakes, and to study the Earth's internal structure.


title: Seismometer

text: A simple seismometer, sensitive to up-down motions of the Earth, is like a weight hanging from a spring, both suspended from a frame that moves along with any motion detected. The relative motion between the weight (called the mass) and the frame provides a measurement of the vertical ground motion. A rotating drum is attached to the frame and a pen is attached to the weight, thus recording any ground motion in a seismogram.


title: Seismometer

text: Any movement from the ground moves the frame. The mass tends not to move because of its inertia, and by measuring the movement between the frame and the mass, the motion of the ground can be determined.


title: Seismometer

text: Early seismometers used optical levers or mechanical linkages to amplify the small motions involved, recording on soot-covered paper or photographic paper. Modern instruments use electronics. In some systems, the mass is held nearly motionless relative to the frame by an electronic negative feedback loop. The motion of the mass relative to the frame is measured, and the feedback loop applies a magnetic or electrostatic force to keep the mass nearly motionless. The voltage needed to produce this force is the output of the seismometer, which is recorded digitally.


title: Seismometer

text: In other systems the weight is allowed to move, and its motion produces an electrical charge in a coil attached to the mass which voltage moves through the magnetic field of a magnet attached to the frame. This design is often used in a geophone, which is used in exploration for oil and gas.


title: Seismometer

text: Seismic observatories usually have instruments measuring three axes: north-south (y-axis), east-west (x-axis), and vertical (z-axis). If only one axis is measured, it is usually the vertical because it is less noisy and gives better records of some seismic waves.


title: Seismometer

text: The foundation of a seismic station is critical. A professional station is sometimes mounted on bedrock. The best mountings may be in deep boreholes, which avoid thermal effects, ground noise and tilting from weather and tides. Other instruments are often mounted in insulated enclosures on small buried piers of unreinforced concrete. Reinforcing rods and aggregates would distort the pier as the temperature changes. A site is always surveyed for ground noise with a temporary installation before pouring the pier and laying conduit. Originally, European seismographs were placed in a particular area after a destructive earthquake. Today, they are spread to provide appropriate coverage (in the case of weak-motion seismology) or concentrated in high-risk regions (strong-motion seismology).


title: Seismometer

text: The word derives from the Greek σεισμός, "seismós", a shaking or quake, from the verb σείω, "seíō", to shake; and μέτρον, "métron", to measure, and was coined by David Milne-Home in 1841, to describe an instrument designed by Scottish physicist James David Forbes.


title: Seismometer

text: "Seismograph" is another Greek term from "seismós" and γράφω, "gráphō", to draw. It is often used to mean "seismometer", though it is more applicable to the older instruments in which the measuring and recording of ground motion were combined, than to modern systems, in which these functions are separated. Both types provide a continuous record of ground motion; this record distinguishes them from seismoscopes, which merely indicate that motion has occurred, perhaps with some simple measure of how large it was.


title: Seismometer

text: The concept of measuring the "shaking" of something means that the word "seismograph" might be used in a more general sense. For example, a monitoring station that tracks changes in electromagnetic noise affecting amateur radio waves presents an "rf seismograph". And helioseismology studies the "quakes" on the Sun.


title: Seismometer

text: The first seismometer was made in China during the 2nd century. It was invented by Zhang Heng, a Chinese mathematician and astronomer. The first Western description of the device comes from the French physicist and priest Jean de Hautefeuille in 1703. The modern seismometer was developed in the 19th century.


title: Seismometer

text: In December 2018, a seismometer was deployed on the planet Mars by the "InSight" lander, the first time a seismometer was placed onto the surface of another planet.


title: Seismometer

text: In AD 132, Zhang Heng of China's Han dynasty invented the first seismoscope (by the definition above), which was called "Houfeng Didong Yi" (translated as, "instrument for measuring the seasonal winds and the movements of the Earth"). The description we have, from the History of the Later Han Dynasty, says that it was a large bronze vessel, about 2 meters in diameter; at eight points around the top were dragon's heads holding bronze balls. When there was an earthquake, one of the dragons' mouths would open and drop its ball into a bronze toad at the base, making a sound and supposedly showing the direction of the earthquake. On at least one occasion, probably at the time of a large earthquake in Gansu in AD 143, the seismoscope indicated an earthquake even though one was not felt. The available text says that inside the vessel was a central column that could move along eight tracks; this is thought to refer to a pendulum, though it is not known exactly how this was linked to a mechanism that would open only one dragon's mouth. The first earthquake recorded by this seismoscope was supposedly "somewhere in the east". Days later, a rider from the east reported this earthquake.


title: Seismometer

text: By the 13th century, seismographic devices existed in the Maragheh observatory (founded 1259) in Persia, though it is unclear whether these were constructed independently or based on the first seismoscope. French physicist and priest Jean de Hautefeuille described a seismoscope in 1703, which used a bowl filled with mercury which would spill into one of eight receivers equally spaced around the bowl, though there is no evidence that he actually constructed the device. A mercury seismoscope was constructed in 1784 or 1785 by Atanasio Cavalli, a copy of which can be found at the University Library in Bologna, and a further mercury seismoscope was constructed by Niccolò Cacciatore in 1818. James Lind also built a seismological tool of unknown design or efficacy (known as an earthquake machine) in the late 1790s.


title: Seismometer

text: Pendulum devices were developing at the same time. Neapolitan naturalist Nicola Cirillo set up a network of pendulum earthquake detectors following the 1731 Puglia Earthquake, where the amplitude was detected using a protractor to measure the swinging motion. Benedictine monk Andrea Bina further developed this concept in 1751, having the pendulum create trace marks in sand under the mechanism, providing both magnitude and direction of motion. Neapolitan clockmaker Domenico Salsano produced a similar pendulum which recorded using a paintbrush in 1783, labelling it a "geo-sismometro", possibly the first use of a similar word to "seismometer". Naturalist Nicolo Zupo devised an instrument to detect electrical disturbances and earthquakes at the same time (1784).


title: Seismometer

text: The first moderately successful device for detecting the time of an earthquake was devised by Ascanio Filomarino in 1796, who improved upon Salsano's pendulum instrument, using a pencil to mark, and using a hair attached to the mechanism to inhibit the motion of a clock's balance wheel. This meant that the clock would only start once an earthquake took place, allowing determination of the time of incidence.


title: Seismometer

text: After an earthquake taking place on October 4, 1834, Luigi Pagani observed that the mercury seismoscope held at Bologna University had completely spilled over, and did not provide useful information. He therefore devised a portable device that used lead shot to detect the direction of an earthquake, where the lead fell into four bins arranged in a circle, to determine the quadrant of earthquake incidence. He completed the instrument in 1841.


title: Seismometer

text: In response to a series of earthquakes near Comrie in Scotland in 1839, a committee was formed in the United Kingdom in order to produce better detection devices for earthquakes. The outcome of this was an inverted pendulum seismometer constructed by James David Forbes, first presented in a report by David Milne-Home in 1842, which recorded the measurements of seismic activity through the use of a pencil placed on paper above the pendulum. The designs provided did not prove effective, according to Milne's reports. It was Milne who coined the word "seismometer" in 1841, to describe this instrument. In 1843, the first horizontal pendulum was used in a seismometer, reported by Milne (though it is unclear if he was the original inventor). After these inventions, Robert Mallet published an 1848 paper where he suggested ideas for seismometer design, suggesting that such a device would need to register time, record amplitudes horizontally and vertically, and ascertain direction. His suggested design was funded, and construction was attempted, but his final design did not fulfill his expectations and suffered from the same problems as the Forbes design, being inaccurate and not self-recording.


title: Seismometer

text: Karl Kreil constructed a seismometer in Prague between 1848 and 1850, which used a point-suspended rigid cylindrical pendulum covered in paper, drawn upon by a fixed pencil. The cylinder was rotated every 24 hours, providing an approximate time for a given quake.


title: Seismometer

text: Luigi Palmieri, influenced by Mallet's 1848 paper, invented a seismometer in 1856 that could record the time of an earthquake. This device used metallic pendulums which closed an electric circuit with vibration, which then powered an electromagnet to stop a clock. Palmieri seismometers were widely distributed and used for a long time.


title: Seismometer

text: By 1872, a committee in the United Kingdom led by James Bryce expressed their dissatisfaction with the current available seismometers, still using the large 1842 Forbes device located in Comrie Parish Church, and requested a seismometer which was compact, easy to install and easy to read. In 1875 they settled on a large example of the Mallet device, consisting of an array of cylinderical pins of various sizes installed at right angles to each other on a sand bed, where larger earthquakes would knock down larger pins. This device was constructed in 'Earthquake House' near Comrie, which can be considered the world's first purpose-built seismological observatory. As of 2013, no earthquake has been large enough to cause any of the cylinders to fall in either the original device or replicas.


title: Seismometer

text: The first seismographs were invented in the 1870s and 1880s. The first seismograph was produced by Filippo Cecchi in around 1875. A seismoscope would trigger the device to begin recording, and then a recording surface would produce a graphical illustration of the tremors automatically (a seismogram). However, the instrument was not sensitive enough, and the first seismogram produced by the instrument was in 1887, by which time John Milne had already demonstrated his design in Japan.


title: Seismometer

text: In 1880, the first horizontal pendulum seismometer was developed by the team of John Milne, James Alfred Ewing and Thomas Gray, who worked as foreign-government advisors in Japan, from 1880 to 1895. Milne, Ewing and Gray, all having been hired by the Meiji Government in the previous five years to assist Japan's modernization efforts, founded the Seismological Society of Japan in response to an Earthquake that took place on February 22, 1880, at Yokohama. Two instruments were constructed by Ewing over the next year, one being a common-pendulum seismometer and the other being the first seismometer using a damped horizontal pendulum. The innovative recording system allowed for a continuous record, the first to do so. The first seismogram was recorded on 3 November 1880 on both of Ewing's instruments. Modern seismometers would eventually descend from these designs. Milne has been referred to as the 'Father of modern seismology' and his seismograph design has been called the first modern seismometer.


title: Seismometer

text: This produced the first effective measurement of horizontal motion. Gray would produce the first reliable method for recording vertical motion, which produced the first effective 3-axis recordings.


title: Seismometer

text: An early special-purpose seismometer consisted of a large, stationary pendulum, with a stylus on the bottom. As the earth started to move, the heavy mass of the pendulum had the inertia to stay still within the frame. The result is that the stylus scratched a pattern corresponding with the Earth's movement. This type of strong-motion seismometer recorded upon a smoked glass (glass with carbon soot). While not sensitive enough to detect distant earthquakes, this instrument could indicate the direction of the pressure waves and thus help find the epicenter of a local quake. Such instruments were useful in the analysis of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Further analysis was performed in the 1980s, using these early recordings, enabling a more precise determination of the initial fault break location in Marin county and its subsequent progression, mostly to the south.


title: Seismometer

text: Later, professional suites of instruments for the worldwide standard seismographic network had one set of instruments tuned to oscillate at fifteen seconds, and the other at ninety seconds, each set measuring in three directions. Amateurs or observatories with limited means tuned their smaller, less sensitive instruments to ten seconds.


title: Seismometer

text: The basic damped horizontal pendulum seismometer swings like the gate of a fence. A heavy weight is mounted on the point of a long (from 10 cm to several meters) triangle, hinged at its vertical edge. As the ground moves, the weight stays unmoving, swinging the "gate" on the hinge.


title: Seismometer

text: The advantage of a horizontal pendulum is that it achieves very low frequencies of oscillation in a compact instrument. The "gate" is slightly tilted, so the weight tends to slowly return to a central position. The pendulum is adjusted (before the damping is installed) to oscillate once per three seconds, or once per thirty seconds. The general-purpose instruments of small stations or amateurs usually oscillate once per ten seconds. A pan of oil is placed under the arm, and a small sheet of metal mounted on the underside of the arm drags in the oil to damp oscillations. The level of oil, position on the arm, and angle and size of sheet is adjusted until the damping is "critical", that is, almost having oscillation. The hinge is very low friction, often torsion wires, so the only friction is the internal friction of the wire. Small seismographs with low proof masses are placed in a vacuum to reduce disturbances from air currents.


title: Seismometer

text: Zollner described torsionally suspended horizontal pendulums as early as 1869, but developed them for gravimetry rather than seismometry.


title: Seismometer

text: Early seismometers had an arrangement of levers on jeweled bearings, to scratch smoked glass or paper. Later, mirrors reflected a light beam to a direct-recording plate or roll of photographic paper. Briefly, some designs returned to mechanical movements to save money. In mid-twentieth-century systems, the light was reflected to a pair of differential electronic photosensors called a photomultiplier. The voltage generated in the photomultiplier was used to drive galvanometers which had a small mirror mounted on the axis. The moving reflected light beam would strike the surface of the turning drum, which was covered with photo-sensitive paper. The expense of developing photo-sensitive paper caused many seismic observatories to switch to ink or thermal-sensitive paper.


title: Seismometer

text: After World War II, the seismometers developed by Milne, Ewing and Gray were adapted into the widely used Press-Ewing seismometer.


title: Seismometer

text: Modern instruments use electronic sensors, amplifiers, and recording devices. Most are broadband covering a wide range of frequencies. Some seismometers can measure motions with frequencies from 500 Hz to 0.00118 Hz (1/500 = 0.002 seconds per cycle, to 1/0.00118 = 850 seconds per cycle). The mechanical suspension for horizontal instruments remains the garden-gate described above. Vertical instruments use some kind of constant-force suspension, such as the LaCoste suspension. The LaCoste suspension uses a zero-length spring to provide a long period (high sensitivity). Some modern instruments use a "triaxial" or "Galperin" design, in which three identical motion sensors are set at the same angle to the vertical but 120 degrees apart on the horizontal. Vertical and horizontal motions can be computed from the outputs of the three sensors.


title: Seismometer

text: Seismometers unavoidably introduce some distortion into the signals they measure, but professionally designed systems have carefully characterized frequency transforms.


title: Seismometer

text: Modern sensitivities come in three broad ranges: geophones, 50 to 750 V/m; local geologic seismographs, about 1,500 V/m; and teleseismographs, used for world survey, about 20,000 V/m. Instruments come in three main varieties: short period, long period and broadband. The short and long period measure velocity and are very sensitive, however they 'clip' the signal or go off-scale for ground motion that is strong enough to be felt by people. A 24-bit analog-to-digital conversion channel is commonplace. Practical devices are linear to roughly one part per million.


title: Seismometer

text: Delivered seismometers come with two styles of output: analog and digital. Analog seismographs require analog recording equipment, possibly including an analog-to-digital converter. The output of a digital seismograph can be simply input to a computer. It presents the data in a standard digital format (often "SE2" over Ethernet).


title: Seismometer

text: The modern broadband seismograph can record a very broad range of frequencies. It consists of a small "proof mass", confined by electrical forces, driven by sophisticated electronics. As the earth moves, the electronics attempt to hold the mass steady through a feedback circuit. The amount of force necessary to achieve this is then recorded.


title: Seismometer

text: In most designs the electronics holds a mass motionless relative to the frame. This device is called a "force balance accelerometer". It measures acceleration instead of velocity of ground movement. Basically, the distance between the mass and some part of the frame is measured very precisely, by a linear variable differential transformer. Some instruments use a linear variable differential capacitor.


title: Seismometer

text: That measurement is then amplified by electronic amplifiers attached to parts of an electronic negative feedback loop. One of the amplified currents from the negative feedback loop drives a coil very like a loudspeaker. The result is that the mass stays nearly motionless.


title: Seismometer

text: Most instruments measure directly the ground motion using the distance sensor. The voltage generated in a sense coil on the mass by the magnet directly measures the instantaneous velocity of the ground. The current to the drive coil provides a sensitive, accurate measurement of the force between the mass and frame, thus measuring directly the ground's acceleration (using f=ma where f=force, m=mass, a=acceleration).


title: Seismometer

text: One of the continuing problems with sensitive vertical seismographs is the buoyancy of their masses. The uneven changes in pressure caused by wind blowing on an open window can easily change the density of the air in a room enough to cause a vertical seismograph to show spurious signals. Therefore, most professional seismographs are sealed in rigid gas-tight enclosures. For example, this is why a common Streckeisen model has a thick glass base that must be glued to its pier without bubbles in the glue.


title: Seismometer

text: It might seem logical to make the heavy magnet serve as a mass, but that subjects the seismograph to errors when the Earth's magnetic field moves. This is also why seismograph's moving parts are constructed from a material that interacts minimally with magnetic fields. A seismograph is also sensitive to changes in temperature so many instruments are constructed from low expansion materials such as nonmagnetic invar.


title: Seismometer

text: The hinges on a seismograph are usually patented, and by the time the patent has expired, the design has been improved. The most successful public domain designs use thin foil hinges in a clamp.


title: Seismometer

text: Another issue is that the transfer function of a seismograph must be accurately characterized, so that its frequency response is known. This is often the crucial difference between professional and amateur instruments. Most instruments are characterized on a variable frequency shaking table.


title: Seismometer

text: Another type of seismometer is a digital strong-motion seismometer, or accelerograph. The data from such an instrument is essential to understand how an earthquake affects man-made structures, through earthquake engineering. The recordings of such instruments are crucial for the assessment of seismic hazard, through engineering seismology.


title: Seismometer

text: A strong-motion seismometer measures acceleration. This can be mathematically integrated later to give velocity and position. Strong-motion seismometers are not as sensitive to ground motions as teleseismic instruments but they stay on scale during the strongest seismic shaking.


title: Seismometer

text: Accelerographs and geophones are often heavy cylindrical magnets with a spring-mounted coil inside. As the case moves, the coil tends to stay stationary, so the magnetic field cuts the wires, inducing current in the output wires. They receive frequencies from several hundred hertz down to 1 Hz. Some have electronic damping, a low-budget way to get some of the performance of the closed-loop wide-band geologic seismographs.


title: Seismometer

text: Strain-beam accelerometers constructed as integrated circuits are too insensitive for geologic seismographs (2002), but are widely used in geophones.


title: Seismometer

text: Some other sensitive designs measure the current generated by the flow of a non-corrosive ionic fluid through an electret sponge or a conductive fluid through a magnetic field.


title: Seismometer

text: Seismometers spaced in a seismic array can also be used to precisely locate, in three dimensions, the source of an earthquake, using the time it takes for seismic waves to propagate away from the hypocenter, the initiating point of fault rupture (See also Earthquake location). Interconnected seismometers are also used, as part of the International Monitoring System to detect underground nuclear test explosions, as well as for Earthquake early warning systems. These seismometers are often used as part of a large scale governmental or scientific project, but some organizations such as the Quake-Catcher Network, can use residential size detectors built into computers to detect earthquakes as well.


title: Seismometer

text: In reflection seismology, an array of seismometers image sub-surface features. The data are reduced to images using algorithms similar to tomography. The data reduction methods resemble those of computer-aided tomographic medical imaging X-ray machines (CAT-scans), or imaging sonars.


title: Seismometer

text: A worldwide array of seismometers can actually image the interior of the Earth in wave-speed and transmissivity. This type of system uses events such as earthquakes, impact events or nuclear explosions as wave sources. The first efforts at this method used manual data reduction from paper seismograph charts. Modern digital seismograph records are better adapted to direct computer use. With inexpensive seismometer designs and internet access, amateurs and small institutions have even formed a "public seismograph network".


title: Seismometer

text: Seismographic systems used for petroleum or other mineral exploration historically used an explosive and a wireline of geophones unrolled behind a truck. Now most short-range systems use "thumpers" that hit the ground, and some small commercial systems have such good digital signal processing that a few sledgehammer strikes provide enough signal for short-distance refractive surveys. Exotic cross or two-dimensional arrays of geophones are sometimes used to perform three-dimensional reflective imaging of subsurface features. Basic linear refractive geomapping software (once a black art) is available off-the-shelf, running on laptop computers, using strings as small as three geophones. Some systems now come in an 18" (0.5 m) plastic field case with a computer, display and printer in the cover.


title: Seismometer

text: Small seismic imaging systems are now sufficiently inexpensive to be used by civil engineers to survey foundation sites, locate bedrock, and find subsurface water.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: In petrochemistry, petroleum geology and organic chemistry, cracking is the process whereby complex organic molecules such as kerogens or long-chain hydrocarbons are broken down into simpler molecules such as light hydrocarbons, by the breaking of carbon-carbon bonds in the precursors. The rate of cracking and the end products are strongly dependent on the temperature and presence of catalysts. Cracking is the breakdown of a large alkane into smaller, more useful alkenes. Simply put, hydrocarbon cracking is the process of breaking a long chain of hydrocarbons into short ones. This process requires high temperatures.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: More loosely, outside the field of petroleum chemistry, the term "cracking" is used to describe any type of splitting of molecules under the influence of heat, catalysts and solvents, such as in processes of destructive distillation or pyrolysis.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: Fluid catalytic cracking produces a high yield of petrol and LPG, while hydrocracking is a major source of jet fuel, diesel fuel, naphtha, and again yields LPG.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: Among several variants of thermal cracking methods (variously known as the "Shukhov cracking process", "Burton cracking process", "Burton-Humphreys cracking process", and "Dubbs cracking process") Vladimir Shukhov, a Russian engineer, invented and patented, the first in 1891 (Russian Empire, patent no. 12926, November 7, 1891). One installation was used to a limited extent in Russia, but development was not followed up; In the first decade of the 20th century the American engineers William Merriam Burton and Robert E. Humphreys independently developed and patented a similar process as U.S. patent 1,049,667 on June 8, 1908. Among its advantages was the fact that both the condenser and the boiler were continuously kept under pressure.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: In its earlier versions it was a batch process, rather than continuous, and many patents were to follow in the US and Europe, though not all were practical. In 1924, a delegation from the American Sinclair Oil Corporation visited Shukhov. Sinclair Oil apparently wished to suggest that the patent of Burton and Humphreys, in use by Standard Oil, was derived from Shukhov's patent for oil cracking, as described in the Russian patent. If that could be established, it could strengthen the hand of rival American companies wishing to invalidate the Burton-Humphreys patent. In the event Shukhov satisfied the Americans that in principle Burton's method closely resembled his 1891 patents, though his own interest in the matter was primarily to establish that "the Russian oil industry could easily build a cracking apparatus according to any of the described systems without being accused by the Americans of borrowing for free".


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: At that time, just a few years after the Russian Revolution and brutal Russian Civil War, the Soviet Union was desperate to develop industry and earn foreign exchange, so their oil industry eventually did obtain much of their technology from foreign companies, largely American. At about that time, fluid catalytic cracking was being explored and developed and soon replaced most of the purely thermal cracking processes in the fossil fuel processing industry. The replacement was not complete; many types of cracking, including pure thermal cracking, still are in use, depending on the nature of the feedstock and the products required to satisfy market demands. Thermal cracking remains important, for example in producing naphtha, gas oil, and coke, and more sophisticated forms of thermal cracking have been developed for various purposes. These include visbreaking, steam cracking, and coking.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: Modern high-pressure thermal cracking operates at absolute pressures of about 7,000 kPa. An overall process of disproportionation can be observed, where "light", hydrogen-rich products are formed at the expense of heavier molecules which condense and are depleted of hydrogen. The actual reaction is known as homolytic fission and produces alkenes, which are the basis for the economically important production of polymers.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: Thermal cracking is currently used to "upgrade" very heavy fractions or to produce light fractions or distillates, burner fuel and/or petroleum coke. Two extremes of the thermal cracking in terms of the product range are represented by the high-temperature process called "steam cracking" or pyrolysis (ca. 750 °C to 900 °C or higher) which produces valuable ethylene and other feedstocks for the petrochemical industry, and the milder-temperature delayed coking (ca. 500 °C) which can produce, under the right conditions, valuable needle coke, a highly crystalline petroleum coke used in the production of electrodes for the steel and aluminium industries.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: William Merriam Burton developed one of the earliest thermal cracking processes in 1912 which operated at and an absolute pressure of and was known as the "Burton process". Shortly thereafter, in 1921, C.P. Dubbs, an employee of the Universal Oil Products Company, developed a somewhat more advanced thermal cracking process which operated at and was known as the "Dubbs process". The Dubbs process was used extensively by many refineries until the early 1940s when catalytic cracking came into use.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: Steam cracking is a petrochemical process in which saturated hydrocarbons are broken down into smaller, often unsaturated, hydrocarbons. It is the principal industrial method for producing the lighter alkenes (or commonly olefins), including ethene (or ethylene) and propene (or propylene). Steam cracker units are facilities in which a feedstock such as naphtha, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), ethane, propane or butane is thermally cracked through the use of steam in a bank of pyrolysis furnaces to produce lighter hydrocarbons.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: In steam cracking, a gaseous or liquid hydrocarbon feed like naphtha, LPG or ethane is diluted with steam and briefly heated in a furnace without the presence of oxygen. Typically, the reaction temperature is very high, at around 850 °C, but the reaction is only allowed to take place very briefly. In modern cracking furnaces, the residence time is reduced to milliseconds to improve yield, resulting in gas velocities up to the speed of sound. After the cracking temperature has been reached, the gas is quickly quenched to stop the reaction in a transfer line heat exchanger or inside a quenching header using quench oil.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: The products produced in the reaction depend on the composition of the feed, the hydrocarbon-to-steam ratio, and on the cracking temperature and furnace residence time. Light hydrocarbon feeds such as ethane, LPGs or light naphtha give product streams rich in the lighter alkenes, including ethylene, propylene, and butadiene. Heavier hydrocarbon (full range and heavy naphthas as well as other refinery products) feeds give some of these, but also give products rich in aromatic hydrocarbons and hydrocarbons suitable for inclusion in gasoline or fuel oil. Typical product streams include pyrolysis gasoline (pygas) and BTX.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: A higher cracking temperature (also referred to as severity) favors the production of ethylene and benzene, whereas lower severity produces higher amounts of propylene, C4-hydrocarbons and liquid products. The process also results in the slow deposition of coke, a form of carbon, on the reactor walls. Since coke degrades the efficiency of the reactor, great care is taken to design reaction conditions to minimize its formation. Nonetheless, a steam cracking furnace can usually only run for a few months between de-cokings. "Decokes" require the furnace to be isolated from the process and then a flow of steam or a steam/air mixture is passed through the furnace coils. This decoking is essentially combustion of the carbons, converting the hard solid carbon layer to carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: The catalytic cracking process involves the presence of solid acid catalysts, usually silica-alumina and zeolites. The catalysts promote the formation of carbocations, which undergo processes of rearrangement and scission of C-C bonds. Relative to thermal cracking, cat cracking proceeds at milder temperatures, which saves energy. Furthermore, by operating at lower temperatures, the yield of alkenes is diminished. Alkenes cause instability of hydrocarbon fuels.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: Fluid catalytic cracking is a commonly used process, and a modern oil refinery will typically include a "cat cracker", particularly at refineries in the US, due to the high demand for gasoline. The process was first used around 1942 and employs a powdered catalyst. During WWII, the Allied Forces had plentiful supplies of the materials in contrast to the Axis Forces, which suffered severe shortages of gasoline and artificial rubber. Initial process implementations were based on low activity alumina catalyst and a reactor where the catalyst particles were suspended in a rising flow of feed hydrocarbons in a fluidized bed.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: In newer designs, cracking takes place using a very active zeolite-based catalyst in a short-contact time vertical or upward-sloped pipe called the "riser". Pre-heated feed is sprayed into the base of the riser via feed nozzles where it contacts extremely hot fluidized catalyst at . The hot catalyst vaporizes the feed and catalyzes the cracking reactions that break down the high-molecular weight oil into lighter components including LPG, gasoline, and diesel. The catalyst-hydrocarbon mixture flows upward through the riser for a few seconds, and then the mixture is separated via cyclones. The catalyst-free hydrocarbons are routed to a main fractionator for separation into fuel gas, LPG, gasoline, naphtha, light cycle oils used in diesel and jet fuel, and heavy fuel oil.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: During the trip up the riser, the cracking catalyst is "spent" by reactions which deposit coke on the catalyst and greatly reduce activity and selectivity. The "spent" catalyst is disengaged from the cracked hydrocarbon vapors and sent to a stripper where it contacts steam to remove hydrocarbons remaining in the catalyst pores. The "spent" catalyst then flows into a fluidized-bed regenerator where air (or in some cases air plus oxygen) is used to burn off the coke to restore catalyst activity and also provide the necessary heat for the next reaction cycle, cracking being an endothermic reaction. The "regenerated" catalyst then flows to the base of the riser, repeating the cycle.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: The gasoline produced in the FCC unit has an elevated octane rating but is less chemically stable compared to other gasoline components due to its olefinic profile. Olefins in gasoline are responsible for the formation of polymeric deposits in storage tanks, fuel ducts and injectors. The FCC LPG is an important source of C-C olefins and isobutane that are essential feeds for the alkylation process and the production of polymers such as polypropylene.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: Hydrocracking is a catalytic cracking process assisted by the presence of added hydrogen gas. Unlike a hydrotreater, hydrocracking uses hydrogen to break C-C bonds (hydrotreatment is conducted prior to hydrocracking to protect the catalysts in a hydrocracking process). In the year 2010, 265 × 10 tons of petroleum was processed with this technology. The main feedstock is vacuum gas oil, a heavy fraction of petroleum.


title: Cracking (chemistry)

text: The products of this process are saturated hydrocarbons; depending on the reaction conditions (temperature, pressure, catalyst activity) these products range from ethane, LPG to heavier hydrocarbons consisting mostly of isoparaffins. Hydrocracking is normally facilitated by a bifunctional catalyst that is capable of rearranging and breaking hydrocarbon chains as well as adding hydrogen to aromatics and olefins to produce naphthenes and alkanes.