A celebration of Joe “Stylo” for all he has done

Hello my name is Katie but I may be better known as MrsStylo around the fighting game community. I met and married Stylo in 2019 and in 2021 we found out he was sick. What was first diagnosed as end stage renal failure, has turned into something much more. He went into dialysis treatment and we were planning on doing a direct donor kidney transplant with me as the donor, but when we got further into the testing process we discovered that it wasn't just his kidneys that were failing. In April of 2023, we found out his heart was also failing and then in August of 2023, we found it was also his lungs. With 3 separate organ systems involved, he unfortunately was no longer a transplant candidate and it was suggested to put him into hospice to ease this next part of our lives. We decided against hospice at the time due to him having to stop dialysis in order to be on hospice and decided to just live every minute to the fullest we could. We had a bucket list trip that both of our families worked together on to make happen and made some incredible memories that I will have forever. We were able to spend as much time as possible with each other knowing that we wouldn't have the 40+ years that we thought we would have, we would only have a few months left to say and do all the things we were planning on doing for the rest of our lives. Knowing that even 3 lifetimes with Joe would not be enough time, I tried to soak up as much of this wonderful man and the love we have for each other as I could so I could always keep those memories with me.

Joe has been an avid gamer for his entire life basically. He started competing in fighting games way back in the olden days of garages, wood mils, and hotel rooms. He has spent the majority of his adulthood traveling to different competitions, practicing, training others, TOing, and just being there as an awesome friend for his community. Even when he got sick, he always did his best to come out to tournaments and support his friends when they were playing and fought so hard to do as well as he could when he would play.

His group of Killer Instinct friends have become lifelong friends of mine, they made up the whole grooms party at our wedding, and so many people that I have met through Joe in this community will I know be in my life for a very long time. I had no idea that fighting games existed let along the scope of them and the community behind it, but I knew when on our 3rd date we went to Wolf and Lamb for a BBTAG tournament that my life would never be the same and I was hooked.

You all know what he has done for the community, how hard he worked to try to get as much exposure for us as possible, ran online and in person events, gone to I don't even know how many EVO's, sacrificed time with friends and family to make sure events were running how they should and trained a lot of people on the games that he was best at. Even when he played games he didn't necessarily like, he played them because his friends played them and he wanted to help them all get better. The games he really excelled in were Soul Calibur, Killer Instict, Guilty Gear, Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, BBTAG, and of course GranBlue.

This is our way of saying we see what you have done, all you have accomplished, and what you could have accomplished had you been given the time you deserved. He may not have much time left, but he hasn't stopped being a great friend, an incredible player, and a pillar of the FGC. This is a show of appreciation and to give me the ability to be able to take care of his final needs, what happens afterwards, and set up a memorial service once we are ready. Anything that you can give to show him how much we all care and how much we are going to miss him is so appreciated.

Thank you to everyone who has reached out, to those who haven't had the strength to reach out, and to those that are silent supporters that just don't know what to say. I think we are all shocked this happened and happened so quickly, and its safe to say that Stylo is one who will be sincerely missed when he is gone. Thank you for taking the time to read this and I'll carry all our memories with me forever.