After Covid-19 caused the cancellation of Evo 2020, organisers decided to take the most prestigious fighting game championship online in 2021 as the pandemic continues to rage on. It looked great on paper: the tournament was launching worldwide on a massive scale and instead of one action-packed weekend, there would now be two. In hindsight, we’re not so sure. Here are 4 reasons why.
1. The Guilty Gear fiasco
Initially, taking Evo online seemed to be a masterstroke. It brought the competition right out of its staging ground of Las Vegas and into four continents: Latin America (LATAM), North America, Asia and Europe. In particular, there was great excitement among the Fighting Game Community in LATAM, which traditionally did not have a big Evo presence.
But the region’s vastness led to connection problems, even with games that had great netcodes. The first weekend saw the LATAM’s Guilty Gear: Strive tournament plagued with technical issues that prevented streamers from watching the Top 8 battle; a major buzzkill.
Apparently, organisers also didn’t ace geography in school, as they bizarrely grouped Mexico – a country in the North American continent – as part of the LATAM countries, aggravating the connection issue.
2. No pools, no EVO
Organisers also decided not to stream any pool play, electing only to feature the Top 8s and 16s instead. It made the most sense in terms of online logistics, but it also meant that viewers missed most of the tournament. This badly sapped Evo of its entertainment value as it removed much of the hype surrounding the players.
After all, part of the fun was to see if any up and coming players with niche character picks could pull a fast one on tournament favourites. Without pools, a crucial part of anticipation was sorely missed.
3. Errr… so who’s the best?
Traditionally, Evo separated the best from the rest. There would only be 1 champion for each game in a winner-takes-all tournament. In 2019, Masato “Bonchan’ Takahashi took the mantle of the best Street Fighter V player while Dominque ‘SonicFox was the King of Mortal Kombat 11.
But this year, the online format led to multiple regional champions. For instance, Street Fighter V had eight winners and Tekken 7 fittingly had seven.
Which begets the question: so who’s the best? We’ll only find out in 3 months when the Evo 2021 Showcase sees these multiple ‘champions’ compete for the title of Champion of Champions. But this new format has led to widespread confusion.
Reddit user SoCo100Proof summed it up pretty succinctly: “calling people “champions” for winning a region is dumb… an event like Evo should be the best of the best.”
4. We need some noise
The build-up to Evo 2021 was to say the least… underwhelming. The preludes to previous editions were a wild ride, with every tourney from March to July drilling in the message that Evo was coming.
But this year, there was barely a sound heard of Evo 2021. While the pandemic might have muted the occasion, the marketing could have been done a whole lot better.
The online format also took away the thunderous crowd presence, which was sorely missed. Remember how the arena erupted at the Mandalay Bay in 2019 when Arslan “Arslan Ash” Siddique defeated Jae-Min “Knee” Bae 3:2 in an intense final? We really missed that this year.
Thankfully, Evo will rightfully return live to Las Vegas in 2022, and here’s our take: Whatever that happens in Vegas should stay in Vegas.
