Competetive gaming has been growing exponentially over the last few years. With this growth there have really been two major forces, eSports: consisting of MLG, WCS and others, and of course the Fighting Game community. Hosting events worldwide culminating every year into Evolution hosted by the group at Shoryuken. With Evo reaching up to 150,000 viewers on Twitch and thousands in attendance the growth for the group has been astounding. With any expansion of something as grass roots as the FGC has been it is only natural that changes will occur and and regulations will be laid down.
One week after EVO, St. Maarten was host to the Video X Games where the worlds greatest qualified to spend time on a tropical island and of course, show off their skills. During the grand finals for Ultimate Marvel Vs. Capcom twitter began erupting with statements of discontent on the character choices and play of the two finalists. Team AGE’s Chris G, and VxG’s Flocker, the two picked teams that they are not well known for but have practiced in the past and many members of the community including Capcom’s, Mark Julio calling for better policing of “collusion” and giving quality events.
Debate went on over twitter and a few days later a new set of rules were released for any tournaments wanting to be considered an EVO qualifier and receive press coverage from FGC sites. All tournament rules are required to hold the following disclaimer:
Collusion of any kind with your competitors is considered cheating. If the Tournament Director determines that any competitor is colluding to manipulate the results or intentionally underperforming, the collaborating players may be immediately disqualified. This determination is to be made at the sole discretion of the Tournament Director. Anyone disqualified in this manner forfeits all rights to any titles or prizes they might have otherwise earned for that tournament.
Once this was released twitter once again erupted in debate over how this will be policed and if it will be fair to players in general. We reached out to David Philip Graham who has been a prominent member of the FGC for years. He commentates most major tournaments and is also a lawyer that focuses on multimedia and video game law. The interview audio will be available in an upcoming episode of Entertainment Is Dead, here is the readable version.
Big Shiny Robot!: Thank you for taking the time to do this sir.
David Phillip Graham: Anytime
BSR!: Twitter was pretty crazy yesterday, watching the two sides go back and forth. With your experience we figured you’d have a tempered view of it.
DPG: Well, the finals sucked. I’ve had to commentate those matches before, where players are clearly not taking it as seriously as you’d like and it sucks. The thing is if you’re one of the players your mind set is “why do I have to conform my play to how other people expect, I’ve gotten this far it should be about what I want to do.” That’s just not realistic, especially in the age of streaming, maybe back in the day. Now it’s annoying to be the commentator and when I was a player if someone who beat me goofed off in the finals I would be frustrated. Because it’s disrespectful, was I that bad? If you’re a viewer it sucks because the stream is less interesting. If you’re a tournament organizer its bad because you put in all this time and money to make a good tournament and event and the players disrespect that, and I’m sure it’s the same for the sponsors. Sponsors don’t like it either as you can see by Madcatz Markman’s reaction. I think it’s a good change and it’s good that we get regulated to a degree. It’s been going on for a while, well forever really, but seemingly worse the last year. The tournament organizers don’t want this and they’ve all come together, these are people with very disparate backgrounds and philosophies, people who in some cases don’t like each other very much all came together on this, which shows they’re pretty serious about it.
BSR!: It shows a lot of growth for the community as well, with Evo having 150,000 viewers we’re seeing growth there. Do you think we’ll see any changes in the players competing or the way teams regulate each other? I feel that Chris G is the heel of the FGC, I’m sure it’s not all him but do you think the regulation on teams will change?
DPG: It’s definitely not just Chris G, Justin Wong has been involved, Filipino Champ, PR Rog, Fanatiq, so like I said it’s been going on for a while and this should help fix that.
BSR!: I didn’t see a lot of response from the Madcatz team besides Markman is that a coincidence or just how it shook out?
DPG: Well he’s mainly the spokesman for Madcatz so that isn’t surprising, but I’m sure other sponsors were just as irritated.
BSR!: That makes sense, Madcatz is definitely one of the more active sponsors. On an unrelated topic one of our readers was hoping you could settle an argument.
DPG: Sure
BSR!: Their questions was about a discussion they had on payout for FGC tournaments vs. MLG or Starcraft they noticed they’re not quite as high. Is that due to a lower interest or the higher learning curve or if the FGC wants to distance themselves from that community?
DPG: I think it’s a mixture of things. There are fewer peripherals in fighting games than in PC based games which leaves fewer opportunities for sponsors to get involved. Those involved are a bit different, I’m not sure why but people in fighting games seem a little more ethnically diverse and a little bit less well off, which neither of those things resounds well to the way advertisers work. There’s also a mindset in the community that is pretty common about not wanting to get involved in more eSports style things, the TO’s are like that I’m like that to an extent, many players are. The top players aren’t so much like that because they understand there is more money, and there is probably more money for me as a commentator (laughs) oh well, not that big of deal. You know top 8 pay out, or get paid out at EVO. Last year they gave first place a bigger percent of the money which annoyed people. This year they redid the formula so it was more balanced and first place didn’t get as much as expected because of that. There is also a different business model on the part of developers and publishers in fighting games. They tend to support with less money compared to Blizzard and Riot. Really the only prominent example of big money is when Warner through in a lot for Mortal Kombat, which they didn’t do with Injustice. Capcom, Atlus and Namco have in the past as well, but not as much as eSports.
Going back to the question of underperformance, we won’t see growth if players don’t take matches like their grand finals seriously. You know if you flew these guys out as a TO you’re going to think twice before doing it next time, sponsors are definitely going to think twice. So those fixing matches or not taking it seriously are really effecting their own payout in the long run.
BSR!: I read an article discussing the FGC growing as a grass roots movement vs. IPL which was closed last year because it cost IGN 1,000,000 to run. What are your hopes for EVO’s growth?
DPG: I think Evo got so many views partially because of the Smash controversy right before. A lot of news sites that don’t normally cover it gave a lot of press to it. Hopefully they come back next year and watch again. Evo will never be like IPL the organizers just aren’t interested in that, it’s definitely much more grass roots. EVO is there for the players, it’s built to satisfy the players and give them enjoyment for their weekend, and it’s not perfect but they are working on that more than they want to satisfy even the top players. As big as it’s going to be I don’t think it will ever become a corporate focused event.
BSR!: Based on attendance they can probably fund ok with a lot of their own cash.
DPG: Yeah, that’s what happened this year, first place didn’t get as much as they expected but they get a lot of attendees and a lot of money, but that gets spent on venue, payouts, crew, and gets broken up eight ways, you see that in the payout.
BSR!: Thanks again for taking the time any final words of wisdom for those hoping to get into fighting games?
DPG: It’s not terribly easy to pick up a fighting game and be serious. Understand it’s a process and nobody gets there immediately, hopefully you have fun along the way. There’s always a stream going on so you can see how other people play and apply it to yourself. You can also check Shoryuken.com, testyourmight.com, dustloop,they all have sources where you can read about play and get more intimate knowledge about game mechanics. My friend James Chen and I have a twice weekly webshow on twitch.tv/ultrachentv, we try to break games down on an intermediate and advanced level. There are definitely resources for any level on line, but it comes down to how interested you are in fighting games and I hope more people invest the time.
David Philip Graham is a man of many talents, find him on twitter @ultradavid, or follow his webshow @ultrachentv. You can also find him at UltraChenTV.com or on Twitch, twitch.tv/ultrachentv
Thomas Winkley is the Gaming Editor for Big Shiny Robot! Find him on twitter @thomaswinkley, or email him Thomas@bigshinyrobot.com
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