PlayStation Buys Evo Fighting Game Championship Series, Announces 2021 Event Dates, Nintendo Comments

Nintendo has made a statement about Sony’s acquisition of the Evolution Championship Series. ‘Nintendo has enjoyed engaging with fans at previous Evo tournaments and wishes the organizers of the show the best with their new venture. We will continue to evaluate Evo and other opportunities as we plan for future online and offline Super Smash Bros. tournament activities. A Nintendo spokesman said.

Original story follows.

Sony has announced that it has acquired the Evolution Championship Series, better known as Evo, the world’s biggest fighting game tournament.

Sony Interactive Entertainment and RTS, an endeavor sports business, have acquired the “assets and assets” of the Evo series. The acquisition means that future Evo events are effectively Sony PlayStation opportunities in partnership with RTS.

Evo co-founders Tony and Tom Cannon remain with Evo as key advisors and Sony took the opportunity to announce the 2021 dates for Evo Online.This year the Evo event will be held digitally on 6 – 8 August and thereafter on 13 – 15 August. The events include Tekken 7, Street Fighter 5: Champion Edition, Mortal Kombat 11 Ultimate and Guilty Gear – Strive -. Details about the online qualifiers will be shared in the coming weeks.

As for other games. Mark Julio, a developer of the Evo company, says ‘Evo is still open to all platforms’, and that PlayStation and RTS enable Julio’s team to work with his community to support fighting games as a whole. Although it does not answer concretely or games from first party developers like Super Smash Bros. of Nintendo will appear at future events.

“Today we are delighted to announce the next chapter in the story of PlayStation and Evo, the world’s largest and longest running combat gaming tournament,” Sony said in a blog post setting out the acquisition.

“For PlayStation, today’s announcement is an exciting step in our journey to promote the growth of the combat community and sports, and to support competitive players widely on our consoles,” says PlayStation. “Fighting games are hugely popular on PlayStation consoles, with gamers recording more than 1.1 billion game hours by 2020 alone.”

Sony says it will break down ‘gamers’ for gamers so that they can compete at all levels of the sport, confirming that they are creating a “safe and inclusive environment for players”. PlayStation is linked to Evo’s message about promoting a safe community.The Evo Online event in 2020 was canceled following allegations of abuse by Evo organizer Joey Cueller. NetherRealm and Capcom have stepped into solidarity with members of the fighting game community since the 2020 rally, speaking out against abuse. It is again part of a larger scandal that threatens to envelop the entire community.

Sony’s official involvement may indicate stronger organizational support to create a safer environment for players and participants.

MattTM Kim is IGN’s news editor.

Source