Capcom Pro Tour - And Why You Should Care

[CrimsonShadow]

Imo this is major news, and this is similar to what I was talking about for IGAU (albeit with more official backing):

http://www.polygon.com/2014/3/10/5490446/capcom-pro-tour-twitch-capcom-street-fighter-league

Because of this, individual events will start to mean something, and people will be able to follow a continuum from event to event. People will know exactly where and when to tune in, and why it matters.

I don't know about you guys, but I think it's about time we started organizing the year's worth of Injustice tournaments into something more meaningful.

If we want people outside the core fighting game community to take things seriously, there needs to be some kind of structure that keeps track of players, binds events together, creates a meaningful and consistent standard and allows fans and people who are interested to put together the storyline of what a season consists of.

If no one is going to hand it to us, then we should make the effort and get it started ourselves. We can build it up on a lower level until it becomes more established and creates room for bigger opportunities.

I'll probably have a lot more to say about this over the coming weeks, but I wanted to start the discussion now.

@AK Pig Of The Hut
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@GGA HAN
@Perfect Legend
@Tom Brady
@Denzell
@MITDJT

 

[HellblazerHawkman]

I'm not sure I understand the difference between this and something like a Team Spooky stream. Like, is Twitch front-paging events? Bigger payouts? I would have thought more tourneys, but those streams are already at established majors. Not trying to be a debbie downer, but I guess there's something I'm missing

 

[CrimsonShadow]

I'm not sure I understand the difference between this and something like a Team Spooky stream. Like, is Twitch front-paging events? Bigger payouts? I would have thought more tourneys, but those streams are already at established majors. Not trying to be a debbie downer, but I guess there's something I'm missing

Sp00ky is an individual streamer of individual, separate events. What this is, is an actual season for Capcom FGC events. So just like players play a series of games or matches in professional sports in order to qualify for the playofs or some sort of championship, this ties each of the selected SF4 events into a larger whole.

And they're unifying it so that people can follow it in one place, just like you follow the NFL or the LCS.

It makes each event mean something, and it means that every tournament will be an important part of the build toward the finals.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

 

[Jack Burton]

Well, I don't reply much on TYM, but I'm not gonna let this post get ignored ( if that's what that angry face in CrimsonShadow's post means). LOL

I think a 'Pro Tour' series for Netherrealm games would be a big step in growing the scene, providing hype over the long term for our games, develop more respect from competitive players in the community who don't play our games and grow viewership for Netherrealm games. Not to mention by planning and executing this now will give a solid infrastructure for Mortal Kombat X when that game is released.

I think calling it "Midway Classics Tour" and should include not only Injustice but classics like MK2, Trilogy, MK9 and, what the hell, NBA Jam (because I have a soft spot for that game LOL!) That would be awesome! lol

 

[SZSR]

Yeah an NRS tour would be awesome. I don't think it even necessarily needs to be sponsored by NRS (thought it'd be awesome), just having a good consistent "season" based on tournaments that knowingly support our games would be a great help to the community at large.

Just to put myself out there, I'd say we could start/end the season with Final Round (since it tends to be one of the bigger NRS tournaments that is well supported) and then build around it. Tournaments need to show major support for the NRS games though to be listed, (e.g., NCR couldn't really fit the bill since they sideline us there too often).



So like just based on 2014 we have:

KIT
Winter Brawl
SCR
(tail end of previous season)
1. Final Round
2. Civil War VI
3. UFGT
4. CEO
5. EVO
6. Summer Jam
7. The Fall Classic
8. Northeast Championships

Try to make sure we get at least one BIG tournament every month if there are enough held.

APEX and similar tournaments can be strewn in as deemed fit.

 

[Jack Burton]

@CrimsonShadow

You should front page this thread.

 

[NoobHunter420]

In order for this to work for NRS Games WB would need get involved, I don't see that happening.
Ed boon and NRS has no saying in this, what WB says is what goes.

 

[GGA Jeremiah]

Top 16 players at the end of the year for Street Fighter will be super stacked!

If we had an end of year tournament with our top 16 players would it be as stacked?

 

[CrimsonShadow]

In order for this to work for NRS Games WB would need get involved, I don't see that happening.
Ed boon and NRS has no saying in this, what WB says is what goes.

The thing is, we wouldn't have to start huge in order to build it up.

I know I'm going to sound like a broken record, but when I played Chess, all the events were a part of the US Chess Federation, USCF. It wasn't a big hollywood operation; just a way to organize all of the official tournaments and events to tie them together in some way.

I think most sports that are major professional sports now started with some kind of organized community effort before the big stadiums, tv deals and sponsorships rolled in.

The NBA wouldn't exist with about the ABA, NBL, etc.

All we would need to do is organize ourselves into a season, plan it out and set the guidelines, and get people's cooperation. Usually organization is the first step in attracting eventual outside help/attention.

 

[VenomX-90]

All I care about is Capcom Vs SNK 3 though.

 

[Jack Burton]

In order for this to work for NRS Games WB would need get involved, I don't see that happening.
Ed boon and NRS has no saying in this, what WB says is what goes.

Something can happen if someone gets the ball rolling. Has anyone asked anyone at Netherrealm what needs to happen to make this a reality?

 

[Immortal Kombat]

Yeah an NRS tour would be awesome. I don't think it even necessarily needs to be sponsored by NRS (thought it'd be awesome), just having a good consistent "season" based on tournaments that knowingly support our games would be a great help to the community at large.

Just to put myself out there, I'd say we could start/end the season with Final Round (since it tends to be one of the bigger NRS tournaments that is well supported) and then build around it. Tournaments need to show major support for the NRS games though to be listed, (e.g., NCR couldn't really fit the bill since they sideline us there too often).



So like just based on 2014 we have:

KIT
Winter Brawl
SCR
(tail end of previous season)
1. Final Round
2. Civil War VI
3. UFGT
4. CEO
5. EVO
6. Summer Jam
7. The Fall Classic
8. Northeast Championships

Try to make sure we get at least one BIG tournament every month if there are enough held.

APEX and similar tournaments can be strewn in as deemed fit.

You left out North West Majors

 

[Skkra]

This of course means that any tournament deemed part of the season will assign points for various placements, and that players will be properly ranked. This means we'd ACTUALLY need to come up with a ranking system that everyone will agree upon.

Honestly though, we could do it with something as simple as
1) a simple but fair point system for the top 16 at every tournament we as a community deem part of the season
2) someone to host a dedicated website to display these stats at all times

The only thing we'd need to do then is to actually have that "superbowl" event somewhere, where all 16 final seeded players are in attendance. I'd be happy to help with all of the other stuff, but I think the biggest issue is that, I imagine, Capcom is going to pay for these top 16 guys to come to their event. That is purely speculation, but it's probably a fair guess. So that would mean that in addition to putting on and streaming this event (are people going to travel JUST to watch this? not much hype without a live audience), 16 people would need to get time off from school/work, then come up with money to travel to another tournament. I see that as the biggest issue with making this happen.

 

[Skkra]

Followup - if we simply have a "season" that starts and ends someplace, and we have seeding points, etc, but no big event to cap it off... well, it's basically what we have now. OK, so we make a ranking system and someone has a lot of points at the end of the season. But what does that really mean? We're still exactly where we are right now: winning Evo is the #1 prize, and nothing contests with it.

 

[Immortal Kombat]

I know this community is kinda strapped cash but....
I honestly think if we put a higher buy in to these tournaments and advertised it to the general public more these things would take care of themselves.
At the end of the day we all watched mlg because the payout

 

[CrimsonShadow]

This of course means that any tournament deemed part of the season will assign points for various placements, and that players will be properly ranked. This means we'd ACTUALLY need to come up with a ranking system that everyone will agree upon.

Honestly though, we could do it with something as simple as
1) a simple but fair point system for the top 16 at every tournament we as a community deem part of the season
2) someone to host a dedicated website to display these stats at all times

The only thing we'd need to do then is to actually have that "superbowl" event somewhere, where all 16 final seeded players are in attendance. I'd be happy to help with all of the other stuff, but I think the biggest issue is that, I imagine, Capcom is going to pay for these top 16 guys to come to their event. That is purely speculation, but it's probably a fair guess. So that would mean that in addition to putting on and streaming this event (are people going to travel JUST to watch this? not much hype without a live audience), 16 people would need to get time off from school/work, then come up with money to travel to another tournament. I see that as the biggest issue with making this happen.

If you look at how they do their season, they are doing it based on selected events; which means that rather than every event everywhere counting, they pick certain events as part of the "season" and try to distribute them well.

That's similar to how I did things for MK9 and it's usually the only way to make a point-accumulation system more fair in a community like this.

Theirs could probably be distributed a little better, but you get the idea.

Followup - if we simply have a "season" that starts and ends someplace, and we have seeding points, etc, but no big event to cap it off... well, it's basically what we have now. OK, so we make a ranking system and someone has a lot of points at the end of the season. But what does that really mean? We're still exactly where we are right now: winning Evo is the #1 prize, and nothing contests with it.

They're using a low-entrant invite-only tournament for the top qualified players to cap it off. That's fairly easy to implement and can be done as a side event at any tournament of choice.

If someone couldn't make the final, their spot could go to the next highest qualifier. But the key would be to hold the final at an event where a lot of top players will be in attendance. That'll make it easier for people to want to travel, since a lot of them would be there anyway.

 

[trufenix]

Its a noble concept, but NRS community is still way too small for this. We don't have enough players that can travel frequently or enough tournaments catered to local scenes to warrant any of this.

 

[DarthArma]

 

[THTB]

In order for this to work for NRS Games WB would need get involved, I don't see that happening.
Ed boon and NRS has no saying in this, what WB says is what goes.

This is the major difference between Capcom and NRS.

Capcom itself is teaming with Twitch for this, and Capcom itself has community members on board as part of its staff for FG-related matters. I know we have Paulo and co checking in on us from time to time, but it's not the same as what Capcom has in Combofiend, Dawgtanian, etc. Plus, NRS has to go through WB.

I would like for NRS to try and get this going, but it seems unlikely.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

Its a noble concept, but NRS community is still way too small for this. We don't have enough players that can travel frequently or enough tournaments catered to local scenes to warrant any of this.

If you read the article, the point isn't for everyone to be able to make every event. It's that each event gives you a chance to qualify. The 10 Premier slots can be secured by winning a single tournament. They used existing majors/events rather than small tournaments catering to local scenes.

But what it does do is make each event matter, as part of a bigger picture. It's been started using existing resources, and it's definitely something that we could do as a community on a smaller scale.

I would like for NRS to try and get this going, but it seems unlikely.

I think that if we truly believe in our game, we should get it started ourselves. We may not have megabucks to throw around, but that doesn't prevent us from organizing a season around existing events.

We'd have a much better shot at getting some kind of outside help down the road if we put some effort in, rather than just sitting around and waiting.

 

[trufenix]

If you read the article, the point isn't for everyone to be able to make every event. It's that each event gives you a chance to qualify. The 10 Premier slots can be secured by winning a single tournament. They used existing majors rather than small tournaments catering to local scenes.

But what it does do is make each event matter, as part of a bigger picture. It's been started using existing resources, and it's definitely something that we could do as a community on a smaller scale.

No, I understand the point. My point is there are maybe 50 actual top players in NRS community and maybe I dunno 500 consistently competitive world wide, real talk. These are not the numbers to justify this sort of idea. Capcom (SF, really) has a major every two weeks, road to evo or not, we can't even decide what our majors are. We are not big enough to try and introduce a year long competitive league.

 

[NoobHunter420]

The thing is, we wouldn't have to start huge in order to build it up.

I know I'm going to sound like a broken record, but when I played Chess, all the events were a part of the US Chess Federation, USCF. It wasn't a big hollywood operation; just a way to organize all of the official tournaments and events to tie them together in some way.

I think most sports that are major professional sports now started with some kind of organized community effort before the big stadiums, tv deals and sponsorships rolled in.

The NBA wouldn't exist with about the ABA, NBL, etc.

All we would need to do is organize ourselves into a season, plan it out and set the guidelines, and get people's cooperation. Usually organization is the first step in attracting eventual outside help/attention.

I hate to be a downer, but I can't see this working w/o WB in the picture.
This community can never agree on anything.
This would require an investment to make so called "pro tour" majors of a higher quality than the rest.
something to make people travel.

 

[CrimsonShadow]

I hate to be a downer, but I can't see this working w/o WB in the picture.
This community can never agree on anything.
This would require an investment to make so called "pro tour" majors of a higher quality than the rest.
something to make people travel.

In most sports communities that have done this, it always worked before big money/business stepped into the picture. People just decided to organize themselves into a league, and they did it.

American football did not start with the NFL. Nor did Baskeball start with the NBA. They started with people organizing leagues on a smaller level. Then someone thought "this is interesting.. maybe we can invest some money into this and make it a bigger thing".

Even in the sports that are now established as huge multibillion-dollar franchise opertaions, there are still plenty of leagues at the community level, regional level, etc. that are organized by regular people like you and me.

The key is not to force people to travel; it's to make the events that people already travel connect in some way and count for something more. That's why Capcom is partnering with existing events.

I think if people read the article in detail, they'd understand how it works.

 

[Fred Marvel]

All I care about is Street Fighter Alpha 4 though.

fixed