What does the community feel about the future of Fighting Game Competition?
Since Evolution, there hasnt been much news or hype for future games or even current games for that matter.
MvC2 - seems to finally have died down
CvS2 - still seems to get some play but not as much recently
ST - the community cant decide which version to use except an arcade cabinet
3s - has always been exciting to watch when the Japanese plays, it but is usually dead all year round in the states
KOF XI - while I think the game has tremendous potential I dont think very many places in the states will carry the game and therefore not make it competitive enough to get people to play it
SC3 - the game that everyone was expecting and hoped to be a great success because of all the accolades SC2 received in the states, turned out to be filled with bugs and glitches
T5:DR - while I hope it will be the game to carry the fighting game community through next year, Tekken 5 didnt seem to last very long. It did have its spike but died as well when 5.1 and T5:DR was announced
GGXX #R or Slash honestly the only promising game for next year but who knows when it will come on console, hopefully it wont be like #r and take forever before the game can actually be playable in the states.
So now what?
This past week CPL had its grand final and Fatal1ty won the biggest purse for competitive gaming $150,000, and Im questioning could the fighting game community match or at least come close to CPL success.
CPL has been around for 8 years and in its time it has gotten tremendous success and notoriety, sponsors from some of the biggest company in the computer industry and has joined the $1Million dollar prize that so many reality TV shows and contests have promoted. With its success, the public and the media are now paying attention to CPL and competitive gaming; this might be the right time for other competitive gaming genre to branch out
SRK this year joined MLG to sponsor Evolution but with many problems faced by the 3D gaming community, MLG seems to have lost credibility amongst fighting gamers.
I once again look at this past year CPL announcement and see what SRK can do to really bring competitive fighting games to the main stream. One of the boldest move CPL did was announced a game that wasnt popular with the FPS masses and announced PainKiller as its one v. one FPS game. With a large sum of money on the line gamers were pretty much forced to learn the game if they wanted to compete for the large purse. While many didnt care much for the game, it was successful and with its $1Million purse it got the media attention to legitimize competitive gaming and really push the industry within to produce better games.
While I am just a fan of competitive fighting game I wonder if SRK should do something similar. One of the major drawbacks is the lack of major sponsors that are willing to support SRK and the community. Capcom seems to careless about the gaming scene and many of the other gaming company with the exception of Namco have not really taken an interest in competitive fighting game. I wonder if SRK can take a page out of CPLs book and try to get Microsoft and TECMO to sponsor this coming Evolution by making DOA4 as the main game at this years Evolution. Promote it with a large enough purse to persuade gamers that if they want to win decent money at Evolution they would need to play DOA4 regardless of how the community currently feels about the game.
Even though I personally am not a fan of DOA or with Xbox for that matter, Microsoft is a major player in the industry and has shown some interest in giving away large purses when it comes to competitive gaming. TECMO had its producer record a clip to announce DOA4 at Evolution this year might suggest that TECMO is actually looking at Evolution as a legitimate stick to measure its popularity in the American market. I think SRK should take advantage of this opportunity and make the most out of it.
While I know this seems to be a bold move and something I dont know if SRK or the community can accept, I do feel something this drastic needs to take place or else the fighting game community might be on its last legs. While I may be over reacting, such bold moves and if Microsoft and/or TECMO are willing to give SRK major sponsorship it might shake the industry within and send notice that fighting gamers can be as competitive as those competing at FPS and that there is a market in the console genre that may be able to compete with FPS that isnt an FPS on console. With this move SRK might also be able to shake the market and put notice that if you want gamers to be serious about your game and be promoted at future Evolution or other regionals then you need to produce better games with fewer bugs and actually find ways to evolve this genre.
So whats your opinion?