The winner, Japanese player Naoki “Moke” Nakayama, had earlier in the year lost his sponsorship and was only in attendance thanks to support from his local scene, some of whom accompanied him to the crowded setup before the tournament-deciding match. The runner-up, hometown hero Jesse “Commander Jesse” Espinoza, challenged Moke after enduring an intense trip through the losers bracket with Dhalsim, who many consider underpowered compared to the rest of the Street Fighter V cast. These would have been amazing moments to see broadcast on an official stream, but Capcom’s inability to give the community that small concession prevented all but the most dedicated fighting game players from seeing it happen live.

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The issue with the last-chance qualifier was bad enough, but going into the Capcom Cup main event, several cracks in the “logistics and setup” continued to show, including:

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It was all too much. I ended up avoiding watching Capcom Cup most of the weekend because of how frustrating it was to see these issues playing out. I tuned in only during the grand finals to see the all-American championship match and to find out whether or not Capcom would announce a new character for Street Fighter V.

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The best I’ve been able to deduce from social media over the last few days is that very few actual community members appear to have been involved in the event’s planning or production, despite Southern California being home to an existing and proven infrastructure for fighting game events. The resulting botch job therefore would represent a failure on Capcom’s part, and I only hope folks don’t let next year’s Capcom Pro Tour and the surprise reveal of a returning character prevent them from holding the company accountable for the embarrassment we witnessed this weekend.

The community has long survived without outside influence or support, and Capcom would do well to either tap into that vein of talent and reward those who have built the fighting game community from nothing or just let the scene do things on their own again. I’ve long been wary of developer involvement, and when big payouts and oversized novelty checks fail to sway me, the next argument is invariably, “But think of the logistics support!”

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This weekend proved that the community can’t even expect that much.

Ian Walker loves fighting games and loves writing about them even more. You can find him on Twitter at @iantothemax.