Fighting game community

Arslan “Arslan Ash” Siddique steamrolled his competition to win Tekken 7 at Evo 2019. The Pakistani competitor has been on an absolute tear since his surprise victory at Evo Japan, and this latest championship ties a nice little bow on his burgeoning Tekken career.

Masato “Bonchan” Takahashi has been crowned Street Fighter V champion at Evo 2019. It’s been a long road for Bonchan since placing second in Ultra Street Fighter IV at Evo 2014, fraught with character crises and surprisingly early eliminations, but now he can finally add an Evo championship to his resume.

Oscar “Shinku” Jaimes opened Evo 2019 finals day with a victory in the BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle championship. Shinku defeated three Japanese powerhouses—Kamisue “mekasue” Kazuya, Seitaro “domi” Ohno, and Hiroyuki “Kyamei” Kamei—en route to his first Evo title.

Seon-woo “Infiltration” Lee is Evo 2019’s Samurai Shodown champion. Typically a Street Fighter player, Infiltation is currently on hiatus from official competition after an investigation into domestic violence allegations against him.

The next iteration of the Under Night In-Birth franchise, the bafflingly named Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late [cl-r], is coming in early 2020. It will include balance changes and at least one new character.

Clearlamp is the very first Evo champion in Under Night In-Birth. He outlasted several of his fellow Japanese competitors (and one Canadian) to win, all of whom provided further proof that this unique game absolutely deserved its spot at Evo 2019.

A recent Samurai Shodown tournament in Japan was won by a cosplayer dressed as his main character, Ukyo. The player, Shingo “K2" Kito, has also been known to dress as combat butler Hein during King of Fighters XIV events. Must be quite the power-up!