Evo promises to improve Japan event after multiple players raise serious concerns

Evo Japan 2023 is in the books and was mostly a fantastic showing for the fighting game community, but there were a few areas that led to some fairly serious backlash from players in attendance. Something that the Evo team has now directly responded to with a promise to fix things. 

Along with the decision to forgo in-person commentary for the English broadcast, players competing in the event frequently complained about poor management during pools and issues with various setups that would go on to impact some important matches.

The most controversial issue came from some setups at the venue being laggy, specifically regarding the main stream’s display. Multiple players called this out throughout the event, including top players such as Rangchu, Knee, and eventual Tekken 7 champion Arslan Ash. 

Related: Arslan Ash claims a third Evo title as Tekken 8 gets two new characters

That problem was dragged further into the spotlight during the first round of the top eight loser’s for Street Fighter V when Punk pointed out the issue live on stream. This would delay his match against Momochi for over half an hour before going on to lose the set 0-3. 

Punk’s infamous Twitter fingers went to work after the series, talking about the experience and quickly switching his excitement about competing to bashing the dual stream setup. This is when more fans picked up on the previous complaints and things began circulating. 

While there was very little communication during the event about this problem, multiple members of the Evo team including event general manager Rick “TheHadou” Thiher spoke out in support of the players who levied the criticism. 

Thiher specified that Punk and the other players were completely right about being negatively impacted by the stage setup, but that the issue was due to the actual stream design and not the Sony INZONE monitors that were used throughout the event—and provided by Sony since it owns the event series. 

That was only one of the problems though, as multiple players documented the entirety of Evo Japan’s earlier rounds being run very poorly, with a few workers even noting that many of the volunteer—and paid—workers barely knew anything about fighting games or how to manage tournaments. Not only that but at least a few main games were being run using paper brackets while having over 1,000 entrants, leading to some older players pointing out that this is not a new thing. 

This, paired with complaints about pools being run off of single setups, a seeming lack of air conditioning in the venue, and other problems that have been stacking up led to Evo making an official announcement that this “flawed competitor experience” would be worked on so an “imbalance” won’t happen again. 

“We are committed to making great player experiences globally,” Evo said. “Our US team will work closely with our partners in Japan to align this event series with community expectations. Evo Japan has limitless potential as an experience and destination. We will ensure it reaches it for you.”

It is important to note the mention of different teams being used, as the people who run Evo Japan are not necessarily the same ones responsible for Evo’s core event. This message to the community likely means both sides will communicate more thoroughly moving forward to avoid these same issues happening again in the future while generally improving Evo Japan. 

And that isn’t to say the event experience was entirely negative either. Several players have tried to add highlights for the good done by Evo Japan too, including comprehensive instructions on disconnecting controllers, the side tournament experience, and production for the main stage too. 

As Evo business development director Mark “MarkMan” Julio said, feedback from all areas is being taken into account as he and the team look to improve the Evo experience as a whole for everyone involved moving forward. That means both the good and the bad, so make your voice heard.