Smash Bros. Tournament Fiasco Has Players Boycotting Events

In the wake of Nintendo being Nintendo and unceremoniously cancelling the Smash World Tour, one of the year’s biggest esports tournaments dedicated to all things Super Smash Bros., copious folks in the game’s community have come out in protest. Casual fans, pro players, long-time commentators, and even other tournament organisers, from AITX eSports to Beyond the Summit, have all publicly denounced not just Nintendo for its asinine decision but also Panda Global for allegedly causing the Smash World Tour to get shut down. Now, it appears many of those people are boycotting all of Nintendo’s officially licensed tournaments as well. Starting in 2020 and operated by Video Game Boot Camp, the Smash World Tour is a series of unofficial international tournament circuits for the brawler. Despite the pandemic shuttering the Smash World Tour 2020 event, Video Game Boot Camp hosted an online tournament last year and planned for this year’s competition to return to the in-person format that was planned two years ago. Unfortunately, because Nintendo wouldn’t sponsor the Smash World Tour 2022 event, potentially due to the company already partnering with esports organisation Panda Global in 2021, Video Game BootCamp announced in a Medium post that “without any warning” this year’s tourney was now dead. Read More: Nintendo Shuts Down Smash World Tour, Organisers ‘Losing Hundreds Of Thousands Of Dollars’ [Updates] “We don’t know where everything will land quite yet with contracts, sponsor obligations, etcetera — in short, we will be losing hundreds of thousands of dollars due to Nintendo’s actions,” the Smash World Tour’s organisers said in the post. “That being said, we are taking steps to remedy [the] many issues that have arisen from cancelling the upcoming Smash World Tour Championships — especially for the players. Please keep an eye out in the coming days for help with travel arrangements. Given the timeline that we were forced into, we had to publish this statement before we could iron out all of the details. All attendees will be issued full refunds.” Super Smash Bros. fans aren’t happy about what’s going on, with many posting their frustrations on Twitter. Some pointed fingers at Panda Global CEO and co-founder Dr. Alan Bunney for allegedly trying to recruit tournaments to the Panda Cup by threatening to get Nintendo involved to shut the Smash World Tour down and reportedly attempting to create a monopoly by requesting exclusive streaming rights to the Panda Cup. Others fear this may hurt their careers and livelihoods. The main consensus is to never watch, support, or attend a Panda Global event ever again. A lot of people seem to feel this way.

I will never attend a publicly licensed Nintendo or Panda Circuit event ever again. I will continue to support grassroots locals and majors, unaffiliated with Nintendo, that have been the lifeblood of our scene for 20+ years. pic.twitter.com/62cp4HHXiY

— Aiden (@aidencalvin) November 29, 2022

Obviously boycotting any Panda/Nintendo events

Principles are everything and I have absolutely no empathy for scum

— Fiction | 69% Apparel (@FictionIRL) November 29, 2022

I personally won't ever watch, support, or attend a panda organized or broadcasted event ever again.

No disrespect to the players or employees that work there, I know it's not your fault. https://t.co/zzy5MJGoLr

— Ken Chen (@Hot_Bid) November 29, 2022

People OPENLY boycotting Nintendo/Panda so far

Aiden (Ludwig's TO)
BTS
Ken Chen (Team Liquid director)
Fatality
Lima
Sparg0
Dark Wizzy
Joshman
Ddee
ETossed (MPGR panelist)
And IBDW is threatening to leave the team

It's been an hour.

— sparkle (@homeinurgut) November 30, 2022

Our best recourse as a community, in my opinion, is to boycott any Panda cup event and additionally any event associated with Nintendo.

This includes TOs, players, commentators, everybody. https://t.co/YUsuCCaFoD

— Jas | FIZZI#36 (@Fizzi36) November 29, 2022

In Twitter messages with Kotaku, Captain Falcon main Jas “Fizzi” Laferriere said he doesn’t purchase Nintendo games anymore out of moral duty ever since the company brought down another Smash tournament, The Big House Online, back in December 2020. Now, with the news of Nintendo causing the shutdown of another tournament, Laferriere is suggesting that the community boycott. “I do not intend to attend any Panda Cup events,” Laferriere said. “We have always been a grassroots community first and I think it’s important to stand up for our tournament organisers. I hope we can come back stronger, as we’ve done many times before.” Even Video Game Boot Camp, after already cancelling the Smash World Tour, posted a Google document just quickly touching on the “uncertainty regarding Video Game Boot Camp’s future.” In the short statement, the organisers said that a couple of other upcoming Smash tournaments it’s hosting this year, such as Glitch: Duel of Fates and Double Down 2023, have also been cancelled. “At the moment, our future is uncertain in regards to running major tournaments — but as of right now, based on our recent communications with Nintendo, we would be putting ourselves at further risk if we continued forward with our current plans,” Video Game Boot Camp said in the post. “We are hopeful that this does not mean we will not be running major events in 2023 — just that our future is currently uncertain.” The future of Super Smash Bros.’s competitive fighting game scene is looking quite precarious, with Video Game Boot Camp admitting in the statement that it’s “currently navigating budget cuts, internal communications with our team and partners, commitments/contracts, as well as sponsorship negotiations that will inevitably be affected by all of this.” It’s possible that smaller tournaments will continue without Nintendo’s blessing, but, as has been done time and again, it’s likely only a matter of time until Nintendo comes a-knocking. And that bums me out a lot, as someone who’s a big fan of these tournaments. Kotaku reached out to Nintendo and Panda Global for comment.  

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