The Smash World Tour Championships, an unofficial Super Smash Bros. competitive event, has been shut down by Nintendo.
This news comes from the event’s Twitter account, which says that they received a notice from Nintendo stating that the event could “no longer operate”. As a result, the 2022 Smash World Tour Championships, as well as future events from 2023 onwards, will have to be cancelled.
You can read some excerpts from the event organizer’s statement about the cancellation below:
“Without any warning, we received notice the night before Thanksgiving from Nintendo that we could no longer operate. This was especially shocking given our discourse with Nintendo the past twelve months. Since then, we have been working around the clock to take the proper steps logistically, as well as to prepare this statement with proper legal guidance.”
“…In 2022 alone, we connected over 6,400 live events worldwide, with over 325,000 in-person entrants, making the Smash World Tour (SWT, or the Tour) the largest esports tour in history, for any game title. The Championships would also have had the largest prize pool in Smash history at over $250,000. The 2023 Smash World Tour planned to have a prize pool of over $350,000.”
“…The impact the Tour has had globally cannot be overstated — the amount of tournament organizers, competitors and fans this will affect is hard to measure. We realized just how much we could expand our spotlight to lesser-known regions, as well as Smash World Tour prize pools in 2023 and beyond, establishing a much healthier ecosystem in the community around the world. We believe this decision by Nintendo sets all of that back significantly, which is incredibly disappointing.”
It is no secret that Nintendo has had a complicated relationship with the competitive communities for most of its games, and with Super Smash Bros. in particular. It is speculated that this move could have something to do with Nintendo’s deal with Panda Global to run officially sanctioned Smash tournaments, although Nintendo has yet to officially comment on this matter.
What do you think? Let us know in the comments.
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