It has been announced that Sony interactive entertainment will be selling off it’s stake in EVO (Evolution championship series for those unaware) after becoming co-owners back in 2021 along with Endeavor. The tournament series has been the largest fighting game tournament in terms of overall entrants and is a big part of why viewing fighting games as an esport has become more popular over the years.
EVO Moment 37 in particular is perhaps the first moment in the FGC to go viral. Sony will be selling their stake off to NODWIN, an eSports media company based in India that’s known for running events for PUBG events among other things. It’s worth noting that NODWIN is also backed by SIE’s parent company, Sony group corporation. SIE will still remain involved as a sponsor as well.
The announcement has had alot of fighting game fans wondering what this means for the future. There has been concerns that the PS5 as a platform isn’t the best option to run these kind of events due to overheating among other issues.
If SIE is no in charge directly, maybe it could open up the avenue for other platforms such as Xbox or PC to be explored. If EVO did drop PS5 as the primary platform, perhaps other events such as Capcom Cup and EWC would as well.
There’s also speculation this could open the door for Super Smash Bros to return as an event as it was a staple game for many years but was pulled for reasons never truly explained after Sony took over partial ownership.
EVO had its most recent tournament earlier this month and is also set to have an event in France in October. It’ll be interesting to see if anything about the events change in the future in a significant way.
