Capcom is charging $40 for Capcom Cup. Now what? | Extra Trashy - Trash Talk

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Today on Extra Trashy, we have to answer just one question.
Is Capcom out of their damn mind?
That's what we're going to find out today because we have just
received the official announcement that Capcom Cup 12
is officially going pay-per-viewfor the finals for both the main
Capcom Cup 12 Top 16 bracket andthe street for the League World

(00:21):
Championships. The final two days will cost
¥4000 each, or ¥6000 for the bundle to be able to watch these
events live, which is about $27.00 if you want to pick and
choose which day you want to watch, or $40.00 for those final
two days. And for those who don't want to
cough up the money to pay to watch this event live, don't

(00:43):
worry, you get the Vods for free.
A week later and this announcement was dropped out of
nowhere. On to the FGC.
And the whole community had a lot to say about it, US
included. So I'm back here with Idom and
we're going to breakdown. What the hell is Capcom
thinking? Is this a good play for Capcom
themselves? Is good for the community?

(01:04):
Is this benefit anybody? Is there a lot at the end of the
tunnel? It's is this a strategic move to
actually position Street FighterSix esports in a more positive
and sustainable manner? I don't know.
We're going to go ahead and get into it.
So Adam, did you have any initial reactions to this
announcement? Because I was left scratching my
head. The pay-per-view for Capcom Cup
is. It was very strange, but at the

(01:27):
same time I kind of get it. I was at Capcom Cup last year
and I have to say Capcom Cup last year was actually one of
the better events I've been to because there was so much
production and the arena was amazing, the fans were amazing.
So much stuff about Capcom Cup last year was done really,
really well. But that being said, if I didn't

(01:49):
qualify this year and I had to pay $40 out of my own pocket,
gotta get my wallet, get my hardearned cash out of my wallet and
pay $40, I don't think I could do it personally.
Whoa, one second there. We'll get right back to the
discussion about Captain cup going pay-per-view, but you know
the drill. I'm here to let you guys know
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(02:10):
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(02:32):
score. F OK, that's it.
Back to the discussion. Yeah, the price is kind of
absurd. So in the tweet announcement,
this is the weird thing about itis this was tweeted by Capcom
Fighters on you know, the CapcomFighters Twitter account, which
is historically an English firstaccount run by generally soon to
be the Capcom USA offices who have been the branch of the

(02:55):
Capcom company that has managed the community facing E sports
side of things. And so they they are much more
like boots on the ground of the community interface with the
socials run a lot of the tournament streams.
They're kind of been the the face of the E sports side of
Street Fighter Six and Capcom. And all it was was an

(03:16):
announcement about the schedule for Capcom Cup.
And then just saying, hey, by the way, now give us money to
watch this. No announcement about any sort
of changes to the production, any sort of change to the
format, any details about the rules around viewing this
experience. Just saying hey now to watch

(03:37):
this stream, which was every other year, every other Captain
Cup free and we're going back tothe same venue last year.
So there's an assumption of a very similar type of
broadcasting program. It was free.
Now you have to pay 40 bucks to watch it instead.
Or if you're in Japan, it's actually cheaper to go there in
person. The tickets to attend in person

(03:58):
are actually cheaper than the pay-per-view broadcast.
I mean, obviously you can cough up more dough for more premium
seats that have those options aswell.
So it just logistically or I would say optics, the optics of
it are horrible, horrendous because all it feels like to the
community is, hey, here's something that was previously

(04:19):
free, now we're charging you forit with no sort of explanation
or anything upfront like hey, we're giving away $1,000,000.
Our E sports division is doing rough.
Maybe we need to start generate sales and revenue.
Maybe instead we're going to be offering you a better broadcast
or we're trying to up the production quality.
Nothing, There's no information.This is one of the worst

(04:40):
announcements I've ever seen. So the initial reaction from the
community is entirely negative and everyone's just trying to
scramble to figure out what Capcom is thinking.
I think that's the worst thing about this is it seems so
bizarre to just put down such a harsh paywall and something that
was previously free that we can't understand the reasoning
behind it. And therefore it just leads to

(05:01):
confusion and anger. Because I mean, like you said,
you're hinting at like the scaleproduction of the show and you
were there in person. It's insane.
So maybe there is an issue of ofsustainability or being able to
actually support this kind of show with the returns they're
making from this this venture, which we'll get into more
details as we go on. But I think the big thing is

(05:22):
there's no communication about it.
Just a tiny tweet and suddenly you can't watch Captain Company
more. I, I have to guess they're
probably, I, to me, every E sport is losing money.
I don't want to get into the whole East West aspect of it.
And like, you know, you're just bleeding money.
But at the same time, to me, it's obviously the $1,000,000.

(05:46):
I think like the $1,000,000 tournament.
To me it's just like losing Capcom money.
Like I don't know why they're still doing $1,000,000 brackets.
Because after the first year Capcom, at least for me, I was
like, oh, first year SF6 will bea million.
After that, it'll probably go down to like back to 250 or
whatever it'd be. So for me, I just think they're
kind of using their money and kind of a wrong aspect or

(06:09):
they're not putting their money into kind of the right areas.
I feel. I feel like they're trying to
bring up other events as well. Like obviously they want Street
Fighter League to be big. They've been pushing Street
Fighter League Japan a lot, Street Fighter League US and
Europe is still farther behind. But I think they want Capcom Cup

(06:31):
in general to feel like a big show, like spectacle.
But Capcom Cup has always been, you know, obviously is a really
big tournament. But for many of us, it's just
like, oh, Capcom Cups on. Let me boot up.
I mean, let me turn on Capcom Cup and watch my favorite
players play. But now since it's behind a
paywall, you can't even do that.Yeah, I I think we can't ignore

(06:52):
the esports conversation here. That's entirely what this is,
man. I think we got to get into it.
And you bring up St. Fiddle, that's a good thing to
bring up. For context, this is not the
first time Capcom has gone with the paywall approach.
The first time we actually were introduced to this were previous
seasons of Street Fighter LeagueJapan for Street Fighter Six,
which they took the the playoffsand put them behind a paywall

(07:13):
that was done in Japan. And that was already like a
Japanese only sort of product due to the fact that it's, you
know, weekly the time zones. And on top of that, even before
that paywall went up, Capcom hadalready been exercising their
like copyright muscles and enforcing basically media

(07:35):
blackouts around St. for the Japan.
You couldn't restream it. They would.
They would threaten copyright takedown notices.
You couldn't even make content regarding it because if you use
matches in your footage for recaps, analysis, anything like
that, like normal things that people do with tournament
broadcasts in order to make sureactual proper transformative

(07:58):
content to discuss and, you know, analyze and promote those
events. That wasn't allowed to stripling
Japan. So in general, I think St. for
like Japan was already losing its cultural relevancy outside
of Japan because a lot of peoplefrom the western audiences rely
on content aggregators and content creators.

(08:19):
I would put like myself, like Broski, say jam whoever we, we
generally would be the ones like, Hey, let's highlight
something from this event and, and break it down Because the
Western audience for sure was not up at 2:00 in the morning or
three in the morning watching this four in the morning when it
airs. And they're not going to know
anything about these players or storylines or the plays.
But that was already limited. And then eventually they moved

(08:40):
on to putting the paywall aroundthe playoffs.
And they did that last last season as well.
And from what I heard it was around like $26 USD, very
similar to what the price is now.
It's around the same price for one day of the finals picking
either Kaplan Cup or Street Fighter League.

(09:00):
That one day price is like 27 bucks.
It was around the same price forStreet Fighter League playoffs
in the finals there. So if they were, are were
already able to pay Wall Street Fighter League in Japan and then
they're taking the same model and applying it to Capcom Cup,
to me that indicates that, hey, they've already found success or

(09:20):
some kind of indication that this is a viable model for them
to move forward. But I, I also kind of want to
take a step back and like, thinkabout why would they even want
to do this? Because what was the point of
esports? Like you, you said you wanted to
stay away from that. Dude, we have to get into it.
What was the point of esports? For the longest time it was to
advertise the game. Yeah, that that's like kind of

(09:42):
the main thing. That's what I think esports are
in general. Like you watch the highest level
of player, you watch other people play the game.
Obviously that can happen from not the competitive side, but
even then, if you watch, I feel like maybe so many people got
third strike because Daigo Perry, like that happens all the
time. And that to me is just the E

(10:04):
sports side of things. So I can't imagine how many
people or how many people I've met.
I know so many people who boughtShoot Fighter six because of the
first EVO when they saw MENA Rd.playing on EVO on the EVO
mainstage and they were like, oh, I got inspired watching
MENA. So that happens often.
So you have to think that that has to go into why they do
tournaments and E sports in the first place.

(10:26):
That was the initial model, right?
Like all this existed as first of all they were, it was a
prediction that maybe this wouldblow up and be so big that it
would become like the next NBANFL and there would be
returns with merch and things like that.
But the publishers always had a back up plan.
So the issue with these sports that it totally failed.
And the and the 20 tens was the teams that were franchising and

(10:48):
trying to be part of these leagues.
You know, celebrities were buying on teams.
Echo Fox, Ric Flair was, you know, all these Ric Flair.
Ric Fox. Yeah.
What E sports team was Ric Flairrunning?
Yeah, I would have. Listen, I wouldn't be surprised
if Ric Flair had his own E sports team regardless to
everybody. And their mother was trying to
get in on an E sports team back in the 20 tens.
And they all lost millions of dollars because they were paying

(11:11):
these franchisees spots to the actual publishers who are
running the E sports division. And the only one who like was
actually making a return on thiswas the publisher of the title
because the teams were paying fees to even be in the leagues.
And also on top of that, it's advertising their game.
People then buy the game or playthe free to play game, buy the
DLC, buy the costumes. They become part of the
ecosystem and it's all gravier for them.

(11:32):
And everyone else was losing money now.
So that was one side of it. The other side was the potential
for this to grow and merch salesand stuff, which never panned
down. That's why all the teams and
everything is collapsing. So that was traditionally what
the expectation for E sports wasfor a very long time.
So you have to imagine when did it change?
Like when did the expectation become, hey, we need to make

(11:54):
money on the E Sport directly separated from the product in
the sales? Because one of the interesting
points that I saw brought up andHi-fi tweeted about this, like
some Capcom revenue, they highlight the E Sports revenue
separate from the actual game sales.

(12:17):
And they say, hey, look at our division.
Our division for E Sports is losing like twelve, $67 million
USD per year. But how can you divide that from
the actual sales of the game in the DLC?
To me, it's a marketing write off.
So there seems to be some kind of structural incentive from

(12:40):
Capcom and their earnings reports where they're viewing
the esports division as not a leg of the marketing department.
They're viewing that as an actual separate entity that
should be making a profit on itsown, divorced from whatever
potential sales that may be generating.
And maybe they just don't have any way to track or understand

(13:02):
like how much this is making return on sales of Street
Fighter 6, the game itself, or any DLC with the game itself.
So I feel like there's a real big divide there where it's
like, oh wait, we need to make money on the product of the E
sports spectacle, Street FighterLeague Captain Cup on its own,
which to me seems stupid. I don't know, Like it's not

(13:23):
going to happen. It seems really dumb.
But yeah, it's kind of like thatwith every E sport though.
Like you don't really know the correlation unless like you're
putting like a time stamp. This guy happened to buy Street
Fighter Six right after Capcom Cup or this guy bought Street
Fighter Six right after Eva. You don't know, like somebody
could just buy Street Fighter Six because one of their friends
is like, yo, there's a pretty good game, you should get it and

(13:45):
then he buys it. So the correlation between
whether the E sport is doing it or, you know, somebody's random
friends just telling me to buy it is you can't track that kind
of stuff. So I don't blame Capcom and it's
very hard, but at the same time the E sport has to have some
sort of effect are it's it's something you can't track like

(14:08):
it's intangible. You don't know whether or not.
I would say there's probably ways they could do it.
I do I agree. I would I would think for
Capcom. I for sure don't think they're
tracking that. I'm not I'm not going to say
it's impossible though. I would say for sure this is a
result of them not tracking it. You don't think they could do
like DLC related? I mean, listen, we've even had
the the big problem with the community with this is just take

(14:33):
another step back and go back tothe original point about people
freaking out about the monetization.
I don't think the vast majority of the negative reactions we're
seeing right now, which do vary by communities, I do want to get
into that as well, is based solely on the fact that they are
being asked to financially support the Capcom Cup or Capcom
Pro Tour. I think there's a large number

(14:55):
of people out there who have some amount of disposable income
who are willing and maybe even eager to support the Capcom Pro
Tour because they are fans of the ecosystem, fans of the tour,
and they would like to support it.
And we've seen this done in the past successfully in other E
sports. The International for Dota, they

(15:16):
sell ADLC bundle that raises thethe capital for the prize pool.
Every year they raise millions of dollars across all these
years that been doing this tournament by selling cosmetics
and skins and things like that. And the fans buy it to fund the
prize pool. And Street Fighter 5 used to do
that. We had the CPT DLC bundles and
that was advertised especially in season 1.

(15:38):
That was heavily pushed in 2016 to where 30% of the sales for
that went to the prize pool for Street Fighter Five.
That's only when they did 250K, so they didn't break down
exactly the numbers of like how much they got out of that.
And I think they slowly started to not advertise that split.
It became less and less clear over time because they did those

(16:00):
those bundles for several seasons, I think almost all the
way through through the industryFighter Five.
But that model has existed. And I would buy the DLC for the
Capcom Pro Tour. They're crappy stages where they
would throw a bunch of random assets and, you know, there
would be like a bear there and like a random yoga guy, and it
would just be random character assets that they had in the

(16:22):
backgrounds of other stages put into one.
And it said Capcom Pro Tour on it.
I bought that because I just wanted to support the Capcom Pro
Tour. Yeah, the stage shops, but I
bought it. I feel like there were just a
lot of, you know, cool things that were also 'cause I remember
the the do rags that got costume.
That costume was sick. And yeah, even then you're just

(16:43):
getting. Like that was CPT.
Yeah, I was the CPT I'm pretty sure that was like the, that was
the 2018 or 2019 bundle. I'm not sure, but I remember I I
bought that one and that one wasreally cool.
You just got to have something cool to put into your product
really or just putting into likethe bundle.
I don't like isn't, I don't hatethe idea.

(17:05):
I just think the way they kind of threw it upon a was really
bad. Like, hey, you're paying $40.00
for calp golf like you said withthe Street Fighter five way.
I think that was probably the better way to do it, like ease
them into it. Right.
And it's only that it's $40. It's, it's, it's all or nothing.
And it's also, there's no regional pricing.
I think that's a big thing to take away from this $40 or ¥6000

(17:26):
is also very steep, even for theJapanese audience.
Where I, my view, I think the Capcom execs are thinking, hey,
we're trying to capitalize in the Japanese audience.
I, I, I talked about this on my stream.
I think there's only two realities where any of this
makes sense. Like me trying to B put the
shoes on at the Capcom execs here.

(17:47):
A they're thinking, you know what?
We've tried monetizing Street Fighter like Japan.
It was successful. The vast, vast majority of the
player base, the audience, and our our addressable market is in
Japan. I cannot stress enough how big
Street Fighter 6 is in Japan compared to the rest of the

(18:07):
world. I was talking about this on
stream. Some people are throwing numbers
at me, haven't been able to verify it.
They were suggesting that between 75 to 80% of the
concurrent player base is Japan right now compared to the rest
of the world. I believe is.
I believe you. Like I said, going there for
Capcom Cup, it's a whole different feeling.
I tell the story. I was, after I got eliminated

(18:32):
from Kop Kop, I went to Shibuya and or took the train.
There were so many people just stopping me.
I felt like a celebrity walking around Shibuya.
People were stopping me for pictures and all that stuff.
It's so much different. I've been stopped in New York a
few times, but like not as much as Japan.
Damn famous. I'm over here.
Oh shit, we got a celebrity on the show.
It's so different over there compared to in the States.

(18:55):
It really is that big and then also I always pull up the the
the viewership numbers of a lot of the pro players in Japan.
Kawano is getting between 250,000 to 500,000 views per
stream highlight videos Naro with his Jamie getting 120 two
100,000 views. Same thing with Tokyo.
Whatever all of the pro player content creators in their stream

(19:15):
highlights where they are doing things related to being a top
level player, discussing strategies, training, you know,
doing things in game like actually trying to get good or
talk about being good. You know what I mean like things
that are about the pro-life. Those are getting half a million
views per video, which is just shitting on the rest of the the
content creation scene for fighting games for the rest of

(19:37):
the world, or at least in America's.
So it's just the scale of it is so much higher.
So to, to reiterate what I was trying to say about the, the two
paths, I, I see for this one, maybe captain was saying, hey,
our audience is all in Japan. Let's hone in on that entirely.
And you know, we were trying to make this global push work for,
for a while. CPT started in 2020 doing the

(19:58):
World Warrior and that was the plan.
Originally in 2019, they were announcing the World Warrior.
We were trying to get the whole world involved.
But, and with Street Fighter Six, it's exploded in Japan.
Let's try to capitalize on this in Japan and focus on that
audience. And, you know, we gave our best
shot with the global thing. If you want to play some Street
Fighter Six, if you want to be part of this.
Time to learn Japanese, buddy. That's one idea, and to me

(20:19):
that's the thing that makes the most sense because the other
idea here is they expect this towork on a global scale.
They expect a portion of their global audience to cough up 40
USD to watch Captain Cup to makethis projection work because
they're going to lose a lot of viewership.
I'm sure they expect that, but they think that it's going to be

(20:39):
worth the trade off, at least inthe short term.
If they are including the rest of the world in that projection
that it's required to get sales,they're out of their damn mind
because the rest of the world isnot paying this.
And if that's what the Capcom execs thinks, they are dumb as
rocks. I'm sorry, that is stupid.
The rest of the world is not paying this.

(21:00):
They they culturally, the rest of the world is about that
piracy. They will bootleg this stream
and then for the rest of the world regions were 40 USD, 40
USD. People are saying that's like
1/3 of a monthly salary in otherregions.
Or like, you know, it's just like it's such an extreme amount
of money to certain parts of theworld and for certain people in

(21:21):
different economic situations and different regions.
It's just tone deaf. It's like insulting, like you
expect them to pay this much money.
You have an online qualifier forplayers from all over the world
and then when they when you givethem the spot to go to Captain
Cup, no one from their home country can afford to watch them
play. What are you doing?
What? What was the point?

(21:43):
It's to me, I also think it's it's kind of dumb because I
think Street Fighter 6 is also kind of big because even when I
was even when I was there, Blas had so many fans in Japan.
So even the Japanese player, like all the Japanese fans
aren't necessarily fans of the Japanese players.
Blas has a million fans. MENA obviously has a minute

(22:05):
million Japanese fans. So you're also kind of dividing
them. Obviously they would travel to
Japan if need be, but you're they're losing.
Japan might be losing out on just seeing them play, or maybe
they would feel less inspired because their regions are kind
of getting the short end of the stick because of how the CPT

(22:25):
pricing is going to work. Yeah, yeah.
The Japanese audience are mega fans of the players and the
scene. And I think that's why Capcom
feels like they're, they're emboldened to take advantage of
that. Like, to be clear, like that's
why it works. A lot of the reactions that we
saw from Japanese Twitter and even Chris F went over some of
these this morning. I was watching him doing some
translations. A lot of it is like, well, it's

(22:47):
not ideal, but if it's required or necessary to support the pro
tour, you know, there's a bit oflike, I would prefer this not to
be this way, but if it's I will contribute or participate
because I don't mind spending money on things I like.
And if it's required to help and, and Capcom needs this,
we'll be there for Capcom. That's a very general attitude
we're seeing. I think for me and you know,

(23:11):
shout us to the one. I have a Japanese fan on
Twitter. He he tweeted on my tweet and it
was like, I like that item kind of this is a rough translation.
I like that item complaints and voices and frustration, not only
about, you know, Street Fighter Six, but like the other
situations going on around the game or just with the CPT and

(23:32):
that he wishes more Japanese proplayers or Japanese, you know,
people would kind of voice theiropinions more.
But obviously that's not always a good thing.
Because we saw, I think that happened to Dogra, where Dogra
got fined one year for Street Fighter League because he said
the game's just mine and Bison or something, something along
those lines. So I, I get, I get why they

(23:54):
don't do it, but me too, like I feel like a lot of the Japanese
play it very safe is definitely a cultural difference because
you know, we're Americans and wejust, you know, we have
Americans complaining all that. We like to complain 1st and get
to the nuance later. It's a definite cultural
difference. I mean, but you're not wrong.
Like the the it's one thing for the fans to speak in a more, I

(24:16):
don't know, accepting or pragmatic tone, like, oh, we
will be there in support if it'swhat's required of us because we
like this sort of thing. But for the players, yeah, they
can't say anything if you're in Street Fighter League.
Dogra did get fined or reprimanded publicly, not just
for saying, oh, it was my adviceand but like he was playing
Valorant or something, Apex or something like that.
Yeah, they were like, oh, don't you need to practice?
Oh, don't worry. What do you need to practice

(24:38):
for? It's not that serious.
Like he was kind of making a joke, like brushing it off and
then he got fined for that. They had a whole giant.
They did the Twitter thing wherethey had the logo with the text
and a formal apology from his team.
And I'm like, what are you doing?
Like, no one would have thought about this if you just ignored
it, you know, like, why did you do the whole logo and text?
Like, we're so sorry that Dogra said that Street Fighter League

(24:59):
is not that important. It's the most important thing in
the world. How dairy.
So that does exist in Japan. So it's a very different
experience. I don't expect any top level
players from Japan to say anything, even if they feel one
way or the other. I don't expect any comments.
That's just until Daigo says something because he's the one
who can kind of gently nudge theculture in different directions.

(25:19):
And he occasionally speaks up about like the the shape of the
captain pro Torrel. He spoke up about the fact that
there's no point system which was decentivizing players from
traveling. He might be the person to have
to say something, but I expect nothing from anyone else on the
Japan side. But I do want to bring up here
Men are DS tweet which I thoughtwas very well worded, at least

(25:41):
the Grok translation. He wrote this in Japanese
because his intended audience was the Japanese community and
of course the Capcom E Sports division.
He said in the translated tweet.I find it hard to accept.
I understand that in Japan this is considered normal, and
fortunately the community is still able to support each other
in this way. However, in many regions,

(26:01):
including my own, there's hardlyeven the leeway to play this
game. No one should be deprived of the
opportunity to enjoy the pinnacle of Street Fighter.
I think it's still too early andI think this is a great point.
I think this goes back to the conversation of like the
economic realities of this saying that in his region,

(26:23):
there's not even a leeway to play the game.
I'm assuming it means something more like afford to play it,
have the means to have access toAPCA PlayStation, a controller.
You know, there's the the reality of economic differences
in different parts of the world,including access and then to
then at that point paywall the actual event to give that
inspiration to the next generation, to the next group of

(26:46):
Street Fighter players that could be on the come up is
extremely short sighted. So I think that's what he's
trying to tap into. I think it's he ends up with, I
think it's still too early, meaning like going for this kind
of paid product, it's it's not mature enough to be able to to
go for this. So I kind of agree with that.
I don't know if you feel the same way, because The thing is,

(27:07):
like some people might argue, we're being overdramatic because
it's available for free a week later.
But at the same time, nobody watches if, if I miss the NBA
Finals, if I miss the UFC fight,I'm not going to watch it a week
later. So I think that's kind of the
other other problem that's goingon.
But I think Mehta worded that really well.
But even for me, I just think I also think they can do this

(27:32):
because like you always say how big Street Fighter 6 is, if this
was for Street Fighter Five, Oh my God, this would be this would
be Capcom on fire. But the Street Fighter 6 is so
big. I think, I don't want to say
they're milking their audience, but you're saying they think the

(27:52):
the viewership's going to go down.
I think they're going to make more money for doing this than
they would even if they just, you know, spam the ads like
during the normal CPT broadcast.Even if it was just like
normally free. If they just put all the ads,
you know, ad limit on Max, they're not going to make as
much money as if they're charging people $40.00 for the.

(28:13):
Absolutely. Yeah.
To be very clear, like I mentioned before about the
different approaches behind an esports model, right, The the
original idea, or what many people were expecting, was this
is not even meant to make a return.
This is part of your advertisingbudget for the game.
So you make the return via game sales and DLC.
Well Capcom seems to be allergicto money because they cannot
figure out for the life of them how to make costumes.

(28:33):
Maybe I I people along speculated it's about the RE
engine. Like the the level of detail
it's required and the inability to work with the engine it's
causing issues. Maybe.
Maybe they just set too high of a quality standard.
Maybe they're just not putting resources to producing costumes.
They could make more money from from Street Fighter 6 by just
pumping out DLC. They factually could, and then

(28:54):
the E Sports Division could serve as the advertisement for
those bundles if they don't put out DLC.
What are they advertising? You're not going to sell
infinite copies of the game. A big part of that is to keep
the player retention to sell battle passes and cosmetics.
They keep doing battle hub avatar slop and some of that
sells. But like the people that are

(29:16):
watching a lot of the CPT events, they want costumes for
the characters dude. They want stages.
They want stuff that's going to be actually part of the main PvP
game mode. So Capcom is failing to to
provide the actual product to sell that they would advertise
for through the traditional model.
So then the other model would be, OK, we are an entertainment

(29:37):
product, right? Which is a completely different
mindset that we're selling an entertainment product.
Therefore we need to monetize the actual show, which is, which
is completely different. Getting a return on ad revenue
is I don't think people understand how much scale you
have to have how much viewershipyou have to have to start making
a return like that. The the reason that works for

(29:59):
events like the Super Bowl or World Cup and things of that
nature where they give it away for free is because they have
millions to billions of viewers.We don't have that.
It looks it looks like the scaleof a Super Bowl when you watch
Captain Cup 12 and the Ryu Goku Kokuki gun Sumo Wrestling arena
had a read that one and slowly pronounce each consonant there.

(30:24):
It feels like bigger than life. It feels like millions of people
are watching but that's not true.
It had like at top 320,000 viewers, which is amazing for a
fighting game esports event, butyou're not making a return on
$1,000,000 plus tournament for the prize pool.
People pulled up the stats for how much it costs to rent that
venue for the five days. That's going to be close to

(30:46):
$100,000 minimum just for the venue.
No Internet, no security, none of the actual logistics, none of
the employees working it, just the venue itself, $100,000 out
of the gate. That's probably going to crank
up like crazy. People don't understand that
even like in Vegas for example, we've heard quotes of like
100,000 just for Internet for the weekend as well, on top of

(31:06):
the actual venue fees. So and that's not even including
the fact that there's a whole tour leading up to this.
This is just the one event you're not making return on that
on Twitch ads like on YouTube running an automated ad on
Twitch running the ad, even the sponsors inside embed into the
broadcast. I think Suzuki's been sponsoring
right with this with the motorcycle, if I remember

(31:28):
correctly. And they have some other
sponsors that they're probably not make.
That's where the most of the money's going to come from those
embedded ads, those partners forthe event.
But I still don't think they're making a return on that kind of
money with with those numbers and how much they're investing
in it. So as if if they're trying to
pivot now from being the marketing budget for the actual

(31:50):
DLC and product to Street Fighter 6 to as completely
separate entertainment product that they're trying to be
independent and make a profit, they're forever away from that.
So from that perspective, I see why they're trying to like
quickly capitalize on the marketthey have and squeeze them for
all their money. And yeah, they might make money
this year if if Japan doesn't boycott this because I like I

(32:13):
said, I don't think anyone, I think this sales internationally
going to be garbage. But if Japan shows up and pays
for this, there's a chance this is the most profitable capital
cup ever because it'll be the first one.
They'll they would have out lostmoney if you isolate that year
after year doing this. But what about the next one?
What about the one after that? Where's the audience going to

(32:35):
come from? It's not going to be
international anymore, it's going to be Japan only.
I'm a bit surprised because yeah, I, I never really thought
of it like that, like the calm cups after, because everyone
would kind of lose interest at that point.
So yeah, they, they, they kind of, I don't want to say shot

(32:55):
themselves in the foot. They put themselves in a very
awkward situation with this kindof thing.
But from even what I actually think they were hoping people
would do, because me and my buddies do this, if there's like
AUFC fight, you know, we'll go to all like I'll go to his
house, you know, we'll get some wings, get some pizza, whatever
it might be. We all just watch the UFC fight
together. That's what I think they were

(33:16):
hoping people did in other country.
Kind of like is it is AUFC thing.
It's a pay-per-view. That's what I think they were
expecting. But I don't think I have 10
friends within a, you know, close enough radio that like
Street Fighter Six, enough to come to my house at 4:00 in the
morning, by the way, to watch people.
Play. To watch people play in Japan.

(33:37):
So that's what I think they're hoping, but I don't think
that'll work in anywhere except for like Japan.
Yeah. I think the second largest
market for Street Fighter is probably America and then maybe
Brazil after that. These are what I recall being
the biggest demographics outsideof Japan, and those are in the
opposite of the world time zone.So they're not going to be able

(33:59):
to watch it live most people. So they'd be paying 40 bucks to
watch the VOD alone. Yeah, you're going to watch the
Vaad alone, but even then, that's kind of where, you know,
your friends come in, you pitch in, you'd be like, hey, man, you
know, $40 is $40. But you know, if I have 10
friends, it's it's. Yeah, but it's $4.00.
They're not, it's not like you mentioned, it's not as

(34:22):
ubiquitous. It's not big enough in Japan.
They do these watch parties, right?
It works in Japan. Like I just feel like the
perspective is all about Japan because in Japan they've already
been doing watch parties for street for the League.
They sell the esports cafes actually sell tickets for people
go to watch their favorite team.They grab their noisemaker and
it has good 8 squad written on it and they go yay.
They watch the stream in the venue for their their individual

(34:44):
E sports Cafe where they play that and then they make their
clap their noise maker when Kiwano does a throw loop and
they go, whoa, yay, good 8 squador go, yay, pretty good crazy
raccoon. You know, whatever team is their
team. And that has been working Japan.
And but that's because it's thatbig and that ubiquitous.
And also Japan has the ability to walk around and go places
like just Japan is a different planet.

(35:06):
People are able to go outside and find places to actually,
there's third places that are affordable and you can do social
gatherings like that. That doesn't exist in most parts
of America, I would argue. And and the rest of the world,
it's going to be too niche of anattraction to really do that.
I think it was in the same time zone.
A few people would do a watch party and those will probably

(35:26):
still exist. But to the not to the scale.
If Capcom is really expecting this to work, not to that scale,
I highly doubt it. Like people are not going to be
paying 40 bucks to watch the thefucking VOD the next day.
And on top of that, Oh, go ahead.
No. No, no, I was going to say
that's kind of the main issue, the watching the VOD.
You, you want to see it live. But even for, you know, other

(35:46):
sports events, people in other countries watch the Super Bowl
live. They might stay up to like, you
know, 5:00 in the morning to watch the Super Bowl.
But even in their their perspective, it's only for one
day. So it's much different having to
watch Capcom Cup for like, what is it, 5 days and you got to be
up for 4:00 in the morning or five days in a row.
Yeah, most people probably can'tdo that.

(36:06):
Yeah, they would want to skip out on the group stages, maybe
just TuneIn for the top 16, the one that they're charging 40
bucks for. And on top of that, oh what?
No, no, no. I was going to say that
actually, kind of. Makes sense.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, and on top of that, for the
general cultural awareness of this, with this week long
blackout, you can't do any content creation, any recaps,

(36:29):
any media, Like what are they thinking?
Like, like the whole point of when the event ends is everyone
goes, wow, that was all amazing.We, we shared in this hype
moment together. There's a, a level of excitement
and cultural exchange and just like it being a moment in time,
social media is going off, Twitter's going crazy.
People are making recaps, peopleare highlighting different clips

(36:50):
and sharing it. It's meant to be a live cultural
moment that people participate in and that gets people the most
inspired and the most engage in the E sport itself, right?
And then including content creators like like because of
the fact that this is a different time zone, it could be
hard for people to catch up for that.
For example, last Capcom Cup, I did recaps every single day,

(37:12):
pumping those out every day so that the American audience can
catch up on what happened. Now you're not going to be able
to hear about anything or see any footage or have any of that
being leveraged to like highlight what happened doing an
analysis until a week later. And by that point, it's old
news. It's been spoiled.
You didn't get to see any of it and you just don't care anymore.
Like it just loses that magic and appeal.

(37:34):
So it's going to only hurt the cultural footprint of Captain
Cuff. That's that's the, it cannot
increase it. This is not increasing its
presence in the world, right? It's it's only going to hurt it.
So I just don't understand what the long term play here is like.
Is it really going to make that much of A return on investment
where they're going to be able to support this for longer?

(37:57):
So. And if so, to me, this means,
once again, this is Japan first like this.
This means that, yeah, maybe youstart making money, but you
become less and less relevant tothe rest of the world, and this
becomes a product for Japan only.
And then Street Fighter esports moves to Japan, which is the way
I feel like it's been going for a long time.

(38:17):
I've been, I've been, you know, I've been preaching this to you.
I and this is another indicator to me that it's time to learn
Japanese. I'm dead Seriously, if you're in
this industry for Street Fighter, if you're a pro player
content creator, get into this. Everything is pointing in this
direction and Capcom seems to bedoubling down on that.
So I wouldn't be surprised if ifthis succeeds.

(38:41):
It almost might be worse if thisdoes well.
Is what I think you're kind of hoping it kind of fails, but I,
I think there's ways I, like I said, I think the way they're
doing is bad. I do think there were probably
so many ways to make it better. I I'm even just trying to like

(39:02):
pit ball or brainstorm here. Say I don't know Capcom cups on
Crunchy Roll, I don't know Netflix.
And then like you're going through Crunchy Roll and you
know, you see Capcom Cup Grand Final was all in Crunchyroll.
You might actually, you know, TuneIn to watch it.
So there's better ways they can do it.
I just think kind of what MENA said, they're doing it too fast.

(39:24):
If I had to, I feel like if I could prepare for a Capcom Cups
to be the scale in like a 2028, they could do it a lot better.
But to do it do it so fast, it'skind of hard.
But I think they're also trying to capitalize on the Street
Fighter Six hype. And obviously everyone loves
Street Fighter Six right now, soyou might as well do it now.
It feels extremely short, short sighted like they're like oh

(39:45):
crap we need to make money rightnow.
Like this feels like someone woke up in a panic and just said
oh I'll make it 40 bucks I don'tknow, like it.
It just feels extremely short sighted 'cause it's also on a
Japanese pay-per-view service, which is why the prices are all
in yen, right? Just even even the optics of
that they tweeted out on the American account these
pay-per-view prices in yen. It already feels, I don't know,

(40:09):
man, it's starting to feel a little like, like they didn't
mention anything about regional pricing or anything like hey, go
to the Japanese website, which is already going to be a huge
issue because if you've ever tried to buy anything from a
Japanese website, that shit is. Almost impossible.
I mean, I try to get a restaurant reservation in Japan.
That was a 2 hour ordeal. Not just because of the
translation barrier, the language barrier, but just like

(40:32):
their web infrastructure, the way they do their websites is
archaic. It's insane.
So, and even registering for theCPT Japan premiere that I went
to, that was a mission. The mission have I had to get
FUBAR duck to bail me out. He had to use a second Japanese
phone number to to get an account on there for me.
We had to do a whole bunch of shit.
You get to you, you get your ticket online, then you go to a

(40:54):
711, you bring your QR code and then you print it out there.
It's really weird. So I predict a lot of issues for
anyone who actually even tries to go through with this going
through this service SPWN spawn,maybe I don't know what it
stands for. So who knows how that's even
going to play out logistically, if it's even going to work that
well for the international audiences who dare cough up

(41:14):
their money for this. But beyond that, I I just don't
see. I agree with what you're saying
as well, as well as what men is saying about it being too early.
But it's not too early to monetize.
It's too early or it's it's never the right time to exploit
your fan base. There's so many of us that want

(41:35):
to support the Capcom Pro Tour. I would love to buy the DLCI
would love to give Capcom my money.
They refuse to take it, but thenthey but then they do this,
which feels like a scumbag move.I don't want to give them 40
bucks for this pay-per-view. If they instead said, hey guys,
we're looking to make the CapcomPro Tour more sustainable, we

(41:57):
are going to be offering a partnered stream or a premium
stream here where you can pay more money for a few behind a
little bit of behind the scenes content or something a little
different. Whereas in the mainstream, we're
just going to be running ads. Like if they slowly started to
offer the separation of servicesand offer extra for those who
pay for it, things of that nature, Like I, I guarantee you

(42:19):
so many people would pay just because they don't even care
about the perks. They just want to pay because
they want to be. They want to support this whole
industry because they enjoy the show.
I would gladly pay for that. And people who have disposable
income and want to support wouldprobably also pay for that.
And then those who can't or don't want to support or don't
have the means to could just watch for free.

(42:39):
They this lack of communication just makes it feel like a cash
grab, like like they're just trying to exploit you.
It's just a horrific, just horrific optics from Capcom
here. Other other esports have like
more benefits from fighting games, like fighting is a very
limited, but like other esports in Overwatch that you could be

(43:00):
like, oh, do you want to pay extra money to see this guy's
POV of him playing Widowmaker orwhoever he's playing?
That's kind of like the downsidefor fighting games like paying
extra money to get Blas's point of view when you know Blas to
see what I was seeing on the screen anyway.
So it doesn't really matter. There's no point.
Capcom could have done that anyways, and I would be like, I

(43:22):
get what you're doing Capcom, but here's 5 bucks you're
struggling, you know what I mean?
They could have said, they couldhave said pay 5 bucks for Blas
POV. I'm like all right, yeah sure
Capcom, you need some help, don't you?
That million, I thought our price was expensive.
Here you go, I got you. But even like you're saying, I
don't think it would always workbecause even say if there was a

(43:43):
bundle, if it was like a $40 avatar slop bundle, but you get
that like AI feel like that is also kind of a slop in the face
a bit. Yeah, I mean, I think that would
piss people off. They'd have to price it more
reasonably, but I would pay. If they did a Capcom Pro Tour
avatar bundle, I would buy it ifthey told me, hey, this, this is

(44:05):
supporting the Capcom Pro Tour part of the proceeds or for the
pricing, whatever. If you make it, if they were to
present in a way of like you know, that your financial
contribution directly correlatesor impacts the community, the
players and provide some kind ofsupport to the the actual
community, people would be happyto pay that.
They would be happy to pay it. But this this, so maybe this is

(44:28):
that intention. Maybe this is well meaning,
like, hey, we have to do this tosupport this and make it
sustainable. But with the way they're
implementing it and the lack of communication, it completely
ruins any sense of goodwill and it's just dumb to pay wallet.
I just think this is the wrong way to go about it.
Like maybe they could have done a quality option, which is what
you know, that's what Canada Cupdid, by the way, 895.

(44:49):
I always bring that up lap. She was ahead of his time, man.
They pay walled the higher bit rates for Canada Cup.
So that was back in 2011, I think, and everyone memed on it
for for forever 895 back then. It's like 13 bucks a day now.
Now we're being charged 40 instead.
So just to get access period. So maybe Canada Cup was ahead of

(45:11):
their time, but even that would be better, right?
Like, hey, listen, we're doing something.
I, I still think that wouldn't go over too well.
I think people would still be pissed about that, but I
sympathize with the issue of trying to make this sustainable.
And I saw some critiques or people saying like oh Brian F
thinks that people must get used, must do pay-per-view, or

(45:32):
must cough up their money to keep this thing going or must
get used to it. I don't feel that way at all.
However, I do sympathize with the economic reality of the
scale of the E sports show has far outpaced any potential
return and Capcom has failed, inmy opinion, to make Street
Fighter 6A live service model and game.

(45:56):
They've absolutely failed. I don't know what I am shocked
with the level of content they put out of the past couple
years. And they used to be a talking
point I would bring up a lot. I I gave up, I moved on.
This is not a live service game at all.
I think, I think everyone thought when 6 was going to come
out that it was going to be freeto play because 5 was definitely
leading towards the free to playmodel, especially with the Zenni

(46:18):
to get your characters. So five had a.
Right, but then I guess 6 just Idon't know what happened.
I I always say this 6 was too good for his own good.
What do you mean by? That they I think since 6 is so
good, Capcom can kind of take advantage of all a lot of the
like I said, I definitely think the pay-per-view is because 6 is

(46:40):
amazing and what are you? What are you going to do?
It's it's a really well receivedgame.
It's so good in Japan. Why would I not take advantage
of, you know, people loving our game?
You're saying they're coasting now because in Street Fighter
Five they went into, they went into OverDrive on DLC and
patches and everything to fix the game over the years.
You could argue that, but also wouldn't you just say like, hey,

(47:02):
we have an amazing game with a ton of active players.
Why don't we keep putting out DLC to keep making money from
our active and engaged players? Like that would be the
reasonable thing to to to assume.
I I honestly think that either the management or the devs are
incompetent. I don't.
I don't see any other way aroundit.
I think someone is failing to make the costume.

(47:23):
Someone can't get the costumes done fast enough.
So I, I think, I think we have two different perspective.
You're, I think like you, you're, you're a child.
You got a A on an exam and you got the A and now that I got the
A, I'm going to go into the nextexam.
I'm going to get an A anyway, I'm cool.
You're thinking I got an AI should have got an A plus.

(47:45):
No, it's I got, I got $1.00. Now I can use that $1.00 to make
$2.00 and $3 and $4.00. It's not, it's not getting an A
and it's over. You want to have a recurring
active player base to constantly, you know, extract
wealth and money from. That's the whole point.
You capture the audience, keep them, capture captured, and keep

(48:05):
making money off of them. They don't stay captured anyway.
Capture doing what? Playing your game for free?
Driving up your server costs? That's a burden.
Having players that are playing your game without you selling
them anything costs you money. You are losing money until you
sell them something new. They're going to get a we're
we're going to get who's the next DLC?
Alex. Alex is going to come out
eventually. Like that's, that's the money

(48:27):
we're going to get, obviously sure, but Alex is going to come.
Out soon. It could be more.
My point is it could be more, but that is my point.
And cosmetics have been a provenway.
It's supposed to be a low effort, high return item and
they failed that. And I think that is trickling
into the issues with the E sports division because the

(48:48):
whole point of the E sports division is it's not a separate
entertainment product that's meant to make a return on its
own. It's meant to advertise your
game that has an active marketplace where you can buy
things as you like the game and keep the, the players, you know,
keep the, the player retention high through the excitement of
the E sport. Like there's a whole ecosystem.
There's, there's a unity there, right?

(49:10):
There's a symbiotic relationshipthat is falling apart.
And now for some reason it seemslike Capcom is treating E sports
like it's meant to be an actual sport.
Like, you know, the NBA doesn't exist to sell you basketball.
You know what I mean? Like, I don't go out and buy the
game of basketball. The NBA doesn't own that.
That is an abstract concept. I can ball a piece of paper and

(49:33):
shoot into a trash can. I'm playing basketball.
You know, NBA can't sell you that.
What they can sell is instead the the the merch, the ad
revenue, the eyeballs monetize the audience watching it.
That's an entertainment product.For some reason, it seems like
Street Fighter 6 is trying to goin that direction and we're not
there. We are not there at all.

(49:53):
So I think that's the failure here.
I don't think that's ever going to happen in any E sports.
Like actually, funny enough, I got a Diego shirt on, but you're
one you're a rare breed item to buy merch.
I wouldn't. I wouldn't.
I got this for what did I get this?
I got this for getting 3rd at east, for getting second at East
Coast third. So you didn't even, you didn't

(50:13):
even pay for it. That's a problem.
No one's buying merch. If we all bought merch, maybe
they're, you know, something would be different.
But yeah, I don't think anyone it's not as cool to buy like a
Daigo jersey instead of having like, a sports jersey.
At least boys jerseys are cool. Like, I'm the cool guy.
But if you have a Daigo jersey, who's Daigo?

(50:35):
Umahara. What does that mean?
Like yeah, I think that sounded just the difference.
We're we're a long way from that, But that that's that's my
view of like where this has failed.
I don't know. It just seems strange to me.
And like I said, I really wish they would have made an attempt
to monetize differently. So many people would want to
support the Capcom Pro tour and make this accessible.
And I can't stress enough how much of an issue this is going

(50:56):
to be for fans from around the world.
Like the example of Blas man, imagine being in Chile.
Blas is out there, you know, he made top 16 and you can't watch
his legendary run the grand finals until a week later.
He's already going to be home. He's like, hey guys, how'd you
like the show? And they're like, we don't know
yet because it's it's $40 and tocertain parts of the world and

(51:21):
to certain people, that's a ton of money.
It's an unreasonable amount of money with no regional pricing
it. It just doesn't make sense to
me. I think it's extremely short
sighted and they could do pay-per-view if they just made
an effort to to offer incentivesto do something, talk to the
community, be part of the community, like be involved a

(51:41):
little bit. Whoever made this decision and
in my view is completely divorced from the FTC, but like
no connection whatsoever. Just seeing numbers, seeing St.
friendly Japan projections and sales and trying to extrapolate
that to what's supposed to be the culmination of a global
circuit with global qualifiers from around the world, from

(52:06):
regions who might not be able topeople who might not be able to
afford this. And it just doesn't make sense
to me. So I don't know.
Do you have any, any other last thoughts or analysis on the
situation? Because I think I've exhausted
my talking points. I for me it's just Oh yes, and I
don't, I don't hate it. I do think they just did it

(52:26):
early. I don't hate the idea if, like I
said, if you did it maybe a few years down the line, it could
have been better. But also, I think for one thing,
people want to watch their favorite players and not being
able to watch their favorite players like Capcom Cup might,
you know, might suck. And then the other problem is I
could watch my favorite player and then he just gets throw

(52:48):
looped or knocked out of the tournament.
It's weird for fighting games because like I said, you never
even know how well or how good or bad somebody's going to
really do versus like in UFC, ifI want to watch, if I want to
watch a boxer or I want to watchsomebody fight, I'm going to see
them fight like they're not going to not fight like my my
favorite player, you know, blastmight get thrown without a

(53:09):
tournament and then I wasted $40.00 for what?
Yeah, but OK, you they might getknocked out in UFC or in a
boxing match in in 10 seconds. Like it can happen fast, but
it's also kind of like I guess in Street Fighter just feels
more shitty. Like it was kind of like, oh
damn, he got smoke versus I, I think, I think a lot of people
who do pay-per-view for these fights also feel like it's

(53:31):
pretty shitty when. They they get scammed, they get
scared. So in general, I think that's a
risk with pay-per-view in general that that can happen.
But yeah, fair, fair points. I do want to bring up some of
the conversation we had over at patreon.com/brian under score FI
went to the people to get their thoughts.
Someone or some of the thoughts here. 6 mil mentioned that he
they loved my take on having theBattle Hub, Battle Hub serve as

(53:54):
a way to watch the tournament. Isn't that strange that we have
the Battle Hub and it has that giant screen and people can't
watch the game in the Battle Hub?
That's one thing I was recommending as well is what if
it was pay-per-view? But if you own the game and the
game was on sale for 10 bucks, you know, and you can watch it
in game and have the virtual watch party, isn't that?

(54:16):
Doesn't it seem like that was the point of the Battle hub in
the first place? It's so funny because I thought
you could already do that. I thought that was legitimately
just a thing in the game. I was like, Oh yeah, Whenever I
thought it was like a Capcom Cupor EWC, I always just thought
you could do that. I didn't know that wasn't a
thing. Can you is?
It I don't, I don't think so. I don't.
You can watch battle hub tournaments I think, but that's

(54:38):
it right? I don't think you can watch.
They don't have any infrastructure from what I know
to actually like feed in actual CPT matches in tournaments.
That's that's what it should be for.
Yeah, that's what it actually should be for.
I didn't know that. I actually thought that was
already just a thing. If there was a big, big
tournament, obviously they're not going to stream like a like
a CEO or like, yeah, UFA. But it for like the major majors

(55:03):
like I thought they were going to do.
I thought they already did that.Yeah, it makes sense too.
And that, to me, also feeds intothe whole ecosystem.
You already bought the game, youget to watch the stream and it's
on sale for cheap. So if you want to get the game
as well to watch it. I mean, I I still don't know if
they should even pay-per-view atall.
But if at some point they go that path, that to me would be

(55:25):
something that actually at leastconnects the dots and you're
giving access to those who've already supported the game of
the community and then you give a Ave. for people to get into
it. So another missed opportunity as
well. Smoking C bias here says.
Personally I don't mind it beingpay-per-view.
It being $27.00 so just for top 16 is insane though.
Yeah aside from just pay-per-view the price point is

(55:47):
nuts. Why is it 27 bucks per day?
I don't think. To me, I guess the way I see it
is not terrible. Like if you go do something
else, like if you go to the amusement park, Brian, you're
paying way more than 27 bucks bucks and I think is that going
to last? The the CPT stream is going to

(56:09):
last more than you know me goingto the well, I guess the CPT
stream might be shorter, but it's way cheaper To me.
I feel like if you do anything in the world, if I go to, if I
go do something, it's going to be more expensive than me
watching. Yeah, but you're talking about
going to a plate. Like you're going to go bowling
and get a beer and a burger, dude.
Like, like, yeah, you're gettingfed and you're getting

(56:30):
entertained. Is this stream going to spit out
a pizza? What are you talking about dude?
OK, if I go bowling, if I go to a bar, if I go do anything like
outside, it's going to be more expensive than me watching CVTI.
Actually don't think the $27.00 is that bad personally.
It might be, you know, by I actually don't think it's that
bad. Maybe for, I mean, you're also

(56:51):
from New York. I mean, things are expensive.
Like I said, it's all it's all about a, it's regional pricing,
right? Depends on people who are
listening to this kind of like, what the hell are you smoking it
on? But it's, it's all regional,
right? Like $27.00 to certain people in
certain parts of the world is just an insane price.
I, I get where you're coming, where you're coming from and I
and pay-per-view through other entertainment products.
It's way more expensive. The other thing we didn't even
touch on is there's no announcement that the stream

(57:16):
will be different from the stream last year, meaning the
commentators still got to, you know, take a piss and eat a
sandwich, right? Like they're still going to be
downtime. The players have to swap out
with the matches. They're still going to be
downtime in ads, like no matter what, they're they didn't leave
the announcement. Like, hey, it's pay-per-view,
but we're up in the quality in between the matches.

(57:37):
We're doing exclusive interviews.
We have entertaining side media pieces like we we've really
stepped the game up. They didn't lead with any any of
that. So that leads me to assume it's
going to be the same quality. So you're paying all that money
for a stream filled with ads. I mean, I think the Captain Cup
stream was good for free, reallygood actually.

(57:58):
But for paid, I don't know if it's that good.
No, I don't think it was like itwas good for free.
It was great for free. Loved it it just they just
forgot to say that they're gonnado Justin Wong rock paper
scissors on stream. You know I.
I've that's what they're missing.
Now they can take my money. Capcom, you, you got it.
You got it. So Lucas Francesca here says the

(58:21):
biggest tip for me is that this whole thing is the inability to
make derivative content about the event until a week later,
highlights, reactions and all issuch a big part of it feeling
like we're all a part of the spectacle even though we weren't
there. Yeah, there's going to be
fallout from this. It's not just the event itself,
It's all the buzz around it. It's going to be crickets.
There's going to be like one or two dudes like, wow.

(58:43):
Like on Twitter. Can you believe that?
Like, normally when like something hype happens during
Capital Cup or Eva or whatever, you can just, you see something,
you refresh Twitter and all you see is LMAO.
Or like, Oh my God. Like, you know, it's, it's just
associated with the time. You know what they're reacting
to. You're part of it.
It's almost like an extended chat that's gone and then also

(59:04):
the buzz and discussion after for a whole week.
A week is so long dude. Yeah, it's, it's just a missed
opportunity. Like you're gonna miss like, oh,
X player did something sick or you know, the, the common one
after a tournament. Oh, I always knew X character
was broken. That's that's always my favorite
so. That's the fun, yeah.
Yeah, that's that's part of the the fun stuff of watching

(59:26):
brackets law. Yeah, yeah.
So I think they're they're missing huge opportunities here,
but I'm curious what the people think.
This has been an ongoing conversation on Twitter.
A lot of the Japanese reactions we've seen have been a lot more
accepting. I think we need to find a way to
bridge that gap because I think this is going to my prediction

(59:46):
is this is going to be an ongoing trend with Capcom and
Street Fighter and unless this blows up in their faces, the few
got outcomes either this is extremely successful and in my
view that means that they're going to triple down at this
point on making Street Fighter aJapan focused product and E
sport alone and goodbye Street Fighter league USA, goodbye

(01:00:08):
Street Fighter league EU. You want to get part of the big
leagues? Time to learn Japanese, get on
over there, qualify for Captain Cup in Japan or it blows up in
their face and they never do this again.
Or it blows up in their face andwe don't have a Captain Cup next
year. I don't know.
I think I feel like this is the precursor to dramatic changes.
Either way. Maybe I'm being dramatic, but I

(01:00:30):
feel like big things are going to shift after this.
I don't know if you feel the same way.
I don't. Hey, I don't know.
I've been saying this since the first year.
The right answer is I actually just get rid of the million.
They shot themselves in the footwith a million thing.
I think if they got rid of the million, it didn't like me.
I don't want to say cut back, but if they fixed a lot of
things that they're doing with the Pro Tour, I actually think

(01:00:51):
this they wouldn't have to charge for pay-per-view.
Yeah, I think the million I, I also think the era of the
sticker shock of the $1,000,000 price pull is over.
Yeah. First of all listen SNK is doing
1.5 million for city of the wolves like it's over dude.
Like we've seen if that was the driving force to getting people
to pick up your game and to scare about your E sport, then

(01:01:13):
Essence then City of the Wolves would be the most popular
fighting game of all time. It did not work.
I think, I think that has provenit.
Like cap was like we're gonna doa million, yeah, we'll do
fucking 1.5 baby. And they have negative players
right now, dude. Like it's not it doesn't work
that way. And I think at this point
Normanies are numb to these prize pools.
It's already been done. 4/9 didn't even more larger prize

(01:01:35):
pools. That's that sticker shock is
over. And I think if you knock down
the 1st place prize, which it should never have been that high
or at least the price split should never had been that the
extreme yeah second place gets 100,000, first place gets a
million and 7th place it's like 5K that's stupid it's insulting

(01:01:56):
yeah. I think that's horrific that
price split. So they need to drop first place
like 3 do like the esports WorldCup split.
If anything like 300K for 1st 2:50 is A to 300 Ki think it's a
solid 1st place prize where it'sserious fucking money, people
care about it, and then you can you can lower the overall price
pool and still bump up every other placement.

(01:02:17):
They they could really save a lot of money.
They can save at least $500,000.I think it'd make everybody
happy. They could honestly cut the
entire like the entire budget because what, it's one point
like 187 million, that's the total amount of money in the CPT
right now. They could probably knock that
to like 600700K. And I still think people would

(01:02:40):
like be happy just a qualifier and like, yeah, just that first
place get like 300K and split itway better.
Yeah, yeah. I think that's a big mistake on
their part to keep that up. I, I, I do agree with you that
it should have been the first year and they should have backed
off from that because if anything, I, I always am a
proponent of making things more sustainable, support more

(01:03:01):
players. Giving one guy $1,000,000 does
not help the scene. I'm sorry.
It just doesn't. Like, you need to, you need to
distribute the pricing and create an ecosystem for
sustainability. So in that sense, like I
understand Capcom looking for answers, I think they're looking
for answers in the wrong place. I want this to be sustainable.
I'm not against paying for entertainment, I'm not against
paying out of my own pocket to support the things that I enjoy.

(01:03:24):
And I think there's a lot of people out there that are
willing to do so. But you got to approach it the
right way. You got to be in tune with the
community to be understanding ofdifferent socioeconomic status
and where people are. And you can't cut off access to
the pinnacle of what it's all about.
You have this global tour to inspire people from around the
world, and then you want to deprive them of the ability to

(01:03:46):
see that payoff at the very end.It's almost a little like cruel.
I don't know. It just feels like, like, it's
like a tease the whole way. Like, why did you even have the
qualifier in these regions? And then those players can't see
the representative or be able toeven afford the representative
to watch a representative compete on the world stage.
So I really hope Capcom figures this out and I'm hoping for a

(01:04:08):
sustainable future. This makes me question what's
going on with the world of E Sports even more than I already
do. Things have not been looking too
healthy lately, but we'll we'll move forward and see what Capcom
does next. I I'm hoping for an announcement
of some nuance and some changes on these pricing models and

(01:04:28):
hopefully Capcom adds more context what's going on.
And if not, we'll see if we havea Capcom Cup next year.
Anyways, I think it's a good place to wrap up.
That's all I got for this one. Any final words from you?
I don't for the people. You know Capcom just needs to
make more Chun Lee costumes. Facts, facts.
That's something we can all agree upon.

(01:04:48):
All right, Capcom, you got the message here.
All right, we'll wrap it up there.
Thanks for listening, everybody.Peace.
Hey, you made it to the end of the episode.
Thank you so much for tuning in to Extra Trashy.
If you're watching on a video feed, either on YouTube or
Spotify, the names you're seeingon the screen scrolling past you
right now are the names of our Patreon supporters over at
patreon.com/brian under score. F this show including Trash Talk

(01:05:12):
and Extra Trash Trashy. It's possible due to their
support. So we wanted to take this time
to give a very special thank you.
I also want to personally thank our landfill members Chuckle
Chuck, SBO, Hasterith, Jonathan Ayala, Kelly Lyles and smoking
sea bass. Thank you so much for supporting
the show and thank you so much to everyone who tunes in to
Extra Trashy and Trash Chuck. We'll catch you in the next one.

(01:05:33):
Peace.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Capcom is charging $40 for Capcom Cup. Now what? | Extra Trashy