With EVO 2015, fighting games are more hype than ever before

Evolution 2015 (EVO 2015) is the self-proclaimed “most prestigious fighting game tournament in the world.” With the spirit of the crowd, the large diversity of games and multiple streams (4 streams simultaneously on Twitch.tv), it is hard to argue.

With thousands of entrants for each game and a peak concurrent viewer count of over 200,000 on Twitch, EVO 2015 was bigger and more hype than ever.

Get hype and watch the grand finals matches here:

Ultra Street Fighter IV
Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3
Smash Bros Melee
Smash Bros 4 WiiU
Mortal Kombat X
Guilty Gear Xrd
Killer Instinct
Persona 4 Arena
Tekken 7

What is EVO?

EVO, or Evolution is the biggest fighting game tournament in the world. Held in different spots in Las Vegas, EVO got it’s start in 2002. Back then, it was a smaller tournament for strictly Street Fighter II and other Street Fighter titles.

What boosted the series to the popularity it has today? You need not look further than the Street Fighter III: Third Strike grand finals match during EVO 2004. In this match, Justin Wong (still one of the game’s big competitors) launched a full-scale attack with Chun Li. Daigo Umehara countered every blow with Ken and then came right back to win the game and later, the tournament.

Don’t believe the hype? Watch it below:

While Street Fighter is still the primary focus, other games have joined the ranks as well. A couple of games from the Super Smash Bros series as well as other popular fighting games like Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 have since been included.

EVO 2015 Payout Information

Interested in making a career out of playing video games competitively? E-sports are getting bigger and bigger as each year goes on, but the prize pool is still fairly small. Unless you are playing one of the larger payout games like Street Fighter, it is a tough life.

To put it in perspective, Smash Bros. Melee had the biggest recorded payout in it’s history this year. Only $11,000 went to the first place finisher. Other games fare better, like Street Fighter IV, where a significant amount of money — $50,000 — is contributed by the game developer.

The standard prize distribution is the same for all games. $10 from each entrant in a game goes towards the payout. Once the top 8 players are crowned here is how the money is divvied up:

First place gets 60% of the winnings
Second place gets 20%
Third place gets 10%
Fourth place gets 4%
Fifth and sixth place get 2%
Seventh and Eighth place finishers get 1%

Think about that. With the above Smash Bros example, the eight place finisher gets $180. Not a lot of money, but then it doesn’t seem to be about the money with fighting games. It is about friendships, rivalries, and hype.

With that in mind…