

Joey "Mr. Wizard" Cuellar founding member of the Evo Championship Series

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Miis At Evo 2015?​

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Will We See A Mewtwo Take Evo 2015?​

Thousands at the Melee finals chanting "ONE MORE YEAR" sending a message to Nintendo that they want this back next year. 130,000 watching. — Andrew Groen (@GroenNdrew) July 14, 2013



The First Arcade Game At Evo Since 2003​

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Yesterday the ruleset for for both Ultra Street Fighter 4 and Smash for Wii U were both given updates on the Evo rules page . There has been a lot of discussions on the Evo ruleset for Smash Wii U. Joey "Mr. Wizard" Cuellar, founding member of the Evo Championship Series, has done his best to explain and debate some of these ruleset choices via his Twitter account but there is only so much you can say in 140 characters. I reached out to him on Twitter and he said he would be open to an interview for Smashboards. So the two of us sat down and talked so he could help better explain to the community some of the choices behind the Evo 2015 Smash Wii U ruleset and talk a bit about Evo itself.: Hey Joey, just wanna thank you again a TON for this opportunityIts not a problem.: Alright, I'll start with the ruleset questions and we can move into the more Evo related stuff since I know people will love to hear about it as well. First Question: Was the Apex ruleset very influential in how you picked your rules? If not, where did you draw the most inspiration in crafting the Evo ruleset?: Most times I like to just go read the forums or Facebook posts about stuff to get a general idea. I find when I get advice from people they try to push their agenda on me, so I try to avoid that whenever possible. The ruleset was mostly from APEX. We had to do some minor tweaking with the timer, but other than that, its mostly APEX's rules.: On the subject of the timer I know you have discussed this before on Twitter, but could you go into the reasoning behind choosing 2 stocks 5 minutes as the format for Evo? There are many people who have wanted the timer expanded to six minutes or more and some who even want a 3 stock 8 minute ruleset, saying that a larger timer would result in less timeouts, and that with rage in effect 2 stocks may not be the best format for Smash Wii U. What could you tell them to explain your decision?: 2 stocks, 5 minute matches are what most people are playing online right now. APEX was 2 stock 6 mins, but with Evo being as big as it is, and not having a cap, it could end badly. A person who camps in a 6 minute game is just going to camp 1 minute earlier in a 5 minute game. Players always seem to want more lives, more rounds, more everything, but in a tournament like Evo, its just not feasible. If every game went to time out at Evo, that is already 15 minute matches.: Would you consider changing your position if somehow hard evidence was shown to the contrary before the rules finalization date, or is the timer set in stone?: Nothing is set in stone until March 27, 2015. The problem is, its pretty hard to prove either way that a certain timer is better. Even an extra minute in a 1000 man tournament adds the possibility of 1000 extra minutes, which is roughly 16 hours. I'm not saying it would come to that, but that certainly is a scary thought logistically.: On from timers and into another frying pan, custom moves. I know that the community is slightly divided on the issue but it seems many people are very excited to see them at such a prestigious tournament. A large concern for many players is the logistics of having custom moves unlocked on consoles. What are the current logistical plans for customs at Evo? Is it something like the Custom Moveset Project created by @ Amazing Ampharos with predetermined combinations, will you actually be able to have each move unlocked on every console before the event, or is it something else entirely?: We use the game consoles that APEX used. They have all the Wii U consoles stored, and whatever the current decision is on March 27, 2015, we will relay that information to Gaming Generation, and get them all on the consoles in time for Evo. We plan to use whatever custom ruleset the community wants, and it seems @ Amazing Ampharos is leading the charge in that regards. I would head on over to that thread on SmashBoards and give input so that everyone can be happy.: On the note of customizable things, what is your stance on Mii legality at the event? If they are legal, will they have any sort of size restrictions placed on them or be required to use guest Miis?: I would have to do more research on Mii's. I dont know enough about that to make a informed decision. We don't allow anything being loaded to the console during tournament play, so if it can be accomplished beforehand, then it will probably be allowed.: Guest Miis all have the same default size to my knowledge and are all preloaded onto the machine allowing them to be used to make a Mii with custom moves in maybe 20 seconds or less for those that use them. Is that something you think would work?: I dont have an answer at this time, we will look into it. But anything adding more time to a big tournament is frowned upon.: I checked and learned that Miis ARE covered in the custom moves project so that would eliminate the problems I even asked about earlier as you would have Miis preloaded and selectable just like every other character. With that being the case are Miis probably safe to stay or do you still want further research?: That would all take more research. I have to understand why someone would want to use a Mii over a normal character and what the advantages/disadvantages of using a Mii are. Once more research is done, we will have an answer.: Alright, I wont bother you on it any more, just wanted to be thorough! Well we've talked about the characters and what they can do, how about the places the fight on. You have also previously discussed how the stagelist is locked in for Evo. While we've seen the stagelist can shift around having more or less starter stages, you said no more stages could be added to the list stating that “ Nintendo has stated we can only use certain stages in the tournament, and its locked in via the license “ and “ it has to do with licensing of music ”. Could you elaborate on that further?: Without getting into specifics to violate the NDA, we were asked what stages we wanted to use for tournament play, and we gave a modified list of stages (based off of the APEX rules). From that list, we were told what was OK and what wasn't, and then locked it in via the license.: Are we allowed to know the list of possible stages you gave to them to choose from, or would that violate the NDA?: That would be a violation of the NDA.: Would Omega Stages possibly fall under these rules for which stages can and cannot be selected, and what rules do you have planned regarding Omega Stages for Evo?: Omega stages are currently banned at Evo. The whole purpose of them putting in Omega stages was to make all stages tournament viable. The problem with this option is that the music belongs to other IP's. Most of the time when music is licensed, it is done for personal use, and not for public consumption. If we really wanted to use those stages, we would have to obtain a separate license from the company that holds the IP for broadcast. It's not worth all that trouble, so we will just play with what we have.: I never realized the music itself could be such a problem. In your opinion could things like this end up affecting others who are streaming be it small streamers just showing games or other large upcoming Smash nationals?: That's up to the companies that own the IP on the music, and if they want to pursue it. I don't think they would go after the small guys, but you never know.: This seems obvious now but just to be sure, with these rules in place does this mean the usual gentleman's clause that allows players to go to any stage whether it is legal or not will not be allowed due to possible streaming issues, or are gentleman's picks to non-legal stages still a possibility?: We have to enforce the license at all times. If someone chooses a non-legal stage, and then that match gets uploaded somewhere, Evo could be liable for damages and compensation. We can't allow any such agreements to take place at the event.: Only one more stage related question! Some folks have wanted to remove the starter and counterpick distinction all together and just have one large list to strike from to start a match. This is commonly known as FLSS or Full List Stage Striking. There have been many arguments on how this could be a better system for Smash stage selection, was this ever considered for Evo? If not, could it ever be put up to consideration?: We could definitely do that. We are only limited by the stages in the available pool, and if its just a matter of moving them all to starter stages and then striking from there, that would be acceptable.: A lot of people would be very interested and excited to hear that! Just a few more tiny ruleset questions and we can get to the fun stuff about Evo. If Mewtwo is released before Evo, would he be legal at the event, or might that depend on other circumstances?: If Mewtwo is available to the public at large via DLC without having to own both 3DS and WiiU versions of Smash, then he will be allowed. If its locked only to people that own both, he will be balled. Mewtwo also has to be available within a reasonable time period after release and not a timed exclusive.: The ruleset currently seems to state that all games will be best two out of three. Will that rule carry over to finals as well, or will they get the best three of five treatment?: The Evo standard is everything is 2/3 up until grand finals. Grand Finals is the only 3/5 matchup. We might change top 8 to 3/5 like we did last year, but we have to look at time constraints of the tournament. As you remember last year, Melee was changed to 3/5 weeks before the event. Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is the only game at our tournament that has 3/5 the entire way.: That's a prefect time to transition into some Melee! A lot of people were seriously excited to hear both Melee and Smash Wii U would be at Evo this year, could you tell me a little bit more on what lead you to the decision to have 2 Smash games at Evo in an already massive lineup?: It was not a easy decision. We debated the inclusion of both Smash games for around 4 months, going through both pros and cons of each game. In the end, we didn't want to disappoint dedicated Smash fans, so we decided to do both. This will either be the best Evo or the worst Evo ever. Hopefully the best!: Out of curiosity, would you be willing to share some of those pros and cons, or might that be a bit much?: Some of the stuff includes, do we have the space and time to pull this off, will it be exciting, will there be a lot of player crossover, are people even playing this game, etc. Alot of thought goes into it, so its never a easy decision.: What's the chance at #OneMoreYear? In other words, what would it take for either Melee, Smash 4 , or BOTH to possibly return again next year?: We need to keep focus and only worry about the upcoming year's event. We will have to evaluate how this year goes, and then move on from there. The easiest way is to support all scenes at Evo and don't act in a way that would make your community look bad. Everyone is at Evo to have a good time, and they are all there to enjoy fighting games. Keeping it positive is the easiest way to show Evo that you support things that we try and to make it easy for us to want to have you back in the future.: A lot of the Smash community has wondered what a big name like Nintendo could bring to our strong grassroots community, and seeing how there has to be a lot going into Evo with you have two Smash games can you make any comments as to what they have provided to make Evo a better event?: The partnership of Evo and Nintendo is bound by the terms of the NDA. I will say however its not what most people think.: Alright, more on terms of Evo itself now What are you most excited about for Evo 2015, and what is the thing you worry about most?: Three things I am most excited about. Number one is if we can pull off 9 games in this day and age. A lot has changed since we last tried 9, so it will be interesting to see how it pans out. Number two is we are trying an arcade game, which hasn't happened since 2003. This is super exciting having the new Tekken at Evo, so I hope it goes well. Number three and the final thing is Marvel. I love me some Marvel!. The thing I worry the most about is logistics of the event. Trying to pack all of our fans into a space is always a challenge, and having everything finish on time without having any major problems is my biggest worry.: I'll be sure to fix that up, and I gotta say I too am looking forward to Tekken, it was probably my first fighting game so seeing it like that is going to be sweet! If someone wanted to really step it up and start hosting a large national or international event for Smash or any other fighting game, what advice would you give them?: #1 concern is getting enough space to house the event. With the smash community showing no signs of slowing down, space is a real concern. Especially with all those darn CRT's!: The CRT's themselves aren't easy either from personal experience, how are you managing to grab enough of those? Maybe there's some savvy tip a new TO could use!: There is a nice gentleman by the name of Arian, who is SoCal's supplier of CRT's. He was nice enough to supply Evo with CRT's last year and drive them to Vegas. Hopefully we can get him again this year to do the same.: Good connections then! That actually leads up to my final question perfectly. If someone really wanted to get involved and help the Evo team at the event is there any way for them to do so so they can support such an awesome event?: We are always looking for volunteers to help run the brackets. Around April we put up an application for judges for the event. That is the easiest way to help us out. Stay tuned to Shoryuken.com for more information regarding that. As for other stuff, we have a pretty dedicated staff that handles all the big stuff, so we got that covered!: Alright man! I gotta say again thank you SO much for this interview, it means a lot to me and the Smash community to get to hear your in depth thoughts and it's awesome you took the time out of your day to answer all of these questions. If you'd like any last words or to give some shoutouts I'd be happy to hear them!: See you all at Evo!I want to say how much of a pleasure it was conducting this interview as Joey was an awesome guy to talk to. If you're interested in him hearing your thoughts you can find him on Twitter where he has been very open to discussion on the Smash Wii U ruleset and Evo in general. If you want to chat with me I'm always available on Twitter as well ! Thanks to all that read the interview, hopefully this can help you understand the thought process behind the Evo 2015 ruleset while helping answer some of the questions you may have had. Let's all get excited for Smash at Evo 2015!