Nintendo Clearly Hates Tournaments and Wants Them Dead
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Nintendo has given the community some new guidelines for running tournaments. The major takeaway is that they want the community to stop running tournaments.
Here's the Good Vibes Gaming video breaking down all the new guidelines:
• Nintendo Is Killing To...
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such an awesome comment...
no
@@based980 There's more...
The Arlo community is epic. The internet is toxic. Nintendo wants a way to protect its brand, and if you read the comment section of most channels you can see there is a plenty to protect a brand from. 🙌
So... how about hosting a gaming tournament that includes games other than Nintendo games? The "Nintendo tournament" can still be restricted to 200 participants, etc. Hungry people can get food at the "Microsoft tournament" across the hall. They can buy merchandise at the "Sony tournament" upstairs. Etc.
Nintendo further cements it’s legacy as the grumpy old man screaming at the kids to not play smash bros melee on his lawn
No, no. They can only play it _on_ his lawn!
@@brandonquist8394 that is actually a more apt analogy lol
Arlo is no different
@@brandonquist8394with his rules,and his rules only.
Do those kids know anything about the smash community having p3dos and predators behind the scenes?
The rule against third-party equipment stands out as the worst to me. Many long-time smash players have pretty severe hand problems (arthritis, carpal tunnel) from playing competitive smash and third-party accessibility fight pads allow them to play again without significant pain.
yowch
Sing me the song of your people. Lmao.
Yep it screws them over just to keep people from playing melee. Since, you know, good luck trying to find a 20 yo original controller that still works.
@@espinozamarko6118I have one! It’s amazing!
@@espinozamarko6118 That would screw over the entire scene evenly. The tournament standard (in many places a requirement) is to use GameCube controllers for all smash games because they are wired.
Nintendo is a lot like Disney - I have nothing but respect for the creative folks, but as a company they're consistently infuriating
Disney is even worse. Well nowadays yes. They’re upsetting fans AND not making good content AND losing money
@@sahaprocks7751yeah Disney is leagues worse
Id make the same comparison a decade ago but in recent times? Nah or at least it's not nearly is similar in terms of their perception/image
At least they're better than Disney and they don't let their brands go into the wrong hands that can easily affect the brands just like the delusional smash community with a bunch of lousy 35-year-old neckbeards that are p3dos and predators and rapists behind the scenes
Which is why I'm still boycotting everything Disney. And Warner. And Nickelodeon... I can't in good consciousness platform their content by watching it even for free, let alone go and give them money in a subscription.
Just don't pay people in money. Give them Pachinko balls and then, after the winner gets the Pachinko balls, conveniently have someone in a building next door offer to buy said Pachinko balls off him/her in an amount that would, coincidentally, coincide with how much money they would have won originally.
You forgot a step.
Trade pachinko balls for plushies, sell plushies to the convienance store. Store sells plushies back to pachinko parlor. Rince, repeat.
yeah that’s not how it works
except that’s EXACTLY how it works in japanese pachinko parlors
Honestly TO's could just donate the prize money to the competitor's twitch stream/youtube channel/etc. Impossible to prove that the donation wasn't just a normal streaming donation. And what consistently performing tournament player doesn't have some type of streaming platform.
big brain time!
If Nintendo has the ability to shut your event down anyway, even if you follow all of the rules, just because they decide they don't like it, then there's absolutely no incentive to follow any of the rules
I'm not convinced they even have the ability to shut anyone down. EULA's are not legally binding and while they can threaten all they want, it's certainly not clear that a legal challenge of this nature in attempt to shut down a tournament would even be successful. Perhaps the threat of going to court would be enough to scare most tournament organizers to back down, but calling the bluff and agreeing to go to court may also cause Nintendo to back down. The last thing they want to do is lose a challenge like this in court and then have it be confirmed that they have no legal right to shut down tournaments.
@Il_Exile_lI The problem is at least in most of the US, there is noting stopping Nintendo from sueing you into bankruptcy even if there in the wrong due to how much some of this stuff is worth protecting to them. They, for a long time, have not been very friendly to anything 3rd party or anything they can't control. People are still upset, no classic poekmon games are on NSO, mostly because there prob going to be paywalled to oblivion for the Switch 2 at launch and they wonder why they have such an emulation problem.
@@Il_Exile_lIedit: mind you, I would much rather have the pokemon games separated vs just on nso... but I just have a bad feeling something greedy is going to happen.
Yeah that final clause makes this whole thing pointless to follow.
Its a joke honestly
@@Il_Exile_lI Ah, good ol' capitalism and its monopoly on violence to attain compliance heh
I appreciate you using a knife and fork.
Rather than having crumbs flying all over the place, as certain other blue monsters tend to do.
😂
Not naming names of course
May be a monster but he's not uncivilized
I'm not sure who you're talking about I can only think of a green one but I think he doesn't create crumbs because he's a vegetarian.
Great at the chewin', not so hot at the swallowin'.
Which is funny considering they literally featured a tournament in the Switch reveal as a selling point. Guess they changed their tune
(Edit: I know they were always anti tournament it just wasn’t as front facing as it is now)
they never did, they have always been like this
Well of course. They sold it too you now.
One thing to keep in mind: that was made to look like an official Splatoon 2 tournament.
@@JohnHPVwell yeah I know that I’m just pointing out the irony of them showing a tournament in the trailer and then doing this
These new guidelines aren't that drastic. They only apply to non for profit organizations that don't have a license.
It’s oddly comforting, in a terrible way, that even during the good times where Nintendo releases Mario Wonder and TOTK and tons of awesome remakes, that we can always be sure they’ll pull stunts like this.
It’s like that neighbor who’s really mean when you were a kid is still mean 20 years later. Like it sucks, but at least it’s familiar.
I don’t think that’s comforting at all. It means it’s unlikely they’ll ever change. They’ve been this way for so long, too long.
It's more like that kid that made amazing presentations in school but was an absolute prick to you is now a successful CEO who oversees lots of projects you consume in your day-to-day life, and is still an asshole.
...So, Mark Zuckerberg, come to think.
How is something comfortable is a terrible way?
Ugh.... well no company is perfect.
@@Nonmoth It's predictable.
I'm curious, what would happen if you just ignored the guidelines? Would Nintendo just come to your tournament and turn everyone into newts or something?
Most likely corporate Lawyers descend on normal people like locusts.
Tho considering it has happened before a goon squad of Pinkertons is not off the table.
Have you even heard what the smash community truly is?
@@M64bros No, do explain.
They would threaten to sue everyone involved for breaking the EULA of the game(s). All their games have a clause like _"this license is valid for personal, non-commercial use ONLY"_ in their EULAs which they would point to. They would probably be bluffing though because I don't think that clause has ever been tested legally for enforceability and Nintendo don't want to risk taking it to court only to be told that it's not, that would be disastrous for them.
@@KashiwaDaisuke No problem, the smash community has a bunch of terrible people behind the scenes and other crappy stuff that got exposed to the public and the frustrating part about the situation is the respectful people get drag in to the drama considering the fact they don't have anything to do with it, I wish there was a separated part of the community where they don't get mentioned or harmed.
The Mario kart tournaments and spatoon tournaments are okay and safe at least so no worries for them.
I just have trust issues with communities and it's really frustrating.
For every good decision nintendo makes, they make another 2 decisions that blow nads
This is one 'decision' that won't get very far, I 100% guarantee it
Astonishingly, this is still the best ratio among all the video game publishers
@@SVD978When was the last time Nintendo backpedaled anything?
@@SVD978phew, glad we've got your personal guarantee! That really puts my mind at ease.
@@SVD978no they can get away with it it's gonna be fine I like it
I thought some of this was decently reasonable until Nintendo told us we can’t sell drinks at our own events. That’s just ridiculous.
Yeah like how are they even able to do that? They don’t own the drinks. Tbh something doesn’t seem right about this whole thing.
stay dehydrated my friends
If you actually know anything about running tournaments you'd know that these rules are nonsense and draconian. Now that Nintendo has gone full dictatorship on telling us how to play their video games when we've already bought them I'm done buying their games.
I will still play them though ;) whether they like it or not
@@fullmetalbleachnote No, people fail to understand what this guidelines actually are for, the type of event you have in mind is like your local or an anime convention where they a splatoon or a mario kart tournament, those types of events are unaffected and dont have any troubles whatsoever, local tournaments like a bunch of guys renting a venue and having a 100 or so people enter a mario kart tournament have no issue, or people making a tournament at a restaurant or something isnt gonna get shutdown by nintendo by any means, the people that are affected are big tournament that run without a license, and I mean international level tournaments that actually centralize their event around the games and not them being a side tournament that happens to be there, your local stuff is gonna run just fine, even online events are still gonna run just fine, you people are failing to see this glaring issue that the guidelines where made to shutdown event that specifically refuse to endorse the safety of attendees, and I mean stuff like backpack checks, metal detectors and proper security.
People need to inform themselves correctly before making conclusions based on surface level shit, this is why arlo's is bad in this sense, but he took everything out of context without addressing the obvious, that local tournaments are fine and that this only really affect big tournaments that run without license, plus the licensing process has gotten insane easily as of now, amsa reported that an event in japan got their license within a day, this has also being the case in the past, events like shine an riptide city got their license within a few months because securing a license for a single event has never being hard to begin with.
@@ZeroillusionX You can't run events on a fully non-profit scale. People need to be paid (your mentioned missing securities included), the organisators will be held responsible when something fails. Even forbidding drinks to be sold simply goes too far, on the cost of everyone. They regulated prices before, then they can regulate that too if that's what concerns them.
For events like Smash or AGDQ, invited hosts often get paid their travel compensations. Those events can't happen if you are limited to 200 people, it will not be enough to compensate everyone AND pay for prices because no sponsors are allowed. You need to look at the full restrictions, not one by one.
Taking Japan as example of how easy it is to get a license is stupid, it's their country, of course they will hurry up to get things done (and you can be sure that no checking whatsoever was done if it was approved within a day). But that won't be the case for countries outside of Japan/America. 'A few months' also is nothing to brag about.
"Stop enjoying our games the wrong way!" - Nintendo in a nutshell
Yeah, I hate how limited they make us play their games. I praise their creativity with their characters and gameplay, but their legal crap is evil.
"Also don't enjoy games you make of our games." AM2R 👀
" i have the wrong conclusions" everyone who has not watched moon channels video about why nitnendo does what it does
@@MikePhantom Still not a fan of how insane their legal team is. Doing this stunt makes people less likely to want to play their games.
@@peterrealar2.067 That's not how that works. The VAST majority of people do not care. Hell even when the pros speak out about this stuff on camera, off camera they truly do not care.
Moon Channel has made a couple good videos about how terms of service are often unenforceable and exsist to provide legal cover for the company.
I'm commenting on your comment to hopefully give it an algorithmic boost. Moon Channel has the right skill set to analyze this in a very pragmatic way.
@@Gidaio much obliged for you comment on my comment. I am commenting on your comment of my comment for very similar reasons.
Doing the same, more people need to see these comments
Nope, not a good reason. If a company is putting out anti-consumer statements just because they want legal cover that company should not exist or they should operate in another legal jurisdiction that doesn't make them treat their customers like ass.
You talk about it being unenforcable, and again, that doesn't matter. We all know that Nintendo is more than happy to sue people for having fun in a way they don't like.
Stop defending people who would sue you for modding games.
@@blindmown "if a company wants to follow the law to protect their ip, they should either not exist or not do business in that country" is what your comment reads as. It is anti consumer, and I don't really like it as much as the next guy, but it is also entirely normal and reasonable
And they were doing so well recently, too. It's like for every step forward, they're required to take 2 steps back. They've gotten better at knowing what their fans want, but the disconnect is still there. If only they could see that these tournaments help them overall.
Agreed
Nintendo giveth and Nintendo taketh away.
What are you talking about lmao Tournaments are a complete niche, most consumers dont know or even care about it.
@@ausgod538But as Arlo says, they're still important.
@@ausgod538God, as much as I’d love to dick ride Nintendo because I love their games, I can at least acknowledge every time they shit on fans even if it is a “niche”…. as if Esports isn’t growing in popularity with every year…
Imagine pouring your empathy towards a fucking corporation. Grow the hell up.
And yet Nintendo holds the annual Nintendo Ninja tournament to see which Ninja takes down the most Nintendo fan stuff over the course of a year!
Oh and this quote has me rolling.
"Nintendo cares about the community and would like to support individuals who want to celebrate that passion by creating memorable cooperative and competitive play experiences."
SURE THEY DO 😂😂😂
I recommend watching Moon Channel's thoughts about this whole situation. He is a lawyer by trade and has some really good insights among the heaps of emotions being put out by content creators.
His channel is awesome
Yes thank you I was looking for a comment about this. After watching his video then this one immediately releasing I was so annoyed at some of the points made in this one. His videos really go into the legal why of why nintendo has to do some of these things. I just wished some more people saw his videos they really patronise the american copy right law system which is much more to blame then the companys.
Glad someone commented this. If you hadn't, I would've. Moony does a good job of putting a lot of things like this into perspective.
Yep. So many of the pro smash players are practically rage baiting, when the guidelines aren't as bad as they say they are, and it's only regarding non for profit organizations.
Just replying to boost this comment's algorithm.
Aaah...nintendo can't be a Nintendo for one week at least...
I mean, factor in the smash community bs and you have some idea on why they want control. Granted they can walk this back long term, but it honestly depends on if people are willing to stand their ground against Nintendo for a very long time.
@@mrconroy4672 i doubt they're doing it because of the community tho. This has been a problem for a VERY long time and, even considering the headlines that pop up here and there about a bad person in the community (keep in mind its one in a couple hundreds of thousands), it still makes no sense unless you account for how old fashioned they are.
I love their games, but absolutely hate the company.
@@ninjdraw8305 Fair, but then again, said community did little to better themselves or actually put any effort to improve themselves. If they were just as critical to themselves like they were to Nintendo and actually took action then things could’ve been better. There’s no excuse since they ruined panda and this was a long time coming.
@@mrconroy4672 idk why an entire community gotta better themselves cuz of a couple bad apples tho. Like, i just dont know how they can improve y'know? Askin a lot from a community. I mean, they did act terrible when it came to Steve and sending death threats to some peeps that played him, but that seems to happen in the fighting game community in general, with no real way to stop it. This thing Nintendo is trying to do DEFINITELY wont stop it.
It aint all bad tho. From what i heard, licenses are easy to get and allkw you to basically ignore most rules in there. As long as u approved by Nintendo, u good. I still think its stupid, but hey its better than all restrictions with no work arounds 😌
@@ninjdraw8305 My point still stands. There’s a lot more bad apples than you think. It still doesn’t change the fact they trashed panda, and other toxic crap they enabled and did.
The “they only doing this in case someone is way out of line, and will not harshly enforce this” would honestly hold more weight if it was any company but Nintendo. As much as I love Nintendo, they at anything that is slightly out of their control. Fan made games, preserving digital copy’s of their old games, youtube videos, mod hardware, and the whole tournament thing well before this, Nintendo hates it all. Part of me gets they do it because their biggest power is their ip but part of me feels it’s them being painfully out of touch and honestly makes me wonder if they fucking hate their fans.
For Nintendo's sake, I certainly hope they *DON'T* "hate" their fans, or else they'll be in danger of going down the same downward spiral as Marvel & Disney.
Nintendo got SUPER burned with tournaments following the 2020 EVO scandal and sexual misconduct allegations, not to mention the issues that pop up every so often in the Smash community. They never liked Tourney's before but after that you could see they absolutely wanted to kill them off and this is the unfortunate logical conclusion for them
this is not accurate. Nintendo tried running a circuit with Panda a smash esports org last year. It didnt work out but Nintendo has a continued interest in involving itself with the community whether thats helpful to the comm. or not.
It didn't work out because pro players called for people to boycott Panda out of fear of monopoly/because of any restrictions Nintendo would put in place such as not allowing mods, and Nintendo wanted none of that drama. Smash players begged for years for support from Nintendo but refused to compromise despite knowing full well how unwilling they have been to support the competitive scene they have always been. Panda was their one shot of running licensed tournaments that pros can actually make a career out of, and they blew it. The Smash community shot themselves in the foot, and now the competitive scene will die a slow, painful death.@@christomanci
@@GAMERGUYXL you missed a lot of really important details there. The cancellation of the SWT and Panda's dealing behind their back to undermine them. Dr Alan Pandas president went to many tournaments that were either signed with SWT or had not signed with Panda yet and told them Nintendo would bring them down if they did not sign with Panda. This is why the community boycotted the Panda cup. I was there when that happened and were still here. I guess we'll see if this will kill the community but I seriously doubt it. In 10 years we will still be playing our game.
Well yeah, Nintendo is super anal about what people do with their IP. Remember the creator's program from the mid 2010's? Alan wasn't threatening to shut down tournaments himself: he was warning them that Nintendo would not like tournaments being run without their involvement, which has always been the case anyway.
I get that only one company being allowed to run circuits is far from ideal, but pro players getting to actually make a good living playing smash is better than top 4 barely breaking even on traveling costs because the community refuses to compromise.
Why do you think Armada retired? Why do you think HBox and M2K stream on twitch so much now? The community does not have the funds to remain grassroots, and as a result the competitive scene will slowly die while every other fgc will continue to thrive.
@@christomanci
Here's the thing: For other game companies whose fans host tournaments for their games, the tournaments are a major way to advertise the game and get more people interested in it. But in the case of Smash, it already sells millions upon millions on name alone. It doesn't actually need tournaments to sell. Maybe in Nintendo's eyes, having this whole separate community that they can't control (even if maybe they do get them a few more sales) is more trouble than it's worth. I think this has ALWAYS been their mindset. I'm sure 2020 didn't help either.
Haven’t seen anyone else’s take on this. I didn’t know he was going to make a video, but in my heart of hearts, “No. Not until the puppet has weighed in.”
WHO YOU CALLIN PUPPET, PAL
people have been talking about this forever
I recommend Moon Channel's take on this as a second watch. He's a lawyer who deals primarily with copyright, so he has a different perspective.
Noone is talking about this because this is non issue. Nintendo wants to license big tournaments busecause few years ago top smash players ended up pedo weirdos and they were using tournaments to abuse underages. They just don't want to be associated with those kind of animals.
It's crazy that the most reasonable voice on video games is a blue puppet
People should collaborate to where they host hundreds, if not thousands of tournaments all around the world at once, to overload Nintendo into giving up and just letting it all happen.
Sure, let’s do that to a multi trillion dollar company that has as many attorneys as they do Nintendo fans. They will simply bring every single tournament hosts to court to sue them.
@@Unchainedful There's always a limit.
Anyone that knows the history of how Nintendo treated developers in the 80s and 90s knows that they are not a nice company
It's one of the reasons the Playstation became a hit back then, not only every major 3rd party studio switched to Sony because it was easier to develop games for its system but because how draconian Nintendo was with their policies.
To be fair, when Nintendo did that in the 80’s it was because of one of the causes of the 1983 crash. Activision opened Pandora’s Box and even dog food companies were making games for the Atari 2600. Nowadays that wouldn’t happen again but that was their motivation for setting the restrictions they did.
Although times have changed, many more companies doing the same too
It wasn’t without reason. I mean they were coming off of the crash of 83. They needed those restrictions so another crash wouldn’t happen
the people who were in the executive board of that time havent been at nintendo for like 20 years already lol
Can’t wait to see how many fans claim they’ll be boycotting Nintendo over this and TOTALLY staying true to their word. /s
I did back then and not buy any of their games from that year as I said
But for this I cant cause I love smash and while arlo pretends this is horible for many games lets face it this is just another middle finger to the smash comunity
I already boycott their shitty expansion pack
This is obviously a bad thing, no matter the caveats to that badness. In any world, this is pushing things in a worse direction.
I will say that every tournament org in Japan that I'm aware of that has applied for a license has gotten one within a day or two. There's no guarantee that NoA will behave similarly, but perhaps it's a sign that they're going to be more on-the-ball with licensing than they have been in the past.
I have heard that some of the guidelines (not all, just specific ones) are due to Japanese legislation that can find them culpable for some reason if certain tournaments do certain things; I am not an exert on the Japanese legal code, so this could just be people lying on the internet, but it does still suck that it affects everyone. Maybe they just want worldwide consistency in their guidelines.
How does the guidelines compare to other companies like Capcom and others who are involved in the competitive scene?
commenting for replies to JJFT's comment because i'm curious too
That's the rub, actually... not just about this, but about their heavy-handedness with copyright in general, why they _revel_ in destroying fan projects and ruining lives, and why they _will_ send goon squads to hunt down "illicit" tournaments and sue everyone present (including the spectators)... It's because they think Japanese law (copyright, trademark, everything) _applies to the rest of the world._ It's jurisdictional overstep of the highest caliber, plain and simple.
@@JJFT235 I could not find any guidelines from Capcom for non-licensed tournaments (they might just not allow them, idk). Comparing the licensed Capcom guidelines and the non-licensed Nintendo guidelines doesn't show many differences that can't be attributed to the obvious difference of one being licensed and the other not.
* The prize limit between the two is similar, besides Nintendo having a yearly cap (Idk why it does)
* Size limit is not on the Capcom one from what I see, probably difference between licensed/unlicensed.
* There is no limit to fees in Capcom's guidelines, and you seem to be allowed to require online fees, could be difference between licensed/unlicensed.
* Publicly disclosing your accounting is not under Capcom's guidelines, could be difference between licensed/unlicensed.
* Capcom allows sponsors, though limited to 6k max per event and 30k max per year, definitely difference between licensed/unlicensed.
* No revenue limit from re-posting the tournament online under Capcom's guidelines, probably difference between licensed/unlicensed.
* All "not endorsed by Nintendo" related stuff is obviously because it is non-licensed, and is regular for such a guideline.
* Not being allowed to use the game names in your tournament name is in both guidelines.
* Modified or unreleased games are not allowed under both guidelines (This is normal for any form of guideline of games without developer made mod tools)
* Both say that you must follow laws and not discriminate (because of course they do, that is required for a legal tournament)
* Capcom's guidelines for cancellation are even more strict than Nintendo's "Involve anything that Nintendo deems inappropriate", as they straight up say that they can cancel you "for any reason or without reason".
* The only stupid part of Nintendo's guidelines is restricting "Tournaments involving the sale of food, beverages, or merchandise", as that is unnecessary and not part of Capcom's guidelines, though I don't know if there are potential laws at play to require it to be written on non-licensed guidelines.
Overall, besides the yearly price cap and the no food/beverage, it is a very bog standard non-licensed tournament guideline. To the people who are against this guideline, Nintendo has been following the general ideas of this guideline the ENTIRE TIME, the only thing this changes is that we now know what rules we are breaking (and thus can avoid breaking them, or say f*** it and break them anyways). It is also important to note that this is the UNLICENSED guidelines, licensed guidelines do allow for sponsored tournaments and for-profit tournaments, so that is not a worry. Also, just because something is in a guideline, doesn't mean it is enforced, just that it is the outward corporate policy.
@@JJFT235Pretty much no other company has specific guidelines on unlicensed tournaments in the west; generally companies set up guidelines for tournaments they license or set up themselves because they have specific liability for it. It's pretty unprecedented to restrict unlicensed tournaments as far as I can tell looking into other companies like Capcom, Arcsys, Sega, SNK, Namco...
One other little thing, in accordance to the new rules laid out by Nintendo, there is NO way for Melee to be played, except on disk in person. Basically ALL Melee tournaments are dead now. Also, if using online, you are REQUIRED to use Nintendo's trash online and servers, meaning Brawl tournaments are dead as well, since online for Brawl is borderline unplayable and needs a third party online tool to function half decently. There's a lot of small things that just kill everything.
Moon Channel, a lawyer here on TH-cam who makes videos about the intersections of law and videogames, just put out a video on this topic looking at the guidelines from a legal perspective.
He has a different, more optimistic take about the implications. Worth checking out for a more diverse perspective.
I couldn't care less whether Nintendo likes tournaments or whether tournaments are even beneficial to Nintendo.
They do not have the legal authority to shut down tournaments. Fair use and all that.
Even if this isn’t all bad it’s hard to not be doom and gloom when they’ve been obstructing tournaments/the competitive scene for the last 10+ years
Moon Channel actually made a point of the guidelines potentially putting an end to the antagonistic nature between Nintendo and Tournaments. The point being, if people know what the rules are and follow them, then there's not going to be random shutdowns anymore. It's hard to say the impact the guidelines will have without seeing how Tournaments are handled with them in place and how Nintendo chooses to enforce them.
I think Doom and Gloom is a fitting way to describe people's reactions because they're looking at the rules and seeing them as restrictive and unjust, but there's more nuance to it all that's getting overlooked due to commonplace negative sentiment and bad will.
@Skywolve1998 You're right. Can't be antagonistic to a thing you effectively killed off. This won't put an end to the antagonism, this'll just further strain it.
Real talk though selling water at tournaments is super scummy and exploitative, shouldn't be allowed in general at things like concerts/tournaments. Water should always be free
the indigenous people Néstle is selling their own water back:
Australia and Europe already have laws that force venues to provide free drinking water. It's just an American thing.
@@iminumst7827 I live in one of the richest countries of Europe and I have not seen this being enforced anywhere. Except you're speaking about the tap in the public toilets, then I'd rather diedrate than licking on those
Hey Arlo, long time fan here. Idk if you’ll ever see this comment, but there’s a great YT channel called Moon Channel that covered this topic well. They’re lawyer with a passion for video games and have covered several video game-law topics and stories!
I'm commenting on your comment to hopefully give it an algorithmic boost. Moon Channel just generally has great videos, but the one on these changes was very pragmatic. It's not all sunshine and roses, but it's not the doom that everyone thinks it is.
Oh, Arlo, to point out one caveat of their rules: Non-profit tournaments that are raising money for charity based on donations from viewers would also be outright banned by these new rules.
So much for Extra Life or any form of charity drive
There’s probly a lot of people who would accept these ridiculous rules if there was a “entrants and all attendees must shower” clause.
Dog I would sign that rules list like the Declaration of Independence if the shower clause was added.
I don't really understand the specifics, but Jeff Bailey, the guy behind CEO, said that this actually doesn't impact most tournaments much because of some very specific rules. Basically, tournaments are gonna keep going until Nintendo outright steps up directly.
Honestly seeing all the shit that the smash community has been doing with I'm not surprising Nintendo's cracking down on how to do tournaments
I feel like this happened mostly because of Smash Melee, an old game that Nintendo is not profiting from anymore getting popular is a big no for a company like Nintendo.
As I remember there is a rule about charity insentives and it's only there to stop people from playing Melee at EVO again like they did for EVO 2013.
they hate us cause they cant be us.
Nintendo: "sets up strict guidelines"
Me: "free tournament, $30 for parking"
Ludwig operates his tournaments at a loss and Nintendo STILL sued him
Bruh im so tired of them at this point
As an incomplete quadriplegic and LV person, I rely on third-party devices for just about every game I play (and even then, I still use different software and programs to make single-mouse-button PC games like OpenRCT2 visually accessible. I do this even to browse the internet, since Lenovo and Vivaldi’s built-in accessibility features are pretty lacking.)
I’ve never played a multiplayer/tournament game and really don’t intent to start, but it’s still upsetting to hear about rules and policies that may act as barriers for disabled fans. There’s a huge difference between enforcing rules against certain features or certain devices that are designed specifically for cheating-type performance enhancement, but putting a sweeping ban on all equipment point blank is disturbing. Not surprising, since accessibility features have been randomly added and then stripped back away from Pokemon games for years, but still disturbing.
I support all of yall in these fandoms who are standing up against this shit. Whether it means speaking up with your dollar, your socials, or whatever else, you’re doing the right thing.
The thing that I'm finding wild about this situation online (Or at least on Twitter) is that a lot of people are happy this is happening, but only specifically because it hurts the Smash scene, and so many are saying "Good, y'all had it coming" and I'm just...wtf are they on?
And I get it, some people in the competitive Smash Bros scene are assholes, are gross, etc. But bad people are in EVERYTHING. Why do those guys being terrible mean that thousands of others shouldn't be allowed to play the game they enjoy in the way they enjoy it?
And it's even more baffling because this isn't just "punishing" the Smash community. This is for ANY tournaments using Nintendo games. Smash may be the biggest, but it's not the only game Nintendo makes that has a competitive scene, and now they ALL will be suffering from these rules.
it's because most who are "happy about it" are clout chaser who don't even play or care about said games at all you hate to see it 😭🤦🏾♂️
a lot of "casual" gamers are more elitist than they realize.
I mean, if you want to profit off of virtually any other artform- you have to pay for it. I don't understand the indignance here.
I'm done with Nintendo. They will enforce the smallest breakage of these rules. Let's not forget the guy that they literally sued into oblivion. I won't be buying anymore of their products.
Truth be told, I think all the controversy with competitive Smash over the years has just completely burned Nintendo on any sort of competitive gaming they don't have complete control over. Sorta ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy. I dunno, I feel like if they were being mean for the sake of being mean, the policies would have been stricter. It doesn't feel as mean as say, the music channel deletions.
Yeah I don't blame Nintendo for not wanting their good name dragged through the mud because of the controversy. Smash fans have proven time and again they can't be trusted. Sadly this is the state we're in.
Yeah, especially with the disgusting smash community with p3dos and predators behind the scenes that got exposed to the public
@@Maplewest Time and time again? The only blemish on the Smash community was the MeToo exodus of 2020. Other than that, the Smash community has been the most welcoming, entertaining and self-sustained community I've ever been a part of.
@@Mapleweststop thinking bad minorities somehow make up the whole community I swear it's not the fandoms fault Nintendo don't protect minors at all everyone does their best to keep pedos away from kids 😒
Nintendo has always treated the smash community terribly. While the actions of 2020 were terrible, I'm afraid you're just falling for their PR if you think this was an intentional response. Many people have been ghosted for wanting to make official smash tournaments by Nintendo, including Ninja and Red Bull. Such rules are why hundreds of Project M VODs are now lost and why that fanbase gets screwed the most.
I always wonder if Japan's history with Gambling plays a role in any of this 🤔
I wouldn't be surprised if that is the case still scummy.
Probably not since Nintendo made its name as a card company supplying illegal gambling shops before getting into video games
People who complain about Japan being anti gambling are hilarious to me
No, it doesn't. Capcom is a Japanese company and their guidelines aren't as strict. Plus, Nintendo made and still makes Hanafuda cards and mahjong sets. Both were and are used for gambling, even by the Yakuza back in the day.
These restrictions won't apply if you get a license from Nintendo - these guidelines are only for community tournaments of 200 players or less.
It remains to be seen how easy getting a license will be if this is moved to NA though.
It feels very deliberate and I wonder if they’d prefer smash to be seen in the public eye as a casual party game. The “competitive” appearance is probably viewed as a negative that could intimidate their target casual audience (more profitable by FAR), and from a cold and calculating point of view I can kind of understand that.
They never liked Smash tournaments, that was one reason tripping was introduced in Brawl. So as to combat wave-dashing which was a very common thing to see in touraments
They’ve always wanted Smash to be a casual party game. Why do you think tripping was added in Brawl?
I highly highly HIGHLY recommend people to watch "Moon Channel" because he gives a different point of legal view that MIGHT help understand where Nintendo is coming from. (He's a lawyer btw)
I'm commenting on your comment to hopefully give it an algorithmic boost. I can second the recommendation to watch Moon Channel's video. It's less than half an hour long, too.
@@Gidaio Ayyy thanks bro, we gotta spread the word 💪😤
And yet in the Switch REVEAL trailer years ago, they put tournaments as a huge selling point for this era. But I guess ONLY their tournaments.
Considering some communities get a bit toxic with tournaments, I don't even blame them.
this is also a straight shot directly to the solar plexus of the melee community, as the only way they can compete at all is with the Universal Controller Fix mod.
While I commiserate with everyone about Nintendo’s strict policies regarding tournaments, I do have a modicum of hope. Nintendo always go through this sort of phases tell they relent and catch up to the rest of the industry. 1st: NO 2nd: Ok but strictly our way. Gradually to 3rd: Ok we’ll allow it like everyone else.
How can "tournament guidelines" exist in the first place? I doubt that kind of thing can be enforced at all. Even if they sent a DMCA, this is probably not enough to even start a juridical process.
Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat tournaments in the 90s were famous for being held at arcades that served bad food.
What the hell Nintendo?
Imagine creating a sport like soccer and then saying "btw you are not legally allowed to hold any tournaments or competitions"
That whole forward about Nintendo being behind the times unlocked a memory. When tomodachi life was being rolled out internationally, there was some controversy that the game didn't allow same sex marriage. When confronted about this, the developers basically said "Oh wow, we didn't think of that. We'll add that in if we ever make a sequel." Japan as a whole was still in the phase of anything but the nuclear family being taboo, with same sex marriage being illegal. Japan is intentionally conservative and in their own little bubble, only adapting to modern sensibilities when backed into a corner.
Because Japan as a whole has a very tight knit culture that is way different from the PC leftist/ true conservative culture of the US. Of course Tomodachi life and all life sims that come from Japan will not consider LGBT representation. They grew up in isolation really. They hardly know anything about America. Just their own culture. If anything I would be mad at the localizers. They should have put in LGBT representation themselves as an exclusive to western countries. Because western politics and companies bending to political agendas only happen here in the west.
Edit: point is localizers should have put the representation in themselves. Like how they have been presently. Instead they got lazy.
That controversy was worse than that. The game initially had a "bug" where same-sex relationships could happen, then when confronted, they removed it and said "this is not a political statement".
And then they proceeded to never make another Tomodachi Life game.
Not long before I watched your video, I watched one about this topic on Moon Channel. He does a great job breaking down the legal aspects of these rules, and going through where Nintendo is coming from with them.
My first reaction to this was as emotional as most I've seen, and while I'm sure these rules won't exactly be easy for everyone to work with, that video definitely helped me have a more positive and objective look at this topic
though still, I get why Nintendo is like this, but it is still pretty annoying when they do it.
@@damonlam9145 I agree, understanding something better definitely doesn't make it better
You can charge a fee for "an event" where coincidentially among "other things" there is a Smash Bros tournament. The event sells snacks and drinks, not the tournament. And there are no prizes for the winners, but the host can "DONATE money to good players for playing good". Rules are meant to be loopholed.
9:05 I love that this Annihilape is named "Harry Azcrac" 😆
I'm glad that arlo focuses on the fact that they apply to EVERY tournament not just smash. speedrunning tournaments are feeling this too. just when speedrunning tournaments were just starting to be profitable they prevent that. also now all randomizers tournaments are banned and we can't even say that the tournament is using a Nintendo game? Legitimately preventing all tournaments from existing...
I feel like not enough people know that these guidelines can be avoided by getting a license by Nintendo. Which most tournaments will do anyways.
my good b*tch were you listening when people said how hard and LONG it takes to get licenses in north america from Nintendo?
this potentially will be a problem for the tournaments in-between the commercial and unlicensed status.
I feel like this shouldn’t be allowed, these games were bought and are the player’s property. This is like saying no one is allowed to eat apples in Tears of the kingdom.
This isn't even "old fashioned", it's just greedy! Companies, including Nintendo themselves, LOVED tournaments in the 80's, 90's, even early 2000's like the Gamecube era for spreading the popularity of their games. It was "word of mouth", and they ALSO loved things like videos of speed runs and so on, to the extent they were available back then. They also loved fan art and such things. Heck, Id once ported Super Mario Bros. 3 to DOS and sent Nintendo a sample of their work because that's just how things were DONE back then. Nintendo turned the offer down mind you, but the point is no lawsuit was forthcoming.
This attitude? It stems from an older way of thinking, but the specific thing they're objecting to? That's new. They didn't in the past.
And, it's not really true that Nintendo has this ironclad legal case at all. The only issue is, even if it's likely Nintendo would be as sure to lose a case suing a tournament as a company that makes baseballs would be to sue the World Series for using their brand without permission, Nintendo has a lot of legal money. They could SPEND someone into destitution, and the threat of that is enough to make people comply. It isn't about the merit of the case, it's about who can afford to have their life turned upside down for literal years and pay legal council to defend themselves over that time.
"I was going to buy this game, but instead I just watched a tournament so I don't need to now" said no one.
It feels like to me Nintendo's trying to make tournaments a fun and safe environment, but is trying a little too hard.
I can almost relate to them, actually.
I personally don't like it when tournaments are no longer about the fun and spirit of the competition, but are, "professional" events where people just want fame and money, and forget about playing for the sake of fun.
Obviously a bad thing, but a part in me wonders if those grooming allegation rumors that popped up during that Smash Bros tourneys was what scared Nintendo into doing this.
Those were more than just allegations. It's clear Nintendo wants to avoid a Jared from Subway situation.
Every comunity has those smash Just exposes andhandles them
I find it very annoying how Nintendo constantly exhibits this "you can only play with our products the way we specifically intended them" mentality. I remember when Kit & Krystal still worked for Nintendo and they suggested they do a Nuzlocke challenge, they were threatened to be fired on the spot for even suggesting it, and were told that Nuzlockes were "as bad as hacking". Like... first of all, it's not even close to hacking, and second, what's wrong with setting a specific self-imposed challenge anyway? These "guidelines" Nintendo set for tournaments with their games has a similar energy to them, but what makes this extra gross to me is the fact that they act like they still own their games even after people have purchased them. This claim to ownership is something exhibited by a lot of video game companies in the past, and while I think Nintendo has always had this kind of behavior, the fact that they're really starting to crack the whip now shows just how completely stuck in the past (and up their own ass) they are when it comes to how they view their products. Once we buy your games, Nintendo, they're our games now, and we are free (or at least SHOULD be free) to do what we want with them. But even setting all that aside, I don't really see how this benefits Nintendo at all, like I don't see how being this restrictive with their products will help them in the long-run. They're basically punishing the people who love their games and eliminating promotion of their games, all while making themselves look bad in the process. "Nintendo move" is basically a meme now whenever Nintendo acts needlessly restrictive or makes a baffling business or creative decision, but I think this is close to the logical endpoint of "Nintendo moves"... well, aside from the extreme, overblown punishment Nintendo gave someone who hacked them, which they openly acknowledged was more than the guy deserved, just to send a message to anyone who dared cross them. Geez... "No fun allowed" indeed.
12:10 This is a rule almost everyone has, like in your Windows licence it says Microsoft can take it away for any reason.
As someone who is a long time Smash esports fan.... I kinda get it though. From Nintendo's perspective, the whole thing is a huge liability. Following all the revelations about how toxic the whole scene is, from all the players and TOs kicked out for their predatory behavior to the way Panda Global shit the bed on multiple projects, including both a 3rd party controller & the first ever official, sanctioned Nintendo tournament to how when you squint at it at the right angle, these teams are essentially trafficking minors for profit... If I were Nintendo, I'd want the whole thing just gone at this point. It's not making me any money, it's just a huge liability to my brand. So yeah, I'll make up some legal arguments and even take a bit of a hit to my reputation to kill it.
People say that Nintendo hates smash community. To be honest If I were Nintendo, I would hate them as well :D
The food one is the one that gets me the most, I've seen some people with concern about people not being able to access food and such when at these tourneys, but just the fact that they felt the need to ban it on top of all this makes it feel like they're daring anyone to try setting up a tourney. "Just try it. We dare Ya!" kind of deal. Makes investing time and love into multiplayer nintendo games feel pointless, which sucks.
Nintendo demolishing the home of a random Italian man because he was named "Mario":
Nintendo when people want to play competitive multiplayer games against other people:
Smash literally has a tournament mode built in, do they expect people to just play it with the usual 2-8 players and up to 62 cpus?
While Nintendo definitely benefits in ways from things like TH-cam and tournaments, I don’t think it’s *only* beneficial.
There are certainly situations were people harm Nintendo’s image (such as prominent Smash Bros. players who did not good things)
Did those people really harm Nintendo or their image, though? Unlicensed, unsanctioned tournaments with exactly zero representatives of the company on staff does NOT scream "the company will be affected" to me. That's like blaming the company that made your playground equipment for the bullies you met while playing in the park. Sure, the equipment was there. Maybe the bullies even used that playground set as a way to draw in victims to bully. But it is NOT the manufacturer's fault at all that those bullies exist, and it is NOT going to help their image to specifically ban a bunch of normal playground practices to scare away bullies when it'll also scare away so SO many innocents. Such strange logical leaps.
I think the events you're referencing were THE turning point when it came to Nintendo and tournaments. Them not liking tournaments and going out of their way to shut them down has been a thing for years now, quite a long time. But I remember there was this period of a few months where, much like with Nintendo and TH-cam, it seemed like they were actually starting to come around a bit. Not full on embracing it, but throwing tournament organizers a bit of a bone, giving them more leeway, giving them that reluctant stamp of approval.
And what happened IMMEDIATELY after that? A bunch of high-profile melee players get outed as doing a bunch of not-cool things with girls, some even underage. After that, the door between Nintendo and tournaments has been firmly shut, and I don't think it's EVER going to re-open.
Arlo so dedicated to his sponsors that he grew a right hand just to enjoy Magic Spoon Treats with a knife and fork! 👍
If Nintendo sold us toilets they'd force us to sit down facing the tank
Maybe I’m missing something but I don’t really see a problem with this. The premise in the beginning was “Nintendo make tournaments harder and less fun” but then the main point is the organizers can’t profit off of the IP of Nintendo that they are organizing a tournament around? If you want to have a tournament for fun I think that’s fine but making money off of it is something i think Nintendo is right to be strict about. Nintendo does not want to incentivize/endorse people who just want to have a tournament to make money who don’t care about the brand. I think it all makes perfect sense. Also OBVIOUSLY Nintendo isn’t going to let an unregulated tournament based around Nintendo products serve food and drinks to kids Lolol obviously something could go wrong there and look really bad for Nintendo. They HAVE to have rules. Honestly, I don’t see ANY benefit to Nintendo in allowing unregulated tournaments for any reason. I think as older Nintendo fans we forget that Nintendo is intended for kids and I think it’s obvious why Nintendo doesn’t want kids going to unsanctioned tournaments and events based around their products and brand.
Before everyone celebrates this destroying the Smash community, keep in mind that this doesn’t only apply to Smash. Splatoon and Mario Kart are affected by these changes, too.
they're effected more tbh
You can hate select members of the community over on twitter and what not all you want, saying this is a good thing for the entire competitive scene to die, one that has existed and will continue exist at a national and worldwide level filled with people who are genuinely passionate about the game, want to compete to the best of their ability and most of all, aren't dipshits and predators like the ones that were kicked out of the community don't deserve to be treated like this.
@@ssj4922Couldn’t have said it better myself.
@@ssj4922 hard agree.
@@internetguy7319 Affected more because their online actually works. *looks at Splatoon* Mostly.
The title pretty much summerized my thoughts reading those guidelines. I mean Nintendo doesn't like tournaments and frankly that's a fair stance to have. What I find incredibly hard to swallow is when it comes to charity stuff and them pretty much saying nope to that too.
It’s not a fair stance to have
What happens if someone sell hotdogs outside a Nintendo event just by chance?
But yeah jokes aside it feels a bit like they want to be involved in the events that happens.
Relevant context: Other fighting games have comparable tournament rules
This really upsets me as someone who tends to participate in competitive stuff like this (hell, I organized a smash 64 tournament when I was 8). I've put a lot of thought into this and I just do not understand why they would want to do this. They gain nothing from the tournaments being taken down. From the brand image perspective because some communities are less than stellar, shutting down a passionate fanbase looks worse than slight association with a bad community.
Under capitalism, if they don't defend their "brand" vehemently, they could lose it legally - it's why they had those PSA's years ago about how "Nintendo is a trademark, please don't refer to any device generically as a 'Nintendo'" heh
@@3nertia But a better way of fighting that would be to make starting a licensed tournament easier, then they could deal with the unlicensed tournaments with less backlash.
@@BardicGM Nah, that's merely treating a symptom of the larger problem, which is capitalism ...
Answer: Super Smash Bros was always a casual party fighting series and will continue being one. Tournaments are not what made Smash Bros famous it's the Nintendo + gaming crossover aspect of it.
just look at the melee tournaments, would you like to have tournaments like those for your games as a company?
whats wrong with melee tournaments?
yes theyre great. Big house 10 just happened and was great tournament.
It also kills online smash melee tournaments entirely since there is no way to play it online without modding the game, and Nintendo doesn't allow in their new rules you to play any modded Nintendo games in tournaments. And they don't offer smash melee on the switch at all when they easily could, not to mention not offering it on the switch with online.
It’s so weird, Nintendo wants smash’s identity to be as a party game, but (and this is the funny part) if you go to the default online play for smash ultimate it BY DEFAULT places you in ranked with the only way to not end up in this ranked mode being to enter the TOURNAMENT MODE. Kinda funny eh?
Fun isn't allowed (Nintendo probably)
This was horrible timing for me because I've been arranging a Mario Kart fundraiser tournament for my school club for a good while now. Now I either risk Nintendo cracking down on it, or start my plans from scratch with a different game.
You should probably switch to another game entirely, just in case. Problem is, the only decent competition to Mario Kart that I know is freaking Crash Team Racing
@@csolisr Exactly! I chose Mario Kart because it has such a wide appeal. But, with how busy the average student is at my university, I have no clue if we'll break even if we choose a non-Nintendo game.
The only other good option I can think of is Jackbox, but even then, that isn't typically a *competitive* game.
@@csolisrCTR is Peak
What's the issue
@@murderman8578CTR is way better than Mario Kart. You need actual skill to win.
@@tofugamer2082 yeah anybody can break into it
should really watch a video called "A Lawyer Analyzes Nintendo’s Tournament Guidelines - VG Law Review"
Because yeah that makes things more clear. It especially puts things into perspective. Especially when the people most upset are six figure numbers as streamers and are upset they would need a license
"Money from admissions can't be used for prizing, prizes must come out of pocket."
This is so dystopian, god, is there gonna be a Nintendo representative at every tournament making sure every dollar, every literal dollar and cent that was used to pay for the entry fee (assuming cash on hand, don't even know what they plan on doing for electronic transactions) is not used for prizing?
This is so ridiculous, they can't even enforce this unless they have help from like the IRS lol. They're just counting on their fans being intimidated enough by it that they won't even try to hold tournaments.
What a healthy relationship to have by your fanbase, real "abusive boyfriend" type stuff.
Nintendo: makes a fighting game that is meant to not be competitive
Fans: having fun destroying each other with skills
Nintendo: You're not playing the proper way!
Also Nintendo: makes the most unforgiving party game ever that causes actual fights (Mario Party)
ALSO NINTENDO: You can play games the wrong way too, there are no rules.
As someone who doesn’t care for the tournament scene
That was the end of the sentence
I'm genuinely confused how this is legal for them to do, to a certain extent. Some of the basic stuff that directly interacts with their products, I KIND of get, but the more their stuff like not selling food and drinks, not having sponsors... HOW are they allowed to regulate that? It's not their event! If they were sponsoring an event, or running one, sure, but they aren't and so I don't understand how they get a say in it at all.
That plate from the sponsored section just screams 'childhood' to me. I remember seeing so many plates like that while growing up.
How can they even enforce this? Especially for smaller events, there's no way for them to have the level of oversight they seem to want.
They can't
Think they just want control over things. The rules are a lot more lax as long as you file for a permit and stuff with them. Not saying they should try to control every aspect of everything, but you can still do tournaments. Just have to go through the proper channels.
You can't have food. You can't be disabled. What proper channels, also?
One could argue that they've no right to control over how fans play the games with each other and that this is a draconian level of overreach. They ARE trying to control every aspect, this isn't up for debate, Nintendo made that very clear.
Basically, you can see it as hosting a basketball tournament and the company that makes basketballs you bought from Walmart doesn't want you to sell food/drinks/seats.
It's fucked
To be fair on shutting down inappropriate tournaments, Smash players tend to have that problem of not knowing like, how to make a safe environment for everyone which, fair that Nintendo would want to prevent bad stuff like that
Imagine any other product acting like this. You may NOT use our Rowlings branded baseballs for a baseball tournament. Dont use our skis on a mountain with more than 300 people. These number 2 pencils may not be used for standardized testing.
I wanna get Legal Eagle in on this, what legal power does the maker of a game have over people doing their own tournaments?
Where there is a will there are loopholes.. kind of like gambling in Japan (for those unfamiliar, gambling is “illegal” in Japan, but you can play Pachinko to earn tokens, which can be exchanged for cash from a different institution that’s not connected to the pachinko parlor property, basically)
To be fair, most tournaments are huge profit generators if you know what you are doing and get enough attendees. The tournaments that "break even" or even lose money are mostly just local tournaments that struggle to get a bunch of people outside of their neighborhoods. And the only ones who benefit from these tournaments are the winners and the commissioners/organizers
I personally am starting to dislike Esports in general myself, they destroy a games ability to actually have fun in that game because of "balance" reasons and crying from competitive players. But despite that I do think Nintendo is going overboard as usual.
I'm pretty sure that most majors are losing amount of money by just hosting them alone. Majors such as Shine has been shut down because of that as venues costs a lot, especially hosting more than one day for example. There's a good reason why a major like Genesis cost a ton since what they provides kinda force them to have entre fee that cost a lot in order to not lose money. I would like to think those that can earn the money is either some gaming cafe, or mainly online tournaments.
Isn't fun a very subjective thought when you're saying like that? I do resonate with you that Esport/comp scene kinda makes smash dries out the fun. Sure people won't like to have the meta end up like brawl, but I feel like Sakurai trying to please up everyone that it just hurts smash as a party game in process.