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This liaison that you spoke to. Is this someone that you knew and had a [professional] relationship with at Nintendo? Or is it just a person?
It’s a person who I have emailed before and has essentially stamped their approval, saying: “You’re good to go. Here’s a license agreement. An Evo 2013 situation is not gonna happen to you because of this license agreement.”*
*[Editor’s Note: What happened to The Big House Online is very much what happened to EVO 2013 - except worse. Nintendo relented on EVO, they haven’t on The Big House Online]
The cost of stopping short
How does something like that [cease and desist] affect you personally, financially?
If this was a normal year and this was in-person at an actual venue that cost thousands and thousands of dollars, this would have been much more disastrous.*
But since it was online a lot of the costs weren’t as frontloaded and they were just contracted people who were gonna work that event. So it was more of a matter of talking to them and being like, “I’m so sorry that we’re not working that weekend anymore but this shit just came at me fast.”
[Editor’s note: See what happened to the tournament CEO for an example of how disastrous last-minute major event cancellations can be]
What do the contractors look like?
Mostly the stream broadcasters. That is a big one because production value is very important to me and it’s not cheap to create a good looking broadcast. TOs that help me run the actual event. Commentators.* Those are the main three. [...]
On a more personal level, I think we have some sunk costs here so we’re probably gonna still do something on that weekend that was originally filled by Big House. Whether it’s a rebroadcast or some sort of other game that involves Smash personalities. I’m not sure yet, but I think we’re gonna be trying to raise some money there. So stay tuned for that.*
*[Editor’s Notes: Popular Smash commentator and content creator Kristopher “Toph” Aldenderfer spoke briefly to the money troubles of COVID and of working full-time in an already under-funded Smash scene.
**Follow the Big House on twitter for more information on what’s to come.]
Do you think that this is gonna make it harder to get sponsors?
It might, it’s just too hard to say right now. I think there are some organizations like Beyond the Summit, that have had really good success getting sponsors because they have actual sales people on their team - even without Nintendo support! BTS has never had a Nintendo-partnered license agreement and I don’t think they’re seeking it.
They know who they are, they have a good identity, and I think other Melee TOs have to own that as well instead of trying to skirt the line.
They don’t have their feet on the factory floor
How do you feel about Nintendo’s understanding of the competitive Smash scene as a whole?
I think there may be various people who understand what the community needs and understand that it’s not good to stifle content and innovation but it’s very clear that the decision makers and the legal department, those two entities are out of touch with what’s best for the community.
Is it common to see anybody from Nintendo, especially higher up within the company, come to an event?
I've never seen the Nintendo rep I spoke to attend a Smash event, as far as I know. It's very rare to see someone from Nintendo (especially higher ups) attend a competitive Smash event.
Is there any real way, even for insiders in the Smash world, to know Nintendo’s intention or Nintendo’s plan behind these things?
I don’t think there’s a reliable way to know anything with what Nintendo’s gonna do. The reason for that is the people at Nintendo who talk to the Melee TOs directly, I don’t think they even know.
They’ve gotta escalate to somebody higher up and then that person’s gonna have to escalate it to somebody in legal or someone even higher up than that. By that point there’s so many degrees of separation from the actual community leaders and TOs that that decision maker at the top doesn’t know what’s happening.
They don’t have their feet on the factory floor, they can’t really relate to what’s happening. So various decisions might be made on legal grounds, but morally they’re just completely backwards from where we need to be as a community. [...]
I think there’s a lot of moving parts, especially at a company like Nintendo, and I think the people who actually understand what the community needs... I don’t think they are the decision makers, at the end of the day. That’s kind of the root of the problem, I see. [...] I’m not particularly upset at any individual person. It’s just, I’m saddened at the situation as a whole.
