Street Fighter 6: Capcom Cup Is Weaker Than Previous Years- Big Bird

Evo 2019 runner up and Red Bull Kumite 2023 winner, Big Bird has opined that the current Capcom Cup is not as strong as the years before. 

Capcom Cup was first introduced in 2013 with 8 players participating. By the next year this number had climbed to 16, and by 2015, it had become 32. Qualification was by a points system similar to what is currently in place for Tekken where different tournaments had points attached to them and with each win, the player had points alloted to them. At the end of the pro tour, the top 32 placed players would then gather for Capcom Cup. 

However, things changed with Capcom Cup IX where the Online Premiers and World Warrior were introduced. With these events, players from more regions could not participate in the tournament thereby shining a light on regions that were generally not well known. But, this meant that strong regions like Japan saw their representation reduce drastically. 

Speaking to DashFight, Big Bird said that while the new system of highlighting more regions is good, it has come at the cost of the competition's relative strength. He explained that the current system has reduced Capcom Cup's power as it was no longer the best 32 players in the world, but rather a selection of the best player of various regions. Considering some regions are stronger than others, it can be argued that this is not a fair representation of the FGC's strength. 

According to him, "I think Capcom Cup right now is no longer about the best players in the world, but it's more about showcasing the best player in each region... The reason I say that is because Japan used to fill out the list back then with at least 15 of them and now they only have two qualifiers, and maybe more if they win the offline premiers. I think the level got affected a bit. There might be some groups where you know who is going to get out of the group."

He also mentioned how he thought Capcom could get it right. In his opinion, it isn't a case that showwcasing more regions is bad, but having less people qualify from a region, for instance, one person per region, and bringing back the points system could be a way to up the level again. 

This would mean that the World Warrior events could get scrapped in favor of one online premier for each region, and then World Warrior events instead become offline premiers where players from all over the world can come and compete and get points to make Capcom Cup. 

"For example I didn't know much about Brazil" Big Bird added, "I didn't even know Brazil played fighting games back then. Then I see all of a sudden Infiltration going to Brazil and playing with the players there and that's how I got to know that there are actual Brazilian players." 

He believes that offline events attract international players and does a better job at highlighting a scene than any other method. He gave the example of South Africa and how good it was for so many top players to go over there and experience the country. It also did a better job of shining the spotlight on South Africa in general than having two South Africans make Capcom Cup. 

You can watch the full video where he talks about this and so many more interesting stuff below.