Nintendo Abruptly Cancels Riptide’s Smash Bros. Tournament

<p>Nintendo and cease-and-desists&comma; a combination that never goes hand-in-hand&comma; nor does it bode well for others&period; The company&&num;8217&semi;s very protective of its IPs&comma; and it&&num;8217&semi;s gotten to some pretty desperate extremes in the past&period; This line of thinking&comma; to the dismay of many&comma; is what we&&num;8217&semi;re here to talk about today&comma; as Nintendo filed yet another cease-and-desist&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>A few days ago&comma; Riptide was originally planning on hosting two tournaments for Super Smash Bros&period; Ultimate&comma; and a mod called Project&plus;&period; Everything seemed to be going off without a hitch until Nintendo sent that dreaded cease-and-desist notice&period; Let&&num;8217&semi;s break down what exactly happened&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<h3 style&equals;"text-align&colon; center">Riptide&&num;8217&semi;s Unfortunate Cancelation<&sol;h3>&NewLine;<p>Riptide is yet another victim in Nintendo&&num;8217&semi;s strained grip upon the usage of their games at events and having to play by their extremely stringent rules&period; Below is the original tweet from Riptide with the unfortunate announcement&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<blockquote class&equals;"twitter-tweet" data-width&equals;"500" data-dnt&equals;"true">&NewLine;<p lang&equals;"zxx" dir&equals;"ltr"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;t&period;co&sol;HQymLi9UyA">pic&period;twitter&period;com&sol;HQymLi9UyA<&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&mdash&semi; Riptide &lpar;&commat;RiptideSSB&rpar; <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;twitter&period;com&sol;RiptideSSB&sol;status&sol;1431345822566912008&quest;ref&lowbar;src&equals;twsrc&percnt;5Etfw">August 27&comma; 2021<&sol;a><&sol;p><&sol;blockquote>&NewLine;<p><script async src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;platform&period;twitter&period;com&sol;widgets&period;js" charset&equals;"utf-8"><&sol;script><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>This seems all relatively in character for Nintendo&period; But there&&num;8217&semi;s an even bigger consequence of this&comma; that might not be immediately noticed that makes it significantly worse than <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;the-big-house-canceled-and-the-melee-communitys-indignation-freemelee&sol;">The Big House<&sol;a>&&num;8216&semi;s cancelation <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;twitter&period;com&sol;TheBigHouseSSB&sol;status&sol;1329521081577857036&quest;s&equals;20">last year<&sol;a>&period; Despite Riptide attendees having their entry fees refunded&comma; players are left with completely useless flight tickets and hotel reservations&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The fact that such a cancellation happened was bound to get people talking&comma; and so people did&period; Hungrybox&comma; one of <em>Melee&&num;8217&semi;s<&sol;em> most prominent tournament competitors&comma; gave his comments on the situation below&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<blockquote class&equals;"twitter-tweet" data-width&equals;"500" data-dnt&equals;"true">&NewLine;<p lang&equals;"en" dir&equals;"ltr">Reminder that Brawl doesn’t even have active online servers anymore&period; It came out in 2008&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>This is unforgivable at this point&period; There’s no legitimate reason for <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;twitter&period;com&sol;Nintendo&quest;ref&lowbar;src&equals;twsrc&percnt;5Etfw">&commat;Nintendo<&sol;a> to do this that doesn’t include a complete disconnect with the current culture of their consumers&period; <&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Insanity&period; <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;t&period;co&sol;2TysTTspio">https&colon;&sol;&sol;t&period;co&sol;2TysTTspio<&sol;a><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&mdash&semi; hungrybox &lpar;&commat;LiquidHbox&rpar; <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;twitter&period;com&sol;LiquidHbox&sol;status&sol;1431360733665656835&quest;ref&lowbar;src&equals;twsrc&percnt;5Etfw">August 27&comma; 2021<&sol;a><&sol;p><&sol;blockquote>&NewLine;<p><script async src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;platform&period;twitter&period;com&sol;widgets&period;js" charset&equals;"utf-8"><&sol;script><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>It&&num;8217&semi;s clear that Nintendo does these things in an effort to try to maintain their IPs&period; But the way they go about it feels extremely tone-deaf&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s almost comical that they expect players to conform to only them making rules for these events&comma; despite barely doing them <em>and<&sol;em> not being able to efficiently run them at times&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>There&comma; unfortunately&comma; isn&&num;8217&semi;t much Riptide can do about their canceled event other than refund entrants their entrance fees&period; We&&num;8217&semi;ll update this story if more details become readily available for it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><strong>What did you think about Nintendo&&num;8217&semi;s abrupt cancelation of a tournament within two weeks&&num;8217&semi; notice&quest; Do you think it was right for them to do this right before the event&quest; Are you one of the affected parties in light of this cancellation&quest; Are you hoping things turn out better for the Riptide team&quest; Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below&period;<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;