Evo 2004

Last updated
2004 Evolution Championship Series
Evo Championship Series logo cropped.png
Tournament information
Location Pomona, California, United States
DatesJuly 29–August 1
Tournament
format(s)
Round-robin/Double elimination
Venue(s) California State Polytechnic University, Pomona
 2003
2005 

The 2004 Evolution Championship Series (commonly referred to as Evo 2004 or EVO 2004) was a fighting game event held at the California State Polytechnic University, Pomona in Pomona, California from July 29 to August 1. The event featured nine fighting games on the main lineup, including Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike and Marvel vs. Capcom 2 . While in previous Evolution events until 2003 all competitions were held on arcade machines, most tournaments at Evo 2004 were played on video game consoles except Street Fighter III: Third Strike.

Contents

Evo 2004 featured the first Street Fighter match between Daigo Umehara and Justin Wong, in which Umehara executed the "Daigo Parry". The controversial final match of the Soulcalibur II tournaments held at Evo 2004 motivated the implementation of a collusion rule still in use today.

Background

Evo 2004 was held at Cal Poly Pomona. CP Pomona-CLA.png
Evo 2004 was held at Cal Poly Pomona.

The sixth Evolution Championship Series was held at the California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, Southern California on July 29 to August 1. Evo 2004 featured approximately 700 participants from over 30 nations, each competing in one or more of the nine tournaments held at the event. In order to create an easier situation for staff and increase the average play time of participants, the double-elimination-style tournaments of previous Evo events was replaced with a round-robin/double-elimination pool system. In the old system, some players would find themselves being eliminated from a tournament after losing two games, but because of the newly implemented system each participant would face off against at least nine other players during the preliminary pool. [1]

2004 was in the middle of what Tom Cannon would later describe as the "Dark Ages" of the fighting game community, when fighting games were largely abandoned by game developers. However, the Evolution Championship Series grew steadily every year, and had become the largest fighting game tournament of its time. [2]

Up until Evo 2004, every Evolution event relied almost entirely on arcade cabinets. However, arcade hardware has always been relatively difficult to get a hold of, especially for games that do not run on Capcom's CP System II system boards. Furthermore, arcade hardware would commonly offer up technical issues. Lastly, competitors often complained that the arcade hardware available at Evolution was different from the hardware they have trained on. In order to solve these issues, the Evolution organizers opted to switch to using video game consoles only at the tournament, where participants have to bring their own game controllers. Only the Street Fighter III: Third Strike tournament held at Evo 2004 was played on arcade hardware, because the Street Fighter Anniversary Collection release date was pushed back to August. [1]

Tournament organizers opted to turn the team tournaments, which were traditionally exhibition matches, into a main part of the event. Two specifically seeded team tournaments in Capcom vs. SNK 2 and Marvel vs. Capcom 2 and a Pair Play tournament for Tekken Tag Tournament were held at Evo 2004. Evo 2004 also featured a "Bring Your Own Console" area, where people were able to set up smaller-scale tournaments of games not on the main roster. [1]

Evo Moment #37

Despite having never matched off against each other before, the Japanese Daigo Umehara and American Justin Wong were known for having a supposed rivalry with each other due to their differences in gaming philosophies. The two players met each other in the loser's finals of Evo 2004's Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike tournament. Umehara, playing using the character Ken, was down to his last unit of health and any special attack by Wong's Chun-Li could knock Ken out. Wong attempted to hit his opponent with Chun-Li's consecutively hitting "Super Art" move, forcing Umehara to parry 15 attacks in a very short period of time. Umehara did so successfully and went on to counter a final kick from Chun-Li in mid-air before launching a combo move himself and winning the match. The clip of Umehara parrying Wong's multihit attack became hugely influential and has been compared to famous sports moments such as Babe Ruth's called shot and the Miracle on Ice. [3] [4]

The Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike tournament was won by Kenji "KO" Obata, playing as Yun. He beat Umehara in the finals, just as he did a year prior at Evo 2003. [5]

Soulcalibur II incident

The final match of the Soulcalibur II tournament at Evo 2004 was held between the friends Rob "RTD" Combs and Marquette "Mick" Yarbrough. The two were widely accused for collusion and not taking the fight seriously, playing using different characters than usual and playing on a "sub-par level". The two disputed these claims when asked about it on Game Show Network's Games Across America. Though Combs and Yarbrough were not punished directly, Evo went on to implement a "collusion rule", stating that players who purposely manipulate a match or intentionally underperform would forfeit prize and title. Speaking with GiantBomb in 2013, Evo-founder Tom Cannon stated that "they broke the spirit of the tournament. ... We were like 'fine, this happened, let's make sure this is never gonna happen again.'" Evolution's anti-collusion measure was further expanded in 2013 and is still in place. [6] [7]

Results

PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of the United States.svg Justin WongjwongStorm/Sentinel/Captain Commando
2nd Flag of the United States.svg David LeeKingDavidMagneto/Cable/Sentinel
3rd Flag of the United States.svg Desmond PinkneyXecutionerSentinel/Storm/Captain Commando
4th Flag of the United States.svg Chris SchmidtMagneto/Storm/Sentinel
5th Flag of the United States.svg Tong HoGenghisStorm/Sentinel/Captain Commando
5th Flag of the United States.svg Randy Lew Sentinel/Cable/Captain Commando
7th Flag of the United States.svg Sooyoung ChonSooMightyStorm/Sentinel/Captain Commando
7th Flag of the United States.svg Peter AvilaPotterStorm/Magneto/T. Bonne
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of Japan.svg Kenji ObataKOYun
2nd Flag of Japan.svg Daigo Umehara DaigoKen
3rd Flag of the United States.svg Justin Wong jwongChun Li
4th Flag of Japan.svg Toru HashimotoRaohChun Li
5th Flag of Japan.svg Keisuke ImaiKSKAlex
5th Flag of Japan.svg Katsuhisa OtaKokujinDudley
7th Flag of the United States.svg Hsien ChanghsienKen
7th Flag of the United States.svg Mike WatsonKen
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of Japan.svg Daigo UmeharaDaigoO. Sagat, Ryu, Balrog
2nd Flag of the United States.svg John Choi ChoiboyO. Sagat, Guile
3rd Flag of Japan.svg Kuni FunadaKuniZangief
4th Flag of the United States.svg Justin WongJwongO. Sagat, Chun-Li
5th Flag of the United States.svg Alex Valle CaliPowerRyu, O. Sagat
5th Flag of the United States.svg Wes TruelsonKen, Balrog
7th Flag of the United States.svg Jesse HowardRyu
7th Flag of the United States.svg Seth KillianS-KillE. Honda
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of Japan.svg Yosuke ItoKindevuA-Sakura/Bison/Blanka
2nd Flag of the United States.svg Ricki Ortiz HelloKittyA-Vega/Sakura/Blanka
3rd Flag of the United States.svg John ChoichoiboyC-Ken/Sagat/Guile
4th Flag of Japan.svg DanC-Ken/Ryu/Sagat
5th Flag of the United States.svg Justin WongJwongC-Vega/Chun-Li/Sagat
5th Flag of the United States.svg Campbell TranBuktoothN-Iori/Morrigan/Hibiki
7th Flag of the United States.svg Eddie LeeA-Mai/Eagle/Vega
7th Flag of Japan.svg Ryota FukumotoRFA-Sakura/Bison/Blanka
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of the United States.svg Robert CombsRTDXianghua, Ivy, Voldo, Nightmare
2nd Flag of the United States.svg Marquette YarbroughMickCassandra, Sophitia, Voldo
3rd Flag of Canada (Pantone).svg Mystic SeniorSowNemesisSophitia, Cervantes
4th Flag of the United States.svg Christian GonzalezVicious SuicideYoshimitsu
5th Flag of the United States.svg Steven LuongB:LMitsurugi
5th Flag of the United States.svg Rob NagaroXCTUTalim
7th Flag of the United States.svg Jonathan SoonBinkleyCervantes
7th Flag of the United States.svg Steven HannaEternal FighterNightmare, Xianghua
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of Japan.svg Daigo UmeharaDaigoSol
2nd Flag of Japan.svg Yosuke ItoKindevuEddie
3rd Flag of Japan.svg Ryota FukumotoRFFaust
4th Flag of the United States.svg Kevin TurnerShin KensouChipp, Eddie
5th Flag of Japan.svg Soh MiuraMiuSol
5th Flag of the United States.svg Saif EbrahimIDSol
7th Flag of the United States.svg Daniel RealyvasquezRuinEddie
7th Flag of the United States.svg Peter ShouXenotigerFaust, Axl
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of Japan.svg Hiromiki KumadaItabashi ZangiefShun Di
2nd Flag of the United States.svg Eric ChungShouTimeSarah
3rd Flag of Japan.svg KuritaVanessa
4th Flag of the United Kingdom.svg Ryan Hart Prodigal SonKage, Akira
5th Flag of Japan.svg Toru HashimotoRaohLau
5th Flag of the United States.svg Adam RanaadamYUKIJeffrey
7th Flag of the United States.svg Che DunkleyCappoPai
7th Flag of the United States.svg Jimmy ByunMaddyAkira
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of the United States.svg Anthony TranJackie TranJin
2nd Flag of the United States.svg Joshua MolinaroJinKidHeihachi, Jin
3rd Flag of the United States.svg Thomas KymnTomHilfigerNina, Steve
4th Flag of Greece.svg Nikos FourikisAenicaJulia
5th Flag of the United Kingdom.svg Ryan HartProdigal SonHeihachi
5th Flag of the United States.svg Jason GreesonUSMC OgrePaul
7th Flag of the United States.svg Chetan ChettyChetChettyPaul
7th Flag of the United States.svg Robert WarrenQbert3Jin
PlacePlayerAliasCharacter(s)
1st Flag of the United Kingdom.svg Ryan HartProdigal SonJin, Kazuya
2nd Flag of the United States.svg Shaun RiveraUnconkableArmor King, Devil Kazuya, Anna
3rd Flag of the United States.svg Brad VitaleSlipsJulia / Eddy
4th Flag of the United States.svg Nick ShinShinJulia / Michelle
5th Flag of Italy.svg Fabrizio TavassiBodeMichelle / Julia
5th Flag of the United States.svg Thomas KymnTomHilfigerDevil Kazuya / Jin, Bruce / Julia
7th Flag of the United States.svg Chetan ChettyChetChettyJin / Devil Kazuya, Armor King / Anna
7th Flag of the United States.svg Joshua MolinaroJinKidJin / Devil Kazuya

References

  1. 1 2 3 Kleckner, Stephen (2004-08-18). "Spotlight on the Evolution 2K4 Fighting Game Tournament". GameSpot .
  2. Learned, John (2017-07-17). "The Oral History of EVO: The Story of the World's Largest Fighting Game Tournament". VG247 .
  3. Markazi, Arash (2016-08-26). "Daigo and JWong: the legacy of Street Fighter's Moment 37". ESPN .
  4. Baker, Chris (2016-07-21). "Flashback: Why 2004 'Street Fighter' Match Is Esports' Most Thrilling Moment". Rolling Stone .
  5. Aquino, Andrés (2020-03-25). "The top 10 Street Fighter players of all time". Ginx TV .
  6. Klepek, Patrick (2013-08-08). "The Collusion of Money, Drama, And Pride". GiantBomb .
  7. Guerrero, John (2015-07-14). "Virtua Kazama covers the EVO Soul Calibur scandal of 04' and the famous Moment 37 in 'The History of EVO (Part 2): 2003-2005'". EventHubs.