Nintendo Pulls The Plug On Super Smash Bros Fan Tournament

A popular Super Smash Bros fan tournament has been cancelled after Nintendo sent the organisers at The Big House a cease & desist.

The Big House has been running Super Smash Bros events since 2011, and it seems that they have never had any issues with Nintendo before – that was until this year’s event.

super smash bros art
Credit: Nintendo

The Big House, which has been organising the events since December 2019, took to Twitter with a statement on the matter. The team revealed that the reason why an issue has arisen this year is due to the netcode Slippi being used.

The Big House announced the cancellation on Twitter in which they said they were “heartbroken” by the news.

Slippi is a rollback netcode used to ensure that Nintendo GameCube title Super Smash Bros. Melee is playable online.

However, this particular netcode is not approved by Nintendo and this is where the issue lies.

The Big House 2020 tournament was originally supposed to take place in July of this year in Detroit, and had transitioned from being an in-person event to an online one.

However the recent cease and desist from Nintendo means that the tournament has been outright cancelled.

It’s not the first time that Nintendo has issued cease and desist orders over the years, which has earned them quite the reputation by the gaming community.

Super Smash Bros melee image
Credit: Nintendo

However, in an interesting turn of events, it seems that Nintendo gave The Big House a number of warnings before the cease and desist was issued.

Nintendo released a statement in response to The Big House announcing that the Super Smash Bros. tournament has been cancelled. The company said:

Nintendo appreciates the love and dedication the fighting game community has for the Super Smash Bros. series. We have partnered with numerous Super Smash Bros. tournaments in the past and have hosted our own online and offline tournaments for the game, and we plan to continue that support in the future.

Unfortunately, the upcoming Big House tournament announced plans to host an online tournament for Super Smash Bros. Melee that requires use of illegally copied versions of the game in conjunction with a mod called “Slippi” during their online event. Nintendo therefore contacted the tournament organizers to ask them to stop.

They refused, leaving Nintendo no choice but to step in to protect its intellectual property and brands. Nintendo cannot condone or allow piracy of its intellectual property.

Also in response to The Big House tweet, a follower pointed out the obvious by saying: “You guys should’ve seen this coming. It kinda shocks me that you didn’t.” said the follower.

The follower added “Think about it…you need a Melee ROM to use Slippi. Slippi, itself, is unauthorized software running online.

While we might have “seen this coming,” it’s definitely a blow to the Smash community.

Where do you stand on this cancelled Super Smash Bros fan tournament? Are you on the side of The Big House or Nintendo? Let us know by reacting to our Emoji’s below.

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Featured Image Credit: Nintendo