Capcom Backs Down On Street Fighter Tournament Community License Guidelines

Capcom has revised their previously released Street Fighter Community license guidelines, which allowed tournaments to use official Capcom branding but with strict guidelines on Capcom’s part.

In a blog post, Capcom explained that they’d made the changes based on feedback from the original draft of the Street Fighter guidelines.

“We want to thank our passionate fans for the feedback we received after the first version went live. We hear you”, they said. “Honouring the grassroots tradition of the Street Fighter community is incredibly important to us. To this end, we have updated the Street Fighter V Community License Agreement, taking into account the feedback we received from the community while maintaining our original goal to provide a no-cost license”.

Here’s a summary of the changes Capcom has made to the Street Fighter Community License:

• Increased prize pool limit from $2,000 to $10,000 per event
• Removed the yearly $10,000 prize pool limit
• Increased sponsorship limit from $5,000 to $6,000 per event
• Increased sponsorship limit from $20,000 to $30,000 per year
• Changed spectator fee restrictions
• Changed venue restrictions for bars
• Removed License Grant-back for video/photo content captured at events

A huge chunk of these changes affect the scale of which tournaments would need prior approval from Capcom- basically ensuring that big events would have to get approval and adhere to Capcom’s own style guides.

One other issue was related to venues- Capcom clarified that you will still be allowed to host your tournaments at a bar, as long as the event itself isn’t sponsored by any alcohol brands.

“For the most part, yes, as long as you do not own the bar/establishment and the event is not sponsored by any prohibited brands – including alcohol brands – outlined in Section IV (d)”, Capcom says.

This is a good step forward for Capcom, whose last two Street Fighter-related stories haven’t painted them in a good light, from the first licensing guide to their issues with selecting casters for the Capcom Pro Tour.