EVO 2019 lineup revealed, Super Smash Bros. Melee left out

The full EVO 2019 lineup was revealed. But Super Smash Bros. Melee is not among the nine games revealed and will miss the event for the first time since 2013.

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It's that time of year, when the biggest fighting game tournament in the world decides on its lineup of games. EVO takes place every summer and brings in the top fighting game players in the world. While primarily playing home to the Street Fighter franchise, the annual tournament has also hosted a slew of top fighting games over the years, ranging from the Marvel vs. Capcom series, to the NetherRealm fighters, and even to Super Smash Bros. On Tuesday, Joey "MrWiz" Cuellar and Mark "Markman" Julio revealed the games that will take the stage this year.

Here are the games that will be played at EVO 2019:

  • Tekken 7
  • Street Fighter 5: Arcade Edition
  • BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle
  • Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
  • Dragon Ball FighterZ
  • SoulCalibur VI
  • Mortal Kombat 11
  • Samurai Shodown
  • Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late[st]

The biggest stunner is that this will mark the first time since 2013 that Super Smash Bros. Melee is not featured. Melee first debuted in 2013 as part of a fan vote, where it subsequently broke the EVO viewership record. It still surpassed 200,000 viewers during last year's finals. But with Ultimate bringing multiple Smash communities together, it does not appear that Melee is needed anymore. With that said, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate comes with heighened expectations. Cuellar notes that he expects it to ultimately break the 5,000 entrant mark, a bar only surpassed by Street Fighter V.

Leffen will go down as the final official Melee EVO winner, for now
Leffen will go down as the final official Melee EVO winner, for now

Cuellar also addressed EVO Sunday. In response to a question from Dominique "SonicFox" McLean, Cuellar noted that the final EVO day had started to run too long. Therefore, only four games will be featured on the final Sunday this year, as opposed to the five games from past years. Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition, Tekken 7, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, and BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle will be the four games featured on this year's final Sunday. The shocker here is that Dragon Ball FighterZ is not listed among the Sunday games, despite setting an EVO record for concurrent viewers with last year's Top 8.

Tuesday's stream also revealed that not only would Samurai Shodown be a part of the EVO lineup, but it also unveiled a new trailer, which we'll post as soon it becomes available. Samurai Shodown is set to release worldwide in early summer.

EVO 2019 will run from August 2-4 from Las Vegas, NV. The first two days will unfold from the Mandalay Bay Convention Center, with the final Sunday set to run from the Manadalay Bay Events Center. Tickets will be available on the official EVO website.

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?

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From The Chatty
  • reply
    February 26, 2019 6:30 PM

    Ozzie Mejia posted a new article, EVO 2019 lineup revealed, Super Smash Bros. Melee left out

    • reply
      February 26, 2019 7:33 PM

      Most hype game that I believe still has the EVO record for most views is out now?

      Stupid, but I guess it had to join Brood War and Quake sometime

      • Zek legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
        reply
        February 26, 2019 7:51 PM

        Smash Ultimate finally reached critical mass of bringing people over.

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          February 26, 2019 11:43 PM

          Melee still sets record viewership for Evo. Even Genesis 6 peaked with Melee finals.

          Don’t get me wrong, I think Ultimate is great, 1000x better than Smash 4, but its something entirely different from Melee. There’s room for both, maybe next year

          • Zek legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
            reply
            February 27, 2019 8:18 AM

            I think that's just because Smash 4 didn't have that serious a competitive scene. People like to watch high level Smash play, I don't think the viewers are super loyal to Melee specifically. So I expect the Melee viewership will transfer over to Ultimate.

      • reply
        February 26, 2019 8:08 PM

        Yup.

    • reply
      February 27, 2019 2:06 AM

      That's how it goes. Lots of people still play SF4 but you aren't going to see it on stream. The fighting game community invests so much time into the games that when new games come out, they automatically suck. When most of the time the game is fine, they just can't except the fact that they have to start over.

      If they were smart they would stop bashing 3D fighters who have legacy moves and start playing them. But hey, that makes sense.

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        February 27, 2019 5:13 AM

        Soul Calibur and Tekken are super popular right now? What 3D fighters are you talking about? They even had DOA at the last major. I'm not sure what's going on with Virtua Fighter currently.

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          February 27, 2019 5:21 AM

          I'm just saying the FGC as a whole would be better off if they embraced 3D fighters a lot of us older folks who were there when they first came out.

    • reply
      February 27, 2019 5:34 AM

      Don't the logistics of melee suck for every tournament? You always hear complaints about having to get CRTs together, finding hardware that's consistent and stable, etc. Makes sense if that's the reason.

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      February 27, 2019 5:57 AM

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      February 27, 2019 7:23 AM

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      February 27, 2019 7:46 AM

      [deleted]

    • reply
      February 27, 2019 1:37 PM

      No Guilty Gear Xrd?????? SAD

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