The fifth annual Tekken World Tour is set to kick off in just over a month.
In a press release yesterday, February 21, Bandai-Namco revealed the first details for this year’s globe-trotting Tekken tournament. The first event on tour will be in Tokyo, Japan, at the Tokyo Tekken Masters Tournament on April 4-5, and the final event will be the Tekken World Tour Finals in New Orleans, Louisiana, on December 12-13. In between the kickoff and the finals, there will be over thirty events in different categories, including Masters, Challengers, and Dojo levels. The tour stakes are set at over $200,000 for this year.
Since its release in 2015, Tekken 7 has developed one of the most vibrant competitive scenes in the Fighting game Community (FGC). The game has been featured at every EVO Tournament since it came out, frequently as the main stage event, while other games tend to come and go from the biggest annual FGC event. The fact that the game’s audience can still support a world your style event so late in its lifecycle is further proof of the strength of the competitive scene.
The 2019 edition of the Tekken World Tour was won by Japan’s Yuta “Chikurin” Take who took home $75,0000 for the victory. South Korean players Soo-hoon “Ulsan” Lim and Jae-Min “Knee” Bae rounded out the podium at second and third, taking home $50,000 and $37,500, respectively. On the road through the tournament, both Chikurin and Ulsan dropped only a single game to their opponents until they met in the finals. While Chikurin started the tournament from the upper bracket, Ulsan had to fight through the loser’s bracket. When the competitors met in the finals, the contest was an almost 20-minute back-and-forth despite the 3-0 scoreboard at the end.
Ok, you’ve got 42 days to practice and get to Tokyo. Go! Go! Go!
