Author: Ian "iantothemax" Walker

CEOtaku, the tournament organized by CEO Gaming’s Alex Jebailey as a way to reach out to folks in the airdasher community, is just around the corner. As such, new details have surfaced online pertaining to registration numbers, and things are looking pretty good for the upcoming event.

There are currently nearly 350 unique participants spread across the tournament’s nine official titles and six side events. Unsurprisingly, Guilty Gear Xrd -SIGN- drew the most attention with 185 participants, one player shy of double the next highest title, BlazBlue: Chronophantasma EXTEND. Following that, Persona 4 Arena Ultimax and Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late show respectable numbers, and Marvel brings up the rear.

A complete look at the numbers can be found below.

Arguably more important than the straight numbers, the organizers have also shared tentative pool assignments for folks to review and provide feedback. Much like the details above, these are subject to change due to seeding errors and late registration, but they still provide a quick look at which players are likely to run into each other.

Some of the competitors that you can expect to see include Argenrost, BananaKen, Colpevole, dekillsage, Dogura, doren2k, Kazunoko, ElvenShadow, Flocker, Flux, Foo, FullSchedule, Havoc, Hotashi, Thebeautifuldude, BT|Viscant, and many, many more.

CEOtaku is scheduled for October 17-18 in Orlando, Florida. Further details can be found here.

Source: CEOtaku (1, 2), special thanks to Jebailey for sending these details our way.

If the majority of your gaming happens on Sony platforms, you’ve likely felt pretty left out over the past few weeks with all the fighting game sales taking place on Xbox and PC. Fortunately, this week’s PlayStation Network deals include a number of titles, both old and new, to spice up your PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation Vita libraries.

Similar to past sales, many of the fighters below come from NetherRealm Studios, meaning you can finally check out Mortal Kombat X or even expand your roster with a discounted Kombat Pack. You could also pick up Persona 4 Arena Ultimax if “anime” fighters are more your speed.

The full list of sales can be found in the handy table below.

Source: PlayStation Blog

Earlier this year, ESL provided the Mortal Kombat X community an excellent opportunity with a pro league centered around their game of choice. Regular online tournaments where held for three specific regions–North America, Europe, and the Russian Commonwealth–that culminated in an intense grand finals with representation from all over the world.

That league was such a success that they have announced a second season, with many of the same details as the first. An open bracket will launch every weekend and be narrowed down until only eight players remain. The following Wednesday, that group will be put into a special Fatal Eight bracket for ranking points, which will determine the competitors that take part in the main event.

This time around, however, the money has been significantly increased. Each weekly tournament will feature $1,000 in payouts, and the finals now boast a $100,000 prize pool.

ESL’s Mortal Kombat X Pro League is set to kick off preseason competition this Sunday, October 18, with the regular season beginning on November 1. Players can expect the main event to go down sometime early next year. For more details on regional start times, follow the link below.

Source: ESL Gaming

The ability to update games on the fly has given developers the opportunity to spice up their titles with limited content based on holidays, and Bandai Namco Entertainment is set to do just that in Pokkén Tournament for Halloween.

During the upcoming festivities, players will be able to deck out their trainers in Halloween-themed costumes as well as battle in a special stage designed around the holiday.

Apart from aesthetics, the update is set to rebalance the title with a number of gameplay adjustments for the existing cast and introduce a brand new support duo consisting of Mismagius and Ninetales.

Pokkén Tournament’s Halloween event is scheduled to last from October 15 to November 3.

Source: Pokkén Tournament, tip via Cellsai

Over the past year, pretty much every major Killer Instinct tournament was building to something greater: the Killer Instinct World Cup. Organized by the folks at San Antonio’s Ultra Arcade, this circuit was crafted to give fans of the rebooted Xbox One fighter an event similar to Capcom Cup and the tour that precedes it, with all the prestige you would expect of such a tournament.

The bracket was originally capped at sixteen players, decided through immediate qualifiers at events like Evo 2015 and Combo Breaker as well as a ranking system for consistent placers, but yesterday the organizers announced they have expanded the event to include 32 competitors in total. And instead of a $10,000 prize pool, players will be competing for three times that amount thanks to the Killer Instinct Community Fund set up by Microsoft and Iron Galaxy Studios.

But that’s not all! This expansion has opened up four separate last-chance qualifiers to be held the day before the tournament. These brutal, single-elimination brackets will give folks who just missed out on qualifying through other means the chance to break into the finals, so be on the look out for some intense competition ahead of the main event.

Killer Instinct World Cup is scheduled for January 21-20 in San Antonio, Texas. For more details on what this event is bringing to the table, including hiring Combo Breaker’s Rick Thiher as production manager and additional support from “symphonic metal band” Heliosaga, check out the original announcement by following the link below.

Source: Ultra Arcade

With all the brouhaha surrounding the reveal of Street Fighter V newcomer Laura Matsuda and Yoshinori Ono’s comments on Alex’s future in the upcoming title, some information was bound to fall through the cracks. One such detail concerned when we should expect to learn the identities of Street Fighter V’s remaining two cast members.

During his presentation at Brazil Game Show, Ono laid out a rough timeline for their future announcements, saying through a translator that the fourth new character will be introduced sometime over the next two months. Looking ahead, Capcom Cup falls well within that window, and as of now that’s the best guess we have to work with.

In addition to the final newcomer, Ono also mentioned that they still have to reveal another returning fighter, but didn’t provide any hints as to when we should expect their unveiling.

Street Fighter V is scheduled to launch for PlayStation 4 and PC sometime next spring.

Source: LESTAT MMOs (tip via NightmareSteam), translation courtesy of Rafael Liberalquino