Supernova and CEO are coming, but the discourse has muddied the excitement. The FGC complains way too much, I’ll admit it

I never thought I’d say this, but the FGC complains too much. Yes, even for me.

There are a ton of fighting game events coming up. The Esports World Cup (if you care) has Tekken 8 and Street Fighter 6 this weekend. Supernova is happening at the same time if you’re a Smash fan. CEO 2026 is almost here. And Get On My Level just wrapped up.

The FGC is eating right now. You’d think there’d be a lot of hype building up. A lot of epic rivalries, interesting storylines… No, all I see on X are the most POINTLESS beefs and complaints of all time. It’s to the point where even I, the notoriously salty FGC journalist, have no desire to cover these issues at all.

Can’t y’all just enjoy anything?

The fighting game community has some reasons to be salty and whiny. I think it can be legit, to an extent. There are a lot of issues with developers ruining the balance of popular titles, with tournaments not really providing enough prize money, with large-scale events having terrible setups and game-breaking lag. This is like the tip of the iceberg, the part that the general esports community sees and agrees with.

Go down a bit further, however, and you start getting complaints about Evo losing its prestige, content creators being cringe and ruining the authenticity of the scene, and fans feeling like certain on-stage antics are disrespectful. This is all acceptable discourse within the FGC, but may be seen as dramatic elsewhere.

Complaining has become part of the culture, and I’m here for it. It’s even sort of entertaining. And it’s refreshing to see people standing up for what they believe in.

Go down even further, however, and you’re getting to the point where even fighting game veterans are begging for the scene to be destroyed just to not hear this stupid stuff anymore. This is the stuff that doesn’t sit right with me anymore.

On July 31st, I saw this tweet. Because Elon Musk’s algorithm knows to show me all of the most salty crap on X. If there’s anyone who will report on it, it’s me.

However, I was scratching my head. Apparently, others were too.

Apparently, this guy debated not registering for CEO, one of the biggest FGC events this summer, because they had “no clue who was going” or “how many people” were registered for that game. They begged to know why tournament organizers do this, claiming that tons of FGC fans have also refused to register because of it.

Bro…

I sent it to my colleague here at Esports Insider and heard back: “WTF are they on about?” This sentiment was shared on X: “Bro, stop worrying about who else is going. No, normal people didn’t not register because of that reason. You worried someone’s gonna beat your ass in person?”

However, because this is the FGC, this is actually an ongoing discussion and not a one-time weird tweet.

A top Rivals of Aether player (yes, those exist) replied that they also asked this question before. A lot of tournament organizers answered, noting that players can often disregard a tournament if they don’t see a good amount of entrants. One TO noted that it’s easier to tell the community how many attended last year, rather than let people see the small numbers of the current tourney, since most people sign up very last minute.

I mean, I can see that. Makes total sense. The FGC is grassroots, meaning there isn’t really a controlled and consistent circuit all year. Grassroots gives the FGC its unique charm and unrelenting passion. But it also means each TO will have its own way of doing things. Some will block registration, some will reveal it close to the event, and some will never share it. And when things are like that, it’s healthy to have questions and discussions as a community.

So no, I’m not trying to say this is a completely stupid question or discussion. But the fact that it has become an ongoing discourse, creating arguments and drama in the FGC, is what really gets to me.

What do you mean there’s drama over TOs hiding registrations ahead of an event? Like c’mon. Don’t you ever get tired of complaining? Just ask your friends if they’re going. Check Discord. Check X. Is this really worthy of an ongoing debate?

It’s a legit discussion, but the FGC just made it into such a big debate. And they’ve been arguing back and forth about this non-issue all weekend. And now my entire X feed is people ranting about TO’s hiding attendees and if this matters or not.

This isn’t the only useless argument I’ve seen in the FGC over the weekend. It’s just a single example of an ongoing trend I see.

Salt is entertaining to an extent. But when you see small things like this being blown up on social media for an entire weekend multiple times, it sorta makes sense why other esports communities are freaked out.

The FGC is seen as gatekeep-y, judgemental, salty, and complainy, which isn’t the best look for sponsors, investors, and esports orgs looking for new players to sign. It’s a generally unpleasant subset of the esports industry. While this can often be seen as the FGC being more real than other scenes – fighting for what they believe in and not giving in to changes they feel aren’t right – it can get to a point where we sorta just seem unbearable.

Like c’mon, it’s Supernova and CEO. Can’t we just have a bit of fun? Instead of hearing about the fun rivalries and activities coming up that celebrate this niche esports scene, I’m hearing about hidden registration lists all weekend. All we have is each other. We don’t have the money. We don’t have the brand deals. What we do have? Community. Let’s all come together this upcoming weekend and enjoy what the FGC is all about.