An evening at EVO 2008.

Yesterday was day two of the EVO Championship Series, a yearly fighting game tournament hosted here in Las Vegas. While I wasn’t a competitor (I’m a solidly average 2D fighter player), I dropped by for several hours to take in the scene, see the new games, and to watch the midnight screening of Bang the Machine, a documentary following the participants of a Street Fighter series tournament, all vying for a spot on the team that would be traveling to Japan and representing the United States in further matches.

So, the new games.

Capcom had delivered ten head-to-head Viewlix cabinets for the event, arranged in an outward facing circle near the center of the BYOC (Bring Your Own Console) play area. Eight of the cabinets were running Street Fighter IV, and the final two were builds of Tatsunoko vs. Capcom, a game I hadn’t seen much of prior to last night but ultimately my favorite of the bunch. Additionally, an Xbox 360 kiosk was running Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix, and I’d heard that Arc was on hand the day before with BlazBlue, although it was unfortunately gone by the time I arrived.

Tatsunoko vs. Capcom is looking great. Something like the fighting game version of Super Robot Wars, the game pits characters from various Capcom properties against Tatsunoko Production’s lineup. So far, less than a dozen of the playable characters have been revealed, but the character select screen seemed to be built for a whole lot more. Assuming licensing talks go well (the reason there’s never been a US release of the Super Robot Wars games), it could be quite the collection. I hope Mospeada, Southern Cross, or any of the other Robotech licenses are represented.

Pictures and video after the jump!

Circle o’ Viewlix. I hear these cabinets cost around $5k a pop.

The BYOC area. A healthy assortment of Dreamcasts, PS2, and a couple Neo Geos (including a converted NARC cabinet and a couple half-cabs with MVS setups).