A game that has received PEGI 12 is not fit for Broadcast Standards according to ESPN. The costume that Cammy has been wearing for past 24 years doesn’t sit well with the network’s standards and practices.
When Capcom announced that Cammy would be a playable character in Street Fighter 5 then there was some backlash from the fans as there were comments like Ugly character design and sexually provocative. She is again surrounded with controversy, during last weekend’s Evo 2017 e-sports tournament in Las Vegas, Japanese competitor Ryota Inoue (who competes under the mononym Kazunoko) advanced, on the strength of his Cammy play, to the Street Fighter V finals, where he found himself paired against American player Du Dang, also known as NuckleDu.
Like many fighting games, Street Fighter V allows players to pick from multiple costumes for each character. For his first match against NuckleDu, Kazunoko selected Cammy’s default outfit: a form-fitting green bodysuit, which has been the character’s signature outfit since her debut in Super Street Fighter II way back in 1993.
Kazunoko took the first match handily in two rounds. For their second match, both competitors chose to continue playing as the same characters, but Kazunoko was now playing as Cammy in her Capcom Pro Tour costume. There’s no superstition among pro gamers about using the same costume twice in a row being bad luck, nor do Street Fighter V’s outfits affect the gameplay in any way.
Just before the second match starts, at the 7:06 mark of the above video, a tournament official can be seen speaking with Kazunoko. The gamer looks puzzled as the official fiddles with his controller before giving a nod of acquiescence and holding up a hand in the “OK” gesture. According to competitive gaming website Compete, the discussion took place because cable sports network ESPN, which was broadcasting Evo 2017’s Street Fighter V finals, was uncomfortable showing Cammy in her default outfit, and so “The request was made per broadcast standards.”
This may not be the last time ESPN, or another organization of its ilk, takes issue with something many hard-core gamers have grown accustomed to seeing over the course of 20-plus years.
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Mike
Women’s beach volleyball. ESPN will broadcast this but not a videogame outfit which covers more. Pathetic.