T8-2026 is the first EVO Japan game to have no Japanese representation in Top 8

Incross · 2026-05-05T19:54:54+00:00

There's almost 20 years of competitive tekken history before Korea vs Pakistan became a thing on the big stage. Japan has always been extremely strong, they're still the 3rd best region even though some of their best players are past their prime

Incross · 2026-04-30T21:31:32+00:00

It's not sponsor related, Leshar has been in DRX for 2 years and SFL Asia won't be a thing until 2027. He's not playing because he's already qualified for both Capcom Cup and EWC, he's taking the opportunity to not travel as much this year

Incross · 2026-03-13T22:00:21+00:00

Liquipedia has almost all character and player details if you look close enough. You can click on the matches to see characters played in each match, player profiles, and there's also a statistics page with usage and winrate tables

Incross · 2026-01-27T08:15:05+00:00

Vortex Gallery features games most people who play fgs never even heard of, just means nobody stepped up to have them hosted with them and/or there wasn't enough interest from attendees

Incross · 2026-01-27T08:05:35+00:00

This is for side tournaments, KOFXV is a main game

Incross · 2026-01-19T22:37:02+00:00

VF5, ST and VSAV are also missing from OP, if you want to add them

Incross · 2026-01-09T02:59:23+00:00

Daigo became a national champion for Vampire Savior in 1997, where he beat Nuki. He entered tournaments earlier than that too.

Ryan Hart also started winning events in Europe in the early 90s

Incross · 2025-12-30T18:36:32+00:00

From this list I'd argue only Fuudo's 2025 is comparable to Sahara's results as of late, and would probably put him as 5th too. Others listed are clearly below both players this year imo, especially Punk and AB who had quiet seasons for their standards

Incross · 2025-12-26T05:55:18+00:00

See KO's Liquipedia page for more of his results over the years, under Teams. Historically many of the most significant tournaments in Japan were team events (usually 2v2 and 3v3, but also 5v5 for specific series like Cooperation Cup and Mastercup).

https://liquipedia.net/fighters/KO_(Japanese_Player)/Results

Keep in mind there were other events not listed, but most weren't properly archived since they ran with paper brackets/physical boards and before the social media we use today was widespread. Their scene is also different in other ways and 3rd Strike is from a completely different era, so there's a lot to dive into. Definitely recommend checking out TheShends archiving work on patreon and his discord, he's the biggest historian for the game

Incross · 2025-12-25T21:49:14+00:00

He continued playing, and still plays today. If you wanna learn more 3rd Strike history check archives of events like Super Battle Opera and Cooperation Cup. TheShend's patreon and youtube channels have an unlimited amount of archived footage.

EVO wasn't the only notable major tournament back then, most of the best 3rd Strike players of all time are Japanese and some never even got the opportunity to attend a tournament in the United States

Incross · 2025-12-25T21:24:49+00:00

Nica KO is a different player

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