Exclusive Interview! I asked mr. "Susipaku", the operator of esports-free material birth!

Around the summer of 2018. Mr. Ayano, the e-sports producer at Capcom, proposed to me that he wanted to do an e-sports free material for STV.

I told him that it was quite difficult to get permission for the genre from a rights standpoint, including the location, players, IP, etc. He said he wanted to work on it, so we started by filming at the CAPCOM Pro Tour (CPT) held at TGS2018.

PAKUTAZO has been operating for nine years and has released more than 100 projects, including independent projects and collaborations.

It usually takes at most one year from planning to release, and usually three to six months, but this was the first time that it took two years for a project to be released.

This time, we filmed not only in Japan but also in Hong Kong, and it was very difficult to coordinate with Capcom due to social conditions and rights issues.

Our site is a service that depends on its users, so it took a lot of time to obtain the proper permissions and conduct legal checks each time to ensure there were no problems.

Actually, one of the PakuTaso photographers is a guy from Fangler Games, and he suggested that we shoot in Hong Kong.

We actually dared to shoot at TGS2018, which I mentioned at the beginning of this article, but we couldn't shoot because we couldn't adjust the rights in time.

The e-sports rights licensing hurdles were much higher than I had imagined, and it broke my heart.

Then a PakuTaso photographer from Fangler Games suggested that we shoot the Strike V e-sports tournament in Hong Kong.
Fangler Games has a branch office in Hong Kong, so I had some interaction with the players.

This is how I was introduced to Humanbomb and Mameci.

We also have a good relationship with CGA, which hosts the CGA eSports Stadium in Hong Kong and the Esports Festival Hong Kong 2019 eSports event, so it was great that we were able to get permission to shoot there so smoothly. It was also important for us to be able to smoothly obtain permission for filming.

I think PakuTaso is the only free material site that has obtained permission from Hong Kong's eSports facilities and events.

I don't think Mr. Ayano was expecting to be asked to shoot in Hong Kong (laughs).
(Laughs) But since Humanbomb is a well-known player, he agreed to do it.

"There was also a Street Fighter V tournament at the Esports Festival Hong Kong 2019, and I had heard that the CGA's facilities were great, so I was excited.

It was my first time in Hong Kong, and I was impressed by the excitement of the Esports Festival Hong Kong 2019 and how different the popular game genres were from those in Japan.

I also enjoyed the fact that it was a bit different from Japanese gaming events because it was like an instant sales venue.

I bought a few things and still use them today.

"I was surprised at how well equipped the CGA eSports Stadium was.

At first I thought it was just an arcade or internet cafe, but when I entered, I was impressed by how advanced each piece of equipment was. Just playing a game here is enough to get me excited.

I heard later that Hong Kong itself must have put a lot of effort into it, because the land is expensive and they had to build such a spacious and well-equipped facility in a prime location.
I was surprised because I have never seen such a well-equipped facility in Japan. It would be interesting if they build a warehouse or other facilities like this.

Also, the staff at the CGA eSports Stadium cooperated with the filming, and the manager can speak Japanese, so even though we were filming during business hours, he let us use a corner of the building for filming...

That was Humanbomb's own T-shirt.
I also had a Chun-Li Ver. T-shirt, but I wanted the main character Ryu's T-shirt because it was e-sports free material.

The CGA loaned me the arcade controller.
The CGA eSports Stadium has a corner where you can play fighting games called FIGHT CLUB, and they have a permanent arcade controller there, so they lent me their arcade controller.
When you think of eSports facilities, you may think of PC games such as FPS and MOBA, but CGA has a corner where you can play fighting games, so I was happy to be able to actually play the full version of "Street Fighter V" on PS4.

I think it is rare to find an e-sports facility in Japan where you can play "Street Fighter V".

We are planning to release free materials for the CGA eSports Stadium, so we hope you will make use of them.

I tried to take photos of various characters in the free material.
Also (in the qualifying rounds), I tried to include the players playing and the audience watching them play in the composition.
The sense of realism is very important.

I also play STV, and I was disappointed that not many players were using Ryu, the main character of the game.
Ryu is the main character, so he looks good as a free material...

We used multiple photographers to capture the atmosphere of the entire venue, so we had to be creative.

It was not good to only take pictures of the game screens, and I regret that there were not enough pictures of the players....

However, I think we did a good job of conveying the "atmosphere of an e-sports event.

In other collaborative projects, it is possible to retake the photos if they are too subtle, but since the photos were taken at the actual event, they were taken on the spot, and we couldn't use lighting or flash.

In that sense, it was a good experience to be able to shoot at Esports Festival Hong Kong 2019.

"Esports Festival Hong Kong 2019" was held in August, and "CPT Asia Premiere 2019" was held in September.

As a result, we ended up with a huge amount of photos, and it was very difficult to select photos and exchange data (laughs).

We've had a great response from PakuTaso users who are familiar with games.
Also, I think the number of media coverage was the highest ever for PakuTaso.
We are very happy to see that our materials are being used in articles about e-sports, and are also being used on the corporate websites of e-sports related companies.

We don't have any concrete plans, but recently it has been difficult to hold offline events due to the new coronavirus, so it would be nice if we could shoot e-sports free materials that include the atmosphere of online competitions and networking.

This time, we collaborated only with Capcom, the IP holder, but it would be interesting to collaborate with device makers and network operators as well... I have a fantasy that it would be interesting.