A lot of his assertions at TO's and the community are flat out wrong. Hotels usually do not give out venue space for free. They can give you a discount for booking rooms, sure, but free is hard to come by. Even then, it's not a risk free venture, you have to guarantee a large number of room nights rented, otherwise you're on the hook for the event space and/or rooms... and that's a pretty huge price tag. I'm pretty sure Big E took a huge bath on that Summer Jam when a hurricane hit the east coast.
And he praises Smash and MLG events, which is hilarious. MLG events aren't great so no one goes unless they want that Esports money... and if Smash events are so great, why'd they pony up $100,000 to get into EVO? Cuz most of their tournaments are adhoc shitshows that rely on randoms to bring gamecubes and 13" CRT TV's and expect Round Robin for everything. Oh, and then they steal a bunch.
Personally, I think official streamers SHOULD get a free room. I'm going to compare majors to anime cons- I think the comparison has some merit.
Major guests who are invited in, tend to get free hotels. Not saying you should do this for everyone, but the folks running the primary/secondary streams- you should. That's about a $250 cost, if needbe raise venue fees by a quarter to pay for it. (assuming 2 guys streaming)
As for MLG, the real issue is the lack of Capcom games, which wasn't/isn't MLG's fault. I'll say this from attending a MLG event, it was the most fun I had last year as a VF player- they showed some love for our game, and the VF community appreicated that, even if it was just 15 of us showing up and GT just taking our money. (some of that was due to Summer Jam causing a conflict- if MLG had a better date, GT would have had more competition)
The big issues with MLG is that the stream schedule is not fun for spectators (the MLG Model doesn't work for FG's and they're unable/unwilling to compromise), and the lack of major games. (they just don't get to run Marvel/AE) Really, it isn't in MLG"s interest to run B-tier fighting games, as much as I enjoyed it.
The arguments made about Smash players- at least the stealing part is common for FGC events. Hell, at least year's EVO, someone's prize stick got stolen (Skullgirls). I do think Smash community is pretty much near the bottom of folks I want to be around, but they're no worse than anime game players. (harsh but true, that smell in NEC was worse than having to once be around two Morrigan/Lilith cosplayers who wore the same costume for 4 days)
Also, choosing Bifuteki over Jaxel is a dumb decision just from a quality perspective. Bifuteki is so bad, even my redneck-style commentary would be better. Jaxel may bring backstage drama, but at least he brings quality.
If you could find someone as good as Jaxel who didn't bring the drama, or close to as good, get them. Bifuteki is not that.
