Street Fighter EX Makers Arika To Present A New Playable Game At Evo 2017

Arika, the maker of the Street Fighter EX games went well over a decade without working on fighting games but they currently have something in the works that will be showcased at Evo 2017 this month.

There hasn’t been any confirmations as to what we can expect to see, but let’s go back a few months to April 2017, when Arika first revealed an elaborate April Fools’ prank, which you can check out in the above video. The video also has a notice on the bottom-right saying that everything you see here is for an April Fools’ 2017 prank.

To make the prank even more elaborate, Arika even had a little gameplay live stream session featuring pro gamer Ryota “Kazunoko” Inoue to play the game. Playable characters in the build featured some familiar faces in Garuda, Kairi, and Hokuto.

The game also featured systems such as “Super Cancel,” “Hard Attack,” and more that you’d expect from the Street Fighter EX series. Moreover, Akira Nishitari, executive producer and director of the Street Fighter EX series, helped make the “prank” game and stated that it was all just an April Fools’ project, but he didn’t want it to end there and hoped to see it become something later.

Fast-forward a few months and hopes turned into high expectations as Evolution Championship Series tournament organizer Joey “Mr. Wizard” Cuellar recently shared the following tweet:

The big announcement is out! ARIKA to showcase a new playable title at #Evo2017! Register today! https://t.co/u4TVJm4jrn #Evo2017

— Joey Cuellar (@MrWiz) June 30, 2017

Again, there’s no telling whether the new playable title by Arika will be the April Fools’ 2017 prank game, but considering the time and effort they put into it, it wouldn’t be too surprising to see a new Street Fighter EX game revealed at the major tournament event.

Evo 2017 runs from July 14 through July 16, 2017.