For nearly three decades, the Evolution Championship Series has grown and expanded to host the largest fighting game events in the world, but there’s been another change in ownership for the organizers again.
Saudi Arabia’s Qiddiya now appears to have 100% control over the Evo brand through RTS.
According to a report from ShackNews, Qiddiya City has bought out the co-ownership rights of Evo from NODWIN Gaming to become the sole owners of the fighting game tournament series.
Management over Evo will now reportedly be handled by RTS while NODWIN is apparently sticking around to help with focus on marketing.
This is far from the only shift in ownership for Evo that has taken place in the past months and years.
Back in 2021, Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC and RTS purchased the rights to Evo from the founding Cannon brothers, which led to further expansions for the events into Evo France last year and the Evo Awards alongside the mainline Evo and Evo Japan.
Then in August 2025, Sony sold their stake in Evo to the India-based NODWIN Gaming, which was still partially backed by Sony.
Just weeks later, Qiddiya announced they had taken control over RTS where it looked like they were going to co-manage Evo with NODWIN, but it seems now they wanted the whole pie to themselves after all.
According to the report, key Evo leadership will remain in their positions “to attempt to ensure consistency in Evo’s legacy and values.”
“We are proud of our legacy with Evo that started 5 years ago,” said RTS CEO Stuart Saw via ShackNews. “We’re going to continue investing in the things that matter to our community, elevating and empowering members of the FGC and working diligently with our game developer partners to ensure that Evo benefits all involved parties.”
Saudi Arabia have been dipping their toes more and more into the fighting game community with investments and purchases in recent years, but at this point, some are arguing they have both of their feet fully in the eSports scene like they are in other parts of the entertainment industry.
They of course started hosting large-scale events like the Esports World Cup that will continue this year while also sponsoring Evo in the past before their acquisitions.
In 2022, the Mohammed bin Salman Foundation bought up 96% of SNK where they started throwing their money around last year with Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves’ big marketing push — along with seemingly pushing in some of their favorite real-life celebrities into the actual game between soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo and DJ Salvatore Ganacci.
With the Saudi-backed funding, they were also able to offer record-breaking prize pools for the SNK World Championship that is continuing this year too.
For those still unfamiliar, Qiddiya is Saudi Arabia’s entertainment and tourism megaproject, which has continued to expand since 2017 with the government backing heavy investments into eSports, theme parks and other attractions.
Some prominent members of the Fighting Game Community like Sajam have already voiced their intentions to boycott Saudi-backed events including Evo, and it’ll be interesting if that number increases now that they’re in full control over the tournaments.
There’s no shortage of accusations of the Saudi government “sports washing” with their entertainment investments to try and improve their image on the world stage, and now they’re even more deeply rooted in the fighting game eSports scene between Evo, the SWC, and the EWC.
The tournament series is set to continue in a few months between Evo Japan 2026 in May and Evo 2026 in June followed by Evo France 2026 in October plus plans to expand into Singapore in 2027.
Nobody will probably be surprised, though, if / when they announce Evo Qiddiya in the next year or two.
The FGC is going to have to see what this new ownership will mean for Evo and the wider eSports scene moving into the future.
