SAN FRANCISCO & SANTA CLARA, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Social video platform Twitch and BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment America Inc., publisher of TEKKEN™ 7, today announced an exclusive partnership to create the TEKKEN World Tour. In addition to being the exclusive broadcasting platform for this competitive gaming league, Twitch will manage TEKKEN 7 league operations, circuit events, and content on a global scale. The goal of the partnership is for Twitch to work alongside BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment to build the community and infrastructure to sustain long-term growth of the historic fighting game franchise.

The tour kicks off on June 16-18, 2017 at the CEO Fighting Game Championships with additional U.S. based stops in Orlando, FL, Dallas, TX, Orange, CA, and more. Participants can register to compete through each partnered event’s registration pages. The six-month season, which runs from June to November 2017, will have a total prize pool of over $200,000 USD. All tournaments will be broadcast exclusively on Twitch.tv/Tekken.

“The Fighting Game Community on Twitch features some of our platform’s most vibrant players and fans, with the TEKKEN World Tour created to celebrate their enthusiasm,” said Richard Thiher, Program Manager, Twitch. “We’ve also witnessed how the Fighting Game genre has grown from local tournaments in arcades and living rooms to global attractions filling convention centers and stadiums. TEKKEN has been a major franchise and influence during this evolution. Our partnership with BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment America for this new tournament series will help keep Fighting Games at the forefront of esports, while building toward a sustainable ecosystem for all of the players, fans, and organizers involved.”

“TEKKEN 7 is the latest chapter from one of BANDAI NAMCO’s marquee fighting game franchises and Twitch is home to the fighting game community; it made perfect sense for us to join forces and produce TEKKEN World Tour, a hard-hitting tournament series for our fans to enjoy,” said Eric Hartness, Vice President of Marketing at BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment America Inc. “Our collective goal with the TEKKEN World Tour is to create an unparalleled competitive tournament experience and share the bone-crushing excitement of TEKKEN 7 through Twitch’s social video platform so that TEKKEN fans around the world can enjoy and participate in the action.”

For more information on TEKKEN World Tour, visit the official website at http://tekkenworldtour.com.

About Twitch

Twitch is the world’s leading social video platform and community for gamers. Each day, millions of community members gather to watch, talk, and chat about shared interests. Twitch’s video platform is the backbone of both live and on-demand distribution for all types of content, including the entire video game ecosystem, the creative arts, vlogging (IRL), and more. Twitch also runs TwitchCon, an annual convention for celebrating the Twitch community. For more information about Twitch, visit our Press Center, Twitter feed (#Twitch), and Blog.

About BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment America Inc.

BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment America Inc., part of BANDAI NAMCO Holdings Inc., is a leading global publisher and developer of interactive entertainment for all major video game consoles, iOS, Android, and online platforms. The company is known for creating and publishing many of the industry’s top video game franchises including PAC-MAN®, GALAGA®, TEKKEN®, SOULCALIBUR®, and ACE COMBAT®. BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment America Inc. is the premier publisher in the Western hemisphere for anime based video games including NARUTO SHIPPUDEN™, DRAGON BALL Z®, and ONE PIECE®. More information about the company and its products can be found at http://www.bandainamcoent.com or www.facebook.com/BandaiNamcoUS.