At the release and the beginning stages of Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, the Smash community hadn't solidify anything and the dawn of Esports began to gain popularity. As the game progressed, so did the community. A generation of players began to emerge, tournament organizers began planning premiere events, and organizations began to shape Smash into an esport community. Out of this growth, Panda Global is one of the innovative organizations that has helped form the Smash Wii U community we are familiar with today.
Panda Global is a professional esports organization based in the United States. It was co-founded by Alan "Samurai Panda" Bunney and David "Mashumaru" Wu in June 2015 as a player centric organization looking to help their players' careers, facilitate their goals, and promote the growth of the esports scenes they participate in.
Smashboards recently had the opportunity to speak with Panda Global's founder, Alan "Samurai Panda" Bunney, and talk about how PG became to be, his motivation towards PG, what the Smash community should be doing to gain Nintendo's support, the FGC, and how much of an impact their innovative ideas has resonated with the community.
1PC: Who is Samurai Panda? What is your history in Smash? Where did the idea of Panda Global originate?
Samurai Panda: I actually jumped into the smash community 10-11 years ago when Brawl was coming out. I was really into Melee at the time in college and I was reading a blog the Sakurai posted in Japanese, he would respond to one fan e-mail a week. There was one fan email in particular, he talked about the development of Brawl, he said that not all characters would return to Brawl from Melee. I thought this was huge news obviously so I went to the internet, Game Faqs actually, I typed it out and I just got so much hatred and no one believing me because I read and speak Japanese. And someone said, “You know what, the guys over at Smashboards would be more receptive to this.” So that was the beginning of my career in professional Smash, was when I discovered Smashboards. I think i'm actually still a moderator?
I ended up posting a big thing thread where I translated all of Sakurai’s blogs, I was part of the original Brawl back room which was the Smash Back room, I helped create some of the rule-sets for Brawl, I had a pretty decent presence in a lot of the high premier tournaments that we had when the scene was very young, and I was one of the first commentators of Smash. You can actually talk to personalities like EE & D1, a lot of them would actually quote my early stuff as some of the things that got them started on commentary. I was no slouch either, I was top 5 in the Midwest, one of the top 5 Snakes in the country. So long story short, I quit Brawl when I went to medical school because it was a bit too difficult to balance both Smash and school. That was when Melee had its resurgence, so unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy that.
Samurai Panda Ranked #9 Arizona PR for Smash Wii U October 2014 - March 2015
After one tournament that I helped TO, I saw a lot of orgs mistreating players in my brief exposure to Esports. I said to myself "You know what? I bet I can make a team that doesn’t treat my players like trash. That can actually communicate with the community and be part of it, and be able to help everyone instead of burning bridges and putting people down." So that was the founding principle, I went to David, David and I were making a game at the time which was called “League of Fighters” it’s a LoL based fighting game, we actually met through Melee, we played Brawl and lived together in college. I said to him “Hey, wanna make an esports team?” 2 months later, we got it off the ground.
I’m assuming that’s what Panda Global was built upon? The moral of treating players like family, correct?
Yeah, that's exactly it. And not just players but giving back to the community too, those are 2 founding principles we have. Do right by the players and give back to the community.
(From Left to Right) SS, Samurai Panda, ESAM, & MVD Celebrating 2 Months of PG's Launch
What motivated you to continue having this family based organization?
That’s a difficult question because my motivation has shifted. Every time that there has been a big obstacle, every time that I wanted to call it quits, or it became too much. It is hard to balance being a doctor and running an esports team. But I think its honestly because my players, they have become some of my best friends. Being a part of their lives, seeing where they have come, and kind of seeing people loving what we created.
We have die-hard fans that will support us on no matter we do. I guess the whole idea of a family started spilling more into the public. They started seeing this and are becoming a part of that. It’s hard for me to want to give up something that means so much to so many people.
Whenever you saw this reaction from the community, what were your initial thoughts that came to mind? What other ideas did you want to fulfill with the community's positive feedback?
"It’s about damn time." A lot of times that we’ve stepped in to do something is because no one else is doing it and I’m like “Why is nobody doing this?! This needs to happen!” So we did it. Smash 4 needed a ranking system, it needed eyes on the professional players so that top teams can come and pick up top players.
Panda Global Rankings Top 50
When Suar first came and approached us I said to him "I finally found a way to make this ranking list real." and we set out to be a reality. I’ve been part of the smash community and been trying to promote it for so long that when good thing happened and when the community is celebrating I’m like "It’s about time. We deserve this. We worked so hard.” If you look at any other scene that exists in esports, that amount of work that Smashers do for nothing is truly underappreciated and ridiculous! The things that they created, the structure that they’ve become, its such a huge community with so much potential and still underutilized and thrown to waste when you talk about major esports.
I completely agree! When you go to regionals, you have your local community building up any event for us to play in. You really don’t think about the effort that goes into building those events. Why do you think that the smash community isn’t appreciated or hasn’t really resonated with the FGC or had the type of respect it deserves as you imply?
If you’re talking about the perspective of the FGC, I think the FGC is a unique entity in many ways. You can be a top player in 5 different games in the FGC at the same time. When you play a game that’s “FGC” your skill transitions perfectly. It does not take more than few minutes to understand the basics, explain how to play it to a seasoned veteran so they can jump in immediately. If you put a professional Marvel vs Capcom player in front of Smash, they cannot play it. Fundamentally, the FGC will never truly see Smash as part of the FGC. But that’s okay. That used to be the validation but now, Smash has out grown the need to be accepted by the FGC and in many way its bigger.
Now I think they are coexisting in a much better ecosystem. While there’s still a couple things that rub the FGC the wrong way when we do it or vice versa. For example, when the VIP room idea came about, the FGC was so against the idea. But with Smash, a lot of people liked the idea, they supported it. So from the FGC perspective, I think its just fundamental game difference is what makes it difficult for them to accept Smash as a title or a part of the FGC.
VIP Room at Canada Cup 2016
Where as from of the esports perspective, its because daddy doesn’t love us. We don’t get support from Nintendo. Don’t get me wrong, they’ve done a lot more recently and continue to do more but they do it in the wrong ways. They will be very hidden, very hesitant to tie their name and their brand to the tournament, do a very bad poor job promotion, etc. We’ve heard from some employees that they don’t want implement pot bonuses in, stuff like that. They would rather help get setups and set up a booth at the tournament to have some kind of grassroots engagement. That’s the tag line that they give, which could be true but, I just think that there’s a lot more to it than that people don’t understand because they haven’t. We are completely grassroots. Untouched by the game and developer that owns it and without an official esports representative from Nintendo. That’s why we’re ignored by esports as a whole. That’s why we have so much trouble growing bigger. That’s why we have had to be forgotten when you talk about major esports. If Nintendo were to hire an esports representative and do it right, we would easily be one of the tier one esports.
What are some things that we must do as a community, organizations, top players, basically to the smallest entity of the community, what can we do to show Nintendo we are a living & breathing community that love this game? Where is that same support that Nintendo had for Pokken?
So this sounds ridiculous but to be completely honest with you, it’s as simple as clicking ‘follow’, engaging, and responding to a tweet from your favorite players. Here’s the thing, Smash is growing, it’s getting bigger. What makes it bigger is by seeing the number of followers increase, seeing the viewership increase on streams, seeing that people care. If you provide evidence that people care, if you follow your favorite players on Twitter, respond to them, hit like, hit retweet, those actions goes so far! You have no idea! Social media is the way that we can measure the impact and growth of the community. It’s a way we can directly say that we are touching these people, not just when you see us on stream, but that these people matter to these individuals. They will engage with them, they will be part of them, and they will follow them. Nintendo cannot ignore that, Nintendo is not ignoring that. The only reason why they are supporting the community more or that you see them around more is because the Smash community does a great job on getting behind players or rallying behind people. Whenever we get a morsel, we jump at it, we gnaw at it like we’re starving because we’ve gotten so little.
Nintendo Partnered up with Genesis 3 team as a sponsor the event in Jan 2016
Clicking these articles, following these people, watching the stream, hitting like, hitting retweet, the social media and the engagement is paramount if we continue to do that. Smahsers are beginning to trump their numbers in these areas, in viewership & engagement. People cannot ignore us as we continue to grow. You have esports being made out of games that have 1000 or 2000 followers for their best players, that’s fine, I’m not trying to say that’s a bad thing but make an esport that supports running invitationals, those actions would make it much more valuable to companies. Nintendo is going to be much happier seeing those numbers go up than anything else. That’s something that anyone, no matter how small you are, how apathetic you are, no matter where you are, you can do these things.
I agree! Social media is the key to everything if you want exposure. Let’s trace it back to the beginning stages of Smash 4 where you implemented Bear as the main TO, basically the face of Smash 4 or of Panda Global. How were your first interactions with Bear? How did you guys meet?
Baseem "Bear" Dahdouh TO-ing at Genesis 3
When I started Panda Global he at first took it as a joke he was like “Hey, I’m Bear, you’re Panda, Panda is like a Bear, let’s do this!” I knew he was incredibly valuable, I knew he was incredibly good. Bear’s attitude and Bear’s focus can be something that will become great, and can be something that will move the whole community forward. I said to him "Ya know what? Come on in, be a Panda." And things sort of naturally happened from there.
It’s funny that people say he’s the face of Panda considering that half of people think he’s on the Twitter, no, I’m actually on the Twitter, I tweet in-between patients, it’s not Bear. I think that’s kind of funny and that’s fine because I think he does it well, all the social media, the promotion, doing all this stuff. When Genesis took a chance on him because he was a phenomenal TO, the whole world saw he’s not just a phenomenal TO, he’s probably one of the best out there. From there, the rest is history.
Its admirable when you meet this hard-working person that makes you want them on your team. What are your thoughts of Bear’s progress from the beginning compared to now?
Well, i'm both part proud and vindicated because I was the one telling everyone that this guy is an amazing TO, no one would listen to me. Bear actually helped create a circuit for Marvel vs Capcom called The Curleh Circuit. Because Bear wants to do more in the grander scheme of things yet, Smash 4 is still his game, it’s still his love but he wants to help out other communities like he did Smash.
The response from the Marvel community saying that one of the Smash TO’s that trumps all other, please, I’m not trying to insult anybody but that is how highly I think of Bear. Seeing them be so thankful that he’s helping them out, leaves me knowing that they are in good hands because he’s there. There’s no words that I can really use on how incredibly happy I am that’s he’s gotten to that point that everyone, not just Smash, recognizes his hard work and what he does because he really deserves it.
You mentioned that Bear wanted to move on to other games in the FGC and help their communities. What were some of the incentives for PG to move on to other games such as Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, Marvel, etc. inside the FGC and expand from Smash?
When PG was first starting, the first person I reached out to was MVD. I housed him and liked him a lot and thought he would be a great first player for PG. I asked MVD “Hey man, who else should I get?” he’s like ”ESAM.” And asked the other player I was talking to and he said “ESAM.” Ok then, I picked up ESAM. This was all before PG was announced. Then I reached out to Filipino Champ.
From day one I grew up playing Street Fighter, Marvel vs Capcom, Smash 64, Capcom vs SNK, X-men Children of the Atom, Melee, I literally played every fighting game. You name it, I've played it. I just loved fighting games growing up, King of Fighters? Uff, I love it! I would play it for hours and hours on end, that was my genre of choice. So, when I made PG I knew i'm not just gonna do Smash, even though that’s the game i'm more competitive in, the game I've put the most time in to, I wanted to do it for all of the fighting games.
Panda Global's Sponsors & Games That They Support
Then we talk about it from a business standpoint, there’s no way that Smash could pay the bills. Smash is just not big enough. That’s part of giving back to the community and grow the communities that I was part of. I helped grow Smash to the point where it’s at now and hope to continue to help grow it even bigger so that someday it CAN pay the bills. Then have a team to be able to support Smash and be successful, to be able to pay their bills.
The FGC as a whole, including Smash, is a drop of water in the ocean of esports. Esports is massive! We fight constantly. We go to so many places, talk to so many people and have to try to convince them that the FGC, Street Fighter, Smash 4, Melee, Smash 64, plus all the other games that we do Is worth anything to sponsors. Its not easy. We can go to a sponsor and they can ask us “How is your CS:GO team?”, we don’t have a CS:GO team. “How is your League of Legends team?”, we don’t have a League of Legends team. “Oh ok, bye.” But when we get a sponsor, when get people interested, when people listen to us, people get excited because it is exciting.
At the end of the day, we have to be a business. We have to be able to pay our players, we have to be able to pay these flights. There are a lot of Smash tournaments! We do a lot of travel, like holy ****. That’s not easy. We have to put food on the table, that’s why do all these other games besides Smash, because we love the FGC. With every title that we support, David and I play it. I play Blaz Blue, I picked up a Blaz Blue player. He plays Paladins, we have a Paladins team now. We played H1Z1 together, we have that. I play For Honor, I have a For Honor tournament series. Everything comes from a very personal standpoint. We’re Global, baby.
What can you see for the future of PG? What’s the next step for your organization?
That’s a tough one. There is a lot of things in the pipeline that we haven’t revealed that we are doing behind the scenes. We just got sponsored by Funimation, we brought them into esports. We convinced them of the value, which they loved. I can’t really talk a lot about the stuff we are doing mostly because if it doesn’t come true a lot of people get pissed off. We’re gonna be somebody. I think we’re gonna last.
Panda Global's Funimation Sponsorship Announcement
Esports is a bubble. Right now, you, can go make a team, make Twitter account, get a logo, and pay one of these generic sites to make you a jersey. The bubble will burst. The esports of the wild wild west, where anything goes is gonna end. There are only going to be a few teams left standing, just a handful. I think, I honestly believe, with everyone’s support, that Panda Global can be one of those teams. So we survive. We do what we do. We do it in a Panda way. We continue being Panda Global. I’m not gonna pretend to be C9, I’m not gonna pretend to be TSM, i'm not gonna pretend to be Team Liquid. I’m going to be Panda Global. We are going to do things our way and see how far we can go. What we’re doing is getting noticed. People are seeing that Panda Global is doing well. It makes me realize that I am not making a mistake that people really do appreciate what we do. They see us.
Thank you for those words. It’s really motivating to hear these coming from you. What is some advice you can give small organizations that strive to be like Panda Global?
Members of the Wichita esports club at Wichita State University take part in an organizational meeting
First of all, don’t do this unless you are willing to spend money. Lot of that. Its not easy making your mark in esports. Before you do it or if you’re doing it now, sit down snd take some time to think about who do you want to be? Get a vision. When you see that vision, when you see what your Org will become that is unlike any other Org out there, or maybe like some Orgs. How are you going to be the next Optic or Envious? How are you going to be the next Panda Global? You see that vison? Grab it. Type it out. Type more. Type more. When you have, your full vision planned out and ready, do it. It’s not easy. This is brutal. I have more gray hairs from doing this than being a doctor. I would not recommend for anyone to do esports, and honestly, if I jumped into esports a couple months after I did, I don’t think PG would exist today. But I don’t regret it for a second.
Samurai Panda, thank you so much for doing this interview with us, taking time out of your busy schedule, and giving us the insight of what Panda Global is. What are some final statements you would like to give? Shout outs?
Shout outs to Smashboards, I wouldn’t be here today if I didn’t meet the people that I did and find that website. If that random commentator that commented on my Game Faqs thread didn’t tell me to check out Smashboards, my entire life would be completely different today. I think the most important lesson I learned in life, in general, is to never take people for granted and always appreciate what other people do for you. My shout outs is to everyone that has helped, been a part of or has even clicked 'like' on one of our tweets. Or watched one of our players and type out a PG Chant in Twitch chat. I read all this stuff. Makes it worth it every single day.
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Author's Note:I would like to thank Samurai Panda for taking time out of his busy schedule to do this interview with us. I believe that his brand has impacted the Smash community immensely and has given us something to strive for to better the Smash community as a whole. If you would like to get any info regarding his endeavors or any updates on Panda Global, make sure you follow them on Twitter.
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