EVO Online Canceled, and their CEO Fired, Following Sexual Abuse Accusations

With all the accusations of sexual assault and misconduct that have been rocking the games industry and culture as of late, it’s easy to miss a name or two. In this case, it was revealed earlier that EVO co-founder and CEO, Joey “Mr. Wizard” Cullar, was accused of being something like a sexual predator to young men much earlier in his career. Specifically, he talked about his penis a lot and bribed young boys to strip down into their underwear and jump into bodies of water with arcade tokens.

That is not good.

Anyway, with these accusations coming to light and people being upset about them, a whole lot has happened: for one, a number of games have pulled out of the latest EVO Online tournament to protest the man’s inclusion in events. And it was a big list - Mortal Kombat X, Street Fighter V, Them’s Fightin’ Herds, Tekken 7, Dragon Ball FighterZ, and Soulcalibur VI have all been removed from the line-up and their developers have posted messages decrying the EVO CEO and demanding that something be done about him.

So many games were pulled, in fact, that EVO ultimately decided to cancel the event altogether. But that’s not all – to prevent this from happening again, and, you know, to return at least a shred of decency to the event, they’ve decided to give Joey Cuellar the boot.

“Over the past 24 hours, in response to serious allegations recently made public on Twitter, we have made the first of a series of important decisions regarding the future of our company. Effective immediately, Joey Cuellar will no longer be involved with Evo in any capacity. We are currently working towards his complete separation from the company and have relieved him of all his responsibilities.”

For what it’s worth, the man himself has admitted to the accusations and apologized for them. So that’s something.