Empty Stores
Even as the industry moves forward to new opportunities the UK sees little value in investing in esports
Recent events have seen me have to temporarily leave the second city of England and return to my old stomping ground in the North East. Upon arriving I found that the recession had hit it harder than even I had anticipated and in the three or so years I was away. Redcar was in particularly badly hit, some Northern wit having spray painted the word “ghost” above a sign directing people to the town centre. Many businesses have shut down, only a few chain stores remaining on the high street, no doubt loss leaders that are kept afloat by the profit gathered elsewhere.
In a bid to combat this some highly paid and under educated local council official came up with the “Redcar Uplift Scheme”, which is a novel approach to tackling the problem of local decline. Public money is spent on pasting fake shop fronts over the boarded up shops that have long since been closed. The theory behind it is that it makes the place look more appealing. Of course the truth is far less likely to be embraced by the locals but cuts to the heart of all petty government the world over – quite simply, in the absence of a solution we are happy to at least be seen to do something, even if that something doesn’t address the problem at all.
And so we move from film set shopping centres to e-sports and the wild and wacky events going on in the UK scene. On this site and in this very column we’ve often levelled blame at players, organisations and shameless profiteers as the reasons behind the UK e-sports scene’s struggles. It’s not as if there’s no truth in it… Indeed there’s something fundamentally flawed in the whole business, almost as if out endeavours almost exclusively attract the wrong type of person. Yet there are those that profess to care, that believe they have the best interests of everyone at heart and have the sort of widescreen vision that allows them to see the big picture. What happens then when they too twist a knife already vitally close to an organ or two?
I have nothing against the ESL and indeed think it’s fair to say that their competitions represent the pinnacle of everything e-sports has so far achieved. Yet their recent decision to insist on non registered companies having to use three players from last seasons squad is nothing short of idiocy. That, or something ugly and sinister, like a malicious kick to the balls of a sleeping tramp. Either way, it begs the questions such as “why?” And even if you think it’s a good idea “why now?”
The UK EPS has taken a hit and that’s largely down to players and organisations. An inability to maintain a roster for a few months, coupled with weak and stupid management has seen what should be one of the UK’s premier competition descend into a shambles. Those that limped across the finish line were barely recognisible from those that started the race and some didn’t even get anywhere near to the end, laden with penalty points or just plain lethargy. What an awful contrast to almost every other EPS going and no-one to blame but ourselves. The ESL then withdrew the LAN finals pointing to a lack of interest from the enthusiasts, a bi-product of this behavious. Who wants to watch mix team 1 vs mix team 2?
So how do they resolve the problem? By bringing in a rule that ensures that most teams will now be guaranteed to compete for the first half of the season as mixes. It makes no sense at all and effectively encourages the sort of negative behaviour that they had stated they wanted to discourage.
“Doesn’t matter” they say with a shrug of their shoulders “it would have been a bad season anyway. You know how it is with those UK swine.”
The decision also has the impact of teams having to pay for players who have no tie to them at all. It’s the grass roots gamers that are hit the most by this, the rule not being applied to anyone who has been hairbrained enough to register an e-sports organisation as a registered company. Yet have these teams not equally earned their shot? Is it not inconceivable that one could gatecrash the party if they were able to get off to a good start to the season when teams are still finding their rhythm? Surely it’s those lower down the scale that deserve the leg up, rather than those who have the money and the sponsors already in place, as well as the clout to attract the top players. Wouldn’t a bigger and more experienced talent pool also help the UK scene?
The rule was supposed to clear up the issue over who actually owns a license, to stop people acquiring the lucrative right to compete in underhand manners. Surely this in itself shouldn’t be a problem and if it is then it comes down solely to the demented rules in place. Why not keep it simple? An organisation owns the license and if it’s a team unfortunate enough to not have any form of backing then the person who signed that team up owns the license. There we are. Simple. One license, one person, one signature…
“Preposterous” they sneer “you have incidents of players being frozen out of their own teams because the person who owns the license goes rogue…”
Ah, so now they care about such matters? What kind of contradictory bullshit is this? You’d have to blind drunk from bathtub gin to not see how this sort of standpoint is full of holes. In almost everything else I can care to think of responsibility comes down to one person and one person alone, someone who makes the final decision and when things go wrong can’t pass the buck to anyone. You hear about them earning huge bonuses or committing suicide at Christmas rather than face the public disgrace of being fired for negligence. Regardless of their fate they carry the can. A team is not a grandiose concept – it’s a group of players supposedly with a common goal. Regardless, it’s not a collective. Someone captains that team, organises the practice, pays for the servers… Why then do they have to share a license they likely organised?
No, it’s clear to me that this has got way out of control and it is a dunderheaded move not in keeping with the ESL’s otherwise fine brains. It may be bringing us in line with the rest of the European leagues, it may even theoretically be good for the UK in the long run… The sad truth is there won’t be a long run if we start beating down on teams that have been formed in the ashes of a scene that once produced top CS:S teams with an arrogant haste. Not now and not until we get some stability back.
Will they withdraw the rule? Unlikely… There was an almost startling “we know best” attitude wafting from the whole affair. That or just plain old apathy. Who really knows what their intentions are? It is clear though that the only smart play is to withdraw the rule with immediate effect, pretend it was a joke, a leaked e-mail of a work in progress that should never have seen the light of day. Even if we read between the lines and take it from the statement they’re assisting teams in getting around the rule, surely that in itself is an admission that it’s wrong and too much too soon. Some people who have been trying to fix the UK scene for years are better placed to point to what will work and what won’t. Forcing through a ruling in the face of such objections would show how little they care for expanding into the UK.
Not to worry though – the organisations care, right? Well, only prior to the ESL’s decision we saw Reason Gaming pick up the team we all know as Neckbeards to represent them in the UK EPS. It might seem on the surface of it all a good move, to have a UK academy side alongside a “professional” one based in Denmark. They claim it is a move that shows how much they want to support the UK scene, which is a somewhat contradictory standpoint given that for over two years they have supported teams based outside the country. It’s not even as if they are receiving any support as such… Do shirts, servers and the occasional pep talk really amount to that much in the way of support? Well, not really. Having a platform that enables them to compete with the best on a regular basis would provide that and if they are going to have to pay their own way to events then they already have it within their means. Wouldn’t it be nice to see an upcoming UK side as something more than an afterthought, a cynical means through which to spread a name that already resonates?
Of course Reason aren’t entirely to blame for the players situation. I mean, they looked around for organisations for a while and were rebuffed, while other names took chances on players that have had their opportunity time and time again, ploughing limited resources into those who were all too keen to waste them. In a time when people bemoan how upcoming players aren’t given a break, what would it have took for an upcoming team to get one? They can’t compete with the best yet, not by any means, but where is the motivation to struggle on if the reward is now to play second fiddle to a foreign team?
The truth is no-one is willing to make a stand and in the same way as I predicted organisations pulling out of UK CS:S, we’re now at the point where people who want to come off as championing the scene are actually going out of their way to hamper it also. For once, it seemed, the players had their acts almost together only to be sabotaged by people who benefit from their existence. It’s a rotten business on all fronts, the words justifying the actions as hollow and as empty as anything I saw in the shell of Redcar. I’m seeing too many fake shop fronts in UK e-sports these days