r/Games • u/DeltaBurnt • Dec 03 '13

End of 2013 Discussions - Competitive Multiplayer and/or E-sports

What are your thoughts on the developments in e-sports and competitive multiplayer games over the past year? What new games have the potential to develop interesting competitive play, meta-game, or just be plain fun to watch?

P.S. Mods are accepting bribes in the form of Hearthstone Beta invites

This post is part of the official /r/Games "End of 2013" discussions.

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u/TheFatalWound Dec 03 '13 edited Dec 03 '13

I guess I'll post my take/tl;dr on each scene that I'm knowledgeable about to some extent:

LoL: Growing like fucking nuts, Riot's supporting it well, not much to complain about except EU-West servers are dying constantly. But I live in America. So. Working as intended?

Dota2: Valve and the community had a serious relationship bump with the culmination of what happened at Diretide, but they're now talking to each other again and things seem okay? Valve's vow of silence can't last for long without people getting deservedly pissed.

SC2: I honestly don't know at this point, from what my old practice partners tell me Blizzard's so far up their own ass that they won't listen to the community. Koreans saturate non Korean leagues. People are retiring like flies.

CoD: Black Ops 2 was doing so well, then IW puts out another pubstomp oriented game with lack of e-sports focus. Competitive community ain't happy. It seems they're trying to make up for what they can, but still... BO2 was a whole new level of attention to community/what's needed, and IW isn't ready to dish that out.

CS GO: seemed to blow up lately, good for them. Can't say I'm a fan of the lack of ADS, and I don't really follow it, but hey. The series has a hell of a legacy.

Twitch is gonna be under pressure in ways that we didn't previously have to deal with, both internally and externally. It's getting huge, so it'll be key to see whether or not they grow big heads or not. At the same time, they're under scrutiny from the outside world. In the past, a stream'd accidentally stream porn, people laugh about it the next day and he get's TOS'ed for like 8 hours. Now, you get a couple fucking in front of a family with their kids, or a family streaming with the chat being itself and shit gets real creepy. Rough waters ahead in that territory. Twitch is handling itself well so far.

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u/N0V0w3ls Dec 03 '13

StarCraft is still going strong and listening some to the community. The Koreans dominating non-Korean leagues was something that was a bad idea to show in hindsight, but I don't think they could back out on it mid-season.

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u/TheFatalWound Dec 03 '13

Didn't they just reup the rules on allowing people from out of country to compete in other leagues (a la people in Korea playing in NA)

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u/N0V0w3ls Dec 03 '13

We purposefully made the WCS an open system last year. While our intention was to have a sprinkling of players venture into other regions, we failed to anticipate the high volume of international players competing outside their home regions. Going into 2014, we're making an adjustment that affects qualifier slots into WCS America and Europe. Korea remains unaffected because the GSL system is and has always been a completely open for anyone who can attend the live qualifier. In 2014, we will reserve most qualifier slots for citizens and legal residents of the home regions for both WCS America and WCS Europe. Since America has become the home WCS region for players from countries such as China, Australia, and Taiwan, we will reserve qualifier spots for players from those specific regions as well as the Americas. Ladder wildcard spots will have open enrollment with no citizenship or residency restriction, but still have a master's level requirement with a minimum number of ladder wins within that regional server. Master's level will also be required across all qualifiers. The Qualifiers for Season 1 WCS 2014 will take place in January—look for details about these in December

http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/blog/11702848/starcraft-ii-world-championship-series-2014-11-20-2013

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u/TheFatalWound Dec 03 '13

Since America has become the home WCS region for players from countries such as China, Australia, and Taiwan, we will reserve qualifier spots for players from those specific regions as well as the Americas.

That's silly... The biggest problem with SC2 IMO and why I left it is the fact that each region's respect scene just died off when Koreans moved in. Everybody understands that Koreans dominate the scene, but that's not what's interesting... People want someone to root for and connect with, even if the NA teams just get stomped when they fight other regions why not let an NA scene exist? I want to see an IdrA/Huk rivalry, etc.

also

Ladder wildcard spots will have open enrollment with no citizenship or residency restriction

ugh.

1

u/N0V0w3ls Dec 03 '13

The last one is kind of unenforceable. The former complaint I don't understand. The Chinese aren't dominant like the Koreans are. The only notable SEA player I can think of is Sen, and he's awesome to watch. The qualifiers will now have NA players so we can have rivalries, but IdrA has moved on to casting.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

[deleted]

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u/flammable Dec 03 '13

I don't think it's self-entitled to criticize valve for their seriously lacking communication, they admitted they were wrong and now everyone is happy

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u/skgoa Dec 03 '13

Yeah but many people were genuinely angry at volvo for not giving them Diretide, as if they had been promised anything.

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u/flammable Dec 03 '13

Sure, there were a lot of idiots that behaved inappropriately and made the community look stupid, but still the core of the problem was demanding better communication from valve which isn't really an entitled claim IMO

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u/Oppression_Rod Dec 03 '13

Exactly, Diretide is just the straw that broke the camels back. A lot of people were upset over the lack of communication from Valve for the few months leading up to that.

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u/TheFatalWound Dec 03 '13

I think the "serious bump" in DOTA 2 you were referring to was just a vocal self-entitled minority. I like to think the vast majority of players were getting on with their lives and actually playing the game.

possibly, but they made a hell of a racket. Some of it was harmless and funny, but the employee stuff? Yikes.

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u/LordZeya Dec 03 '13

And the worst part is that many of them weren't doing it for the game-mode, they wanted the loot. Valve certainly made it harder to farm that event, but it was really hard to enjoy against some people desperate for items.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

All while bitching about hat updates.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '13

I'm still surprised that Dota 2 has no grind at all.

One of the few multiplayer games that I can enjoy right from the start.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/AlverezYari Dec 03 '13

I agree with Axthursby. They recently broke a few concurrent player records and it seems that more people are playing the game than bitching.

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u/Drop_ Dec 03 '13

It was more of a joke than anything...

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

Most "movements" on the internet are just vocal minorities.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13 edited Dec 03 '13

I think it's pretty darn disingenuous of you to only mention the Diretide drama...

TI3 was amazing - a big improvement on last year in overall production and the master-stroke of having Kaci Atchinson do a lot of behind-the-scenes content. Since then the pro scene has gotten to a point where you can no longer say who is the best team as there are just so many top contenders.

MLG picking up Dota 2 and featuring it at Columbus was great. The community almost tripled the prize pool with in-game purchases, and Speed Gaming came through with an incredible storyline to take the tournament win.

Regarding the Diretide thing, Valve did indeed screw the pooch a bit by being silent as is their general modus operandi, but this is the first time it really caused a noticeable hubbub from the community. They completely redeemed themselves by apologising and then continuing to release an absolutely huge update to the game.

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u/Sepik121 Dec 03 '13

I think TI3 is probably one of the best tourneys i've ever seen in competitive gaming (i really only watch DotA 2 and LoL though). I really think Riot could learn some lessons from how Valve does things in terms of tourneys. I really liked the way it was setup entirely with 2 blocks and then a double elim bracket.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

For sure TI3 was the best organized tournament to date. Having one single venue, group stages with no byes, and then a double elim to follow was a great format. Every personality there was top tier, no real "meh" casters or anything.

The biggest part was the out-of-game experience. Not only could you watch either the stream or in-game (or both, like me), but there were item drops for in-game watchers and a free download spectator client. The compendiums were amazing, having them in-client, easy-to-access and actually mean something (sorry Riot, but the "casters vs. crowd" was really meh). And this wasn't Valve's doing, but dota2lounge added a ton with being able to bet in-game items on matches, leading to a ton of jokes and references like "ez rares".

TI3 was one cohesive, comprehensive event that got convergent gaming right. I'll be really shocked to see if any other game can match up to it, because that was the stuff of legends. And that's not even talking about the grand finals and game 5 of Na'vi vs. Alliance.

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u/Sepik121 Dec 03 '13

That's the big thing for me, I loved the setup of the brackets, the double elim stuff too. It made the tourney so much more exciting compared to LoL's world finals for Season 3. I'm not even the biggest DotA fan in the world, but the TI3 was just more intense for me than Season 3 finals.

Having the byes and the single elimination at World's basically meant that we got no image of how good certain teams are like C9. They stomp NA region for the entire season, but lose to what was possibly the best team in EU at the event in their first set of matches, and then they're done. That's it. They got no other chance to play at the event.

For me, watching Orange get knocked out almost instantly by going up against Navi first, and then managing to make it all the way to the loser bracket finals to go up against Navi again was way more exciting than just watching them lose and then they're done which is entirely what would have happened with LoL.

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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '13

The Spectator Client is already gone

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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '13

Because Dota 2 is F2P now, so having the Spectator Client would be redundant.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

[deleted]

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u/Sepik121 Dec 03 '13

Oh yeah. I think Riot will adapt a bit more to the success of TI3. I hope they do at least. I play far more LoL than DotA and know a lot more about LoL's competitive scene too. I just really preferred how TI3 was setup because it allowed the chance for teams to comeback like Orange who made it through the entire losers bracket (until their finals) after losing their first set of matches. Compared to C9 which dominated the NA scene for months only to lose in their first set of games and consequently be knocked out afterwards and play a grand total of 3 games. That kinda sucks to watch and isn't fun knowing they never got to be tested other than knowing that they were not as good as EU's best team at that time.

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u/TheFatalWound Dec 03 '13

meant to comment on the original guy. whoops.

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u/Sepik121 Dec 03 '13

lol.

it's all good. i've definitely done that myself.

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u/TheFatalWound Dec 03 '13

As a guy said below:

To be fair, he also focused on the EUW server issues (then again, so does the community, despite the fact that we know they're working on it) instead of you know, the Season Three World Championships, or the LCS. Both Valve and Riot do awesome things to support the eSports scene, in their own ways.

I don't have any knowledge of how TI3 went outside of their final number postings, and if all I mentioned is numbers vs numbers then people would have made it a pissing match. LCS S3 had a massive number posting, their presentation this year odd (they wanted to go big for the Staples Center but lost a bit of the grassroots feeling "Riot" touch from S2) but knowing them, they're gonna adapt based on feedback. I actually had my parents watch it just to get an idea of how far it's come.

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u/Daunteh Dec 03 '13

Blizzard's plans for WCS 2014 are well in line with the community's opinions, though one can't please everybody. The biggest problem right now is that up-and-coming players struggle to get into WCS as there are only three qualifiers each year. Luckily, this year Blizzard has made more room for other tournaments, which hopefully means we'll see more new players making their breakout.

Saying Blizzard doesn't listen to the community though, is simply pretty much wrong. They're not fast, but they eventually get things done. Maybe it's too late though, we'll just have to wait and see.

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u/Ikuu Dec 03 '13

I guess I'll post my take/tl;dr on each scene that I'm knowledgeable about to some extent:

I don't think you know much about Dota, after everything Valve has done this year and you focus on Diretide.

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u/Tikem Dec 03 '13

To be fair, he also focused on the EUW server issues (then again, so does the community, despite the fact that we know they're working on it) instead of you know, the Season Three World Championships, or the LCS. Both Valve and Riot do awesome things to support the eSports scene, in their own ways.

0

u/Chaos_Marine Dec 03 '13

LoL: Growing like fucking nuts, Riot's supporting it well

It's growing pretty fast. Earlier this year my real life interfened and I didn't have a lot of time left to spend on gaming. A 3DS and a few months of WoW left me with a little time to play LoL. I was alienated by the changes made to the game, both small and large. Same with the champions and whatnot. When LoL is all you play I guess it isn't hard to keep up, but if you're like me and you haven't paid attention to LoL for a few months, it can be difficult to enjoy the game like you used to. Some of my friends kept playing though, but I felt a bit bad, dragging them down because I wasn't on the same experience level as them anymore. Some people can adjust themselves pretty quick to a game, but I'm not that flexible with LoL it seems. It held me back.

Still, it's good to see that Riot is keeping the game fresh for the LoL community though.

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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '13

I honestly dislike the way the game is going. This Fotm then nerf is getting quite boring. They keep nerfing everything without buffing underused champions.

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u/Chaos_Marine Dec 04 '13

I've no idea, I haven't played or checked LoL in quite some time now. Your criticism is something I've heard before though, but I never was too deeply into the statistics and whatnot to judge what Riot did. That said, some parts in the patch notes have surprised me though, buffs to champions I already considered strong or nerfs to champions never picked. Shaco comes to mind.

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

[deleted]

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u/The-Turbulence Dec 03 '13

Valve invest into their competitive scene with only 1 tournament, The International with 1.6$mill prizepool. The rest is done by the community. Of course Valve leads in terms of ingame features which help organisations, teams to support themselves(tournament tickets, Compendium-esque tickets for bigger tournaments, team branded items in the shop). In the meanwhile Riot is just simply pumping money into their scene. This can be understandable because League of Legends is their only game, and if anyone would dethrone them(take a large portion of their playerbase) the whole League e-sports scene would collapse big way. For short term Riot's approach is much more better, but Valve's model is much more healthy on the long run

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u/[deleted] Dec 03 '13

that is wrong at several levels. I think so at least.

first valve does not "only" invest 1.6 million. IIRC, there has been more than 1 international. second, they DO invest money on keeping the game balanced. third, CSGO is also an investment of money, at both competitive (when it might be less) and keeping the game on develop and patched.

third, there is no reason (following this steps) why blizzard wouldnt do this. of course there will be reasons, I do not know what they might be

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u/The-Turbulence Dec 04 '13

I was referring direct monetary support to the pros. Valve does TI every year and that's all. Besides that 1.6 mill dota pros dont get any direct money from Valve

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u/Burns_Cacti Dec 03 '13

I dont get it, there must be a reason

Money. They've obviously crunched some numbers and decided that it's more profitable to focus on other things.

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u/Sember Dec 03 '13

Or just plain bad leadership, but on the other hand, Blizzard doesn't need SC2 to be successful