Valorant breaks into esports with its first tournament hosted by ESPN

[Cal Jeffrey]

In context: In what can only be described as an unorthodox marketing maneuver, Riot Games' new competitive shooter Valorant is seeing its first esports tournament this week. On Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, ESPN Esports will be live streaming an eight-team event consisting of 40 pro gamers and Twitch personalities.

ESPN revealed a partial roster of names for its Valorant Invitational, including Rainbow Six Siege reigning world champion Troy "Canadian" Jaroslawski, Counter-Strike world champion Tyler "Skadoodle" Latham and Fortnite World Cup runner-up Harrison "psalm" Chang.

Since Valorant is still in closed beta, ESPN and tournament organizer Greenlit Content are working closely with Riot Games to ensure those on the roster have access to the unfinished game. This televised event is the first time a sanctioned tournament has been held for a game that has not yet released to the public.

The first round of the ESPN Valorant Invitational starts today at 3:30pm EDT on ESPN Esports' Twitch channel. The network will broadcast subsequent rounds on Tuesday and Wednesday, also at 3:30pm.

Other than the fact that it is a tournament for an unfinished game, the event is not all that surprising. Riot planned for Valorant to be an esports contender from the beginning. The overwhelming popularity of the beta version of the game on Twitch has all be cemented the title's place in professional competitive play.

On the day the beta launched, Valorant had over 1.7 million concurrent viewers on Twitch. ESPN is undoubtedly hoping the Invitational can draw similar numbers. However, it is worth mentioning that Riot was giving away beta invites to viewers of select streams when it achieved that recond. The studio since has enabled invite drops on all Valorant Twitch feeds. It wasn't specifically mentioned whether this promotion includes the tournament, but it likely does.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/84901-valorant-breaks-esports-first-tournament-hosted-espn.html

 

[Axiarus]

I like CS:GO and I like Overwatch...but this game just does not do it for me.

 

[Trillionsin]

I like CS:GO and I like Overwatch...but this game just does not do it for me.

I dont get the hype. I believe they fabricated the hype, just as usual with twitch streamers... Game looks rather boring IMO after attempting to get a key for it by watching streamers... I lost interest.

 

[Fearghast]

I like FPS games ... but this feels like another Heroes of the Storm in making.
Bag of cash poured into a game "To make it eSport" usualy ends up in failed promises, no tournaments 1 year later, maintance updates in 1-2 years and RIOT moving to something else ... or moving nowhere as usual.

 

[Nobina]

Pro scene already there for a game that's not even officially out yet.

I dont get the hype. I believe they fabricated the hype, just as usual with twitch streamers... Game looks rather boring IMO after attempting to get a key for it by watching streamers... I lost interest.

That's exactly how they hyped it up, by giving streamers beta key drops so people would watch just for the drops. Wait a few months and then we'll get an idea of how popular the game really is. I think it's gonna hold it's ground but it ain't anything revolutionary.

 

[Trillionsin]

Pro scene already there for a game that's not even officially out yet.


That's exactly how they hyped it up, by giving streamers beta key drops so people would watch just for the drops. Wait a few months and then we'll get an idea of how popular the game really is. I think it's gonna hold it's ground but it ain't anything revolutionary.

The direction they are going really leaves a distaste in my mouth. There are already plenty of reasons to dislike Tencent if you ask other people. I really dislike the idea of having to watch streamers to get a game, anymore... there's no standard of how long a game will be in beta and they could continue this trend "Watch streamers for more in game loot." Like they did for MW... which was buggy at best... after hours of watching I still didnt get what I was SUPPOSE to get. Oh well I really dont care for this system and I do not want to enable it any more, but I know the younger generation of kids will, so its **** all.

 

[Hexic]

Having played it, and occasionally still do - it feels just like CS. They have abilities that very closely emulate Overwatch, that can be critical to winning the match.. but it's about 70% a CS clone and 30% an Overwatch clone.

There really isn't an original bone in this game's body, it all comes very plainly from other games. It's fun... But you realize that Tencent (I.e. Riot in this particular case) most likely isn't capable of creating original content. They just copy off of overly successful titles and mash s*hit together.

I could see it going very heavily into e-sports, it has the recipe for it. But I don't give Riot credit for anything other than emulating companies who are actually skilled at game creation.

 

[texasrattler]

Since when does a unfinished product get on TV? Sad times.
The game is just a csgo rip off that simply promotes camping a corner. Plenty of streamers n pros have said so alrdy. But because ppl are literally throwing money at them they simply wont speak up about the game is nothing new. Sad times.

 

[EClyde]

If they were playing Doom 2 I would watch but not this. Familiarity is the only thing that would draw my interest to televised poker...I mean gaming

 

[Capaill]

It's amazing what Chinese money can buy these days, such as an international eSports match for a game that doesn't exist yet (still in Beta so can be modified heavily before launch).

Having played it, and occasionally still do - it feels just like CS. They have abilities that very closely emulate Overwatch, that can be critical to winning the match.. but it's about 70% a CS clone and 30% an Overwatch clone.

There really isn't an original bone in this game's body, it all comes very plainly from other games. It's fun... But you realize that Tencent (I.e. Riot in this particular case) most likely isn't capable of creating original content. They just copy off of overly successful titles and mash s*hit together.

I could see it going very heavily into e-sports, it has the recipe for it. But I don't give Riot credit for anything other than emulating companies who are actually skilled at game creation.

So, just like every other Chinese product on the market then
We should knock it on the head straight away. Support companies that take risks by being creative and fun. Don't support companies that churn out remixes of someone else's work, especially from China where international copyrights get ignored.