With the recent announcement of AEF going live with prize pots, signup dates/deadline, fees etc all announced it is surely a great period for Wolfenstein - Enemy Territory. Or at least you would like to think so.
May i add that first of all this is not a dig at the tournament or the people involved (i.e. Krosan) its just a few points that id like to raise. At this present time there doesnt seem to be much support in terms of orgs willing to invest big money into ET. I know myself having written out around 30 applications to orgs asking for their support in return for us (lineup TBA) to represent them and arguably having a great chance of at least bringing home some money and some great advertisement. This does then raise a problem for ET competing for signups against COD4 and CSS both known worldwide and having some big financial backing from orgs.
So Wolfenstein - Enemy Territory will be competing against both games mentioned above for the amount of signups which will then influence the prize pot. We all know how ET has been crying out for some sort of recognition and mainly thanks to the recent CiC7 lan it looks like we have. Ideally you would like to think that with this announcement comes great interest from orgs looking to take an ET team under their wings. However, by the looks of it this has not happened (yet?). So what does this actually mean for ET in terms of competing at big tournaments such as AEF.
If you look at the signups and teams competing at CiC7 and include the orgs backing these teams financially you would see names such as Dignitas/Blight, YoYoTech, Rockit, tMoe, myr, Phantoms, nOu. I could probably list a few other orgs/mgcs but my point is this. Why with the recent announcement of AEF, the announcement of a lan likely to take place in Aalborg in October and possibly another Crossfire Lan in the near future have we seen these orgs drop their support/interest for ET? I know first hand that after CiC7 YoYoTech told me that they didnt want to back ET at another lan. Surely after the recent lan announcements and another great tournament ran by crossfire, orgs would be crying out to take ET teams in with the potential of winning tournaments or even giving the org some form of advertisement and other benefits in the long run.
With ET now running alongside top games such as COD4, CSS, Quakelive - surely it has to start getting the recognition and support it deserves. So finally it is our chance to prove to other games and eSports in general that we are a game that should be noticed, recognised and appreciated for the skill and the effort that we have put in to keep making a game which many saw dying years ago a success. A game which in my opinion takes just as much effort and skill and is probably (on a good day not playing vs idle) a great game to watch. So why isnt ET getting the support it deserves?
Many people can argue that teams and players havent gone about the right way in applying to organisations. Of course some teams and players probably havent gone the right way about applying and sending a professional proposal through to orgs, but what about the people that have gone about the right way but still have been turned down? Is there actually much chance of these players and teams being able to compete against COD4 and CSS for signups when ET players and teams are basically being told you will have to pay most if not all the costs yourself. I know that currently my team without the right backing or support would not be able to attend AEF due to financial diffficulties.
In an ideal world everyone would be able to pay for themselves, but unfortunately this isnt the case with most games and gamers. If you take the average age of players competing at Lan then it is probably around 18 or 19. Some, if not most people at this age are still studying and cant really afford to pay the trip to attend 2/3 lans a year. Some if not most arent even able to afford to pay for themselves to attend 1 lan per year. If you take the 2 teams that previously fought it out in the grand final of CiC7 you would find 2 estonians, 1 finnish player, 1 spannish player, 1 italian player, 1 latvian player and 1 swedish player - these (if not financially backed from an org) would find a trip to either Belgium or Holland a costly 1 (which doesnt mean the setting is a bad 1). Ofc i have left out a belgian, a german and an englishman - where costs wouldnt be so bad.
So without this support will we really see the best of the best competing at AEF or will these teams and players find that without support the cost is too much. Or will some orgs come to ET and rescue it from what could possibly be a let down in terms of signups. Will teams like idle and fintastic 5 attend a lan without support, seeing as they are likely to finnish top 3 and still make a profit even after all of the costs to attend such a lan. Or is this too much of a risk? Do they simply not have enough money to even pay for all of the costs? (They might have already found an org, but due to no announcement im using them as an example).
This column isnt written as an excuse for teams not attending or signing up and it isnt supposed to sound like us ET players are victims (although you could argue that it sounds like it). I just hope with or without new orgs entering ET we will have a fantastic amount of signups and 1 of if not the best ET lan there has ever been.
Krosan and all of the team that have worked to provide such a tournament have done a great job and it should be a great tournament for everyone involved.
May i add that first of all this is not a dig at the tournament or the people involved (i.e. Krosan) its just a few points that id like to raise. At this present time there doesnt seem to be much support in terms of orgs willing to invest big money into ET. I know myself having written out around 30 applications to orgs asking for their support in return for us (lineup TBA) to represent them and arguably having a great chance of at least bringing home some money and some great advertisement. This does then raise a problem for ET competing for signups against COD4 and CSS both known worldwide and having some big financial backing from orgs.
So Wolfenstein - Enemy Territory will be competing against both games mentioned above for the amount of signups which will then influence the prize pot. We all know how ET has been crying out for some sort of recognition and mainly thanks to the recent CiC7 lan it looks like we have. Ideally you would like to think that with this announcement comes great interest from orgs looking to take an ET team under their wings. However, by the looks of it this has not happened (yet?). So what does this actually mean for ET in terms of competing at big tournaments such as AEF.
If you look at the signups and teams competing at CiC7 and include the orgs backing these teams financially you would see names such as Dignitas/Blight, YoYoTech, Rockit, tMoe, myr, Phantoms, nOu. I could probably list a few other orgs/mgcs but my point is this. Why with the recent announcement of AEF, the announcement of a lan likely to take place in Aalborg in October and possibly another Crossfire Lan in the near future have we seen these orgs drop their support/interest for ET? I know first hand that after CiC7 YoYoTech told me that they didnt want to back ET at another lan. Surely after the recent lan announcements and another great tournament ran by crossfire, orgs would be crying out to take ET teams in with the potential of winning tournaments or even giving the org some form of advertisement and other benefits in the long run.
With ET now running alongside top games such as COD4, CSS, Quakelive - surely it has to start getting the recognition and support it deserves. So finally it is our chance to prove to other games and eSports in general that we are a game that should be noticed, recognised and appreciated for the skill and the effort that we have put in to keep making a game which many saw dying years ago a success. A game which in my opinion takes just as much effort and skill and is probably (on a good day not playing vs idle) a great game to watch. So why isnt ET getting the support it deserves?
Many people can argue that teams and players havent gone about the right way in applying to organisations. Of course some teams and players probably havent gone the right way about applying and sending a professional proposal through to orgs, but what about the people that have gone about the right way but still have been turned down? Is there actually much chance of these players and teams being able to compete against COD4 and CSS for signups when ET players and teams are basically being told you will have to pay most if not all the costs yourself. I know that currently my team without the right backing or support would not be able to attend AEF due to financial diffficulties.
In an ideal world everyone would be able to pay for themselves, but unfortunately this isnt the case with most games and gamers. If you take the average age of players competing at Lan then it is probably around 18 or 19. Some, if not most people at this age are still studying and cant really afford to pay the trip to attend 2/3 lans a year. Some if not most arent even able to afford to pay for themselves to attend 1 lan per year. If you take the 2 teams that previously fought it out in the grand final of CiC7 you would find 2 estonians, 1 finnish player, 1 spannish player, 1 italian player, 1 latvian player and 1 swedish player - these (if not financially backed from an org) would find a trip to either Belgium or Holland a costly 1 (which doesnt mean the setting is a bad 1). Ofc i have left out a belgian, a german and an englishman - where costs wouldnt be so bad.
So without this support will we really see the best of the best competing at AEF or will these teams and players find that without support the cost is too much. Or will some orgs come to ET and rescue it from what could possibly be a let down in terms of signups. Will teams like idle and fintastic 5 attend a lan without support, seeing as they are likely to finnish top 3 and still make a profit even after all of the costs to attend such a lan. Or is this too much of a risk? Do they simply not have enough money to even pay for all of the costs? (They might have already found an org, but due to no announcement im using them as an example).
This column isnt written as an excuse for teams not attending or signing up and it isnt supposed to sound like us ET players are victims (although you could argue that it sounds like it). I just hope with or without new orgs entering ET we will have a fantastic amount of signups and 1 of if not the best ET lan there has ever been.
Krosan and all of the team that have worked to provide such a tournament have done a great job and it should be a great tournament for everyone involved.
no money :(:(:(:(:(:( damn going to miss another one :(
actually I didnt rly want this to be a public but we havent seen anything (neither money or equipment from zowie they promissed to us) yet, so I wouldnt rly mention them in that group of mgcs...
so true, krosan you the best!
so:
short anwer: no
long answer: noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
see you there ... erm okey
Your nick misses an "i".
n!faculty wanted to support us :>
i guess they d pay entryfee and sponsor tshirts but well...too late :]
fix them for AEF (a)
good night
Wat? Dignitas never really had interest in the game (at least for the last months/events) and only supported idle due to the good relation to the team and the missing support from blight. Rockit is still looking to support ET. Same goes for tMoe (afaik, depends on the team here). Dunno where you get your infos from and I doubt the other orgs all told their teams that they wont get any more money. Also dont forget about MGC's that stepped into ET AFTER CiC7, naming Speedlink and 1stCav as examples here. What you rather wanted to say is prolly that its hard to get new orgs into ET (what is true but possible) but imo you cant say that orgs lost interest (YYT only one) in the game.
I do agree that SL and 1scav is nice to see, but 2 new orgs and like 5 orgs that have stopped support for et isnt going to benefit ET. If current orgs or new orgs had interest in the game, then how come no one can find support ?
'what do these orgs get out of supporting an ET team'
i can understand dignitas supporting idle.ee at cic7 because they were favourites to win so atleast dignitas could lay a claim to some of the prize money and exposure BUT for your normal team whois going to come 3/4/5/6 whats the point of supporting them? Its not like there's that much exposure for ET from an advertisement point of view. You don't see products being sold with a picture of Maus on the cover.
Surely all this MGO stuff is just an excuse for people not putting money in their pockets and paying to come play the game they enjoy playing and have some fun? I have no chance of winning LAN but i'm coming because I had a great time at cic7 and coz I want to see my friends again - I don't ask for 'lan support' for this, if I get it its just a nice extra but its not that important to me.
With the exposure arguement, u could be right there but my point is that with 3 lans likely to take place before the end of the year what more do orgs want? I mean why have some of them dissapeared with what could be the most active and competitive ET we have seen? With ET appearing/competing next to games such as COD4 CSS QL then surely it is going to get seen.
You could argue that ur point about teams not placing top 3 in the game leads to the orgs losing money. However, they do this in games like cod4 css and tf2. Why cant we encourage them to do it in ET?
You're right about ET becoming pretty damn active its a great thing. I guess there is alot more scope for advertisement and exposure in the 'more popular' games like cod4/css/tf2 so its a less risk to come in a lower place. Its really a shame though because ET is much better supported than those games, just look at ETTV + GTV...
I guess we have to encourage them at ET counts, we have many lans this year which is awesome but LANs obviously aren't enough. We have to get into the minds of these orgs, their managers etc.. and work out what they want and then try and deliver it to them. I'm still a little puzzled about what MGOs want.
as a side note what happened to that ET documentary about the crossfire team at quakecon? If that was released properly we would have a massive boost of interest in ET and with the attention many more orgs would come forward imo.
i can understand some mgc supporting 1) idle and 2) fintastic5 (why the hell can't they find support, seeing that some "random teams" (no offense, just compared to a team like mm/f5) which were/are rather unlikely to win + are unstable were/are able to get support). but if i was in charge of a mgc i wouldn't invest much money into any other team either cos the benefit is just way too small (prizepurse-wise and advertisement-wise).
Firstly great job on you guys for getting a tournament at AeF, you are a truly remarkable community at times and Krosnan (the only ET guy I know bar Stu!) and whoever else got involved in setting this up deserves a pat on the back!
It's an interesting one... I think part of comes with the long standing ties that certain organisations in CoD4/CSS have with the game. A few examples of teams that have been ever present in the CoD series are Speedlink, Dignitas, Reason-Gaming, infused, H2K and TCM. All of which have had teams since 2006 and some even before that. Many of the above teams have lived through numerous changes but have stuck with CoD and still have some of the best teams in the game on their books.
You could even add fnatic to that list who won the first European CoD4 event back in 2008 and are still winning everything now!
Correct me if I'm wrong but for the first time in a while ET is branching out for an event away from the wzzrd centre in Enschede and I'm sure if I were running an organisation I'd be concerned as to how many teams will realistically attend AeF, thus making me very hesitant to pick up a team. Perhaps a few orgs are playing the waiting game, if the community really gets behind AeF then potentially you could secure an annual event to go along CIC7, CoD4 basically lives off AeF, Crossfire, TeX and any random tournments that pop up.
On the subject of your own team, what kind of orgs have you been speaking to? Have you focused on a paticular type of organisation? For example organisations with historic roots in ET? Perhaps targetting CoD4 organisations might be a good idea, we're going to be at AeF together and hopefully the next Crossfire event hopefully.
Forgive me for changing subject mid sentence on a number of occasions, just worked a night shift and need sleep.
Cheers !
Fortunately from recent conversations that i have had with organisers, teams/players and orgs there seems to be enough desire to get as many teams to sign up as possible. Fortunately, based on the location, there are a lot of Benelux teams going to attend - varying in skill, who can afford to pay the cost themself to attend AEF. Looking at it this way and from recent conversations, it looks like we will hit the 32+ barrier (if teams sign up quick enough).
Going back to the part of my applications to orgs i decided to target as many as orgs that i thought were interested/had the financial backing to send an ET team to AEF. I targetted orgs that were ever present in the history of ET and RTCW and orgs that i thought would want to get involved in ET now, seeing as by the looks of things we will have 3 lans (including AEF) by the end of the year. I did receive some interest from orgs supporting COD4 but not enough for what we needed. I have though passed this information on to other teams, hoping that they are what the org is looking for.
I guess it all falls down to the exposure and advertisement the orgs see from supporting a game like ET. Unfortunately i dont think they realise the prospect of it even though ET has a lot of benefits such as ETTV (every official game being broadcasted, with spectators allowed to watch whatever team they want and whatever player they want) a strong history in terms of crossfire events, online events and how long the game and the community have been going. The recent addition of lans - AEF and Aalborg.
Anyway my next plan is to release a top 10 ranking system for ET later tonight, hoping that it will encourage orgs to pickup some of these teams as around 50% of them arent even financially supported in anyway. The column was something of a drastic measure to illustrate the point that not all players can afford to attend lans. Fortunately like i said earlier, conversations have lead me to believe we will hit the 32+ barrier at least.
Thanks for your reply again, i know what its like working night shifts being an electrical engineer :D.
To summarise, any decent organisation should be able to pay atleast for the fee and in return you ll advertise them and wear their clanname&tag.
now i dont have to pay fee for next cc lan[if there ll be any]
Organisations wont gain anything for throwing cash a team to finance one event, regardless of where they place.
-edit
some guy mentioned the same thing in more depth up top
but its mostly caused by the inactivity of many teams. there are just a few teams in ET which have the same linu up for years/month. when i talked to mgc, they always asked for stability. people at ET are changing their teams like underwear.
..
they are also looking @ ESL because they think that a good eslrank = good team
(sry its 2 late...cant write proper english :x)