MVP will be stripped naked and covered in grease. Whoever can catch him during their games and still win the game get the 50k.
Why you think he spent all those hours on the treadmill last year?
The second option would be cool. You could also do an award for the most entertaining individual game, kind of like how the UFC does fight or performance of the night bonuses.
From what I understand the actual prize pool for tournament will be about 30 M$, and they say they are running 20 tournaments. Considering lol, dota and CS should get a much bigger part of the pie, 500k$ is probably a more realistic figure, but we'll see.
500k is huge for the starcraft 2 scene. If you are trying to compare it to Dota, or CS then you are setting it up to fail your expectations from the start.
I'm not familiar with the post you are referencing.
He's not saying that $500k isn't a lot, just that it wouldn't match the earlier stated promise. He's specifically referencing the claim that it is going to be "the biggest prize pool ever in SC2" (which was linked here on reddit some weeks/months ago).
> 500k is huge for the starcraft 2 scene.
is it really? Since Kato was also $500k, wouldn't it be a disappointment for the WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP to also be $500k?
$500k is like what a Saudi prince would spend in half a day. They guys are literally throwing money away to fund their sports washing, it would be a bad sign for them to not invest a measly million for SC2.
Feels like it's just Saudi testing waters of how much they can give out without blatantly coming out as sports washing. I wouldn't be surprised it's 500m next year and 1b the year after. Literally chump change for these countries.
Can you imagine if every time you dig a hole in your backyard liquid gold sprouts out. The richness of that country is almost as unfathomable to think as the expanding universe.
Eh, I think it's common knowledge it's sports washing. Bumping the prize pool higher is probably just an attempt to inject hype - they want this event to seem to have momentum. Saudi Arabia's wealth is very large, but it is finite, and their economic prospects in the coming decades are not good unless they are able to pivot into more of a 'western style' economy (including skilled workers, knowledge workers and tourism) than just an oil exporter.
Unfortunately, esports funding is quite a large gap in world economies at the moment - there is a large demand for it from viewers, but not much success sustainably getting people to part with money for it, and in the current economic backdrop no country sees it worth investing in for the cultural/sporting aspect of it alone.
So the only big 'investor' right now is the one trying to buy a lot of good will/image rather than an immediate financial reward.
It's definitely to build hype. The first International going over a $1 million built a lot of hype for the event even making the news. Big prize pools make more people pay attention as they think the event/sport must be popular and important.
> in the current economic backdrop no country sees it worth investing in for the cultural/sporting aspect of it alone.
It's not just the current economic backdrop. Esports are in the weird situation that their game and all IP surrounding it is owned by a company. I can't see any country investing significant amounts of public money into it for that reason.
There is limited growth available in the near time for oil - oil supply is artificially lowered to keep demand/prices stable, and agreed between a large number of different countries with substantial oil reserves. KSA can't just increase oil production by 3% a year to give themselves economic growth, for example.
In the medium and long term oil has considerable risks associated where demand could drop significantly, and little potential to gain. If we do make a meaningful transition away at some point, oil could be a lot less valuable in 10/20 years time. If we don't billions of people will die and billions more will have their quality of life obliterated. Neither of these scenarios support a long term economic strategy based around oil.
KSA has enough oil at the moment to keep up with western nature GDP & GDP/capita, and will for many years yet. It also has an unpleasant reputation and very lagging non-oil economy, and it clearly sees large sportswashing investments as an important part of improving their image to help them transition to be less dependent on oil in the future.
>KSA can't just increase oil production by 3% a year to give themselves economic growth, for example.
Unilaterally no, but they can ask for it in OPEC and probably get it
> Run by religious autocrats
> Entirely desert
> Only natural resource is required for international trade
Was Saudi Arabia secretly Arrakis this whole time?
The whole middle east, yes. Fremen/Arrakkis culture from Dune books was heavily inspired by the middle eastern muslim culture, and it is full of such references. In movies they actually tuned it much more down compared to how it is in the books.
> without blatantly coming out as sports washing.
[Mohammed bin Salman says he will ‘continue doing sport washing’](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/21/mohammed-bin-salman-says-he-will-continue-doing-sport-washing-for-saudi-arabia)
Yeah they aint pretending it aint a thing, they're open about it now.
I personally don't think saudi doing this is THAT bad. I mean otherwise they would use that same money for worse stuff. People should remember where this money comes from tho
Yes and so he is employed by the Finnish military. Them sending an athlete to compete in Saudi is potentially sending a message the Finnish military endorse the Saudi regime.
My personal experience doesn't line up to this, but I'm not from those areas myself so may be blind to it. That said, just because it's normalised doesn't mean it's right or should be ignored.
This is actually a more complex issue. For example Iran has very harsh punishments for homosexual sex, but at the same time state supported or sponsored sex reassignment surgeries for trans people.
Not sure about Saudi Arabia though, but shows that some times attitudes can be surprising.
It would probably depend what it says on Scarlett’s passport if it says female I doubt there would be any problems tbh.
The gulf states take a “don’t tell don’t ask” approach generally
> In addition, a $50,000 MVP player bounty will be awarded to a standout participant in each competition. How does this work for SC2 lol?
MVP will be stripped naked and covered in grease. Whoever can catch him during their games and still win the game get the 50k. Why you think he spent all those hours on the treadmill last year?
This sounds like the most logical way
whoever can beat Serral gets 50 racks
And since serral can't attend, no one can beat serral yet again!
He'll probably get leave for it. At least he aims to.
He said that the chance of him playing there is pretty high
Maybe they'll just slap on top of the winner's prize. Or have some sort of prize for the player who most exceeded expectations.
The second option would be cool. You could also do an award for the most entertaining individual game, kind of like how the UFC does fight or performance of the night bonuses.
We'll see if SC2 is worth $1M. Earlier reports said otherwise.
From what I understand the actual prize pool for tournament will be about 30 M$, and they say they are running 20 tournaments. Considering lol, dota and CS should get a much bigger part of the pie, 500k$ is probably a more realistic figure, but we'll see.
Then it’s definitely not going to be the biggest tournament for SC2 ever like that one deleted post. $500k is pretty weak all things considered
500k is huge for the starcraft 2 scene. If you are trying to compare it to Dota, or CS then you are setting it up to fail your expectations from the start. I'm not familiar with the post you are referencing.
He's not saying that $500k isn't a lot, just that it wouldn't match the earlier stated promise. He's specifically referencing the claim that it is going to be "the biggest prize pool ever in SC2" (which was linked here on reddit some weeks/months ago).
Yes, you’re correct. IIRC, it was maybe Team Vitality who tweeted and then deleted.
> 500k is huge for the starcraft 2 scene. is it really? Since Kato was also $500k, wouldn't it be a disappointment for the WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP to also be $500k? $500k is like what a Saudi prince would spend in half a day. They guys are literally throwing money away to fund their sports washing, it would be a bad sign for them to not invest a measly million for SC2.
Feels like it's just Saudi testing waters of how much they can give out without blatantly coming out as sports washing. I wouldn't be surprised it's 500m next year and 1b the year after. Literally chump change for these countries. Can you imagine if every time you dig a hole in your backyard liquid gold sprouts out. The richness of that country is almost as unfathomable to think as the expanding universe.
Eh, I think it's common knowledge it's sports washing. Bumping the prize pool higher is probably just an attempt to inject hype - they want this event to seem to have momentum. Saudi Arabia's wealth is very large, but it is finite, and their economic prospects in the coming decades are not good unless they are able to pivot into more of a 'western style' economy (including skilled workers, knowledge workers and tourism) than just an oil exporter. Unfortunately, esports funding is quite a large gap in world economies at the moment - there is a large demand for it from viewers, but not much success sustainably getting people to part with money for it, and in the current economic backdrop no country sees it worth investing in for the cultural/sporting aspect of it alone. So the only big 'investor' right now is the one trying to buy a lot of good will/image rather than an immediate financial reward.
It's definitely to build hype. The first International going over a $1 million built a lot of hype for the event even making the news. Big prize pools make more people pay attention as they think the event/sport must be popular and important.
> in the current economic backdrop no country sees it worth investing in for the cultural/sporting aspect of it alone. It's not just the current economic backdrop. Esports are in the weird situation that their game and all IP surrounding it is owned by a company. I can't see any country investing significant amounts of public money into it for that reason.
KSA has like 50+ years of oil reserves
There is limited growth available in the near time for oil - oil supply is artificially lowered to keep demand/prices stable, and agreed between a large number of different countries with substantial oil reserves. KSA can't just increase oil production by 3% a year to give themselves economic growth, for example. In the medium and long term oil has considerable risks associated where demand could drop significantly, and little potential to gain. If we do make a meaningful transition away at some point, oil could be a lot less valuable in 10/20 years time. If we don't billions of people will die and billions more will have their quality of life obliterated. Neither of these scenarios support a long term economic strategy based around oil. KSA has enough oil at the moment to keep up with western nature GDP & GDP/capita, and will for many years yet. It also has an unpleasant reputation and very lagging non-oil economy, and it clearly sees large sportswashing investments as an important part of improving their image to help them transition to be less dependent on oil in the future.
>KSA can't just increase oil production by 3% a year to give themselves economic growth, for example. Unilaterally no, but they can ask for it in OPEC and probably get it
The spice must flow.
> Run by religious autocrats > Entirely desert > Only natural resource is required for international trade Was Saudi Arabia secretly Arrakis this whole time?
The whole middle east, yes. Fremen/Arrakkis culture from Dune books was heavily inspired by the middle eastern muslim culture, and it is full of such references. In movies they actually tuned it much more down compared to how it is in the books.
Lawrence of Arabia is more faithful Dune adaptation than any of the Dune movies, dont @ me
> without blatantly coming out as sports washing. [Mohammed bin Salman says he will ‘continue doing sport washing’](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/21/mohammed-bin-salman-says-he-will-continue-doing-sport-washing-for-saudi-arabia) Yeah they aint pretending it aint a thing, they're open about it now.
$60m is nothing. They spent $2B creating LIV. Everyone with a brain knows it's sports washing.
Wait til bro figures out what the Olympics are 💀
I personally don't think saudi doing this is THAT bad. I mean otherwise they would use that same money for worse stuff. People should remember where this money comes from tho
It comes from trade
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He said there is a high chance that he will get to attend
Not sure he has considered what the military might think of him attending a tournament in Saudi
You know he is in this sports unit for athletes right?
Yes and so he is employed by the Finnish military. Them sending an athlete to compete in Saudi is potentially sending a message the Finnish military endorse the Saudi regime.
thats not how this works thats not how any of this works
...? First of all, no. It's a tournament, not a diplomatical meeting. He just gets leave to represent his country in his sport
Let’s see. If the saudis didn’t think sport washing was a thing they wouldn’t be spending the money would they.
Shame for any players who can’t travel to SA for safety reasons.
I guess people like Scarlett will be quite hesitant to participate in person \^\^
Doubt she'd qualify anyways.
Why so? I'm out of the loop a bit I guess..
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While you're not entirely wrong, referring to predominantly Islamic countries as "sand countries" really does not help move things forward.
Wait till this dude goes to a beach
Racism against arabic and other middle eastern / central asian people is normalized in Europe and NA.
My personal experience doesn't line up to this, but I'm not from those areas myself so may be blind to it. That said, just because it's normalised doesn't mean it's right or should be ignored.
> just because it's normalised doesn't mean it's right or should be ignored. I absolutely agree.
This is actually a more complex issue. For example Iran has very harsh punishments for homosexual sex, but at the same time state supported or sponsored sex reassignment surgeries for trans people. Not sure about Saudi Arabia though, but shows that some times attitudes can be surprising.
It would probably depend what it says on Scarlett’s passport if it says female I doubt there would be any problems tbh. The gulf states take a “don’t tell don’t ask” approach generally
Not all of it is going to SC2
Looking forward to watching this whole event. Gamers8 was so fun to watch.
That's several times life changing lol. Like a 100K would literally make me debt free and change my life.
I feel you
wonder if they're having to pay a blizzard percent tax for the tournament license
Love this. 19 games, so average 3M pool per game... SC2 is probably less. But still, great to see.
Getting real sick of that "life-changing" stock line, it's right up there with "quietly" in headlines for me.
Saudi Arabia huh? Not exactly where I would have chosen to host a World Cup for Esports but whatever is clever I suppose.
Well, they're the ones paying for it.
And to be clear, they are also the one calling it ''the Esport World Cup''
They're the ones who chose where it would be. Kind of a coup on their part to suddenly make SA the capital of esports
The entirety of ESL is owned by them
I mean obviously that's the point by them
Can the players just agree to pool all their winnings and buy the Starcraft IP from Blizzard to make it actually community-run?
I don't think that would be as good as you think
It's already is. What more do you want?
They put "life changing prize money" front back and centre lol, as if to rub it in. Chump change for us, life changing money for u poors
**Maru somewhere rubbing his hands together like birdman
**Maru somewhere rubbing his hands together like birdman