RLCS 2024 announcement causes uproar – Here’s some silver linings

Epic Games finally announced the start of the RLCS 2024 season, and it came with a fair share of backlash from the community. Let’s take a look at the changes that have been made, and what has caused this extreme reaction from fans all over the world.

It seems as though we are getting the exact same format as last season but without the Fall split. Less tournaments, less prize money and a lot less communication from Epic Games.

No more third split

So let’s start with the format changes. Many fans were expecting more LAN events for RLCS 2024. However, we will sadly be getting the opposite as only 3 international LANs have been announced, two majors and the World Championship Finals.

Similar to previous years, each Major will have three online qualifiers, but the new two split system means that we will have a lot less Rocket League action than we have had in past seasons.

Prior to the announcement, I would have been okay with a two split season if it meant more of a break throughout the season for both players and spectators. For me, having regionals so close together and so often makes the online events become a bit stagnant, and having a longer break between the events would help to build excitement.

However, the dates that have been announced seem to be in line with previous years (without the fall split), apart from the fact that every region will be playing on the same weekend. This is really devastating news for a number of reasons.

Spectators will be forced to watch multiple regions at the same time, which in most cases would lead to the minor regions getting even less viewership than they usually would. As a result of that, organizations would be less interested in signing teams from these regions, hurting the game even more.

This seems to be one of the many ways that the RLCS 2024 team are striving towards a more sustainable format, as they will not have to pay the production team and casters to work across multiple weekends.

Open Qualifier and RLCS 2024 Major Format

Each online Open Qualifier will now use a standardized format across the year:

Open Double Elimination bracket to determine the top 16 teams in each region.
16-team Swiss System to determine the top 8 teams in each region.
8-team Single Elimination bracket to determine standings in each region.

This is one of the few positive changes going into this year, as Swiss proved to be the best format for qualification matches and having a different format every split was confusing and unnecessary. This new qualification system will hopefully provide clarity for both new and seasoned fans, whilst also consistently sending the best teams in the regions to the Majors.

Both RLCS 2024 Majors will also use the same standardized format as the Open Qualifiers. And yes, this does mean that there will still only be 16 teams at each major, something that many fans hoped would be increased for this year. These qualified teams are going to be slightly different this year:

North America (NA): Top four (4) teams
Europe (EU): Top four (4) teams
Middle East & North Africa (MENA): Top two (2) teams
Oceania (OCE): Top two (2) teams
South America (SAM): Top two (2) teams
Asia-Pacific (APAC): Top (1) team
Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA): Top (1) team

Whilst giving SSA the chance to compete at Majors and giving MENA a well deserved second spot was high on the list of priorities, this has come at the cost of losing a spot for both Europe and North America.

This is why the only step to improve majors would be to increase the number of teams. It’s not fair to remove teams from the best two regions. We needed more spots for these regions too, not fewer. The top 4 teams from the World Championship were all European, and if we want the international Majors to have the best competition then removing European and North American teams is definitely a step in the wrong direction.

Minimum Age

The most concerning change in my opinion is the decision to reduce the minimum age from 15 to 13. Allowing children that young to compete at the top of a highly competitive esport, whilst signing professional contracts is not a smart move.

Younger players shouldn’t be open to the immense pressure that comes with competing. There are also potential issues such as players dropping out of school to play which could severely impact their lives in the future. Having the minimum age set at 15 already caused this to be one of the most immature and unprofessional esports amongst the pro players. Making it even lower will definitely not help with that. This could possibly cause new organizations to be turned away, as they may understandably not want to work with young children.

The reason for this change is most likely because of Epic Games’ desire to unite Rocket League esports with Fortnite esports, and making them have the same minimum age does make sense in that regard. But I still think this is an irresponsible decision and they should instead consider raising the minimum age in Fortnite.

Prize Pool

The prize pool has been announced to be $4,300,000, which is a significant decrease from the previous $6,000,000.

It is the first time that we have seen a decrease in the prize pool since the beginning of RLCS, which is very concerning for the growth of the game. We are used to seeing RLCS do things bigger and better every year, and it is sad to see us having to take such a large step back. With Epic Games’ new partnership with BLAST, hopefully the production and entertainment value of RLCS will still see some huge improvements despite the prize pool cuts.  And I do understand that cuts may be needed to ensure sustainability.

One decision regarding the prize pool that has left many fans confused is the prize distribution being widened significantly:

Each Open Qualifier will now award the top 128 teams cash prizes in both North America and Europe.
Each Open Qualifier will now award the top 64 teams cash prizes in South America, Oceania, and MENA.
Each Open Qualifier will now award the top 32 teams cash prizes in APAC and SSA.

It makes no sense to me why they have chosen to spread out the money so far after reducing the overall prize pool. Yes, they have removed an entire split which will free up a lot of extra cash, but giving this money to so many teams at the bottom is a strange decision in my opinion.

The main reason why this is concerning is because it shows that the new people in charge of making these decisions clearly don’t know the game well or the size of the competitive player base.

In previous seasons, SAM, OCE and MENA barely even have 64 teams signing up for the qualifiers, and so teams from those regions just have to sign up and they will win free cash. So the issue isn’t with the decision itself, it is with the people in charge having a clear lack of understanding.

The one positive that may come from this is that it may encourage lower skilled players to sign up and play and hopefully help grow the player base. So as long as it doesn’t take any prize money away from Worlds/Majors, I am all for it.

There is hope for the RLCS 2024 season

Whilst these changes do serve as huge downgrades to what we have had in previous seasons, I do think that the outraged fans are not understanding the fact that the RLCS team are striving towards creating a sustainable competition for the future. Hopefully, in a few years time, we will look back and realize these financial cuts were necessary to keep the game alive long term.

It’s still obvious that whoever is now making some of these decisions does not understand what needs to be done to satisfy the fans and players.

One of the reasons why these changes have caused so much pain for the Rocket League community is the already constant desperation for communication about what we can expect for the future of the game, as the only news we seem to get is negative. This has really been the last straw. First with the removal of player-to-player trading, and now these negative RLCS changes, Rocket League fans have lost all hope.