Season 2 World Championships: Day 1

Before I begin, I'll warn you that this post will contain spoilers if you have yet to watch any of the matches. Read further at your own discretion.

Day 1 of the Season 2 World Championships can be summed up in one word: disappointment.

There have been a number of tournaments and competitions in the past couple of months, including the regionals, where the strict adherence to the current meta was excused because teams were ostensibly saving their secret strategies for the world stage. Many players and theorists have been waiting with great anticipation for the new and interesting strategies that were supposedly being kept under wraps. So far they haven't surfaced.

Almost all of the strategies displayed have already cropped up in past tournaments. 1v2 lane swaps, triple teleport compositions, and fast turret pushes are relatively recent developments, but are nonetheless a far cry from the secret exciting metabreaker strategies that were expected. The only truly new strategy was Dignitas' roam strategy, which bore a closer resemblance to a train wreck than a competitive meta. Thus far, players looking to this tournament for a new meta will be nothing short of disappointed.

At the same time this tournament has brought to the foreground the waning competitiveness of the North American teams. Both Dignitas and CLG.NA have been eliminated, and convincingly so. They were not beaten by the advancing teams so much as routed. It's an all too familiar situation for eSports veterans; North America tends to do well early on, but after a honeymoon period Europe and Asia are fast on their heels. Unless TSM has a stellar showing today this weekend will serve as a rude awakening to the North American competitive scene.

In a way we, the players, may have contributed to the downfall of our favorite teams. Of the teams that were eliminated three feature one or more extremely popular streamers. At the professional level teamwork, strategy, drilling, and research become incredibly important, but make for inadvisable or boring streaming material. As a result, popular streamers are torn between the steady, guaranteed income from streaming and the practical needs of a competitive team. It isn't a 1 to 1 correlation, CLG.EU advanced despite having many prominent streamers, but fan demands appear to make pursuing necessary practice regimens difficult.

This isn't to say that the tournament is a wash. There were many exciting games and epic moments to be found. Azubu Frost versus Invictus Gaming was an incredible match. CLG.NA's triple teleport base race finish against SK Gaming was surprising. NaJin Sword versus Saigon Jokers was close and interesting. The venue itself is fairly impressive, minus the failure to account for the effects of sunlight upon gaming monitors. The disappointments all stem from hype that hasn't reflected reality, and the failure of popular teams to compete on the worldwide stage.

We'll see how the tournament develops over the coming days. It's my hope that the coming matches will be much more competitive, and feature the heretofore unseen secret strategies that will define Season 3.