Riot Games has officially announced the first part of the 2024 VALORANT Champions Tour schedule, which includes an exciting tournament for each region to start the year in February. However, questions will be raised over the competitive viability of one team lucky to secure a bye in week one despite lacking a full roster.
The tournament format includes three stages: a group stage, play-ins, and playoffs before the grand finals. But since each VCT region now has 11 teams after last year’s Ascension tournaments, one team will open the season with a bye.
In the Americas region, the team with a bye through the first round is the 2023 VCT Championship-winning team Evil Geniuses. Normally, no one would bat an eye at this reward for being the best team on the planet, aside from one notable problem: EG does not have a roster, and the kickoff is less than a month away.
The format of the 2024 VCT Kickoff tournaments is notably different from 2023’s LOCK//IN tournament. Instead of a VCT-wide opening to the season, each region will have its own smaller tournament with all 11 teams participating. This will establish a preliminary hierarchy for the teams to move into the regular season and select the teams competing in Masters Madrid. To top it all off, a new points system will be implemented from the beginning of the season as teams work their way towards Champions at the end of the year.
All of this is to say that teams will have to come out of the gate running in February with no time to waste before immediately entering a tournament bracket. This presents some challenges for teams who have undergone major roster changes in the off-season, but EG, in particular, will look nothing like the champions of the past.
After their triumphant home victory in Los Angeles at the 2023 VCT Championship, EG as an organization has continued to implode. From the organization’s LCS exit to its departure from competitive Counter-Strike, EG is in shambles. In mere months, the organization went from winning the biggest VALORANT event in the world to all but exiting esports altogether, and fans still don’t have answers regarding the 2024 VCT season.
EG was one of ten orgs from North and South America to win a franchising spot when the VCT officially partnered with Riot, but the spot is in jeopardy with the uncertainty surrounding the company. Not to mention it was reported shortly after the team won their championship trophy that the rostered players were effectively in “contract jail,” leaving their options limited.
After all this chaos, it is no surprise that all but one of the 2023 VCT Championship-winning players have signed contracts with new teams for 2024. Stars Ethan Arnold and Max “Demon1” Mazanov have signed with NRG, while former in-game leader Kelden “Boostio” Pupello will play with 100 Thieves in 2024. Sova pioneer Corbin “C0M” Lee has joined the Argentina-based Leviatán. This leaves EG with one sole player still rostered: Alexander “jawgemo” Mor.
EG hasn’t announced the signing of any other VALORANT players, either, so the official franchised roster currently only includes jawgemo and coach Christine “potter” Chi. With the VCT Americas Kickoff tournament set to begin on Feb. 16, the franchised organization has less than a month to figure out its plans for fielding a team in 2024.
This isn’t the first time in the last year that a North American esports organization has left VALORANT fans uncertain of its future. After VCT Ascension in late 2023, The Guard infamously failed to complete the onboarding process into the VCT on time, leaving the players without an organization or contract for VCT 2024. Thankfully, another credible esports organization stepped in to give the players a second chance, but stories like this seem to only be getting more common in North America.
It’s puzzling that a team can go from the highest of highs in an esport and then fall to the point of having only one rostered player just a month before the start of the next season. Clearly, the 2023 EG roster proved that North American players are worth investing in, so how does Riot get the orgs supporting them to step up to the plate?
VCT Americas begins on Feb. 16 with the group stage of the Kickoff Tournament. We’re sure to know EG’s fate in the tournament—and competitive VALORANT as a whole—before they take to the server in round two.
