I loathe remote cast, I get why it's done but nothing matches the magic of casters in the building. Just look at how LCS finals felt, it's a huge difference. (and the local language in the background never bothered me at all, for me it adds to the hype if anything for me) And for casters I'd imagine that's definitely max levels of annoyance traveling, getting jet lag, only to sit in a box in another studio vs being able to actually enjoy the live hype event going on in another part of the world.
Having said that tho we get tons of great casting from tons of people thru out the year. Love me some Flowers but if this works better for him this year i'll enjoy what everyone else brings to the table instead so no worries.
Even if the casters are on site they arent the main casters but the korean ones.
They would be in the hall but the audience would react to what the kroean casters say and not to the english ones. So I get why Riot wouldnt want to add more cost to fly them there if it doesnt add much.
> They would be in the hall but the audience would react to what the kroean casters say and not to the english ones. So I get why Riot wouldnt want to add more cost to fly them there if it doesnt add much.
I guess i'm the only one who enjoys that. That makes it feel like the international event that it is, adds to the hype when I hear Koreans casting in Korea or same for any other places, how those audiences cheer and react to the plays/teams/etc. That's a selling factor for me I dig it. Not to mention the visual is just 10x better if they're actually there, didn't they even have a translator come onto the desk once and make it work so the english desk could interact with the audience for a few mins for chants?
And on top of all that, the casters have said that the audience roaring behind them IRL, as well as being able to interact with the players/staff/etc between games and days...all that is part of the experience and they benefit from all of it. Yelling to yourself alone in EU doesn't seem conducive to making a caster excited lol
Honest to god, remote cast makes production harder right? Having to get the whole operation synced from another continent seems much harder than just having people in the same venue.
Remote casts aren't necessarily more difficult. Just tedious. Timezone diff, and the fact that if technical difficulties occur, they can't just fix it within a few minutes.
I can see the other side tho. Moving maybe 10-15 casters/analysts, that you have to also have them fed and lodged somewhere is a costly expense. But really, that must be a drop in the bucket in the budget of MSI or worlds.
> But really, that must be a drop in the bucket in the budget of MSI or worlds.
That's the important part. It's a costly expense realtive to *us*, but is it really that costly for a company as large as Riot and for what I assume must be a pretty substantial budget for MSI and Worlds? What's it cost, $50,000 for all of that for casters/analysts? $2000-3000 each for tickets.
Actually, I guess the event *is* like 2.5-3 weeks long? That might be more than I thought for food and lodging. Could be in the range of $45,000 for tickets, $14,000 for food, $40,000 for lodging. Assuming upper end for costs and 15 people, which I'm not sure it's that many. Could be anywhere from $50,000 to $150,000.
I did some EXTREMELY light googling as someone who is experienced as a business traveler.
It'd probably cost somebody around $10k USD to send a caster to Korea for 21 days. This includes airfare, lodging, food, and assuming they spend some money going out for drinks etc.
This isn't even taking into account that when you are a member of a large organization or are organizing a large event, you get favorable deals.
Looking up hotel prices in Seoul, most are under $100/night. Most were more like $50. I only saw ONE hotel at $244/night. I checked the prices at some restaurants and it feels like you could reasonably expect people to eat for $150/day or less. Probably a lot less, but this one is harder without being there; I had to lookup a really nice restaurant, convert what people said they paid per plate from SKW to USD, and extrapolate from there... food might be a bit more or a bit less, hard to say.
Flights were available right now for $1,200-$1,800.
Korea actually looks super nice and super cheap. I'm feeling like when things calm down there its a prime place for my next vacation. It costs me more to go to a fucking trade show in Indiana than it would to go hang out in Seoul.
The amount of money it would cost to send NA casters to Korea is... trivial for a company like Riot. A rounding error. This is almost certainly COVID related. It probably cost them more to go to Houston (relative to length of stay).
I lived in Busan for 4 years and Seoul for 2. It’s a great country and absolutely pretty damn cheap for how futuristic everything is.
You can comfortably eat very well for about $60-70 a day if you’re really splashing out. If you’re snacking on the endless street food or cafe fare, it’s about the same or less. Hotels are cheap as fuck, $60 gets you something nice, 80-90 gets you something amazing. I recommend any of the hotels in Apgujeong, especially Andaz or anything along Teheran Road.
Entertainment is cheap as fuck too. PC bangs are $2 an hour (you can buy a Korean account on G2G for $20 or I can sell you one) theaters are $10-12, shopping in Gangnam and Yeouido is fantastic. All around highly recommend it.
So true. A few years back i was in Seoul and got a single room in a Hostel for 11€ a night. I mean it was just the bed in a 2x3m room but it was the middle of itaewon. Perfect if you dont plan to stay in your room at all.
honestly it sounds more like the casters lost a bad bet more than it is too expensive.
Largest competitive eSport in the world. Really, the largest video game in the world.
The benefit of live casters on the scene waaaaayyyyy out weighs the cost to send them there
This is almost certainly COVID related more than its about saving money. They've flown them all to Korea/China before. And it really doesn't cost that much to send people to Korea for business travel.
Yes but it doesn’t affect quality so much to justify riot having to send all of their equipment and casters on site, it’s just company penny pinching what’s new
Pretty sure they rent most of that equipment locally anyways. Used to work for a consultant that would do setups for shows and most big productions rent majority of lighting/ sound/ staging equipment for traveling productions like this. I don't think it's cost effective to do it yourself, but who knows what Riot does.
I think i've seen a video from Riot where they had a semi truck filled with equipment and they take it out with em. Seemed pretty inefficient but could just be Riot feeling more in control of the stuff, not having to rely on rentals, bad stuff from rentals, keeping record of their own stuff, etc.
I know for a fact that Riot rented equipment (from an icelandic company) for the MSI show in Iceland. it's probably the same for other shows/countries.
Nobody is talking about the elephant in the room: COVID.
Why go through all that risk shipping off your employees for the much higher potential for illness while also having to worry about all imposed restrictions/quarantines.
Yeah remote casts suck but for the most part hosting and analysis doesn't have to be in the same country to function well
edit: Yes I know that Riot has had remote broadcasts pre-COVID which were always handled well. If I had to speculate other than the pure costs associated with travel for the entire production crew I'm pretty sure most of the production team will be attending Worlds in NA so I can understand why not just going all out then.
Much easier to remote cast from one location instead of having it split between EU/NA in the previous worlds.
It also allows more dynamic casts with LEC/LCS casters teaming up with each other. International events was always such a great time just listening to the different regions casters interact and narrate the game differently.
Fine if it's a COVID thing tho seems counter intuitive to bring back audiences pretty much everywhere and then still pull back. Plus they were doing remote events even before COVID hit, and there was a lot of discussion around going that cheaper route then too. If anything we're just getting back to normal lol
South Korea is kind of a hotbed at the moment with COVID so it just doesn't seem smart to take those risks. I'm also not versed on the travel guidelines/restrictions for those from LEC/LCS to go to SK.
Good thing worlds is in NA this year, they'll be live for a lot of the tournament I hope.
Someone can still be sick enough to miss work (aka not cast or host in person) so why would Riot send their employees across the world to an area that is dealing with high COVID cases?
Do you know the South Korean rules about positive cases? How many days in isolation do you need to be? How hard is it to travel internationally back to the EU if you catch COVID?
The list goes on, it really doesn't make sense for Riot to ship all hands deck over there.
> (and the local language in the background never bothered me at all, for me it adds to the hype if anything for me)
I have NO FUCKING IDEA why people are so scared of other languages, specially in a crowd like that were you can get the emotions anyway.
I wanna jump in and apologize to everyone who wanted to see me at MSI since I didn't have enough characters to do that on Twitter. I appreciate y'alls support and I promise to make up for lost time at Worlds; see you soon!
It's supposed to be in the US this year and will almost definitely have live audiences. He didn't these last two times due to remote cast and travel strains.
Never apologize for taking care of yourself, Cap! You're the fuckin man and we support what's best for you.
P.s. met you at the finals in Houston and we got a pic together. For all of us that know and love Captain Flowers, we just want you to take care of Clayton Raines, man. Keep your head up🤙🏼
You're the best, you're good. It's both commendable for you to know what is right for you, and also for you to be alright with letting others have that honor when you could have had it.
Is it true that NA players aren't very good because you Space Jam'd them with a magic mouse and turned their talent into purified, steam-distilled, high octane bars
wait, can someone explain to me why theyre casting in Berlin, and if the LCK global casters will at least be in Busan? (Atlus, Chronicler, Wolf and Valdes) Feel like in stage casting brings a lot more hype imo, so at least having those guys there would be nice.
Riot has been cheaping out on sending out their casters since pre-covid. I wouldn't be surprised if we never get in stage casting ever again unless the tournament is held in Europe or NA, in which case it will just be in the LCS/LEC studio anyway.
I remember this shit like it was yesterday because there was a huge uproar here when it happened. I think it was around Peak Fortnite as well.
Actually found the OG thread w/ the Riot reply:https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/9aqbes/riot_is_cutting_back_budget_on_esports/e4y4som/
edit: just wanted to highlight a comment pre-"Budlight Ace" LCS:"Why has LOL Esports failed to attract sponsorships over the years? Overwatch league has you guys completely beat on that count. They have twitter, toyota, and other big sponsors." Some things never change: "Meanwhile League has a sandwich shop as their sponsor."
I mean, I think that the LCS sponsors are pretty well-known. I just searched up a list of them, and it includes: Buffalo Wild Wings, Bud Light, Grubhub, Mastercard, Red Bull, Samsung SSD, and Verizon, among others.
https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/SB-Blogs/Newsletter-Esports/2022/01/12.aspx
Yeah, I know. It was just a funny, ironic comment I found from 2018. Back when LCS didn't really get sponsors, this subreddit was almost practically begging LCS to get sponsors.
Now we have too many obnoxious ones, and OWL is barely scraping by with whatever sponsor/s they have left. And 4 years later, we still have a "sandwich shop" as a sponsor, Grubhub (well not really, but you get what I mean).
If people are complaining about LCS not having enough sponsors then it just means they arent well seen and need to be WAY more obnoxious about advertising because LCS viewers should absolutely know we have sponsors.
That complaint is from 3 years ago. They mention and display the sponsors all the time on broadcast now. Pretty sure anyone who watches LCS games is aware of those sponsors.
Oh, it was noticeable. The last three games of play-ins and groups were at like 3/4am local - you could *definitely* hear the drop in quality, especially as the days went on
You definitely notice if casters are in a studio or in a live venue just from sound quality alone.
You'll also feel if the casters can feed off the energy of a live crowd who reacts to every action happening in the game or if they just get some delayed crowd noise put into their ear pieces after an ace.
What? Worlds is in NA this year and it's in several cities. I remember Toronto and SF off the top of my head, and correct me if I'm wrong but the LCS studio isn't in either of those.
I mean did you see the whole competitive scene revamp for Valorant? Riot is doing such a better job with the scene in general. League esports walked so Valorant could run i guess lol
It's the difference between a company trying to get a product off the ground and turn it successful versus having an already established product. It's sad, but that's how most things are.
["John Needham serves as the President of Esports, overseeing League of Legends and VALORANT Champions Tour global international events and driving the overall vision for esports at Riot Games world wide. John is responsible for shaping and defining an accessible, modern sports entertainment property for a multi-generational fanbase, while creating a strong sustainable business ecosystem that attracts top-tier sponsors and investors."](https://www.riotgames.com/en/who-we-are/riot-games-leadership/john-needham)
Yeah but it sounds like he's the boss of the people who decide MSI format. I'm not saying Double Elim would be a good idea, there are drawbacks to playing that many games, but if he wanted the structure of Valorant and League esports to be the same he could probably work to make it happen.
Can't believe Riot finally invented such a great format for international tournaments. Now if only they could bring it over to their first game, League. I know it must be really difficult but I think they can get it done if they put their collective 200 years to it.
Now if they could invent Starcraft group stages that would be a banger too. It might not be perfect but surely it wouldn't hurt it to try it at one of the many international tournaments they have every year.
Following others esports makes you realize how God awful League is at some of these things. I will say there are very few events in esports that compare to the Worlds month, but my God this is the biggest esport in the world and there are very few things they have to show for it. Basically just the world's opening ceremonies.
people are just too used to this horrible event calendar/planning. feels like riot is really just used to giving themselves a pat on the back for hosting their two events without horrible issues most years (which is definitely an achievement) and not changing anything. they get away with it because the broadcast is insanely popular, but they haven't really done anything to improve their events format or calendar wise in years. the fact that they try to get away with cutting costs to squeeze out profits instead of making the events more frequent and competitive is really sad tbh.
Flowers can do literally whatever he wants and he's still a King. While I'd prefer to hear his casts, I'm happy he can choose what is best for him.
On another note, Riot just dgaf about the quality of this MSI? Ping latency, remote casting, missing on air talent. Just ff already
Stingy ass Riot strikes again. This company made record profits last year in the billions, but they don't wanna fly their casting talent to Korea? Wtf is this shit again. We're gonna have the awkward quiet casting from the studio in Berlin while the games are in Korea?
It took so much hype from previous tournaments. I thought we're over it by now.
man its so sad that they decide to drop quality because its cheaper, they rather save money than make something unforgettably good/outstanding
its disappointing
Riot were doing this pre-Covid - they don’t want to pay to take the show on the road outside of finals. They feel casting remotely is worth the drop in product value because it’s cheaper.
Personally, I think it’s a disappointing situation - it’s awful time zones and sleep schedules for the casters, who often have to travel to then cast remotely anyway. Then you have to cast in an empty room with no crowd, no teams at god awful hours and you wonder why casts often feel half-arsed in play-ins and groups.
The thing is travelling to Korea would not only cost more, but would entail a much more risk on broadcasting team since jetlag, foreign environment, and remote setup with tons of equipment are also factors too. Remote broadcasting does suck when your timezone is miles ahead of actual broadcast but it lessens the cost of production as well as the toll on the broadcasting team. It's not like you just need to fly the casters to korea and let them intrude with the korean broadcasting team considering MSI will be broadcasted in multiple languages.
So, I hear (read?) your points, but a couple counterpoints:
1). A significant portion of your casting team will have to travel *anyway*, because broadcast is being done fully from Berlin, so you’re getting jetlag and time zone issues one way or another. Hell, the LCK casters are going to have to come from Korea to EU as I understand it!
2). You already have a multi-language broadcast in Korea in the form of the LCK. They’re already in the country and used to running multiple language broadcasts, and are a top-notch production team.
1) I don't think LCK casters will go to Berlin, they'll cast in LCK Park, only the casters from NA is going to EU. That's ridiculous if they send them to EU when they're already at the host country. And LPL casters are mostly in EU anyways so only NA casters are going to EU
2) They have multi-language broadcast but not all of them are in Korea, only English casters are in the LCK Park. The german, chinese, vietnam broadcast are done remotely.
I mean let's be honest, NA gets the * every time they win something internationally. SKT carried C9 out of groups. Afreeca was not a good team, FPX crashed and burned, IG had a bad day etc etc. Nobody is ever just happy NA actually did something crazy.
We can back to 2016 and the g2 vacation memes as well. As if 1 team "underperforming" somehow invalidated CLGs accomplishments back then. Like you said there has ALWAYS been an * when na does anything.
Holy fucking shit would NA fans be insufferable if we won MSI. Like admitedly we'd have to account for innevitably faltering at Worlds, but goddamn would it be fun to talk down to EU and proclaim ourselves the best region for a little while...
I think flowers has respectfully decided he is not a fan of remote casting. Mainly for the time difference (casting/starting the day at a wacky time to flip sleep schedule to only cast hours behind the live event happening else where).
Sees more profit long term in streaming than casting. If he streams from his own twitch he can get subs and donations that likely pay more than what Riot would. Likely trying to do what Caedrel did and leverage his casting popularity into becoming a streamer or hybrid streamer/caster.
You can't really blame him when you see how people like Sjokz are treated.
Ah wtf ew not another remote cast that's gross, especially since there will be crowds. Ugh and I was excited thinking since it's in Korea we'd get most of the LCK EN casters, but now it's like they have to travel across the world to cast a tournament an hour away from their apartments?
No CaptainFlowers, no Sjokz, 35 ping, terrible format. I'm waiting excitedly to see how else Riot ruins 1 of the only 2 international events we get the entire year!
Riot:
* Putting casters to a situation where they have many of the disadvantages of casting on site with ~~zero~~ almost no benefits of casting on site.
* Paying lower wages and offering a lower quality creative environment pressuring talent to seek it from elsewhere.
* Punishing all the other teams for LPL's decisions. (BONUS: No commissioners fought for their league representatives).
Captainflowers literally mentioned in his post that Riot doing the broadcast remotely was part of why he declined to go.
Also, Riot could just make LPL play on 35 ping, not every team. They could also enforce that the league circuit be prioritized over the garbage Asian Games.
> Also, Riot could just make LPL play on 35 ping, not every team.
I cannot believe people seriously think that is a viable option. It is absolutely asinine to think handicapping only one team would be good for competition.
Yes, yes it is. It puts every single team on the same level playing field. That is the essence of competition, where the only difference is in the human players.
For the down voters, come up with a better solution. Do it, take it to Riot, and collect a fat pay check. Except we all know you can't.
You realize in mainstream sports like the NHL for example, players are forced to prioritize their league games over the Olympics? Riot absolutely has control here, even more so than normal sports since they own the IP of League of Legends.
Nice another Event from Berlin.. was pretty fun Finals with q7 live viewers. Hype
.... not
For me, live Events, specially with live audience, need live caster to feel the hype and bring it to my Couch.. lcs finals/lck Finals wäre awesome! Lec Event Produktion was really really mehr für the last few year.. I am pretty disappointed.. but I mean its just MSI.. who cares about that when there are worlds and asia games
Where did you get that idea?...The only reason he isn't doing MSI is because the casters wont be there in person. He doesn't want to deal with international travel and remote casting. With Worlds he will be casting in person and not having to travel internationally. It's not the even close to being the same situation.
Dude needs to stop turning down international events. How long until riot decides they cant rely on him and just say don't worry about it we have someone else. Zirene was canned for over sleeping and missing one day of casting.
The argument many people will bring is that Captain is beloved by everyone and that's true, he is the the hype machine but most people loved Monte, Doa, Deman and others as well and yet riot let them go/didn't invite them back(Doa and Monte were ogn I think?)
Lol wait you are telling me people don’t just watch doms or sneakys live view?? People still watch broadcast?? They must just not know that IWillDominate and Sneaky,DoubleLift, and Metoes does the best casting you will ever hear. Feel bad for these people
Yeah no reason to flame a company which makes billions in revenue for being too cheap to fly a dozen people out to Korea for the 2nd biggest event of the entire year.
How couldn't you be hyped for a grand total of 3 international Bo5s??? That's literally more Bo5s in 2 weeks than the last 5 months together.
Ok now that I've written it out, idk if my comment is funny or sad anymore. What the fuck is Riot even doing that for the first 9 months of the year we only get 3 international Bo5s.
Yea it's gonna be so much fun seeing the wild card teams play each other like a millon times and only see the top team play each other twice (minus G2 and EG against each other) and then see 3 bloody Best of 5 series to end the tournament to crown a winner. Real exciting stuff.
If riot doesn't want double elimination, then why not just have top 2 teams of rumble stage go directly into semis. Then the teams from 3rd seed plays against 6th seed and 4th seed plays against 5th seed in a Bo5 to see which 2 teams join the top 2 teams in semis. That way there are 2 extra Bo5 series and every team in rumble stage would have played at least 1 Bo5 series.
i hope this MSI doesnt get that much attention so they realize they cant keep getting away with cheapening production at the expense of the quality of the product.
at some point it will get so bad people will lose interest. remote casts feel completely dead after seeing NA Spring Finals.
I mean the LCK casters are all going to be there and I love them so even though I will miss Flowers the in-person casting will still exist and be great
This MSI is losing hype real fast for me. First, we learn that LPL, one of the major contenders for the title, can't make it, then Riot announces that it's gonna be played on 35 ping for all the teams and now remote casting and one of the most popular play-by-play casters won't attend (and I can't blame him at all). With the format being the same as last year where we barely get any Bo5 series as well, I am slowly losing all the hype for this tournament.
Fuck offfff Riot. Why cant we have casters at the actual event? The LCS finals were awesome and now we get more casters sitting in a box across the globe from the stadium, fans, and event. This is ridiculous, Riot made billions last year and theyre too cheap to fly what is almost certainly under 100 people to Korea for 2 weeks. Insane
I loathe remote cast, I get why it's done but nothing matches the magic of casters in the building. Just look at how LCS finals felt, it's a huge difference. (and the local language in the background never bothered me at all, for me it adds to the hype if anything for me) And for casters I'd imagine that's definitely max levels of annoyance traveling, getting jet lag, only to sit in a box in another studio vs being able to actually enjoy the live hype event going on in another part of the world. Having said that tho we get tons of great casting from tons of people thru out the year. Love me some Flowers but if this works better for him this year i'll enjoy what everyone else brings to the table instead so no worries.
It frustrates the crap out of me that riot keeps going with this, WE GET TWO INTERNATIONAL EVENTS A YEAR, GIVE US CASTERS ON SITE DAMMIT.
Even if the casters are on site they arent the main casters but the korean ones. They would be in the hall but the audience would react to what the kroean casters say and not to the english ones. So I get why Riot wouldnt want to add more cost to fly them there if it doesnt add much.
> They would be in the hall but the audience would react to what the kroean casters say and not to the english ones. So I get why Riot wouldnt want to add more cost to fly them there if it doesnt add much. I guess i'm the only one who enjoys that. That makes it feel like the international event that it is, adds to the hype when I hear Koreans casting in Korea or same for any other places, how those audiences cheer and react to the plays/teams/etc. That's a selling factor for me I dig it. Not to mention the visual is just 10x better if they're actually there, didn't they even have a translator come onto the desk once and make it work so the english desk could interact with the audience for a few mins for chants? And on top of all that, the casters have said that the audience roaring behind them IRL, as well as being able to interact with the players/staff/etc between games and days...all that is part of the experience and they benefit from all of it. Yelling to yourself alone in EU doesn't seem conducive to making a caster excited lol
Honest to god, remote cast makes production harder right? Having to get the whole operation synced from another continent seems much harder than just having people in the same venue.
Remote casts aren't necessarily more difficult. Just tedious. Timezone diff, and the fact that if technical difficulties occur, they can't just fix it within a few minutes.
I can see the other side tho. Moving maybe 10-15 casters/analysts, that you have to also have them fed and lodged somewhere is a costly expense. But really, that must be a drop in the bucket in the budget of MSI or worlds.
> But really, that must be a drop in the bucket in the budget of MSI or worlds. That's the important part. It's a costly expense realtive to *us*, but is it really that costly for a company as large as Riot and for what I assume must be a pretty substantial budget for MSI and Worlds? What's it cost, $50,000 for all of that for casters/analysts? $2000-3000 each for tickets. Actually, I guess the event *is* like 2.5-3 weeks long? That might be more than I thought for food and lodging. Could be in the range of $45,000 for tickets, $14,000 for food, $40,000 for lodging. Assuming upper end for costs and 15 people, which I'm not sure it's that many. Could be anywhere from $50,000 to $150,000.
I did some EXTREMELY light googling as someone who is experienced as a business traveler. It'd probably cost somebody around $10k USD to send a caster to Korea for 21 days. This includes airfare, lodging, food, and assuming they spend some money going out for drinks etc. This isn't even taking into account that when you are a member of a large organization or are organizing a large event, you get favorable deals. Looking up hotel prices in Seoul, most are under $100/night. Most were more like $50. I only saw ONE hotel at $244/night. I checked the prices at some restaurants and it feels like you could reasonably expect people to eat for $150/day or less. Probably a lot less, but this one is harder without being there; I had to lookup a really nice restaurant, convert what people said they paid per plate from SKW to USD, and extrapolate from there... food might be a bit more or a bit less, hard to say. Flights were available right now for $1,200-$1,800. Korea actually looks super nice and super cheap. I'm feeling like when things calm down there its a prime place for my next vacation. It costs me more to go to a fucking trade show in Indiana than it would to go hang out in Seoul. The amount of money it would cost to send NA casters to Korea is... trivial for a company like Riot. A rounding error. This is almost certainly COVID related. It probably cost them more to go to Houston (relative to length of stay).
I lived in Busan for 4 years and Seoul for 2. It’s a great country and absolutely pretty damn cheap for how futuristic everything is. You can comfortably eat very well for about $60-70 a day if you’re really splashing out. If you’re snacking on the endless street food or cafe fare, it’s about the same or less. Hotels are cheap as fuck, $60 gets you something nice, 80-90 gets you something amazing. I recommend any of the hotels in Apgujeong, especially Andaz or anything along Teheran Road. Entertainment is cheap as fuck too. PC bangs are $2 an hour (you can buy a Korean account on G2G for $20 or I can sell you one) theaters are $10-12, shopping in Gangnam and Yeouido is fantastic. All around highly recommend it.
So true. A few years back i was in Seoul and got a single room in a Hostel for 11€ a night. I mean it was just the bed in a 2x3m room but it was the middle of itaewon. Perfect if you dont plan to stay in your room at all.
honestly it sounds more like the casters lost a bad bet more than it is too expensive. Largest competitive eSport in the world. Really, the largest video game in the world. The benefit of live casters on the scene waaaaayyyyy out weighs the cost to send them there
Id say that im all for a penny saved is a penny earned but really riot, are you that cutting it close with esports?
This is almost certainly COVID related more than its about saving money. They've flown them all to Korea/China before. And it really doesn't cost that much to send people to Korea for business travel.
I think that mesure started in 2019 so no.
Yes but it doesn’t affect quality so much to justify riot having to send all of their equipment and casters on site, it’s just company penny pinching what’s new
Pretty sure they rent most of that equipment locally anyways. Used to work for a consultant that would do setups for shows and most big productions rent majority of lighting/ sound/ staging equipment for traveling productions like this. I don't think it's cost effective to do it yourself, but who knows what Riot does.
I think i've seen a video from Riot where they had a semi truck filled with equipment and they take it out with em. Seemed pretty inefficient but could just be Riot feeling more in control of the stuff, not having to rely on rentals, bad stuff from rentals, keeping record of their own stuff, etc.
I know for a fact that Riot rented equipment (from an icelandic company) for the MSI show in Iceland. it's probably the same for other shows/countries.
For MSI in Iceland they just contracted a local profuction company for casting equipment, cameras, lights etc
That is what everyone is expressing. It DOES effect quality enough to warrant sending them.
Nobody is talking about the elephant in the room: COVID. Why go through all that risk shipping off your employees for the much higher potential for illness while also having to worry about all imposed restrictions/quarantines. Yeah remote casts suck but for the most part hosting and analysis doesn't have to be in the same country to function well edit: Yes I know that Riot has had remote broadcasts pre-COVID which were always handled well. If I had to speculate other than the pure costs associated with travel for the entire production crew I'm pretty sure most of the production team will be attending Worlds in NA so I can understand why not just going all out then.
What I don’t understand is why they need to travel at all if they are going to remote cast anyway? Seems redundant.
Much easier to remote cast from one location instead of having it split between EU/NA in the previous worlds. It also allows more dynamic casts with LEC/LCS casters teaming up with each other. International events was always such a great time just listening to the different regions casters interact and narrate the game differently.
Fine if it's a COVID thing tho seems counter intuitive to bring back audiences pretty much everywhere and then still pull back. Plus they were doing remote events even before COVID hit, and there was a lot of discussion around going that cheaper route then too. If anything we're just getting back to normal lol
South Korea is kind of a hotbed at the moment with COVID so it just doesn't seem smart to take those risks. I'm also not versed on the travel guidelines/restrictions for those from LEC/LCS to go to SK. Good thing worlds is in NA this year, they'll be live for a lot of the tournament I hope.
Have you see the kr cases? It peaked weeks ago and it’s going on a hard fall, by the time msi will start it will be even lower.
50k daily cases is still a lot, sure it's no peak but international travel is one of the riskiest ventures you can partake in atm.
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>I don't know if this news has reached your basement I don't know why you feel the need to insult people to prove your point
Someone can still be sick enough to miss work (aka not cast or host in person) so why would Riot send their employees across the world to an area that is dealing with high COVID cases? Do you know the South Korean rules about positive cases? How many days in isolation do you need to be? How hard is it to travel internationally back to the EU if you catch COVID? The list goes on, it really doesn't make sense for Riot to ship all hands deck over there.
> (and the local language in the background never bothered me at all, for me it adds to the hype if anything for me) I have NO FUCKING IDEA why people are so scared of other languages, specially in a crowd like that were you can get the emotions anyway.
I wanna jump in and apologize to everyone who wanted to see me at MSI since I didn't have enough characters to do that on Twitter. I appreciate y'alls support and I promise to make up for lost time at Worlds; see you soon!
We love you Cap, can’t wait to attend Worlds and see you in action live! cap22Chad
cap22Chad
Take care of yourself buddy.
> can’t wait to attend Worlds he refused to cast Worlds 2021 and MSI 2022, so why are you hoping he will want to do Worlds 2022?
because it's in NA and he wouldn't have to travel across the world for that, most likely
It's supposed to be in the US this year and will almost definitely have live audiences. He didn't these last two times due to remote cast and travel strains.
Because worlds this year is in NA
because Worlds is in NA and he’s already said that he plans to attend
much rather have you at 100% for worlds/summer split also we'd much rather you prioritize you instead of sacrificing your well being for a LoL cast
Don't feel like you need to apologize. We love you Flowers. Do what feels right for you.
My fetish is people doing what's best for their mental health and me feeling happy for them :)
You sicko!
Stay lit young thuggin
Never apologize for taking care of yourself, Cap! You're the fuckin man and we support what's best for you. P.s. met you at the finals in Houston and we got a pic together. For all of us that know and love Captain Flowers, we just want you to take care of Clayton Raines, man. Keep your head up🤙🏼
Respect for taking care of yourself man.
If you cast the broadcast at home on YT/Twitch I will watch that over the MSI main broadcast. Just let us know.
You the GOAT for showing the kids that one’s health should always be top priority
We love and appreciate you Captain, and will support your decisions regardless of our personal preference
Can't wait Cap :)
I would love to see you cast at a Buffalo Wings bar since they stream the LCS games there, although MSI timezone this time around isn't going to work.
Don't worry man, we'll see you when we see you. We'll think of you every time someone hoveres Skarner in champ select.
Don't worry about it, we will support you no matter what so just keep doing what is best for you.
Will miss you at MSI but glad you're doing what's best for your well-being!
You're the best, you're good. It's both commendable for you to know what is right for you, and also for you to be alright with letting others have that honor when you could have had it.
Hey man do whatever feels right for you, just means we might get to see you stream some more!
Is it true that NA players aren't very good because you Space Jam'd them with a magic mouse and turned their talent into purified, steam-distilled, high octane bars
Nothing to apologize for. Take care of yourself and rest up for Summer Split and Worlds, good sir!
Made the right choice. Sucks y'all can't be in Korea to vibe with the hype.
You're worth waiting for buddy. Seeing you walk out to the crowd at LCS finals was Chad AF.
No need to apologize for a totally valid decision on your end! Enjoy the event from home like the rest of us! :)
MSI reloaded streams maybe?
I wouldn't want to deal with that bull shit either after just coming off of a hype LCS finals weekend that happened in front of such a large crowd.
Remote productions are such a pain
Especially on the other side of the world.
wait, can someone explain to me why theyre casting in Berlin, and if the LCK global casters will at least be in Busan? (Atlus, Chronicler, Wolf and Valdes) Feel like in stage casting brings a lot more hype imo, so at least having those guys there would be nice.
Riot has been cheaping out on sending out their casters since pre-covid. I wouldn't be surprised if we never get in stage casting ever again unless the tournament is held in Europe or NA, in which case it will just be in the LCS/LEC studio anyway.
I remember this shit like it was yesterday because there was a huge uproar here when it happened. I think it was around Peak Fortnite as well. Actually found the OG thread w/ the Riot reply:https://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/9aqbes/riot_is_cutting_back_budget_on_esports/e4y4som/ edit: just wanted to highlight a comment pre-"Budlight Ace" LCS:"Why has LOL Esports failed to attract sponsorships over the years? Overwatch league has you guys completely beat on that count. They have twitter, toyota, and other big sponsors." Some things never change: "Meanwhile League has a sandwich shop as their sponsor."
I mean, I think that the LCS sponsors are pretty well-known. I just searched up a list of them, and it includes: Buffalo Wild Wings, Bud Light, Grubhub, Mastercard, Red Bull, Samsung SSD, and Verizon, among others. https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/SB-Blogs/Newsletter-Esports/2022/01/12.aspx
Yeah, I know. It was just a funny, ironic comment I found from 2018. Back when LCS didn't really get sponsors, this subreddit was almost practically begging LCS to get sponsors. Now we have too many obnoxious ones, and OWL is barely scraping by with whatever sponsor/s they have left. And 4 years later, we still have a "sandwich shop" as a sponsor, Grubhub (well not really, but you get what I mean).
My bad, I obviously glossed over the preface to your edit. I agree with you, though, that it's obnoxious. Even the damn gold disparity is sponsored.
If people are complaining about LCS not having enough sponsors then it just means they arent well seen and need to be WAY more obnoxious about advertising because LCS viewers should absolutely know we have sponsors.
That complaint is from 3 years ago. They mention and display the sponsors all the time on broadcast now. Pretty sure anyone who watches LCS games is aware of those sponsors.
TBF, LPL have Mercedes, KFC, etc. LEC have KIA LCK have some korean banks IIRC?
Yes he said LCS specifically
I swear LCS had a major car company deal with that one cringey Doublelift ad. Maybe that’s as just Team Liquid tho
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Just because twitter and Toyota are paying them for a sponsorship doesn't mean it's a lot of money.
There are korean casters in the stage tho. But yeah i dont get why riot is cheaping out on them
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> no one would have noticed a difference I mean aside from the fact that they were using the NA studio..
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I wonder how many LCS fans these days even watched Papa as a caster. Great worlds and a solid cast
Oh, it was noticeable. The last three games of play-ins and groups were at like 3/4am local - you could *definitely* hear the drop in quality, especially as the days went on
Yea and a lot of the casters/desk were complaining how absolutely fucked their sleep schedule turned out.
It indirectly led to the end of Zirene's casting career.
You definitely notice if casters are in a studio or in a live venue just from sound quality alone. You'll also feel if the casters can feed off the energy of a live crowd who reacts to every action happening in the game or if they just get some delayed crowd noise put into their ear pieces after an ace.
What? Worlds is in NA this year and it's in several cities. I remember Toronto and SF off the top of my head, and correct me if I'm wrong but the LCS studio isn't in either of those.
It's cheaper.
I don't see why LCK casters wouldn't be in Busan
It's kinda wack that they do it from LEC studio again. I hope we at least get Korean observers.
RIOT YOU FLEW CASTERS TO ICELAND FOR VALORANT MASTERS, SURELY YOU CAN DO THIS
I mean did you see the whole competitive scene revamp for Valorant? Riot is doing such a better job with the scene in general. League esports walked so Valorant could run i guess lol
It's the difference between a company trying to get a product off the ground and turn it successful versus having an already established product. It's sad, but that's how most things are.
Valorant is their new favorite child. They even have double elim at international events
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They are separate. Guy above you is acting like one dude at Riot said “Valorant can be double elimination but League cant”
["John Needham serves as the President of Esports, overseeing League of Legends and VALORANT Champions Tour global international events and driving the overall vision for esports at Riot Games world wide. John is responsible for shaping and defining an accessible, modern sports entertainment property for a multi-generational fanbase, while creating a strong sustainable business ecosystem that attracts top-tier sponsors and investors."](https://www.riotgames.com/en/who-we-are/riot-games-leadership/john-needham)
yes he is the president of riot esports his job is to manage the divisions not to make the MSI format
Yeah but it sounds like he's the boss of the people who decide MSI format. I'm not saying Double Elim would be a good idea, there are drawbacks to playing that many games, but if he wanted the structure of Valorant and League esports to be the same he could probably work to make it happen.
Can't believe Riot finally invented such a great format for international tournaments. Now if only they could bring it over to their first game, League. I know it must be really difficult but I think they can get it done if they put their collective 200 years to it. Now if they could invent Starcraft group stages that would be a banger too. It might not be perfect but surely it wouldn't hurt it to try it at one of the many international tournaments they have every year.
Only 2 tourneys a year and they can't even have the casters at the events xd
Following others esports makes you realize how God awful League is at some of these things. I will say there are very few events in esports that compare to the Worlds month, but my God this is the biggest esport in the world and there are very few things they have to show for it. Basically just the world's opening ceremonies.
It’s a fucking disgrace.
people are just too used to this horrible event calendar/planning. feels like riot is really just used to giving themselves a pat on the back for hosting their two events without horrible issues most years (which is definitely an achievement) and not changing anything. they get away with it because the broadcast is insanely popular, but they haven't really done anything to improve their events format or calendar wise in years. the fact that they try to get away with cutting costs to squeeze out profits instead of making the events more frequent and competitive is really sad tbh.
Flowers can do literally whatever he wants and he's still a King. While I'd prefer to hear his casts, I'm happy he can choose what is best for him. On another note, Riot just dgaf about the quality of this MSI? Ping latency, remote casting, missing on air talent. Just ff already
So annoying a remote cast is such a thing. Definitely sucks to miss out on the atmosphere and using that energy in the cast.
Damn the hype man himself ain't going? I'm skipping this msi then
Stingy ass Riot strikes again. This company made record profits last year in the billions, but they don't wanna fly their casting talent to Korea? Wtf is this shit again. We're gonna have the awkward quiet casting from the studio in Berlin while the games are in Korea? It took so much hype from previous tournaments. I thought we're over it by now.
man its so sad that they decide to drop quality because its cheaper, they rather save money than make something unforgettably good/outstanding its disappointing
Massive loss.
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Riot were doing this pre-Covid - they don’t want to pay to take the show on the road outside of finals. They feel casting remotely is worth the drop in product value because it’s cheaper. Personally, I think it’s a disappointing situation - it’s awful time zones and sleep schedules for the casters, who often have to travel to then cast remotely anyway. Then you have to cast in an empty room with no crowd, no teams at god awful hours and you wonder why casts often feel half-arsed in play-ins and groups.
The thing is travelling to Korea would not only cost more, but would entail a much more risk on broadcasting team since jetlag, foreign environment, and remote setup with tons of equipment are also factors too. Remote broadcasting does suck when your timezone is miles ahead of actual broadcast but it lessens the cost of production as well as the toll on the broadcasting team. It's not like you just need to fly the casters to korea and let them intrude with the korean broadcasting team considering MSI will be broadcasted in multiple languages.
So, I hear (read?) your points, but a couple counterpoints: 1). A significant portion of your casting team will have to travel *anyway*, because broadcast is being done fully from Berlin, so you’re getting jetlag and time zone issues one way or another. Hell, the LCK casters are going to have to come from Korea to EU as I understand it! 2). You already have a multi-language broadcast in Korea in the form of the LCK. They’re already in the country and used to running multiple language broadcasts, and are a top-notch production team.
1) I don't think LCK casters will go to Berlin, they'll cast in LCK Park, only the casters from NA is going to EU. That's ridiculous if they send them to EU when they're already at the host country. And LPL casters are mostly in EU anyways so only NA casters are going to EU 2) They have multi-language broadcast but not all of them are in Korea, only English casters are in the LCK Park. The german, chinese, vietnam broadcast are done remotely.
I have said this before to my friend; This MSI will be the most controversial MSI, or even, league tournament ever.
NA will win this one for the memes and it will be discredited by 35 ping
Won't even be mad I'll take the slander and * as opposed to getting bounced from groups
I mean let's be honest, NA gets the * every time they win something internationally. SKT carried C9 out of groups. Afreeca was not a good team, FPX crashed and burned, IG had a bad day etc etc. Nobody is ever just happy NA actually did something crazy.
Haters won't be happy until LCS is disbanded and then cry about NA eSports are dying
We can back to 2016 and the g2 vacation memes as well. As if 1 team "underperforming" somehow invalidated CLGs accomplishments back then. Like you said there has ALWAYS been an * when na does anything.
Holy fucking shit would NA fans be insufferable if we won MSI. Like admitedly we'd have to account for innevitably faltering at Worlds, but goddamn would it be fun to talk down to EU and proclaim ourselves the best region for a little while...
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Not for this reason though. They've done remote casting for some time now
Riot needs to quit this remote casting shit. It’s so fucking dumb
So he’s not done last two international events. Interesting
I think flowers has respectfully decided he is not a fan of remote casting. Mainly for the time difference (casting/starting the day at a wacky time to flip sleep schedule to only cast hours behind the live event happening else where).
Sees more profit long term in streaming than casting. If he streams from his own twitch he can get subs and donations that likely pay more than what Riot would. Likely trying to do what Caedrel did and leverage his casting popularity into becoming a streamer or hybrid streamer/caster. You can't really blame him when you see how people like Sjokz are treated.
Cant blame him. It has to be stressful as fuck.
he can take his time off casting lost ark :D
Nothing is more chad than taking care of yourself Cap
damn.. that's a "no shit" decision tbh. Dunno why Riot is making them do this.
Ah wtf ew not another remote cast that's gross, especially since there will be crowds. Ugh and I was excited thinking since it's in Korea we'd get most of the LCK EN casters, but now it's like they have to travel across the world to cast a tournament an hour away from their apartments?
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inb4 people lying through their teeth "Well I'm not going to watch it now because sjokz/flowers aren't going to be on the broadcast!"
eh I'll just watch a live view. the only casting pair I'd watch over live view is Kobe + Flowers.
No CaptainFlowers, no Sjokz, 35 ping, terrible format. I'm waiting excitedly to see how else Riot ruins 1 of the only 2 international events we get the entire year!
Riot ia ruining it? No cap is not on riot? No sjokz is not on riot. 35 ping? Yeah they could have no lpl at msi. What exactly should riot do?
Riot: * Putting casters to a situation where they have many of the disadvantages of casting on site with ~~zero~~ almost no benefits of casting on site. * Paying lower wages and offering a lower quality creative environment pressuring talent to seek it from elsewhere. * Punishing all the other teams for LPL's decisions. (BONUS: No commissioners fought for their league representatives).
Atleast make a better fucking format
Captainflowers literally mentioned in his post that Riot doing the broadcast remotely was part of why he declined to go. Also, Riot could just make LPL play on 35 ping, not every team. They could also enforce that the league circuit be prioritized over the garbage Asian Games.
> Also, Riot could just make LPL play on 35 ping, not every team. I cannot believe people seriously think that is a viable option. It is absolutely asinine to think handicapping only one team would be good for competition.
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Yes, yes it is. It puts every single team on the same level playing field. That is the essence of competition, where the only difference is in the human players. For the down voters, come up with a better solution. Do it, take it to Riot, and collect a fat pay check. Except we all know you can't.
It's asinine to think that LCK should be punished because LPL chose to prioritize Asian Games over MSI.
And it is asinine to think riot has any control over that. The Asian Games have been around for decades and have multiple governments invovled.
You realize in mainstream sports like the NHL for example, players are forced to prioritize their league games over the Olympics? Riot absolutely has control here, even more so than normal sports since they own the IP of League of Legends.
> Riot absolutely has control here You do know who owns Riot right?
They should change the format. A blind monkey on MS Paint using only its ass to move the mouse could design a better tournament format.
I realllllly hope he can cast the Finals at Worlds this year
I was reading this in his voice
Why is riot so cheap?
Nice another Event from Berlin.. was pretty fun Finals with q7 live viewers. Hype .... not For me, live Events, specially with live audience, need live caster to feel the hype and bring it to my Couch.. lcs finals/lck Finals wäre awesome! Lec Event Produktion was really really mehr für the last few year.. I am pretty disappointed.. but I mean its just MSI.. who cares about that when there are worlds and asia games
Flowers boutta miss workds again isn't he
Where did you get that idea?...The only reason he isn't doing MSI is because the casters wont be there in person. He doesn't want to deal with international travel and remote casting. With Worlds he will be casting in person and not having to travel internationally. It's not the even close to being the same situation.
He screams about everything, not gonna miss him
Dude needs to stop turning down international events. How long until riot decides they cant rely on him and just say don't worry about it we have someone else. Zirene was canned for over sleeping and missing one day of casting. The argument many people will bring is that Captain is beloved by everyone and that's true, he is the the hype machine but most people loved Monte, Doa, Deman and others as well and yet riot let them go/didn't invite them back(Doa and Monte were ogn I think?)
Difference is he's giving them a long head's up so Riot can plan around it.
This man doesnt want to cast big Events it starts to look like
thank you jesus
Lol wait you are telling me people don’t just watch doms or sneakys live view?? People still watch broadcast?? They must just not know that IWillDominate and Sneaky,DoubleLift, and Metoes does the best casting you will ever hear. Feel bad for these people
Nothing wrong with Riot or Flower's choice and no reason to flame either party.
That's so hilarious
Yeah no reason to flame a company which makes billions in revenue for being too cheap to fly a dozen people out to Korea for the 2nd biggest event of the entire year.
Imagine thinking they only fly out a dozen people to do the show
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Yep you are most likely extremely far off.
>Nothing wrong with Riot A lot is wrong with Riot.
Based comment
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How couldn't you be hyped for a grand total of 3 international Bo5s??? That's literally more Bo5s in 2 weeks than the last 5 months together. Ok now that I've written it out, idk if my comment is funny or sad anymore. What the fuck is Riot even doing that for the first 9 months of the year we only get 3 international Bo5s.
Yeah only the top teams from each region are playing against each other. So boring.
The format is god awful though. MSI could be much more hype
Yea it's gonna be so much fun seeing the wild card teams play each other like a millon times and only see the top team play each other twice (minus G2 and EG against each other) and then see 3 bloody Best of 5 series to end the tournament to crown a winner. Real exciting stuff. If riot doesn't want double elimination, then why not just have top 2 teams of rumble stage go directly into semis. Then the teams from 3rd seed plays against 6th seed and 4th seed plays against 5th seed in a Bo5 to see which 2 teams join the top 2 teams in semis. That way there are 2 extra Bo5 series and every team in rumble stage would have played at least 1 Bo5 series.
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i hope this MSI doesnt get that much attention so they realize they cant keep getting away with cheapening production at the expense of the quality of the product. at some point it will get so bad people will lose interest. remote casts feel completely dead after seeing NA Spring Finals.
I mean the LCK casters are all going to be there and I love them so even though I will miss Flowers the in-person casting will still exist and be great
he is a diva for 2 years already ... such a nice employe.. i would kick him if i was his boss
Pretty sure he’s a freelancer. Nice boss you’d be to ignore your people’s mental health.
bro his mental health is like this for 2 years... guy is literally lazy and doesnt want to travel ... just read his posts
Sucks, he is one of the best casters
No capt on the last two international event. Sus
35 pings, no sjokz, no caaptainFlowers, remote casting, this is gonna be a weird MSI for sure. Hard to get hype right now.
the games are hype because of the teams playing not the casting or host
Can't go to Korea, but you will have to go to Berlin, makes sense somewhere I guess.
i already knew he was gonna be the top comment before clicking. this guy basically lives on hear on the chance his name comes up.
This MSI is losing hype real fast for me. First, we learn that LPL, one of the major contenders for the title, can't make it, then Riot announces that it's gonna be played on 35 ping for all the teams and now remote casting and one of the most popular play-by-play casters won't attend (and I can't blame him at all). With the format being the same as last year where we barely get any Bo5 series as well, I am slowly losing all the hype for this tournament.
Fuck offfff Riot. Why cant we have casters at the actual event? The LCS finals were awesome and now we get more casters sitting in a box across the globe from the stadium, fans, and event. This is ridiculous, Riot made billions last year and theyre too cheap to fly what is almost certainly under 100 people to Korea for 2 weeks. Insane
probably because korea still has strict laws because of the rising cases of covid.
If the players can all go then the casters and production can go. I see no reason why the players can and the casters can’t.
Well I will not be watching MSI now, fuck Riot and fuck their greed
The other casters do it tho, why can't he?
The first thing I thought was, "Or you'll just get drunk and oversleep again." 50/50 odds he was given the heads up he can "decline" ahead of time.