In recent days, there has been continuous controversy surrounding ASIAD 2023. From excitement because for the first time Esports in general and League of Legends in particular have the opportunity to become a medal competition, now the community is worried. somewhat disappointed. Not only from the issue of version 13.12 being applied at the tournament, but also from factors coming from the competition formats as well as what the national teams are facing.
The ASIAD tournament is showing many shortcomings
The first is the ambiguity about the format of the Road to Asian Games (RTAG) 2022 in mid-year. At that time, the teams were only informed that there would be seeding. But in the end, according to information from the representative of Chinese Taipei, the 4 seeded teams of RTAG 2022 went straight to the 8th round of ASIAD. Thus, because of the lack of information, many teams have put themselves in a difficult position. Korea, Vietnam… will likely have to face each other in the group stage and only the strongest team from each group will be able to advance.
The first is the lack of clarity in the information surrounding the Road to Asian Games 2022
From here, the second shortcoming of the tournament is clearly pointed out, which is the single round-robin format and every match is BO 1 in the group stage. In other words, this is the same format as the World Finals but with a much higher level of risk. Teams will only be given a maximum of 3 opportunities, and only need to stumble in 2/3 matches to completely “pop”. In some cases, it is even possible that teams losing just 1 match is enough to have to leave the tournament. Worth mentioning, the BO1 format has almost no longer been applied in professional League of Legends for a long time, except for Worlds 2022. Even in the current domestic tournaments, most of them are BO3 or have 2 rounds – return.
Then, the BO1 round-robin format in the group stage was considered inappropriate
It can be said that fans were extremely disappointed when the format was only BO1 matches instead of attractive BO3 and BO5 matches like international tournaments of Esports in general and League of Legends in particular. However, there are still opinions expressing sympathy when saying that this is the first year that Esports can compete for medals. And maybe the ASIAD organizers haven’t really had much time to research to come up with the most suitable formats. Not to mention, when taking place at the Asian Games, Esports has to share time with other sports.
The audience believes that Esports and League of Legends have not received proper attention at ASIAD even though they are medal events.
Of course, even if fans are not satisfied, it cannot be denied that the Hangzhou ASIAD is truly an important step forward for Esports. But clearly, the ASIAD BTC side also needs to make more appropriate changes in the future to stay true to the spirit of eSports.
