A Million Dollars for CS:GO’s Majors Tournaments

On February 23, 2016, Valve, the developers of Counter-Strike, have announced that they will increase the prize pool of the Counter-Strike:Global Offensive (CS:GO) Major Championships from $250,000 (P11.88 million) to $1 million (P47.52 million).

The Majors have been announced by Valve in partnership with DreamHack back in 2013 as a part of an initiative to create events that will attract the existing CS:GO community, draw new players and serve as the benchmark for creating CS:GO tournaments.

The reason why Valve increased the prize pool to a million dollars is because it wanted to maintain its place as the tournament that everyone will be mark as a red day on their calendars.

Back in 2013, the biggest third-party CS:GO tournaments had a prize pool of $35,000-40,000 (P1.66 to P1.9 million): All the season finals of the Esports Entertainment Association (ESEA) had $39,500, while EMS One finals had $35,000. Even DreamHack Valencia 2013 only had a prize pool of $5,000, despite the fact that renowned teams such as n!Faculty and Clan-Mystik attended the event.

In other words, Valve intended the Majors to be the most prestigious CS:GO tournament in a given season: With a prize pool of $250,000 and located inside the largest LAN  party in the world, it would surely attract not just the cream of the crop of the CS:GO scene, but a multitude of fans as well as spectators who may be watching CS for the first time.

Then in 2014, the formula continued to work as the CS:GO Majors broke every record imaginable: People watched for an overall total of 3.5 million hours as well as having 6.2 million sessions on stream, while at the same time, seeing different storylines come into the light as Virtus.Pro, Ninjas in Pyjamas and LDLC.com grab their respective trophies for that year.

In terms of prizes, the Electronic Sports World Cup (ESWC) was the only tournament that came close to Valve’s prize pool: At $60,000, it saw Fnatic win over LDLC.com on their own turf. Then comes FACEIT League – Season 2 with $50,000…and other tournaments had more or less the same prize pools as 2013 (Dreamhack Invitational II, Starladder StarSeries X and Dreamhack Summer 2014 all come to mind as they had a $30,000 prize pool.)

Finally, here comes 2015, where Electronic Sports League (ESL), in partnership with ESEA, announces the first two seasons of the ESL ESEA Pro League, with a total prize pool of $1,000,000 (P47.52 million). The LAN finals of each season had a prize pool of $250,000 (P11.88 million), which is similar to the tournament prizes given in a CS:GO major.

READ: Fnatic Makes CS:GO History by Grabbing Second Major Title at ESL One Katowice

As for the CS:GO Majors, three things set it apart from the rest of the pack in 2015. Firstly, it has set another milestone by reaching the 1-million mark in concurrent viewership during ESL One Katowice. Secondly, it saw Fnatic take three major titles during ESL One Cologne against EnVyUs, which is in itself, puts Fnatic as one of the best teams that graced CS:GO history. Finally, Dreamhack Cluj-Napoca saw the best production in the history of any CS:GO tournament, as renowned commentator Jason “moses” O’Toole attests:

Bomb defusal stage production from #DHCJ15 pic.twitter.com/yx0FwhyHlR

— Jason O'Toole (@OnFireMoses) October 29, 2015

So, the question is, why change it in 2016? A quick look on Liquipedia would reveal that a good number of third-party tournaments have a prize pool of $200,000: ESL ESEA Pro League, ESL One, Intel Extreme Masters and Starladder i-League Starseries XIV Finals are among the tournaments that have great prize pools.

And let us not forget Turner Sports’ ELEAGUE Season 1, which has a whopping $1,200,000 prize pool…and one which is sure to attract the best teams in the world and expose them on mainstream television.

In addition, the increase in prize money may give another reason for the teams to motivate themselves to go for the win instead of being contented with sticker money: According to Valve, teams earned more than $8 million in cash from the sticker proceeds from the three majors held in 2015.

Overall, the change in the prize pool is a win-win for everyone: Not only does Valve keep the status of the Majors as the premier tournament of the year, but players get to earn more monetary reward as a result of playing well.

Mark my words, the Majors will be bigger this 2016.

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