An open thread about Competitive CrossFire 2016 and beyond
![[MOD]Zzxq](https://z8games.akamaized.net/cfna/forum/customavatars/20/navatar_5345120.gif){kind=avatar}
Introduction
I want to preface this by saying that I have been a part of this community since the beginning. I have seen the highs and lows from different perspectives and have watched closely as the game has gone on throughout the years and seen where we thrive and where we need to make drastic improvements. Crossfire as a game has insane potential with the amount of revenue it pulls in globally, and it feels to many in the community at large that something is severely lacking on the competitive side that makes the game very unappealing.
As of yet I have not committed to, but have intentions to host leagues for CF whether or not it is for the Smilegate "NA ESPORTS" I am unsure as of now. I am hopeful that changes can be made, and will choose to either work with a league or create my own over the next months. I am excited to see the community starting to rally together once again. On top of this I also am interested in hosting LANs which I now have to resources to do, if they can be implemented to the community in the right way.
New Structures Needed
A - League Format and Structure
The structure of the league should be in line with not only community desires, but provide the most realistic and sustainable option. Right now the weekly points format is the best until expansion starts to occur, however once it does start to occur gradually moving towards a full league structure is the best way to go. Right now the focus needs to be finding a way to isolate and elevate the pro teams. People currently in the competitive community don't have any distinction of who is pro and who is not, so there is no reason to stay on top and be a "top team". We need to provide incentives and promote these top teams to create an "Idol" effect that will in turn cause more interest in the competitions. If we elevate our pro teams to a new level instead of having all of our teams playing together this will create more competition in the current state just by teams developing a desire to become a team labeled and treated as professional.
Example of a isolated pro league format:
CF OPEN: Unlimited Sign Ups (25% of prize budget)
CF PRO: 4-8 Teams Invite only (75% of prize budget)
Pro would ideally have a LAN finals at the seasons end.
B - Professional Team Structure
Professional teams in Crossfire need to be elevated in a way that puts them in the spotlight. They need to be treated as the celebrities of our game so in turn players will want to be them, which causes more interest and more competition. If we don't create an idolization around professional players, being a top player doesn't mean a whole lot to players. The question though now becomes HOW do we make these distinctions and show the community how these players are different and why other players should strive to be professionals. Here is a list of things that we can do to create a sustainable structure, and following the list I will outline how we can achieve each.
Professional Crossfire Elevation Changes:
- Professional Team Items and Crates
- Professional Crossfire Esports Web Page or Site
- Financial Incentives for Professional Players and Sustainability
- Exclusive Professional Events
- Promotion of Professional Players and Professional Content
B1 - Professional Team Items and Crates
First off I want to start off by stating that this is 100% possible and has been proven to grow and sustain professional gaming communities. It has been done in CS:GO and several other games and is proven to incentives not only current pro teams to stay active but elevates the money behind being a pro team which in turn promotes interest because pro can actually draw in more money from being a professional player. The best way to do this and sustain is create content that is partially for company revenue but partially used to fund competitive events and teams. We could create a ZP Crate for each team using the already made CFS Weapons and offer those crates for a zp purchase. In turn we could cut 2/3 to smilegate and 1/3 to Competition creating a specified way to generate funding for pro events and giving an elevated incentive for these teams to play more and get better. This also promotes the teams in game by having a Crate named after each team. Also each crate could include a spray featuring each teams logo. This would create pro branding for professional teams and pro sprays have already been done in other versions of the game. Having this available funding would be a huge step forward considering how much Crossfire draws in per year from micro-transactions. Crossfire compared to Dota 2 makes insanely more revenue and could use this method globally to have the largest esports tournament in the world which GUARANTEED would grow public interest of the game considering right now we have a global prize pool at CFS that is lower than SMITE who uses the "Crate Crowd-Funding Method" to generate their prize pool and had a season 1 event with almost 2 million up for grabs compared to our games 220k pool for CFS 2015 it seems silly we cant match a game with 5% of Smilegates global revenue in prizing. If Crossfire had a larger global pool it would draw attention on a global scale that would elevate the games view to new potential players.
B2 - Professional Crossfire Esports Web Page or Website
Something SG West has need for a long time is a cleaner website that features an esports site or page dedicated to promoting professional events and teams. The current "Competitive Section" on the site is outdated, never up to date, and does nothing to recognize top teams. We need to promote and market our top teams within SG west so that by showing we care the Crossfire community will care. Having and showing what we care about really does effect the community. Also having this page can draw attention to our esports and give us a professional platform to provide information about events and teams. Something along the lines of the CFS site for each specific versions pro teams would be a huge step forward and one the is much needed as every other major game has an esports pro site.
B3 - Financial Support for Teams and how to sustain it
Its no easy task to pay players to compete, but every major game does it in some form, and crossfire is capable of becoming a game that can do this. Using the Crowd funding method mentioned (B1) we can use this money to pay teams and create larger prize pools. This can be used to sustain competition but also push forward by creating incentives for teams who compete at a professional level that weren't previously available. Also by isolating and elevating professional teams we can easily attain sponsors for Professional Crossfire. Companies will see our new plan in action and a sustainable pro scene structure and some will easily be interested in getting involved in ways which can also help us provide bigger and better events. The reason this game has lost teams is because no teams beyond the very best 2 have ever got anything of real value, but by giving all pros a reason to stay it creates not only incentive for them, but now a goal for up and coming teams to attain. They can no longer just show up and compete in the best prized events, instead they have to earn their place and this creates a new and intriguing element of competition within the game.
B4 - Exclusive Professional Events
Pro events need to be exclusive. The reason behind this is people want what they cannot have its a proven fact. If you put the best paying events in a locked box that only the host has the keys to get into, teams will play their heart out and put in all on the line to become professionals and thats the kind of passion you want. This will pump life into a community on the brink of downfall and give people a reason to stay. Once there is more elevation live pro events are also key. With big names like DreamHack Moving to the United States in 2016, making sure Crossfire is on the forefront of not only asian majors but NA majors is insane exposure. It will showcase our professionals to a new audience and show that Crossfire really is a game more than capable of providing a professional competitive atmosphere.
B5 - Promotion of Professional Plaayer and Content
We need to utilize all social media platforms to promote events, media, and players in our pro scene. This will help market to a wider audience and spread public interest in the changes that are improving Competitive crossfire.
Other Recommended Changes and Resources
- Finding an effective way to integrate players in SG West Server that are not located in North America such as UK Players
- Hosting LAN Finals for NA only Professional Events
- Developing Regional events with Brazil, UK, EU, ES, NA all together
- Developing a similar concept to Sticker Money in CS for Crossfire
- Giving players ability to trade items (actually gives the game a huge amount of appeal)
- Possibly making a more centralized server (For example having West Coast, Midwest, and East Servers)
- Working with other versions to push out new content faster (A big complaint in North America is the delay we have in getting new content)
- Really supporting Esports with a passion because esports makes games much bigger. The best way to think about it is building a community behind the brand. Every big company does this and that is why they thrive and expand. In the world of gaming, esports is your community to build the Crossfire brand with. You have to support this community and help it thrive otherwise you are losing the community behind your brand which can drastically hurt any brand. Having a community behind your brand not only supports it, but provides free reach to grow your market to a new audience because that communities passion will reach those close to them and in turn grow the community.
Closing
I think Crossfire has a lot it could do to become a thriving Esports title. It starts with those at the top implementing changes needed to take place, and I truly hope that NA ESPORTS will provide a much needed change of pace, however if it does not, I am happy to step in and do the above listed to the best of my abilities. This game could really have a thriving professional scene, if the time and effort is put in to make the scene as it should be. For now its time to take a step back and see what NA ESPORTS may bring, and thanks for any of you who actually read the whole post.
I want to preface this by saying that I have been a part of this community since the beginning. I have seen the highs and lows from different perspectives and have watched closely as the game has gone on throughout the years and seen where we thrive and where we need to make drastic improvements. Crossfire as a game has insane potential with the amount of revenue it pulls in globally, and it feels to many in the community at large that something is severely lacking on the competitive side that makes the game very unappealing.
As of yet I have not committed to, but have intentions to host leagues for CF whether or not it is for the Smilegate "NA ESPORTS" I am unsure as of now. I am hopeful that changes can be made, and will choose to either work with a league or create my own over the next months. I am excited to see the community starting to rally together once again. On top of this I also am interested in hosting LANs which I now have to resources to do, if they can be implemented to the community in the right way.
New Structures Needed
A - League Format and Structure
The structure of the league should be in line with not only community desires, but provide the most realistic and sustainable option. Right now the weekly points format is the best until expansion starts to occur, however once it does start to occur gradually moving towards a full league structure is the best way to go. Right now the focus needs to be finding a way to isolate and elevate the pro teams. People currently in the competitive community don't have any distinction of who is pro and who is not, so there is no reason to stay on top and be a "top team". We need to provide incentives and promote these top teams to create an "Idol" effect that will in turn cause more interest in the competitions. If we elevate our pro teams to a new level instead of having all of our teams playing together this will create more competition in the current state just by teams developing a desire to become a team labeled and treated as professional.
Example of a isolated pro league format:
CF OPEN: Unlimited Sign Ups (25% of prize budget)
CF PRO: 4-8 Teams Invite only (75% of prize budget)
Pro would ideally have a LAN finals at the seasons end.
B - Professional Team Structure
Professional teams in Crossfire need to be elevated in a way that puts them in the spotlight. They need to be treated as the celebrities of our game so in turn players will want to be them, which causes more interest and more competition. If we don't create an idolization around professional players, being a top player doesn't mean a whole lot to players. The question though now becomes HOW do we make these distinctions and show the community how these players are different and why other players should strive to be professionals. Here is a list of things that we can do to create a sustainable structure, and following the list I will outline how we can achieve each.
Professional Crossfire Elevation Changes:
- Professional Team Items and Crates
- Professional Crossfire Esports Web Page or Site
- Financial Incentives for Professional Players and Sustainability
- Exclusive Professional Events
- Promotion of Professional Players and Professional Content
B1 - Professional Team Items and Crates
First off I want to start off by stating that this is 100% possible and has been proven to grow and sustain professional gaming communities. It has been done in CS:GO and several other games and is proven to incentives not only current pro teams to stay active but elevates the money behind being a pro team which in turn promotes interest because pro can actually draw in more money from being a professional player. The best way to do this and sustain is create content that is partially for company revenue but partially used to fund competitive events and teams. We could create a ZP Crate for each team using the already made CFS Weapons and offer those crates for a zp purchase. In turn we could cut 2/3 to smilegate and 1/3 to Competition creating a specified way to generate funding for pro events and giving an elevated incentive for these teams to play more and get better. This also promotes the teams in game by having a Crate named after each team. Also each crate could include a spray featuring each teams logo. This would create pro branding for professional teams and pro sprays have already been done in other versions of the game. Having this available funding would be a huge step forward considering how much Crossfire draws in per year from micro-transactions. Crossfire compared to Dota 2 makes insanely more revenue and could use this method globally to have the largest esports tournament in the world which GUARANTEED would grow public interest of the game considering right now we have a global prize pool at CFS that is lower than SMITE who uses the "Crate Crowd-Funding Method" to generate their prize pool and had a season 1 event with almost 2 million up for grabs compared to our games 220k pool for CFS 2015 it seems silly we cant match a game with 5% of Smilegates global revenue in prizing. If Crossfire had a larger global pool it would draw attention on a global scale that would elevate the games view to new potential players.
B2 - Professional Crossfire Esports Web Page or Website
Something SG West has need for a long time is a cleaner website that features an esports site or page dedicated to promoting professional events and teams. The current "Competitive Section" on the site is outdated, never up to date, and does nothing to recognize top teams. We need to promote and market our top teams within SG west so that by showing we care the Crossfire community will care. Having and showing what we care about really does effect the community. Also having this page can draw attention to our esports and give us a professional platform to provide information about events and teams. Something along the lines of the CFS site for each specific versions pro teams would be a huge step forward and one the is much needed as every other major game has an esports pro site.
B3 - Financial Support for Teams and how to sustain it
Its no easy task to pay players to compete, but every major game does it in some form, and crossfire is capable of becoming a game that can do this. Using the Crowd funding method mentioned (B1) we can use this money to pay teams and create larger prize pools. This can be used to sustain competition but also push forward by creating incentives for teams who compete at a professional level that weren't previously available. Also by isolating and elevating professional teams we can easily attain sponsors for Professional Crossfire. Companies will see our new plan in action and a sustainable pro scene structure and some will easily be interested in getting involved in ways which can also help us provide bigger and better events. The reason this game has lost teams is because no teams beyond the very best 2 have ever got anything of real value, but by giving all pros a reason to stay it creates not only incentive for them, but now a goal for up and coming teams to attain. They can no longer just show up and compete in the best prized events, instead they have to earn their place and this creates a new and intriguing element of competition within the game.
B4 - Exclusive Professional Events
Pro events need to be exclusive. The reason behind this is people want what they cannot have its a proven fact. If you put the best paying events in a locked box that only the host has the keys to get into, teams will play their heart out and put in all on the line to become professionals and thats the kind of passion you want. This will pump life into a community on the brink of downfall and give people a reason to stay. Once there is more elevation live pro events are also key. With big names like DreamHack Moving to the United States in 2016, making sure Crossfire is on the forefront of not only asian majors but NA majors is insane exposure. It will showcase our professionals to a new audience and show that Crossfire really is a game more than capable of providing a professional competitive atmosphere.
B5 - Promotion of Professional Plaayer and Content
We need to utilize all social media platforms to promote events, media, and players in our pro scene. This will help market to a wider audience and spread public interest in the changes that are improving Competitive crossfire.
Other Recommended Changes and Resources
- Finding an effective way to integrate players in SG West Server that are not located in North America such as UK Players
- Hosting LAN Finals for NA only Professional Events
- Developing Regional events with Brazil, UK, EU, ES, NA all together
- Developing a similar concept to Sticker Money in CS for Crossfire
- Giving players ability to trade items (actually gives the game a huge amount of appeal)
- Possibly making a more centralized server (For example having West Coast, Midwest, and East Servers)
- Working with other versions to push out new content faster (A big complaint in North America is the delay we have in getting new content)
- Really supporting Esports with a passion because esports makes games much bigger. The best way to think about it is building a community behind the brand. Every big company does this and that is why they thrive and expand. In the world of gaming, esports is your community to build the Crossfire brand with. You have to support this community and help it thrive otherwise you are losing the community behind your brand which can drastically hurt any brand. Having a community behind your brand not only supports it, but provides free reach to grow your market to a new audience because that communities passion will reach those close to them and in turn grow the community.
Closing
I think Crossfire has a lot it could do to become a thriving Esports title. It starts with those at the top implementing changes needed to take place, and I truly hope that NA ESPORTS will provide a much needed change of pace, however if it does not, I am happy to step in and do the above listed to the best of my abilities. This game could really have a thriving professional scene, if the time and effort is put in to make the scene as it should be. For now its time to take a step back and see what NA ESPORTS may bring, and thanks for any of you who actually read the whole post.
Comments
-
A lot of great suggestions and thought has been put into this post. I can totally agree with pretty much every point that you made and if Smilegate West does take in some of those suggestions, then we can safely say that CrossFire NA/UK will improve in both the population and the competitive scene.
It's nice to see more leagues created and if done right, it can attract a lot more players. I am more willing to help with anything in the competitive section however, as you may know, I have only recently started to take a more of a interest in the competitive scene. And if any kind person was to take me under their wing, I would gladly do my best to support and help out.
However, recently Smilegate have been developing regional events such as 'Brazil Invitational' and 'Vietnam Invitational'. Both events have been successful and brought several countries together to fight for the championship. From the success of those previous regional events, it has been said that this year, Europe will be hosting a Invitational regional event which will bring Brazil, UK, EU, ES, NA all together for one tournament. -
Categories
- All Categories
- Z8Games
- 1 Z8 Forum Discussion & Suggestions
- 15 Z8Games Announcements
- Rules & Conduct
- 2.5K CrossFire
- 709 CrossFire Announcements
- 712 Previous Announcements
- 2 Previous Patch Notes
- 320 Community
- 12 Modes
- 392 Suggestions
- 16 Clan Discussion and Recruitment
- 73 CF Competitive Forum
- 1 CFCL
- 16 Looking for a Team?
- 522 CrossFire Support
- 7 Suggestion
- 15 CrossFire Guides
- 35 CrossFire Off Topic