IPL 6 is Cancelled - Official Statement - Page 10

On March 05 2013 11:46 lowercase wrote:
So... no IPL6, or no more IPLs ever?

On March 05 2013 11:05 IGNProLeague wrote:


Yes, our friends at Alienware will be hosting our event with us at SXSW. All our staff is already there and setting up the production assets we had prepared for IPL6. Our goal was to match the mark GOM made at IPL5. We are putting our all into this event, and please tune in for the Ultimate Fight Club.

p.s. my man Paul made this bittersweet promo:

p.p.s. my man Paul wrote Austin Convention Center when it should be Palmer Events Center.

On March 05 2013 11:44 MVega wrote:
I knew, I just knew some people would somehow try to blame this on StarCraft. Blaming this on LoL is equally ridiculous though. Plain and simply this was a business decision. They couldn't justify the cost of the event and somehow figured that it would be cheaper to cancel the event this close to it than to go through with it.

Honestly I don't blame them. Viewership for both LoL and StarCraft would likely have been at much lower levels than they'd have liked. LoL because of a competing event, and StarCraft because weeks after HotS launch very few people are going to want to watch the WoL portions of the event.

I don't like how IGN handled this situation at all. That said it's a lose-lose for them, and they took the smaller loss.



So you haven't been paying attention to HotS at all then? Most of the HotS features cater to the casual players. The stuff for the hardcore fans is already solid.

On March 05 2013 11:47 AnomalySC2 wrote:


I view it the other way around. I think Blizzard really pushed SC2 as an esport (look to GSL and WCS and Blizzconn tournaments), but the game itself just wasn't good enough to keep people interested. It wasn't particularly fun to play or to watch, specifically at launch when every game was less than 10 minutes long with one player just getting flat build order owned without any chance. Then after a lot of nerfs went down, the games started to get more interesting, but they kept making changes to the game to the point that it just got boring and predictable.

In short, I think Blizzard is very aware about how running an esport is an ongoing investment. They've pumped plenty of money into the tournament scene, but WoL just wasn't that good in retrospect.

On March 05 2013 11:58 ke_ivan wrote:
it's okay. rumour mill has it that Blizz is in talks for IPL.

On March 05 2013 11:52 Defacer wrote:


You mean XP? Earning skins? Non-ladder 1v1?

I mean, that's all fine and dandy, but trust me — the philosophy of balancing for pro players is really, really holding back what the game designers can do creatively.

For example: Lurkers. Everyone loves lurkers. Everyone wants lurkers. They already have models of them, for crying out loud. But they can't just give players lurkers without affecting game balance.

Imagine if there was a totally separate ladder — let's call it Wood league — where players earn (or buy!) XP, and can unlock lurkers, or Massive Queens, and Science Vessels, or Odins. You can have island maps, giant maps, all-gold maps or maps with all the destructible and collapsible imba BS you want.

It would be an entirely broken, ridiculous ladder separate from the real 'pro' ladder ... but it would also be a lot of fun, with a lot of incentive for complete newbs to grind away and earn skins, spells or entire units.

On March 05 2013 11:49 bloodyrooster wrote:
IPL is probably over. IGN has eliminated 1up & Gamespy as well. They are really hurting right now. I wish the economy would turn around. SC2 could have been better if it wasn't for the depression.

On March 05 2013 12:01 WinterTV wrote:
Really really unfortunate news. This really hurts the NA scene not having an event like this 4 times a year, and especially hurts the teams which exist to send players to such events.

Hopefully some organization will step up and take over the company to bring it back to some of it's former glory.

Glad to see IGN working towards fixing some of the fiscal damage they've caused to the fans investing in this event specifically.

On March 05 2013 12:03 holy_war wrote:
Huh? They're not reimbursing for anyone's non-refundable airfare. Hotels and passes are small change compared to that.

On March 05 2013 12:01 recklessfire wrote:


sounds like fun, but im beginning to think the blizzard all stars thing is supposed to be their version of casual play for them. All you need to do is buy sc2, and boom you have a dota with all your favorite blizzard characters. Just sell skins and more characters, etc.