This year’s Spring Festival was on January 23rd, which was earlier than previous years. Pei Qian looked at the calendar and calculated the time. After the exams this week, he would spend a lot of energy to spend money and the settlement.
Pei Qian sipped his drink and swiped his cell phone to see if there had been any news recently when he arrived at Fish-Catching Internet Cafe.
“Eh? The foreign media revealed that FV Club are unable to get opponents for mock competition?”
Pei Qian had not intended to pay special attention to news about FV Club. However, this news was on the front page of the game and the E-Sports zone. He had no choice but to pay attention to it.
Pei Qian perked up when he saw the news. He quickly clicked on it.
This was a piece of news from the foreign media, and the source of the news seemed to be from the clubs in Europe and America.
The news itself was very simple. The reason was that the media had interviewed the European and American clubs that had entered the top eight before the start of the quarterfinals. They had also briefly asked about their current state and situation with the mock competitions. One of the clubs said that FV Club had tried to get an appointment with them for mock competition but they had not accepted.
Of course, there was nothing certain for this kind of news. There was not even a chat record. However, the media that exposed this news was still quite famous. Thus, it was quickly reposted by various major media.
The quarter finals would only start on the weekend. The GPL’s Spring Competition would also start on Saturday so there was not much news in the E-Sports circle during this period. Such a gossip made the headlines and caused heated discussions.
Pei Qian was not sure if Long Yu Corporation was involved but seeing the popularity and discussion of the news, it would be impossible to say that no fake reviewers were behind it.
There were already many comments below this piece of news. Many people were mocking FV Club.
“No mock competition? Isn’t that too miserable?”
“What’s the point of playing the game then? Could it be that they would only play Gods Rising as a bypasser? Wouldn’t they be tortured in the top eight?”
“This must be a dereliction of the club’s management, right? Mock competitions have to be arranged early. Of course they wouldn’t be able to get any competitors for the mock competition since the others’ schedules are filled!”
“Do you really think it’s because the others’ schedules are filled? Why are you so naive? If they were really a strong team, would the others miss the opportunity to play mock competition against them? They would squeeze some time out! Obviously, they found excuses to reject them because they were lousy in their opinion!”
“You’ll understand once you go to the live-streaming platforms and forums overseas. They’re all spamming ‘CN IOI noob’. They all feel that they are too lousy and it was a waste of time to play the mock competition, alright?”
“What about the other two clubs? Are they going straight back to China? Aren’t they going to stay to spar with them?”
“Spar my a*s. Didn’t the FV knock them down when the clubs lost the competition? Would they help them to train?”
“Heh, if you ask me, FV deserved it. Didn’t they do a good job on Weibo previously? They mocked almost all the teams participating in the international competition. The other clubs didn’t say anything, but how could they not have any grudges in their hearts? THey are now isolated, right? They can’t even find anyone for mock competition!”
“There’s no hope. IOI’s international finals this year were really infuriating. The qualifiers were badly organized, and two teams were eliminated in the group stages. The first seeded team only mocked others on Weibo the entire day, they would probably be eliminated with 3:0 by then. That’s it. I’ll go watch the GPL.”
“The competition hasn’t started yet. There’s no need to be in such a hurry to mock them, right? I heard that SUG is still sparring with them.”
“What’s the use? There’s too much of a difference in standards both domestically and internationally. Wasn’t SUG also beaten to death? They did not even have the chance to compete in mock competitions with European and American teams. How are they going to study other people’s tactics and playstyles? Their understanding of the game has been left far behind. This can’t be made up for by playing!”
The internet was filled with negative comments. Even the few players who supported FV Club did not have much hope either.
What’s more, FV Club had been doing their jobs on Weibo. In addition, Long Yu Corporation had hired some fake reviewers to set the pace. Thus, FV’s popularity was not very good.
Now that the negative news of “no mock competitions to play” had been released, it made things worse for gamers who had no confidence in domestic teams.
All in all, the internet was filled with gloom.
Pei Qian flipped through the comments and could not help but smile.
Not bad!
Could this be what it meant when the forces of heavens and earth came together?
Even foreign clubs were starting to give me a hand?
Pei Qian did not ask Wu Yue about the authenticity of the news because it was likely true.
The teams in the same division were more inclined to team up during the mock competition. After all, they did not want to reveal their trump cards to the other divisions.
What’s more, FV was the only domestic team left in the top eight. Those European and American teams would form teams to compete in mock competition and isolated FV Club. Objectively, they could greatly weaken FV team’s strength and reduce their competitors.
Logically, foreign teams had a strong motive for doing this.
Pei Qian was elated. He had already made preparations.
He would call Wu Yue at once to express his condolences after FV Club’s top eight were eliminated. He would tell everyone that he had tried his best not to be upset and to continue playing in Los Angeles until the world finals ended!
…
At the same time, in Los Angeles…
On the second floor of the internet cafe, FV and SUG teams were still training seriously.
Wu Yue, on the other hand, was looking at the news on the internet and fuming.
“Are these European and American teams crazy?”
“It’s fine if you don’t want to play mock competitions with us, but why are you talking about it everywhere?”
“Are you crazy?! Do you think we want to compete with you in mock competitions?”
FV Club had a special data analysis team and two training teams. There was indeed no need for them to compete in training competitions with European and American teams. Not only would they not learn anything, but they could also expose their tactics.
However, seeing that the competition was about to start, Wu Yue felt that it did not seem appropriate to have not played any mock competitions at all. Thus, he thought of casually inviting a European and American team to play as warming up before the competition to stabilize the players’ mentality.
Unexpectedly, he was rejected after he asked!
As for the reason why they were rejected, these clubs naturally would not say it out loud. They would only say that their mock competition schedules were already full.
However, everyone knew the truth.
There were more than ten hours of training in a day. How could their schedules be full?
If it was a very important mock competition opponent, they would definitely be able to squeeze out some time.
Therefore, to put it bluntly, these clubs’ response was for two reasons: First, they felt that FV was too lousy and that the mock competition would have no effect, so they were unwilling to waste time. Second, they deliberately banded together to isolate FV, affecting FV’s training state, and killing an opponent in passing.
Initially, Wu Yue did not take it to heart. In any case, it did not matter if they did not compete with each other. FV Club was not lacking in the mock competitions so it wasn’t important.
In the end, it was unknown which club was so loudmouthed that they told the media and made this news spread!
This made Wu Yue very angry.
“Tell the team members, make a killing in the quarterfinals. I want you to show your all!”
“Aren’t these European and American teams looking down on us? Let them experience what cruelty is!”
…
…
January 7th, Saturday…
Pei Qian only woke up in the afternoon, feeling refreshed.
Last Friday, he had just finished a very important closed book exam. What’s more, Pei Qian felt good about himself. That was why he played games late into the night to celebrate. Today, he woke up naturally.
Pei Qian still had the last two subjects to revise this weekend. However, one was an open book while the other was a closed book exam. He should not be as stressed as before.
Pei Qian planned to relax a little. He would go to the GPL venue on Saturday to watch the competition. He would rest at home during the weekend and take some time to study a little.
This weekend was like a festival to the E-Sports audience.
The GPL Spring Competition would officially begin this afternoon.
The schedule for the GPL’s Spring Competition was very full. After all, there were 16 teams in the entire league now, and they had to play the BO3. Thus there were competitions everyday except for Monday.
What’s more, even though there were no competitions on Monday, a review program would be arranged. It would briefly review last week’s competition and some key battles. It would also mention jokes that appeared in the competition and interact with netizens.
In terms of time, GPL could be said to be doing high-intensity performance work seven days a week. The audience would watch it every day.
At the same time, the IOI World Finals had also entered the top eight competitions. There were two BO5s on Saturday and Sunday, directly deciding the top four.
Due to the time difference and competition schedule, the IOI World Finals’ quarter finals would be held at 5 AM domestic time on the second day. On the contrary, it would be more friendly to domestic audiences.
They would watch the opening battle of the GPL on Saturday afternoon, watch the IOI quarter-finals on Sunday morning, continue watching GPL in the afternoon, and continue watching the IOI quarter-finals on Monday morning…
It could be said that the competition schedule had been fully filled and could binge watch all at once.
There might not be many IOI players in the country but it was the IOI world finals after all. Long Yu Corporation had been doing its best to promote it recently. Coupled with the previous series of public opinions, it still received a lot of attention.
…
In the afternoon, Pei Qian wore a mask and arrived at the GPL Spring Competition venue.
The pre-season competition was held last month. Several newly formed teams had already appeared. Some of the problems in the competition had been fixed and improved. Some solutions for possible emergencies had already been planned ahead.
Today’s opening battle was arranged between H4 and SHG. The former was the world champion while the latter was a team established by Shenhua.
SHG had received a lot of attention ever since the establishment of their SHG team. After all, Shenhua’s results in football were very good. Using the gameplay of football to play eSports could be seen as a dimensional reduction attack. Many people were looking forward to their performance.
SHG had also appeared a few times in the pre-season competition. Their performance was not bad. After a period of preparation and practice, the main team had been confirmed and improved very quickly. In the end, Zhang Yuan decided to let them play the opening battle according to the situation in the mock competition. It would also give the team a better chance to be exposed.
