GGL Wire

GGL’s Carmac filed this report on the road:

The G7 teams have issued a statement that they will not attend the CPL Winter event, or any future CPL-branded events until further notice. The reason for this are problems with CPL’s prize payments.

The G7 group is a club of twelve of the world’s most prominent e-sports teams, including the likes of Fnatic, SK Gaming or Meet Your Makers. Most of the teams that competed in CPL events have experienced problems receiving the prize money won.

The time to get the check was three months to over a year, although some teams still claim to have unresolved issues from CPL events that took place in 2003.

Several of CPL’s license holders have also not paid the prize money. One such tournament would be CPL Turkey in 2005 and last year’s CPL Italy. The CPL not only did not help the teams and players get their money, but shifted the blame to its partners.

In a CPL forum post about CPL Italy, Angel Munoz said in this forum post that “… [T]he CPL had nothing to do with prizes from Italy last year. The organizers held that event on their own and are responsible for the prizes ….”

More about late prize money being paid out late can be read in the CPL forums.

While this may not have affected established teams with big budgets so much, it was a very difficult situation for smaller teams whose budgets are in a large part based on winnings. The G7 teams claim to have approached the CPL attempting to resolve the situation, but have failed.

Although the statement does not use the word boycott, this is exactly what the teams have responded with. Meanwhile, the signups for the CPL Winter CS 1.6 and CS: Source are disappointingly low. What if other teams follow G7’s example?

You may remember the CPL’s recent announcement of a $1,000,000 Halo 3 tournament at its Extreme Winter Championships. Now, here’s the cost to get in: $475 or a $275 discounted rate if you register before Nov. 2.

It’s a steep price to pay for a free-for-all tournament, which critics charge is a fairly random gametype. However, it’s worth saying that Major League Gaming, by far the most popular Halo league, uses FFA in addition to its team format. That is to say, an FFA tournament is not totally unheard of in the Halo world.

Still, rules have not yet been made for the tournament, and the CPL and main sponsor X Factor promise to disclose them after registration ends. The CPL’s Angel Munoz stated that potential maps for the tournament may be Epitaph, The Narrows and Guardian.