Riot Games Cancels Rift Rivals for Play-in Regions
Oceanic Esports Fans,
After careful consideration, we are making the decision to sunset the OCE/SEA/JPN Rift Rivals. Regional Rift Rivals tournaments will be continuing in EU/NA and LPL/LCK/LMS this year at times in the season that make sense for those clusters, but the other clusters will not be continuing, including OCE/SEA/JP.
This was not a decision that we took lightly. The event was exciting for our region and for the teams, players and fans involved. However the compelling rivalry still never really eventuated (damn you charming SEA/JPN teams!) and the viewership was similar to a regular round of the OPL, but came at a significantly higher operational cost.
We believe that we will be more impactful continuing to focus our efforts on the OPL itself and the ecosystem surrounding it (including University, High School, OCS and other grass roots initiatives).
After weighing the pros and cons and discussing this with each of our regions, we felt this change to Rift Rivals was the right one to make for the long term health of our sport. In the future we also remain open to other globally integrated events.
