News
CPL Shuts Down
Cyberathletes Take a Hit
by Coop
As of March 13, 2008, the Cyberathlete Professional League is no more. The league, which has run for over ten years and focused on competitive PC gaming, has officially pulled out of the sport and cancelled all remaining competitions for the year. Citing the current economic climate and the abundance of new leagues, the organization made the following announcement on their website:
Effective immediately, the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) will cease operations. Therefore, all CPL events currently scheduled for 2008 are hereby canceled.
The CPL was launched in June 1997 with the pioneering mission of promoting and sanctioning video game competitions as a professional sport. For ten years the CPL events experienced increased growth - commencing with a small LAN event in Dallas, Texas, and culminating in world-class competitions across five continents.
However, the current fragmentation of the sport, a crowded field of competing leagues, and the current economic climate have prompted the CPL to suspend its pro-tournament operations. The CPL regrets that this news will disappoint those that were planning on attending the summer and winter events this year.
Many thanks to all of the sponsors and partners that helped CPL establish the groundwork for professional video game competitions. Their vision and pioneering spirit should always be remembered.
This is sad news for all competitive gamers, both amateur and professional. CPL was one of the first on the scene; bring structure to an otherwise formless concept. Every gaming league, in a way, owes something to it for that. Some may use this as further proof of the demise of the PC gaming industry, but seeing as one of the main perpetrators in the death of CPL was “a crowded field of competing leagues,” this argument is moot.
The announcement also rides on the coattails of MLG becoming even more buddy-buddy with Bungie by announcing that their wildly popular league is going to be represented in-game in Halo 3. Professional gaming is a strange place right now, and I look forward to seeing how this will all turn out.
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Comments
Personally, I've always thought of "professional" gaming as a strange concept. If somebody told me that they wanted to be a pro gamer I would feel that we, as a community of gamers, have lost something. That something is the spirit of what it is to be a gamer. Were not doing this to be the best at something, but to partake in something as a community. I'm not saying we should stop competing in games, but that we should keep the communal aspect of being a gamer in mind. Some of my favorite gaming moments involve me getting bloody pieces of my rear handed to me in countless games, and on the other hand, some of my least favorite moments involve me getting too wrapped up in trying to be the best in the room. This is what makes me say that leagues like this one make me a bit uncomfortable. Maybe I'm a purist... but then again I'm sure that people thought something like this about skateboarding and snowboarding when the first pros in those sports emerged.
I think the gaming leagues are taking it a step too far. It emphasizes the reward, not the fun playing. That's where my problem is. Competing is good, but when that becomes the emphasis of playing rather than enjoying the game then I think there is something wrong.