The Four Horsemen

Danan Flander joins to discuss changes coming to American League of Legends esports, the downfall of Immortals in the LCS, shady business dealings made by NRG, sloppy communication from Riot in regards to Tier 2 competition, why Saudi Arabia is likely to become even more involved with Riot, and more.

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Richard Lewis, Thorin, and MonteCristo are joined by Graham "messioso" Pitt, currently the GM for Complexity CS, to discuss upcoming changes being made by Valve to professional Counter-Strike. Main topics include Team Falcons and Saudi conflicts of interest, difficulties that teams are facing with securing visas, teams' perspectives on the upcoming changes, the one hire that we recommend Valve make to improve the scene, and more.

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Richard Lewis, Thorin, and MonteCristo are joined by journalist Kevin Hitt to discuss the state of esports journalism. Topics include the history of esports journalism, recent involvement from Saudi Arabia especially in relation to Rolling Stone and the Esports Awards, the reasons why ESPN Esports failed, how the recent Dr. Disrespect scandal was handled, Chris Greeley's subtweet on behalf of Riot Games in response to the latest Summoning Insight, and more.

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Richard Lewis, Thorin, and MonteCristo are joined by retired former Challenger player Yasukeh to discuss Riot Vanguard: Riot Games's anti-cheat used for VALORANT, League of Legends, and Teamfight Tactics. Further topics include the intrusiveness levels of kernel-level anti-cheat systems, Riot's claims on why Vanguard is needed, Reddit Moderators deleting comments and threads discussing Vanguard, and more.

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Richard Lewis, Thorin, MonteCristo, and guest Phillip Aram continue the mini-series "The EG Files" by discussing Phillip's history with Evil Geniuses, the successes and struggles of their iconic DOTA team, the effects of the org splitting from Twitch and Amazon, difficulty in gaining sponsors and investment, the reasons why Peak6 was eventually chosen to support the org, and more.

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Richard Lewis, Thorin, and MonteCristo begin the mini-series "The EG Files" by discussing how Evil Geniuses was formed, the team's time in Quake, Starcraft 2, and early Counter-Strike, Alex Garfield's cut-throat rise in power, EG's spike in popularity with signing players like HuK & IdrA, their handling of media, their Twitch era, and more.

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We check in with Tomi "Lurppis" Kovanen on the status of "esports winter" as we head into the second year of budget cuts, layoffs, lack of sponsorship interest, and more. The Horsemen discuss the changes in the landscape, particularly the money flowing in from the Saudi government through ESL FACEIT Group and the surprising sticker returns from the Paris Major in Counter-Strike. They touch on the reinvention of Overwatch Esports, the struggles from the professional teams, and how the dissolution of the partnered leagues in Counter-Strike will upend the current order.

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Richard Lewis, Thorin, and MonteCristo are joined by Harris Peskin of ESG Law to discuss the lawsuit filed by H3CZ and Scump against Activision-Blizzard and their alleged monopoly of Call of Duty Competition. The discussion also delves into the past and potential future of organized esports competition, the monumental impact this case could make on U.S. law, esports and video games in general, why other game publishers, like Nintendo and Riot Games, could get involved.

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Richard Lewis, Thorin, and MonteCristo are joined by Dan "Foxdrop" Wyatt to discuss the mass layoffs at Riot Games & Activision Blizzard, the layoffs' effects on the LEC as a product, experiences working with people at Riot and Activision Blizzard, and the bleak future of working in the esports industry.

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