MLG’s Strengths

Since its inception in 2002, MLG has made some dubious decisions, and the people with influence there didn’t always seem to be steering the ship in the right direction. However, it provided thousands of jobs in North America for an industry we love, both directly and indirectly.

Outside of Electronic Sports League (ESL), there are few organisations in the industry that have the wealth of history, experience, and brand recognition that MLG has. Running large events is no easy feat — especially LAN events, in which attendance can fluctuate drastically.

Monetisation has always been a problem for MLG, and it’s been hard to find themselves in the green without significant capital injection. But that’s not unique to them. Everyone in esports feels these growing pains and it’s gradually changing with more monetisation avenues opening up to businesses, coupled with interest from non-endemic parties.

We’ve seen many esports organisations fall by the wayside in the past. Most notably is own3D, which was at one time the largest competitor of Twitch and, to this day, still owes hundreds of thousands of dollars. More comparable is IPL, which was bought by Blizzard back in 2013. IPL 5 was one of my favourite events; it had some of the best international teams, double elimination bracket and set in Vegas! After qualifying for IPL 6, I was eagerly anticipating the event. Myself and the team were all disheartened by news that it was cancelled before Blizzard acquired it.

Thankfully, it doesn’t seem like MLG will see the same fate as IPL. Instead, it will now have to worry less about monetisation and focus on what they are good at: providing a platform for gamers to compete on. It seems that all of the employees of MLG have been offered new full-time positions, with much more stable jobs at a larger and very reputable company. All while still keeping the family together. That’s great!