“It’s kill or be killed out here,” says Gregory Bayer. “I’m at the top right now, but I know that the league could chew me up and spit me out if I let my game down for even a second. But that’s just how the Rainforest Rescue scene is. I know what I signed up for. Dora is a cold, hard bitch.”

Bayer, the first person we interviewed for this piece, gives us just a glance at what is one of the most brutal, unforgiving esports scenes ever: that of the incredibly competitive Dora the Explorer: Rainforest Rescue.

“We spend about 60 hours a week training in this room,” claims Al Carter, the coach for team Backpack Crusaders, who took home the first place trophy for last year’s Rainforest Rescue League (RRL) world championships. In the background, we hear a member of his team lamenting, “where’s the fucking cave?”

“We try to keep it cool, but the competition is fierce. If I don’t keep their gameplay as optimized as possible, we don’t stand a chance, and my wife leaves me for sure. Had a kid last year who was our top performer. I mean, when Dora asked this kid where the tree was, this kid could find it right away. But he got a papercut on his fingertip late in the season, his APM went down, and we had to cut him. He works at an Outback Steakhouse now; but hey, I go home tonight and fuck my wife.”

Last season alone, RRL brought in millions from advertisers, and the winning team brought home a 2 million dollar jackpot. They’ve invested all the money into R&D, developing very advanced techniques to optimize object-on-screen finding performance, and Swiper Retaliation Techniques (or SRT).

This very competitive scene will come to a head this November when the teams will once again go head-to-head in the ultimate Rainforest Rescue showdown at the world series. The winner will be taking home 2.5 million USD, and possibly Al’s wife.

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