We talked to OpTic Gaming’s Ian “Crimsix” Porter, who reflected on their recent Pro League Split, franchising and his newly announced H4X sponsorship.

Photo Credit: (OpTic_Crimsix)

myst: First off, coming into the first week of the Pro League you guys were forced to play with your substitute player in Zooma. How hard was this adjustment to make from switching roles and communication with little to no practice?

﻿Crimsix: The adjustment was pretty hard. We effectively had three saug players and one Maddox player on the team. I don’t think it would’ve been much of an issue, but Zooma also used a different specialist from Dashy. We originally thought that having him just take over Brandon’s role + specialist would be the easiest, but it wasn’t the best form of our team with that roster. We ended up having Seth change roles, Zooma using a specialist he’s never used, and I also had to switch my specialist. All in all, there was an adjustment period to say the least.

myst: Ultimately you guys finished at 4-3 with back-to-back losses in the final games. What do you think went against you guys in those last two matches?

﻿Crimsix: I played pretty poorly in the GenG match that definitely costed us. I had my L2(Heal) button break a couple hours before so I had to switch to my backup controller right before the match, and versus LG we were terrible at Control with Zooma and we ended up getting beat by streaks in game 5 vs LG.

myst: I wanna ask you what are your general thoughts/concerns about the recent news of a franchising system being implemented for the next game being developed by Infinity Ward. Do you think this can increase viewership and offer more long-term stability within the scene?

﻿Crimsix: Yes and yes. COD esports lacks that “official” feel that other top tier esports have. For how big Call of Duty is, I’m surprised that it’s taken this long to franchise. I’m expecting a huge change for next year, or not any change at all, just different team names/etc. I don’t want to comment much on the subject because no one knows the format, how transfers are going to happen, where/how league matches are going to go down, etc. I think, either way, next year will be a big step towards the future of Call of Duty esports.

﻿ Photo Credit: MLG

myst: Along with the lines of franchising would you prefer a copy of the OWL model with organizations rebranding their respective teams, or a copy of the LCS system?

﻿Crimsix: I’m not that familiar with the LCS system, but I’d assume that Activision decides to go with a format similar to the OWL system.

myst: Also, in recent news, you announced your partnership with H4X, what does this partnership mean to you and do you and the company have many plans ahead?

Crimsix: ﻿I haven’t had apparel since AW back in 2015. The quality of material was terrible back then, and I felt as if the collection wasn’t what it should’ve been both for Optic and for my personal brand. 100T has stepped up big time in producing quality, good looking street apparel for gamers. Right now, we are in the era that gaming is “becoming” cool/not necessarily nerdy to sit down and play video games all day. The turning point for this was around the time Fortnite started blowing up and people like Drake gaming with Ninja.

﻿Anyways, this time period is a perfect time to create a collection of apparel not just gamers to wear, but anyone. I knew H4X was the right choice after seeing some of their clothes in person. My goal is for people to open up their Crimsix apparel package and be amazed at the quality and the designs of whatever they ordered. The word to mouth approach. OpTic apparel from back in the day was of low-quality, and I bet that people didn’t make a second order unless it was some sort of jersey. I want to go in the opposite direction with that. I want people to realize how amazing their first order is and be inclined to make a second order and so on.

myst: Looking ahead to CWL Fort Worth this will be the first event after the impending roster mania on March 1st. Do you picture many teams changing preparation for this event and who can you see ultimately getting picked up.

﻿﻿Crimsix: Good question. I think you’ll see changes after the event but not before. I think a lot of teams are somewhat satisfied with their league standings.

myst: At the end of this interview, I would like to say thank you for partaking in this and do you have anything to say to your fans out there?

Crimsix: ﻿﻿Pursuit Episode 3﻿﻿ is out now! Apparel will drop sometime between Mid-March and Mid-April. Thanks for all the support from everyone on the live streams and YouTube videos. Maybe I’ll see some of you at Fort Worth? ﻿﻿

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