The team’s Irish players virtuoso (centre) and Maxeew (left) – photo by Michal Konkol
The co-founder of esports organisation Gaimin Gladiators has heavily criticised the facilities at the recent RLCS London Major 2024.
He took to Twitter and LinkedIn to complain about the event held at the Copper Box Arena, for the team’s practice room being right next to an open toilet area.
Joseph Turner, Gaimin Gladiators co-founder and chief of esports, said: “Welcome to Epic Games’ and Blast’s idea of a suitable practice room. Stinks of bleach and faeces. No WiFi. Guys cannot even play whilst waiting for their series. Their hotel practice room is just as ridiculous. With some teams suffering total blackouts, no air conditioning, PC failures, no internet…
“ESL hosted the [RLCS London Major 2022] event at the same place two years ago, had an open plan area for practice spaces, a nicer hotel, and Swiss was not played in 40-degree heat.
“Rocket League genuinely treat their pro players like they never even wanted an esport ecosystem. I implore players and staff to actively let organisers and publishers know when they are cutting costs at a detriment to the entire scene.”
Teams were given separate areas to practice in, both at the Copper Box Arena and at the hotel.
With how the venue was set up, the on-site team practice spaces were built in locker room facilities, which included bathrooms. These were separated with partial walls between the bathroom and practice space. The spaces were then available for teams to use in preparation for the Swiss and Playoff games while the venue was open.
And with the Copper Box Arena being used as a multi-sports events arena and gym, it has various fitness studios and locker rooms.
Epic Games and Blast did not provide comment on the matter.
The Rocket League London Major 2024 was announced back in March. Esports events company Blast and Rocket League esports teamed up with Live Nation to support and promote the RLCS Major 2.
Gaimin Gladiators’ Rocket League team ended up finishing 14th out of 16 teams at the event, with one win and three losses. Their roster includes Dutch player ThO, Irish player virtuoso and Irish/Singaporean player Maxeew, plus Scottish coach Markydooda.
G2 Stride ended up winning the RLCS London Major 2024.
Why Gaimin Gladiators wore different shirts at RLCS London Major
Gaimin Gladiators were not allowed to wear their official player jerseys at the event due to Epic Games and Psyonix rules around gambling and crypto sponsors.
This meant the team wore standard ‘Rocket League’ T-shirts.
Some other teams also wore adjusted jerseys. For example, the PokerStars logo was missing from Furia’s player jerseys.
According to the RLCS 2024 rulebook under the sponsor prohibitions section 3.5.7: “Team names, player names, logos and avatars may not consist of any sponsors or any branding referring to prohibited categories as listed in section 7.8.2.”
This includes ‘cryptocurrencies, non-fungible tokens (NFTs), or any other blockchain-related product or service, gambling products (including fantasy sports betting), lotteries or illegal wagering’, as well as drugs, tobacco, alcohol, firearms, political candidates and more.
Gaimin Gladiators have partners including blockchain ecosystem BNB Chain, Russian bookmaker Winline, crypto platform Coin Market Cap, betting website Kaiyun and watercooled PC company Stoneforged Technology. Their front of jersey brand is web3 gaming platform Gaimin.
Joseph Turner, Gaimin Gladiators co-founder and chief of esports, told Esports News UK: “Epic, despite themselves advertising blockchain games on their platform, refuse to allow it on RLCS or Fortnite. They aggressively enforced the rules against us, but have allowed sponsors such as PokerStars on other jerseys [in the past], despite rules against gambling sponsors.
“We were refused our jersey, our players had to wear RLCS T-shirts for the duration. Other than that, there was no real penalty.
“We are not too upset about their jersey ruling, as we understand restricted sponsorship areas, however, the event itself was a shambles. Catering for players was awful, yet RLCS staff had quality catering, the player practice rooms in the Stratford Hotel were awful, with sub-par equipment, frequent blackouts, bad WiFi. Players were forced to watch from general admisson seats, meaning they were harrassed constantly by fans. Then there is the toilet practice rooms…”
‘Stop doing esports events in London, it’s a pigsty with gold adornments’ – Gaimin Gladiators co-founder rips into London and the state of UK esports
Joseph Turner also took shots at London itself, saying: “I detest events in London. The place is a mess, you can barely move around without gangs of thieves, drunks, druggies and ignorant business people getting in your way. Choose somewhere better, where players and teams can enjoy themselves without having to be locked in their rooms.
“Stop doing events in London. The place is a pigsty with gold adornments.”
Joseph Turner also recently complained on LinkedIn about people talking highly of the number of esports events in the UK in 2024.
“Everyone screeching about how huge it is for the UK to be hosting multiple esports events this year, just remember, the Government still does not accept esports as an official sport,” he said.
“Visa admission for esports orgs is still a major issue (referring to the 1win issue at ESL One Birmingham 2024) and the UK still doesn’t see esports as a viable investment space. It is all just lip service for easy engagement. Frankly, it is an embarrassment [to bring my teams to the UK to compete].
“Stop lying to your audience that the UK is “moving in the right direction”. We are a decade behind our counterparts, and that will not change until we have an understanding of the benefits the industry brings.”
Joseph Turner, Gaimin Gladiators
The Gaimin Gladiators esports org is registered in Canada and Portugal, and the Gaimin software group also has UK operations.
The org are currently competing in the Esports World Cup 2024, which kicked off its opening ceremony earlier this week.
They are competing in Dota 2, Apex Legends, Free Fire, Mobile Legends Bang Bang and Warzone.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
