If you visit any gaming news sites, you’ve probably seen something about the controversy surrounding a Hearthstone tournament earlier today.
The upcoming ASSEMBLY gaming event in Helsinki will be hosting a Hearthstone qualifier tournament. The top players in the tournament will compete in the International eSports Federation’s World Championship.
The tournament first came under fire when a Reddit post pointed out that only male players are eligible for the competition.
According to an article from PC Gamer, the event’s head administrator, Markus Koskivirta, explained that the qualifier is male-only because only men are allowed to compete in the IeSF Championship. “This is to avoid possible conflicts (e.g. a female player eliminating a male player during RO8) among other things.”
People were quick to cry foul, but the organizers at ASSEMBLY aren’t at fault at all and their reasoning is sound. Since female players can’t move on to the world championship, then including female players in the qualifier would have potentially complicated matters. It’s also important to note that they have stated that they are against separating competitors by gender for eSports competitions.
The real issue is the IeSF World Championship itself. The event, which will be held in November in Baku, Azerbaijan, will host a number of tournaments where men and women will compete in separate leagues. That’s really strange is that the two groups won’t be playing the same games.
Males competitors can take part in tournaments for Dota 2, Starcraft 2, Hearthstone and Ultra Street Fighter I. Female competitions at the event include Starcraft 2 and Tekken Tag Tournament 2.
What we need to be asking ourselves is why there are two leagues at all and why they aren’t playing the same games. The arbitrary distinction between the games available to males and females in the tournament just doesn’t make any sense.
The IeSF has issued a statement saying that the female league is meant to encourage female participation in the largely male eSports community. They pointed to similar competitive activities, such as chess, where there are leagues for both men and women.
It can also be argued that the separation by gender protects female gamers against some of the harassment that has plagued eSports in the past.
That argument covers why there are two separate leagues but it does not explain why some of the games are only open to one of the groups.
The chess analogy is also flawed, as the PC Gamer article points, because the women’s league is voluntary. Female competitors are free to compete with the men if they choose.
Though providing chess as an example backfired for them, IeSF should follow the example of that sport when organizing their world championship event. Giving women the chance to choose between the two tournaments is a good alternative to illogical setup they have now.
The women’s league would still serve the functions the organization outlined in their response and female players of games like Hearthstone and Street Fighter would have the option to take part in the championships.
IeSF should come to their senses and offer the same games for both male and female competitors. If they want eSports to be taken seriously by those outside of the gaming community, they need to address these kinds of issues before their event this fall.
Never Sleep Gaming 