Paytm First Games Rigged Clash Royale Tournament, Alleges Stalwart Esports
Stalwart Esports, curator of professional gamers, alleges that Clash Royale tournament hosted by Paytm First Games from April 10-12 was rigged in favour of some players.
Paytm First Games (backed by Alibaba Group and One97 Communications Limited) recently hosted a Clash Royale Tournament with a prize pool of Rs 4 lakhs, in partnership with SuperCell.
In its public statement, Stalwart Esports said ‘The first tournament of the Clash Royale by Paytm First Games was manipulated and had numerous loopholes.”
As per their statement, Stalwart Esports’ ace Clash Royale player Qusai Attarwala, also known as STE Darklord, who is also a Red Bull MEO 2019 champion, was among the top 8 players in the tournament of 11,000 players.
In the play amongst the top 8 players, Attarwala’s first game saw some glitches and ultimately crashed due to the load on the cache memory. This crash led to disqualification of Attarwala from the game at an important juncture in the tournament. As per Stalwart, the onus of the crash should be on the administrators. The Indian gaming fraternity, as the public statement of Stalwart claimed, came out to support Attarwala and demand a rematch.
Commenting on the incident, Attarwala said, ‘I got disqualified due to a bug induced on my game that crashed it though it was not in my control. Even the host admitted it. However, the company came later with merely an apology.”
The reply of Paytm First Games on this allegation is yet to be seen. The gaming platform has been in the news a lot recently for various accomplishments. It raised INR 40.75 Cr (around $5.4 million) in April from AGTech Media Private Limited amid rise in its number of users due a large audience base being forced to stay at home due to the lockdown enforced in India due to the spread of COVID-19.
Paytm First Games also recently linked up with Esports Players League (ESPL) to organise mobile esports tournaments in India, in which ESPL will supply the technology, global sponsorships, media deals, and esports strategy.
ESPL targets ametuer gamers who aim to become professionals. The first ESPL tournament in India will run from May to November.
