Rivals Championship Series: Indy Devs Supporting Esports Done Right

Rivals of Aether — A look at Small Scale Esports

Esports can be a brutal market in gaming, with numerous titles competing to have their place in the larger competitive community. This applies to games both large and small, from Fortnite to Divekick. Shootmania was seemingly built on the idea of being the next big thing in the shooter genre and a quick search online currently shows single digits of teams that still play competitively. In the past year games like Battlerite and Heroes of the Storm announced massive cuts to developer support after an initial large investment into their esports scenes.

I do want to note that I have nothing but respect for these teams who are still competing in a game they care about. Esports was built on the idea of players striving to have mastery over games and Shootmania is no different.

Developer support for games can be a hard line to walk; too little support can leave you open to criticism (or just a lack of interest) and too much can create an unsustainable scene. There is no catch-all solution for getting this right and looking at examples to conclude from is the best option for anyone interested in supporting their games.

In September of 2015, the platform fighter ‘Rivals of Aether’ released into Early Access on Steam. An alternative to the Super Smash Bros for Wii U that had launched a year prior and the upcoming Brawlhalla, Rivals offered a more traditionally competitive take on the platform fighter genre. The game featured core game mechanics from the Melee era of Smash; with things like advanced movement and combos brought into a more modern era.

Rivals of Aether features its own championship series, often referred to as “RCS”. Now in its fourth season, RCS has been a centre point for the game’s competitive scene for the past 4 years. Outside of RCS, the developers have offered support to other events too (including my own).

With RCS having proven to be a sustainable model that has seen the growth and sustainability of its competitive scene, I think it’s worth looking through this game’s history to learn some valuable lessons.

Season 1 — Genesis of RCS

In 2016, the first season of the Rivals of Aether Championship series took place. While looking back for information about this part of the game’s history, the season 1 details had to be found in a news update on the game’s Steam page. The season’s smash.gg page contains only standings from the seasons and a list of events where players had earned points throughout 2019.

Circuit events would give out points for competing, and travel vouchers for the finals at Genesis, the largest offline Rivals of Aether tournament to date. There were also exclusive championship skins for characters, with championship Zetterburn for participating and Etalus for making top 8 in an event. Over 1300 people would take part in season 1; an impressive number for a niche game before its official release.

I don’t remember entering any season 1 events. Some 2018 events are listed under season 1 though, so that might be why. It’s still funny to see my name near the bottom though.

FullStream took first place at the season finals at Genesis in January of 2017, earning over $4000 in the process. He would later go on to be sponsored by Esports team ‘Panda Global’ and is ranked as one of the best players to this day.

FullStream would continue to be a season finalist in seasons 2 & 3.

It was still the early days of competitive Rivals and season 1 had taken place while the game was still in early access. While season 1 wasn’t groundbreaking in the greater picture of esports, it also didn’t need to be. The structure surrounding how an esport functions is rarely right on its first try, so the minimalistic season 1 of RCS would lead into a more detailed path going forward.

Season 2 — Support and Rewards

After a break of 4 months and the game coming out of early access, RCS returned in May of 2017 with its second season. The format stayed similar to the first season, with a mixture of online and offline events players would earn circuit points at. The difference this time was how the developers and community supported it.

The biggest change was the addition of a “Compendium” to financially support the season. This allowed people to buy exclusive DLC and physical goods, with a large share of the profits going towards the season. This included goals for increasing prize pools and helping with travel funds for players.

A cool $11,000 prize pool bonus is pretty nice.

The strength of this system was purchasers could choose what goals they wished to support. Want to see your favourite players attend an event? You can support the travel fund. Want to see a bigger season finals prize pool? You can absolutely make that happen. Want to support a different event? Events have their own shops with themed cosmetic DLC. The purchaser feels empowered to show their support for as little as $5.

Additional championship skins were added, encouraging players to take part in online and local events as they were handed out as prizes. Events reaching certain sizes offered an additional cosmetic reward for all participants, encouraging competitors to advertise the event to those they knew and bolstering signup numbers.

The result of this was an overall increase in participation between season 1 and 2 by over 150%. More money coming from shop sales boosted prize pools without the developer paying directly out of pocket. A cosmetic that sells a thousand copies will be more cost-effective than paying over $2000 out in developer sponsorship and will continue to generate revenue over time.

Season 3: Sharpen Thy DLC

With the foundation season 2 set in place, season 3 continued along much of the same path. More cosmetic DLC were added and the game’s roster was fully completed with the announcements of characters such as Shovel Knight.

Season 3 saw roughly equal numbers of competitors compared to season 2 and similar levels of prize support. The season schedule was cemented at this point as well; starting in May each year with the season finals at Genesis near the start of the next year.

The latest two spikes in activity lining up with DLC releases, which also took place shortly before and during season 3. Shovel Knight’s release is a notable inclusion.

Interest in the game remained throughout the rest of the season, the combination of game updates and prize support giving boosts to player activity with each release.

Rumoured for a long time, Shovel Knight was announced in front of a live audience at 2018’s Super Smash Con. He would be the final officially released DLC character for the game.

The things that really stand out about season 3 was just how solid a followup it was to Season 2. The new characters were interesting and kept people playing the game. The compendium raised enough money to reach the season goals, with a Finals Prize fund roughly equal to the year before. Season 3 might not have shown growth after Season 2, but it did sustain itself through game updates and new DLC.

Season 4: Work Still In Progress

It’s hard to tell exactly how Season 4 will turn out, but it has certainly seen a downturn since previous seasons. With Shovel Knight as the last DLC character release, the future of content was looking bleak going into Season 4. Some interesting concepts like a whole new companion system were put into the game with a mixture of paid and in-game unlockable content for players. They also released the visual novel game “Lovers of Aether” for free on April 1st.

They were definitely dedicated to the joke.

However, the player base was waiting for 3 major content updates though: new netcode, the definitive edition and the Nintendo Switch release. While writing this piece, the new net code went into open beta and is now allowing live streaming of matches without using replays after completion. There is no set timeframe for the definitive edition or Switch release, but it wouldn’t be out of the question for these to happen between seasons 4 and 5.

Another important piece of content was also announced though. Steam Workshop integration was announced at this year’s Super Smash Con; allowing people to add stages, characters and more into the game. While this also falls into the category of something that will likely be of more benefit in the future than in season 4, it is something that will extend the longevity of the game in terms of new content.

During a recent AMA, it was also suggested some custom content might be patched into the game as officially supported content.

Going back to season 4 though, there is still a shop and people are still supporting the season by attending events. With the reduced amount of content so far this year, an unreleased Switch port and the newly released Smash Ultimate still going strong, it isn’t too surprising that this season has been quieter. If there is a lesson to learn about keeping a competitive scene going for a game, regular content updates are significant to keeping interested competitor numbers high.

Lessons Learned

So to recap based on the successes and struggles of RCS:

• Starting with a lower investment to gauge the level of interest in the game as an esport is likely to lead towards future growth.
• Building the game to allow for cosmetic microtransactions to directly feedback into the competitive ecosystem naturally scales support with the size of the customer base.
• Giving buyers a level of control over what their money supports empowers those purchasing to fund what they consider important.
• Regular game content updates keep player retention higher.
• Larger content work without filler updates can lead to downtime and lowered interest.
• Expanding the level of support over time to match the size of the scene has a lower risk of being unsustainable, rather than going beyond it to push growth.

It will be interesting to see where Rivals goes in the future and what future lessons can be learned. For now, RCS serves as one of many starting points to look at and the best example of smaller-scale esports support for an indy title.