FACEIT looking to fix North American CSGO with new FPL Cup events

FACEIT is overhauling its long-running FPL program by introducing team qualifications and cash prizes to the system.

The third-party tournament organizer announced a complete rework of its FPL circuit, a division of its Counter-Strike: Global Offensive services that offer the opportunity for growing players to gain experience by playing with professionals. Instead of qualifiying individually for FPL as they did before, players will now qualify as a team and compete for cash prizes in a variety of sponsored tournaments.

The change is meant to foster growth in what has become a stagnant CSGO scene, where new talent struggles to get noticed by and picked up for professional competition. FACEIT has worked to eliminate selfish play by creating a team experience with money on the line. It’s a team-orientated approach to a team game, and should see players incentivised to work together in a more structured, professional setting.

The initial FPL Cup schedule runs from September 12 to October 24 and includes six different tournaments, all run by established tournament organizers that specialize in tournaments for growing teams eager to showcase their skills.

FACEIT introduces FPL Cups, dates, times, and prize pools

• Sep. 12 – Mythic FPL Cup 1 – $4,000 prize pool
• Sep 26 – WINNERS League FPL Cup 1 – $4,000 prize pool
• Oct 3 – NACCS FPL Cup 1 – $3,000 prize pool
• Oct 10 – Golden FPL Cup 1 – $4,000 prize pool
• Oct 17 – DUST2US Masters FPL Cup 1 – $3,000 prize pool
• Oct 24 – RushB FPL Cup 1 – $3,000 prize pool 

According to the official FACEIT blog post regarding the changes, each match a team  wins awards them points that add up over the course of the tournaments.

Entry to the tournaments is free, meaning that players who would otherwise miss out on a chance to graduate into FPL now have a pathway to growing their CSGO skills.

Alongside the new FPL, FACEIT also announced a feature called FACEIT Leaderboards, a tracking system that tallies players’ performance across all tournaments. This leaderboard will be used to determine which players receive the coveted invites to FPL-Challenger and the chance to play with professional CSGO players.

North America’s CSGO scene has been ravaged by the arrival of Valorant, making FACEIT’s new qualification system an intruguing proposition for players on the fence about switching games.

Fans will get their first look at the FPL Cups when it kicks off with the Mythic FPL Cup 1 on September 12.