Valorant Game Changers Champion claims Riot’s “ignoring” major GC concerns

Valorant Game Changers 2023 Champion Melanie ‘meL’ Capone said she feels “ignored” by Riot Games as the developer announced the schedule for the 2024 edition of the circuit.

Riot Games announced the schedule for the 2024 season North American Game Changers season on January 4, 2024. The women’s circuit will have a new organizer for the new year and also have an expanded schedule with multiple qualifiers for each main event.

The North American circuit has three main events and will have three qualifiers for the second and third tournaments while the first tournament will only have two. The circuit will also run from January to October in North America, with the World Championships presumably following in November.

The announcement was not met with cheers by everyone as Shopify Rebellion IGL, and the 2023 Game Changers World Champion, meL posted a lengthy statement about the upcoming season. She said that the way the circuit is being run is “in direct opposition to its mission statement” and that she feels ignored by Riot Games after giving feedback about the competition.

Valorant Game Changers Champion feels Riot “ignored” her feedback

meL highlighted four points of frustration with the NA Game Changers schedule announcement that has to do with her team giving the developer feedback on the previous schedule and how the new one seems to run counter to the goals of the circuit’s initiative.

“I have tried through private channels to get my feedback across, but I feel as though these recent changes merit a public response. The tournament schedule, lack of communication & implementation of feedback, and inconsistent auto-invite system discourage GC teams and orgs from participating by making it disadvantageous to compete in both circuits,” meL said.

The way NA Game Changers is being run this upcoming season is in direct opposition of its mission statement- that is, bridging the gap between GC and T1/T2 coed competition. I have tried through private channels to get my feedback across, but I feel as though these recent changes…

— SR meL (@melanji) January 4, 2024

meL first pointed out that the 2024 schedule puts GC teams at a disadvantage if they also want to try to qualify for the North American Challengers League. The two qualifiers for Game Changers Series 1 are right before the first open qualifier for NACL and the second is in between the first and second qualifier for NACL.

Second, the player said that she and her team sat with Riot privately and asked the Game Changers off-season to align more with the VCT leagues for better mobility for GC players. As it stands now, most VCT teams finish their scouting and trailing of new players during the final months of the Game Changers circuit and the World Championships.

meL also called out the fact that teams that qualified for the Game Changers World Championship from North America don’t have an automatic spot in the main event and will have to battle through the open qualifiers like every other squad.

The player’s last section dealt with how there is a huge gap in time between qualifying for the main events and then playing in them.

“It is frustrating delivering feedback for years and feeling as though it’s been ignored or seeing the complete opposite come to fruition. I hope Riot can revisit these changes so we can better achieve our shared dream of seeing women and marginalized genders compete at the highest level one day,” meL said.

meL also said that she will be discussing the issue further on a live stream. The IGL ended her post by saying that she and her team will play in the upcoming NACL open qualifiers, even though she thinks they will be at a disadvantage due to the GC schedule.