The planned Rainbow Six majors for August and November 2020 in North America and Europe respectively are still on the cards, according to Ubisoft’s Esports Director, who told Dexerto they are already “looking into” alternatives.
The Rainbow Six esports ecosystem is undergoing a major shakeup currently. Pro League as we know it has wrapped up, with new regional leagues spaced out around the globe replacing it.
Teams around the world would have a chance of qualifying for major events through their respective regional leagues. However, given the move to online play across all esports, the future of the majors have been up in the air.
In an interview with Dexerto, Ubisoft’s Francois-Xavier Deniele revealed there’s a possibility we could still see a major international event this August, as shown in the year overview at the Six Invitational. It may just not be how we expect it.
“[The NA and EU Majors] were meant to be a very special moment for us,” he told Dexerto. “Unfortunately, we had to cancel the Pro League finals in May, so we are currently looking into what we will do for the major in August.”
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The shift to total online play has been drastic for all esports. However, for Siege, it couldn’t have come at a more inconvenient time. With the implementation of the new regional leagues system expected to be rolled out across June, some LAN events — like the NA league — are also up in the air.
“We are online right now with our weekly matches to continue Pro League and be ready as soon as possible to start our new program,” he added.
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Ubisoft’s regional leagues span across Europe, North America, Latin America, and the Asia-Pacific. On May 26, Ubisoft revealed how the APAC system will be shaping up with a North and South division.
National leagues for Japan, Korea, South East Asia, Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), and South Asia (India and Bangladesh) will feed into the two divisions respectively.
From there, the best six teams in APAC North and the two best teams in APAC South will duke it out for the region’s four spots at the Majors and Six Invitational.
While Deniele didn’t go into specifics about the alternatives Ubisoft is looking at for the 2020 major, he did add they would “let the community know as soon as we can about our plans for the August Major.”
The August 2020 Major was set to be held in North America, 12 months on from the Raleigh Major. Back then, Team Empire managed to take down the two-time Six Invitational champions G2 Esports in a four-game thriller.