Fall Guys is a sensational game that is receiving nothing but praises in its favour since its release. Just 2 weeks after its release, Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout has dethroned Fortnite for the crown of most popular battle royale game on the streaming service Twitch, a feat that took Fortnite months of perseverance after its release. It seems as if pretty much every Youtuber and Streamer is playing Fall Guys these days.
So the question in front of us is- Can Fall Guys Become the next big Esport?
While some games were built to be the next big thing in Esports, others were just built for leisure. Valorant, per se, is a competitive 5V5 title that was meant to support a competitive format. It was developed with tournaments and esports in mind. Furthermore, Riot Games, the developer behind Valorant, is paying out a ton of money to promote and support Ignition series, a global Valorant tournament made possible with the collaboration of local teams and organizers. Let’s not forget that Riot Games is one of the most notorious names in Esports, well acknowledged for League of Legends.
Fall Guys, on the other hand, is a game built for leisure. Although, once you play it and look past the colourful animations, a competitive spirit is embedded deep within the roots of the game. Thus, Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockdown has the potential to become one of the next big names is Esports when you factor in its popularity.
Fall Guys’ publisher Devolver Digital hosted a tournament on Twitch that pits 20 streamers in 5 teams against each other. The tournament was a massive success as thousands of viewers logged in to watch the tournament live.
Unfortunately, in the grand scheme of things, Fall Guys’ potential to become a sensational competitive esports title is capped by the inexperienced developers and publishers. While Riot games is a veteran of esports with thousands of employees, Mediatonic, the developers of Fall Guys is a much smaller studio based in London with a focus on mobile games.
The concept of Fall Guys is also a wee bit different than other Battle Royale games. While the most popular Battle Royale formula is dropping players on a closed map with the purpose of eliminating others, Fall Guys is based on a series of smaller mini-games where the purpose isn’t eliminating other players. While the different concept doesn’t weigh down Fall Guys as a game, it can fail to earn acknowledgement in the eyes of professional players.
The inexperienced developers and a radically different concept aren’t certainly stopping Fall Guys from becoming the next big thing in esports. However, it’s the lack of any such motivation on the part of developers and the publishers that may hinder its chances of becoming a competitive title. As of now, Mediatonic is simply working hard on maintaining its servers that are crashing frequently due to heavy loads. They simply don’t have enough resources to make Fall Guys the next big thing in esports.