Last week, EA’s servers were having some major issues, causing difficulty for fans of games like Apex Legends and FIFA 20. Those problems apparently extended to FUT 20 Champions Cup, an international FIFA 20 tournament, where players Shaun “Brandsha” Galea and Hasan “Hasoo19” Eker had to resort to virtual rock, paper, scissors matches to determine winners for a qualifying round. In a separate case, one player, Levy Frederique, was forced to default to Tassal “Tass” Rushan after trying unsuccessfully to log-on for more than three hours. All in all, it’s a rather embarrassing turn of events for EA, particularly when players’ livelihoods are on the line.
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The unfortunate reality of esports is that server issues are going to happen from time to time. It’s a very bad look, however, for matches to be decided in such a ridiculous fashion, as a result. Unfortunately, EA’s rules require match-ups to be decided within a certain timeframe. Moving forward, EA is going to have to find a way to reschedule match-ups, or find some way to avoid this kind of thing from happening altogether.
Understandably, both Frederique and Brandsha were rather upset about how things shook out, airing their grievances on Twitter. Brandsha’s game was essentially decided by luck rather than skill, and Frederique didn’t get to play at all. Some fans of Frederique made the claim that Rushan shouldn’t have accepted the default in the first place.
I cannot believe it !! @EASPORTSFIFA @EAFIFADirect We literally had to play a rock paper scissors becauce we couldn’t find each other to invite in an EA LICENSED QUALIFIER . WTF !! 😭😭 I am done
— Shaun Galea (@brandsha56) February 29, 2020
While the Rock, Paper, Scissors situation is definitely a bad look for EA, the company responded on Twitter, pointing out that neither player was actually eliminated from the tournament as a result. Galea and Hasoo19were both eventually eliminated from the tournament, but they still played in subsequent matches, failing to progress in that regard. Whether or not they might have performed better had things worked as intended is impossible to say.
Statement on FUT Champions Cup Stage V Qualifier match between Brandsha56 and Hasoo. #FGS20 pic.twitter.com/g0Rt62iSQV
— EA SPORTS FIFA Competitive Gaming (@EAFIFAesports) March 2, 2020
What do you think about EA’s server issues? Let us know in the comments or share your thoughts directly on Twitter at @Marcdachamp to talk all things gaming!
