Online Melee League Coming Soon: Slippi Champions League
Beyond the Summit and the Slippi online team announced the launch of a new Super Smash Bros. Melee league utilising the online emulator with rollback netcode. This announcement could not come at a better time for Melee fans as the community has been waiting for a new big tournament or online series to compete and watch since Get On My Line back in July.
Format and Schedule
The league has two divisions with eight players in each division. Each week, both divisions will compete in a single-bracket elimination tournament with the top four of the top division keeping their spots, and the bottom four dropping into a relegation bracket with the top four of the second division. The second division also has relegation, with the bottom four players of each week fighting to keep their spots in the league against challengers from an open bracket system.
Each match is a best-of-five, and the $20,000 prize pool will be disseminated over the course of each week. The first-place winner in division one will receive the biggest payout, $1,600, each week and those finishing above the last four spots in division two also receive a small payout.
Open qualifiers for the league, the CLG Mixup tournament, will be taking place September 26 with players fighting to take the first two open spots available for its inaugural week. The official start date for the event is October 11.
The league is also region locked to North America, meaning prominent European and Japanese players will take a backseat in this event.
Participants
Fourteen spots have already been filled for the league, with big names like Juan "Hungrybox" Debiedma, Joseph "Mango" Marquez, and Jeffrey "Axe" Williamson filling out the top division. The second division is also full of Melee veterans like Zachary "SFAT" Cordoni and Johnny "S2J" Kim, but also with some young up-and-comers like Albert "Albert" Luu and Zaid "Spark" Ali.
The invitations for the initial participants and division placement are closely aligned with the MPGR rankings, with a few exceptions. Edgard "n0ne" Sheleby is in the top division despite ranking No. 15 on the MPGR. This is likely because of his first-place finish at the most recent online tournament, Get On My Line.
The second division is littered with top 25 talent but also has Albert, who was ranked 37th overall at the end of 2019. The young Texas native did make waves last year, and went from unranked to his current spot, but was also invited over veterans like Aziz "Hax$" Al-Yami, Kevin "PewPewU" Toy, and DaJuan "Shroomed" Jefferson McDaniel.
Storylines To Watch
The first big storyline for this event is who will join the six other players in the lower division. Fringe top 15 players Joey "Lucky" Aldama and PewPewU are competing alongside lower nationally-ranked players like Anees "Free Palestine" Assaf and even local legends like Kentucky's Austin "Reeve" Reed for a shot at the league. The first open bracket should set the tone for what fans and players should expect the level of play to be to get into an event like this.
A player to watch for the first week is definitely Albert. The Falco main has been playing Melee for a while, but only recently broke into the national conversation in the summer of 2019. His breakout tournament was Low Tier City 7 in his home state. At that event, he took down Hungrybox and Lucky but ultimately finished outside of the top four, losing to Hungrybox in the losers bracket.
Since then, Albert has been making a name for himself. He finished in the top 15 at DreamHack Anaheim 2020 and has two solid online tournament results, first in a qualifier tournament for the Ludwig Ahgren Championship Series 2 and making it to the top 15 in that event. Albert has not attended many events outside of Texas, but thanks to Slippi and this league, fans can finally see what he has to offer when playing consistently against top 100 players.
Another player fans should keep their eye on is Zain "Zain" Naghmi. The sixth-ranked player in the world and the winner of the last Smash Major, Genesis 7, Zain has been quietly trolling through Slippi in online tournaments and competitive matches. He has recently pulled out the much-maligned Roy as his online secondary, and it does not look like he has lost a step since Melee transitioned to online events, placing in the top 15 at Frame Perfect Series 2: Online playing only Roy and winning the Ludwig Ahgren Championship Series 2.
Zain also has a decent 2020 record against most of the players in the top division. He took down Justin "Wizzrobe" Hallett, Cody "iBDW" Schwab, and n0ne at Smash Summit 9 and conquered Hungrybox and Mango en route to his first-place finish at Genesis 7. Fans should keep an eye on Zain to see if 2020 will continue to be his year.
Images via Nintendo
