Imperial fe and florescent made history for women in games this week.
Jan. 16, was a tough day to hate on women playing video games as the CS2 team Imperial fe and former VALORANT Game Changers superstar Ava "florescent" Eugene proved that women can hold their own against men in competitive first-person shooter (FPS) titles.
The odds were against both Imperial fe and florescent. The CS2 team had the tall task of facing NAVI, one of the best teams in the world. Florescent, on the other hand, debuted in the Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region's VALORANT Champions Tour (VCT) Kickoff for Apeks and faced Gentle Mates, an all-men team, for the first time in her career.
Many CS2 fans thought Imperial fe were going to embarrass themselves in BLAST Bounty Season 1 and get knocked out without winning more than a couple of rounds. Many also thought florescent would flounder and show the discrepancy between Game Changers and an international VCT league.
However, the opposite happened. Imperial fe put out a good fight against NAVI and delivered an entertaining show to a broadcast that peaked at over 490,804 viewers, the highest ever for a match including a women's CS2 team. For comparison, Imperial's all-men team lost to the same NAVI last year by 13-2 at Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) Rio.
Apeks also lost to Gentle Mates, but florescent top-fragged for her team and nearly averaged the highest ADR in the series, according to VLR.gg.
Now that Imperial fe and florescent put women in the spotlight of competitive FPS and proved that women aren't worse than men at games, we can discuss what esports could do to diminish the gatekeeping.
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Where do we go from here?
Imperial fe's performance against NAVI couldn't come at a better time. It arrives at a time when many organizations have stopped funding women's teams in CS2 as a result of getting less money from ESL due to the end of the partnership system.
Imperial, for example, is one of the four Brazilian organizations investing in women's CS2. The country has a multitude of teams competing both in Brazil and abroad.
While all-women tournaments should still exist as they provide a safe environment for them to compete, their scene would improve greatly if Valve keeps valuing women's tournaments highly. This is the only way that more women's teams can compete in the biggest CS2 tournaments.
Not only this would grant women time on the spotlight, but would also lead to them getting more practice against quality teams, something that Imperial fe's Zainab "zAAz" Turkie touched on in the post-game interview.
As for VALORANT, Riot Games could do something similar. Imagine if the best Game Changers team in the world were given a slot to play in their respective international VCT league and Master events?
This would give the opportunity for women to improve at a fast rate as they'd get to practice and face some of the best teams in the world. It would also pave the way for more teams to build a mixed lineup like Apeks with florescent.
Conclusion
Of course, some fans might argue that women don't deserve this help. However, while most men have grown up being incentivized to play games, women didn't get the same benefit. And when they do try to play online, they're welcomed with misogyny by their male counterparts.
If done right, this could inspire countless young women to pursue a career in competitive FPS. After all, it's hard to feel inspired when you only have a handful of people to look up to.
May what Imperial fe and florescent accomplished on Jan. 16 be the turning point towards more inclusion of women in FPS.
That's all for now. Stick around on esports.gg for more news and updates.
