iNation cease operations

4-6-2024 20:15

The Serbian organization cited "the recent update from Valve concerning the Major and RMR" as the primary reason for dropping their CS team.

iNation competed in the Europe RMR for BLAST Paris Major, having begun their journey in the open qualifiers

iNation has announced they are discontinuing operations and that the players on their books are "free to pursue new opportunities." The news comes in the face of Valve's recent updates to the Major rulebook, which included the removal of Major open qualifiers in Europe.

Open qualifiers removed in raft of Major rulebook changes

The statement released by the organization stated they "could not sustain the project" as a result of Valve's update, saying it "significantly impacted our core objectives and reduced the feasibility of achieving our goals." It was also mentioned that they "hope this is a temporary farewell and not a permanent goodbye," suggesting a return may be in the cards in the future.

Whilst the statement did not explicitly mention the removal of open qualifiers, that is presumably the update which will have most affected iNation, as they were a team unlikely to reach a high enough position in Valve's Regional Standings to earn an invite for the RMR closed qualifiers.

Community reacts: Valve removes Major open qualifiers

iNation has a history in CS dating back to 2013 and a number of well-known players, coaches and talent have graced the organization throughout the years, with their alumni including the likes of Nikola "⁠NiKo⁠" Kovač, Nemanja "⁠huNter-⁠" Kovač, Nemanja "⁠nexa⁠" Isaković, Janko "⁠YNk⁠" Paunović and Aleksandar "⁠kassad⁠" Trifunović.

Largely iNation competed in the lower echelons of Europe's CS scene, but they made headlines in 2023 by making a surprise run to the BLAST Paris Major Europe RMR B, one that began in the open qualifiers.

After they failed to make it to the Major the team fell back into tier-two obscurity, and mere months later the organization withdrew from CS entirely, citing their "region's business market" as the reason.

iNation announce return with new team

iNation returned to CS in April of this year with a new team featuring the likes of Luka "⁠emi⁠" Vuković and Jane "⁠aidKiT⁠" Apostoloski, but the return was short-lived as a result of Valve's recent move.

iNation were:

Luka "⁠emi⁠" Vuković
Nikola "⁠Dragon⁠" Boskovic
Luka "⁠c0llins⁠" Živanović
Jane "⁠aidKiT⁠" Apostoloski
Zoran "⁠xicoz⁠" Markovski

Uroš "⁠eRCEG⁠" Erceg (coach)

2024-06-04 20:16

2 replies

who

2024-06-05 04:20

2024-06-05 04:40

lose map, cease operations is hella rough

1 reply

lose map?

2024-06-05 15:42

welp

rip

hard to feel bad if the sole reason you even returned was to try to make it to Shanghai, albeit it was likely never possible to begin with for them.

2024-06-04 20:18

4 replies

yeah I dont get the comments on this post, as if this team was ever gonna make it if they already give up on their ranking. The teams people talk about making the open quals to the major like ecstatic and ITB were ranked ~50 so they wouldve been invited anyway in the new system, but even disregarding all that, when was the last time a team barely even ranking in the top 100 even made the RMR? I dont really care about losing teams just trying to bank off of a fluke result that has a 1% chance of happening anyway

2024-06-04 20:29

3 replies

Disregarding the Asia RMR squads which are usually outside the Top 100... Europe: Quazar was a weird case due to coming from the Russia Far East Qualifier for Antwerp's RMRs but were 149th Americas: Flamengo at the Paris RMR (95th) who made it over a team like 9z. O PLANO were 90th entering the Rio RMR Infinity were 93rd ARCTIC 100th Isurus in the Antwerp RMR were 107th Leviatan were 136th Sao Caetano were 175th

2024-06-04 20:43

Thanks, didnt really think about the americas RMR, was focused on EU, still interesting so few even make the RMR itself, none of them made the major though, right? Were any close? Would be curious to see if some got within a game or something like that but I check all rn im on the road

2024-06-04 20:52

Eh Sao Caetano went 2-3 that RMR but that also featured additional knockout games for the 3-2 teams due to only having 6 spots.

2024-06-04 21:05

again?

2024-06-04 20:17

so sad :c

like they had a chance

All the tier 2-3 teams cease operations because the Next Major won't be a open qualifier SADGE

2024-06-04 20:19

the open qualifier was cooked anyways it's just rng if you going to be up against t1 teams or t3 teams. in NA furia, liquid, and col all had to play each other and it was guaranteed 1 of them wasn't going to make it wile teams like legacy, imperial, and pain only had to play t3 teams

2024-06-04 20:58

it has nothing to do with OQ, those teams played each other in the closed qualifiers, and CQs wont be going away no matter what format valve chooses going forward

2024-06-04 23:22

What are you even talking about, that literally just never happened ??

2024-06-06 07:42

Damn rip

2024-06-04 20:22

xd rip

2024-06-04 20:26

xd rip bne

2024-06-05 01:30

BNE 3 times legends

2024-06-05 19:36

so what? u guys act like they won a major.. chill.

2024-06-05 19:52

Master move from Valve, kill tier 2+ so more people gonna play deadlock on release

7 replies

wtf is deadlock

2024-06-04 20:35

6 replies

Upcoming 6v6 shooter from Valve, cs2 killer

2024-06-04 20:37

5 replies

oh man the amount of times i've heard CS killer in the last 25 years the first one i remember was a CS clone called new world order CS just has that secret sauce

2024-06-04 20:48

Sticking to a good and simple principle while (trying) to refine it instead of changing in order to chase a hype for example I think that's why i came back to CS

2024-06-04 21:00

beta tests have concluded it's basically overwatch + valorant it's probably gonna be a disappointment knowing valve recently

2024-06-05 01:32

looks like tf2 and dota so im excited

2024-06-05 03:57

uncle dane talked about it in his latest video; it doesn't look good

2024-06-05 05:09

iNation NiKo never forget

and coldzera hltv.org/matches/2336111/bluejays-vs-ina..

2024-06-05 03:50

I was more referring to his time with them in 1.6, but sure.

2024-06-05 11:40

and this seems not gonna be the last disband announcement thanks volvo for ruining tier 2-3 chances to get into the RMR or Major

2024-06-04 20:23

Lmao we arent good enough to be top 50 in all of europe so we are hoping we can luck out in open quals, no offence but when was the last time a team ranked 100 made the major? Doesnt make any sense for an entire org to function on that alone, good riddance

2024-06-04 20:25

was BNE even ranked when they made the major?

2024-06-04 20:27

BNE didn't have any significant ranking when they made to the major. The only reason they got invites to the closed RMR (correct me if Im wrong, I dont remember seeing them in OC) is because they made it to the challengers stage the major prior

2024-06-04 20:31

I dont really remember cause I didnt watch Antwerp, but Antwerp was in May and in Feb of 2022 they were ranked roughly 20 in the world, dont know when open quals started though. For the other majors they made they were consistently ranked 20 ish as well. Dont really think a team making it every 3 years should have a massive impact on the structure of the scene anyway but it seems like they wouldve been invited to closed qual for antwerp in any case afaik Edit: just saw that during their Open Qual games for Antwerp they were ranked #44 in the world so BNE wouldve been invited regardless, I cant think of a single team ever making the major that wouldnt have been invited to closed quals. hltv.org/matches/2354644/bad-news-eagles..

2024-06-04 20:41

GJ Valve, removing open qualifiers will definitely improve the scene. Was totally worth it because 5-6 teams out of a 1000 are known to use cheats and they still don't get very far with those. Massive fuckup from Valve that may have insane consequences down the line.

14 replies

They werent making the major anyway, who cares Why are we weeping for grifters leaving the scene? How is that a bad thing?

2024-06-04 20:34

they had A CHANCE at making to the major, now they don't. That's a difference between investors shelling out the money and investors showing you a middle finger. Many orgs will close because of this change, so overall a terrible change and essentially a product of poor anti-cheat. And if you develop your game in such way that your fight against cheaters is affecting legitimate players - you are doing it wrong.

This has nothing to do with anti cheat, youre just showcasing that you have no idea what youre talking about, this change was announced a while ago. Regardless there is nothing you can do to stop people from cheating in open quals, kernel lvl does nothing to stop radar cheating, and even if it did there are plenty of high grade cheats that you can buy if you wanna spend the cash at the chance of getting sticker money. The issue isnt the anti cheat, its the open qualifier format. You either accept that bad actors will infect the space are you make it private, there is no other way. Regardless no they really didnt have a chance, There are thousands of teams each major cycle trying to make it and none have made it in past years that werent ranked enough to be invited anyway, youre just hanging on to emotions with no logical basis. Even BNE were ranked 44# when they played the open qual for antwerp so they wouldve been invited anyway, same for ecstatic and ITB. I dont want a system that caters to grifters that will string players along for the qualifiers and then drop them immediately, we need orgs that will actually stick around

2024-06-04 20:40

Great point. We shouldn't want orgs with this one track goal in CS. If they want to make the major, put together a team, play the smaller tournaments of which there are many, and get yourself ranked. Prove yourself over a long period as opposed to the week of open qualifiers. I would encourage anyone to actually look at the rankings right now and realize how easy it is to make top 50 in a region, it just requires actual effort. Which you should realistically have if you want any shot of qualifying for the major. A good change by Valve that some people are too stupid to see the forest from the trees on.

2024-06-04 22:57

Exactly. I understand the sentimental value of open qualifiers but are we gonna pretend every single one didnt just have the community complaining more than the last? You cannot control who enters, there will always be bad actors, it will always be a mess when its the major youre talking about, but every other tournament still lets you try to qualify, and honestly if you qualify to just one S tier event youre probably gonna be top 50 no matter what happens. And I couldnt find a single team that made the major in recent years that wouldnt have been invited to closed quals anyway. I am sad to see the RMRs maybe going, I love the emotions of the event and I hate the idea of the qualification for the major being purely mathematical, but open quals are unnecessary and havent lead to anyone making it further than the RMR itself anyway. It just leads to grifters toying with peoples careers promising to stick around but dropping them the second the major cycle is over.

2024-06-05 00:08

Oh no, a bunch of no namers who would have never made it, won't be able to try and make it. Anyways.

8 replies

you do understand that without lower tier scene that entire scene will suffer? Less people will be inclined to dedicate that much time to push them selves and eventually T1 teams won't have as many good players as they have today

2024-06-04 20:36

Yep I sure do. NA died and everyone cheered, so you won't find remorse from me.

2024-06-04 20:44

trolls cheered cause NA people have short fuse and are easy to trigger by teasing them with anything. For everyone with a room temperature IQ, that was a bad situation. But you choose who you listen and who you aspire to be.

It's more than that. I tried to convince many that any loss to the scene was bad as you're doing right now and it's just a waste of time. The community is primarily garbage and that's how it'll be treated since you reap what you sow.

2024-06-04 20:50

+1. Well said

2024-06-05 00:31

hltv.org/img/static/flags/30x20/NAM.gif you would've been happier if they had the pride flag behind their logo

2024-06-04 20:45

You ok bud? No one is talking about woke crap and yet here you are hamfisting into whatever you see fit.

2024-06-04 20:46

many players were nonemers and became tier 1 players after qualifying at a major from the balkan scene, crazy did it, so hunter and nexa became tier 1 players and they were nonemers

2024-06-05 09:17

Here we go again.

They couldnt remove the cheaters so they removed the open qualifiers. gj again shitters

2024-06-04 20:32

Good, fuck this game now because fuck valve

The jijihao business model is dead for Europe, ggs

again...

F That's so sad to see Valve ruining pro-scene by removing RMR quals instead of making a decent anti-cheat and iNation quitting CS again. iNation made a lot for our scene; NiKo, huNter and nexa all came out from this team.

*"did a lot", not "made a lot", sorry for my english.

2024-06-04 20:55

byeNation

RiP

radarhackers out of competition early. EZZZ

Easier to change entire major structure than add a working anti cheat

3rd time ceasing operation already. next year they coming back no biggie

2024-06-04 20:49

wow already? rip

nice valve killing the serbian representatives because you cant make a working anticheat absolute troglodytes

2024-06-04 21:22

SIGN AIDKIT ASAP

2024-06-04 21:27

It’s one of many orgs that will cease to exist if for this reasoning, but, they would not have made majors anyway, so, again, nothing changes.

2024-06-04 21:51

So you are happier that less players will get payed? And less orgs will stay in CS since they have no way to be profitable?

2024-06-04 22:03

It’s just an explanation not an evaluation.

2024-06-04 22:35

So orgs will have to take more % of the price pool, give lesser/no salaries or just disband entirely. What a move! There is almost no way for a tier 3/4 org to make money now.

2024-06-04 22:02

These orgs weren't making the major anyways. This team has barely played and have lost when they do play. If they had any potential of making the major, they could achieve top FIFTY in the region, of which it isn't unreasonable to expect a team to be top fifty in their region to have a realistic shot of making the major. Nothing has changed here, and iNation are just using this an excuse to bail on the game for the 50th time this year.

2024-06-04 22:52

RIP

2024-06-04 22:19

Valve screwing over small national orgs

2024-06-04 22:26

Damn after one and half fucking months

2024-06-04 22:47

lol they were just tryna get the major money lolllll

2024-06-05 00:18

In what universe their managment thought they will even get a chance to qualify for a major with that stack... jesus.

2024-06-05 03:33

2024-06-05 01:21

2024-06-05 03:12

thats really sad, ination was one of my favourite teams (i really like their logo and niko and hunter having played there). Hopefully they can comeback.

2024-06-05 03:52