A Japanese player has become the official tournament champion of Fortnite in Asia: the FNCS Invitational. However, he was disqualified after winning for cheating and banned from Fortnite. The prize money goes to someone else.
This is the tournament: From May 22 to 24, the tournament final “FNCS Invitational Finals” took place. It was a solo tournament within the Fortnite Champion Series, a series of online tournaments.
To participate in the event, players had to qualify through strong performances, proven earlier that they were among the best Fortnite players, or be personally invited by Epic.
The tournament took place in 7 regions: Europe, NA-East, NA-West, Brazil, Asia, Oceania, and the Middle East. While in the major regions the strongest player took home $40,000, in Asia there was still a prize of $15,000. Fortnite is not as popular here as in other regions.
Secret collusion for tournament victories
This is what the cheater did: The Asia tournament was won by the Japanese player “Sekosama”. He scored 205 points according to the tournament point system. Points are awarded for a mix of good placement and eliminations: you have to survive long and ideally collect kills.
Thus, it can be worthwhile to play particularly defensively, avoid fights, and “safely” make it to the endgame and the top 10.
However, after the tournament, the player was accused of cheating. He allegedly played alongside another solo player who supportively assisted him:
- The other player allegedly provided Sekosama with important items by placing them in certain hidden locations: including medkits.
- He is said to have fed kills to Sekosama, i.e., intentionally sacrificed himself to provide points and good items.
- Sekosama and his helper are said to have been in a voice call together to coordinate.
It is said that this happened frequently in 12 matches. In a clip on Twitter, one can see that Sekosama stands far outside the safe zone, in the storm, and then runs towards the eye of the storm. On the way, he continuously finds medkits with which he can mitigate constant damage and survive the way through the storm.
This is the punishment: Playing with another player in the solo mode of Fortnite is strictly prohibited. Epic deemed this collaboration as evident.
The player Sekosama was disqualified and banned from Fortnite for 14 days. The $15,000 prize money was rescinded, which only the 2nd player receives.
Player denies accusations
This is what the player says: He denies the accusations. He claims he achieved 1st place alone and without help. He also did not share a call with another player during the game but only celebrated his victory outside of the game.
Online tournaments in Fortnite suffer from many problems
This is what’s behind it: The online tournament of Fortnite has repeatedly faced exactly these problems. Players are accused of:
- blatantly teaming up with someone
- Making collusions and not attacking each other
- Using “external information” to gain an advantage.
All of this is strictly prohibited, but apparently is a real problem in Fortnite e-sports.
If cases become known so regularly now, one can only guess how high the dark figure of cheaters is that aren’t caught. This does not reflect well on e-sports in Fortnite.
The 17-year-old US pro Daniel “Dbus” Walsh was recently banned for 30 days; he was also accused of cheating. He supposedly worked together with his actual duo partner in solo mode. Both landed in one spot, but then avoided each other and even shared loot.
Dubs says it was just a “clever strategy” in Fortnite, all pro players avoid early fights.
