The Valorant India Invitational is one of the official off-season events of the Valorant Champions Tour (VCT) for the APAC region. It was organized by Galaxy Racers and the LAN finals were held at GMR Arena, Hyderabad. The AMD-powered event featured a $100K prize pool and was streamed on Galaxy Racer’s official Youtube, Glance, and Twitch channels. The Championship also saw a collaboration with Sunburn, Arena to showcase a mix of esports and music for the first time.
The Valorant India Invitational LAN Finals recorded over 9 million viewers across Galaxy Racers streaming platforms on YouTube, Twitch and Glance. The Hindi commentary stream of the event alone noted a staggering 6 million views.
Also read: Amazon India may be preparing to launch Prime Gaming in India
Paper Rex is the Champions of Valorant India Invitational, Receives $50,000 Cash Prize
The Valorant India Invitational LAN Finals featured a total of eight teams (5 invitees + 3 qualifiers) in which Enigma Gaming and GodSquad (Global Esports) were the participating Indian teams. However, they did not make the playoffs, while 4 teams including Team Heretics, Paper Rex, Bleed Esports, and Team Secret clinched their Playoff spots.
Singapore-based professional team Paper Rex faced Spanish team Heretics in the Grand Final, where the finals followed a BO5 format. During the final match, it was Paper Rex who clinched the match against Team Heretics with a score of 3-1 and ultimately won the Championship and took home the bulk of the $100K prize pool. His heroics were also praised by the strong Hindi-speaking market (HSM) when India hosted the first Valorant mega-event internationally.
Siddharth Ravishankar, Game Director of Galaxy Racer, stated “Bringing a Tier 1 event combined with the music industry was a unique experience for us, and we are very grateful to the community for their response. Some of the best teams in the world, 4 of which are newcomers to the upcoming Valorant Partner Program, have all stepped up the mantle, providing a taste of a top-class Valorant heading into the new season and format in 2023.”
Team Heretics loved the Indian community and their response, and team attendees expressed their views in the following words: “Valorant India Invitational and Sunburn Music Festival in Hyderabad was definitely something special for us as a team. It was great playing our first LAN as a team and also playing against other teams from the APAC region.”
The Valorant India Invitational provided a platform for some of Valorant’s top personalities and teams to compete against each other for the first time. The grandeur of the event and the fan reaction speak to the promise of this PC game in India, especially with additions like the mix of music and esports.
Conversely, few of the teams and the audience had any other views during the LAN finals with many reporting that the event is not organized according to their standards. Power outages, delays between matches and many other issues have distressed some of the participants.
Also read: Apex Legends Mobile wins Game of the Year award for both Android and iOS
Thanks for reading to the end of this article. For more informative and exclusive tech content, please like our Facebook page.