Acend quits Halo esports

The European esports organization, ACEND Club, announced that it would exit the competitive Halo scene.

The organization’s executive director, Benjamin “bencb” Rolle, explained the reasons for the exit through a video posted on the team’s official Twitter account.

In the long explanation bencb, reference is made to a mismanagement of the league and a lack of communication by the developers of the game, 343 Industries.

Official statement

In the video, Rolle said that he did not feel that 343 and HCS understood how to create an esports ecosystem that would be attractive to different organizations. In addition, he also said that the organizations that were hurt the most were:

“Especially outside of the North American region and the partnership program.”

On the other hand, the official statement highlights:

“Our primary issue was the incredibly poor communication we received from the esports team. We were naturally disappointed that we were passed over for partnership, even though we never felt we were entitled to join. Regardless of the decision we doubled down on our support for the scene, resigning our players and increasing our budget to provide the best possible training and preparation for our team for the upcoming tournaments.”

Another reason for this decision is that after Acend was not part of the Halo Championship Series partnership program, 343 Industries ignored all forms of communication with the organization. In other words, Acend was trying to improve its relationship with 343 to gain a future partnership space.

To this point, Acend claims that 343 did not share information about the esports plan for 2023, and the developers ignored any requests asking about this. This is why Acend felt completely unsure about its future in the scene.

Problems when creating content

Bencb also pointed out instances where ACEND had different problems creating content, as behind-the-scenes access was only for partner teams. The fact that Acend is based in Austria and is a European team affected them significantly. To do so, they had to spend an additional amount of money. They had to bring their content creators to the events in the United States.

On the other hand, the Halo 2022 World Championship Finals were held in the United States. This generated many problems for the European teams due to the distance to North America.

Rolle was very confident in the Halo project

There is no doubt that Rolle and his entire team had complete confidence in the organization’s Halo project. But, the fact that the European Halo did not receive the same attention as the North American Halo was always highlighted. In addition, Rolle also commented:

“With some support, Halo could grow into a successful esports title in multiple regions.”

The Twitter announcement concludes with the organization thanking all its players and wishing them the best career success. It further noted that it felt very sad for those experienced players who claimed that:

“Similar mistakes were made with Halo Infinite as had been made before with “other Halo titles.”

Header: HCS