Riot Games on Tuesday revealed the structure and initial sponsors of Valorant esports for '21, and a tournament-based model will continue but with new levels of competition that culminates in a world championship. The L.A.-based publisher debuted Valorant as its new first-person shooter game earlier this year, and it has started the esports scene around it with tournaments instead of immediately starting with a franchised league. That will continue next year but with a more structured scene called the Valorant Champions Tour that will involve regional and global competitions to determine the best pro team in Valorant. The first two sponsors of the competitions will be Red Bull and SecretLabs, two pre-existing League of Legends esports sponsors.
The three-tier pyramid will consist of the Valorant Challengers series on the lowest rung; this will be regional competition and the way to qualify for the next rung, the Valorant Masters, which will be comparable to LoL’s Mid-Summer Invitational; and finally the top tier will be Valorant Champions, which will be a global competition pairing the top teams from the various regions. Valorant Challengers will begin in February and the season will wrap up with Valorant Champions in December.
