CS:GO, or Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is a competitive online shooter that sees two teams competing against each other to either eliminate each other or to complete a certain objective (place or diffuse a bomb, defend or liberate hostages, etc).
Gaming Paradise was created by Sassa Bullock, the CEO of Turman organizer Gaming Resorts. The event was meant to be half CS:GO and half another game called DOTA 2, each with a prize pool of $50,000. It was to take place in Puerto, Slovenia, a small town on the countries Adriatic coast.
Since Sassa had no organizing experience, he hired Peter Markovic and his tournament organizing company Gaming Dot RS. Gaming Dot RS was to handle getting the tournament itself off the ground: getting a stage, getting high-speed internet set up, etc while Bullock and Gaming Resorts would pay for everything.
However, things started to go downhill before play even began. As teams started flying into Slovania for the qualifying rounds, the busses that took them from the airport to the venue was late and they ended up arriving at 3:00 AM. The next day, the first round was delayed due to a storm (the computers where to be set up outside under tents).
As things where getting set up for the next round, it was discovered that only the monitors where going to arrive on time as the guy driving the truck carrying the actual PCs had gone MIA. They tried to upgrade some old work stations, which they upgraded using.......less than ethically acquired Eastern European bitcoins, but they still weren't up to the same snuff as the PC's they'd ordered. Keep in mind, this is all happening a week before the first livestreamed matches are supposed to be played.
Next week rolls around and the first day begins. The games are touch-and-go, the internet that Gaming Dot RS was slow and was causing some serious rubber banding. They were also getting flamed by the Twitch audience for the low-quality, stuttery livestream.
Day two, the DOTA 2 half of the tournament is just outright cancelled. Also, its discovered that somewhere in all this confusion, the hotel that the players and tournament staff are staying in was never paid. They called the local police who canfiscated everyone's passports until the payments where made. ALSO also, turns out the venue that the tournament is being played at wasn't paid either and its staff locked the tournament's production staff out.
Oh, and one more thing. Remember Sassa? The CEO of Gaming resorts? Well, he shows up and announces that due to having to basically pay off the hotel, venue AND the police, he no longer had the prize money and that whoever won wouldn't be getting the winnings for up to 90 days after all this was over.
Several days, stuttery matches and bad livestreams later, a team called Kinguins ended up winning the tournament. 90 days pass and......no prize money. Yeah, turns out Gaming resorts filed for bankruptcy days after everyone got home, and Sassa basically dropped off the face of the Earth.
But, I would like to point out how awesome Gaming Dot RS was through all this. Not only did they help everyone get their passports back, but they paid for everyone to fly to Dubai for another tournament they were late for, and its CEO held a Reddit AMA answering every question he possibly could about the tournament and what all went wrong.
So, yeah. that was Gaming Paradise. Busted computers, seized passports and an act of God. There's been no tournament quite like it. I would like to leave you all with a quote that Sassa gave the website the Daily Dot: "It was my first event, and I still did much better than anybody around."
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