FTW Summer Showdown: All-Women VALORANT Invitational to be hosted in September

Edited on September 10th, 2020 at 6:40 PM CEST

Today, it was announced the event is officially a part of the Ignition Series circuit in North America. The number of teams participating in the tournament has been excend from 8 to 12. On the top of that, the teams will battle not for the previously announced $10,000 USD but $50,000 USD instead.

The VALORANT community can’t really complain about the amount of events it's getting every week. Not only do the signed professionals have the possibility to show their impressive skills to the wider audience, but the semi-pros and aspiring amateurs have a place for themselves too. The only group of players that might have seen some kind of disappointment when it comes to the amount of tournaments dedicated to them are women, specifically those who transitioned to VALORANT mostly from the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive scene. There, women-only events are nothing new, as they’ve been there for years.

That’s why the recent news about the largest women's tournament to date, FTW Summer Showdown: All-Women VALORANT Invitational, being hosted soon will definitely put a smile on their faces.

The well known Nerd Street Gamers, who have already hosted one of the biggest Ignition Series events in North America, T1 x NSG Showdown, will power up the tournament along with the owners and operators of the Overwatch League team, Philadelphia Fusion, and more relevant for VALORANT, T1, Spectacor Gaming. The sponsors are the mentioned earlier T1 and GFUEL. The event will take place on September 12th, 2020 at 3PM ET and will feature eight women-only professional, amateur and content creator teams that will battle for the share of the $10,000 USD prize pool.

“We’re excited to team up with Spectacor Gaming, T1, and G FUEL to host our first all-women VALORANT invitational and spotlight female gamers who are making strides in the industry. From the players to the logistical staff, this tournament is a testament to the power that women have to drive the gaming industry forward today and in the future,” comments Paige Funk, Senior Marketing Director at Nerd Street Gamers in the official announcement.

The FTW Summer Showdown is part of a bigger project, whose inception started one year ago in 2019 as Spectacor Gaming decided to put focus on the female esports scene to “connect, support, and inspire the growth and advancement of women across all sectors of the gaming landscape”.

Out of eight teams, seven spots are reserved for invited squads, with one place remaining open for all women-only teams that want to prove themselves throughout the open qualifier that will be hosted by the GALorants Discord Community, a community dedicated to women playing VALORANT. The qualifier will occur on September 5th, 2020. The registration is now open, and the qualifier itself will be broadcasted on the same day at 6:15 PM ET at twitch.tv/nerdstgamers. Nerd Street Gamers will also stream the main phase of the tournament later on September 12th, 2020.

The organizers has started to reveal the invited teams, with the first one to be with MAJKL, that consists of one of the first woman to reach Radiant, Annie Dro.

This might be the first chance we get to see the Dignitas Female squad in action, after the announcement of them expanding from CS:GO to VALORANT. Despite the event being hosted for the North American players, there is a small chance we might see an European squad signed to an organization, GODSENT after quite a long absence from the professional events after competing in a few during the closed beta, and early days of official VALORANT’s release. It’s definitely a good opportunity for the ladies to showcase their skill and potential to the wider audience thanks to the idea and people behind this project. This might as well be an inception of a revolution on the female VALORANT scene, creation of more teams, and a sign of an increased amount of events dedicated to them happening more frequently in the future.