In what turned out to be a more surprising 2009 for Counter-Strike teams and fans, we were left with plenty of interesting and exciting results in terms of Counter-Strike tournaments during this year. At the end of the it all, the question remains as to what order the teams found themselves after a year of hard-fought matches.

In returning to the ranking system that I developed, actually starting in 2006, we have the following 2009 Counter-Strike top 10:

		Change	Points	Winning %
1.	fnatic	0	4215	0.942
2.	SK Gaming	0	3139	0.826
3.	Wicked	+1	2574	0.896
4.	mTw	-1	2209	0.778
5.	WeMade FOX	+1	960	0.527
6.	Alternate	+1	894	0.604
7.	TyLoo	+4	649	0.627
8.	Meet Your Makers	+3	648	0.785
9.	Evil Geniuses	-1	639	0.473
10.	Mousesports	-4	582	0.426

Outside looking in: k23, Virtus.Pro, compLexity, wNv.cn

Depending on response, an explanation of specific reasons for the team’s placement in this ranking can be developed.

Now, before everyone jumps on it, let me try to remind everyone of how the ranking system works. As many published events as possible are gathered from eSports media websites. Once those are accounted for, I assign the simple point system.

For those that don’t know, you get 100 points for first, 90 for second and so on. For tournaments that list 3-4, 5-8 etc… they’re given the median, the number in between the two (3=80, 4=70, thus 3-4=75). I’m aware of certain arguments against keeping the points so close together, but I find that it skews the rankings far more in the end result.

Now, after the initial top 10 is completed, those teams play into the following criteria for tournaments to be counted: tournaments must contain at least two countries, or the tournament must contain two top ten teams to be counted. This was changed from one top 10 team because it also skewed the rankings too much.

The next step after determining the tournaments for criteria is to apply the weighting system. The first weighting system works by taking the number of top 10 teams in the tournament and making the multiplier one less than that number. So, if there are four top 10 teams in a tournament, the multiplier will be 3, to be applied to those top ten teams in their point totals. In theory, teams outside the top 10 would be privy to a larger multiplier, but no team has benefited from such an occurrence.

After that weighting is done, I do the calculation for the winning percentage. In looking at one of the teams, I divide their multiplied point total by the maximum number of points that they could achieve from the events that they attended. Once that is done for each team, I work that winning percentage into the final point total that you see above.

Unfortunately, these rankings are only supremely effective at looking at a specific picture of what you’re trying to rank. I have a few ideas to keep an up-to-date and rolling ranking to use throughout a year, but that will take time that I don’t really have at the moment.

Dignitas have decided to join the top-ranks of the WoW scene by adding the well known squad GODMODE.  Most of you in the WoW community may know these players from the blog, Hydramist.net.

The new lineup consists of Thomas ‘Flyn” Kogler as Mage, Christopher ‘KalamisT’ Ioannou as Rogue, and Ryan ‘Hydra’ Van Buiten as Priest.  Dignitas has said that the team will be partnered with the Alienware M17x to enhance their gaming experience to the highest ability.

Ryan ‘Hydra’ van Buiten:
First of all myself, Chris (Kalimist) and Thomas (Flyn) are all very pleased to be joining the dignitas family; they have been a pleasure to talk to so far and seem to be a very professional organisation. A big thank you goes out to them for giving us this opportunity.

Over the course of 2010 we plan to build on our current victory at gamescom 2009 and take our team to new levels. We have high hopes for future tournaments and are aiming to place at least Top 3 in each event we attend since I believe that our team is made up of the very best players of each class.

We are excited to be playing under the name of Team Dignitas and hope that we can represent them at the very top of our game. We are also working closely with them to promote our new website www.hydramist.net. This incorporates first person livestreams from each of our team members, frequent blog updates on the current state of the game, as well as active forums where people can ask questions, chat about arena or anything that takes their fancy.

Dignitas also stated that all of their WoW news will be streamed from the Hydramist.net blog, so stay tuned to that for all of their latest news

Just after their 8th place finish at World Extreme Masters, rumors have surfaced that WeMade Fox is possibly dropping their CS 1.6 team. 

Sources say that the team will not have their contracts renewed after the 12th of January, 2010, when they are supposed to expire.  Although this is to be released very soon as the team is on the competitor list for the Arbalet Cup Kazakhstan due to take place from the 30th of January to the 31st, in 2010.

Other sources say that WeMade Fox will be going full pledge into Starcraft and Warcraft, with rumors surfacing after seeing the signing of a former SK Gaming player.

We will keep all the fans updated as we get the news!

In a current series, HLTV.org is attempting to garner a public perception of the best players of the decade.

The majority of the polls have been broken down into geographical divisions; among those divisions up for voting include Best AWP player, Best South American player, Best North American player, Best Asian player and Best European player.

Voting will end on Wednesday, December 30th, where the winners of each category will be entered into the final poll to determine the overall best player of the decade.

More information on the series and links to the polls can be found here.

The MLG 2009 PC Circuit Championship will be taking place in Orlando, Florida, at the Gaylord Palms Resort from January 9-10th. The four highest ranked teams will be battling it out for $15,000 and to say they are the 2009 MLG Champs! The top four teams are; Check6, SK.EG, compLexity and Button Bashers.

Saturday will be featuring an All-Star Tournament, here are the full details.

The All-Star 3v3 Challenge features a unique team selection format that will mix and match players from the championship teams. One player from each of the four championship teams attending the event will be selected by MLG to be designated as team captain. Team captains will then choose, in rotating order starting with high seed captain, 2 more players for his team. Captains must choose players not on their current roster for the championship. In other words, Captains must choose players from other teams, not their own. Once chosen, all four teams will compete in a best of 7, double elimination 3v3 arena tournament. The winning team will become the 2009 MLG PC All-Stars and the team will receive $1000 cash.

Sunday is when the true action gets underway. The full schedule can be found below.

11:30am – Welcome/Pre-Game Show
12 noon – Championship Winners Round 1 A
1pm – Championship Winners Round 1 B
2pm – Championship Losers Round 1
3pm – Lunch Break
4pm – Championship Winners Finals
5pm – Championship Losers Finals
6pm – Championship Finals
7pm-7:15pm – Award Ceremony

Source: GotFrag

Yesterday, Team-Dignitas.org reviewed the coL Edition Creative Sound Blaster Arena Surround USB Headset. The headset, which earns an average of 8.5/10 by the reviewer, is “the perfect Christmas present to get if you care about your sound in-game.” This is one of the most in-depth reviews for this headset to date, and is a must read if you are interested in purchasing a headset of any kind. Below is an excerpt:

Comfort:
‘Woah’ was my first reaction when putting it on. This is most likely the most comfortable headset I have ever owned. The padding, which is also in charge for blocking out background noises, is very soft and sets itself to your head straight away, no sore ears from the tension that you some times get with new headsets.

The padding blocks out all environmental noise which is really important for any gamer. When you are at LAN I believe this headset could really handle blocking out all the surrounding noise so you can focus on your game. This is something many gaming headsets claim to do but as we all know only a few manage to actually live up to its promises, the Sound Blaster Arena is one of the latter.

Sound:
I can’t possibly say anything bad about the sound quality as it is just awesome. I started listening to one of my favorite songs and I immediately noticed the many new sounds that I can pick up with this headset, they were always there but I just couldn’t notice them as they were lost in the rest of the sound. Using the X-Fi Crystalizer option in the driver menu you can increase the sound dynamic to give the song more ‘power’, I noticed the difference straight away.

I tried out the Bass Boost which was quite overwhelming I must say, which I’m sure many Drum N Bass or House Music fans will love to hear! Luckily you can adjust pretty much every sound volume control, allowing you to tweak the headset just the way you like it.

The Arena Headset offers two sound modes, a standard Stereo Setup and a X-Fi CMSS 3D Setup, which quickly turns your headset into an 8-speaker modus. Again you are able to set up the balance between Stereo and complete Surround just the way you like it.

This last option makes the difference between an average Gaming Headset and the Arena USB Surround as it really helps me to locate my opponents during a match. Instead of just hearing an opponent on my left I can now make the difference between front-left, rear-left and anything inbetween that. I personally play games such as Quake Live, Counter-Strike and Call of Duty and I was able to hear my opponent pick up weapons or move around and locate him much easier than with my old headset in all of these games.

Click here to read the full review on Team-Dignitas.org

Alexey “LeX” Kolesnikov one of the most recognizable CS players from Russia has announced he will be retiring from the game. He had been hinting at retirement for the last few weeks because of his health. At Arbalat Cup in August he was rushed to the hospital.

Alexey was the captain of the Virtus.pro and when they disbanded in November he went into the free agency market. He was used as a stand in for tp.uSports in the most recent Arbalat Cup.

Alexey “LeX” Kolesnikov had this to say to Gameinside.ua

“I think it’s no big secret the fact that all the tournaments and tight scheduled had been hard for me to deal with these past months.

Our ambitions, our desires and our goals, together with with great faith, hard work and constant analysis is the force that allows us to achieve the highest possible results in any business and is able to break any walls that come in our way – except for health.

I can not continue playing actively. Now I need some time and effort to restore my health and regain vitality.”

Although his career in playing is over he will be in charge of the 2010 Arbalet Cup season, which will featuring a $100,000 prize purse.

The G7 Organization has released an update regarding their persuit for unpaid prize money by large tournament organizers and leagues. Below is the official release:

G7 Teams is looking for the community to support our petition to boycott and not participate in any ongoing or future events by e-sports organizations that have significant outstanding prize claims.  We have tried to reach out to each organizer and address the outstanding claims from gamers around the world, but they have refused to engage in meaningful discussions.

We ask that the community reviews, signs, and supports our petitions against CPL, ESWC, and GGL and organize so our joint voice cannot be ignored.  Once the community has signed the petitions, G7 will be contacting the Attorney General’s office in each of the states they do business (where applicable), advertisers, and sponsors to alert them to our grievances.

CPL:       http://www.petitiononline.com/cplg7/petition.html
ESWC:   http://www.petitiononline.com/eswcg7/petition.html
GGL:      http://www.petitiononline.com/gglg7/petition.html

Click here to visit the G7 Website