Garena, the company that deserve more hate than Ubisoft

[RazeG3SG1]

Let me start off this long post with this warning, this is a super long and little pic post and many emotions expressed here are extremely negative, biased and based on real life experience.

 

My childhood with Dota and Garena
I started my first step in PC gaming back in 2007 where my friend introduced me into Dota, back then it was a Warcraft 3 Mod. Players either connect with Battle.net or other lobby client software, one of the juggernaut is non other than Garena. The wiki page is kinda false as Garena existed before 2009.

(The login window for Garena circa 2007-2009)

 

(The main client window of Garena, this is the oldest one I can find.)

 

Garena back then was just a lobby client that allow players to play Dota with each other, other than Dota, it also allow Brood Wars. Garena had many rooms allocated to different region and the host of the game would have to tunnel the connection for the players. Usually, successfully played game would allow an account to accumulate EXP to level up. These level serve no purpose except that it allows the player to join higher level room. AFAIK, Level 25 allow the user to start a clan which requires the player to dedicate a lot of the time into playing. Back then I was a complete noob and occasionally pros would join our room and stomped us completely, like KingSurf Chuan who was in Malaysia back then.

 

Garena even had a micro transaction back then that is called the Gold membership. It allows the user to join a room that has been fully occupied. Garena allocated some slots for these Gold members, also you gain EXP faster, allowing Pro Smurfing players to quickly reach high level to create clans etc.

 

Garena handles toxic players such as leavers by implementing GM, Game Masters or Garena Masters, they are like the admins, able to lift the ban hammer etc. GMs back then does their job diligently and some are even high skilled players, albeit there are recurring toxic players, ie. First Departure Chibix back then.

 

My early PC gaming life was started thanks to Dota, but it also marked my unstable life in gaming and in real life. I would be forced to quit Dota for a few years. But Garena started its descend to the path of evil.

 

 

Garena Overhaul, Garena+
Garena+ was implemented in 2010 and along with it, League of Legends. Riot decided that it is best to let Garena to distribute the game. It also marks the decline Dota in my country. Garena and Riot marketed the game so strong, and with simpler mechanics, many Dota players were lost.

 

Since LoL have so many micro-transaction, it allows Garena to generate a lot of revenue. And with many players still play Dota, Garena started its first move to kill the Singapore scene. They no longer organize community tournaments for Dota. Dota literally disappear from Garena's page, it was LoL everywhere, another FTP FPS game, Blackshot also got promoted very aggressively.

Kids got interested in LoL and never heard of Dota again due to LoL's superior graphics and simpler mechanics. Dota players started to worry about the future of their game. Battle.net was too complicated for SEA players, one guy managed to launch another lobby client, called Ranked Gaming Client also known as RGC. I witnessed how Garena attempted to suppress the Dota players, launching DDoS attacks on RGC, knowing very well that RGC dev cannot afford to fight back.

 

Due to the dying numbers of Dota players in Garena, the GMs, professional players all jumped to RGC, is dead in Garena. Garena then never bothered to pull its players back again. As someone who plays many games now, I started to hate Garena. They could have let both Dota and LoL coexist nicely in the country. And yet they destroyed it.

 

I then started to play Blackshot after the recommendation of a friend. It has microtransaction and the game wasn't as pay to win as it is now. Though you are looking at spending some money if you want to get to the top. They also uses the GMs to deal with cheaters and toxic players. I would spend my time in Blackshot to 2012 while following Dota scene too.

 

 

The end with Garena
Blackshot had an update which added a character skin with unfair advantage and a few super overpowered weapons into the game. Though players complained a lot but it is ignored as you have to cash to buy them. They added more skins with advantage too later on. At this time on wards, many players considered quitting Blackshot, and then Valve's CSGO and Dota 2 are at the horizon. I along with other Blackshot players and other popular FTP FPS, Wolf Team players jumped to the unknown realm of CSGO.

Very glad we made that choice, it didn't take long for many of us to realize how foolish we were in supporting Garena. I can't believe Garena would do such despicable acts for other games, I'm also glad that I had only spent SGD$10 on Garena because I wanted to taste what was it like to get one of the most OP gun in game. While others, spent at least 100+ on Garena.

Meanwhile, there are happy ending to Dota players as Dota 2 enters open beta in early 2013. Many playes are able to play Dota 2 and then a full release in July. Though SEA scene is still trying to recover from the damages in the void period.

 

 

A clear picture
Then I started to realize what Garena has done to its other games. LoL, its biggest cash cow also got screwed hard. They delay patches from Riot, delayed skins, made them exclusive for a limited time. Due to patch delays etc, LoL in SEA and Taiwan cannot compete with other countries. My cousin is a Singaporean LoL professional players, this hurts him a lot.

This effectively locked the players to compete locally in a league. That is completely unfair and it should not happen to Esports. To make matters worse, they have the right to revoke competitive account or ban the account if a pro player or streamer talks bad to the world about them. That is why there is not much improvement.

Garena also removed the Tribunal system, leaving work to GMs again. The problem is, this time, the GMs literally sucks. They don't do their job, in fact, they even paid players to boost their account. Something that is unheard and condemned upon back in 2007.

Now you may ask, why Riot didn't step it? Well, it's because they couldn't. Their contract might have been that Garena has control over the game. And breaking of contract may cost way more damage than to fix everything right. Riot even has to obligate to redirect SEA LoL website traffic to Garena's LoL website.

I tried to convince my cousin to jump to Dota 2, or Smite or even HotS but the damage has been done. He cannot put down what he had put in effort.

Blackshot also got screwed after many of us left, more pay to win mechanics implemented and so on. Recent ban hammer on cheaters has cleared many of its players. It is as good as dead now though kids still try the game now regardless.

 

 

Path of Exile Controversy
I played PoE in 2013 during its beta and the devs are extremely good in polishing the game. The game is very good, and even beats Diablo 3. The microtransaction are extremely ethical, you can only buy skins and not buffs or whatsoever. Eventually, right before the game was fully launched, they announced it is to be published by Garena in SEA.

Many beta players like me are extremely upset in the decision. Reasons being toxic players, delayed patches, and even BAN REMOVAL microtransaction for banned players. However, we are lucky that this time, Grinding Gears just hidden the gateway in their main client. All we have to do is to manual type in "Singapore" and voila, Garena free kids free game. Meanwhile Garena added more microtransactions according to some players of Garena PoE.

 

 

Garena Stadium Singapore, War of Attrition with Colosseum
It was built in 2012 and it happens to be right around my workplace. Garena built this for Esports event for LoL and Blackshot (the latter failed misearably) and act as a Cybercafe for Garena games. I'm sure many gamers are delighted as they thought there is some kind of land mark of Esports.

(Just your average day outside Garena Stadium. Inside is really empty too.)

 

(This was taken in TI4 Pubstomp, Colosseum is a known juggernaut in community involvement)

 

However, it announced closure this year. The reason is simple, no general public cares about Esports, not to mention the tournament booths are empty most of the time. There are too little community tournament organized and as a Cybercafe, you only offered Garena games. While Colosseum, a juggernaut and veteran in Cybercafe business in Singapore offered full range of games. While both operate in the same building, Garena game players even go to Colosseum due to better environment and equipment.

 

All I heard was just "Oh kinda sad they had to close down.". For god sake, think of the money that you had contributed to the Stadium! You spent so much on Garena and they built the stadium, and after that? They screw you money by allowing it to close down! Why can't gamers just realize that? Are you content to continue to spend your money after they screw up like that? This only makes me hate Garena and its user even more. I wanted the business to crash down so hard that they'll learn not to screw with the community.

 

If only their user start to wake up and know what is going on. I'm trying so hard to tell kids not to accept the candy of Garena, but they are too ignorant.

 

My Advice to All Gamers and Devs
If you are a dev that is developing a free to play game, no matter what you do, DO NOT LET GARENA PUBLISH IT! Garena will tarnish your name (look at Blackshot) so bad that you get unwarranted hate. In fact, many SEA games would rather you to publish it in Steam instead.

 

And for all gamers, if one day Garena enters your region, try to get everyone to say no. It will be hard, but we have to prevent people from support this greedy company. The faster it dies, the better for all gamers.

[BananaNinja]

ok

[KieranFretwell]

How long did it take you to write this book? 

[Fulgrim]

Christ, it's been years since i last used Garena.

[evilarceus]

Garena and Ubisoft are two different companies that do two different things

[RazeG3SG1]

How long did it take you to write this book? 

Two hours. Could have taken more time if I have never used Garena.

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

We don't really have any alternatives...

[RazeG3SG1]

We don't really have any alternatives...

I suppose you play LoL in Singapore? I heard that there are people pay for VPN to play in NA servers, but I heard you are liable of being banned for doing so.

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

I suppose you play LoL in Singapore? I heard that there are people pay for VPN to play in NA servers, but I heard you are liable of being banned for doing so.

 

Yes. The game is IP locked for a reason. 

[RazeG3SG1]

Yes. The game is IP locked for a reason. 

To be honest, I know it is hard, you should jump to Dota or HoTS if you're really fed up with the company. 

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

To be honest, I know it is hard, you should jump to Dota or HoTS if you're really fed up with the company. 

 

I'm not really a fan of RTS games. So no dota or HoTS for me. I'm only playing league with my friends. I gave up on Garena quite a long time ago. 

They just fuck up everything.