Upcomer confirms that Natus Vincere is set to enter VALORANT with a CIS roster, as first stated by former Gambit analyst “k1n3c7.”
While Na’Vi is looking to field a roster in their home region, the organization initially considered a European side.
While the roster remains incomplete, former Crow Crowd player Kirill “Cloud” Nehozhin will spearhead Na’Vi’s VALORANT roster, according to one source.
It remains unknown whether Na’Vi will secure a full team in time for the VCT CIS Stage 3: Challengers 1. This upcoming event is to begin on June 28. Placement inside of the top two would earn qualification to the EMEA Challengers Playoffs in August of 2021.
However, Na’Vi, like most organizations without a VALORANT roster, could remain skeptical of the monetization strategy in Riot’s first-person shooter. In a 2020 interview with cyberslovo.ru, Na’Vi’s Chief Operating Officer Aleksey “xaoc” Kucherov said “there is no clear monetization [opportunity] for organizations.”
Since then, VALORANT developer and tournament organizer Riot Games has completed one of the most successful offline events this year. This could have incentivized the move, however.
The first international event, VCT Stage 2 Masters — held in Reykjavík, Iceland — boasted almost 1.1 million peak viewers, according to EsportsCharts.
Na’Vi will become one of the major CIS organizations in VALORANT. Gambit Esports and forZe — both well known from their highly competitive CS:GO teams — each field a CIS roster in VALORANT.
This story is breaking.
