Rocket League Championship Series


The Rocket League Championship Series is a biannual Rocket League video game tournament series produced by Psyonix, the game's developer. It consists of qualification rounds in North America, South America, Europe, and Oceania, and culminates in a playoff bracket with teams from those regions. The qualification rounds are played as an online round-robin tournament and the finals are played live in different cities. The Season 9 championship in 2020 was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with other online events being held in place of it.

History

Psyonix had observed the popularity of Rocket League matches on Twitch and other live streaming platforms by early 2016 and were looking to use the game more in esports. In March 2016, Psyonix announced the first Rocket League Championship Series; the finals took place in August 2016 with a 55,000 prize pool. The second season of the championship series took place in December 2016 with a $125,000 prize pool. A third series began in March 2017, with the $300,000 prize pool finals taking place three months later. In this season, two teams from the oceanic region were also invited to compete.
A second division, the Rocket League Rival Series, was added in Season 4. The two teams finishing at the bottom of the RLCS and the two teams finishing at the top of the RLRS for each region play each other in a promotion tournament at the end of the season to determine if teams are promoted or relegated. At the advent of Season 5 in June 2018, Psyonix organised and managed the event alone. Previous to this, they partnered with Twitch. Season 6 started in September 2018 and featured a million dollar prize pool. For Season 7, Psyonix introduced South America as a new region. Season 8 took place in December 2019. The Season 9 championship was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with winners of the regional championships being considered the champions. In July 2020, Psyonix announced a new format for the tenth season of RLCS, known as RLCS X. This format league play in favor of teams earning points through three regional splits, all culminating in three seasonal majors.

Results