GeoGuessr has withdrawn from the Esports World Cup following significant backlash from players and map creators over the event's hosting in Saudi Arabia this summer.
GeoGuessr, a geography game that challenges players to identify their location from random spots around the globe, has garnered an impressive 85 million users. The game offers extensive customization options, allowing players to select their opponents, choose specific maps, decide between urban or rural settings, and even control movement, panning, and zooming capabilities. This flexibility, combined with a wide array of community-created custom maps, has made GeoGuessr a beloved fixture in the esports community.
However, on May 22, Zemmip, representing a significant portion of GeoGuessr's most popular map creators, initiated a "blackout" by making their maps unplayable. This protest was in response to GeoGuessr's decision to host a World Championship wildcard tournament at the Esports World Cup in Riyadh. Zemmip's statement on the GeoGuessr subreddit highlighted Saudi Arabia's human rights violations, noting that the government targets groups such as women, LGBTQ individuals, apostates, atheists, political dissenters, migrant workers under the Kafala system, and religious minorities. These groups face severe discrimination, imprisonment, torture, and public executions, which Zemmip argued are well-documented and indisputable.
"By participating in the EWC, GeoGuessr is contributing to that sportswashing agenda, which is designed to take attention away from Saudi Arabia's human rights violations," the statement asserted.
The blackout involved dozens of creators and their maps, including the majority of the most popular competitively relevant world maps. The organizers vowed to continue the blackout until GeoGuessr canceled its wildcard event in Saudi Arabia and committed to not hosting any events there as long as the oppressive regime persists.
"You don't play games with human rights," the statement concluded.
GeoGuessr has pulled out of the Esports World Cup after a backlash.
Following confusion among fans on the subreddit and social media about the map blackout, GeoGuessr issued a statement on May 22 announcing its withdrawal from the event. CEO and co-founder Daniel Antell stated, "We will not participate in the EWC. I’ve seen your reactions over the past few days regarding our decision to participate in the Esports World Cup in Riyadh."
Antell explained that the initial decision was made with the intention of engaging with the Middle Eastern community and promoting GeoGuessr's mission to "Explore the World." He emphasized the company's commitment to being community-first since its founding in 2013 by Erland, Anton, and himself.
However, he acknowledged that the community's feedback made it clear that participating in the event did not align with GeoGuessr's values. "That’s why we’ve made the decision to withdraw from participating in the Esports World Cup in Riyadh," Antell concluded, promising to provide information on wildcard distribution soon and thanking the community for their input.
The top reply on the GeoGuessr subreddit praised the decision, stating, "Now that's a 5K" — a reference to the highest possible score in the game for pinpointing an exact location.
Another comment celebrated the community's efforts, saying, "The community came together, they fought for what they wanted, and they got it done."
IGN has reached out to the Esports World Cup for a comment on GeoGuessr's withdrawal.
Despite GeoGuessr's exit, numerous other games and publishers, including Dota 2, Valorant, Apex Legends, League of Legends, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, and Rainbow Six Siege, among others, are still set to participate in the event in July.
GeoGuessr's recent release on Steam faced initial criticism, debuting as the second-worst-rated game of all time on the platform. Players were frustrated by missing features in the supposedly free-to-play version, such as the inability to play solo for practice. The free amateur mode is reportedly filled with bots rather than real players, and paid features from the browser version do not transfer to the Steam version. Despite these issues, the game's rating has since improved to the seventh-worst-rated on Steam.
