Popular Fortnite streamer Nicholas “NickEh30” Amyoony has come under fire for cheating allegations after the recent Streamer Bowl match he played in.
The charity event had a prize pool of $500,000 and was a joint effort of several big-ticket names from the streaming and NFL world.
The Streamer Bowl featured streamers as well as NFL players, all fighting for a good cause. The streamers and players were paired off into duos – one of the game formats of Fortnite. Each participant had a named charity that they donated their portion of the winnings to. The charities included, among others, St. Jude’s, the Australian Red Cross and WWF.
Cheating for Charity?
Despite its charitable goals, the Twitch Rivals Streamer Bowl was overshadowed by the cheating allegations against NickEh30. He was paired up with footballer David Morgan. Overall, the pair came in 6th, winning $30,000 – a considerable sum.
The allegations relate to a conversation caught on camera ahead of the third game of the Fortnite competition. Although it’s a little difficult to make out, Amyoony can be heard strategizing with his partner minutes before the start.
This wouldn’t be a problem, were it not for the suggestion he made about where to land. In the Twitch Rivals Streamer Bowl, there are restrictions on where players are allowed to land. If they land outside of their allotted squares, they receive a warning, similar to how fouling works in many sports. Amyoony suggested doing just that in order to get a better starting position, which violates the rules, but isn’t really punished as per the tournament format.
The definition of Cheating
Debate sparked about it fairly quickly – after all, the Twitch Rivals streamer didn’t use any sort of aim bot or similar tools to cheat. But for many, deliberately ignoring rules for an advantage still counts as cheating. While some fans simply took his action as clever strategy, others felt it wasn’t fair to the ones who landed in the suggested zone.
“I used to watch this guy here and there like a year or two ago back when i still played fortnite. Its crazy to think someone like him would do this, he comes off as the nicest most family friendly content creator but hes really just faking it...
I always felt he had a little bit of a pretentious attitude about him...” UndisputedFacts on Reddit
“All these whiteknights on Twitter make me sick. Cheating is cheating. No matter what tournament it is.” – janekay95 on
His strategy paid off – by landing outside of his area, Amyoony managed to kill a higher-ranking pair of players that didn’t expect to encounter anyone just yet.
Criticism also extended to the format of the competition itself, saying that the restrictions of landing space made it less fun to watch. Given that the Twitch Rivals Streamer Bowlwas a charity match, people were particularly upset – even the ones who felt it wasn’t cheating said it was cheap.
To me, that is playing within the rules. If you land here, you get punished. Punishment stated before tournament. If landing there outweighs the punishment, then rules need to be adjusted. If anything it might be considered cheap, since it was a charity event.
— TJ (@TJ_SoFa) January 31, 2020
Cheating is a real problem in esports – particularly Fortnite seems to have suffered its share of incidents. This sort of problem isn’t new – in fact, Fortnite publisher Epic Games was criticized last year for not punishing cheaters in the Fortnite World Cup hard enough.
What do you think? Is NickEh30 a cheater or do you think he was justified in a charity event?
