Fragadelphia aims for comeback in CS2
It's official, Fragadelphia will be coming back and is currently in the midst of plans for a new LAN nearly one year after its last event. The most well-regarded tournament organizer in North America has told Dust2.us that Fragadelphia 18 is happening and was originally planned for this summer, but the upcoming arrival of Counter-Strike 2 has delayed plans. As Stephen "sasquatcH" Csikos tells Dust2.us "Everything is pointing to CS2."
The last event held by Fragadelphia was back in September 2022, which featured teams like BIG Academy, Evil Geniuses Black and Evil Geniuses White, and 2023 BLAST.tv Paris Major semifinalists, Apeks.
Several international teams have started attending Fragadelphia, citing the prizepool, exposure to a LAN environment, and traditional "old-school" LAN culture. At Fragadelphia 17, teams from Norway, Germany, and the United Kingdom were in attendance for the $100,000 event.
Fragadelphia, which was first held in March 2014, has seen at least one event happen every year since then, except for 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With several precautions, Fragadelphia circuit events were held in 2021 and 2022, culminating in Fragadelphia 17 offering the largest LAN prizepool in North America for an open entry event in recent memory.
Crisis occurred after Fragadelphia 17 and in the wake of the FTX collapse when Fragadelphia announced that they were no longer tied to Nerd Street, the tournament operator that had been with them in a working relationship for years. In an interview with Csikos, co-Founder of Fragadelphia, he revealed that the brand had only been "lent" to Nerd Street, but was now back under his control.
With Nerd Street facing significant financial issues, there were worries that Fragadelphia would struggle to come back in its pervious form, if at all.
However, with Csikos confirming that Fragadelphia is coming back, North American players can start to get their teams in order for one of the biggest and best events in the entire year.
