Cheating, even at the pro level, has been an issue in esports since the early days of Quake and Street Fighter. Players using aim assist, wallhacks, or even throwing games have also been problems in the gaming community today. However, dodging opponents in online matches is a new one for sure, and that’s precisely the core of the stream sniping problem ravaging the FIFA North American pro scene right now.

According to allegations and pictures from FIFA YouTuber Nick ‘RunTheFUTMarket’ on Twitter, pro FIFA players in the region have been utilizing a Discord server to stream snipe opponents of their choice and dodge each other.

In the case of Nick, they were actively trying to snipe him while he streamed to match-up and defeat him since he’s a lower level player and thus easier to beat.

The Impact of FIFA Stream Sniping

This method of dodging opponents is allowing the players to climb the ladder and qualify for big events without coming into contact beforehand with other pros and gives them the ability to somewhat control who gets into these events.

Since FIFA and EA events only care about top scores for qualifying, and you can dodge games as much as you want, these pros can dump on low-skill players to boost their scores, making them look better than they are and easing their path to qualifying.

Nick also alleges the server, which was initially founded as a practice server, houses up to 50 NA pros and a good number eMLS (the Major League Soccer esports scene) players. This means an astronomically high number of big names in the scene could be caught up in the FIFA stream sniping scandal.

Even worse, the founder of the Discord server is allegedly one of the eMLS teams’ coaches, an even more damning accusation than just the pros being involved.

Those are massive allegations to make, and Nick backs it up by name dropping those involved in his video. He noted the game could not be competitively viable if this is allowed to go on. He called on EA to do something about this stream sniping ring.

EA has yet to respond to the allegations against the pros at this time. We’ll continue to keep you all updated as the situation develops.