As the year progressed towards the world championship in Berlin, Team Liquid found its form. In the , Team Liquid defeated Giants Gaming to take the title. Ultimately, Europe sent Acend, Fnatic, and Team Liquid to the $1,000,000 Valorant Champions finals in December 2021.
In the summer of 2021, a collective of talented individuals from across the continent convened in Amsterdam for an event branded as . Hosted in a state-of-the-art studio, the gathering was designed to celebrate creativity and innovation within the digital "casting" and streaming sectors.
The match went to a full 5-map series. In the final map ( Neon Alley ), Los Fuegos was down 12–8 (match point for the Nordics). What followed was the greatest comeback in Casted history. The Spanish team won 6 rounds in a row, taking the map 14–12 and the championship €150,000. casted europe 2021
Perhaps the most explosive story was the pay dispute. Veteran caster Mitch "Uber" Leslie went on a passionate rant regarding tournament organizers undercutting talent. He revealed that some events were holding "casting challenges" where the winners would cast Closed Qualifiers for no payment at all . Uber argued that if an organizer lacked a budget for broadcasting, they should not broadcast at all, rather than devalue the labor of the talent.
Casted didn't just enter Europe in 2021; it gave European marketers the tools to finally be heard. As the year progressed towards the world championship
With a record-breaking on the line, the responsibility on the casting desks was immense. Because safety protocols barred fans from filling the stadium, the on-air talent became the primary bridge between the intense matches and the millions watching via streaming platforms like the Dota 2 Twitch Channel . The Voices of an Unprecedented Underdog Story
While Casted focused on B2B podcasting, the European podcasting ecosystem was heating up in 2021 with significant activity among consumer-focused platforms. Notably, Podimo, a Copenhagen-founded podcast subscription platform, raised €11.2 million in February 2021 and later secured $78 million in Series B funding in November 2021 to enter new European markets and expand its content catalog. This indicated strong investor confidence in the podcasting space across Europe. In the summer of 2021, a collective of
By integrating with hubs like HubSpot and Adobe , Casted allowed European sales and marketing teams to finally speak the same language.
By 2021, remote casting became standard practice rather than a temporary emergency measure. Casting directors across Europe heavily utilized digital platforms for initial auditions. This shift reduced the reliance on in-person auditions in major hubs like London, Paris, and Berlin, allowing talent from smaller European markets to audition for major roles without travel constraints [1]. While this broadened the pool of potential actors, it necessitated new skills for actors, who had to become proficient in self-taping and virtual chemistry reads [1].