First of all stop talking like Europe has it so bad when they have it by far the best right now. Europe as a whole gets 20 invites, with the chance to attend multiple Nationals. America gets 4 invites and Japan only gets 2 and had to suffer through a very poor online qualification tournament.Uhhh what rofl
The trip to japan was worth over $5000 on its own. They've even removed the consoles this time, after downgrading them last year.
As for the trouble with the holidays, that wasn't with the airline, it was with TPCI claiming that the prize was only part of the money towards a holiday when it wasn't.
So no, these prizes are awful, we've been downsized again and Europeans especially have been shat on from a great height.
Do you know how much $3500 pays for at a British university? It doesn't even cover 2 months of tuition fees. Some Europeans don't even have to pay for university, so it's pretty much $3500 of nothing. Unless there's some way to make the money useful, it's an awful prize for people not in tertiary education.
This is our World Championships grand prize. TCG US nationals has $5000 lol that's ridiculous. Bit of proportion, please? But whatever, I'm not surprised. The only reason I still play competitive Pokémon is that I'm really good at it. And it's a lot of fun just showing up.
The trip to Japan was not worth more than $5000. It was worth exactly $5000. Anything over $5000 you had to pay for. Which you then had to pay taxes on. Which you had to endure a travel agent arranging the trip at inflated prices. This year is obviously a transition year, and having scholarships as prizes is a step in the right direction. I have been in the past and still am disappointed with the way things have gone, but this is one of the things they are doing right. We are still just a side event for TCG so it's expected that they have much better prizes.