Ninjas in Pyjamas - History

History

Ninjas in Pyjamas was originally formed in June 2000, but was solidified as a team in 2001 after several lineup changes and namechanges.

Their biggest success was winning the 2001 Cyberathlete Professional League World Championships after a very close final with X3 (a forerunner to Team 3D). Soon after this they had trouble finding sponsors but the solution came when they joined the prominent e-sports organization SK Gaming and were known by the names SK Scandinavia and SK Sweden during their time there. At SK they continued their success and became a dominant force in Counter-Strike. The prize money from their tournament victories in 2003 totalled approximately 170,000 U.S. dollars.

Feeling they could secure a larger share of the sponsorship money, they left SK in early 2005. Later in the year some of those players returned to SK Gaming leaving NiP to seek out new talent to replace them.

Emil Christensen, together with co-player and friend Tommy 'Potti' Ingemarssen, managing directors Peter Hedlund and Victor Lindqvist reformed NiP as a Swedish stockcompany in 2005 due to problems with the German organisation SK. The reformed NiP continued their participation in international tournaments, placing high in many of the events they attended. Emil Christensen, Peter Hedlund and Victor Lindqvist managed to take the company to the next level by closing some of the biggest sponsorship deals in the scene so far. They got about 100 000 members on their international e-sport community website in Europe during their first two years and was also the first Counter-Strike team, not from Asia, to enter the Asian market. Within six months they had about 90 000 members on their Asian website. The team have been among the most outspoken opponents of competitions changing from the original version of Counter-Strike to the newer Counter-Strike: Source.

On the 10th of August history was rewritten, Ninjas in Pyjamas announced their comeback by switching from CS 1.6 to CS: Global Offensive. As of now the roster will read as: Patrik "f0rest" Lindberg (formerly SK Gaming), Christopher "GeT_RiGhT" Alesund (formerly SK Gaming), Richard "Xizt" Landström (formerly fnatic), Robin "Fifflaren" Johansson and Adam "friberg" Friberg on the roster, the last two players coming from the Counter-Strike: Source scene. The situation is strikingly similar to that which arose in 2005 when HeatoN and Potti left SK-Gaming to revive the Ninjas in Pyjamas. It is reported the players were unhappy with the play action from SK's side, as expressed in various interviews. This also means that Xizt will leave fnatic's team success, a team he took over as captain after carn put his gun on the shelf. The Swedish-Danish team has recently won all the tournaments and went down in history as the last dominant team in 1.6 's history. The remaining players on fnatic are moddii, trace, karrigan and Friis, and it seems that fnatic 1.6 may be coming to an end. Ninjas in Pyjamas backed not surprising by ZOWIE Gear, and it appears that GeT_RiGhT has abandoned his long-time sponsor SteelSeries. But the biggest sponsors are expected to be HeatoN's own brand of computer 'Heat Gaming' and Anton Budak's 'Inferno Online'. HeatoN, who was NiP's biggest star when it came to be assumed to be the driving force behind the building along with Anton Budak, who earlier expressed interest to house its own team in the Inferno Online.