Blizzard doesn’t want a hero limit although many players and tournament organizers do. What are the arguments on both sides of the debate? MOBAs follow the convention of only allowing one or two unique heroes on a map. Why is Overwatch giving free reign? After all, the character element came …
Read More »The top 10 players competing at Evo 2016
In two days, over 15,000 contenders will gather to compete in the world’s largest fighting game tournament: the Evolution Championship Series (Evo). This year, the event’s set of nine titles includes Street Fighter V, Super Smash Bros. Melee, Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, Mortal Kombat X, Ultimate Marvel vs. …
Read More »A basic comparison of champion select trends across five major regions
Until recently, draft phases had become homogenized internationally. Watching a game in a given major league followed the same patterns. Spectators expressed irritation that "everyone was just copying Korea." That seems to have changed this summer, as teams within leagues and leagues themselves have begun to prioritize different picks. Looking …
Read More »Regulating The Billion-Dollar ESports World Is Nearly Impossible
There’s a new Esports sheriff in town, ready to combat the influx of gamblers and would-be match fixers that have descended upon the burgeoning, soon-to-be $1.9 billion dollar industry, hoping to stem the tide of rigged games that have plagued the world of professional gaming of late. Read more on …
Read More »Kjaerbye and karrigan talk new Astralis roster
Perhaps the biggest and most surprising roster change in Counter-Strike this year was the transfer of Markus Kjaerbye” Kjrbye from Team Dignitas to Astralis and Rene cajunb” Borg going in the other direction. At the time, both sides were struggling and seemed to be in need of some kind of …
Read More »SK Gaming’s Coldzera is MVP of ESL One Cologne
SK Gaming claimed their second back-to-back CS:GO Major this weekend after defeating Team Liquid in the ESL One Cologne finals. Though under the Luminosity Gaming banner for April’s MLG Columbus, the same Brazilian squad have cemented their place at the top of the pack as we head into a new …
Read More »Splyce wants to change the European narrative in Call of Duty
Splyce has heard it all before: the jeers from North American fans and the disinterest from analysts when the discussion inevitably shifts to the Call of Duty European scene. For Splyce’s shot caller Joshua-Lee "Joshh" Sheppard, it almost becomes second nature. "It’s a topic that always comes up in conversation …
Read More »Removing auto-relegation enables mediocrity
I’ve never understood American professional sports. The franchising system, the cornerstone of most U.S. sports leagues, makes teams permanent members of a league, rewarding mediocrity and penalizing success. This is vastly different to most European sports leagues, which feature promotion, relegation, and little-to-no connection between organization and league. As such, …
Read More »GamerMania officially cancelled but new event set for 2017
New video games expo GamerMania has been cancelled. It was set to take place between July 29th and August 1st at London Excel. The event was being organised by MCM, the team behind the successful Comic Con events in May and October. GamerMania was announced in September last year as …
Read More »Building the Crescendo: an interview with King Caffeine
After a run of poor results during the summer leg of the Heroes of the Storm Global Circuit, the former world champion team Cloud9 has disbanded. Both Kun iDream” Fang and Derek DunkTrain” Arabian have retired from competitive play, leaving Keiwan k1pro” Itakura and John Paul King Caffeine” Lopez to …
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