ESPORTS WEEKLY UPDATE – STORIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED!
It’s been another full on week in eSports! WarOwl took us through one of the most nail-biting matches in CS:GO history with Team Liquid and Luminosity at MLG Columbus. Valve keep us excited about the future as they announce they’re plans to combine two of the hottest buzztrends in gaming into one: spectating and VR! The first ever Team Co-Ownership eSports league is set to launch through a partnership between FACEIT and Twitch, and Luminosity Wins MLG Columbus CS:GO Major. Read on for the full low down.
Esports makes up 21.3% of Twitch’s viewers
Esports is becoming a big deal in driving online video traffic. Market researcher Newzoo said today that esports drives 21.3 percent of viewership on livestreaming site Twitch, which has grown to more than 100 million viewers a month.
And while Twitch’s creation of a market of game spectatorship is often credited for the dawn of esports, there’s plenty of evidence to show that esports is helping Twitch grow even more massive. Newzoo estimates that fans watched 475.5 million hours of esports content across all franchises from July 2015 to December 2015. The average viewing time was 79 million hours per month.
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Valve will let you watch Dota 2 games in virtual reality
Valve is about to combine two of the hottest buzztrends in gaming into one: spectating and VR. Its own Dota 2 title, rivaled in popularity as a spectator e-sport only by Riot’sLeague of Legends, will get a VR spectator mode.
The mode is teased briefly in a supercut on Valve’s SteamVR website of upcoming VR features being added to your “favorite games.” The video shows a standard e-sports-style stream of a Dota 2 match hanging in space, with a 3D minimap of the game sitting in front, full-sized avatars of the players on the right and left, and holographic infographics available at a viewer’s Vive controller fingertips.
Dota 2 is already best-in-class when it comes to spectating — you can watch pro and amateur games from inside the game client, giving you freedom of camera movement and all sorts of wonky stats without relying on a professional broadcast to provide the information to you through a static video stream.
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The British government wants to create the Olympics of esports
The British government has backed an international committee to establish the eGames, an Olympic-style competition pitting countries against each other.
At an esports summit opened by secretary for culture Ed Vaizey, the International eGames Committee (IEGC) was announced as a non-profit organization advised by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
The inaugural games will be held in Rio de Janeiro, alongside the 2016 Olympics this Summer, with future games to be held during Olympic years in the host cities. The current plan is to use the same Olympic venues of future events but one month after the games themselves.
The first “pop-up” event in Rio will feature four “eTeams” from Brazil, Great Britain, Canada and the U.S.A but it is hoped future events will have a global representation.
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FACEIT and Twitch Partner to Launch First Esports League with Team Co-Ownership
LONDON and SAN FRANCISCO – April 6, 2016 – FACEIT, the world’s leading competitive gaming platform, in partnership with Twitch, the world’s leading social video platform and community for gamers, is launching a revolutionary esports initiative, the Esports Championship Series (ECS). The initiative’s flagship league, ECS – Counter-Strike, signifies a giant leap forward in the evolution of esports, as it will be the first professional esports league to offer teams co-ownership, like many traditional professional sports leagues. The league will consist of 20 teams (10 from North America and 10 from Europe) and will kick off today with a pre-show at 8:30am PT/11:30am ET and game time at 9:00am PT/12:00pm ET with US$3.5M in payout for prize money and team financial support.
“Players and teams are the heart of the esports community and deserve the opportunity to reap the rewards of their hard work and dedication to grow esports into a mainstream phenomenon,” said Michele Attisani, co-founder of FACEIT. “We make the community our first priority and as such, we’re excited to support the first esports league that positions teams as co-owners.”
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Luminosity Wins MLG Columbus CS:GO Major
The biggest, and best MLG CS:GO major thus far was just won by Luminosity Gaming. It was a hard fought and challenging victory but there’s nothing like seeing the joy on these guy’s faces. Luminosity is the first team ever from South America to win a CS:GO major as well as the only team not from Europe to ever win a major as well. The team will take home 500,000 in cold hard cash.
Coldzera won MVP of the tournament and rightfully so after some great performances, and one of the biggest eSports moments ever.
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THE BETTING FIGURES BEHIND E-SPORTS: MORE WAGERS WILL BE PLACED ON LEAGUE OF LEGENDS THAN CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
With astronomical attendance figures and constantly growing, seven-figure prize pools, E-Sports, or competitive computer gaming, is rapidly carving a reputation as the world’s fastest growing sport. So much so, that betting turnover on League of Legends has eclipsed Champions League winner market takings so far in 2016.
Fanatics and detractors could debate the validity of the aforementioned statement at tedious lengths, but we’re not here to do that so it’s going to stand for now.
Indeed, on a certain scale, League of Legends wager-making could potentially surpass the Champions League in terms of bets placed.
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MITHICAL ENTERTAINMENT VISITS RIOT GAMES HQ
“I’ve never been that good at League of Legends. Botched skill-shots, overcommitment, tower dives…you name it, I’ve committed pretty much every cardinal sin that n00b players can. Still, I come back for more punishment on a regular basis just because it’s so damn fun to play. Since its creation in 2008, League has seen many game modes come and go, champions introduced, discontinued, nerfed, buffed and revamped.
I’ve followed the game and the company behind it, Riot Games, pretty closely over the last 8 years. So you can imagine that when I was asked if I’d like to tour the headquarters of Riot Games, I nodded so hard I gave myself whiplash.
he opportunity presented itself after a chance encounter with Erika Olsen, executive assistant, at the Psycho Pass premiere about a month ago. I had just reached out to Riot asking about media access barely a week before, so when Erika handed me her Riot Games business card I just about fell over.”
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Biggest Choke in Counter-Strike History?
