Eric Van Allen

All These Ultimates Aren’t Enough To Stop South Korea’s Overwatch Team

An onslaught of ultimates, rebuffed by a lineup featuring some of South Korea’s best. This weekend’s Overwatch World Cup qualifiers hosts some strong international talent, but South Korea has been dominating their group stage matches so far. It’s little surprise, after last year’s South Korean squad took first in the World Cup in an undefeated…

Korean League Slaps League Player On Wrist For Bragging About Salary

The League Champions Korea Operations Committee has issued a ‘caution’ penalty to SK Telecom T1’s Junsik “Bang” Bae for a reply to one of his viewers during a League of Legends stream in February 2017. The comment came after a viewer of Bae’s stream told the streamer to “work harder,” saying “Faker just got one…

Learning To Own The Arena In Splatoon 2 And Pyre

Controlling the field is a core tenet of any competition. Fighting games are about the footsies, League and Dota demand good positioning, shooters like Overwatch and Counter-Strike are as much about tactically holding or taking key areas as they are shooting accuracy. At a high-level, controlling the field of play is as important as play…

Hearthstone Streamer Uncovers Proof Of Guild Dedicated To Thwarting Him

Several times throughout his Twitch-streamed arena runs, Octavian “Kripparrian” Morosan has noticed odd things: repeating opponent names, accounts named “sniper,” and decks that seem constructed to beat his own draft. After some investigative work, Morosan found proof that this was no coincidence, uncovering a dedicated group of players who would build strong decks and wait…

The International 7 Ditches Dota 2‘s Confusing Underwater Map After Fans Complain

This year’s theme for The International is all about the ocean: there are aquatic cosmetics and a campaign about a sea-dwelling monster called Siltbreaker. But this year’s special map, Reef’s Edge, caused a stir in the Dota 2 community during TI7’s kickoff. As the group stage matches commenced yesterday, it became clear that all games…

This Week Is Prime Time To Farm Abilities In Splatoon 2

This weekend’s Splatfest isn’t just about deciding the better condiment (hint: it’s the red one), but it’s also prime time to farm up a big store of ability chunks for your competitive wardrobe. Once you’ve taken a side in the great Mayo v. Ketchup conflict in this month’s Splatoon 2 Splatfest, you receive a blank…

Gamer Cruise In Limbo After Losing Its Boat

A combination cruise/LAN party set to sail on Oct. 20 has been put on hiatus for the time being, as organizer Gamer Tech Events searches to replace an investor who pulled out in May. The cruise, dubbed the Video Gamer Gauntlet, had been accumulating partnerships months after losing the charter to its initial date. Though…

The Dota 2 Twitch channel is running some of the best games from past Internationals, leading up to the start of The International 2017. If you’re a newcomer or just want to relive Na’Vi vs. Alliance game 5, replays will be running for most of the day.

Blizzard Shows Off StarCraft: Remastered With Biggest Names In Brood War

After 20 years, StarCraft players will finally be able to see the details of the enigmatic man inside the spinning missile turret. During a showmatch event in Busan, South Korea, some of Brood War’s greatest took up the keys again to compete in the upcoming remaster. StarCraft Remastered definitely has the same vibe, but with…

League Casters Compare Future Of Healthcare To Death By Cyborg Man-Crab

The uncertain future of our nation’s health care system, or being ground to death by a giant cyborg? In a talk show-style segment that aired between games one and two of TSM vs. FlyQuest in today’s League Championship Series matches, Josh “Jatt” Leesman and Sam “Kobe” Hartman-Kenzler debated which is more terrifying: the League of Legends…

European League Team Finally Wins Its First Series Of The Summer

With a surprise showing of skill and, at one point, a miracle, the bottom-ranked team in the European League Championship Series will not end the summer winless. It took Ninjas in Pyjamas eight weeks to find its first series win after rejoining the EU LCS by way of purchasing Fnatic Academy’s spot. Many were critical…

Dota 2 Is Getting More Newbie Friendly 

A new update to Dota 2 will try to make sure new players are always matched with nice players. In a blog post, the Dota 2 team discussed two changes to the newcomer experience. First, all new accounts will be limited to a selection of 20 heroes for their first 25 games, curated for new…

70 People Ran A Super Mario 64 Relay And It Was Incredible 

At the 2017 European Speedrunner Assembly, a relay had 70 different people collecting a star each in Super Mario 64. It was pandemonium, and it was one of the most entertaining Mario runs I’ve ever seen. Speedrunners 360Chrism and Fuzzyness hosted a steady stream of Mario players, from well-known players to newcomers who had never…

What Pros Think After A Week With Splatoon 2

Splatoon 2 has been in Switch owners’ hands for almost a full week, as squeaky-clean newcomers and grizzled ink veterans alike have been tearing through countless turf wars. While the battles rage on, we wanted to chat with some top-level players to get their assessment of the sequel: What’s the best tool for inking? What’s…

ESL Lifts Lifetime Ban On Counter-Strike Match Fixers

Esports organization ESL announced on Monday a number of changes to its rules regarding cheating, doping, bribery, and most notably, match-fixing. In accordance with these changes, four former players from iBuyPower who were lifetime banned for fixing a match will be allowed to compete in ESL events After consultation with “a number of” Counter-Strike: Global…

Counter-Strike Team Caps Off Dominant Run With First-Ever Majors Win

Nine of the ten players in today’s PGL Major finals had never made it to a Valve major finals before, with one team having never qualified for a major ever. Only Danylo “Zeus” Teslenko had competed in the finals of a major prior, and he’d been snubbed twice. In a tense match between the two…

When You Want Everyone To Know You Made That Overwatch Play Of The Game

Tanks, next to supports, are the often the unsung heroes of a match. So when you make one of the bigger plays of the game, even on the main stage of the Overwatch World Cup qualifiers, it’s fine to gloat a little. During the last night’s group stage matches in the Sydney qualifiers, Sweden took…

So Here’s What Waka Flocka Thinks Of Dota 2

Rapper Waka Flocka Flame was in town for DreamHack Atlanta, performing a set at the tournament and video game convention. It so happens that Flocka is a fan of games, and so during a desk segment for a Dota 2 match between Team Secret and Planet Odd, he joined the panelists to give his thoughts…

Knife In Overtime Steals The Show At Counter-Strike Major

There’s flashy ways to win in overtime, but few as good as a leaping knife slash to ensure a bomb goes off. The PGL Major, playing out in Kraków, Poland this weekend, has had its fair share of both drama and compelling matches. In the quarterfinals between BIG and Immortals yesterday, the first game went…

Game Developer Makes Soccer Game Without Learning How Soccer Is Played

Dan Marshall set out to make a game based off a single tweet, where he admitted to having very little knowledge of how soccer is played and, frankly, not caring to learn. The result of that exercise is Behold The Kickmen (on Steam for $4), an irreverent caricature of soccer that somehow makes the full loop…