Esports

Let Geguri Live

This past week, 18-year-old Kim “Geguri” Se-yeon took to Twitter to say that she felt ugly and fat. This is pretty standard for someone in that age bracket; Geguri just is the first female player signed to an Overwatch League team, expected to make her competitive debut as Shanghai Dragons’ new flex tank next week.…

Why aren’t more black kids going pro in esports? Latoya Peterson digs into this question in a piece on The Undefeated and reaches the conclusion that the PC/console divide has also become a racial divide—one with big implications in terms of how much money players can make. “This divide isn’t sacrosanct,” she writes. “Clearly there…

One Of Overwatch League’s Most Popular Players Hasn’t Played At All This Season

Despite a lengthy history in Overwatch’s pre-Overwatch League pro scene and a Twitch following of more than 250,000 fans, San Francisco Shock player André “Iddqd” Dahlström has yet to play in a single official OWL match. He’s been on the bench for the entirety of the season, only briefly donning his team’s signature Naruto-orange duds…

Dragon Ball FighterZ Shows Its Versus DNA With The Discovery Of Infinite Combos

Despite using a different property, Dragon Ball FighterZ is probably the closest thing that fighting games have to a true Versus title at the moment. These ties recently became even more apparent with the discovery of infinite combos. These infinite combos, or strings of attacks that can continue indefinitely, first started popping up on social…

Overwatch League Star Says He Missed Games With “Stress And Panic Disorder”

The New York Excelsior’s Kim “Pine” Do-hyeon was the star of the Overwatch League season’s first quarter, but conspicuously absent since. After the Excelsior won the second-stage title, Pine said that his absence from the team was because depression, stress, and a panic disorder stopped him from practicing. The English text reads: I feel very…

New York Beats Philly To Win Overwatch League Stage 2 Title

After five weeks of games, the New York Excelsior found itself in the stage title match again, this time against the Philadelphia Fusion. This time though, it was New York who would pull off the reverse sweep, taking the stage 2 title and prize in an exciting 3-2 finish. The Fusion came in hot off…

Dota Team Sweeps Finals, Has A Quick Jam Session

Team Secret entered today’s DreamLeague grand finals off an undefeated run through the winner’s bracket. In a final series against Fnatic, Secret kept the streak alive, and celebrated with a little music. Secret has held a high spot in the Dota 2 pro circuit for most of the season so far, and a win today…

Great Minds Think Alike In Dragon Ball FighterZ

It’s like synchronized martial arts. In last night’s Dragon Ball FighterZ finals at Thaiger Uppercut 2018, two players who both ran Adult Gohan figured out that they were fighting with a similar set of tools. When two hits collide like that, it’s referred to as a “clash,” and it’s been around longer than you might…

Well-Timed Rocket League Respawn Thwarts Goal Attempt

Rocket League is a game with very little randomness. It’s mostly about the physics of rocket-powered cars slamming into giant balls. But during today’s Rocket League championship series matches, the one aspect of randomness in the game made a surprise appearance: respawning. When your car is hit hard enough by a player, it gets demolished…

Dota Pro Breaks Record By Playing 108 Different Heroes

Kuro “Kuroky” Salehi Takhasomi broke a record yesterday by simply picking a single hero, and he continued to widen the lead today. Among the 115 heroes currently in Dota 2, Kuroky has played 108 of them at least once in a competitive Dota game. Over the last few days, Kuroky has played a number of…

Korean League of Legends Team Dealt An Emotional Loss On Road To Playoffs

In League Champions Korea, the potential fate of two team’s playoff hopes came down to a single match and a very emotional outcome. KSV has not had the easiest road to travel in the League of Legends Korean championships. After a strong start to the year, the team started slipping in the standings. For the…

The Weekend In Esports: So Long, Stage 2

We’re almost halfway done with the Overwatch League’s inaugural season. While this stage had its fair share of highs and lows, the real standouts for me are the two teams who will be vying for the third spot in the stage playoffs this weekend: the Philadelphia Fusion and the LA Gladiators. The Fusion got off…

Overwatch League’s Code Of Conduct Got Leaked [UPDATE]

Esports broadcaster Richard Lewis posted a scanned hard copy of what he says is the Overwatch League rulebook today—about two months after commissioner Nate Nanzer said he would but still hasn’t done so. What the 35-page leaked documents show is incredibly sweeping. If these rules are still in place, it means that Blizzard owns the…

Overwatch League Star’s Long Break Is Well Deserved

Most everyone who watches professional Overwatch remembers the January night when “Big Boss” Kim “Pine” Do-hyeon casually laid waste to an entire enemy team like he was a grown adult at a county fair popping balloons with darts. Pine’s celebrity grew as his wild, risky plays became even wilder and riskier. Then, without much warning,…

Why Was The Pac-12 Esports League Killed Before It Started?

Tune in every weeknight to the University of Utah Esports Twitch stream and you can catch players from universities across the Pacific-12 conference competing in League of Legends, Hearthstone and Rocket League. It is the first league of its kind, an organization bringing together schools from a major conference for esports competitions. The Pacific Alliance…

Major Fighting Game Tournament Completes Its Final Round

In a lengthy announcement, Final Round tournament organizer Larry “Shin Blanka” Dixon revealed that the flagship event series will come to an end. After two decades, the fighting game community has lost one of its most prominent competitive arenas. When Dixon took to Facebook after wrapping up the twentieth installment of Final Round this past…

How Esports Gambling Works

The first few months of Overwatch League’s inaugural season have already resulted in unexpected upsets, emerging tactics, and drama between players that has resulted in pros getting fined, benched, or released from teams. That stuff isn’t just fun to follow and grist for the content mines: it’s moving betting lines. Overwatch is the newest league…

An Overwatch Pro Is Turning The Game’s Zen Monk Into A Vicious Killer

Overwatch’s healer-monk Zenyatta floats cross-legged while delivering voice lines like “embrace tranquility” and “be one with the universe.” He was a frail, peace-loving healer, it seemed—until Sung-hyeon “JJonak” Bang’s January debut in the Overwatch League. Four days after the League launched, JJonak’s Zenyatta exacted an absolutely bonkers 10,764 damage, 24% of his entire team’s output…

Dragon Ball FighterZ Titans Collide Again In Extraordinary Finals

It was only fitting that Dominique “SonicFox” McLean and Goichi “Go1″ Kishida meet again in this weekend’s Dragon Ball FighterZ tournament. Avoiding each other all the way until the grand finals, it was the anime legend Goichi who managed to edge out the young prodigy and cement his status at the top of the FighterZ…

Pokkén Player Invades Broadcast, Cuts Fire Promo, Loses Every Match

During pool play at Final Round 2018 yesterday, one Pokkén Tournament player took the opportunity to take the mic and deliver some choice words for his next opponent. Whether a work or a genuine mic-grab, Franke “2PlayRough” Sisto delivers a WWE-caliber promo about determination and proving his mother wrong. “I’m put up against an opponent…