This weekend marks the end of the first World Electronic Sports Games finals, with several tournaments across Dota 2, Hearthstone, and more featuring giant prize pools thanks to the event’s deep-pocketed organizers.
Unlike your regular esports tournament, WESG 2016 teams each represent a country, much like the World Cup. It also takes place it China, so prepare to stay up late and wake up early if you’re in the West.
Looking beyond the money, however, the first DreamHack event of the year is also this weekend, as well as the start of the 2GG’s Smash Bros. Championship Series. Without further ado then, here’s where and when you can catch all the weekends biggest events in competitive gaming. Let me know what you’ll be watching in the comments and if you think there’s something I missed.
Dota 2
WESG 2016's giant Dota 2 tournament is coming to a conclusion in China this weekend. After a brutal slog through the group stage and knockout round, two teams of the original twenty four will meet in the grand finals to see who will take home $800,000 of the $1.5 million prize pool. The tournament teams consist of players who are all from the same country, so while the finals have come down to Cloud9 vs. TNC Pro Team, the best-of-five contest doubles as a duel between Denmark and the Philippines.
The series will take place tonight at 10:00PM EST, followed by the third-place series between Sweden’s Alliance and Peru’s Infamous will take place at 1:00AM EST tomorrow morning. All the matches can be found here.
Hearthstone
WESG 2016 is also home to a big Hearthstone tournament that will also be concluding this weekend. First place takes home a healthy $150,000, with each mode played to a best-of-five using the “conquest” format, under which players must win one with each of their three decks.
The grand finals and third place matches will take place tonight at 10:00PM EST, and will be streamed live here.
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
It’s a big weekend for Counter-Strike, with both the WESG 2016 coming to a close and the opening of DreamHack Leipzig 2017. In the CS:GO WESG 2016 World Finals, Kinguin face Virtus.pro at 10:00PM EST tonight, with EnVyUs vs. Space Soldiers taking place at the same time. The third place match will follow at 1:00AM EST tomorrow morning, and the grand finals will be held at 5:30AM the same day. $800,000 awaits the winners. You can stream all of those matches, as well as earlier games from the tournament, here.
Meanwhile in Germany, the action is underway with LDLC facing FNC.A today at 12:00PM EST, followed by Vega vs. BIG at 3:00PM EST. The semifinals will begin tomorrow at 5:00AM EST, with the grand finals set to begin at 9:30AM EST. A less extravagant prize of $50,000 will go to the DreamHack winners.
All the remaining games can be watched live in the stream below.
StarCraft II
Featuring a prize pool of $402,000 and ton of teams, the WESG 2016 StarCraft II tournament has be spectacular to see unfold so far. After Canadian fan-favorite Sasha “Scarlett” Hostyn fell to South Korea’s Cho “Maru” Seong Ju in the quarterfinals, the semifinals will now see Maru go up against Germany’s Tobias “ShoWTimE” Sieber and America’s Alex “Neeb” Sunderhaft face-off against South Korea’s Jun “TY” Tae Yang.
The semifinals will begin at 11:00PM EST tonight, followed the grand finals at 3:30AM EST tomorrow morning. All the matches can be streamed here.
Smash Bros.
The 2GGC: Genesis Saga kicks off today, with entrants like ZeRo, VoiD, MKleo, and komorikiri going head-to-head in Smash 4 with a $2,000 pot bonus. The event will go towards promoting Genesis 4, the first big Smash event of 2017 taking place next weekend.
Matches begin today starting with doubles at 1:00PM EST, followed by singles at 3:00PM EST. Top 8 play will take place around 9:00PM EST. You can watch all of the matches here.
League of Legends
The EU CS Qualifier Finals conclude this weekend, with the top two teams advancing to the EU Challenger Series. Games will be played on patch 6.24 and still utilize the old 6-ban system (the new 10-ban system won’t be used until the start of the CS Spring Split).
The final matches will occur starting at 8:00AM EST tomorrow morning, and be available to watch live here.
Splatoon
So your psyched for Splatoon 2 to be coming to the Nintendo Switch later this year? No worries, because even though that release is still months away, you can watch the first game at its best in the Turficane 4 tournament going on this weekend. Play begins at 12:00PM EST with over over 200 entrants battling more for glory than for money.
All the matches will be streamed live here.