Small fact, big trends, trivia… Here’s what happened this week in Esport
If you can’t beat, be it
The “Sports vs Esports” rivalry is slowly dying, as numerous traditional sports households are simply getting into Esports.
After West Ham, Sampdoria, Besiktas and Shalke, the Valencia Football Club just announced and introduced its Esport team. All these clubs came at the right time: Esports are both big enough to invest in and small enough to invest moderately.
Back at it again, Russia
Without any announcement, Russia has officially recognized Esports. To be more specific, Russia recognized again Esports. The country did it already in 2000 but then retracted in 2006.
Sixteen years later, it changed its mind again and hope it’ll stay this way. Virtus.Pro, Russia’s biggest Esport organization, will be able to spend its millions dollars with a lighthearted mind.
Killing the Fatality killer
That’s a first: a team forbid its Mortal Kombat player Scar from performing to displaying on stream any Fatality, these gory finishing move that made Mortal Kombat so (in)famous.
Facing the expected community backlash, team Panda Global U-turned and killed the clause. We’ll never know how they killed it, tho. More seriously, this little drama shows one the ongoing Esport debates about on-screen violence and the will to go mainstream. As the ESL always claims, “It’s a family show, guys”. But do we really want it ?
Play (of) the Game
Another player went into trouble. Talented but unstable LoL player Konstantinos “FORG1VEN” Tzortziou was just benched by his club Origen. The team cited “motivation issues” in its official statement. The player cited “Overwatch” on its Facebook post.
If this isn’t the definitive sign the latest Blizzard shooter is on its way to become a huge Esport… You won’t escape the hype, even on Facebook.
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