The time is here to take a look back at the CS:GO going-ons of last week, and what a week we have in the rearview mirror this time… It seems like every week there’s more and more to report on, as majors come and go and various pro teams shuffle their rosters. The headline-stealer of the week was the MLG Columbus, obviously, the first-ever major held in North America, the first ever to feature a $1 million prize-pool and the first ever to be won by a Brazilian team.
Indeed, the winner of the MLG Columbus was Luminosity Gaming, who overcame Natus Vincere in the finals, following a surprising 2-0 effort. The two maps on which the Brazilian success unfolded were de_Mirage and de_Overpass. While on the former, the battle went to an overtime, the latter turned out to be quite lopsided as Na’Vi could only take two rounds on it. The winner’s share of the prize-pool was $500k, which is probably a record haul too, certainly for Luminosity it is…
April 1st is always an opportunity for everyone to pull practical jokes on whomever is listening/available, and that’s exactly what a number of eSports teams did. Ninjas in Pyjamas coach Bjorn “THREAT” Pers announced for instance that he would become a starter for his organization, while Jacob “pyth” Mourojarvi tweeted that he was out of the lineup and moving to CoD. ESL have made a few prank announcements concerning weapons, maps and tournament rules of their own too. Some of these false news were so credible that they had part of the fan-base up in arms before their true nature was revealed.
In other – more serious – news: Asian retailer Alibaba have announced that they were getting into eSports hook, line and sinker apparently, through their AliSports organization, the goal of which would be to link up sports with technology in a move to “enhance the quality of life”. To start off, the retailer announced it would organize its own premier eSports tournament called the World Electronic Sports Games, and that it would put up a $5.5 million prize-pool. The pool would cover games like CS:GO, HearthStone and DotA. It does indeed look like more and more major actors are recognizing the value and growth-potential in the eSports vert and they’re making moves to position themselves for the coming eSports revolution.
In still other news: FaZe put in a rather dismal performance at the MLG Columbus and someone has already emerged to take responsibility for the drubbing the team suffered at the hands of Team Liquid and Fnatic. Mikail “Maikelele” Bill said he would be leaving the team. No other information is currently available on the move, nothing about Maikelele’s replacement or his future plans either.
In the meantime, Torpedo Gaming’s quest for a 5th player has come to an end: Mattias “malle” Lindberg’s replacement will apparently be Erik “zende” Sundeqvist, whose trial period has come to an end. Zende is a true professional indeed: he has stints at FlipSid3 Tactics, Copenhagen Wolves and Team Property under his belt, so experience will definitely not be a problem on his part.