These are just some thoughts and views about ‘Gaming’ in general. Its spectator qualities; how those can be overcome. What is required for the mainstream, and perhaps why the mainstream cannot adapt to this ‘new form’ of entertainment and therefore how the entertainment must be changed to conform to mainstream ideals. This article was inspired by the recent discussion on the GGL ranking system, particularly the views of JonJay and Red. (Reference 2)

Reference:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/game-theory/
http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=995417
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_World_Cyber_Games

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Demos for the Icemat 2nd Edition Review. Rather these note appear on the ESR page.

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Most likely one of the last Quake3 1v1 tournament is taking place this summer, at ES World Cup 2005 in Paris, France. The staff of Ligarena selected 24 star players to compete versus each other in this tournament. Some very surprising and old school players has been selected and will be fighting each other from the 6th until the 10th of July 2005 for a first place worth $6000.

ESWC first announced that they would invite 16 players, but now they decided to invite 24 players, which gives the opportunity for more players to compete at this tournament. The 24 selected players are pretty surprising; new and old school players has been selected.


The invite list looks very impressive with some familiar faces which could lead to some very interesting matches. Unfortunately there are also a few big names missing, for example ZeRo4. The biggest surprise on the list is the well known German player sl1nger, who was very successful in TDM during the primetime of the ClanBase EuroCup. He managed to win the EuroCup three times in a row, with Unmatched (EC2 & EC3) and also with SK Gaming (EC4).

Note: All the players still need to confirm that they are able to attend the event.

Today saw the launch of the new Fnatic website, replacing the temporary home that had been host to team news. While this new site is still a work in progress and bug reports are encouraged, there are many interesting new features, notably the ability for visitors to create their own user accounts and write blogs. Other additions include demo downloads, player blogs and an extensive set of galleries featuring snapshots from all recent World Tour events. This site will be almost exclusively reserved for reporting developments related to the Fnatic gaming teams, but in the coming months look out for the launch of Club Fnatic, a community site that will act independently from its team based counterpart. Following that will be Fnatic Depot, dedicated to hosting files of interest to competitive gamers; Fnatic Media, providing media to esports fans; and finally Fnatic Outlet, which will serve as a retail centre.

www.fnatic.com | #fnatic.team on Quakenet

SK Gaming GmbH (SK)
Company type: german Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung (German Limited)
Nationality: International but German based
Sponsors: Intel, ATI, Sennheiser, Shuttle, Razer, Steelpad/Icemat.
website: www.SK-Gaming.com

Four Kings Ltd. (4K)
Company type: Limited (Ltd) UK
Nationality: British based team, with international squads.
Sponsors: Intel, ATI, Steelpad/Icemat.
website: www.Four-Kings.com

OCRANA e.V. (OCR)
Company type: eingetragener Verein (e.V.) - German
Nationality: German only
Sponsors: ATI, Plantronics
website: ww.ocrana.de

Team Dignitas Ltd. (d)
Company type: Limited (Ltd) - UK
Nationality: German / UK
Sponsors: ABIT
website: www.team-dignitas.com

mTw Gaming GmbH (mTw)
Company type: german Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung (German Limited)
Nationality: German based, but also internationally
Sponsors: ATI, Indiweb
website: www.mymTw.com

Against All Authority (aAa)
Company type: Not registered company
Nationality: French Only
Sponsors: XS Arena, Sennheiser
website: www.team-aaa.com

Fnatic Pty. Ltd.
Company type: Proprietary Limited (Pty Ltd) - Australian company
Nationality: International - Mainly based in the Netherlands
Sponsors: None.
website: www.fnatic.com

Eyeballers Ltd. (EYE)
Company type: Limited (Ltd) - UK
Nationality: Swedish only
Sponsors: RIX Telecom, Corepad, BetOG, datorbutiken.com, Colorcase, Razer, Cooler Master
website: www.eyeballers.com

mousesports (mouz) (part of Freaks 4U GmbH)
Company type: german Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung (German Limited)
Nationality: German only
Sponsors: BenQ, AOpen, Levicom
website: www.mousesports.de

Team 3D Inc. (3D)
Company type: Incorperated (Inc.) - USA
Nationality: American
Sponsors: NVIDIA, Sennheiser, Xfire, PNY
website: www.team3d.net

Team 64 AMD (64AMD)
Company type: Not registered.
Nationality: German
Sponsors: AMD, Corsair, PNY, Logitech, Maxtor, Creative
website: www.team64AMD.com

Check Six LLC (x6)
Company type: Limited Liability Corporation (USA)
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

a-Losers (aL)
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

e-stars AB (e*)
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

riZe Gaming Ltd. (rZ)
Company type: Limited (Ltd)
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

A.S. Play It (play.it)
Company type: Sports Association (AS)
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

Meet Your Makers(MYM)
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

x6tence (x6)
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

United Five (u5) Ltd.
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

Team Pentagram
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

SSV-Lehnitz e.V.
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

compLexity
Company type:
Nationalities:
Sponsors:
website:

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The Russian top WarCraft 3 player apm70 has a signed a contract at SK Gaming. The Russian star player will leave Team 64AMD to represent SK Gaming in the upcoming events. The sixteen year old player needs to bring SK on the top of the prestigious WC3L. He intends to play some strong solo games for SK and also play together with a mate for two-versus-two matches again. "I will do my best in the solo lineup and I want start playing 2v2 with someone from SK. So I hope I will add some special points to the team, like I did with Cara in the WC3L finals in Denmark." Said the new Russian face of SK.

Not to long ago he went from armaTeam Intel to Team 64AMD. Enrique leaving the top German multi gaming team was for apm70 a big reason to call it a quit as well in T64 AMD. “The reason why I wanted to join SK is that Enrique left T64, he was a spirit in the team and now I want to be with him and together bring SK to the top 1 in WC3L and MCL.” Adds amp70.

The international WarCraft 3 team of SK Gaming counts 15 players now. The squad is still full of top names, even though the star player MadFrog is retired. However, there is not one SK player competing in the Samsung European Cyber Games, the European edition of the World Cyber Games, which takes place at the Cebit fair in Hannover, Germany this weekend.
The multi gaming team Four Kings is represented with three players at the CeBit; Grubby, Zeus and ToD.
The Dutchman is the biggest favourite to win the WarCraft 3 competition.

The Swedish powerhouse NiP Gaming announced their newest addition in the lineup yesterday, after Eyeballers announced that vilden will no longer be part of the team. “We were disappointed in the results at Optihack and have been discussing some changes to improve our team to the max.” Was stated on Eyeballers.com.

NiP picked up the very talented Counter-Strike player from EYE, who is now the seventh player in the lineup of NiP. It doesn’t seem to be that obvious that NiP picked him up, since they already had a stable lineup of six players. With seven player it seems possible that one player of NiP, will trade teams with vilden. As Eyeballers said on their website, a fifth and new player is being announced very shortly.

The new addition of NiP is going to take a tactical role in the team together with his old EYE team mate hyper. “He will also be the one to lead our squad to victory together with Daniel “Hyper” Kuusisto.” Said the statement of NiP. “Together they will create conditions conducive to a peaceful development within the team when it comes to developing tactics and creating new opportunities.”

“It feels fantastic to be a part of Ninjas in Pyjamas; it's like a dream coming true. To be able to play with the best players in the world, and under the best organization in the world feels like a million dollars. I'm looking forward to a year of success and happiness together with the Ninjas in Pyjamas.” Says the newest addition of NiP.

Ninjas in Pyjames seems with a new organization and a strong lineup ready to face the though competition and be the dominating team again that it was in 2003 under the flag of SK.swe.
NiP also launched their website on www.nip-gaming.com.

Games die, new games come and attract the attention of star players from different scenes. Gamers who were on the top of their games a few years ago, players that are considered to be the newest talent; that have made their debut on a professional level this summer, players that we have seen in many different games already and will be seeing again in the CPLs latest tournament addition: Doom 3 1v1 tournament.

A lot of duel tournaments have and had a high competition but there are only a few tournaments that had the absolute best players from the world attending in that game, a few of those were also organized by the CPL. CPL Razer and CPL Babbages.
The competition was high, the prizes were high and Fata1lty still considers CPL Razer the best tournament he ever participated in.

• Read more about CPL Razer and Babbages tournaments:

[ 13, 14, 15 April, 2000 ]
CPL Razer event was at that moment offering the highest cash prize for a duel tournament, $100.000 in cash!
The final was between fatal1ty and Makaveli. Most of the Quakers remember the legendary final on dm13 between those two Americans.
Other then that, it also included many players from all over the world, big names that are also signed up for the upcoming CPL Winter event.

[hide=Rankings of CPL Razer]1st Fatal1ty - $40000
2nd Makaveli - $20000
3rd PowerK - $10000
4th dethstalker - $7000
5th Blue - $6000
6th Sector - $4000
7th DOOMer - $3000
8th vise - $2000
Top 12 Sujoy - $700
Top 12 Kane - $700
Top 12 Python - $700
Top 12 Matador - $700
Top 16 Wombat - $500
Top 16 RiX - $500
Top 16 Pure - $500
Top 16 Lobsta - $500
Top 24 Timber - $200
Top 24 Xenon - $200
Top 24 revenant - $200
Top 24 blokey - $200
Top 24 Elan - $200
Top 24 Scoob - $200
Top 24 lantern - $200
Top 24 gloat - $200
Top 32 Insane - $200
Top 32 LakermaN - $200
Top 32 Hakeem - $200
Top 32 citizen - $200
Top 32 method - $200
Top 32 Moonshine - $200
Top 32 Mirage - $200
Top 32 airdave - $200

[ 14, 15, 16, 17 December, 2000 ]
The CPL Babbages tournament was not just known of the high competition but also for the bluebug, the plasma climb of proZaC and a beautiful final between LakermaN and ZeRo4 on q3dm6tmp. Fatal1ty was also there but had to be happy with a 7th place.

Some people still consider this the best duel tournament ever been played

• Rankings of CPL Babbages

1st ZeRo4 - $25000
2nd LakermaN - $15000
3rd DOOMer - $10000
4th C3 - $8000
5th czm - $6000
6th blokey - $5000
7th Fatal1ty - $4000
8th Elan - $3000
Top 12 insano - $1000
Top 12 Treble - $1000
Top 12 proZaC - $1000
Top 12 Serm - $1000
Top 16 Timber - $800
Top 16 Python - $800
Top 16 Wombat - $800
Top 16 Burn - $800

[/hide]
The upcoming CPL Winter event includes a $50,000 Doom 3 1 versus 1 tournament and the sign up list is the most interesting list ever seen in a FPS 1vs1 tournament. Major names from different game genres: Quake1, Quake2, Quake3, RTCW, Call of Duty, Counter-Strike, Painkiller are all registered for the first Doom 3 tournament that CPL organizes.

You might not know all of them and know how they performed or what game they played, that’s why I wrote this article to introduce to you more then 40 strong individual gamers that have proven to be a strong competitor in their previous game(s). So, do you wonder who Tobias Grieser, or any other player, what game he used to play and what made him a “known” player, then be sure you check it out!

Article Page: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 || next page >>

Electronic Sports World Cup 2004 has officialy been ended but it’s not over yet! The second edition was for some people a great success, for some not so successful or great but still it stays an event to go to, as gamer and spectator. The whole crew of ESReality that was there tried their best to make something out of this event coverage wise, even though that it wasn’t that easy to get access to some locations.
There are plenty of Galleries which you can check out and there is enough stuff to read.

The tournaments had some big upsets, some expected wins and some happenings around the event as well that were non related to gaming.

In the upcoming weeks you can expect all kind of interviews for different games, reviews, columns and stories of this event. Also, ESReality Uncut 2 is coming out, simonb worked his ass off during the entire week to get some awesome footage. Expect a great movie with enough interviews and nice stuff in it.

Coverage links:

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=634709”>ESWC Coverage article

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=713478”>ESWC Final Standings

Gallery links:

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=712824”>Gallery: Sujoy

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=714933”>Gallery: Black2lip

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=710874”>Gallery: raccoon

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=713039”>Gallery: scoop

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=710891”>Gallery: simonb

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=715515”>Gallery: sizah & zr0’s part 1

http://www.esreality.com/?a=post&id=714275”>Gallery: sizah & zr0’s part 2

The Kuh3liga is nearing his end. The win is as good as decided, it is looking that Xtreme will take the first place of this German UT2004 league. One map win is enough for Xtreme versus Team 64 AMD to take the title, then they would leave top teams such as Schroet Kommando and mTw behind them. mTw is also the team that has the second place in this league, they tied three times and xt only once.
Xtreme is doing very well at the moment in duel and TDM, they haven’t lost any matches in the Kuh3liga nor UT Champions League. With a very solid four man lineup consisting of lauke, roach, 2aU and R0X, xtreme has not only strong players in 1v1 but it is also a team who are top in TDM, this league proved that.

The team of mTw is of course doing very good as well with a nice second place and leaving their rival SK behind them, however they doesn’t seem to be able to take the first place in the kuh3liga. The first place for mTw depends on the performance of xtreme versus 64AMD. One map win for xt is enough.

Group A

Clan	Played	Won	Lost	Round Difference	Points
[flag=GBR] Team 1
[flag=GBR] Team 2
[flag=GBR] Team 3
[flag=GBR] Team 4
[flag=GBR] Team 5
[flag=GBR] Team 6

QLAN2 is up and running, with internet connection and people warming up already. All international teams like Cloud9, 32nd, aAa, fps, msk, fallen arrived safe in Sweden.
I promised to release the schedule yesterday but I wasnt really able to do it, we've uploaded it now and it can be found right here.

To give you an idea in big lines how it will look like, tonight we will have a few tdm games and ctf games. The Main duel tournament starts tomorrow but the qualifiers are tonight already. The best 16 of them will face 16 players out of the 32 invited players, the weaker once - that make together a 32 player fight, the best 16 of them will be taking part in the main q3duel tournament and make together a 32 player tournament.
The structure that QLAN2 will be using is the double group stage, like on ESWC. The 32 players will be divined over 8 groups of 4. The top 2 advanced to the next round, where they play again in a group stage. Again, the top2 advanced and will be playing in a 8 player double elimination bracket.

QLAN2 is less then a week away and will be considered as one of the best LAN’s for TDM, CTF and duel. Many top clan’s and players are represented and that assures us for a lot of fun and interesting matches.
Since most of the clans are known for the scene but might have some changes, I’ve done a small write up plus lineups.

(Even if it's tempting)