eSports Roundup

Several eSports events took place this month, so Leigh Milner looks at all the results.

Yes with a whopping $30m prize pool .. the first ever Fortnite World Cup took place earlier this month at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York.If you’ve never played the game before .. think of Minecraft mixed with the Hunger Games.

Voiceover - Collect building and crafting materials while traveling across landscapes where no two are alike

Over forty million players attempted to qualify .. but only 100 finalists had a shot at winning the top prize of $3m.

That’s a lot of money for 16 year old Kyle “Bugha” Giersdorf from the US, who after six rounds was eventually the last man standing in the solo competition. Well done Kyle!

Announcer - Ladies and gentlemen the champion Bugha. $3 million dollars richer. The biggest. Victory. In Gaming. History.

Now it was Nyhrox and Aqua who won the doubles .. but here in the UK Jaden Ashman, otherwise known as Wolfiez stole the headlines.

He might have come second alongside his Dutch teammate Dave Jong .. making them both millionaires, but he did it using a controller rather than the usual mouse and keyboard.

It’s now led to fans creating a “controller gang” yes it’s a real thing, celebrating players who use this more difficult method of control.

播音员- results are in, ladies and gentlemen congratulations to the first ever fortnight champions - Nyhrox and Aqua.

Like many parents Jaden’s mum hated him playing on the game .. so much that she’s admitted to throwing his Xbox and his headset in the bin! Sacrilege! But don’t worry there is a happy ending. Now that he’s a millionaire, he can afford to buy another console and he’s promised his mum he’ll carry on studying for his exams.

Also a few other bits of eSports news…

As a new study suggests that eSports revenue will grow 5 fold by the year 2024, we’ve also just had the FIFA eWorld Cup recently, with 47 million viewers across the tournament.

MoAuba was crowned champion, winning a quarter of a million dollars.

Announcer - 15 years Germany have waited for a champion.

Also a tournament called The International for DOTA 2 has an even bigger prize pool than Fortnite… it’s underway as we record this… but the total prize on offer is at least $33 million dollars.

Chris - That’s a lot of money.

Leigh - And finally… Celtic Football Club have signed an e-sports team to compete in the Call of Duty World League Championship. It makes them the first UK football club to seriously invest outside of football title Fifa.
Celtic's business manager said "This is a great opportunity in an e-sports area where we see almost no engagement from professional football clubs." The competition, which got more than seven million Twitch views last year, has a prize of more than £1.6 million pounds.