Poland is a nation well-grounded in competitive gaming. eSports alone has grown into an industry worth billions of dollars. Owing to the inclusion of the eSports sector in their Stock Exchange market, multiple gaming firms have gained solid ground in the Polish economy. In Poland alone, over 500 game development studios have been built with nearly a hundred registered e-gaming firms.
CD Projekt, a Polish e-gaming company, birthed one of the best video games in the world – The Witcher. Poland also hosts several eSports competitions. Some of these include the Intel Extreme Masters World Championship and European Games eSports Championships, among others. Today, even the best Polish online casino can’t do without listing eSports betting options. These bet options are often based on the top eSports tournaments. Curious to know which eSports dominate the state of Poland?
League of Legends World Championship
This is a competitive sport organized by its very famous developers, Riot Games. This is popular in Poland as many of its citizens are LoL gamers. Poland is also among the top countries with the highest views of League of Legends games and tournaments. The biggest LoL tournament is among the most awaited eSports events of the year in Poland as the best teams in the world gather to compete for the overall Championship. The eSports is also infamous for its large fan base as millions watch LoL tournaments live.
Intel Extreme Masters Katowice
Hosted in Katowice, Poland itself, the competition remains one of the favourite eSport tournaments in the country. Since 2017, the tournament has been hosted yearly by ESL and Valve. The “Intel” added to the event is from the sponsorship of the tech firm “Intel”. The tournament involves two major eSports games – Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and StarCraft II. In this tournament, global elite teams gather to cart home the prize money set by the organizers. The prize money is no less than $1,000,000.
The prize money is shared among 24 skilled teams. The event kicks off with a double-elimination bracket where only the top eight survivors move to the group stage. The main aim of every team is to win the highest share of the prize pool and get a ticket to the next Intel Extreme Masters tournament.
Fortnite World Cup
The Fortnite World Cup is another popular tournament in Poland. Here, the players are experts in the game of Fortnite as only two modes of the Fortnite video game will be used in the tournament. The most used is the Fortnite Battle Royale where over 100 players are transported into a virtual map without a single battle weapon. In other words, the tournament is all about survival as weapons are to be sourced for while fending for food and shelter. The players can play as a team of two or rather be lone wolves. Fortnite World Cup places a prize pool of no less than $10 million as each solo player earns $50,000 for participation.
The International
The Dota 2 event cannot be left out when discussing the biggest competitive virtual gaming tournament in Poland. Held annually, this event marks the end of the Dota 2 gaming season for the year. The tournament is under Valve’s control as they organize and determine the rules of gaming.
The tournament involves a vicious battle between paired teams during the event. The tournament requires the participation of 16 teams. Each team is assigned to a group of four teams and only the top three teams get to move to the next stage. The group stage remains until only eight teams survive and they are moved into the playoff stage of the tournament. As usual, the winning team takes home the lion’s share of the prize.
PUBG Mobile Global Championship
This is another survival game where the players are dropped into an online location where they battle among themselves to be the last man or team standing. Famous as an eSports game, its competitive tournament is second to none as it is hosted in every region.
The Championship is played by 48 teams and each team is divided equally to form 3 groups. Here, each team targets the top 3 teams in each group as the three best teams of each division advance to the grand finals. These teams have a high chance of winning the prize pool. This prize pool is usually set at $3,000,000.
Parting Words
Poland is unarguably a respectable country in the e-gaming industry. They have not only hundreds of gaming studios, but they also dominate the tournaments. The reason for this is not farfetched: they produce elite competitive sports gamers. Perhaps, this is why thousands of casinos target the Polish market, as the country remains a main hub of competitive gaming activities and tournaments.
