AHIII: (laughs) It is still a mystery to me too. I started casting in January 2016. There’s a community effort called Chair League which is like Saturday night bowling. It’s for recreation; you do put a team together and there are standings but it’s for fun. They were looking for casters. I emailed the person who started it and said, “Hey, do you need another caster?” He was like, “Yeah, what experience do you have?” I had none but I just thought it would be c

Blizzard dropped the ban hammer this past week on four different players for “win trading,” including two well-known professional players. All four players are now disqualified from the World Championship, and the two pros have apparently had their entire Hearthstone account shutdown as w

Nintendo, on the other hand, finds the free-to-play model frustrating. Nintendo’s president Satoru Iwata, in a Q&A with investors , said, “As with games that are free-to-play, or ‘free-to-start’ as we like to call it, there is a tendency within the entertainment industry to make gaming as easy as possible to start playing.” Because Nintendo uses an integrated hardware-software model, unlike many companies, they require a hardware purchase before their games are playable, making the free-to-play model unrealistic unless they completely overhaul their current strat

Such a new major event with backing from some of the biggest names in eSports would likely draw a lot of attention. There was also a rumor that the companies involved might create exclusive deals with only certain teams or existing competitions. This is causing some of the organizers of existing smaller tournaments to fear that they could lose influence if such a super league was announ

League of Legends has a heavy focus on the gameplay during skirmishes. That is, the team vs. team fights have a huge effect on the way the game progresses. These ‘team fights’ are large indicators for which side will win the game, and which player will carry the team to victory. So, the winners get stronger and keep winning. Under League ‘s current power balance, it’s fairly doable for a mechanically-skilled player to dominate a MOBA game DLC in under half an hour. If the enemy team is disheartened enough, they can surrender as early as twenty minutes into the g

LoL has come from a niche game to being one of the major competitors in eSports, with dozens of teams going head to head in tournaments, with several voices calling it a real sport or even trying to get it into the Olympics. Besides the tournaments and events held outside of your house, the ranked community of LoL is huge, paving the way for newer games like Overwatch . Getting your foot into that community can be hard however, from other players expecting a certain degree of skill from you or simply being too toxic to accept

AHIII: Yeah, it is very much that principle. Thankfully, people have enjoyed my casting. It has led to other opportunities and snowballed into where I’m at now. I feel extremely lucky to have gotten the opportunities that I have. It’s just me trying to be

Last hitting is exactly what it says on the tin, when you hit a minion and it dies, giving you gold and experience. CS means Creep Score, or minion kills and is often referred to as such, and will carry your champion through the earlier parts of the game, mostly applying to players in the lanes rather than Junglers. Again the best place to practice this is in practice mode to start off with, seeing how many normal attacks, spells only or other attacks it takes to kill a minion or what can kill a minion on what percentage of hea

By now, you would have played a few games, both in practice mode and vs real players. You should have noticed that every champion has different abilities, cooldowns, damage and reach, and you should learn these. While it might seem daunting at first, with over 130 enemies to face, that number quickly drops when it comes to PvP and ranked, as not every champion is played. Simply ask your teammates or look only for “popular” champi

Meanwhile, Dota 2 matches can average around 50 minutes per match. A huge complaint among the Dota 2 community is the inability to concede a match. However, comebacks are much more common in these matches . Many of the game’s most amazing turnarounds could never have happened if Valve had allowed the implementation of a surrender opt

In every match, League of Legends places its players into one of five roles; Top, Mid, Jungler, AD Carry, and Support. Typically, champions fit into only one of these roles, and have little wiggle room outside of them. Much of the variety lies in the differences between them; a support that heals vs. a support that disables. In tandem with this, the equipment that champions buy generally serve to focus a character further into its roles. I.e: A heavy damage-dealer builds more damage. This —and the heavy focus on teamplay— make for fairly predictable ga