Super League Gaming is beefing up its content game, announcing the launch of SuperLeagueTV this Monday on Twitch. The platform will serve as “the first ever network dedicated to amateur esports and competitive amateur players” with initial programming that will include gameplay from Super League’s City Champs tournaments, as well as storylines that emerge from among the thousands of individual and team-vs-team competitions in Super League events across game titles such as League of Legends and Minecraft. The channel will broadcast from Ultimate Media Ventures’ Huntington Beach-based production facility beginning with Super League Gaming’s League of Legends City Champs season and featuring host Alexandria“Puns0fDamage” Trehuba, play-by-play from Alexander “Opal” Archumbault, and color commentary by Alex “Mad_Magical” Whieldon. For more, check out our interview below!
Dreamhack is renewing vows with Twitch in a multi-year deal. The relationship dates back to Twitch’s previous incarnation as Justin.tv and fans will be able to tune into Twitch to watch all of DreamHack’s premium esports content live, including DreamHack Open, CORSAIR DreamLeague, CORSAIR DreamHack Masters and DreamHack Fighting Game Championships. The content agreement also includes live coverage in 13 languages and Twitch will be the Head Partner for four of DreamHack’s festivals: DreamHack Tours, DreamHack Austin, DreamHack Montreal and DreamHack Atlanta. Twitch will also continue to host the popular Twitch Player lounge and the Twitch After-Party at DreamHack events each year.
NewZoo is out with a new report that states that a whopping 30% of all core PC gamers played battle royale games in February, with 16.3% preferring Fortnite, and 14.6% opting for PUBG. Meanwhile, the two titles also racked up viewership numbers during that span across Twitch and YouTube, with Fortnite clocking in at 83.3 million viewership hours that month, while PUBG notched 57.2 million hours.
Speaking of which… YouTube’s Ryan Wyatt Tweeted that Fortnite recently set a record for the largest single live game stream, drawing 1.1 million simultaneous viewers who saw streamer ElrubiusOMG at play. Overall, with 100 creators taking part in the game, the same event drew 42 million unique views overall.
Australia’s OVO Mobile locked in an exclusive broadcast deal with the Australian Esports League. The five-year agreement will see OVO launch a dedicated esports channel on its OVOPlay platform starting next week with the AEL University Cup, which features teams from universities across Australia competing with each other. The first year of the deal will see OVO offer more than 140 hours of exclusive content.
The First Annual College Esports Expo, hosted by Emerson College Esports and Incubate Esports, is on deck for April 5 in downtown Boston to coincide with PAX East in a move to “explore the key issues driving the growth of this new emerging medium.” The inaugural event will consist of two separate experiences that bridge the gap between student interest, industry need, gameplay, career development, and administration support. Emerson’s Semel Theater will host panelists, workshops and guest speakers who will delve into all topics relevant to the collegiate and amateur esports industry. Just down the street, Emerson’s Bill Bordy Theater will transform into a student lead, interactive competitive gaming zone with exhibitions of collegiate competition in Fortnite, League of Legends, Overwatch, Smash 4, Street Fighter 5 and NBA2k18 powered by Microsoft.
The University of California, Irvine Division of Continuing Education is offering a new online course, Effective Communication in Esports. The school is currently developing an Esports Management Certificate Program that will provide a comprehensive understanding of the Esports and online gaming industry. Curriculum will include plans on how to execute an Esports tournament, project management skills and how to create a business plan for a team, community event or any other opportunity geared towards the Esports audience.
Capcom locked in a deal with Entertainment One to develop, finance, and produce a live-action TV series based on the Street Fighter franchise with Joey Ansah, Jacqueline Quella and Mark Wooding slated to executive produce the series. GDC saw over 30 companies come together to launch the Fair Play Alliance, designed to combat toxicity in multiplayer games. Members include: Blizzard Entertainment, CCP Games, Corillian, Discord, Epic Games, Flaregames, Huuuge Games, Intel, Kabam, Kefir, Ker-Chunk Games, Mixer, Owlchemy Labs, Playrix, Radial Games, Riot Games, Roblox Corporation, Rovio, Space Ape Games, Spirit AI, Supercell, Two Hat, Twitch, Unity Technologies and Xbox. The mission statement: “We provide an open forum for the games industry to collaborate on research and best practices that encourage fair play and healthy communities in online gaming. We envision a world where games are free of harassment, discrimination, and abuse, and where players can express themselves through play.”
Infinite Esports & Entertainment continues to expand its umbrella, picking up esports apparel company Sector Six, which will now become the official apparel provider for sister company OpTicGaming. “Thanks to Infinite’s backing, we now have the ability to level up our stats across the board; not just an improved product line, but improvements on materials used and in our production timelines too,” said Sector Six owner Zachary Sass in a statement.
This year’s World Video Game Hall of Fame finalists have been unveiled, with a dozen finalists contending for the honors. This year’s potential inductees include: Asteroids, Call of Duty, Dance Dance Revolution, Final Fantasy VII, Half-Life, John Madden Football, King’s Quest, Metroid, Minecraft, Ms. Pac-Man, Spacewar!, and Tomb Raider. This year will see the hall invite gamers to help determine the 2018 class with winners announced on May 3.
POWER PLAYERS – Matt Edelman
With SuperLeagueTV ready for launch, Cynopsis Esports spoke with Matt Edelman, Chief Commercial Officer of Super League Gaming, about expectations, content and goals for the new platform, which will offer five nights of live gameplay, along with pre- and post-match content and more on Twitch.
Edelman on goals: SuperLeagueTV is the first esports network on any platform that is fully dedicated to amateur gamers and amateur competitions. There are hundreds of millions of players who have made competitive video gaming one of their primary sports pursuits. Our commitment is to provide that ever-increasing audience with exciting programming across a robust set of channels that shines a light on their passion, their skills, the tournaments and events that serve their aspirations and, most importantly, the path that so many of them are seeking to go pro.
On content: SuperLeagueTV programming will include event and tournament coverage as well as original episodic content and specials dedicated to the expansive world of amateur esports. While we are starting off with live coverage of the premium competitive gameplay happening in Super League’s third season of League of Legends City Champs and of course will feature all of Super League’s events, we are in discussions with and will be featuring amateur competitions from a multitude of other event and tournament operators. As the network grows, we’ll also look to complement our programming with content from third parties who are as fired up as we are about what’s happening throughout the amateur esports landscape.
On sponsors: We’ve been incredibly fortunate to form partnerships already with several global brands across Super League’s live event business. We’ll be expanding those partnerships and also growing our sponsorship base through SuperLeagueTV. We’re in discussions to incorporate sponsors into special segments within live broadcasts (think ‘halftime show’ and ‘gamer profiles’), to integrate brands into original series and to create branded content, as long as the latter enhances the value of SuperLeagueTV to our audience of amateur gamers.
On UMV: With LA being the definitive esports hub in the US, Ultimate Media Ventures offered Super League a best-in-class team and production facility in our backyard. We see them as a strategic partner given their involvement across multiple components of the esports industry, as they have a deep understanding of both live streaming product development and content creation. They’ve taken great care to design a comfortable environment for collaboration and are focused on delivering quality output.
