This weekend included a banner day for eSports with a competition for Blizzard’s Heroes of the Storm getting broadcast live on ESPN 2 . More on that later, but first, there were also major developments across Dota 2 , Hearthstone and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. It’s all on this week’s eSports Rep

Many free-to-play games have in-game currency that can be purchased with real money, giving those who are willing to shell out actual money a reward. That’s all well and good, but many gamers feel it sets the stage for unbalanced play, as people willing to spend real cash may get better weapons or more play time to level

Enter free-to-play games. Though free-to-play isn’t an entirely new business model—in fact, it originated in early MMOs often targeted towards children and casual gamers, such as Neopets and MapleStory —its implementation is spreading. Rather than asking for an expensive sum upfront, as the traditional sales model does, free-to-play games are free but include advertisements, microtransactions, or in-game purchases that expand the players’ experience, such as League of Legends ‘ additional champions or Hearthstone ‘s card pa

Not all free-to-play models are bad; League Of Legends does it well with rotating champions and monetized skins that add customization but no significant advantage. Mobile games are known for particularly exploitative models, and psychologists have even made connections between particularly devious free-to-play games and gambling addicti

The HGC Western Clash is a bracketed double-elimination tournament. This allows teams that lose in the first round a second chance; this also means that there are two brackets. When a team gets eliminated from the upper bracket, they are sent down to the lower bracket. If a team loses in the lower bracket, they are eliminated. However, the team that makes its way through the lower bracket will see themselves at the Grand Fi

Piracy has long been a scourge of gaming, affecting and frustrating both developers and players, for intertwined but different reasons. moba game esports news distributors have tried many things to combat piracy. It started with CD keys and progressed to DRM that limits the possible number of installations or requires internet access at all times. Some developers even include code that will glitch pirated games, leading to some truly hilarious resul

Thought safely entombed in a tomb deep beneath the unforgiving desert, an ancient princess (Sofia Boutella of Kingsman: The Secret Service and Star Trek Beyond) whose destiny was unjustly taken from her is awakened in our current day, bringing with her malevolence grown over millennia and terrors that defy human comprehens

The two (former) professionals are Olzhas “Naiman” Batyrbekov and Dan “Alchemixt” Walton. The two lesser known players were only identified by their gamertags, XzaM and Damnery. While Blizzard has banned players for offenses like botting and win trading in the past, this is the first time they have publicly named the players. It seems like they’re stepping up their efforts to clean up the professional scene as Blizzcon gets clo

And yeah, I know these $60, AAA titles still have some greed to work through (like $10 DLC for Titanfall that’s just three maps), but it’s all manageable, and Dota 2 is still the only game to do free to play right. Beyond Dota 2, The Last of Us just had a completely free multiplayer map pack released for it. It can be done. All gamers want is a model that fosters mutually and equally beneficial purchasing. Give it to them.

If that wasn’t enough, three Heroic Account Unlock codes will be given away on each day. These codes will give you access to every Hero in the game, excluding Whitemane. To be eligible to win, you’ll need to watch at least one hour on any of the given days. After the day’s action is over, the Heroic Account Unlock codes will be distribu

Arizona State took home top notch gaming systems for their runner-up finish. Heroes of the Storm may still be in beta until June, but its appearance on national television last night got the eSports scene some of the best mainstream exposure its had

And it’s hard on gamers to just not buy games that use microtransactions; some of our most beloved series are heading down this path and whether or not the content is worth the extra money is an individual decision. Counting on big-name distributors not to do whatever they can to make money doesn’t leave a whole lot of room for hope, but, short of boycotting popular series and supporting games that do it right, there’s little gamers can do to stop the waves of cha

As games like League of Legends succeed, developers and distributors look towards their success and analyze how it can be applied to their products. H1Z1 attracted a lot of recent attention for going back on their initial statement that in-game payments could not be applied to ammo or guns by implementing airdrops, a system that would allow players to pay a fee and have a plane drop off supplies that may contain weapons and ammo. The developers say that the possible consequences of these drops—attracting zombie attention, possible raiding by other players,and the rare drop rate of weapons—even out the potential for unbalancing the game. But players weren’t satisfied, and many asked for refunds when the airdrops were announ