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Naโ€™Vi defeat Astralis 2-0; advance to IEM Katowice grand finals

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Naโ€™Vi took a 2-0 victory over Astralis in the semi-final of IEM Katowice 2020 (16-5 Dust2, 16-5 Nuke) to secure a place in tomorrow’s grand final match.

The vetoes can be found here:

  • Natus Vincere removed Vertigo
  • Astralis removed Mirage
  • Natus Vincere picked Dust2
  • Astralis picked Nuke
  • Natus Vincere removed Overpass
  • Astralis removed Inferno
  • Train was left over

The second match of the day kicked off on Dust 2, Naโ€™Vi’s map pick. The Russian side had a solid T-side display and just exchanged some rounds before closing the map 16-5. Two of their star players, s1mple and Perfecto carried the rest of the team with 39 frags combined.

Map: Dust2 / Photo via HLTV
Map: Nuke / Photo via HLTV

The teams went to Nuke for Game 2, Astralisโ€™ pick, where Naโ€™Vi promptly pulled ahead with a 13-2 lead before switching sides, flamie led the way with 23 kills and only 10 deaths in the map, as Naโ€™Vi eventually sealed the deal with a 16-5 score.

Navi will play G2 Esports in the finals of IEM Katowice 2020 today at 9:30 pm IST.

StarLadder ImbaTV Dota 2 Season 3 Minor Groups revealed

DPC points summed with $300,000 up for grabs and a spot at the Major, the StarLadder ImbaTV Dota 2 Minor Season 3 featuring 8 teams around the world is going to be an intense affair.

About next week, 5th March, we will be witnessing the next Dota 2 event that is a minor and the groups for the event are now decided.

Group A

  • Business Associates
  • Forze
  • Team Aster
  • Boom Esports

A glance at Group A, we have Business Associates from North America, the team having TI winner โ€™Fearโ€™ as their caption. Adding Team Aster to the stack who claimed the final and only slot for China after clean sweeping 3-0 series win against Newbee in a best-of-five. Further joined by second-placer from South America Qualifier as well as Sea Qualifier winner, Forze and Boom Esports.

Group B

  • Alliance
  • Gambit Esports
  • Fighting Pandas
  • NoPing e-Sports

Group B, the name that stands out is โ€™Allianceโ€™ which feature NikoBaby who claimed a slot in a very drastic victory in the final game massive comeback with all five games played against Nigma. Accompanied by Fighting PandaSโ€™ new roster consisting of Skiter, Bryle, KheZu, Aui_2000, and MoonMeander after Envy and Sneyking announced their departure from the team. Alongside them is the SA Qualifier winner, NoPing, and the CIS winner, Gambit Esports.

Gen.G player Bdd donates $4,000 to coronavirus victims

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Gen.G midlaner Gwak โ€œBddโ€ Bo-seong, has donated 5 million KWR or $4000 approx to organizations concerned with the coronavirus outbreak.

https://twitter.com/Bdd990301/status/1232986446941716480

“Hi, it’s Gwak “Bdd” Bo-sung. To have a meaningful upcoming birthday and 4th anniversary of my debut, I joined the funding for COVID-19. I’m happy to post this after winning the match, but also so sad for not hearing fans’ birthday song for the first time after my debut. As I said, I will do my best for my fans, to say “I cheer Bdd” proudly. Take care and thanks for cheering today!”- read Bdd’s Tweet as translated by a fan.

https://twitter.com/Forsy_C0rgi/status/1232988804446711809
https://twitter.com/Forsy_C0rgi/status/1232989527221780481

Bdd expressed his concern over his fan’s heath which has been massively affected after the coronavirus outbreak. This led him to take this step in order to help fight this peril. Before Bdd, his organization Gen.G has also promised to donate their homestand, merch sale earings to the same cause as their player.

Game Developers Conference has been postponed indefinitely over coronavirus fears

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The Game Developers Conference is an annual conference for video game developers where developers from all over the world come and showcase their upcoming games or improvements to the world.

The Game Developers Conference for 2020 was scheduled for March 16-20 but after many developers and publishers withdrew over concerns of the spread of the COVID-19 (novel coronavirus), event organizer announced on Friday announced that the event has been postponed indefinitely.

In a statement on GDCโ€™s official website, the organizers said:

“Having spent the past year preparing for the show with our advisory boards, speakers, exhibitors, and event partners, we’re genuinely upset and disappointed not to be able to host you at this time. We want to thank all our customers and partners for their support, open discussions, and encouragement. As everyone has been reminding us, great things happen when the community comes together and connects at GDC. For this reason, we fully intend to host a GDC event later in the summer.”

The news of event cancellation comes just hours after some more companies such as Amazon, Microsoft, Bethesda, and Gearbox announced their official withdrawal from the event. The spread of COVID-19 is still at large with WHO recently raising the alert level of the virus to highest. Many countries have started to lockdown their borders and initiating extensive scanning procedures to keep the virus from spreading. As of Friday, there have been more than 85,000 confirmed cases of the Novel Coronavirus worldwide and a close to 2919 deaths have been reported.

With the growing concern around the world about the virus, the GDC organizers committee isnโ€™t shocking and was expected. Even if they went on with the event, many big names would remain missing and the event would result in failure either way. GDC is the latest in the list of events being called off due to concerns over the spread of the virus.

Dr Disrespect gets a challenge from WWEโ€™s star wrestler Undertaker

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While streaming Overwatch this week, Dr DisRespectโ€™s stream was interrupted by a phone call and soon the background of his stream changed into a purple arena with a big message asking him to โ€œPick Upโ€ the call. Noticing the sudden changes, his stream chat frantically started spamming the chat asking him to pick up the call. While still acting shocked he picked the call and was greeted by an intense voice saying:

โ€œYou’ve trespassed on sacred ground. I have no patience for the Two-Time. WWE is my domain, my yard. Your transgressions will be punished. Dr. DisRespet, you will rest… in… PEACE!”

Chat quickly recognized the person on the other side of call as WWE wrestler, Mark William Calaway aka The Undertaker. Ending the call DisRespect acted scared and quickly went off-screen.

Previously, this month Dr DisRespect teased a come back to WWE and this cliche act may very well be a promotion for an upcoming event.

Dr DisRespect is a huge name on Twitch and is known for his entertainment and production values. DisRespect fame also extends outside of Twitch to other mediums and shows, such as his upcoming audiobook, appearing on Jimmy Kimmel Live or various collaborations with other entertainers.

All you need to know about PUBG Mobile Pro League South Asia 2020

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After the conclusion of Spring Split’s PMCO 2020 Indian and South Asian Regional Finals, the list of teams moving ahead is now confirmed. 20 of the best squads from both regions will battle it out to reserve a berth in this year’s World League Spring Split.

List of Teams

As per the newly introduced esports structure for PUBG Mobile, this will be the second stage. Teams will move on to World League and then onto the World Championship which is the penultimate round. A total of 20 teams have been selected, 9 from Indian Regional Finals, 6 from South Asian PMCO, and 5 direct invitees from the previous year’s Fall Finals.

Direct Qualified

  • Entity Gaming
  • Team Soul
  • SynerGE
  • Etg.Brawlers
  • Team IND

Club Open India

  • Orange Rock
  • Marcos Gaming
  • MegaStars
  • Team Tamilas
  • Godlike
  • Fnatic
  • UMumba esports Rxn
  • VSG Crawlers
  • Celtz

Club Open South Asia

  • Hype
  • Instinct Esports
  • Jyanmaara
  • Team Extreme
  • Deadeyes Guys
  • ElementriX

Dates

This major tier tournament is scheduled to last almost a month right from 12th March to 5th April. The format has not yet been revealed although we know that all matches will be played in TPP (Third Person Perspective) mode. Also, the points allotment system will be the same as the previous rounds.

Allocation

Out of the total 20 participating teams, the top 5 will qualify for PMCO Spring Split World League 2020 where they will face off against the World’sbest Pubg Mobile squads for a slot in the World Championship as well as a share of the $5 million Prile Pool.

Broadcast Details

Indian casting scenario for this title has been taken to another level by some of the most talented and dedicated talents. A few speculations of our for the broadcast team of PMPL from India’s side include big names like Mannu “Krat” Karki, Ketan “K18” Patel alongside the veteran player, Animesh “Thug” Agarwal and Ocean Sharma. There is no confirmed news about the broadcast talent and these are mere speculations.

Stay tuned for more news and updates!

Report: Trouble brewing inside Microsoftโ€™s Mixer department

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Microsoft launched its twitch rival streaming service, Mixer with all guns blazing just a few months ago. With high profile Twitch streamers such as Shroud and Ninja switching to Mixer after signing an exclusive deal everyone thought Mixer will see more such deals and grow exponentially. However, since the initial hype and release, the service hasnโ€™t made any big announcements.

In the past 6 months, Mixer has lost a big chunk of its management and talents such as the original founders, alongside a general manager and corporate vice president. Although these departing were reported publicly, some details were omitted.

A report from OnMSFT reported that over the last six months, there have been a total of sixteen layoffs due to budget cuts and since then Mixer has lost more than 25% of its working force and has been operating on skeleton crew which has caused feature releases to slip schedules.

Replying to OnMSFTโ€™s email an employee also shared a video of the newly-appointed general manager Shilpa Yadla, when she spoke at the Mixer town hall trying to address the growing sense of frustration and low morale within the service.

https://youtu.be/8RZxaSLyjUM

In the video, Shilpa can be heard rather harsh. She refers to internal feedback as โ€œblah, blah, blahโ€ and surmise legitimate issues as โ€œnegative feedback.โ€ and mentions she has no tolerance for โ€œnegativityโ€ or โ€œnegative feedbackโ€ and that she is not there to โ€œsympathize with anybody.โ€

Microsoft has reportedly spent millions on signing high profile streamers but doesn’t seem to have made a particularly large investment in the service. If the reports about Mixer having internal tensions and working with a skeleton crew are right then Microsoft is in for a bad 2020 as the other competitors are picking up the pace and introducing new features, which might result in people switching over to those services and Mixer going under.

fnatic defeat 100T 2-0; advance to IEM Katowice semi-finals against G2

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The first quarter-finale encounter between 100 Thieves and fnatic began on Inferno – Aussies’ map pick. On the other side, fnatic went forward with Mirage. Dust II was the decider to affirm G2 Esports’ opponents in the semi-finals.

  • Inferno: fnatic 19-16 100T
  • Mirage: fnatic 19-16 100T

Inferno being 100 Thieves’ map pick, fnatic began their campaign on CT side. With early apartment control, fnatic secured pistol round flawlessly. 100 Thieves fell to fnatic’s force-buy in the succeeding round as they opted for arch/CT spawn rap around for B-site. 100 Thieves forced the next round and eventually stumbled their economy as fnatic advanced their lead 3-1. Golden got two early kills as opponents on banana lined-up for him, though, his side collapsed 3vs5 and 100 Thieves secured their first buy round. To hault their opponents, flusha aced in the sixth round; scoreboard tickled 4-2.

100 Thieves’ economy crumbled yet again while fnatic advanced 5-2 as JW roasted three enemies with his grenade. He further picked apart 100 Thieves with his aggresive AWP and got triple-kill towards mid while Golden secured the round with a double-kill in banana. 100 Thieves finally grabbed a round though Fnatic responded back with two rounds. Jks picked two players towards apartments in the thirteenth round and single-handedly secured fourth round for 100T. First half ended 10-5 inclined towards the Swedes.

Fnatic advanced their lead 11-6 as they grabbed second pistol-round as well. 100 Thieves didn’t risk their economy with a force-buy in the following round. 100 Thieves bagged eighteenth round as scoreboard turned 12-6. Golden entered B-site and picked apart two defenders to secure thirteenth round and break Aussie economy. Fnatic advanced to fourteen rounds props to Brollan and Krimz picking up two kills each. 100 Thieves finally secured three consecutive rounds for the first time this series with admirably strong hold deep into the bombsites.

Jks held strong on B-site with two kills as fnatic picked apart his teammates towards CT spawn and arch and rapped around towards B-site to secure map-point. With shaggy SMG buy and a saved AK-47, 100 Thieves breathed longer and entered double-digits. Fnatic forced in the succeeding round and took critical advantage early into the round, though Jks saved the day with a massive quad-kill safeguarding B-site. Jkaem single-handedly got a double-kill towards banana and miserably forced fnatic to hit A-site.

Fnatic were yet again down to pistols and armour while 100 Thieves ran to thirteen rounds. Jks savagely fragged in the last few rounds as he led his side into the overtime with 27 frags. Fnatic won the first round of overtime and ultimately ended 100 Thieves’ six round streak. 100 Thieves returned back with a win, but after sixteenth round win, fnatic ran past the victory mark and secured map one 19-16.

100 Thieves began their crusade on CT-side on fnatic’s map pick – Mirage. 100 Thieves showed heavy middle presence and frags were traded while fnatic came out on top. 100 Thieves tied scores 1-1 as fnatic crumbled against deagles and scout towards A-site. 100 Thieves bagged the follow up round and demolished their economy to lead 3-1. Fnatic came back with a couple of rounds and destroyed 100 Thieves’ economy to tie scores at 3-3. Fnatic took the lead 4-3 as they won anti-eco.

100 Thieves bought out rifles and crashed fnatic’s early aggression and seemingly picked them apart with critical flanks to tie scoreboard at 4-4. Fnatic was stunned yet again towards B-site and 100 Thieves took back the lead 5-4. Fnatic levelled the scoreline with upgraded pistols and armour as Krimz and Flusha chimed in with massive individual impact. 100 Thieves took three rounds in succession as fnatic’s finances were shattered. Both the sides traded a round towards the end of first-half and ended it 9-6 inclined for 100 Thieves.

100 Thieves rushed A-site in the second pistol round of the second map and bagged the round on back of jkaem’s triple-kill towards CT spawn. Aussies grabbed the following round as fnatic were down to unarmoured pistols. Fnatic won the first buy-round as JW decimated opponent’s B-site rush. Scoreboard turned 12-7 while fnatic called out a tactical timeout after losing a crucial buy round. Fnatic stole the following round with deagles and CZ-75s. Fnatic built upon and annihilated 100T’s economy while they bagged five consecutive rounds to tie the scores at 12-12. 100 Thieves apparently haulted Swedish resurgence and took 13-12 lead after a steady B-short rush.

Aussies built their lead 14-12 as Gratisfaction and Jks got a double-kill each. Jks secured yet another round with a 1vs2 clutch and a triple-kill to secure map point on fnatic’s map pick. Krimz turned around a round with a quick flank towards B-short to keep the map boiling. Fnatic won the following two rounds pretty convincingly to initiate overtime. Fnatic dismantled a quick A-site rush to take early lead in the overtime. 100 Thieves repeated the same strat but the results differed to tie scoreline at 16-16. Fnatic didn’t drop a round since, and grabbed the second map 19-16 with Krimz’s 1vs3 clutch in the last round.

Dr Disrespect advices Ninja to not make TikTok videos

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Popular Twitch streamer Dr Disrespect is quite well-known and applauded for his unapologetic vocal outpours. For much of the community, he believes in straight-forward and not so diplomatic retorts. This time, during his February 27 stream, he colossally adviced Fortnite sensation Ninja to seize creating TikTok videos and uploading them on Twitter.

“Ninja’s TikToks are some of theโ€ฆNinjas has the worst TikToks,” Dr Disrespect said. “I’m just going to come out and say since no one else wants to. Ninja, here’s a little message. Ninja, hey, Dr Disrespect here two times back to back – 1993, 1994. Ah, Ninja, if I were you, I would save your brand by not making any more TikToks. Don’t! Stop it, knock it off! Knock it off, man! That’s enough, Ninja that’s enough. No more TikTok,” he yelled.

TikTok, ever since its inception, has attracted large numbers of teenagers and millennials. The app has topped download charts and several celebrities have established it as yet another social media platform to connect with their fans. However, with growing userbase, the app has had much of its critics as well.

Swag announces CSGO retirement; awaits to go pro in Riot Games’ Project A

Braxton โ€œswagโ€ Pierce on his twitter has announced that he will be quitting the Pro scene of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive as he now awaits the arrival of Project A which is being developed by Riot games.

Earlier today on Twitter the 23year old North American revealed his plans about the future where he decided to step down from his current team Swole Identity thus opting to quit from playing Counter-Strike: Global Offensive competitively.  Swag will now be looking forward to make a career out of Riot Gamingโ€™s upcoming title known as Project A where he aims to ace and be the finest player in the world. With this news about him stepping back, he now has withdrawn from Swole Identityโ€™s starting five hence making the team search for a player who would match Swagโ€™s potential as he was their best performer in the ESEA MDL Season 33 where he was unassailable with an average rating of 1.43.

It was Team Complexity who gave Swag a flying start to his career when the latter was signed by iBUYPOWER ending his 8-month stint with Complexity. Under coLโ€™s banner, Swag did help the team to scale new heights as we saw him and his team reach the semi-finals of CSGOโ€™s first-ever major Dreamhack Winter in 2013. But no one had ever expected such a disheartening turn in Swagโ€™s career as he along with three of his teammates were indefinitely banned by Valve which made them incapable of attending any of its Majors as they had been involved in a match-fixing scandal in one of CEVOโ€™s matches which was later confirmed by Valve that the bans wonโ€™t be ever lifted. But later in July 2017, ESL and ESEA did unban the ex-iBP Squad followed by Dreamhack allowing the players to compete at its tournaments. With several tournament organizers lifting their bans as to provide a second chance to the players, Brax did attend some tournaments with a plethora of teams which do include a couple of ESL Pro League LAN tournaments and a Dreamhack Open Tours Event with Torqued. Brax did play his last LAN tournament in the ESL Pro League Season 10 with Swole Patrol where his team finished last along with Cloud9 and Infinity Esports. Since his entry in Counter-Strike 1.6, he has a record of 22,000 hours in both Counter-Strike 1.6 and Global Offensive.