We’re heading to Miami! This month we announced the location for our big return to North America, with the Esports Awards heading to Miami this November. It’s going to be our biggest show yet, and we can’t wait to show you what we have been cooking.
Obviously, we’re very excited about Miami, but our event is still a few months away and the world of esports never stops moving. In August the Esports World Cup came to a close with some shock winners, there’s a new member of the Hall of Legends and one of the greatest Dota 2 teams of all time set a new record that is unlikely to be beaten.
It has been busy, as always, so keep reading to make sure you are up to date on everything that has happened in esports over the past month.
Industry News
Credit: Esports World Cup
We’re Heading To Miami
This is the last time we’ll mention it (maybe), but the Esports Awards are heading to Miami on November 17. We’re preparing for our biggest event yet, with lots of surprises in store. Right now you can cast your votes for nine awards, with more categories to be launched as we get closer to the big night. We promise that you will not want to miss what is set to be our biggest show ever.
AG.AL Wins Esports World Cup Club Championship
The Esports World Cup is over for another year and, for the first time in its three-year history, Team Falcons has not won the Club Championship. The overall competition, which rewards organisations for having success across multiple titles, has been dominated by the Saudi org for the past two years, but this time, despite having the most rosters in the competition, they were pipped to the post on the penultimate day of EWC by Chinese organisation AG.AL.
It eventually came down to Trackmania, a new addition to the EWC lineup, with Gwendal “Gwen” Duparc winning the tournament to lock in AG.AL as Club Championship victors. AG.ALended with 5300 points, while Falcons lagged behind on 4600 and Team Vitality took third with 3,300.
EWC Sets Viewership Records
The Club Championship drama was not the only positive thing to come out of EWC, with the Esports Foundation revealing that the event broke its own viewership records. EWC earned 850 million viewers and 440 million hours watched, beating last year’s numbers by 13% and 26% respectively. That marks a big increase for the first international version of the competition, and something the Foundation will no doubt want to build on when the event returns to Riyadh next year.
Caps Enters The Hall of Legends
Rasmus “Caps” Winther has become the third inductee into the League of Legends Hall of Legends, joining Lee ‘Faker’ Sang-hyeok and Jian ‘Uzi’ Zi-Hao. The first European inductee, Caps has been one of the most successful players of all time in the West, having won 17 LEC titles and MSI, and appeared in the Worlds final. An in-game event to celebrate him is due to start in the next few weeks, with an exclusive Caps-themed skin expected to launch.
M80 Enters CDL
M80 has joined the Call of Duty League for the 2027 season, by acquiring the slot of the Boston Breach team. The team will play under the name M80 Boston, with the new owners of the slot opting to keep the regional branding that has been in the league for the past four years. M80 also competes in 2XKO, Counter-Strike 2, Valorant, Rainbow Six Siege, and Rocket League, with the Call of Duty League spot the latest addition to their growing roster of teams.
Zywoo And Apex Extend Contracts With Team Vitality
Mathieu ‘ZywOo’ Herbaut and Dan ‘apEX’ Madesclaire have both signed extensions with Team Vitality that will keep them with the organisation until 2028. The two Counter-Strike legends have already accomplished pretty much everything there is to do in CS as part of Vitality, and they are now going to try and build on that legacy further for at least another couple of years. For both players, 2028 will mark 10 years since they joined the org, making them some of the longest tenured players in all of esports.
World Leaders Attend EWC
The Esports World Cup closed out with a fancy closing ceremony that was attended by world leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron and Saudi Crown Prince HRH Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud. The two leaders are obviously tied to the event given both governments helping to put on the 2026 event, but it marked a significant step for esports with multiple leaders in attendance. Of course, other big names such as EWC ambassador Cristiano Ronaldo as well as the biggest names from esports were also at the event.
Tournament Results
Credit: Esports World Cup
Karmine Corp Secure VCT EMEA Trophy In Barcelona
The EMEA VCT went on a road trip to Barcelona for the Stage 2 finals, where Karmine Corp came out on top. The French org took down Team Liquid 3-1 in the final, claiming the $100,000 first place prize and giving the Spanish fans a solid show. Both organisations have now qualified for Valorant Champions, which will close out the competitive year in October.
BIG Duo Become First Back-to-Back Fortnite LAN Winners
Fortnite players Taylor-Petrik “vic0” Gatschelhofer and Danila “Malibuca” Iakovenko, playing for BIG, became the first duo to ever win back-to-back LAN events at the Esports World Cup. Prior to arriving in France, the pair won the FNCS Major 1 Summit in Düsseldorf, then won the Fortnite Reload Elite Series at EWC in a 13-game match-point final.
Team Spirit Wins A Record Third Dota 2 International
Team Spirit has become the first organisation to win the Dota 2 International three times, after victory in Shanghai earlier this month. Despite a slow start and being knocked down to the lower bracket, Spirit found their form and ended the tournament with three 2-0 victories before edging out a close final 3-2 against Parivision. This makes Magomed “Collapse” Khalilov and Illya “Yatoro” Mulyarchuk the only players to have won TI three times.
15-Year-Old Street Fighter Pro Wins EWC
Another story to come out of EWC last month was 15-year-old Jaime “Craime” Bustos winning the Street Fighter 6 competition. He became the youngest EWC winner ever and secured vital points for Team Falcons in the Club Championship. He took down Hibiki in the grand final, which was a battle between one of the oldest players and one of the youngest in the competition.
Pokémon World Championships Head To San Francisco
The Pokémon World Championships headed for San Francisco to end August, with four main competitions taking place. Takuma Yamazaki won the video game competition, Andrew Hedrick won the trading card game tournament, GGs489hiromaru took the Pokémon GO trophy while Zeta Division emerged victorious in Pokémon Unite. The event was a massive celebration of Pokémon and had a real community spirit to it.
And Finally
Storied Korean Esports Team DRX Is Making K-Dramas
Korean organisation DRX, best known for its world championship winning League of Legends team has announced plans to diversify its business outside of esports, and one of the areas it is expanding into is producing K-drama shows. The organisation says it has two K-drama projects that have been fully cast and are entering production, and they think their fan base from esports will appreciate the new content the company is working on.
