WCG reborn as WCA in China with $3.2 million in prizes on the line

Early this year, eSports fans were sad to learn that the World Cyber Games, one of the biggest international eSports tournaments, was ceasing operations. But since February there have been hints that, at least in China, a new tournament would rise to take its place, and now we know what that tournament is: WCA, the World Cyber Arena.

The WCA was officially announced on Tuesday at a briefing in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, where the country’s legislative body meets. We don’t know all the details of the event yet, but here are the basics:

• It’s an international tournament that will include teams and players from around the world.
• It will be held this year in October in Yinchuan, Ningxia province, China.
• It will feature RMB 20 million ($3.2 million) in prize money, including an RMB 3 million ($490,000) grand prize for a single player in one of the events.
• The event is being organized by Brad Lee’s team, which previously worked on WCG
• It will include competitions for PC, mobile, and browser games
• It has the rather awkward official English motto: “Hero’s arena, player’s dreamland”

Still, with $3.2 million at stake, who cares about the motto? It will be interesting to see what games this new WCA event has on offer. Previous WCG finals in China have included Dota 2 (in 2012), League of Legends (in 2013), Warcraft 3, Starcraft 2, FIFA, and a number of domestically-popular games like CrossFire and QQ Speed. I would expect WCA to feature a similar, but expanded, lineup.

(via QQ Games)