Today, Afreeca TV announced that Afreeca TV StarCraft League (ASL) will return for its fifth season on March 11. The return of ASL marks the second season of play in StarCraft: Remastered and you’ll be able to enjoy every minute of the action on the English stream: http://www.afreeca.tv/afasl
ASL Season 5 will run for ten weeks, with games scheduled every Tuesday and Sunday at the Freecup Studio. The round of 24 will be held as a single elimination dual tournament. The twelve players that emerge victorious from the round of 24 will be joined by the top four finishers from ASL Season 4 in the round of 16 for Season 5. The round of 16 will also feature the single elimination dual tournament format, while the semifinals and finals will be best-of-five, single elimination.
“StarCraft is the original epic strategy experience that has driven 20 years of competitive gaming and esports around the world,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “We’re excited that StarCraft esports fans will get a chance to witness spectacular moments from legendary professional players during Season 5 of the ASL.”
“ASL is an esports celebration brought to you by fans and streamers, and I am excited to see its new season kick off,” SooGil Seo, CEO of Afreeca TV, added. “Through the collaboration between Blizzard and Afreeca TV, we will strive to make the best league possible.”
Youngho Lee (Flash), the winner of ASL Season 4, will be joined by fellow top-four finishers Iljang Cho(herO), and HongGyu Lim(Larva), in the round of 16 in Season 5. Bisu, who has recently enlisted in the military to fulfill his mandatory military service, will not be participating and his slot will be determined by a wild card match. Additional details on the wild card match will be announced soon.
Registration for ASL Season 5 starts February 12 (Monday) and continues until 11:59PM Korean Time on February 21(Wednesday) and is open to anyone who goes to the official website (http://starleague.kr/). The preliminaries for ASL Season 5 will be held on February 24 and 25 at the Seoul and Busan Afreeca TV Open Studios.
Details about ASL Season 5 preliminaries and main tournament can be found at the ASL Season 5 registration website (http://starleague.kr).
This is what we've all been waiting for. Seems like they aren't doing twitch/google streams again, but I don't mind personally as last ASL I could finally watch afreeca streams. Hope they continue to improve them.
On February 09 2018 17:39 Caos2 wrote: and you’ll be able to enjoy every minute of the action on the English stream: http://www.afreeca.tv/afasl
Does this mean that this season will be afreeca only i.e no twitch broadcast parallel to the afreeca one? The lack of a twitch stream last season really hurt foreign viewership. I was really hoping that they'd have sorted it out so that this season could be back on twitch again like seasons 1-3. Oh well. Hopefully it still will be and they've just not mentioned it in the announcement.
Either way, I'm hyped as for ASL5 kicking off so soon. Thanks Afreeca!
This is good news indeed. Hope to see Flash again .
It's a shame blizzard doesn't do shit for the foreign scene though. Supporting only a portion of your playerbase is a slap in the face to a lot of their customers ;(.
On February 10 2018 10:30 chaosTheory_14cc wrote: I bet Afreeca has already made another ASL trophy with Flash's name on it.
Might as well. With the way things are going with his 1/1/1 build there's not a Zerg that can compete with him right now. There isn't a strong protoss to be found. Maybe Rain but I keep hearing that he doesn't take Brood War seriously. And I can't imagine another Terran that can beat him right now. His TvT matches in ASL4 were so lopsided it was pathetic.
On February 10 2018 14:45 angrypofke wrote: Guys, did you watch DanJJing starleague? Flash didn't even make it to the semis, he was stopped by a new protoss hope (who? go find out yourselves)
So HYPE for ASL!
I heard a lot of that before ASL4. The fact is the FlaSh takes it to a whole new level offline with big money at stake.
I truly hope someone, anyone, can challenge him. Haven’t made it all the way through DSL yet so it’ll be interesting to see who you’re talking about.
It's really sad that it took this long... Now pls also allow Afreeca to do another ATB. And please let's not repeat this next time, let afreeca do asl6 asap. I can't believe that I have to hope for a company to allow someone to run a tourney to promote their game....
Anyway, let's see if someone can take down flash. With protoss loosing their leader, I think it'll be the age of extinction for Toss until a new hero rises. Also can't wait to watch the qualifiers again, following several streams + LR thread was sooo much fun last time.
On February 11 2018 03:29 Lorch wrote: It's really sad that it took this long... Now pls also allow Afreeca to do another ATB. And please let's not repeat this next time, let afreeca do asl6 asap. I can't believe that I have to hope for a company to allow someone to run a tourney to promote their game....
Anyway, let's see if someone can take down flash. With protoss loosing their leader, I think it'll be the age of extinction for Toss until a new hero rises. Also can't wait to watch the qualifiers again, following several streams + LR thread was sooo much fun last time.
Well put. We should have at least 4 leagues a year so there is constant offline competition besides spons and 2-3-4 player team battles.
The qualies will take their toll.
And it's just two cities again. It will be stacked!
On February 10 2018 14:45 angrypofke wrote: Guys, did you watch DanJJing starleague? Flash didn't even make it to the semis, he was stopped by a new protoss hope (who? go find out yourselves)
So HYPE for ASL!
I heard a lot of that before ASL4. The fact is the FlaSh takes it to a whole new level offline with big money at stake.
I truly hope someone, anyone, can challenge him. Haven’t made it all the way through DSL yet so it’ll be interesting to see who you’re talking about.
Flash losing Danjjing is like Roger Federer losing ATP masters series, then shits on everybody at the Grand Slams.
On February 09 2018 17:39 Caos2 wrote: and you’ll be able to enjoy every minute of the action on the English stream: http://www.afreeca.tv/afasl
Does this mean that this season will be afreeca only i.e no twitch broadcast parallel to the afreeca one? The lack of a twitch stream last season really hurt foreign viewership. I was really hoping that they'd have sorted it out so that this season could be back on twitch again like seasons 1-3. Oh well. Hopefully it still will be and they've just not mentioned it in the announcement.
Either way, I'm hyped as for ASL5 kicking off so soon. Thanks Afreeca!
What if the lack of a Twitch stream is because Afreeca is paying Blizz for exclusive streaming rights, but Blizz actually wants to stream there? This is why there's the cost and the disagreement? It actually sounds plausible since Blizz wouldn't purposefully botch so much of SC:R's marketing and have made sure that other events were streamed on Twitch. Maybe that's the piece of the puzzle that makes this all make sense?
Whatever it is, I'm glad to see ASL5 come. Snow is the Protoss we need.
ASL Season 5 will run for ten weeks, with games scheduled every Tuesday and Sunday at the Freecup Studio. The round of 24 will be held as a single elimination dual tournament. The twelve players that emerge victorious from the round of 24 will be joined by the top four finishers from ASL Season 4 in the round of 16 for Season 5. The round of 16 will also feature the single elimination dual tournament format, while the semifinals and finals will be best-of-five, single elimination.
Why would you pick those guys? I guess Mind and Killer lost to Bisu last season... I'd have figured that they'd pick the 4 players with the most ASL points.
I'm really hoping Best shows us his ASL2 form. That was legit scary. His macro is probably one of the best in the game imo. Also, Mind too and hoping that someone finally takes down Flash in an epic BO5 series. That'd make this ASL that much better!
On February 15 2018 11:26 BigFan wrote: I'm really hoping Best shows us his ASL2 form. That was legit scary. His macro is probably one of the best in the game imo. Also, Mind too and hoping that someone finally takes down Flash in an epic BO5 series. That'd make this ASL that much better!
His PvZ hasn't looked that impressive. His PvT on the other hand looks scary as hell.
On February 15 2018 11:26 BigFan wrote: I'm really hoping Best shows us his ASL2 form. That was legit scary. His macro is probably one of the best in the game imo. Also, Mind too and hoping that someone finally takes down Flash in an epic BO5 series. That'd make this ASL that much better!
His PvZ hasn't looked that impressive. His PvT on the other hand looks scary as hell.
Really, I felt like his PvT was very one-dimensional, especially in the KRS on 31.1. vs Mind and Ssak he was in a bad position imo and just won bc of a good recall. With proper prep I dont see him pull that off again tbh.
Actually, there are a lot of protosses in good form currently. Best, Shuttle, Rain... I haven't followed Snow and Mini, they could be in fine shape too.
Looking for some great games! Can't wait, really...