The most impactful change is Blizzard ceasing its funding of the EPT, leading to a significant reduction in prize money. The upcoming 2023/24 season will pay out "at least" $663,600 in total prize money, with ESL leaving the door open for the possibility of a later prize pool increase. In comparison, approximately $1,340,000* was paid out in 2022/23.
ESL confirmed that two seasons of ESL Masters—a rebrand of the previous DreamHack Masters—will be held in the Summer and Winter:
ESL StarCraft II Masters Summer:
Online Regionals on May 2 - 21, 2023
Finals to take place live at DreamHack Summer in Jönköping, Sweden, on June 16-18, 2023
Featuring a $200,000 total prize pool
ESL StarCraft II Masters Winter:
Online Regionals on October 31 - November 19, 2023
Finals to take place live at DreamHack Atlanta in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, on December 15-17, 2023
Featuring a $200,000 total prize pool
ESL announced its intent to introduce new tournament formats for both the online qualifiers and live finals, but did not reveal the specifics at this time.
ESL did announce a major shake-up in regional qualification. Latin America and North America will be merged into a single "Americas" region, while the [China], [Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, and Japan], and the [Oceania and Rest of Asia] will be merged into a single "Asia" region.
While ESL confirmed $200,000 in total prize money for the EPT Championship (world championship), it was not confirmed to be held again at IEM Katowice. Regarding the location, ESL only stated "Stay tuned as more details about the EPT 23/24 Championship, including its location, will be announced later this year - however, the prize pool level of at least $200.000 is guaranteed!"
ESL included a short Q&A section to address a number of topics:
Why did you merge the smaller regions?
We feel that the level of competition in previous season’s regions was too different from each other. The main goal of our change is to make sure we have a strong competition in every regional tournament where players are able to compete in a good environment and produce a great show for our esports fans.
Why did you change the “DreamHack Masters” to “ESL Masters”?
With DreamHack being a festival brand and ESL being focused on esports competitions, we would like to better highlight the nature of our tournament. With the upcoming format changes, ESL Masters is going to be focused on the highest level of StarCraft II esports - but the offline events will still be part of DreamHack festivals so we hope to see you there!
What are the format changes for ESL Masters events?
Our goal is to focus more on the highest level of competition and we are going to implement new tournament formats for both Regionals and offline Finals. More details about the ESL Masters format will be announced on our website soon.
Will you have talents onsite this year for both Summer and Winter events?
We pay very close attention to the feedback from the community and know that having no talents onsite in Atlanta was really disappointing for a lot of our fans. Our current plan is to bring the talent lineup to both Masters events this year.
What is the total prize money for EPT 23/24 season?
The total prize pool is going to be at least $663.600 which includes:
$200.000 for the Summer season
$200.000 for the Winter season
$63.600 for 53 weekly Open Cups
At least $200.000 for the EPT Championship to be announced later this year
Stay tuned as more details about the EPT 23/24 Championship, including its location, will be announced later this year - however, the prize pool level of at least $200.000 is guaranteed!
What about GSL, will it continue?
Yes, GSL continues as well - you can find all details of GSL 2023 plans via AfreecaTV announcement.
Are there any 3rd party events like HSC or TSL in the upcoming season of EPT SC2?
We are still happy to include the 3rd party tournaments into the EPT circuit - and we definitely hope to see HomeStory Cup, TeamLiquid StarLeague and other community events in the lineup for this season! There are no 3rd party tournament-related announcements to be made from our side at this point though.
Will there be new maps or balance patches?
We will continue supporting the SC2 esports scene with some of the most talented progamers and passionate fans in the whole esports world. Our current plan is also to continue implementing the tournament map pool updates and balance changes from Blizzard Entertainment.
I don't think either of these changes are all that unexpected. We knew the Blizzard money was leaving, it's just nice they are able to keep it going. As for the region mergers, honestly these should have happened sooner.
could it be the fact that there are no koreans working at esl that results in the consistent reduction of $ for koreans moreso than other regions YoY? Surely the death of korean sc2 is not good for the scene.
I'm assuming there will be a separate GSL post? Prize pool cut by 80% and no super tournaments - first prize only gets 8K now. Online entirely except for Ro4 onwards.
Considering this the death of the korean sc2 scene as we know it.
The ESL tour prize pool and format is still pretty healthy. GSL is basically dead though. Crazy, I was hoping for a reduction similar to the one last year but instead prize pool is cut massively to the point where all 3 seasons combined pay 50% less than a single season last year and there will only be 6-9 (depending on if ro4 is still split) offline days for the entire year.... Very sad times.
Well with no more Blizzard money for the prizepool, I gues there wasn t anything more we could ve expected. I gues these prizepools are what is self sustainable for ESL and afreecaTV
On February 24 2023 04:22 Akio wrote: GSL starting from ro16 and all but semis and finals played online? This is depressing.
This.
Reminds me of that depressing "end of starcraft 2" article from a few years back. GSL not being live until semis, and only 16 players..? I accepted to 20 player change, some what. But this is... I dunno, it's going to feel way less glamorous and exciting.
On February 24 2023 03:55 luxon wrote: could it be the fact that there are no koreans working at esl that results in the consistent reduction of $ for koreans moreso than other regions YoY? Surely the death of korean sc2 is not good for the scene.
ESL doesn't run the GSL. It's a partnership program, ESL includes GSL as part of its league but Afreeca has the full run of GSL they are free to do whatever they want with it.
Without the Blizzard funding, Afreeca is pretty much just on its own when it comes to running and funding it, and we can see from how drastically it was reduced that Afreeca doesn't have the budget to keep it going like before.
The writing has been on the wall for this for a while now.
Glad to see the merging of smaller regions, but man, ESL needs to kick in some for GSL or actually run tournaments there if they want even medium term survival for the Korean scene.
On February 24 2023 03:55 luxon wrote: could it be the fact that there are no koreans working at esl that results in the consistent reduction of $ for koreans moreso than other regions YoY? Surely the death of korean sc2 is not good for the scene.
ESL doesn't run the GSL. It's a partnership program, ESL includes GSL as part of its league but Afreeca has the full run of GSL they are free to do whatever they want with it.
Without the Blizzard funding, Afreeca is pretty much just on its own when it comes to running and funding it, and we can see from how drastically it was reduced that Afreeca doesn't have the budget to keep it going like before.
The writing has been on the wall for this for a while now.
I would asume, that afreeca even gets some of the funding from esl now
I hope those new World Championship (which I would bet will not happen at Kattowice anymore) pay attention to the new realities and South Korea gets treated more like a fourth region and not as a singular thing compared to the foreign scene. With a GSL that shrunk, it would be just weird to give 50% of the "region slots" towards it. Especially since I believe Dark and Cure will probably not be around long enough because of their military service, right?
On February 24 2023 07:57 Balnazza wrote: I hope those new World Championship (which I would bet will not happen at Kattowice anymore) pay attention to the new realities and South Korea gets treated more like a fourth region and not as a singular thing compared to the foreign scene. With a GSL that shrunk, it would be just weird to give 50% of the "region slots" towards it. Especially since I believe Dark and Cure will probably not be around long enough because of their military service, right?
I think until Korea actually does bad at an IEM they deserve all their slots. Despite Time winning Korea had a very good IEM overall and made it clear they definitely deserved their 50% representation.
It's very likely that more Koreans will retire due to the GSL cuts but you can't just assume that and punish players for it. Korean players are already punished enough with the GSL downsizing. Doing what you're suggesting would just force even more retirements.
On February 24 2023 04:22 Akio wrote: GSL starting from ro16 and all but semis and finals played online? This is depressing.
This.
Reminds me of that depressing "end of starcraft 2" article from a few years back. GSL not being live until semis, and only 16 players..? I accepted to 20 player change, some what. But this is... I dunno, it's going to feel way less glamorous and exciting.
the 16 players format was the only obvious downgrade. KR doesn't even have 20 pros anymore
in hindsight, Artosis leaving GSL would mean he knew the whole thing was going to shrink in size to the point one wonders if it's still existing. depressing news anyway, but could have been even worse. Blizzard is letting its game die for what is for them just spare money.
On February 24 2023 10:44 knotfun wrote: in hindsight, Artosis leaving GSL would mean he knew the whole thing was going to shrink in size to the point one wonders if it's still existing. depressing news anyway, but could have been even worse. Blizzard is letting its game die for what is for them just spare money.
We've known for years that Blizzard funding would end this year, it was pretty obvious that there would at least be some budget cuts
It is (almost) 13 years old game. All things come to an end one day. There were ups and downs, but in general these 13 years were awesome. Sad to see Korean scene taking such a big hit but it is what it is.
Hopefully Stormgate will be released next year and become successful - then we'll see quite a few familiar faces again, I'd guess.
All good things come to an end. Huge thank you to ESL for the continued support of the sc2 scene. Hopefully we can have a great Year and corwdfund some community tournaments as well.
I'm actually excited to see what happens in the condensed Regionals. It'll be interesting to see how well some of the "smaller" regions manage to compete, and it'll also mean that we'll see fewer one-sided series at the start of Global events.
It's obviously a shame that the prize money has gone down, especially to the extend that it has in Korea, but this was always going to happen without developer support. If these are the levels that are deemed sustainable from advertising and viewership alone, then I don't think things are as bad as some people are trying to make out.
Besides, it's a 13 year old game, so we're very lucky to have gotten this far!
ESL is doing good by the SC2 community. I hope Microsoft can support SC2 after the Blizzard acquisition. If not, we shall enjoy SC2 as it will be. Also hope Frost Giant's game will be good, if Microsoft does not pick up SC2 I can see a lot of player migration and maybe the "death" of SC2 scene.
Very happy about this! Was expecting way worse. GSL-level downsizing or nothing at all. New format and region makes sense and 660k+ is still good money. Thanks ESL!
On February 25 2023 03:22 [Phantom] wrote: people excited about stormgate are on hopium.
The fact is this:
Even if stormgate is great, it will never have the budget to fund big events
Exactly. Even if this does come out big, the first big tournemts will have max price pools of maybe 50k. There is now way a small company like this can invest heavily into esport right from the getgo
On February 25 2023 03:22 [Phantom] wrote: people excited about stormgate are on hopium.
The fact is this:
Even if stormgate is great, it will never have the budget to fund big events
Exactly. Even if this does come out big, the first big tournemts will have max price pools of maybe 50k. There is now way a small company like this can invest heavily into esport right from the getgo
they probably can't, but if they can find one/a few big sponsors, things might be different. if Stormgate can make some large company believe in its Esports potential, that might be enough.
On February 24 2023 15:41 digmouse wrote: This is the beginning of the end, isn't it.
It's hard to say to be honest. Korean scene is probably done, but it's been that way for some time, more or less since pros realised that ASL + streaming made BW a viable option again. Foreign scene maybe isn't quite so bad, given ESL hasn't cut things from a percentage standpoint quite so much as GSL + maybe not so many Koreans taking higher spots - on the assumption that they don't make prize money absurdly top heavy (as so many major tournaments have had a tendency to do in the past).
That said, I fail to see how ESL can possibly be breaking even on investment and would be able to retain the prize fund levels they have in the medium term, especially given how casual interest is basically zero at this stage. Checking on the SC thread in another forum I frequent, and while volumes are generally down, there's been barely a couple of hundred posts a year for half a decade now, and half of those are discussing ASL/BW. I personally can't recall the last time I watched an SC2 game - probably Neeb's Kespa Cup win. Maybe there's a greater propagation of community tournaments (hate the term, but for want of a better name for those not bankrolled by Blizzard) and players can at least maintain a side income from SC2, who knows, but I don't see how you ever get any significant new interest in the game again.
On February 24 2023 15:41 digmouse wrote: This is the beginning of the end, isn't it.
That said, I fail to see how ESL can possibly be breaking even on investment and would be able to retain the prize fund levels they have in the medium term, especially given how casual interest is basically zero at this stage.
Given the state of esports and the economy currently, I wouldn't be surprised if it continues to plummet if not drop it entirely.
On February 25 2023 03:22 [Phantom] wrote: people excited about stormgate are on hopium.
The fact is this:
Even if stormgate is great, it will never have the budget to fund big events
It doesn’t have to be huge, just a bloody good game that’s relatively successful.
It doesn’t have to be hitting the heights Starcraft(s) have to carve out a big enough niche for folks who love competitive RTS. Although people are I think giving into hype more in desperation than hope.
As for these changes, not as bad as expected. Actually think some of the region merges are something that could have been done a while ago.
EPT![[image loading]](/staff/Waxangel/EPT/esm734.jpg)
