Your weekend in esports: Watch 'Rocket League,' 'CS:GO' and 'Street Fighter V'
Esports tournaments are happening all the time, and it can be tough to keep track of everything going on in the world of professional competitive gaming. Each week, Mashable rounds up the best and biggest tournaments in esports to let you know when they're going down, and where to catch all the action.
This weekend, you're looking at the biggest Street Fighter V tournament of the year, the start of a Dota 2 Major and the second-ever Rocket League championship.
Check out what's going on this weekend and next week below.
Street Fighter V: Capcom Cup
The Capcom Cup is the culminating championship tournament for the 2016 Street Fighter V season, and whoever comes out on top of this 32-player bracket will be crowned the best SFV player of the year, walking away with the biggest piece of the $350,000+ prize pool.
Some of the top players—who qualified through a number of international and regional tournaments—are Seonwoo "Infiltration" Lee (first place at Evo, Final Round and NorCal Regionals), Zhoujun "Xiao Hai" Zeng, Hajime "Tokido" Taniguchi, Keita "Fuudo" Ai, and Justin Wong.
On Friday, Dec. 2, 32 competitors will be whittled down to eight at the Esports Arena in Santa Ana, California, running from 9 a.m. to midnight (PST). The top eight will go head-to-head Saturday at PlayStation Experience at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California, running from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. (PST). All of the action will be broadcast live on Twitch.
Rocket League: Rocket League Championship Series Season 2
Rocket League's second Championship Series season has been a long run, and only four North American and four European teams are left in the double-elimination playoffs for $125,000. It's the biggest prize pool in the history of Rocket League.
The top European team is FlipSid3 Tactics with players Mark "Markydooda" Exton, Francesco "Kuxir97" Cinquemani and Marius "GreazyMeister" Ranheim, who won the regional finals 4-0 over Precision Z. The top North American team is NRG Esports, made up of Jacob McDowell, Jayson "Fireburner" Nunez and Kais "SadJunior" Zehri. They defeated Orbit Esports 4-2 in the regional finals.
The action in Amsterdam starts Saturday, Dec. 3 at 7 a.m. (EST), followed by the last loser's rounds and winner's finals starting at 6 a.m. (EST) Sunday with the grand finals at 1:30 p.m. (EST). All the action will be broadcast live on Twitch.
CS:GO: ELeague Season 2
ELeague's second season of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is coming to a head this weekend with only four teams left in the running Friday. The $1.1 million tournament is one of the last premier CS:GO tournaments of the year and its finals will be an interesting and entertaining match-up no matter who makes it through.
The four teams left are reigning Major champions SK Gaming, FaZe Clan, Astralis and OpTic Gaming. OpTic Gaming has the worst showing of the four and will probably have the toughest time making it to first place.
The semifinals matches in Atlanta are Friday, Dec. 2 at 5 p.m. (EST) and 10 p.m. ET, and the finals are at 4 p.m. (EST) Saturday. All matches will be broadcast live on Twitch and the second semifinals match and the finals will be broadcast on TBS.
Dota 2—Boston Major
The first Dota 2 Major of the 2016-2017 season is getting started this weekend as 16 teams battle in group stages to secure their seeding in the single-elimination bracket kicking off next week. The Boston Major's $3 million prize pool is the biggest in all of esports for December.
Some of the top teams in the tournament are The International 6 champions Wings Gaming, North America's best team Evil Geniuses, and recent The Summit 6 winners Virtus.pro.
Group A and B play starts 10 a.m. (EST) on Saturday, Dec. 3, and group C and D play starts Sunday at the same time. The matches will be broadcast live on Twitch.
Super Smash Bros.—UGC Smash Open St. Louis
Smash is heading back to the Midwest this weekend with the UGC Smash Open in St. Louis, Missouri. Some of the best Melee and Smash 4 players in the world are convening on UGC Smash as they battle for $40,000 spread across both games.
The action starts at 10 a.m. (CT) Saturday and Sunday Dec. 3 and 4. The Smash 4 singles top eight starts at 4 p.m. (CT) Sunday, followed by the Melee singles top eight at 7:30 p.m. (CT). The matches will be broadcast live on UGC's Twitch and Melee Everyday's Twitch.
ELeague is owned by Turner Broadcasting, which also is an investor in Mashable.
