| Lyna Mohamad |
THIRTY-THREE local gamers representing six teams will compete at the World Electronic Sports Games (WESG) at Quill Convention Centre, Kuala Lumpur from today until December 16.
Teams Revival, Exidium and Unikats will represent Brunei in the Dota 2, CSGO and CSGO Woman respectively while Fadhil Majid will compete in the HearthStone game category, Rahman Yassin in Starcraft 2 and Fantastic 6 in Vain Glory.
The 33 gamers departed for Kuala Lumpur yesterday accompanied by Hawaii Yee from BruGames who was appointed to conduct the Brunei tournament to determine winners and qualify for the main stage.
Hawaii expressed hopes that they will get the opportunity to learn and put Brunei on the e-sports map.
Hawaii, who represented Brunei in several games in Kuala Lumpur, has assigned his team members from Goodfellas, who have participated in several major tournaments abroad, to coach the players.
“It is going to be a tough journey for Brunei as e-sports has been included in the SEA games next year.”
Hawaii also expressed appreciation to sponsors, Pro Builder Sdn Bhd, Kenview Enterprise Sdn Bhd and Aewon.
An initiative by Alibaba Sports Group (Alisports) to spearhead the development of e-sports on a global scale, the WESG has conducted several tournaments since its inception, and it is back with a prize pool of USD5.5 million.
Global gamers are taking note of the tourney and to increase the participation of Southeast Asian countries in e-sports, the Beyond e-sports platform will be introduced and promoted alongside WESG.
BruGames on the other hand aims to nurture local talents and help them to compete with the best from other countries.