Smoking is bad, but violence...?

Gears 5 will not include any depictions of smoking. The upcoming third-person shooter, slated for release on September 10 on PC and Xbox One, does away with all tobacco use after a push from the Truth Initiative. The anti-smoking organization, Truth Initiative, approached Turner, the company that owns the rights to broadcast Gears 5 ELeague esports matches. Turner, after speaking with Truth Initiative, spoke to The Coalition about the removal of the use of tobacco from the game.

Previous entries in the Gears of War franchise have had...

Turner "Tfue" Tenney claims his contract with FaZe Clan is in violation of California law.

Tfue is one of the hottest names in esports right now, with over 120 million Twitch views, 10 million subscribers on YouTube, and over 5.5 million Instagram followers. Tfue, otherwise known as Turner Tenney, is known as one of the world's best Fortnite players. He is suing the FaZe Clan esports organization that he is a part of. He claims that the organization is taking up to 80% of his earnings from brand deals. ...

The competitive gaming scene continues to soar in popularity and the biggest events have attracted millions of fans from across the globe. Esports have already begun to rival traditional sporting tournaments, and the juggernaut shows no signs of slowing down as prize pools become increasingly lucrative. Leading companies like MasterCard, Intel and Red Bull sponsor tournaments and leading gamers have become multimillionaires with massive social media followings as a result of their exploits. Here are the five most prestigious esports events to look out for over the next year:
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The time to blob your friends has finally come.

Today marks the release of Puyo Puyo Champions. Those in Asia know the game as Puyo Puyo eSports. The blob matching puzzle game is out today for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC via Steam. Drop those blobs on players from all over the world as you strive to become the best player.

The best part? This game is only $9.99 (USD). It may not feature a battle royale mode like some classic puzzle titles, but it's still got that classic Puyo Puyo gameplay most of you have already come to know and love.
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There is no denying that Dota 2 is an esports juggernaut. As the game enters into its sixth year this Summer, the popular "multiplayer online battle arena" (MOBA) shows no signs of slowing down. Last year, the annual Dota 2 tournament, The International, offered the biggest esports payout of any single video game tournament. In fact, The International occupies the top five positions on the top esports earnings list.

This means that with the rise of Dota 2 esports comes the rise of the Dota 2 betting site. If there is a competition or a tournament for something, rest...

The Tekken World Tour 2019 was officially announced today. This new esports tournament series returns thanks to a partnership between Bandai Namco and Twitch. As you may safely assume, Twitch will be the go-to location to watch all of the latest Tekken 7 action. New this year for the World Tour is "more action" along with new locations, returning favorites (whatever that means), and "innovative tournament categories enabling more players to earn Tekken World Tour Ranking Points."

This is all on top of a prize pool that totals over $185,500 (USD). The World Tour Finals will have a $100,000 baseline prize purse for the best players. All of this begins on April 20, 2019 in France. ...

Team Ninja announced a bunch of things today for Dead or Alive 6 during EVO Japan 2019. First up is the announcement of a Deluxe Demo for the game. Second, they announced Dead or Alive World Championship, a new esports venture. Finally, they also revealed the first details on the "DOA6 Season Pass 1," which includes two characters from SNK's The King of Fighters XIV.

Let's take a look at what's going on with that Deluxe Demo first of all.

This demo will be exclusive to PlayStation Plus and Xbox Live subscribers. The demo will be live on February 22,...

If you've ever been on Twitch for even a small amount of time, you probably have a decent idea of just how downright terrible the chat experience can be. It is especially egregious in larger chats and chats that lack proper moderation, filters, or spam reduction modes enabled. Even then, it's still kind of garbage. Blizzard realizes this and they are apparently taking their own steps to try to make the chat experience a little bit less crap.

The studio announced that they will soon require anybody interested in chatting during various Overwatch matches to tie their Twitch...

Epic Games announced that the Winter Royale Online Tournament for Fortnite will have a $1 Million (USD) prize pool up for grabs. Winter Royale Qualifiers will begin on November 24.

Full details can be found in Epic's latest blog post.
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On Saturday, November 10, Valve will kick off the Artifact Preview Tournament. In addition to this tournament, Valve will also open up pre-orders for the game. And then on top of that, the dev team released the Card Set and Deck Code APIs that will allow creators to make tools to share cards.

The APIs are available right now for free. They can be downloaded from the Artifact website.

Pre-orders will open at 9AM (PT) tomorrow. The game itself won't be released until November 28.

The Artifact Preview Tournament will have 128 players competing for a shot at the $10,000 (USD) prize pool.
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Hey, there's a new Command & Conquer game coming. It's a mobile game.

Command & Conquer: Rivals will hit Android and iOS devices come December 4. It promises to deliver a "fast-paced, RTS action game" built for mobile users. I am confident this will make fans of the older games absolutely thrilled. However, given EA's apparent commitment to seeing this game succeed in a competitive sense, they may actually find something to like here.
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PUBG and eSports go together like, well, like two things that sort of go together but not quite and is only somewhat enjoyed by the masses but would maybe be accepted more if the presentation was better than it used to be? You know what I'm talking about.

That's perhaps why today's news about FACEIT and PUBG teaming up is probably a good thing to learn about.

On September 28, PUBG will be added to the FACEIT platform for Europe, North America, and South America. This essentially means that competitive players will have a structured place to keep track of progression and help them get noticed by professional teams. The upcoming...

Resident Ev...

Nielsen, the company that already tracks what shows you're watching, wants to broaden its horizons a bit. Today, they finalized the acquisition of SuperData Research in order to track digital game sales and eSports. This acquisition will bolster their Nielsen Games and Nielsen Esports divisions.

Nielsen is often very useful for various production companies to see what consumers are watching or purchasing. It helps them to see and understand various market trends. That kind of stuff is pretty damn useful to companies in all sorts of fields, including gaming.
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