By REYNALD MAGALLON
Following a successful first season, the PBA, in partnership with Dark League Studios continue to push for the growth of the esports scene in the country with what promises to be a bigger and better Season 2 of the PBA Esports Bakbakan Dota 2 tournament set to fire off on Oct. 22.
With the focus now on discovering aspiring and future esports athletes from the grassroots, the Dota 2 tournament is now solely for amateur teams which will go through an open qualifier to determine the 12 best teams for the lion’s share of the P500,000 prize pool.
The qualified squads will then get the chance to pick the PBA team they want to represent with its own players, including eight-time MVP and Dota 2 enthusiast June Mar Fajardo, also joining as part of the official roster.
“This program of the PBA creates an opportunity for the grassroots that we have for them to potentially be seen, known and potentially represent one of the professional teams that we have,” said Dark League Studios co-founder and CEO AC Valdenor during the press conference at their headquarters on Thursday, Oct. 3.
Teams will be divided into two groups playing in three rounds of swiss with the top two teams from each advancing to the Final Four. The playoffs will be played in an offline setup on Nov. 22.
For the PBA, the venture to the esports scene has been successful especially in terms of closing the gaps between the fans of esports and mainstream sports like basketball.
“Magkaibang kultura, magkaibang sports pero napagsama natin ang basketball at Esports. Malaking bagay sa amin sa PBA itong Esports. Win-win situation for both,” said PBA commissioner Willie Marcial who was joined by marketing Jo Francisco and the player representatives of the 12 teams.
Last season, Converge, represented by 747 Dota 2 team bannered by pro players Marvin “Boomy” Rushton, Muhammad “InYourdreaM” Anugrah, Daud “Db-” Budiawan, Karl “Karl” Baldovino and Jaunuel “Jaunuel” Arcilla, came out victorious to bag the top prize of P150,000.
The second season of Dota 2 is now the fifth title under the PBA Esports Bakbakan with Mobile Legends Bang Bang, Player’s Unknown Battlegrounds, Call of Duty and Streetballers tilts also played last year.
“With the branding of the PBA on top of this program, we’re going to attract more users and fans from Season 1 where we had 351 teams. That’s how famous the PBA is and it’s very good to our vision of bridging the gap between physical sports and Esports,” added Valdenor.
