theScore esports

Welcome to the Deep Dive! In this LinkedIn-exclusive show, Keith Capstick will select esports and gaming subjects with a specific business tie and tell you everything you need to know to stay up to date with the industry. In our inaugural episode, we’re discussing the almost $500 League of Legends skin bundle that Riot Games dropped to celebrate Faker being the first player inducted into the Hall of Legends -- their version of the Hall of Fame. The question on everyone’s mind when this dropped was the same: How could a set of in-game cosmetics POSSIBLY be worth that much money!? The response from League fans was certainly mixed after the announcement. That is a TON of money for some skins. But tune in and find out how revenue sharing opportunities like this between devs and esports orgs can be a game changer for the industry when done right. And if there are any specific topics you want us to tackle on this show, let us know in the replies, or send us an email at tips@thescore.com! #esports #thescore #business

You don't see a lot of brand partnerships built on logo slaps -- especially in gaming. But if a brand isn't selling GPUs or OLEDs, it can be tough to find an authentic way to weave itself into a gaming partnership in a value-additive way. One notable exception in Hewlett Packard Enterprise, as last year it helped to create one of the biggest turnarounds in esports history. About this time last year, we learned about the HPE Futures Combine from Lewis Smith at GMR Marketing. Utilizing data and AI learning, HPE and Evil Geniuses developed a tool that looks at compatibility analysis, skill analysis, and communication effectiveness and boils it all down to one easy-to-understand rating leveraged to evaluate talent at the combine. Last year, the combine helped to identify Demon1 -- a little known American player who would help take EG from the bottom of the standings to the VALORANT Champions 2023 title. This spring EG invited theScore esports to LA for a behind-the-scenes look at the 2024 combine, which we've showcased in an episode of our tech-meets-gaming series, CRACKED. Here Dimitri Pascaluta and Colten Gowan break it all down with some help from HPE's Ashwin Pendyala, EG's Soham Chowdhury, and its VALORANT coaches potter and pho. Shoutout to Niall McCrossan, Matthew Massey, and the rest of the CRACKED team for another great example of what makes theScore esports the greatest storytellers in gaming. Hope you'll take a few minutes to check it out. #VALORANT #esports #combine

Earlier this year, be quiet! by Listan GmbH! came to us with a challenge.     They wanted to be a part of the biggest events in esports, reach a large gaming audience, and increase U.S. awareness of their high-quality PC cooling parts and peripherals in a way that kept them top of mind without being “down your throat.”      But we knew that in this industry, you can’t just slap somebody’s logo on your content and call that a partnership. You need to find a way that they can bring something to the audience that simply wouldn’t be there without them.     And together with be quiet!, that’s exactly what we did.     They helped us fly our team to Copenhagen to cover CS2’s first Major up close and personal, and they powered one of our most ambitious video projects to date: our one-and-a-half hour epic ICONIC Moments in CS:GO. A love letter to a game that we’ve covered since theScore esports began.     None of which would have been possible without this partnership.     ☑ Together we published 81 total pieces of custom content across all our platforms   ☑ We created a short-form video series called “The Coolest Quiet Plays in CS:GO History” weaving the brand’s messaging with bite-sized storytelling   ☑ In total this campaign has organically generated 12.4 million views, 53 million impressions and more than 852,000 engagements    ☑ More than 600,000 organic views across our two documentaries which highlighted be quiet!’s Shadow Base 800 PC case    ☑ On the ground in Denmark, we created custom short-form videos giving away Mountain keyboards to fans     ☑ And most importantly, all this content was net-new because of be quiet! They were able to power content that wouldn’t have existed without them. Which is a key to reaching the esports audience in the correct way #esports #business #thescore #sponsorship

Last week, we published this episode of our news show ‘Don’t @ Me’ about a team of vigilante crime fighters working to prevent cheating in @Valorant.    Now that may sound outrageous, but we promise it’s true. Our team sat down and interviewed one of the members of the Anti-Cheat Police Department, who are working with Tencent and Riot Games to stop cheaters in their tracks.  Here’s some highlights of what they’re doing: 1️⃣ They’re specifically targeting content creators who advertise content for paid cheating subscriptions   2️⃣ So far, 100s of YouTube and TikTok accounts have been reported because of their work  3️⃣ Some have even been terminated entirely    With the work Riot Games has done with their Vanguard product to deter cheating, Valorant does not have the same widespread problems as games like Counter Strike or Apex Legends. With that said, cheating content is more prevalent than ever. And without prevention, this kind of advertising can point those who are inclined to cheat in the direction of the tools they need.   While this can be a sore subject in the gaming space, it is also an extremely important one. Every year, esports gets bigger, more money enters the space, and the importance of competitive integrity strengthens.    This particular story is a window into how passionate the community members of games like Valorant can be, and the work that the industry at-large is doing to make gaming healthier and more approachable for years to come.     If you liked this story and want to hear about something else like it on this channel, send us an email at tips@thescore.com! 🙏 #youtube #thescore #esports #valorant

Crysis, Power Creep, GA'd... WTF do they mean? At theScore esports, they mean millions of views. WTF is a short-form series that takes viewers down meme-ory lane to tell the stories behind some of the most random semantics of gaming vernacular. (I know, WTF is gaming vernacular?) Apparently I'm not the only one who needs the education, as WTF has become one of our most popular series -- with several videos generating well over 2M views. Series sponsorships are a way for brands to share in the popularity of franchise content, and the viral opportunity with short-form series like WTF shouldn't be ignored. #shorts #shortform #gaming #esports

Evo 2024 was one of the biggest esports events of all-time!  More than 10,000 competitors showed up to compete, making it the largest Evolution Championship Series ever, and the biggest esports event ever in terms of active players.  Our team was on-the-ground covering the event and gathering interviews for an upcoming special project in collaboration with Cash App.  🕹 The main event this year was Street Fighter 6. And on Sunday night, Punk stood above them all as the second-ever SF6 Evo world champion 🎮 Arslan Ash dominated the biggest Tekken tournament in history, triumphing over 4,646 players as the first ever Tekken 8 Evo world champion 🕹 The main takeaway with Evo is always a constant: this is a massive, diverse audience of incredibly passionate fans. No matter what esports looks like in the future, the Fighting Games Community is going to be a big part of it In other news, the International Olympic Committee announced the creation of the Olympic Esports Games recently.  🎮 The first installment of the games will take place in 2025 but what we don’t know yet is what games will be featured 🕹 The IOC has been testing gaming since 2018 and hosted an esports week last year, but they didn’t feature any of the major esports titles 🎮 The big takeaway here is a big investment from a large traditional sports body in esports and gaming going forward. But for it to be done right it needs to feature games like League of Legends and Counter Strike to be taken seriously by the esports world If there’s something that you want to see covered on Run it Down in the future, or you’re looking to chat some esports with fellow enthusiasts, hit us up at tips@thescore.com!  

🔎 🗺 Counter-Strike vs. Valorant: A Map Size Comparison 🗺 🔍 About a year ago, in collaboration with writer and on-air host Devin Coull, we embarked on a fascinating project to compare the map sizes of Counter-Strike and Valorant by importing them into Blender. Together, we created an insightful YouTube video for theScore esports x Shopify. Key steps: 1️⃣ Extracted and converted in-game maps. 2️⃣ Imported them into Blender for accurate scaling. 3️⃣ Analyzed and compared dimensions and layouts. 4️⃣ Reflected on our findings. In our deep dive, we explored why Valorant maps, despite being larger, often feel smaller than CS maps. Our analysis revealed the intricate design elements that contribute to this perception. Curious about the details? Watch our full analysis on YouTube and see the comparison for yourself! Check out the full video in the comments ⤵ 👀 #GameDesign #3DModeling #Blender #CounterStrike #Valorant #MotionDesign #GamingIndustry #TheScoreEsports

Here’s another episode of Run it Down and Keith Capstick's got some MAJOR news from the world of fighting games for you all.  🔥 New 2XKO Footage Drops    One of League of Legends’ most ICONIC champions is joining their  upcoming fighting game: 2XKO. 2XKO has no release date, but given how huge Street Fighter 6 and Tekken 8's launches were recently, many anticipate big things from Riot's first ever fighting game.    🔥 Riot Was Making Another Fighting Game!?   In other Riot fighting game news, this week, independent journalist Mikhail Klimentov reported that Riot has cancelled an unannounced, Smash Bros.-style platform fighter that was code-named Pool Party. The project went through many revisions, changing from a more focused fighting game to a party game with more casual elements in addition to the hardcore mechanics, before being cancelled after Riot executives got cold feet upon seeing the failure of Multiversus, Warner Bros. recent, widely-panned platform fighter. 🔥 Esports World Cup Kicks Off    In other news, after much anticipation, and even more controversy, the Esports World Cup has finally kicked off in earnest. This event has a total prize pool of 60 MILLION dollars. An unprecedented amount of money for esports, especially in its current state where many orgs are struggling to stay afloat. #esports #gaming #runitdown #business

While others carry on with endless debate on presidential cognition and sound bites from Big XII media day, theScore esports comes through with the definitive piece on the speedrunning Shiba Inu named Peanut Butter conquering 1994's preeminent NES game, Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball. Don't @ Me -- always there to cover EVERYTHING that matters in gaming.

Evo, the largest fighting games tournament in the world, is right around the corner. The tournament is an annual global meetup of some of the most passionate fans in gaming. They are diverse, passionate, and have shown brand loyalty to those that invest and authentically support them.  If you want to catch up on the illustrious history of this marquee event, check out The Story of Evo Part 1 & 2 on our YouTube channel linked below, which chronicles what this event means to the community and how it came to be. P.s Our team will be on the ground at Evo cooking up something special for this year’s event if you want to come say hi! #esports #youtube