eSports
Galaxy Racer expands into North America to nurture and invest in emerging US women gaming talent
Galaxy Racer (GXR), the biggest esports, gaming and lifestyle organization, headquartered in Dubai, is proud to announce its official expansion to North America, where the newly established brand, HER Galaxy, will focus on building two verticals, a multi-platform tournament series and a foundation for all women esports talents in the region. HER Galaxy will be launched across North America as an ambitious grassroots esports initiative to create an inclusive ecosystem for women-identifying gamers, leveling up the resources available with representation, sponsorship opportunities and tournaments that promise to develop the community and provide a path to pro.
In 2021, nearly 48% of all gamers in the US identified as female, but only make up 1% of professional players and an estimated 5% of the esports workforce. Thus, Galaxy Racer will be taking inspiration from its work across the globe in bridging the gender inequality gap in competitive esports with new inclusive initiatives and tournaments that can encourage greater representation in North America.
Across its global operations, Galaxy Racer has developed some of the highest-profile initiatives for women in esports, including forming the first ever women’s League of Legends team in the Middle East. The brand has supported a range of other inclusive initiatives including the La Ligue FĂ©minine esports tournament in France and sponsoring two European women’s esports teams and one Southeast Asia women esports team.
In early 2022, HER Galaxy will be empowering four esports teams across multiple platforms (two PC, one console and one mobile team), with a significant amount in overall grants at the first iteration, as part of an initiative to encourage the creation of all-women teams and build an inclusive and safe platform for them to compete and grow. The support from Galaxy Racer will ensure a stable and secure foundation for teams to build on, providing each team with a notable amount to cover salaries for five players and a team coach, while the initiative will also offer additional support for travel, marketing, PR and branding.
HER Galaxy will also include an exclusive multi-platform tournament series for three esports game titles on PC, Mobile and Console platforms that will build up an entire women’s esports ecosystem.. The new tournament series will offer unparalleled opportunities for exponential growth of women’s esports teams, featuring monthly online community tournaments, up to quarterly offline events across the US for the top performing teams to showcase their skills and compete for unprecedented prize pools.
A content series is also slated for production, following the whole journey of the HER Galaxy Foundation teams as they scale up their training and compete against the best women’s teams in multiple esports tournaments. A significant sum will be invested in the women-only tournaments to offer lucrative prize pools and provide high-quality production and tournament management.
Founded in 2019, Galaxy Racer has an existing global footprint of over 500+ million followers worldwide, and more than 100+ content creators and over 2.5 billion monthly views, including recently signed North American YouTuber Addison Pierre ‘YourFellowArab’ Maalouf. Having cemented its position as one of the biggest names in esports worldwide, gaming and lifestyle across the Middle East and North Africa, Southeast Asia, South Asia and Europe, the organization is expanding into North America with new headquarters in Los Angeles.
Alongside its esport initiatives, the brand has championed women in gaming and lifestyle content creators since its inception. Last year the brand began working with YouTube sensation Noor Stars, one of the most popular content creators in the Arab speaking world and a pioneer for women content creators in the region. Galaxy Racer also signed Anne “Mamabenjyfishy” Fish, the Fortnite streamer and mother of the renowned professional fortnite player Benjy “benjyfishy” Fish, as it continues to promote inclusivity among its global audience.
As the Galaxy Racer organization expands into North America, it will continue to build its portfolio of women gaming stars as part of its wider ambition to develop the esports and gaming space into an inclusive, safe and exciting environment for women.
Akemi Sue Fisher, CEO of Galaxy Racer North America, commented:Â “I am thrilled to join the Galaxy Racer team as we expand into North America. The ongoing focus on building a foundation for emerging women esports talent with HER Galaxy is deeply important to me and the greater gaming community. Through HER Galaxy, we hope to empower the incredible women talent within the US and look forward to meeting all the hopeful teams in the near future!”
eSports
Community Gaming Joins Forces with Moonton as Official Esports Partner for Mobile Legends: Bang Bang
Community Gaming (CG), the leading esports platform for automated tournament payouts and sponsor of the Mobile Legends: Bang Bangâs professional league for the Latin America Region, MPL LATAM, now supports developing esports communities in Latin America in collaboration with Moonton.
This partnership is a significant boost to CGâs existing advantages associated with its grant program, a partner-backed initiative to provide organizers with economic resources based on the performance and growth of their local gaming communities. Tournament organizers can apply to receive platform support, prizes, in-game currency, items, and tournament professional assistance including âTournament Mode,â a special setting on Mobile Legends: Bang Bang that grants organizers enhanced features, such as unlocking all available skins in the game for players to fully enjoy a complete and unique MLBB pro tournament experience.
Wei Xu, regional esports operation manager at Moonton, said: âWe are excited to announce the partnership with Community Gaming. Community Gaming is the most accepted esports platform in our community in Latin America. We hope this partnership brings new experiences to the players.â
As MPL comes to its end this year, CG will also be collaborating with MLBB professional teams for a flash $4000 prize tournament set to enhance the visibility of the companyâs services. This event marks a pivotal moment set to highlight CGâs preparedness to impact the professional MLBB scene.
Community Gaming and Moonton are no strangers to mutual cooperation. In the past both companies have partnered to develop the Dawn of Heroes Series, a set of events in 2021 and 2022 that offered qualifying slots to MLBBâs Signature Competition, Liga LATAM. The companies have also worked together on Peruâs University Tournament INTERU 2023 and currently Community Gaming hosts significant activity of MLBB Tournaments from over 12 countries on a monthly basis.
eSports
Esports player age verification should be simple
Despite the continuing professionalisation of esports, misconceptions about player age persist â particularly of underage pros playing in professional esports.
Back in 2021, the PandaScore whitepaper dug into the data around player age in professional esports and found that the average age of a pro player was just under 24 years old. By comparison, the same report noted that the average age for a menâs professional footballer was about 26 years old.
While there is no great gulf in player ages between esports and traditional sports, thereâs more apprehension around this topic once thereâs a keyboard or controller involved. There are good reasons behind this focus, but the truth is that a simple and straightforward product makes player age verification easy.
The reason behind the focus on player age
Compliance with player age requirements has been a particular concern as legalised sports and esports betting rolls out across the US. These are completely reasonable concerns, partly because of the state-by-state nature of American regulation, but also due to past compliance issues in the likes of ITF tennis.
Age compliance isnât a challenge unique to esports. It does have younger players in the same way tennis does, so it’s a space that operators consider a potential risk area based on precedent. While it’s understandable to be vigilant about ensuring age compliance across your whole book, the reality in esports is itâs just like any other sport.
However, with this greater attention, itâs crucial for esports suppliers to have a simple, high-quality solution that is flexible for any jurisdiction â and not just treat it as a spreadsheet-based, tack-on service.
Importance in the US
Itâs abundantly clear that if you want to ensure compliance in the US space, player age verification isnât a nice to have, itâs an integral part of your product. Across each jurisdiction player age verification can vary â something weâve seen in Europe as well such as Swedenâs rule that a match must have 60% of players over the age of 18 for an operator to offer match bets.
In sports, itâs fairly straightforward to implement but has been an oversight from sports data providers in the past. Itâs quite easy to provide, it just requires collecting data from multiple, reputable sources outside of the match itself.
PandaScore has been collecting player age verification data since it was founded in 2017 to ensure compliance no matter the regulation, no matter the jurisdiction.
Embedding player age verification in your product
Ensuring age compliance was a founding principle for our product suite â we included it as a key datapoint in our API, which is the bedrock of our broader offering. Suppliers should have this embedded in their products, rather than an additional service.
PandaScore believes that offering player age verification as part of an API and integrated into your service means you can be more confident in your compliance not just for individual esports titles, but from match to match.
For us itâs simple: one of PandaScoreâs founding principles is to not rely on only one single data source, but leverage multiple quality data sources that we can trust. We have a longstanding and highly developed process that guarantees a level of accuracy for player age verification thatâs in line with regulation and gives operators the confidence that theyâre compliant. Our practice of using multiple data sources means that double and triple-checking information to ensure player age compliance is in our nature.
With player age verification built into an API, operators can leverage the data to match the compliance needs of any given jurisdiction. This can be done by integrating player age data via the API, it can be included in their feed via our odds product with the flexibility to add exclusions where necessary, or if an operators wants it in a simper form, it can be done via request.
Player age verification might seem like a simple item, but is a compliance matter thatâs essential to operating in a proper fashion. Noting the concerns and greater focus on player ages in esports, itâs something thatâs important to get right: player age verification should be entrenched in esports products themselves to give operators the flexibility and simplicity that they need.
Author: Oliver Niner, Head of Sales at PandaScore.
eSports
CS2 Intel Extreme Masters Rio 2024 SuperComputer: NaVi to bounce back after Blast Fall Final loss
Final: Natus Vincere (36.5%) to beat Team Vitality (28.1%)
Semifinal 1: Natus Vincere (52.6%) to beat MOUZ (16.3%)
Semifinal 2: Team Vitality (47.7%) to beat G2 Esports (18.7%)
Quarterfinal 1: G2 Esports (39.8%) to beat FaZe Clan (32.8%)
Quarterfinal 2: MOUZ (35.9%) to beat Eternal Fire (24.7%)
Group stage:Â
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Natus Vincere –Â 48.7% to finish 1st; 17.0% to finish 2nd; 84.1% to make playoffs
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Team Vitality –Â 40.8% to finish 1st; 17.4% to finish 2nd; 77.7% to make playoffs
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G2 Esports –Â 19.3% to finish 1st; 20.4% to finish 2nd; 56.7% to make playoffs
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MOUZ –Â 14.5% to finish 1st; 21.8% to finish 2nd; 53.0% to make playoffs
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FaZe Clan –Â 13.9% to finish 1st; 21.0% to finish 2nd; 50.2% to make playoffs
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Eternal Flame – 40.7% to finish 1st; 16.2% to finish 2nd; 40.7% to make playoffs
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Liquid –Â 16.3% to finish 7-8th; 35.7% to make playoffs
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Virtus.pro – 15.4% to finish 7-8th; 29.9% to make playoffs
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Astralis –Â 28.9% to finish 9-12th; 31.5% to make playoffs
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The MongolZ –Â 32.7% to finish 9-12th; 25.4% to make playoffs
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Complexity –Â 34.3% to finish 9-12th; 21.2% to make playoffs
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Heroic –Â 26.8% to finish 9-12th; 23.5% to make playoffs
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paiN –Â 36.5% to finish 13-16th; 21.0% to make playoffs
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FURIA –Â 36.4% to finish 13-16th; 20.9% to make playoffs
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9z –Â 44.7% to finish 13-16th; 14.6% to make playoffs
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Imperial – 49.1% to finish 13-16th; 13.9% to make playoffs
It has been quite the run for NaVi despite their loss with back to back grand finals in recent weeks but CSDB.ggâs predictive model suggests there will be no let up for the Ukrainian esports organisation.
G2 will also be looking to build more momentum in preparation for Majors season with NiKo on a quest to finally get over the line this year to win his first major title. Hopefully Rio wonât have to see a repeat of his reaction in the semifinals at BLAST Premier Fall Final 2024 where he punched a hole in a table after losing out to Team Vitality in a key moment.
However, the hosts of Intel Extreme Masters Rio 2024 may want to lockdown any nearby furniture and reinforce their desks if G2 are set for disappointment at the semifinals stage as predicted by the CSDB.gg SuperComputer.
A victory in Rio could be even more consequential for how the end of the year shapes up for the leading teams on the circuit. The Valve Global rankings have both teams close at the very top (NaVi at 1988 and G2 at 1953) meaning a win for either team could hand them a key advantage when it comes to who enters the Majors as top seed.Â
Back-to-back wins in T1 events for G2, should they prosper in Rio, would set the Berlin-based team on an incredible trajectory going into the winter months.
Meanwhile, Brazilian hopes for glory look slight according to the CSDB.gg SuperComputer with FURIA, the team co-owned by Neymar, having only been given a 20.9% chance of even making the playoffs.Â
They are the leading contenders to make an impact for the home crowd but there are other teams flying the flag for Brazil with paiN and Imperial also set to give it their best to give local fans something to cheer on.
In terms of forecasted matchups of note, G2 and FaZe Clan could offer up a fascinating encounter in the quarterfinals should both teams qualify, with each organisation rated as having a strong chance of making the semis with little to separate them should they meet.
How was the CSDB.gg CS2 Tournament SuperComputer created?
The CSDB.gg CS2 Tournament SuperComputer is a predictive model created using world ranking points, team quality ratings and performance trends. An element of randomness is also included in the model to avoid the best teams and players always winning, to reflect the fact that upsets can happen.
Every tournament is simulated 1,000 times with the results aggregated into a percentage rating of the chances teams or players have to achieve the predicted result.
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