New Delhi : The inaugural edition of the nation-wide Esports league, Esports Premier League (ESPL) 2021 has seen an unprecedented response among the gaming community with massive one million registrations.
The registrations for the event went live on June 16 and the last user registration phase has been just concluded.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Season 1 of the league is being hosted virtually for two and a half months.
ESPL 2021, which has Infinix smartphone as the presenting sponsor, is being played under the aegis of a gamer-centric campaign ‘#ESPLGameSeFame’ that encourages players to showcase their top game and get recognized in the industry.
India’s first-ever franchise-based Esports league for Free Fire, ESPL, is preparing for the Second Level of the tournament.
Out of the more than 1 million registered users, about the top 400 players from 88 teams will move to Level 2, where the top 8 invited teams of India join the mix. This will take the total number of teams to 96 teams in the level.
These teams will be divided into 8 groups of 12 each to compete for the top 8 spots. The top 8 teams will represent the 8 regions of ESPL.
At the end of Level 2, ESPL will have the best Free Fire teams from India. The scale of the tournament highlights ESPL 2021 as the platform for all the Free Fire players to showcase their skills.
”The tournament crossing 1 million registrations serves as a testament to outline the importance of the platform. This number also points to the gradually increasing interest in Esports in India,” a release said.
”Most of the gamers signed up to take part in the tournament in the last few days of the registration phase and this number is a testament to the far-reaching impact and popularity of the league in the gaming space,” it added.
Prize money for ESPL 2021 is a whopping INR 25 lakh.
”The astounding figures we have for the registration numbers of ESPL 2021 itself validate our position in the Esports sector. We are extremely happy by this overwhelming response to the inaugural edition of India’s first-ever franchise-based Esports league,” said Mr Vishwalok Nath, Director, ESPL.
”The second phase of the league has all the action and current scenario working as a catalyst for our league, so be assured of a rocking & entertaining season,” he added.
This live action from the second phase will be available on OTT giant Disney+ Hotstar, Free Fire official streaming platform Booyah and Malayalam OTT platform Koode alongside official YouTube and Facebook channels of India Today and Aaj Tak and its websites.
UNI
