This week there’s been a couple of pieces of Valorant news of interest to UK players and fans.
Riot announces first major Valorant tournament – First Strike
Riot Games has announced First Strike, the first big esports tournament in Valorant.
This will allow players to take part in qualifiers in the second half of October, before reaching multiple regional finals from December 3rd to 6th.
These will take place in Europe, North America, CIS, Turkey, Asia, Oceania, Brazil and the Middle East.
Players aged 16 and over who have earned a rank of Immortal 1 will generally be eligible to compete in the qualifiers, with full rules and more info to follow at a later date.
Whalen ‘Magus’ Rozelle, Riot’s senior director of global esports, said in this post: “Since the launch we’ve been busy listening to your expectations and hopes for the future of Valorant esports.
“Both through the Ignition Series and hundreds of smaller tournaments, we received valuable insight from tournament operators and fans that we have incorporated into our plans for First Strike.
“We look forward to sharing First Strike with you and discovering which teams will become the first Champions of their region.”
Whalen also said that competitive integrity remains Riot’s top priority, and that Riot has also evaluated which formats and scheduling work best, as well as prioritising observer features requested by fans.
epic.LAN’s first Valorant tournament will feature a prize pool of at least £2,000
UK event organiser epic.LAN has announced its debut Valorant tournament has been sponsored by Logitech G UK.
This means the competition at epic31 will have a prize pool of at least £2,000, rising to £3,500 if at least 32 teams take part.
UK Valorant side SUMN FC and Tarren Mill have already signed up.
The tournament runs from October 9th to 11th and there’s full details over on the epic.LAN website.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
