UK-based tournament organiser the UK Esports League (UKEL) has partnered with esports platform provider Playbase.GG as it sets out its vision for 2022 and beyond.
The news comes one month after the UKEL confirmed there would be no amateur League of Legends league for 2022, as it sets its sights on other tournaments and games.
“We’ve always wanted to provide leagues for multiple games, and alongside our main, broadcasted leagues, have development leagues for amateur players,” the UKEL said in an announcement post on its website.
“In order to do this, our current website wouldn’t be enough. We’re delighted to announce that we are partnering with Playbase.GG and moving our operations over to their platform. Whilst the platform is still currently in development, we’re excited with what we’ve seen so far and testing has been successful.”
The UKEL says Playbase will allow it to run open and closed leagues and tournaments, as well as tracking player stats and generating revenues via adverts and products. It also said that all UKEL competitions will continue to remain free to enter.
“We’re delighted to announce that we are partnering with Playbase.GG and moving our operations over to their platform.”
The UKEL
Beyond that, the UKEL has some other ambitious plans for 2022 and the future.
“The eventual goal of using this platform is to provide ‘pro’ leagues with participation funds as well as prize pools, and subsequent leagues below with a promotion/relegation system and prize pools at lower levels as well,” the UKEL added. “We’ll also be looking to run off season tournaments to keep everyone engaged and well practiced.”
The UKEL previously qualified League of Legends teams to Riot’s official UKLC for the UK and Ireland, which was below the NLC (UK, Ireland and Nordics European Regional League) that feeds into the EU Masters – one tier below the LEC.
However, last summer, Freaks 4U took over as NLC tournament organiser, and NLC divisions 2 to 5 were added, replacing many of the existing third-party amateur leagues in the process.
In response to this, the UK, Ireland and Nordics LoL esports community is currently up in arms over grassroots tournaments (like the UKEL’s) being shut down by Riot and Freaks 4U.
The UKEL’s co-founder and MD is Marc ‘Omni’ Busby.
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.
