Division 1 of the Northern League of Legends Championship (NLC) will miss its studio broadcast in 2023, sources have said.
This year the NLC, the EMEA Regional League (ERL) for the UK, Ireland, Nordics and Malta, was broadcast out of its Berlin studio, with an impressive series of shows in terms of production quality and NLC broadcast talent.
NLC Division 1 will instead start with a remote broadcast in 2023, though a studio could return for the summer split or beyond. It comes as no real surprise given that the NLC was demoted to a non-accredited ERL last month, with organisers Freaks4U saying the NLC would have ‘downscaled broadcast, media content and coverage’, with stipends for teams reduced from €200k to €45,000 per year. So we can expect to see fewer casters and talent on the broadcast.
NLC talent like Nymaera and Initialise have also been recently advertising their services on Twitter.
Also, the NLC currently has five divisions, and for 2023 the NLC recently said “for the system below Div 1 we will work out a solution within the next weeks”.
It seems to be good news now for teams in the lower leagues, as sources say Division 2 and below will likely continue in 2023 in some form.
Update (January 3rd 2023): Freaks4U is due to team up with a regional partner and Riot Games for NLC Divisions 2 and below. Also, there are no broadcasts planned for these lower divisions.
NLC also added more info on Division 2 and below in this Twitter thread in early January 2023.
The NLC will also get another Pro-Am tournament in 2023, as expected, given Riot Games last year announced all ERLs would get a Pro-Am tournament from 2022 onwards. Dusty recently won this year’s NLC Aurora Open pro-am tournament featuring teams from across the different NLC divisions.
And finally, the teams. The NLC Division 1 had ten teams as an accredited ERL, and while Riot recently said the NLC could remain with ten teams despite being a non-accredited ERL ‘if all ten teams are able to participate’, it’s been confirmed this week that the NLC Division 1 will in fact have eight teams in 2023, like other non-accredited ERLs.
“With 2023 approaching, a fresh era of the NLC starts – and a new split always comes with some interesting changes.”
NLC
NLC Division 1 2023 teams
The eight teams are as follows, as confirmed in this post on the NLC website:
- Ruddy Esports (UK)
- Verdant (UK)
- Nativz (Ireland)
- Vanir (Norway)
- Riddle (Norway)
- Domino Esports (Norway)
- UniQ (Sweden)
- Nord Esports (Scandinavia)
This is a huge change from the 2022 teams, with eight departing and two (Vanir and Riddle) remaining.
Nord are also a brand new org, formed by some former Bifrost staff Michel Klepper and Victor Peñalver (aka Pena), Esports News UK understands.
The eight departing teams are MNM Gaming (whose slot was acquired by Ruddy Esports), JD XL (whose slot was acquired by Verdant), Astralis Talent, Singularity, Dusty, NYYRIKKI, Bifrost (who were booted out of the league for ‘financial reasons’ after claims they were not paying their talent) and X7 Esports (who have ceased operations).
It’s been a tough few months for fans of the NLC and those working within it, and call us fools, but us at Esports News UK are trying to remain optimistic for the future of the league. Let’s hope 2023 can provide a fresh start for our region. We have some solid talent and ideas here, so let’s see what we can do next year and beyond.
The NLC also said on its website: “With 2023 approaching, a fresh era of the NLC starts – and a new split always comes with some interesting changes.
“We would also like to thank the previous organisations for an incredible past year, their amazing games and the great collaboration. We hope to see the same support and love by the fans for next year’s teams.”
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.
