The Valorant esports league for Northern Europe has announced a rebrand to Challengers North Polaris.
The league, formerly known as Challengers Northern Europe, will now be known as Challengers North.
“Not only will we have a new name but also a big overhaul of our graphics,” the league said on its official X account.
The news comes as Split 2 prepares to kick off on May 16th 2024, for teams in the UK, Ireland and Nordics.
The graphical tweaks also come perfectly timed, as the northern lights have been visible to some in the UK in real life over the past weekend!
Why the Valorant Challengers North Polaris name change? BoDork explains
Bo ‘BoDork’ Hoogland, Social Media and Esports Strategy Manager for Valorant Challengers North and its organisers MistGames, told Esports News UK: “The name change to North was on our priority list since the first day we received the license.
“Right now our name can be difficult to pronounce for many, and it has boiled down to people just calling us ‘Polaris’, which for some reason makes people think we’re a Polish league.
“For Split 2, we’re doing a soft rebrand, this is primarily to help get the message across that Northern Europe is turning over a new leaf.
“This is not the same league as it was before and I hope we can send that message with these changes. For Split 2 we’ll also be adding player cams which we hope will make the viewing experience even better.”
BoDork, Valorant Challengers North, MistGames
“We did not have time to build the league the way we wanted for 2024, so our priority this year is to experiment with everything and see what works and what doesn’t.
“We have bigger plans coming up after Split 2, but we’re taking our time so we can make the right decisions for Northern Europe.
“Overall in terms of the league, we are happy with how Split 1 has gone and we don’t have much expectations for Split 2, as we know for a fact viewership will be lower than last split.
“We’re not satisfied with our product as we know we can do more, we’re just limited this year due to how late we took over.”
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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.
