UK StarCraft II personality James ‘Kaelaris’ Carrol will host an esports showcase of new RTS game Stormgate – the Stormgate Invitational.
The exhibition will take place at the Esports World Cup in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, today (August 13th 2024 from 6pm BST) on the Stormgate Twitch channel, as the game also enters Steam early access.
Stormgate is a new free-to-play RTS (real-time strategy) game from Frost Giant Studios, akin to StarCraft II. The science fantasy game is available on PC, with additional early access packs available, and drops via content creators on Twitch.
Designed with both competitive and casual players in mind, the game currently features ranked 1v1 competitive ladder play, three-player co-op missions, and an early look at the game’s story-driven campaign mode.
“We invited four of the most exciting RTS players competing today to showcase Stormgate on the EWC stage, where they’ll compete in an epic display of the game’s strategic depth and tremendous potential for skill expression.”
Matt ‘Heyoka’ Weber, Frost Giant Studios
In the future, Frost Giant will introduce a bespoke 3v3 mode as well as an in-game editor so that creators can build their own maps, mods and custom games.
Frost Giant Studios has partnered with the Esports World Cup (EWC) for the showcase.
A host of Stormgate activities will begin taking place at EWC on August 12th to 14th, including opportunities for fans to play the Early Access release of the game, and a tournament.
Stormgate Invitational players, info and broadcast talent
The Stormgate Invitational features top RTS pros hailing from North America, Europe, China and South Korea. These are:
- Won ‘PartinG’ Lee-sak (South Korea)
- Grzegorz ‘MaNa’ Komincz (Poland)
- Hu ‘MacSed’ Xiang (China)
- Derek ‘TheoRy’ Travisano (United States)
These RTS all-stars will compete for the Esports World Cup Stormgate Invitational championship and their share of a $5,000 prize.
The EWC Stormgate Invitational will be a double elimination tournament.
Broadcast coverage of the EWC will be available live on Twitch in English, and on other platforms in various languages.
The EWC Stormgate Invitational also features a top line-up of esports broadcast talent including:
- Host James ‘Kaelaris’ Carrol (UK)
- Casting duo Nick ‘Tasteless’ Plott (United States) and Dan ‘Artosis’ Stemkoski (United States)
- Jessica ‘ZombieGrub’ Chernega (United States)
- Kevin ‘RotterdaM’ van der Kooi (Netherlands)
They will all also be working on the StarCraft II Esports World Cup broadcast.
Kaelaris said:
Kaelaris has worked on several notable StarCraft 2 events as a host, including the WCS Global Finals, IEM Katowice and Gamers8.
We also featured Kaelaris in our recent article on the history of UK StarCraft 2 esports.
The author of the article, and UK SCII player, Molten, wrote: “Kaelaris is well known for his expressive and engaging personality and keeping any broadcast light-hearted and jovial. His interactions with other desk panellists often makes for unique and entertaining content.”
“Stormgate Early Access is just getting started, but the RTS community has really latched onto this game – they’ve been competing as playtesters in grassroots tournaments since the earliest days of pre-alpha,” said Matt ‘Heyoka’ Weber, Esports Lead at Frost Giant Studios.
“We invited four of the most exciting RTS players competing today to showcase Stormgate on the EWC stage, where they’ll compete in an epic display of the game’s strategic depth and tremendous potential for skill expression.”
There’s more info on the Stormgate Steam page, Stormgate Discord and the game’s website at playstormgate.com.
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.
