With ESL’s 25th anniversary on the horizon in 2025, ESL Faceit Group (EFG) is kicking off the celebration early with a new campaign at IEM Cologne this month.
As part of this, ESL is getting a new look with refreshed visuals, such as a bespoke ESL font and digital statues ‘capturing iconic game IP, players, casters, and fans’, and featuring the likes of HenryG, Natalia and Twistzz (pictured above, left to right).
There will also be community-centric experiences like the IEM Cologne Walk of Legends at IEM Cologne this month.
Fans will get a first look at the brand campaign at IEM Cologne, with the new visuals becoming standard across ESL Pro League, ESL One, and more ongoing.
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Fans will be able to experience a unique stage takeover on Friday August 16th 2024 at the CS2 LAN event. Earlier that day, they are also encouraged to ‘participate in a fan march alongside legendary community champions as they make their way into the Lanxess Arena to kick off IEM Cologne’s Playoffs’.
ESL said in a press release that the new brand campaign has been ‘inspired by the community to remind fans that, together, they are the beating heart of the new global sport’.
The brand campaign has been co-created in collaboration with global brand design agency Design Bridge and Partners.
Fabio Tambosi, Senior Vice President of Marketing, ESL Faceit Group, said:
“We know from first-hand experience that the best way for fans to fall in love with esports is to actively participate in the brand, and we’ve been creating best-in-class opportunities for them to do just that since 2000.”
Fabio Tambosi, ESL Faceit Group
“We look forward to continuing to grow our global audience of 225m fans and helping players and fans around the world fall in love with this global sport as it becomes a leading form of entertainment.”
“Live Legendary is a new creative platform that reclaims ESL’s heritage as a leader in moving esports into the mainstream and making heroes of not just pro players, but also ESL fans,” added Marta Swannie, Creative Partner at Design Bridge and Partners.
“This is a significant and exciting chapter in ESL’s journey to the top, and we are proud of the part we have played in helping to make ESL the category-defining esports entertainment brand.”
ESL and Faceit were acquired by Savvy Games Group, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, back in early 2022.
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.
