BlizzCon rarely fails to disappoint when it comes to esports. With upsets, shock wins and history defining victories all on the cards, BlizzCon 2018 was one of the best in terms of esports.
With World Championships on-the-line in WoW Arena, Heroes of the Storm and Starcraft 2, plus the Overwatch World Cup and WoW Mythic Dungeon Invitational All-Star and Hearthstone Global Games, BlizzCon offered us some top-level esports action under one roof. Below we have a brief recap of each main event including links to finals VODs.
Starcraft 2 World Championship Series Global Finals
Winner: Serral
Winning game score: Serral 4 v 2 Stats
Prize: $700,000 (£530,000)
VOD: Link
Serral winning the final was ironically both a shock and expected. He was a lot of people’s favourite coming into the event but the shock factor was still palpable as Serral became the first non-South Korean to ever win the Starcraft World Championships. The Finnish superstar is sure to have sent shockwaves through South Korea while appearing completely nonchalant doing so.
World of Warcraft Arena World Championships
Winner: Method Orange
Winning game score: Method Orange 4 – 0 The Gosu Crew
Prize:$280,000 (£220,000)
VOD: Link
In a week of North America taking a beating across esports, an all NA final meant that even if they lost again, they would still win. All joking aside, this was a big moment for North America. The region has failed to take a WoW Arena title thus far, so victory for Method Orange will hopefully rejuvenate region during Battle for Azeroth.
World of Warcraft Mythic Dungeon Invitationals All-Stars
Winner: Free Marsy
Winning game score: Free Marsy 2 – 0 Method NA
Prize: $100,000 (£75,000)
VOD: Link
While NA saw success in the Arena, they failed to do the same in the MDI. Free Marsy, representing the Asia-Pacific region had the final series on lockdown from the start. It’s clear going into 2019, Free Marsy are going to be the team to beat in the interesting PvE turned esport Mythic Dungeon scene.
Overwatch World Cup
Winner: South Korea
Winning game score: South Korea 4 – 0 China
Bronze place match: United Kingdom 2 – 3 Canada
Prize: $128,000(£100,000)
VOD: Link
While the UK didn’t win, and we’ve used images of the winner for every title thus far, we just can’t quite stop smiling at how well the UK Overwatch side did at BlizzCon. South Korea emerged victorious, unsurprisingly, but that wasn’t without the UK squad knocking out the U.S.A. and giving Korea quite a scare in their semi-final. The UK lads, made up mostly of players from the Contenders scene showed off their talent on stage against a team of the Overwatch Leagues’ very best and didn’t look out of place.
Heroes of the Storm Global Championship Finals
Winner: Gen.G
Winning game score: Gen.G 3 – 0 Dignitas
Prize: $1m (£750,000)
VOD: Link
It wasn’t the fairy tale Dignitas would have hoped for after their big rebrand. The team who have had great success in HotS in the past again performed well, only to fall to the powerhouse of Gen.G 3-0 in the final.
Hearthstone Global Games
Winner: China
Winning game score: China 3 – 0 Brazil
Prize: $410,000 (£320,000)
VOD: Link
China, quite frankly terrorised the competition at BlizzCon. While the side had a close call against their neighbour Hong Kong, they ultimately looked comfortable in the final stages breezing past both Norway and Brazil 3 – 0 to claim the Hearthstone Global Games crown.
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