Gaming and esports campus in Croatia receives €26m in financing

Image credit: Sisak-Moslavina County

The first round of financing for an upcoming gaming campus in Novska, Croatia, was approved yesterday by the Croatian Government, amounting to around €26m (£22.1m).

The campus will include several buildings and facilities, including an esports venue with 4,000 seats and the largest dedicated esports facility in Croatia. The project is mostly financed by the European Union (EU)’s Just Transition Fund.

ESI Lisbon 2024

The gaming campus is the culmination of several smaller gaming-focused projects in Novska, a town with a population of just over 10,000. The town is located roughly 100 kilometres southeast of the country’s capital Zagreb.

Since 2018, various initiatives have taken place to make Novska the centre of Croatia’s emerging game development industry, and the town currently has a gaming incubator and facilities for game developers.

The new campus will be located on just over eight hectares of land and will feature various facilities, including a dorm, education spaces and a large-scale esports venue.

Although not much is known about the esports facility, the creators of the campus first mentioned that it will have around 2,500 seats, a number that has since grown to 4,000 in the most recent announcements.

The venue is to be fully adapted to host esports matches and tournaments, as well as conferences and other events.

Ivan Šimić
Ivan comes from Croatia, loves weird simulator games, and is terrible at playing anything else. Spent 5 years writing about tech and esports in Croatia, and is now doing it here.