ESL Pro League has partnered with ArenaNet’s Guild Wars 2 to run a dedicated competitive league. The game’s developer announced Wednesday that the tournament series will boast $400,000 in prize money. The league has officially been dubbed the EDL Guild Wars 2 Pro League.
In regards to the reasoning behind setting up the league at this time, Game Director Colin Johanson had this to say: “We’re seeing massive growth in players joining Guild Wars 2 and competitive play is the fastest growing segment in the game. Working with ESL to develop this tournament is a natural next step for us, inviting more players from this growing community to come take their shot at being elite.”
The league will begin in November with open qualifiers and will finish with a LAN season finals at the ESL studios. A second season will be run following and the prize pool will be split between the seasons. After the two initial seasons, a World Championship event will be held to name a global champion. Location and additional details for this event will be shared at a later date.
The open qualifiers will determine four teams that will join the Pro League. The other four teams will be previous World Tournament Series finalists and top teams from the Go4GuildWars 2 Cups in October.
If you want to get in on the Guild Wars 2 action, the game recently went free-to-play and has an expansion, Heart of Thorns, coming October 23, which features Nolan North as the main antagonist. Check out the rules and details for ESL’s league here.