A Taiwanese video gaming team defeated its South Korean rival 3-1 in the finals of an international online video game competition in Los Angeles, California, on Saturday, bagging the top honor and US$1 million in prize money.
The Taipei Assassins (TPA) dueled against South Korea’s Azubu Frost in the Grand Final of the League of Legends Season 2 World Championship, forcing the South Korean team into an untenable position early in the third round before clinching the match in the fourth.
The seven-strong team were led by Chen Hui-chung (陳彙中), 22, who quit school to game professionally.
Photo: CNA
The other four of the five members the team fielded in the playoffs were Wang Jung-tsan (王榮燦), Chang Po-wei (張博為), Sung Kuan-po (宋寬柏) and Liu Wei-chien (劉偉健), who is from Hong Kong.
The two reserve players were Lin Ying-po (林穎波), the only female member of the team, and Chiu Po-chieh (邱柏傑). All the members are between 19 and 23 years old.
Despite general pessimism over TPA’s performance at the outset, the team’s successive defeats of South Korea’s third-seeded NaJin Sword, second-seed Moscow 5 of Russia and first-seed Azubu Frost, helped them clinch a decisive victory.
The Taipei team advanced into the Grand Final on Wednesday after defeating the Moscow 5, the Season 1 champions, in two straight games.
Saturday’s competition was watched live by nearly 20,000 people at the center, with a number of Taiwanese making the journey to Los Angeles to cheer on the team.
Interestingly, the cheering from the audience was almost all for the TPA, due to an incident on the part of Azubu Frost. Regulations prohibit players competing on stage from looking backward at a giant screen that shows an entire map without the fog-of-war settings. Azubu Frost broke that rule during a pause when a problem with the team’s microphone was being fixed.
The team was docked 20 percent (US$30,000) of their total prize money for the indiscretion, which Riot Games said would go toward the company’s charity program in South Korea.
The competition had 12 teams from around the world competing for total prize money of US$2 million.
The game, developed and published by Riot Games for Microsoft Windows, is based on the popular “Defense of the Ancients” map for Warcraft 3, a video game developed by Blizzard Entertainment. League of Legends has more than 2.4 million registered users in Taiwan and more than 70 million users worldwide.
Commenting on the playoffs after the competition, Liu said he was happy the TPA team had been able to secure the championship against great odds.
Chen also expressed gratitude to the company Garena for providing training, as well as company sponsors, adding that it was because of their support that the TPA team had been able to get where they are today.
RESPONSE: The transit sends a message that China’s alignment with other countries would not deter the West from defending freedom of navigation, an academic said Canadian frigate the Ville de Quebec and Australian guided-missile destroyer the Brisbane transited the Taiwan Strait yesterday morning, the first time the two nations have conducted a joint freedom of navigation operation. The Canadian and Australian militaries did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The Ministry of National Defense declined to confirm the passage, saying only that Taiwan’s armed forces had deployed surveillance and reconnaissance assets, along with warships and combat aircraft, to safeguard security across the Strait. The two vessels were observed transiting northward along the eastern side of the Taiwan Strait’s median line, with Japan being their most likely destination,
‘NOT ALONE’: A Taiwan Strait war would disrupt global trade routes, and could spark a worldwide crisis, so a powerful US presence is needed as a deterrence, a US senator said US Senator Deb Fischer on Thursday urged her colleagues in the US Congress to deepen Washington’s cooperation with Taiwan and other Indo-Pacific partners to contain the global security threat from China. Fischer and other lawmakers recently returned from an official trip to the Indo-Pacific region, where they toured US military bases in Hawaii and Guam, and visited leaders, including President William Lai (賴清德). The trip underscored the reality that the world is undergoing turmoil, and maintaining a free and open Indo-Pacific region is crucial to the security interests of the US and its partners, she said. Her visit to Taiwan demonstrated ways the
GLOBAL ISSUE: If China annexes Taiwan, ‘it will not stop its expansion there, as it only becomes stronger and has more force to expand further,’ the president said China’s military and diplomatic expansion is not a sole issue for Taiwan, but one that risks world peace, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday, adding that Taiwan would stand with the alliance of democratic countries to preserve peace through deterrence. Lai made the remark in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). “China is strategically pushing forward to change the international order,” Lai said, adding that China established the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank, launched the Belt and Road Initiative, and pushed for yuan internationalization, because it wants to replace the democratic rules-based international
RELEASED: Ko emerged from a courthouse before about 700 supporters, describing his year in custody as a period of ‘suffering’ and vowed to ‘not surrender’ Former Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) was released on NT$70 million (US$2.29 million) bail yesterday, bringing an end to his year-long incommunicado detention as he awaits trial on corruption charges. Under the conditions set by the Taipei District Court on Friday, Ko must remain at a registered address, wear a GPS-enabled ankle monitor and is prohibited from leaving the country. He is also barred from contacting codefendants or witnesses. After Ko’s wife, Peggy Chen (陳佩琪), posted bail, Ko was transported from the Taipei Detention Center to the Taipei District Court at 12:20pm, where he was fitted with the tracking
RSS