Games

eSports Update: North American Star League Begins

Hankering for more high-level StarCraft 2 play? The dust's barely settled on the GSL World Championship Finals, but you'll find plenty of competitive nail-biters this week courtesy new kid on the block, the North American Star League.

NASL matches start on Tuesday, and they're scheduled to go on every week from Tuesday through Saturday at 6PM Pacific. Low-quality streaming is free, while video-on-demand access will set you back $5 for a weekly pass and $25 for a full season pass. At the moment, the season schedule lasts into June, so not too shabby for the cost of a couple trips to the cineplex.

Unlike the GSL and MLG events, NASL employs a league play format similar to most professional team sports. NASL players are divided into five divisions, and each game day consists of five matches by players within their respective divisions. Once players have squared off with everyone in their division, the top two from each division compete in a live finals event.

Must-watch matches: GSL commentator Artosis (Protoss) hopes to revive his pro gaming career against Sheth (Zerg) on Tuesday, Brood War elder statesmen July (Zerg) and White-Ra (Protoss) play on Wednesday, and Drewbie (Terran) takes on pro gaming legend SlayerSBoxeR (Terran) on Saturday.

GSL World Championship Finals results

The smart money was indeed on IMMvp (Terran) this weekend, as he won his second GSL championship (4-2) over MarineKingPrime's fallen Siege Tanks and Marines. There's not much to say: Mvp was ruthless, consistent, efficient, and overwhelmed MarineKing with better play and solid decisions. While MarineKing did manage to win two games in the best-of-seven set--which by the way adds up to two more wins than his last matchup with Mvp--he simply wasn't able to keep up with Mvp's economic skills and smart plays.

This marks the third time MarineKing came up short in the finals, after losing to Mvp in the recent Code S tournament. It's clear that Mvp's relentless play-style still trumps MarineKing's approach, but look forward to a high-stakes rematch should they meet in the next season of the GSL (especially if MarineKing keeps improving, as he did here).

MLG offering refunds for Dallas ticket buyers

Did you buy a high-quality pass for the MLG Dallas stream? If so, you didn't get what you paid for, and MLG's trying to set thing right. Go here to start the refund process. If you don't submit a request for refund by May 18th, you'll automatically receive an HQ stream pass for the next MLG event (MLG Columbus in June).

Patrick Miller is a Staff Editor for PCWorld. Add him on Twitter or Facebook, or message him on Battle.Net (pattheflip.729) for a game.

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