EA and Virgin Gaming Announces $1.6 Million Battlefield 3 Tournament
EA DICE with Virgin Gaming will offer the gaming world the biggest pot prize for any international gaming tournament. You can bring home part of $1.6 Million in cash and prizes in their Battlefield 3 Worldwide Conquest Tournament.
"Battlefield 3 is one of the year's most anticipated games, having won over 50 illustrious awards at all of the gaming industry's major trade shows." said the press release announcing the tournament. Battlefield 3 is a first person shooter game being developed by EA DICE, a Swedish game developer under EA, set to launch in Oct. 25, 2011 on Xbox, Playstation 3 and Windows for North America. It is the direct sequel of Battlefield 2 but the eleventh game in the series.
There is an open beta for the game going on for those who have bought Medal of Honor Limited Edition and people who have downloaded the beta version on the Battlefield 3 website. The game is also notable for featuring a game mechanic where players can fly jets in the playing field.
The tournament itself would be held completely online, a first since every gaming tournament was done over LAN on different venues. The tournament is open for PS3 and Xbox 360 players and will start in 2012. To join, players must be over 18 and registered in Virgin Gaming. The prize money would be divided between the best players of the tournament.
PC gamers were disappointed with the exclusivity of the event to PS3 and Xbox 360 owners. "Our technology is only set up to integrate with console games at this phase in our life. We're still new and trying to create a unique service that resolves a lot of the challenges in the competitive gaming space today" a Virgin representative said on the matter. It might also be because of the fact that FPS games gives significant advantages to players who use a keyboard and mouse instead of a control pad.
Other details on the tournament are still lacking and may be revealed later during the last quarter of the year. There are still question on the tournament mechanics such as will there be teams in the tournament? Or will the winner be decided by the most kills.