The National Esports Championships (NESC) 2023 to pick the Indian contingent will commence from today, 15 March and will be conducted in the online mode.
The competition is organised by the Esports Federation of India (ESFI) to pick the Indian contingent for the upcoming 15th World Esports Championships (WEC) in Iasi, Romania. ESFI’s event partner Upthrust Esports will be executing the qualifiers where a total of 275 athletes will be participating across all four titles – CS:GO, DOTA 2, Tekken7, and eFootball 2023.
The country’s top female CS:GO athletes will be battling it out in the NESC to secure their berth at WEC 2023 for the very first time. While the open qualifiers of CS:GO will have 21 teams (127 athletes) competing, the women qualifiers will see the participation of two teams (11 athletes). For DOTA 2, there will be six teams (33 athletes) fighting against each other and for the single-player titles such as Tekken7 and eFootball 2023, there will be 72 and 32 competitors respectively.
“We are proud to see the overwhelming response for NESC 2023 from the male as well as female athletes of the country,” said Esports Federation of India president Vinod Tiwari. “The participation of such talented athletes will give India the impetus to exceed all expectations at the WEC. The qualifiers are going to be an exciting affair with high-quality gameplay and top-notch thrilling moments as every athlete gives it their all to compete on the biggest of stages.”
The qualified teams from CS:GO and DOTA 2 will compete in the Asia Regionals which are scheduled in May – June, the champions of Tekken7 and eFootball 2023 will qualify directly for the tournament’s global finals.
The WEC 2023 will have a whopping prize pool of $500,000 (Rs 4.12 crore) and is set to be the largest edition of the tournament to date with at least 130 countries participating in it. The global finals of the tournament will take place from 24 August to 4 September 2023.
The quarterfinals, semifinals and finals will be streamed live on ESFI’s YouTube, Facebook and Glance Gaming channels.