The Biggest Prize Pools in E-Sports

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Video Games have been around for decades now and they have constantly been evolving in terms of how they are made and the experiences that are given to the players.

When tournaments were introduced in the world of video games, they started off as small-prized tilts held mainly for fun. But when the competition grew along with new competitive games, big companies started investing in what we now know as E-Sports. 

We have a lot of incoming world tournaments in the E-Sports industry this year. Did you know how much were the prize pools in the previous world competitions in different games? Here are 5 tournaments with the biggest prize pools in the history of Esports.

DOTA 2 (THE INTERNATIONAL – 2019)

DOTA 2, also known as “Defense of the Ancients 2” is a 5v5 MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) game. For those who don’t know how this game works, you choose a hero and your 4 teammates will also choose theirs and you will use your heroes to destroy the enemy “Ancient”. It’s a famous online game that almost every gamer knows. For the prize pool, The International 2019 (The DOTA 2 world championship ) reportedly dangled a US$34,330,069 prizemoney, easily the biggest in E-Sports history.

FORTNITE (WORLD CUP FINALS – SOLO 2019)

Fortnite is a multiplayer online game with three modes, Survival, Battle Royale, and Sandbox. However, the competition only used the Battle Royale Mode with two different events, one for solo players and a separate one for two-player teams or duos. In a battle royale game, you have 100 players coming in the game, and you have to survive and become the last surviving player to take home the prize. In 2019, Fortnite’s prize pool was US$15,287,500.

PUBG (GLOBAL INVITATIONAL.S – 2021)

PUBG also known as PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is also an online multiplayer battle royale game. It works the same way as Fortnite except that, unlike Fortnite where you can also get the materials to make a tower, in PUBG you can only scavenge for guns, bags, medkits, kevlar, and helmets. It also starts with 100 players and you have to strive to become the last man standing to win the game. PUBG had a prize pool of US$7,068,071 for their Global Invitationals that was held in Incheon, Korea last February 2021.

LOL (WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP – 2018)

LOL, also known as League Of Legends is an online MOBA game with simpler rules and controls unlike DOTA 2. Just like any other MOBA game, in LOL you start the game while choosing your and your teammates Champions, and to put it simply you have to fight your way to the enemy base known as Nexus to destroy it. During the 2018 World Championship, LOL had a prize pool of US$6,450,000.

HONOR OF KINGS / ARENA OF VALOR (WORLD CHAMPION CUP – 2020)

Honor of Kings (王者荣耀), also known as Arena of Valor in its international release, is a mobile MOBA game with three game modes and five arcade modes. The competition though only uses one game mode which is the 5v5 arena called Valley of Kings. At the 2020 World Champion Cup, the Honor of Kings’ prize pool was US$4,606,400.

These are just some of the biggest prize pools in the history of Esports and those prizes are just going to continue going up as investments in the industry rise. We are now in an era where more games are being developed and more competitions are being organized. We’ll have to wait and see if the above prize pools are going to be overtaken by other games in the coming years.    /rcg