Today at a press event at 1Utama Petaling Jaya, ASUS Malaysia has announced that the country will be hosting the International Grand Finals of ROG Masters, the hardware brand’s own esports tournament.
This is the second year that the ROG (Republic Of Gamers) Masters is running. After the success of last year’s event, which covered Asia and Oceania regions, 2017 see the ROG Masters expanding to the rest of the world, now encompassing four regions: APAC (Asia Pacific), EMEA (Europe, Middle-East and Asia), Americas and China competing in Dota 2 and CS:GO.
It is also the second year running that the Finals will be held here.
There will be national qualifiers for each participating country. For Malaysia, it will be happening this weekend at 1Utama. The tournament is open to all, so expect to see big teams in Malaysia such as Fire Dragoon Esports and Orange Esports in action, as well as unknown dark horses that may get their big break here. Up to RM100,000 worth in prize pool is up for grabs.
Attendees of the ROG Masters Malaysian qualifiers stand a chance to win a lucky draw: an ASUS ROG GL553 gaming laptop.
Winners of the national qualifiers will move on to the APAC (Asia Pacific) regional qualifiers at Manilla, Philippines on 26-29 October. Winners in the qualifiers will then go to the International Finals at KLCC, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on 7-10 December which will offer up to $500,000 USD (roughly RM 2,102,750) of prize pool, split evenly across the two games.
This is quite a big deal. Malaysia having the honours of hosting the finals for the second year in a row speaks to how confident ASUS are with the esports market here in Malaysia. ESL hosting its premier event at Genting Highlands was only the start of seeing more huge esports events on our soil, and more would follow suit.