Twitter strikes live-streaming pact with the world’s biggest eSports company

By Saqib Shah March 2, 2017

eSports arena — Jakob Wells/Flickr

Twitter is opening a new front in its battle to become a live-streaming destination. On Thursday, the social platform announced a new deal with, ESL, the world’s largest eSports company, that will include a total of 1,500 hours of live broadcasts from over 15 events.

The competitive gaming coverage will include the ESL One, Intel Extreme Masters (IEM), and DreamHack circuits. The broadcasts will be kicked off this Saturday with IEM Katowice and its Counter Strike: Global Offensive and Starcraft II tournaments.

The live-streams will be available globally to both logged-in and logged-out users via dedicated ESL, IEM, and DreamHack live URLs. Additionally, ESL is also going to produce an original weekly highlights show for the platform, complete with behind-the-scenes footage from the events.

“Esports fans are endemic to digital and this partnership with Twitter expands ESL’s reach for all of our major tournaments for fans around the globe,” said ESL social media and editorial vice president Johannes Schiefer. “Intel Extreme Masters Katowice is our most anticipated live event, and we are excited to bring premier content from this tournament and beyond to more fans in a premium experience.”

Last summer, Twitter teamed up with Turner’s eLeague to live-stream its Counter-Strike: Global Offensive semifinals and championship. The ESL deal is a major coup for the company, which faces stiff competition from Facebook — the social network is currently hosting live coverage of Blizzard’s Heroes of the Dorm competition.

Twitter began tapping into its gaming community last year with the launch of its official gaming account. Described as the site’s dedicated gaming hub, the arrival of Twitter Gaming was welcomed by ESL in the form of a tweet.

Over a year later, the company’s COO Anthony Noto now claims the platform is back bigger and better than ever when it comes to eSports. “We see this collaboration as a way to tap into the engaged audience of gamers that are already using Twitter as a primary source of content,” said Noto. “By partnering with the leading eSports companies like ESL and DreamHack, we look forward to bringing the best of eSports live video and conversation together on Twitter.”

Topics

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Saqib Shah is a Twitter addict and film fan with an obsessive interest in pop culture trends. In his spare time he can be…

Computing

Best Prime Day gaming PC deals: AMD, Intel, Nvidia savings

Lenovo Legion Tower Gaming PC on a table.

Gamers who need to upgrade their gaming desktop shouldn't miss the savings that are available from this year's Prime Day deals. These machines can get pretty expensive if you want to purchase top-of-the-line models, but even if you're targeting a budget-friendly option, you should check out the Prime Day gaming PC deals that we've rounded up. You're going to have to hurry in making your decision though, as there's always high demand among gamers for gaming PC deals with massive discounts like the ones we've highlighted below.
Best Prime Day gaming PC deals (Intel)

For most gamers, Intel remains their go-to brand for gaming PC processors. You'll have your choice from low-priced options to premium models, and you can pair them with the appropriate graphics card for the fastest performance that your budget allows. You're going to want to go for the latest Intel processors if you can afford them, but previous-generation models are still worthwhile purchases if combined with a good GPU and a decent amount of RAM.

Gaming

All Resident Evil games in order, by release date and chronologically

Leon parries a chainsaw villager in Resident Evil 4.

There are almost no survival horror games that last for more than few entries, let alone ones that have persisted for decades like Resident Evil. This series had humble beginnings as a small horror experience set in a single mansion to explore, solve puzzles, and fight against the clunky tank controls and fixed camera angles. Since then, the series has evolved and grown into one of the most recognizable Capcom IPs there is, with new entries and amazing remakes coming out almost every year.

Currently, the highest-numbered Resident Evil game is 8, aka Village, but you would be wildly off if you thought there were only eight entries to consider when looking to complete the series. Right from the start, Resident Evil has loved expanding its world with a massive cast of characters and new protagonists from game to game. Resident Evil 7 was a soft reboot for the series, but there is still a cannon order to the events surrounding Umbrella, the various zombie viruses, and all our favorite heroes like Chris and Leon.

Gaming

Best Lego Prime Day deals: Star Wars, Marvel, Technics, more

A pieced together Star Wars Imperial TIE Fighter Lego set with side characters on a table.

Whether you're a Lego beginner or veteran, you shouldn't miss the discounts from this year's Lego Prime Day deals. This is your chance at huge savings on all kinds of Lego sets, ranging from basic builds to complex structures, but you're going to have to hurry because stocks may already be running low for some of the more popular Lego deals. Some Prime Day deals aren't expected to last until the end of the shopping holiday, so if you see an offer that you like, you need to proceed with your purchase of it immediately.
Best Prime Day Lego Marvel deals

Grab your piece of the Marvel universe by shopping any of the Prime Day Lego Marvel deals that we've rounded up below. There are Lego sets for your favorite characters, cool objects, and iconic scenes, so no matter that you love from Marvel, there's surely something for you from these bargains. However, because of the brand's popularity, we expect stocks to sell quickly, so place your order as soon as possible if you don't want to miss out.