eSports Update: North American Star League Begins

11.04.2011
Hankering for more high-level StarCraft 2 play? The dust's barely settled on the , but you'll still find plenty of competitive nail-biters this week courtesy new kid on the block, the .

NASL matches start on Tuesday, and they're scheduled to go on every week from Tuesday through Saturday at 6PM Pacific. Low-quality streaming is free, while video-on-demand access will set you back $5 for a weekly pass and $25 for a full season pass. At the moment, the season schedule lasts all the way into June--not too shabby for the cost of a couple trips to the cineplex.

Unlike the GSL and MLG events, NASL employs a league play format similar to most professional team sports. NASL players are divided into , and each game day consists of five matches by players within their respective divisions. Once each player's square off with everyone in their division, the top two players from each division then play off in a live finals event.

Must-watch matches: GSL commentator Artosis (Protoss) hopes to revive his pro gaming career against Sheth (Zerg) on Tuesday, Brood War elder statesmen July (Zerg) and White-Ra (Protoss) play on Wednesday, and Drewbie (Terran) takes on pro gaming legend SlayerSBoxeR (Terran) on Saturday.

The smart money was indeed on IMMvp (Terran) this weekend, as he won his second GSL championship (4-2) over MarineKingPrime's fallen Siege Tanks and Marines. There's not much to say: Mvp was ruthless, consistent, efficient, and overwhelmed MarineKing with better play and solid decisions. While MarineKing did manage to win two games in the best-of-seven set--which by the way adds up to two more wins than his last matchup with Mvp--he simply wasn't able to keep up with Mvp's economic skills and smart plays.