When you think of Gameworks, you may think of a noisy arcade full of kids. What you may not realize is that the Las Vegas Gameworks location in Town Square has dedicated an area to esports including a LAN center with consoles and PCs, as well as Twitch stream viewing.
Las Vegas is Seeing an Influx of Esports Professionals
With all of its amenities it is no wonder that esports professionals such as the former Mach 5 have frequented the building both for casual gaming and tournament play. As a matter of fact just this Saturday February 11th, ex-members BTB, Fiddle and Taiwan Ninja all participated in the 3v3 Overwatch tournament held at Gameworks Esports Center.
There are a lot of Professionals now visiting or moving to Las Vegas including Enigma 6 for Call of Duty and Gears of War and League of Legends (LoL) professionals such as Trick2G and Team Gates. Gameworks would like to cater these professionals to either coach tutorials or participate in the community.
Connecting Casual Gamers with the Pros
Gameworks has big goals; ones that may help esports explode in Las Vegas. The hope for esports manager Shantell Labajo, is that Gameworks can become a place where the casual gamer as well as the professional can come together and create an esports community. This community would help jumpstart the already growing popularity of esports in the Las Vegas valley.
Freddy Lam, A.K.A FreddyLamChops on Twitch, runs the tournaments at Gameworks. He would like to see Gameworks become a sort of boot camp for esports in Las Vegas. “Kind of like the prefight before the main event,” he says. He talks a bit about his goals.
“My vision for esports at Gameworks is the growth of the community. Where the players can come compete casually and make new friends. Where there is the possibility of an amateur team growing into potentially a professional esports team. I want to see Gameworks continue to be seen as a hub where talent can be found, trained, and bound for greatness for those playing casually or seeking to go pro. I also want Gameworks to be the pre or post host of major league events in esports that are happening in Vegas.”
Freddy has some great goals for esports in Las Vegas, and judging by the turn out so far, these goals are starting to be met. Many more professionals and casual gamers need to visit Gameworks, both for tournaments and casual play, because you never know where it might lead. Gameworks and its staff are ready to aid anyone looking to make it big in the esports world. Who knows, we may find our next Professional at their upcoming Overwatch tournament, which is March 18th 2017.