Devilwalk: “Right now, tournament organizers are competing with each other to attract the best teams and capture viewers’ attention.”

BanKs: I think the overlap between IEM Atlanta 2026 and PGL Astana 2026 was unfortunate. The first tournament was packed with strong teams, while only NAVI and Vitality stood out in the second. Nevertheless, this overlap allowed us to watch a lot of Counter-Strike matches. Perhaps there were simply too many games—for example, Devilwalk was watching IEM Atlanta while I was working in Astana. It’s hard to pay attention to two major events at once.

BanKs: In 2027, many teams will prefer PGL tournaments, but given the large number of events in the Schengen Zone, they’ll also attend BLAST events in Singapore and Mongolia. I can say that elite teams won’t want to fly far for championships, since they’ll be very tired. BLAST made a smart move by deciding not to hold tournaments in the U.S.—there’s a great audience there, but major issues with obtaining visas. I’ll note that scheduling conflicts were inevitable. In the first season of next year, these will be BLAST Bounty Winter 2027 and PGL Bucharest 2027, followed by BLAST Open Singapore 2027 and PGL Łódź 2027.

Devilwalk: We’re seeing more and more tournaments being scheduled for strategically important dates—now tournament organizers are competing with each other for the best teams and viewers’ attention.

BanKs: The only tournament operator that won’t be affected by PGL and BLAST’s decisions is ESL, because all the top teams essentially agree unanimously to participate in its tournaments every year.