Global StarCraft II League
The Global Starcraft II League ( GSL short ) is a StarCraft II tournament, which is aligned by GomTV and Blizzard Entertainment in South Korea.
It replaced by professional players, known as e- sports, in two leagues in the game against each other: The code S- league and Code -A minor league. The games will be broadcast over stream at GomTV. All transfers are accompanied by experienced game commentators.
There is an English stream for all non- Korean viewers. With the Global StarCraft II Team League ( GSTL briefly ) existed until 2013, a team league, which was held parallel to the GSL and was in competition for the Proleague.
History and mode
The 2010 Open Seasons were the first GSL tournaments. There were three Erstturniere with a total prize pool of 600 million won (about € 380,000 ) and a prize money of 100 million won for the winner. These sums attracted the world's attention, because they were among the largest ever of e-sports history. The purpose of the 2010 open season was to qualify the player for code S and code A- leagues.
As of 2011, the GSL was a regular tournament, which was held several times per year. The qualification for the Code -A minor league is always held before a new season. Only the top players of the Korean Battle.net (code B) may participate. Play a total of 32 players in Code A- League. The best seven of the code A- League and the last eight code S players take part in Up & Down matches to five in a group. The top two players from each group of five will qualify for the code S- League, which consists of the 32 best players in Korea. The code -S winner will be announced as GSL champion.
The top 3 players in the GSL rankings and 7 winners of other major tournaments of the past year such as MLG, Dreamhack or the World Cyber Games will qualify for the Blizzard Cup. The tournament began with a group stage with two groups, each with 5 players. The top two teams move directly in front of the semi-finals, the second-and third-place play in 2/4 finals to the semi-finals. The winner may be called best player in the GSL tour of the bygone year.
The American Major League Gaming and GomTV had organized in 2011 and 2012 a player exchange between the tournaments. The MLG invited to every tournament four Korean players directly for the Championship Pool a. Since the MLG Anaheim 2011, the MLG winner earned a code S- placement. The top three non- Korean players ( top four if the winner is Korean) received code -A rankings.
Since 2013, the GSL is part of the international StarCraft II World Championship Series ( WCS short ).