Under the Ministry of Youth and Sports (KBS), Esports Integrated (ESI), is launching the Malaysia Esports Championship (MEC 2020).

First introduced during the launch of ESI in October 2020, the launch of MEC is a key pillar in the esports development roadmap which serves as a springboard that will establish the esports national circuit here in Malaysia.

Esports Integrated CEO Ahmed Faris Amir said:

“MEC is aimed to integrate the championship into various professional and well-established leagues, where MEC acts as a platform for esports talents to have the opportunity to progress both nationally and internationally.

Historically, the professional esports scene has been driven predominantly by game developers through nationwide professional leagues where grassroots talents have risen through the ranks and have made it to the international scene, most notably with superstars such as Mushi, Soloz and Xorn.

To amplify this success, ESI believes that it can play the crucial role of working together with game developers to provide a wider avenue for talents to be able to showcase their talents and to be promoted into these national and international leagues.

More information on these collaborations will be unveiled throughout the MEC 2020.”

Participants of the MEC 2020 will stand a chance to win from a prize pool of RM100,000 in cash when they compete in four popular game titles featured in the championship, such as Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, PUBG Mobile, Dota 2 and FIFA 21.

Weirdly enough, it’s hard not to notice that that the PC and console games (Dota 2 and FIFA 21) are getting considerably less prize money than the mobile games (Mobile Legends and PUBG Mobile).

FIFA 21 is a solo game so that’s excusable but what about Dota 2? It doesn’t make sense that the Dota 2 winning team would only win RM5,000 while the winning teams for Mobile Legends and PUBG Mobile get RM18,000 and RM15,000, respectively.

Arguably, there is more stake in the mobile games though, as the winning teams for Mobile Legends and PUBG Mobile will be able to automatically qualify for the upcoming MPL MY Top 8 Qualifiers and PMNC MY/SG Qualifiers.

It looks like Esports Integrated is clearly prioritizing mobile game esports over PC and console game esports. The reason is probably simple enough; mobile games are generally more popular than PC and console games in Malaysia. Any casual user with a phone can play free-to-play games like Mobile Legends and PUBG Mobile.

Registrations for the Malaysian Esports Championship 2020 (MEC 2020) are currently open. For more information on registration and tournament schedules, you can head on over to the official website here.