NCsoft and ArenaNet announce first Guild Wars World Championship

NCsoft and ArenaNet announce first Guild
Wars

World Championship

Competition kicks off in October; Finals set
for Taiwan in February 2006

 

 BELLEVUE, Wash., September 29, 2005—Players
of the hugely successful Guild Wars^®
online computer game will soon get a chance to battle for supremacy in the
upcoming Guild Wars

World Championship. The
competition, sponsored by NCsoft^®
and Guild Wars developer ArenaNet^®,
will kick off this weekend, and will come to an exciting conclusion with teams
from America,
Europe and
Korea competing in the Guild Wars World Championship Finals during the
week of the Taipei Game Show, which takes place February 16 – 20, 2006 in
Taipei, Taiwan.

The inaugural season will begin Saturday, October 1, 2005, as ArenaNet resets
the Guild Wars ladder at midnight Pacific Daylight Time (7 AM GMT). The
ladder season will last three months, and will lead to playoffs among
top-ranked guilds in three regions: America, Europe and Korea. Two
eight-player teams from each region will then qualify to compete in Taipei for
the Guild Wars world champion title in February 2006. Teams from Taiwan
and Japan will also compete in exhibition matches with the world finalists.

“Players have been clamoring for a tournament ever since we launched Guild
Wars in April,” said ArenaNet Co-founder Jeff Strain. “This sort of global
competition has been in our plans from the start, and since the emphasis in
Guild Wars is on player skill, the game is perfectly suited for tournament
play.”

“We are pleased that the inaugural championship playoffs will take place in
Taiwan where we’ll be able to celebrate the launch of Guild Wars, which
will take place just a few weeks prior to the finals,” said ArenaNet Business
Director Tommy Park.

The announcement comes on the heels of last week’s news that Guild Wars
surpassed more than one million units sold in North America and Europe. And
earlier this month ArenaNet released their Sorrow’s Furnace Update, a
free expansion of Guild Wars content that offered two new explorable
regions, new quests, new monsters, new items and more.

 

 

NCsoft, the interlocking NC logo, Guild Wars,
ArenaNet, Lineage, and all associated NCsoft logos and designs are
trademarks or registered trademarks of NCsoft Corporation. All other
trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

 

Guild Wars World Championship rules and
eligibility requirements are available at
www.GuildWars.com.