Samsung White are currently the most popular team in the most popular game in the world, after winning the final match series in League of Legends’ World Championship this weekend. 40,000 fans watched them best China’s Starhorn Royal Club in a sold-out Seoul World Cup Stadium.
SSW defeated Star Hor Royal Club three games to one, acquiring $1 million USD in the process. The South Korean squad lost only two matches during the entire month-long tournament – one less than last year’s winners, SK Telecom T1 K.
You can catch up on all five games of the final in the officialWorld Championship VOD archive.
Fans watched live on the official LoL site, Twitch, and via proper sports channel ESPN’s livestreaming service. But Riot have yet to collate and announce this year’s total viewership numbers.
In 2013, 32 million fans tuned into the LoL Championship finals, and 8.5 million watched concurrently. League of Legends player numbers nearly doubled over the course of that year, so the game’s only got bigger since then. But we shouldn’t necessarily expect a huge increase in figures – the South Korean location meant the match was broadcast in the middle of the night US time.
Last year, Riot rented out LA’s Staples Center, and hosted around 11,000 fans – a live audience they’ve now nearly quadrupled. Do you think the finals can quadruple in scale again next year?