Players from all around the country will come together at one location to fight it out for the number one spot and to prove that they have what it takes to win the prize and prestige of calling themselves Sri Lanka’s best FIFA 18 player. During the last Xstation Esports League we saw Dishan Nithrananthan come out on top as the champion for FIFA 18. Will he be able to repeat it once again or will a new contender claim the throne?

Mobitel, the leading Mobile Service Provider in Sri Lanka aims to introduce new technology to the youth of Sri Lanka and plans through such engaging events. In strategic partnership with Gamer.LK, they have entered a new chapter, venturing into the continuously evolving and improving world of eSports.

Register now at : http://bit.ly/xstationfifa

The Sri Lanka Telecom Esports Cafe Challenge, that will be held on the 14th of July 2018 at the Keero Gaming Cafe, will be the next installment in the many illustrious tournaments hosted and organized by SLT. The expectations for the event will be high, given the hype that’s always surrounding SLT Esports events following the SLT Esports Championship and the SLT Regional Championship that was  held in Kandy.

SLT’s introduction of SLT Esports Championship in 2015, became an instant success with the largest prize pool for an Esports tournament being on offer. With massive turnouts and exciting Esports action, SLT has continued to stay true to their commitment towards bringing Esports and the online gaming experience to the masses by continuously introducing new and innovative Esports experiences. SLT has once again initiated a new series of events that promises to fuel the enthusiasm of the local Esports community.

The first-ever SLT Esports Cafe Challenge will showcase; Overwatch, FIFA 18, Injustice 2, Tekken 7, Clash Royale and Project Cars as the official gaming titles. With a prize pool of 190,000+ awarded across all the gaming titles, there will be nothing short of the best taking part at the event to prove to themselves as well as to those watching that they have what it takes to bring the championship home. Overwatch will be broken down into 2 segments with the initial rounds kicking off online early next week and followed by the final rounds taking place at the event on the 14th.

Sri Lanka Telecom, featuring SLT Broadband, famous for its low latency, dedicated and reliable broadband connectivity which is compulsory for competitive gaming, has continued to organise top-tier gaming tournaments in the country, with intense and adrenaline filled excitement.

The SLT Esports Cafe Challenge will be a tournament to remember, a gauntlet of hard-core gamers, both individuals and clans, will take part in their events and go head to head in an exceptional test of skill and strategy, so we encourage all gamers to be at this event, as it will undoubtedly be an unforgettable experience.

For more information on this event, visit http://www.slt.lk/esports/

The RLG FIFA Championship 2018, held at the flagship Redline Technologies store on the 2nd of July alongside their strategic partner Gamer.LK, came to an exciting close with the winner earning himself the chance to represent Sri Lanka on an all-expenses paid trip to the Asian Football Gaming Championship (AFGC) 2018 in Singapore.

Proceedings kicked off early in the morning, with 96 registered cyber athletes who were ready to take on the challenge to represent their country as well as prove to everyone and themselves that they had what it took to be Sri Lanka’s best FIFA 18 player. The 96 participants were assigned to 6 groups consisting of 16 players each, where the top 2 athletes of each group moved forward into a final bracket containing the last 12 participants.

The 6 qualifiers saw some amazing and enthusiastic gameplay, where a lot of renowned players faced off. Most of the games came down to the wire in an amazing display of skill by the participants. The 12 cyber athletes that made their way to the final bracket were PnX.G, M-es.pro, PnX.Moin, TM.Sajadh, M-es Heatzer, TM.Sid, nA.Shark, PnX.Dishi, PnX.Sharpshooter, M-es.MhmdAfzl as well as PnX.Dumin and PnX.Costa.

With the qualifier out of the way, everyone’s high expectations for the final bracket were met with some breathtaking gameplay and exciting rivalries over the course of the final bracket. Fighting their way through to the semis, we saw PnX. Moin take on PnX. Dishi in the first semi-finals. The match seemed to be even, with both players scoring 2-2, until PnX. Moin pulled ahead, ending the game and taking the victory at 4-2 and advancing to the finals. In the second semi final we saw an old rivalry where nA. Shark took on PnX.Sharpshooter, which was one of the most anticipated matches of the entire tournament. It was an intense back and forth trade between both players coming into the final stretch of the game with a tied score of 3-3, but in a spectacular showing, nA.Shark clutched out the match with an amazing goal with space created from pass play to ensure the victory and snag a spot in the finals against PnX. Moin.

The finals was much more decisive than the previous matches of the bracket, with nA.Shark roaring out of the gates, taking an early lead over his counterpart Pnx.Moin, who tried his best to get back into the game, but the effort went to waste as nA.Shark ruthlessly pushed his lead, ending the game with a dominant 4-1 victory and earning himself the chance to represent Sri Lanka at the Asian Football Gaming Championship (AFGC) 2018 in Singapore.

The Asian Football Gaming Championship 2018 will be hosted from the 11th of July till the 15th of July in Singapore, where some of Asia’s most talented FIFA 18 players will gather with a shot to bring glory to their country. We congratulate nA.Shark on his achievement and wish him the best of luck for the upcoming challenges he will face in Singapore.

A crowd of over 200 showed up at the Keero gaming café on the 24th of June 2018 to find out who would be crowned the champions at Kings of Lan tournament. The event showed a lot of promise given the number of participants who were up bright and early to make sure they don’t miss out on their chance to take part in this event which was organized by Gamer.LK which was powered by Dialog gaming alongside technology partners MSI and official energy drink partner RedBull.

The event kicked off at around 10.00 am with an exciting Special Forces 2 match between Maximum Esports team GoDaddy and Maximum Esports team Ox!de closely followed by the individual titles which were Tekken 7, FIFA 18, Injustice 2, Project Cars and finally Clash Royale.

The first game of Special Forces 2 brought on an early hype to the day as the match was between two teams from the same clan and there was a lot of friendly rivalry as both teams played exceptionally well. Every game after seemed to have an amazing history behind it as there was a lot of excitement and intensity in every game with teams going head to head winning by the smallest margin, but in the end PnX Allstars took the title coming out on top against nA team reconnected to win the Special Forces 2 title.

Another title that saw a major upset was Tekken 7 with some new faces turning up at the event a lot of new talent was on display, the matches following up to the finals all were evenly matched and seemed like it could have gone either way. The final match for Tekken 7 was between Ashen “Blazer” Samaranayake from n00b Alliance and his long time rival Roshan “JURA” Jurampathy from Phoenix gaming. Blazer has shown some amazing dominance with his all time favorite character Yoshimitsu but  JURA who had put in a lot of time studying his opponent and long time rival finally managed to figure out how to bring down Blazer’s Yoshimitsu who strayed away from his usual Kazumi pick which was one of his most feared characters that he had mastered and went with Katarina who seemed to be the answer as he ended up taking the number 1 spot for himself winning the Tekken 7 title.

FIFA 18 as always was another highly contested title having over 40 participants taking part. Akeel “VeNoM” Ameerdeen from n00b Alliance showed great consistency as he overcame obstacle after obstacle to compete in the finals against Ashen “Penaldo” katagoda from Tech Morph who also created a few major upsets to get into the finals. In an exciting final Akeel ”VeNoM” Ameerdeem came out on top to clench the victory against Ashen to take the title for FIFA 18

On the flipside, we saw the usual dominance in Clash Royale coming out from Joel ‘Daniel’ Joung who made his way to the finals pretty easily given that he is a very talented young individual with a lot of experience in the game making it all the way to the finals without so much as breaking a sweat. Joel who recently took part in the South Asian qualifiers for the Asian Games 2018 showed great form and patience during his games to outplay and outpace his opponents. Haniff Ameen once again fell short of glory going up against his rival Joel both from n00b Alliance was not able to find the right answer to deal with Joel’s quick and devastating tactics falling short of the number 1 spot and ending up as the runner up with Joel taking the champions spot for Clash Royale.

Injustice 2 saw its usual dominance coming out from Rashad “RaSSyCZaR” Ameer from Xiphos Esports who comfortably made his way to the finals with not much effort. His close friend and long time rival Umashankar “Redwire” also from Xiphos Esports found himself taking on Rashad in the finals after defeating a number of opponents fell short during the finals and was not able to secure the number 1 spot which ended up in Rashad’s hands.

Project cars saw quite an interesting upset as Rasheed “BIGHORN” Ameer from Xiphos Esports who was the rank number 1 player for Project Cars fell short during the finals up against Hafzel Preena from Phoenix gaming and uncharacteristically making one small mistake which allowed Hafzel to clinch the title for Project Cars with a better timing.

The overall championship was a tie between Phoenix Gaming and n000b Alliance with Xiphos Esports coming in at second place. With some tough fought battles and rivalries it definitely was an unexpected outcome with the players from each clan fighting to the bitter end to earn the number one spot for Kings of LAN 2018.

The day was filled with alot of excitement and competition every participant giving it their best to bring down the walls that they faced. Kings of LAN once again coming out a success bringing with it some intense competition and gameplay from all who participated we hope to see more of these exciting times as Esports grows further and takes new corners in the upcoming future.

The National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka (NOC) is scheduled to introduce Esports at the Olympic Day celebrations happening in Nuwara Eliya on June 25. Raveen Wijayatilake, President of the Sri Lanka Esports Association (SLESA) presented Esports to the media at the press conference held by the NOC for the Olympic Day celebrations. Mr. Wijayatilake spoke of what Esports is and why it has developed into one of the fastest growing sports both in Sri Lanka and abroad..

“We are one of the few National Olympic Committees in the world to support Esports as we believe firmly that is the future,” revealed Maxwell De Silva, NOC secretary general. “We will introduce eSports to our youth at our Olympic Day which will once again be held under the theme of ‘Move, Learn and Discover’.”

Esports made its debut as a demonstration sport at the Asian Games 2018, where the Sri Lankan national Esports team will represent the South Asian region in the title StarCraft 2. Esports athlete Amruth “AmyPie” Alfred beat competitors from Pakistan and the Maldives to secure a qualifying spot in Indonesia in August. Esports will be a medal sport at the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou, China.

The full article can be found on the Sri Lanka National Olympic Committee website: http://www.srilankaolympic.org/all-news/esports-make-appearance-nocs-olympic-day

The National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka (NOC) is scheduled to introduce Esports at the Olympic Day celebrations happening in Nuwara Eliya on June 25. Raveen Wijayatilake, President of the Sri Lanka Esports Association (SLESA) presented Esports to the media at the press conference held by the NOC for the Olympic Day celebrations. Mr. Wijayatilake spoke of what Esports is and why it has developed into one of the fastest growing sports both in Sri Lanka and abroad..

“We are one of the few National Olympic Committees in the world to support Esports as we believe firmly that is the future,” revealed Maxwell De Silva, NOC secretary general. “We will introduce eSports to our youth at our Olympic Day which will once again be held under the theme of ‘Move, Learn and Discover’.”

Esports made its debut as a demonstration sport at the Asian Games 2018, where the Sri Lankan national Esports team will represent the South Asian region in the title StarCraft 2. Esports athlete Amruth “AmyPie” Alfred beat competitors from Pakistan and the Maldives to secure a qualifying spot in Indonesia in August. Esports will be a medal sport at the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou, China.

The full article can be found on the Sri Lanka National Olympic Committee website: http://www.srilankaolympic.org/all-news/esports-make-appearance-nocs-olympic-day

Metropolitan Computers (Pvt) Ltd, the premier IT retailer for the world’s best brands launched the latest Acer lineup of products powered by Intel Optane Memory for the first time in Sri Lanka. The authorized distributor for Acer computers in Sri Lanka, Metropolitan Computers continues to make its mark in Sri Lanka’s technology landscape, and this is another milestone in its efforts.

At the launch, Marketing Director of Acer introduced the newest updates to their popular Predator series which is focused on high performance gaming, and the refreshed features of the Nitro series of laptops in the form of the Nitro 5. A large gathering including partners and customers from across the country participated at the occasion.

One of the highlight of the new product range was the inbuilt the Intel Optane Memory. Intel Optane Memory offers an unprecedented combination of high-capacity and persistence. By moving and maintaining larger amounts of data closer to the processor, workloads and services can be optimized to reduce latencies and enhance performance. Intel Optane Memory lets you accelerate your game by allowing launch and level-loading at unprecedented speeds – without the usual speed bumps. Whether you’re blasting through hyperspace or filing the lane on a fast break, you’ll enjoy a smooth, rich gaming experience, with less lag time and reduced performance bottlenecks. In addition, it learns the tasks you perform most frequently from system startup to file search, to program launch and steps on the gas to give you the extra boost you need.

These latest Acer products are available at any Metropolitan Mcenter showroom where you can fulfill all your IT requirements along with the world’s best brands. Backed by 60 years of Metropolitan trust, Metropolitan Mcenter showrooms are available island-wide with supportive staff and team, ready to educate on any product with reliable technical assistance at the showrooms itself.

The centerpiece of the gaming range was the Predator Orion 9000, which is a pre-built desktop with specs that can only be described as overkill; a GTX 1080 Ti with 11 GB of vram, 32 gigabytes of RAM, a 512 GB SSD with an added capacity of a 3 TB hard disk and an i9 7900X sitting at the heart of the computer for heavy content creation focused applications during gaming.

The Predator Orion 5000 was also introduced, with specs more in line with mainstream gaming requirements; a GTX 1070 Ti with 8 GB of vram, a 256 GB SSD with an added 1 TB of hard disk storage, 16 gigabytes of RAM and a i7 8700k to power it all. All in all this build is more likely to be popular as it will be more cost effective than the aforementioned 9000 series, while still being able to run any games released in the next few years at maxed out or near maxed out settings.

The Predator Helios 500 gaming laptop, which packs a powerful punch in a more compact form factor; consisting of a GTX 1070 with 8 GB of vram, 32 gigabytes of RAM, a 512GB SSD with an added 2 TB of hard disk storage, all capped by an i9-8950HK into a 15.6” thin body. This laptop, unlike most, makes no tradeoff between performance and portability, offering a desktop level gaming experience on the go.

The Nitro 5, a more lightweight laptop geared towards lighter gaming, consisting of a GTX 1050 with 4GB vram, 8 GB of RAM, 128 GB SSD with an added 1 TB of hard disk storage, all being powered by an i7-8750H processor, packed into a 15.6” thin body. While this laptop isn’t as powerful as the flagship Helios 500, it will still deliver adequate performance with it’s GTX 1050 and i7 processor. Staying true to its core, Acer continues to deliver lifestyle products to suit your profession, image and requirements in life.

All these Acer systems will come with a copy of Windows 10 preinstalled and two years warranty on the systems. In addition, the Orion 5000 and 9000 comes with DVD-RW drives equipped as well.

Two monitors were also unveiled at the launch; the XZ350CU and the XR382CQK.

Of the two, the more mainstream is the XZ350CU, which is a massive 35” curved ultra-widescreen display with a resolution of 2560×1080 with the added benefit of a ultra-smooth refresh rate of 200Hz. Combined with DTS Sound, multitasking and great design, this monitor is worthy of the most advanced gaming setups. The monitor also has the following I/O: HDMI (v2.0) + HDMI (v1.4)/MHL (v2.0) + DisplayPort (v1.2) + DisplayPort out (v1.2) + USB Hub 3.0×4 (1up 4down) + Speaker. This monitor also supports FreeSync, which will allow smoother gameplay on AMD cards.

The XR382CQK is a 37.5” UltraWide QHD resolution curved widescreen display, with the latest Adaptive-Sync technology offering stutter-free and tear-free gaming and DTS® Sound speakers to amp up the audio. Boasting of a maximum resolution of 3440 x 1600 and a modest standard refresh rate of 75Hz, the monitor sports a curved UltraWide QHD display with ColorPlus technology, including 100% sRGB gamut and 6-axis color adjustment for a perfect picture. IPS1 technology lets you see clearly from nearly any angle. This monitor is more geared towards content creators, but it does have the benefit of FreeSync which will pair very well with AMD cards. The monitor also has the following I/O:HDMI (v2.0) + MHL (v2.1) + DP + mini DP + DP out + Audio out + USB Hub 3.0×4 (1up 4down) + Speaker.

In addition, Acer has introduced new models to its Swift, Spin and Switch lineup of thin & light series of devices as well.

With the continued introduction of cutting edge, innovative yet affordable products Metropolitan Computer’s re-emphasize its leading role in the industry and helps demonstrate its commitment to the market while maintaining a successful long term relationship with all dealers.

From Left to right

Mr. Ivor Maharoof- Managing Director –Metropolitan Group

Ms. Li Shi Chia– Marketing Director – Acer Singapore

Mr. Andrew Hou – President of Acer Pan Asia Pacific regional Operations.

Mr. Saumitra Rai- Head of Sales , South Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and Korea for Intel

Mr. Sunil Nair – General Manager – Sales , Acer Singapore