Day 4: If we have to use only a few words for gamescom's last day, they would be "championship day". Despite that, the more important thing happening in the LCS playoffs was the match for third place which had to decide whether Gambit or EG would miss the world finals. EG started with a win in the first game, but it wouldn't have been Gambit if they don't lose the first map before they start dominating. They crushed EG in the second game and even though Froggen did everything he could utilizing TF's split push in the final map, it wasn't enough and EG will have to miss out on the world finals.

Then finally it was time for the EU LCS Playoffs finals which were more a game for pride (and money) since the first seeded team won't get a group stage bye anyway. Fnatic went out with a bang crashing Lemondogs in the first two games. xPeke was on a roll on both TF and Ahri, and his charming fox-lady was amazing to watch even in the third game that Lemondogs successfully took away from Fnatic. That was all they were capable of doing though and Fnatic closed out the series at 3-1, winning the European LCS summer split just as they did in the spring. Congratulations to them!

Meanwhile, things were getting intense on the WCS stage, too. Choi Ji 'Bomber' Sung and Jae Dong 'Jaedong' Lee were the two players that made it to the finals and everyone expected a tough battle between them. However, Bomber didn't agree with that idea at all and swept Jaedong 4-0, winning his first major SC2 title and lifting the amazing WCS Season 2 trophy!

With that all the major eSports tournaments at gamescom came to a close and it was time for everyone to pack the stages and head home. One thing is for sure though - if you have the chance to visit the Koelnmesse for gamescom 2014, do not miss it for anything in the world!

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Day 3: MC once again opened up the day at the WCS finals with his desiding game against Rain. MC did his best but couldn't overcome his fellow Protoss - not in the first or in the second map. That sadly ended his run in the tournament, but he will be back stronger than ever in WCS Season 3. You can check out here what he had to say about his performance and future plans.

On the LCS stage Ninjas in Pyjamas and Alternate were fighting for their survival in the LCS. Similarly to the latter's game the previous day, NiP took a hotly contested first game. This time though it was time for Alternate to strike back and they did exactly that focusing on Bjergsen and thus shutting down NiP's major power source. Despite NiP's roster changes earlier in the split were done with the hopes of getting into the world finals in mind, in the end they are once again in relegation and will have to prove they deserve to stay in the LCS in the promotion tournament next year.


In the semifinals Fnatic were up against EG. The first game went clearly in Fnatic's favour, but the second one Froggen was on fire (even though he was playing a fish) and he caused a lot of problems for his opponents. However, Fnatic didn't intend to go down without a fight and they managed to turn around the game in the usual spot for Season 3 - the baron pit. Enrique Javier 'xPeke' Cedeño Martinez and company secured the second win in the set and thus became the first European team to qualify for the world finals.

The other semifinal saw Gambit versus Lemondogs . In the beginning of the split no one actually expected Lemondogs to get that far but they did far more than that - they won their set with a 2-0 and maybe finally left no doubt in the audience that they are here to stay... and to fight in the World Championship.

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Day 2: The day started with the SMITE tournament kicking off. SK played in the first game and took a convincing win against Vengeance. In their second game of the group stage they did a great turnaround in the end, beating Bipolar, but they couldn't overcome COGnitive EU in the following game. Despite that SK still had secured their place in the final against COG. The boys really wanted to get back at them for that loss, but only managed to take one game away from them and lost the final 1:2. Great performance nonetheless and we can expect more great things from them in the future. In the mean time you can check our interview with Psiyo after the first game of the group stage.


The WCS Season 2 finals kicked off on Friday as well with MC in group A. He once again took down Welmu after the European playoffs, this time with 2:1. Sadly, despite he put one hell of a fight, he couldn't do the same against Jaedong, who won the set 2:1. MC will be playing the decisive game of the group on Saturday. Don't forget to tune in and cheer for him, if you are not at gamescom!


On the League of Legends front it was time for the Wildcard tournament final. The Lithuanians from GamingGear.eu didn't give Brazil's hope paiN Gaming much chance and took them down 2-0, securing their place at the World Finals. It will be very interesting to see how they can compare against the LCS teams from NA and Europe and the Asian powerhouses once the Season 3 World Championship kicks off on September 15.

After that it was finally time for the main LoL event - the European LCS Playoffs. Team ALTERNATE took on Evil Geniuses and started really well, winning the first game of the set. That woke up Henrik 'Froggen' Hansen's killer instincts and he was a beast in the next two games. EG's 2-1 win secured them the place in next year's LCS, but they were looking for something more - the spot for Worlds.

On the other hand Gambit Gaming didn't give any chance to Ninjas in Pyjamas and quickly secured the two wins they needed to advance to the quarter-finals.

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If you are one of the many gaming fans, swarming the halls of Koelnmesse, you have probably already saw SK’s presence there. You can find us not only at the BigBen booth in hall 7, but you can also add some serious swag to your shopping bag if you stop by the ESL shop in hall 8. There you can find all of our fanware, as well as the exclusive SK Gaming chucks.

Besides that, today SK was also involved in the Dr Pepper Allstars tournament final, where Server Forge represented us against mousesports’ allstar team, CPlay. As it suits any finale, the games went to a deciding third game. The one thing that can describe the whole set though was the untypical choice of mid lane champions by both teams. In the first game, SK’s representatives played Lanewick (aka Warwick in mid lane) and crushed their opponents with it. That prompted CPlay to ban the big bad wolf from the next two games and Server Forge lost their edge because of that. CPlay went for Quinn twice in a row and it worked very well for them. They managed to shut down Server Forge’s aggression and won the final 2-1 despite Carlos 'ocelote' Rodríguez Santiago and Patrick 'Nyph' Funke looking over SK’s team.


In other news, Copenhagen Wolves finally won their spot at the Promotion Qualifier for Season 4’s LCS next year. After they lost their previous chance in Tenerife to TCM-Gaming , this time they managed to successfully overcome them in the semifinal. That allowed them to face KMT in the battle for the spot in the qualifier. The Wolves were merciless and scored two relatively quick wins, in which Martin 'Rekkles' Larsson didn’t die even once.


Two more teams left the competition in the International Wildcard Tournament, which will select the 14th team for the Season 3 World Championship. Turkey and Oceania’s representatives felt short in their tracks and couldn’t reach the final. The deciding set between Brazil’s paiN Gaming and CIS’ GamingGear.eu will be played tomorrow.

That’s all for today, but tomorrow it will be even better as Min Chul 'MC' Jang will start the group stage of the WCS Season 2 finals and the SK Gaming SMITE team will compete in the gamescom LAN event. In the mean time you can check a few impressions over at our facebook page!