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    Major League Gaming expands to Brazil

    Major League Gaming expands to Brazil

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    major league gaming logo 640
    major league gaming logo 640

    Competitive video gaming, aka eSports, is growing at an incredible pace. 32 million people watched the League of Legends championship broadcast in 2013, and last year's tournaments awarded an estimated $15.6 million in prize money. At the same time, Brazilian gamers are on the rise, spending a reported $2.6 billion on video games in 2012 and giving birth to a meme. Now, the world's biggest eSports league is going to cater specifically to that Brazilian audience. Major League Gaming (MLG) has just announced that it will expand to Brazil with its second international license, following an expansion to Canada in 2007.

    While MLG already holds qualifiers for its tournaments around the world, MLG Brasil will start operating local and online tournments designed specifically for the nation in partnership with travel and hospitality group Grupo Águia. According to the league, MLG Brasil is just the first of many international franchises to come.

    With a larger audience comes more money, of course. Recently, both broadcasters and film studios have realized that eSports have a lucrative young male demographic that advertisers are keen to target.