WESG under fire for different rules and lower prize pool for women’s Hearthstone tourney

Traditional sports may have an esports problem now that many young people are flocking to competitive online games. But it seems esports has a traditional sports problem as well. World Electronic Sports Games (WESG) split its esports tournaments into men’s and women’s divisions, attempting to follow the structure of the Olympic games. On its registration page, it noted that only men could enter the main competition for games like Hearthstone and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, while women had to compete in their own division for a much smaller prize pool.

It’s now clarified that policy after Blizzard Entertainment reached out to it, but not before causing consternation in the fan base. A tweet from top Hearthstone streamer and caster Alexander “Raven” Baguley called out WESG on August 22: