Once again we see a major DotA tournament, the SMM Grand National DotA Tournament! With over $18,000 of prize money it will be one of the biggest Asian DotA events so far. Teams such as Rush3d, Kingsurf and EHOME will be attending, as well as our own fnaticMSI.DotA.

fnaticMSI.DotA is one of the big favourites for the event, coming from a victory at the Make Games Colorful 2008 tournament, beating all their major rivals.

SMM will be kicking off at the 21st of November, and will end at the 23rd of the same month. It is hosted at the Berjaya Times Square, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The same weekend will also play host to the Intel Extreme Masters Continental Finals America. The fnaticMSI.WoW team will be attending the event in Philadelphia along with the best World of Warcraft teams that America has to offer.

EM Philadelphia will offer $80,000USD in prize money for the WoW and CS attendees; however, the most valuable prize for the top placed teams will be the opportunity to compete at the Grand Finals.

The event is sure to prove challenging for the fnaticMSI team, especially with teams like Pandemic and Gravitas Gaming in attendance. Gravitas Gaming in particular will be hungry for redemption after their defeat to fnaticMSI.WoW at MLG Dallas.

Latest Score Overview

Time	Game	Team	Result	Opponent		Stage	Tournament
TBD		fnaticMSI.DotA	[00:00]	Imbanology		Groupstage	SMM
17:00		fnaticMSI.WoW	[00:00]	Trade Chat		Groupstage	EM Philadelphia

With an overall statistic of 37 wins and only 13 loss, fnaticMSI.FoCuS is the best player in the current fourteenth WC3L season. But not only in the WC3L our orc player could access his WarCraft III skills. After a successful match against mTwAMD.FoV, Hyosub Eom got the chance to represent his country, South Korea, at the World Cyber Games.

Sadly he did not meet his own expectations and got eliminated in a tie-breaker. Nonetheless FoCuS kept his high spirit, writing a blog about the recent happenings, and sitting down for a interview with the Chinese website www.replays.net.

His blog can be found here. Furthermore you can read the original interview which can be found here, or you can read the translation by clicking on "Full Story".

Back in August, fnaticMSI saw the addition of a FIFA team to the fnatic Academy, but as of today, that team has been released.

Containing top players such as AleX, Delfin-1 and Maximo12, the team was destined to perform well, but unfortunately things have not quite worked out and the FIFA team did not make it through their trial period.

The FIFA team has had mixed success, such as managing to get the first, second and third place at the World Cyber Games Spain Qualifiers, but they did not manage to impress at various other online and offline events, such as the World Cyber Games finals itself.

For a statement by Jose "WoN" Hervas, team manager of the FIFA team, and the full line-up, click "Full Story"!

SteelSeries has released brand new and revolutionary MMO gaming gear! The leading manufacturer of innovative professional gaming gear have decided to venture into the MMO scene with three new products. First off is the SteelSeries World of Warcraft MMO Gaming Mouse and are first to release such a mouse.

SteelSeries World of Warcraft MMO Gaming Mouse Technical Specifications

• 15 programmable buttons plus scroll wheel that includes:
  

4 way D pad on left side
2 way button on each side

• Custom macro creation
  

• Real-time profile switching
  

• Import and export profile capability
  

• 6 CPI (counts per inch) settings at 800, 1200, 1600, 2000, 2400 and 3200
  

• 3 possible polling rate settings of 250, 500 or 1000 Hz
  

• Independent X/Y axis sensitivity settings
  

• 2.5 millimeter lift distance
  

Drooling already? Would you like to *win that mouse? It's simple! All you really need to do is come up with an innovative and exciting answer (in less than 15 words) to "Why do you think the new MMO mouse from SteelSeries rocks?".

Remember, you have less than 15 words to express the answer, post your entry below in the comments in this news post. Remember, the contest begins on the 12th of November and runs right up till the 19th of this month. We would also appreciate if there's no spam and kindly remember that it's only 1 entry (post) per person!

If your answer is witty enough you will stand a chance to win *one of the new MMO Gaming range released by SteelSeries

* Subject to availability and stocks.

Click Full story for complete information on the new MMO gear from SteelSeries!

Tonight will be the kick-off for fnaticMSI.CS in the Scandinavian EPS. This league has been known in other parts of Europe, like Germany, for quite some time now and the ESL decided to introduce the league in Scandinavia with a €16,000 prize purse. Every big Scandinavian team is participating, so this is a good measurement for Swedish` finest teams.

Fnatic will start of with 2 matches at once, taking on the Swedish team Playzone, immediately followed up by the game versus Norwegian superstars XpreZ. As a good start is half the work, fnaticMSI.CS will look to secure 6 points tonight!

The Swedes will be played at 19.00 CET on de_dust2. They had a rough start versus Lanklan in their first round and are looking to score points at this map. At 20.00 CET the game versus Real&co is on. All warmed up fnaticMSI will aim for the 3 points on de_inferno.

»ESL EPS Scandinavia Playday 1&2 (19:00 CET - 19th November 2008)

	Team	1st Half	2nd Half	Result
	fnaticMSI.CS	14	02	16
	Playzone.se	01	00	01

fnaticMSI: dsn - Archi - f0rest - ins - cArn

Playzone.se: BARBARR – pita – pronax – danne - xeron

	Team	1st Half	2nd Half	Result
	fnaticMSI.CS	12	04	16
	XpreZ	03	11	14

fnaticMSI: dsn - Archi - f0rest - ins - cArn

XpreZ: REAL – t0s – syrteks – prb - noLA

DEMOS

• cArn vs CBteam (28.0MB)

It's that time again! Fnatic Tuesday is here again with another crazy offer in association with our shop and Steelseries! This week we are featuring the very popular Steelseries Siberia Headset in both white and black both reduced by 25%!

SteelSeries Siberia Full-size Headset highlights:

• Designed for gaming + MP3-players
  

• Extremely comfortable
  

• Separate microphone
  

R.R.P - €64.99 FNATIC SHOP PRICE - €48.00

The SteelSeries Siberia Headset was developed in co-operation with professional gamers to ensure that the soundscape, specifications and comfort is suitable for long gaming sessions.


Apart from using the headset for PC-gaming, this product has been designed so gamers can use it with their favorite MP3-player, handheld gaming device or practically any other kind of portable digital device.

That is why the headset features a separate microphone, so users can enjoy music on the road without having to bring unnecessary gear. The cable length has been optimized for use with MP3-players and similar products and comes with an additional extra long cable for use with stationary computers.

Available in both black and white editions whilst stock lasts!


*subject to availability, prices do not include postage and packaging.

It's with great pleasure that we announce Roald "Roychez" van Buuren as our Editor in Chief for fnatic. He has been a part of fnatic since April and has proven his worth and consistency over his time in fnatic.

With the new title comes a host of new responsibilities and the biggest one would be to keep you! Yes you, the reader fixed to fnatic for endless hours.

For a statement from the Editor in Chief kindly click "Full Story"

While the long and hard MSI World Tour has come to an end a few weeks back, our Counter Strike pros are back in Sweden enjoying the weather but there have been 2 galleries out in our gallery section for a few days.

The first one details the teams journey in the World ESport Masters tournament where they secured a 4th place amongst stiff competition.



The second gallery sees them in a professional photo shoot done by our sponsors SteelSeries. Along with their dashing good looks and Mortal Kombat moves, this gallery is surely not to be missed.

In an article written by Luke Cotton on CrackClan.com we get a history lesson about fnaticMSI. The article was originally intended to be posted for Inside-eSports in 2008, but the project didn't lift off and the article was just recently posted on CrackClan.com.

The article, named "Fnatic: Then and Now" is introduced with a small piece about the foundation of fnatic, the management and how owner Sam "zr0" Mathews and his organization have been an important factor for the development of eSports.

Cotton writes about the very first teams of fnatic, such as our dominating Call of Duty, Unreal Tournament and Painkiller teams. Of course Sander "Vo0" Kaasjager, the legendary Painkiller duellist (currently Quake 3 player for fnaticMSI), gets noticed, pointing out to his CPL victories and retirement, as well as his recent comeback.

In the middle of the article we see the Counter-Strike 1.6 team get to order, their slow start and roster changes they have made in order to get renown as the best Counter-Strike team in the world. In the last part Cotton writes about other fnatic teams including the legendary Dutch Counter-Strike: Source team and the Call of Duty 4 squad.

Interested in more? Click here!

Following their victory at MGC 2008, myMYM has conducted an extensive feature on the fnaticMSI.DotA team to allow everyone a deeper understanding of the team. Meanwhile, gameriot has come up with a detailed interview with fnaticMSI.Hafu to discuss the new patch and her team's current state.

Romi "melen" Gunawan was interviewed by myMYM and talked about what's in store for the future, what happened at MGC and how his team functions.

melen: We train every single day and sometimes we gather at my house or Ritter's house to discuss tactics. Also, watching replays is a personal responsibility for all the members. We analyze our opponents replays as well, as a team.

• Fnatic DotA feature
  

Rumay "Hafu" Wang expressed frustration to GameRiot as the new patch has nerfed her team's comp.

Hafu: I'm not confident in my line-up anymore at all. I don't think anyone, aside from PMR, should be confident. It's been too soon since the changes for anyone to have formulated consistant strategies versus everything. It's important to have flexibility on our team in order to be successful.

• Hafu interview