This past weekend saw the conclusion of our first season of Mortal Kombat 11 action. After weeks of online qualifiers, all roads led to the Protea Hotel Fire & Ice! by Marriott in Pretoria for the Last Chance Qualifier and the top eight finale.

The Last Chance Qualifiers welcomed players from South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Tanzania as they battled for the opportunity to join the top four online qualifiers. 32 players battled through a tough double elimination bracket to secure the slots available. As the first part of the day's action drew to a close, the top four to claim the right to battle for the incredible prize pool on offer were:

  • TagaBearClaw | South Africa
  • ZaZa | Zambia
  • rtkay123 | Zimbabwe
  • FTG I-AM-GROOTI | South Africa

TOP EIGHT CLASH

The grand finale brought together potentially the very best Mortal Kombat fighters in Africa and ensured a great showcase for the talent on the continent.

Another gruelling double elimination bracket lay in wait for the players, with the online qualifiers getting the seed advantage. That didn't mean an easier route at all, as the game proved to be another beast offline. However, the majority of the online qualifiers went through unscathed in the first round, with only XRay_92 dropping to the lower bracket.

He would however not go down without a fight and survived the lower bracket right until the lower bracket final. A defeat to FTG Sho Kahn saw him secure a third spot in the tournament. Sho Kahn - who was the Injustice 2 SA Cup champion - secured himself a grand final match against Zambia's Mr. 5000. The match was a repeat of the winner's bracket final and proved to be a real test of the two player's knowledge of each other and their character picks.

It took four sets and a fair amount of attrition before the player from Zambia secured a 3-1 win over Brandon ‘Sho Kahn’ Jacob. Justin 'Mr. 5000' Banda took a well deserved victory and thee right to represent Africa at the Celtic Throwdown event in Ireland at the end of August.

  • 1st Place: Mr 5000 | Zambia [R15,000 cash + Trip to Celtic Throwdown in Ireland + Razer Raiju Ultimate PS4 Controller]
  • 2nd Place: FTG Sho Kahn | South Africa [R7,500 cash + Razer Raiju Tournament Edition PS4 Controller]
  • 3rd Place: XRay_92 | South Africa [R5,000 cash + Turtle Beach Recon 200 White Headset]
  • 4th Place: ZaZa | Zambia [R2,500 cash]
  • 5th - 6th place:
  • 7th - 8th place:​

You can watch the video-on-demand of the stream below:

The event would not have been possible without the support and sponsorship by a number of partners. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Mortal Kombat's local distributor TeamFinity. Protea Hotel Fire & Ice! in Pretoria proved to be the perfect backdrop for the event - and the milkshakes proved a real hit. PlayStation South Africa for supplying the consoles, and ASUS ROG for ensuring players were competing on screens with the best response time in the business. Apex Interactive for supplying headsets from their Razer and Turtle Beach ranges for tournament use and prizes.

A further round of thanks is owed to the players and supporters who attended the event. Some travelled quite a distance to compete and support the local fighting community. A shoutout to Luca 'RoBoHoBo' Tucconi for joining our very own Nick Holden on commentary duty. And finally, thanks to the ACGL crew for their commitment over the weekend.

And if you are wondering, standby for season two...

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