Recently, Garena, the publisher and developer of Free Fire, participated in a digital roundtable with a group of video game media professionals, during which Mr. Hans Saleh, Regional Director of Garena in the Middle East and North Africa, spoke about the game’s ambitions in the wider Arab region.

Initially, Free Fire is the name of the game developed specifically for cell phones by Garena, and it is a shooting battle royale that places 50 players on an island, where they can explore the vast map, hide in the desert, or seek to eliminate enemies until only one survivor remains.

Free Fire is the world's number one game, the world's most downloaded mobile game in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022 as a battle royale game according to data.ai, formerly known as App Annie.

It is present in more than 160 countries around the world, and the number of its subscribers is more than 450 million, the Free Fire: The Battle of Egypt tournament, which is considered one of the largest e-sports tournaments in Egypt, which was held during the past year in cooperation with the Ministry of Youth and Sports and the Egyptian E-Sports Federation More than 16,000 participants registered across the republic.

In the city qualifiers, they were held in the cities of Cairo and Alexandria, with the participation of more than 400 participants and 1,000 visitors in the qualifiers in each city. on YouTube.

Free Fire tournament map:

There are many tournaments organized by Free Fire and they are divided into 4 categories:

1. World Championship: Free Fire World Series.
2. Professional level tournament: Free Fire Super Star – Free Fire: The Battle of Egypt – Free Fire MEA League.
3. Pre-professional class: Free Fire All Stars – Free Fire Women’s Championship – Free Fire MEA Championship.
4. national championship categoryFree Fire Community League Egypt – Free Fire Ramadan Tournament – Free Fire Alpine Tournament Free Fire Cold War.

• The Free Fire ALL Stars tournament takes place during the month of January.
• The Free Fire Super Stars tournament takes place during the months of February and March.
• The Free Fire Ramadan tournament takes place during the month of April.
• The Free Fire SEA Invitational tournament takes place during the month of May.
• The Free Fire MEA Championship takes place during the months of June and July.
• The Free Fire MEA League tournament takes place during the months of August and September.
• The Free Fire World Stage tournament takes place during the month of November.
• The Free Fire Ladies Championship takes place during the month of December.

Players' path in the competitions:

• In December 2022, the Free Fire Egypt Community League tournament was held, with the participation of 76 Egyptian teams, through two stages (qualifying phase - final phase).
• In January 2023, the Free Fire All Stars tournament was held with the participation of thousands of teams from across the Middle East and Africa, including 36 Egyptian teams, through 3 stages (qualifying phase – qualifying phase – grand final phase).
• During the months of February and March 2023, the Free Fire Super Star tournament is currently being held with the participation of 24 professional teams from across the Middle East and Africa, including an Egyptian team, in two stages (qualifying stage – final stage).
• During the month of May 2023, the Free Fire SEA Invitational tournament will be held with the participation of 18 teams from the Middle East, Africa, Europe, Vietnam, Indonesia, Pakistan and Taiwan. Through two stages (the final phase – the grand final phase).

Celebrating Ramadan with Free Fire:

• To celebrate the holy month of Ramadan with our users in the Middle East and Africa region, we will be launching the Ramadan Tournament, where we will invite top pro teams and influencers to play a fun match every weekend.
• We will connect pro gamers, influencers, and community leaders with fans, and each week the winning team will give away the prize to 5 lucky winners who are their fans.
• There will also be an in-game event to celebrate with all players in the Middle East and Africa region.
• We are planning this celebration with a very fun and local experience, inviting users to enjoy the Free Fire characters who must visit them and get to know the main tourist spots in the Middle East and Africa during the month of Ramadan and celebrate Eid Mubarak with local foods.

Now we will share with you the most important questions along with the answers asked to the Head of Garena Middle East, which were shared by other colleagues during the recent Garena Virtual Roundtable.

What are Garena's ambitions for the next period with the Free Fire game?

Garena is committed to continuing to develop Free Fire into the most advanced gaming platform in the long term, we focus on continuing to learn more about what our players like and strive to improve their overall experience. It is important to reaffirm the company’s commitment to continue developing the Free Fire esports community, as esports is a great way to connect and interact with our community.

It is also important for us to provide players with more opportunities to be part of the esports system, and we continue to develop the talents of Free Fire esports players in Egypt and improve their potential to be future esports stars and grow from players from the Middle East and Africa to world-class players.

Which markets or countries do you see as having the greatest opportunity to invest in eSports?

I don't think we can answer that question because our focus is not just on a specific market in the Middle East and Africa, but based on what we have seen in many reports about esports and gaming in the Middle East and Africa region, we believe that the region in general has very good potential for the expansion of the gaming and esports market.

What do you think of the esports industry in the Egyptian market?

It is noticeable that the Egyptian esports industry market is constantly increasing and the success of the tournament is significant
Free Fire: Battle of Egypt, held last September, is a good example of this, as the tournament attracted almost 350,000 views on YouTube, and the number of participants in the tournament overall reached over 16,700 subscribers.

It is no wonder that the Middle East and North Africa Gaming Market Report issued by Nikko Partners stated that Egypt is an emerging gaming market, but at the same time it is an active and competitive gaming community and one of the largest markets in the region by the number of gamers.

We focus a lot in Egypt and the Middle East on user experience, and we work to provide advanced content and unique quality of tournament-level competition, because we aim to cultivate an advanced generation of users and build an advanced e-gaming community.

Are there any other tournaments to be held in Egypt?

With the great reception and success we have seen in our previous tournaments in Egypt, we believe it is very possible that we will have a similar or even better tournament in the future, but what I can say now is that we are now working on holding a Free Fire eSports tournament in Egypt, but we will announce all the details in due course when we are done.

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