BAM 11 hits hard in Melbourne this weekend

Esports giant Battle Arena Melbourne (BAM) is having their 11th annual event this Friday May 17 to Sunday May 19 at the Melbourne Convention Centre – aptly titled BAM 11.

Billing itself as “Australia’s largest open esports event”, players from any experience bracket could go head-to-head against fighting game world champions. With over 1000 local and international players already pre-registered to compete, that’s a lot of heads-to-heads.

The weekend will see a bunch of tournaments play out, some of them being events in global esports tours. For the second year in a row, Tekken 7 will be played as a Master event in the Tekken World Tour, and the Street Fighter V tournament will mark BAM’s sixth year hosting an event in the Capcom Pro Tour.

There’s also tournaments for Mortal Kombat 11 (who are also the presenting partner for the event), Super Smash Bros Melee, as well as Super Smash Bros Ultimate, which, with a whopping 340 participants, is being called the biggest fighting game tournament ever in Australia and New Zealand. Take that, New Zealand! (But also you’ve got Jacinda Ardern, so please let us have this.)

There’s a pool of over $50,000 in cash and prizes to give away during the weekend. Plus, three local players will be deemed “best in region” for Tekken, Smash Bros and Street Fighter. These lucky champions and their tired fingers will win trips to the EVO World Championships in Las Vegas this August. Check out this link for info on how to qualify.  This also applies to New Zealand players (Because we love you, please don’t leave us).

For the rest of us non-competitive folks, you can simply attend BAM as a spectator, where you can watch the tournaments live, play some indie games, check out some art, or take part in a cosplay competition on Sunday.

You can check out a full event schedule here (complete with Twitch links so you can watch the tournaments from home), and get your tickets here if you’d like to attend what is sure to be an exciting time.

CouchWarriors has been organising BAM every year since its inception in 2009. Along with the Melbourne Esports Open this August, it’s great to see such a big esports platform in Australia. It seems to be an attempt to bridge the gap between people who understand esports, and people like me. But also there’s cosplay. Everyone loves cosplay.