Esports World Cup Announces Lineup and Total Prize Pool

Saudi Arabia's Esports World Cup continues with another installment in 2026. The event has recently announced their game lineup, consisting of 24 titles across different genres.

The prize pool is also growing yet again. The first EWC was already promising a substantial amount of money, with 62.5 million USD split across all titles. In 2025 this number grew to 70 million USD, and now 75 million USD.

If you're wondering how could something like this be even remotely profitable, don't worry, because it isn't. Esports World Cup is a part of Saudi Arabia's sportswashing efforts that have been going on for many years at this point.

The purpose of these events is to create a more positive image for the country and its government through sponsoring big entertainment events. Between sports, music, video games, and recently opening a Mr. Beast theme park, these efforts make casual observers associate Saudi Arabia with fun and luxurious events, rather than slave labor, inequality, and human rights violations, like the killing of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

While the promise of riches still attracts many competitors, a sizable portion of the FGC and players worldwide has boycotted the event as a matter of personal moral principles. One of the most notable examples includes the last year's Esports World Cup, which was slated to feature a GeoGuessr tournament.

The game's community had an overwhelmingly negative response to this news, and unlike with most other games, they actually had leverage. Since GeoGuessr relies heavily on user created maps (as in, picking specific locations and static spots), the mapmakers had a way to put pressure on the company. If GeoGuessr didn't withdraw from competition, they would black out the maps and make any sort of tournament impossible without the company scrambling to produce their own set of competitive maps. This, alongside the total outrage in the community, has led to the game promptly removing itself from the event.

This year's lineup sadly doesn't have much room for this, as it largely features games from huge publishers who couldn't care less about the ethical or moral concerns. However, even a brief glimpse at the lineup should reveal that high level competition is not the point here.

What possible reason could a serious tournament have for including League of Legends, and then two mobile games that are overt ripoffs of League of Legends? The same way, Counter-Strike 2, a game with an incredibly strong and established community, is featured alongside CrossFire, a game that has been an obvious Counter-Strike clone for nearly two decades now.

The only reason these games are included, while competitive staples like Quake, StarCraft, Age of Empires, and many others are omitted, is down to popularity. They're not shooting for the most competitive titles, the point is to get a lot of eyes on the event, which is why it's rife with mobile games that have millions of active users (yet no real competitive scene).

It's hard to gauge how much their efforts are paying off, but even with Saudi Arabia's bottomless money reserves, it's hard to see this being sustainable for years into the future. Especially while the royal family continues to invest the money from gradually depleting oil reserves into unrealistic projects, and desperate attempts to boost their reputation.