ESL has made a drastic change in the ruleset for IEM Cologne mere days away from the tournament kicking off in Germany. It was just revealed that every BO1 series will now be replaced by a BO3 series, giving the community more intense matches to watch and offering players and teams a broader opportunity to regain against challenging competitors.
This is one of the biggest and most highly anticipated events in the Counter-Strike esports calendar – will this change make much of a difference to the teams?
IEM Cologne Is Coming Soon
Between August 7 – 18, 24 teams will embark on a journey to Cologne, fighting for the lion’s share of the $1 million prize pool. Not only that but the winning team will get instant qualification to IEM Katowice 2025 and the BLAST Premier World Final – there’s a huge amount on the line in Cologne.
Originally, every match in the Play-In stage would have been a BO1, which means it was drastically easy for a team to fall short of qualifying based on a single-round loss. While this change to a universal BO3 format will mean that the tournament is stretched out a little longer, it’s what fans have been clamouring for, per the message posted by ESL on social media:
Now, IEM Cologne will look like this:
Play-In Stage: Double elimination bracket, BO3, top eight teams qualify
Group Stage: Two double-elimination groups with eight teams each (directly qualified and Play-In), BO3, top three teams from each group qualify
Playoffs: Single-elimination bracket, BO3 quarter- and semi-finals, BO5 grand final
It’s hard to predict a winner for IEM Cologne. While G2 Esports are fresh off a win at IEM Dallas, Natus Vincere is riding high since scoring big at the Esports World Cup mere days ago. It has also been a solid year for Team Spirit.
Ultimately, the biggest names in CS2 esports are facing off at IEM Cologne for a $400,000 grand prize – it’s enough to fill any team with the momentum needed to score a huge win.
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