{"id":13110,"date":"2018-08-29T06:23:56","date_gmt":"2018-08-29T06:23:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=13110"},"modified":"2018-08-29T06:23:56","modified_gmt":"2018-08-29T06:23:56","slug":"ea-cancels-3-tournaments-after-florida-shooting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=13110","title":{"rendered":"EA cancels 3 tournaments after Florida shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The silhouettes of attendees are seen standing in front of a Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) logo displayed on a screen during the company’s EA Play event ahead of the E3 Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Saturday, June 9, 2018. EA announced that it is introducing a higher-end version of its subscription?game-playing service that will include new titles such as Battlefield V and the Madden NFL 19 football game. Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon\/Bloomberg via Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

EA Sports said it will cancel three remaining Madden Classic qualifier events to review safety protocols after a deadly shooting last weekend at an event in Jacksonville, Florida.<\/h2>\n

“We’ve all been deeply affected by what took place in Jacksonville,” EA Sports CEO Andrew Wilson said in a statement released Monday<\/a>. “This is the first time we’ve had to confront something like this as an organization, and I believe the first time our gaming community has dealt with a tragedy of this nature.” <\/p>\n

On Sunday, David Katz, 24, opened fired at a Madden Classic qualifying tournament killing two and injuring 10 others<\/a>. Katz had competed in the head-to-head tournament but was eliminated. <\/p>\n

Sheriff Mike Williams said Katz was actively targeting<\/a> other gamers. On Monday, the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office said<\/a> Elijah Clayton, 22, and Taylor Robertson, 28, were killed. All of the injured are expected to survive. <\/p>\n

The shooting forces eSports events to reconsider security at their venues. <\/p>\n

“I think the eSports industry as a whole is going to have to step back and take a look at further strengthening our security,” CompLexity Gaming founder and CEO Jason Lake told CNN<\/a> on Sunday following the shooting. CompLexity sponsored a competitor who was injured on Sunday. <\/p>\n

ESports is a massive billion-dollar industry<\/a> with several hundred million fans. It’s estimated that 380 million people watch the competitive sport with the bulk of fans coming from North America, China and South Korea. <\/p>\n

For EA Sports, the Madden football franchise is a huge money maker. The game has brought in $4 billion in revenue and has sold more than 130 million units since its inception nearly 30 years ago. <\/p>\n

Gamers can make a hefty amount of money: EA Sports is offering a $165,000 prize pool with the top winner taking home $25,000 at this year’s tournament. <\/p>\n

The remaining qualifiers were scheduled to take place in Virginia, California and Texas throughout September<\/a>. The main event was scheduled to take place in Las Vegas in October, but its unclear if that will move forward. <\/p>\n

EA Sports did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment. <\/p>\n

CNNMoney (New York) <\/span> First published August 28, 2018: 12:08 PM ET<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The silhouettes of attendees are seen standing in front of a Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) logo displayed on a screen during the company’s EA Play event ahead of the E3 Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Saturday, June 9, 2018. EA announced that it is introducing a higher-end version of its subscription?game-playing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":13111,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}