ESports have come a long way over the past few years, and with an increasing number of leagues dedicated to specific games like Call of Duty. Now, ArenaNet wants to take the popular Guild Wars 2 to a new level.

ArenaNet announced a partnership with the Electronic Sports League to create the ESL Guild Wars 2 Pro League, which includes two seven-week seasons of tournaments, with qualifiers starting November 14th, and $400,000 (broken down to $200,000 per season) in prizes. This is a huge bounty compared to most eSports tournaments.

Part of the reason Guild Wars 2 is such an eSports darling stems from ArenaNet’s decision to make the game free-to-play this past August, garnering a bigger audience as a result. “Since the base game has gone free, we’ve seen a huge influx of audiences from countries like Brazil, Poland, Russia, Spain, and Turkey,” said John Corpening, competitive game director for the game.

ResizedImage600355 Guild

The structure for the tournament is broken down above, going from the Open Qualifier to the World Championship. “From a business perspective, [the pro league] is important to us because playtime is increased if we can make players excited about playing PVP (player vs. player),” said Steve Fowler, head of global marketing at ArenaNet.

The average player that doesn’t engage in PVP takes part in approximately 722 minutes (12 hours) of action per week. With PVP, that number increases to “744 minutes per week,” said Fowler. That’s a lot of time to practice for a big prize.

PVP has a huge part in the Guild Wars 2 competitions, and a player only has to get to level two to access it, so it’s wide open for everyone to jump in and compete, according to ArenaNet. The tournament will support both amateur and professional teams alike, so everyone has the opportunity to win.

Building a league not only presents a chance for eSports to shine on yet another stage, but it also opens up promotion for Guild Wars 2’s existing community, as a new expansion for Guild Wars 2, titled Heart of Thorns, is set to release on October 23rd.

Speaking exclusively with [a]listdaily, Fowler added, “We are extremely excited about our new partnership with ESL on Guild Wars 2 Pro Leagues. It is the natural evolution of the relationship we have built with them supporting Guild Wars 2 competitive community over the last 15 months. The league is a direct response to supporting the fastest growing part of Guild Wars 2, PvP, and happens to come at a time when Guild Wars 2 is experiencing massive new interest in anticipation of the release of our first expansion, Heart of Thorns, and the recently released Play for Free version of the core game.”