Team Todak takes the podium at the MLBB World Championship (M1)

In the recent Mobile Legends Bang Bang (MLBB) M1 World Championship, local eSports team Todak cemented themselves as one of the top three teams in the world at the mobile game. With this finish, Todak took home a USD20,000 (~RM83,536) cash prize.

Their tournament run saw them top their group in the group stages, edging out Philippine team Sunsparks despite recording a 2-1 score. This seeded the team straight into the upper brackets where they would face and be defeated by Indonesian powerhouse Rex Regum Qeon (RRQ) 0-2 in a best of 3.

However, thanks to the double elimination format of this tournament, they were given a second chance in the lower brackets as they faced off against Japanese team 10s Gaming Plus. The sole Japanese representative had just swept the second playoff Malaysian team Axis Esports, but were ultimately unable to triumph over Todak with the Malaysian team securing a 2-1 victory.

As they climbed through the tournament, they tore through the Burmese Ghouls 2-0 to reach the lower bracket finals where they would face off against the very team that knocked them down in the upper bracket: RRQ. The Indonesian team just suffered a crushing 0-3 defeat to fellow Indonesian team EVOS Legends were to secure a rematch with EVOS in the grand finals. Meanwhile, Todak’s tale was one of good old fashioned revenge.

Unfortunately, Todak were unable to overcome RRQ in the lower bracket finals, falling 1-3 in the decisive best of 5 series. With this victory RRQ would face-off against EVOS Legends once again in an epic best of 7 to cap the tournament. In the final match, RRQ would take a commanding 3-1 lead over EVOS Legends, but EVOS wouldn’t go quietly into the night as the team fought back and won back to back games to tie up the scoreline at 3-3. Then, in the final game, EVOS Legends absolutely crushed RRQ off a disgusting performance by Wannn’s Lunox, earning them the championship.

With the third place finish, Team Todak’s manager Mohd Syazlan–better known as Ashi–was proud of the team’s performance. This was the best achievement the team has accomplished and being third best in the world was no easy task. He added that as a new team, there was still a lot for them to improve and they look to shore up any weaknesses for the upcoming tournaments.

M1 2019 was the first world championship for wildly popular mobile game MLBB, and Malaysia was chosen as the first country to host this massive event. Even though I’m not someone who plays MLBB, I can totally appreciate the tournament format that was employed here. I love the kind of storylines double elimination brackets are able to produce because you get to see rematches between teams which gives chance for adaptation and improvement in what is a highly strategic battle arena.

Because of this we were able to see teams like Todak play RRQ twice to set up a storied final versus EVOS Legends which actually saw the victors pushed to match point before fighting back to claim the tournament. On top of that, the best of 7 finals was a treat to see because if it was a best of 5, we would have had a very different victor. Instead, we got to see EVOS claw back three games in a row, dominating RRQ in the final game ending it in just over eight minutes.

Tournament VOD