Wait a minute. Let me check the date again. It’s not April 1st, is it? No – this is just weird news.

Team Liquid owner Steve Arnhacet has just announced that Team Liquid will be running a competitive Civilization VI team.

Their first player is Stephen ‘MrGameTheory’ Takowsky, who will be the team’s captain.

“The foundations of Team Liquid are built on strategy games. My Team Liquid co-CEO, Victor “Nazgul” Goossens, began his competitive career with StarCraft, and he transformed Team Liquid into the most popular StarCraft website on the internet,” Arnhacet said. “While Victor was shaping the competitive StarCraft scene, and before I began competing in League of Legends, I was polishing my competitive bearings with the Civilization franchise. It was through competing in Civilization IV at the highest level that I found the confidence to jump into the world of esports and leave behind my job in the world of finance.”

MrGameTheory currently holds the record for most 1v2, 1v3, 1v4 and 1v5 ladder victories in Civ IV, and held the #1 rank on the Civilization Revolution leaderboard, Civ IV International League and the Civ V International League. He’s also commonly referred to as the God of Civilization by the community.

MrGameTheory had the following to say on the signing:

Civilization holds a very special place in my heart, and I still feel nostalgic about those times I used to enter “C:\games\civ\civ.exe”. I spent countless hours spamming settlers and phalanxes back in 1991. It was in Civilization IV where I hit my peak, and that’s when I decided to create my own team, dominating the multiplayer scene in weekend CCC events—decathlon-like Civilization events with 10+ person teams playing in various formats (ironman, anc ss, medi, occ, etc) When Civ V came out I was too focused on building the foundation of what would become Team Liquid to participate as actively in the multiplayer community. However, with the release of Civ VI and after spending hours watching twitch streams, looking at the various game modes, mod features, and the hints to the resources, and noticing the new focus on FFA multiplayer, I’m once again excited. What really thrills me is the real evidence that Civilization VI is going to be competitive and will be here to stay, even with any dramatic changes to the teaming structure that MPers have grown used to playing with.

Team Liquid says that they will be launching a tournament for Civ VI (which just released today) soon.