By Chloe Cabrera In a move to provide gamers with a less toxic approach to Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (Moba) games, Asiasoft and Level Up are bringing S2 Games? upcoming Moba Strife to Philippine soil. In line with the game?s introduction, S2 Games chief operating officer Scott Valencia announced in a press briefing on Thursday, July 31, Strife?s first major Philippine tournament and its nearing open beta testing phase ? scheduled to happen in around three months. [caption id="attachment_19996" align="aligncenter" width="600"] S2 Games chief operating officer Scott Valencia[/caption] The tournament will feature a P500,000 prize pool which will be help within the fourth quarter of 2014. According to Valencia, while the tournament champions will be receiving a total of P100,000, all players will earn certain amounts of cash prizes throughout the entire tournament. Dubbed as a ?fresh take? on the highly successful Moba genre, Strife aims to eliminate the flaws in the current Moba model by introducing new concepts and features that guarantee smooth team-based play with minimal toxicity for all kinds of players ? regardless of skill level. According to Valencia, most players nowadays are faced with high amounts of toxicity in-game due to the high expectations or standards some Mobas dictate. He notes that the system of creating certain Mobas for high-level players and others for casual players makes it difficult for them to explore and experiment with their play styles on a level playing field. ?We?re tired of games telling you where or what [role or certain Moba] you?re supposed to play [based on your skill level],? Valencia explained. ?A game should not tell you how hardcore you are.? Among the unique features Strife is bringing to fix these flaws are the inclusion of a pet system, item crafting, and gold sharing. The pet system allows players to bring in companion pets with special abilities to aid them in battle, while item crafting grants players the ability to create their own crafting recipes and customize items to their specific play styles. Gold sharing, on the other hand, is a resource distribution system unique to Strife, where gold from kills is shared between teammates in order to encourage teamwork instead of fighting over resources. Unlike other Mobas, while the game?s heroes may have base roles like ?tank?, ?support?, and the like, no hero has one single set role in the game. Players can choose to customize heroes with the help of pets and other items to alter roles to their tastes, allowing for greater flexibility and experimentation. Strife will also implement a skill-based matchmaking system, and will rank a player?s skill level for each hero separately ? allowing players to gain experience in the arena with multiple heroes instead of being forced to use only their ?best played? hero most of the time. Upon release, Strife will have a dedicated Philippine server to cater to local connections and improve connectivity. Local gamers can also play with other users across Europe, the US, and South East Asia with the global client, which balances out the ping rate between players in international connections. The game will go live across all regions globally on the same day and will come in several different languages for both text and audio. S2 Games currently plans to release the game in English, German, Russian, Portugese, Spanish, Thai, Mandarin, and Bahasa Indonesia, but the developers are also looking to add more Asian and European languages as well. Strife is currently still in development, with the simultaneously ongoing closed beta stage allowing developers to tweak the game based on both the testers? and game partners? feedback. Once the game goes live, however, Valencia says people will be very surprised with what it will bring to the market. ?We have four or five new features ? never before heard of, and they will change the paradigm of gaming and e-Sports.? ]]>