Juked.gg has announced the launch of its open beta today, which will give esports fans a first look to follow their favorite teams in competitive gaming.  Juked's platform serves to act as a guide to the wide world of esports that covers any gamer or esports fan's preference, and features a comprehensive hub for fans and gamers to support their favorite teams in over 20 esports titles without visually overwhelming the user. 

Juked's primary function is aggregating and indexing every esports broadcasts (live, upcoming, and VOD) and related data (brackets, standings, schedules, results, player profiles, and teams) into one viewing app, so fans can easily stay on top of their favorite games, teams, and players. The Juked beta also features the industry’s most robust esports events calendar, in which users can sort and filter events to their preference and set reminders for upcoming esports tournaments. 

Meet the Founders

Juked was founded byChris “ChanManV” Chan and Ben “FishStix” Goldhaber; industry veterans with over 25 years of combined experience. ChanManV's background includes 15 years of experience in software and product engineering. He was also a top-rated WarCraft 2 and NBA 2K competitive player and created several of the most popular podcasts in esports over the last 7 years, includeing Value Town, Unfiltered, and The OverView, the latter of which FishStix was a co-host.

“We are excited to launch the open beta to the world today," said ChanManV in an official press release by Juked. "We look forward to Juked helping fans follow the esports they love more easily and to enjoy new esports content they may not have watched otherwise."

Most recently, ChanManV was the head of Product, Marketing, and Strategic Partnerships at Hearthsim, an esports analytics company which created HSReplay.net, and is the co-founder and CEO of Visual Core, creator of popular online game show Streamer Showdown.

FishStix was previously the Director of Content Marketing at Twitch, where he worked from 2011-2018. His roots in esports began in 1999 where he played first-person shooters competitively for a decade. FishStix then began doing commentary and streaming in 2008, and in 2010 he launched GamesCast.tv, the first aggregator of live esports content.

The aforementioned project is what led FishStix to getting hired at Justin.tv as the first full time gaming employee, just 4 months before the launch of Twitch. His initial role at Twitch was as a partnership manager interfacing with and managing relationships with the biggest esports leagues and events on the platform, before moving up to his director position. GamesCast.tv was both a precursor to Twitch and Juked.

Fervor of FishStix

Prior to the open beta launch, FishStix sat down with InvenGlobal's Nick D'Orazio to discuss what led to the founding of Juked.

"As passionate esports fans, we've been frustrated by the lack of good ways to follow the games we care about now for many years," explained FishStix. "And this problem is only getting more severe as new esports games and leagues launch every single year - we're to the point where there are literally dozens of esports tournaments worth watching every single week, but no good way to discover/watch them."

FishStix is of the belief that esports fans enjoy multiple competitive video games as opposed to just one or two, which is not a common opinion in the industry. However, Juked has gone all-in on giving fans as much agency to follow everything they would like at once. "We decided to take the plunge because we think this problem is holding back the growth of the industry as a whole and are passionate about solving it," said FishStix.

FishStix expects Juked to catch on immediately with hardcore esports fans, but that doesn't mean the more casual fans of competitive gaming are not on the company's radar. "We expect our product to be most immediately interesting to hardcore esports fans who follow multiple titles, but hope to lower the barrier to entry to enjoying any esport," FishStix elaborated.

According to FishStix, Juked hopes to expose existing esports fans to games they might not have caught otherwise in hopes to create more crossover between the global network fo esports communities. Juked has been beta testing since August, but is now open at Juked.gg. 

The following esports are supported on Juked:

League of Legends
Counter-Strike: Global Offensive
Dota 2
Overwatch
Rocket League
Smash Bros. Ultimate & Melee
StarCraft 2
Call of Duty
Hearthstone
Fortnite
Street Fighter V
Tekken 7
Mortal Kombat 11
World of WarCraft
Rainbow 6: Siege
StarCraft: Brood War
FIFA
Apex Legends
Teamfight Tactics
Magic: The Gathering
Quake Champions