Korean game company Smilegate is bringing its annual Crossfire Stars global competition to Egypt, a rare destination for e-sports, the company said Friday.

This will be the first time the company has held the e-sports event in Africa.

CFS teams have begun to fly in to Cairo, Egypt, for the CFS Invitational Egypt 2019 slated for Saturday. 

The winning team gets to compete in the grand final in China in December. The scope of the prize money is yet to be confirmed.

A Smilegate representative preparing the event in Cairo said that the Egyptian government was directly involved in the launching of the event, and the atmosphere there was not unlike other cutting-edge e-sports competitions.

The company said it would deliver Korean e-sports to Arabic and African communities through regional broadcasts of this Saturday’s invitational match.

Smilegate is hosting invitational events in 11 global regions, with the one preceding the game in Egypt having taken place in Brazil.

By Lim Jeong-yeo (kaylalim@heraldcorp.com)