Blizzard announced that World of Warcraft 3v3 Arenas are part of the new College Gaming League, the first official amateur league partner of the Championship Gaming Series. The Dell-spearheaded venture works with Intel and Microsoft to offer educational discounts and PC bundles for students, faculty and staff at numerous partner schools all over the United States. Students and faculty at Dell University partner schools can register and receive benefits like special offers on games and systems, access to public game servers, and compete in tournaments.

Among the tournaments -- which include Xbox 360 and PC games -- is the World of Warcraft 3v3 Arena competition. Registration began last August 21 and closes on September 11, while the official matches span from September 15 to October 5. Loot up for grabs are three Alienware m15x notebooks as Grand Prizes, three Microsoft Zune players as First Prizes, and three $50 Dell gift cards for the runners-up. It's an underwhelming selection past the Grand Prizes, to be sure, but registration is free and members can participate in other tournaments with a host of other prizes to be won. Initiatives like these certainly give students something to while away their time... after they've submitted those term papers, of course.

The premiere 3v3 Arena team from Europe of Cherez, Beasteh, and Hydra -- aka Nihilum Arena -- won top honors at the recently concluded Championship Gaming Series Arena Tournament. This win comes after their notable absence from MLG Orlando despite a 2nd place finish in San Diego. Considering the purse for the MLG series is $12,000 (and an HP Blackbird for each team member), Nihilum fortunately participated in this tournament, winning a whopping $25,000.

Frag Dominant Duelists continued their strong showing on the pro circuit, finishing 2nd again after falling to Orz in MLG Orlando about a week ago, and placing first in MLG San Diego. FD-DGFG ran a double healer Rogue, Druid, Priest comp, taking home $12,500 after their defeat to Nihilum Arena's Hunter, Druid, and Priest. Two runner-up teams took home $6,250 apiece. The tournament used a format that pitted Europe's against the United States' best in the finals.

The coverage was different from the MLG series, being much more friendly to viewers not overly familiar with the game or Arena tournaments, with extensive previews of the characters used by the players, and an overview of the Arena maps prior to matches. The shoutcasting was also much more casual-friendly, at a significantly slower pace than the MLG coverage. The choice of the infamous Leeroy Jenkins to commentate was definitely a marketing move, with more than a few mistakes (calling Scatter Shot Distracting Shot, saying Ice Block's cooldown as 2 mins vs. the correct 5, being fooled by Cherez' Feign Death, etc.). The level of analysis wasn't as deep as MLG's, which featured Arena pros for commentating. Camera view was also an overhead style as opposed to the third person view used by MLG. Both tournaments had good points, and it's exciting to see Arena play gaining a stronger foothold in the pro gaming scene.

On Saturday, July 19th, the four finalists in the CGS 2008 World of Warcraft Arena Championship will meet in the squared circle of pixels to duel it out for glory. The four finalists are MoB Gaming (US), Frag Dominant (US), aÄa Agïta (EU), and Nihilum Arena (EU). The US teams will fight first, then the EU teams, and then the winners will face-off up to determine the final champion.

The matches run in a best-of-five format, ending when one team reaches three victories. There is a 15 minute time limit for each round, and the show will be live streamed by the Championship Gaming Series. The matches will be shoutcasted by none other than the infamous Leeroy Jenkins. No, really.

The show starts at 4PM Eastern, with aÄa Agïta versus Nihilum. MoB Gaming versus Frag Dominant kicks off around 5PM Eastern, and the US Finalist versus the EU Finalist will fight it out by 6PM. That schedule's going to shift a bit, obviously, if any of the match ups finish especially quickly. At any rate, we'll let you know who wins.

The Championship Gaming Series has announced its second World of Warcraft Arena championship, to be held in June and July later this year. It'll be a 3v3 tourney, and CGS is taking its cues from Blizzard -- they've got their own Arena realm to hold it on, and all the options on the official tournament realm will be available on theirs, too.

In fact, it sounds like the tournament is actually starting on the live realms themselves -- CGS says that they're going to invite the top 1,000 Arena teams from North America and Europe, so if you're one of those, you can probably expect an email with an invite. The actual tournament takes place in June, with the finals in Los Angeles on July 19th, and the winner netting a $25,000 purse. The second place team gets half of that ($12,500), and the 3rd and 4th place teams will each take home $6,250.

Nice work if you can get it. Good luck to everyone out there.