MLG Columbus 2016 Major: Luminosity Gaming and the first $1 million Major

The MLG Major Championship: Columbus 2016 was the eighth Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Major, the first held in North America and the first with a $1,000,000 prize pool. Luminosity Gaming's Brazilian roster won it, beating Natus Vincere 2-0 in the final, and became the first champions from outside Europe. For collectors it brought holo team stickers back and added a showmatch with its own Souvenir package.

The tournament

Major League Gaming ran the event in Columbus, Ohio, from March 29 to April 3, 2016. It was the first Major not organised by ESL or DreamHack. The group stage was played behind closed doors at the MLG Arena from March 29 to 31, and the playoffs moved to the sold-out Nationwide Arena from April 1, according to HLTV.

• Group stage: four GSL groups of four. Every match was best-of-one except the best-of-three decider for the second playoff place.
• Playoffs: a single-elimination bracket of best-of-three series.
• Maps: Cache, Cobblestone, Dust II, Inferno, Mirage, Overpass and Train, unchanged from Cluj-Napoca 2015.

On February 23, 2016, Valve announced that every Major from Columbus onwards would have a $1,000,000 prize pool, four times the previous $250,000. HLTV and PC Gamer published MLG's split:

Luminosity Gaming

Luminosity won Group A by beating mousesports 16-13 and Ninjas in Pyjamas 16-5. In the quarterfinals they lost Cache 17-19 in overtime to Virtus.pro, then took Cobblestone 16-10 and Overpass 16-11.

The semifinal against Team Liquid turned on a single round. Liquid led Mirage 15-9 and needed one round. HLTV's report describes coldzera stopping a rush through the apartments with four AWP kills, including a jumping double kill. Luminosity did not lose another round on the map and won it 19-15 in overtime, and Kotaku called the play the moment that killed Liquid's momentum. Luminosity then won Cache 19-16, also in overtime.

The grand final was played on April 3:

Mirage was Luminosity's pick, and Natus Vincere led it 11-4 at the half before Luminosity forced overtime and won 19-17. On Natus Vincere's pick, Overpass, Luminosity led 13-2 at the half and finished 16-2. HLTV called them "the first major champions coming from outside of Europe", and its event page lists coldzera as the MVP.

Other storylines

• New Legends from North America. Team Liquid, with Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev, reached the semifinals and Counter Logic Gaming the quarterfinals, so both became Legends. FaZe Clan and the Cluj-Napoca champions, Team EnVyUs, lost their status.
• A coach in the server. Ninjas in Pyjamas' new signing Jacob "pyth" Mourujärvi could not play because of visa problems, so coach Björn "THREAT" Pers took his place.
• An All-Star showmatch. Before the final, a North American All-Star team beat a European one 22-19 on Nuke, a map that was not in the tournament pool.

Stickers and autographs

Valve released the set on March 17, 2016. The release notes said team and autograph stickers were on sale "with 50% of the proceeds from sticker sales going to the players and organizations", and that they were game pieces for the Columbus Fantasy Team Game and Pick'Em Challenge.

The Cologne 2015 and Cluj-Napoca 2015 team capsules had held only foil, so this set brought holo team logos back. Gold logos and gold autographs exist only on Souvenirs. More on how the capsule system and the 50% share worked is in our guide to Major sticker capsules.

Several autographs have a story attached. s1mple had not played at Cologne 2015 or Cluj-Napoca 2015, the only earlier Majors with autographs, so his MLG Columbus 2016 sticker is his first. pyth's autograph is in the Ninjas in Pyjamas capsule even though he never made the trip. And the event had two players with almost the same name: Gambit's AdreN and Liquid's adreN, separated only by the capital letter.

Souvenir packages

Souvenir packages dropped to viewers watching in-game or on Twitch. There were eight: one for each of the seven tournament maps and one for Nuke from the All-Star match. Each held a skin from its map's collection. According to the Counter-Strike Wiki, tournament Souvenirs carried a gold MLG sticker, gold logos of both teams and a gold autograph of the round MVP. The showmatch packages swapped the team logos for orange and blue All-Stars holo stickers.

The final was played on Mirage and Overpass, so those two packages hold the final drops. The Cobblestone package could contain an AWP | Dragon Lore, as our Dragon Lore history explains, and our souvenir packages guide covers how the system changed later.

The same Brazilian core went to Cologne three months later under a new name: see ESL One Cologne 2016.

Collecting MLG Columbus 2016 items today

• Read the full name. MLG ran only this one CS:GO Major, and its items end in "MLG Columbus 2016".
• Know the finishes. Team logos come in paper, holo, foil and gold. Autographs come in paper, foil and gold, with gold only on Souvenirs.
• Check the capitalisation. AdreN and adreN are different players on different teams.
• Spot the showmatch Souvenirs. A Nuke Souvenir from this event has All-Stars stickers instead of team logos.
• Inspect the scrape. On applied stickers, check wear in game before you buy, and search for specific stickers with the filter on Buy.

Sources

• MLG Major Championship: Columbus 2016 — Liquipedia
• Luminosity win MLG Columbus 2016 — HLTV.org
• Luminosity to Major final over Liquid — HLTV.org
• Major Growth — Counter-Strike blog (Valve)
• Release Notes for 3/17/2016 — Counter-Strike blog (Valve)
• MLG Columbus viewer's guide — HLTV.org
• Valve puts in $1 million for all future major CS:GO tournaments — PC Gamer
• MLG Columbus 2016 Souvenir Packages — Counter-Strike Wiki