This is an short update for last month post about the ENSL.org Season 11.

The sign ups for the 11th Season of the ENSL will close today. So this is your last chance to sign up.
The season will start at the 22nd of March. It will take 2 to 3 months with around 1 match per week. Matches will be schedule by the teams through the match pages.

Each Team needs at least 6 players on their roster until the 17th March to participate in the 11th Season of the ENSL.
Also each player has to make sure they only signed up with one team for the season. Otherwise the ensl.org admins will remove them from all teams …

After the newcomer tournament and the upcoming season of the competitive league we are happy to announce the Mod Madness tournament! This tournament is dedicated to those who are looking for a little less competitive but fun evening event.

What is it and what can I win?
The Mod Madness tournament is a unique event for all players to try out the amazing custom game modes that have been created for Natural Selection 2. All game modes (except NS2:Combat) can be found in the NS2 Steam Workshop or under the Arcade tab in the server browser.

Every participant will get a brand new in-game badge! Furthermore the tournament winner will receive a gold version while the second and third will …

First of all we would like to thank everybody who took part at last week’s Newcomer Tournament. We hope both participants and spectators enjoyed it as much as we did.

In addition a special thanks goes out to Ixian, Luchs and Hoeloe who casted this event and every ensl.org referee and admin. Because without them this tournament would never have happened.

In case you participated your badge is now available in your steam inventory. You can enable it in-game via the Customize Player menu. Should somebody miss their badge please leave a comment below.

For all of those who are now fired up for some more competitive Natural Selection 2 action we have good news:

You can now sign up …

What is the Newcomer Tournament 2017 and what can I/we win ?
The ENSL.org Newcomer Tournament is an opportunity for all the players (rookie or veteran) to test their skill in a competitive environment balanced for 6vs6.
You can find a rundown of the differences between the normal and competitive balance (Comp Mod) at http://www.ensl.org/articles/998

Every participant receives as special treat a brand new in-game badge. The teams making it first and second receive a golden and silver badge everybody else that shows up and plays a Match gets a blue one:

Newcomer tournament will happen:
4 February 2017 start 19 CET / 13 EST till 23-24 CET /15-16 EST
5 February 2017 start 19 CET / 13 EST till …

A happy new year to all of you out there! I’ll bet some of you thought we hit the snooze button around the holidays and never woke up, but no! We’ve been tinkering in the shadows and working on some fun new stuff to show you.

First off, we’re finally finishing up on our changes to NS2 training and bringing you the new Alien Commander tutorial. As per usual, BeigeAlert has put a lot of love and once again, yes, even an easter egg into this new training scenario. Special shout out to all our contributors in tutorial-committee for their input and advice. We decided to also make some slight changes to a couple gameplay features to continue and round …

Greetings!

Squad 5 badges are handed out by the Natural Selection 2 community and us developers to show our  eternal gratitude to those who helped growing NS2 and its community.

Anybody who makes a sustained, positive, and reasonable effort to support NS2 and / or the vibrancy of its community may be awarded with a blue icon.

Silver and Gold are 'big deals' and are only awarded extremely sparingly for outstanding efforts.

Thank you all for your contributions even if you haven’t made it into Squad 5 yet, and thank you to those who took the time to nominate them.

Note that the only way a community member can be considered for Squad 5 is if YOU nominate them here…

Aliens didn’t get all the love, though. Marines have also received some new toys and changes to their existing tech. A preliminary version of the Heavy Machine Gun (HMG) has been added. This is a gun that was loved in NS1 and one which many of us have always wanted to see make a return in NS2. The HMG was pioneered successfully in Comp Mod, and now it has made its way into the main game.

We’ve also heard your cries and beacons, and recognize that Contamination tended to be very frustrating for Marines. We’ve made some changes to how it works to give Marine players more time to react to it. It will now do its damage over time …

It’s time for the next round of Squad 5 awards!

This batch of recipients are comprised of somewhat lesser known individuals who have still made amazing contributions to our game and community. This is exactly what this program is meant for, publicly recognizing those lesser known for their hard work.

Be sure to try out the fruits of their labor when applicable, so that you can determine for yourself the level commitment that is associated with being a Squad 5 recipient, and because these people have spent hundreds of hours all towards something they hope that you will enjoy.

Note that the only way a member can be considered for Squad 5 is if YOU nominate them here!

Be …

Update 291 was just released!

Update 291 adds a brand new training mode to the game called “Hive Challenges”. You can find it at the Training Menu.

Try your best as Lerk and Fade to defend your Hive against different and increasingly difficult waves of marines. How long will you last?

Beyond that we included our weekly amount of fixes and tweaks for various issues:

Tweaks / Improvements

• Added Hive Challenge mode! Access it from the Training menu

• As Fade or Lerk, defend a lone hive against endless waves of marines

• Removed mute option from tutorial, because our data tracking showed a regression in completion rates (experiment fail, revert!)
• Lowered the default temporarily ban time of votekick to 2 minutes.