E-sports are trying to encourage more women to compete
For now, all the top players are male
YOU WAIT, rifle in hand. An enemy appears. You kill him, and whoop for joy. Welcome to VALORANT, a popular video game that some people play professionally. This year the VALORANT Champions Tour, a series of contests that ends next month, will offer $1m in total prize money. Eighty players are competing; all are men.
This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “Console sisters”
Europe November 27th 2021
From the November 27th 2021 edition
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Herbert Kickl, Austria’s hard-right ideologue who played the long game
The Freedom Party leader is on the verge of becoming chancellor
A dispute over old war crimes strains Polish-Ukrainian relations
The beneficiary is Russia
Austria could soon have a first far-right leader since 1945
Herbert Kickl of the Freedom Party could be the next head of government
Europe has lots of lithium, but struggles to get it out of the ground
Its targets for strategic autonomy look hard to meet
Spain’s government marks 50 years since Franco died
Opponents say it is the birth of democracy that should be commemorated