US visa denial of Philippine representatives for BlizzCon's North American Hearthstone Qualifiers 2014

U.S. visa denied for Chalk and Staz.

In September 2014, two Hearthstone Philippine representatives for the BlizzCon North American LAN Qualifiers, Chalk "Chalk" Zaldivar and Euniel "Staz" Javiñas, were denied US Visas that prevented them from participating in the US$250,000 BlizzCon Hearthstone World Championship.

Hearthstone is a multiplayer online card game developed and published internationally by Blizzard Entertainment. The game is divided into four regions: Americas, Europe, China, and Asia. The Philippines and most of the Asia-Pacific countries were designated to the Americas region, as the Asian server was assigned to South Korea and Taiwan.

On August 8, 2014, Blizzard announced that the online SEA qualifiers for the BlizzCon Hearthstone World Championship 2014, which has a prize pool of US$250,000, would be held throughout the month. The qualifiers were per-country tournaments, and the winners would represent their countries for the main Americas qualifiers.

The main Americas qualifiers are comprised of two phases. Phase 1 is an online-only tournament. The top 16 of Phase 1 would proceed to the Phase 2 LAN qualifiers that were scheduled to be held in New York City, United States.

The Philippine qualifier was held on August 16, 2014. Chalk "Chalk" Zaldivar and Euniel "Staz" Javiñas won the qualifiers, allowing them to represent the Philippines in Phase 1 of the Americas qualifiers.^[1]

At Phase 1, both Chalk and Staz reached the top 16 rankings, making them two of only four Asian-Pacific players to qualify for the Phase 2 LAN qualifiers. The two other Asia-Pacific players are "DTwo" from Japan and "Stunner" from Australia. Chalk and Staz would need to apply for U.S. visas to proceed to the Phase 2 LAN qualifiers.

On October 1, 2014, Mineski.net reported that both players were denied visas by the U.S. embassy, preventing them from traveling to the LAN qualifiers. On Chalk's and Staz's initial visa applications, they were rejected due to their lack of ties and reasons to return to the Philippines. On their second try, both players were backed by Blizzard Entertainment but the embassy still denied their applications.^[2]

They were replaced by "Ant" and "itsProtoHype", both from the United States

1. Chalk, Staz win Philippines Qualifier for HS BlizzCon 2014. August 22, 2014 at 1:00 PM. ericcc (Eric James Valmonte). Mineski.net. Retrieved on 2024-07-12.
2. BlizzCon:North American Qualifiers Philippine Representatives' VISAs Denied!. October 1, 2014. LighT. Mineski.net. Retrieved on 2024-07-12.