Ence (esports)
Ence is a Finnish esports organization with teams and players competing in Counter-Strike 2, PUBG: Battlegrounds, StarCraft II, and NHL 22. ENCE was founded in 2013 and the organization takes inspiration for its name from the Enceladus of Greek mythology. It is currently based in Helsinki and is the most popular esports organization in Finland. The organization also competed in Hearthstone and Overwatch until 2018, and in League of Legends for the 2020 season. ENCE is best known for its success in Starcraft II and CS:GO. Serral was the first non-Korean to win a StarCraft II World Championship and the CS:GO team finished second at IEM Katowice Major 2019.
''Counter-Strike''
''Counter-Strike: Global Offensive''
ENCE was founded in 2013 and picked up a Finnish CS:GO team which competed in local tournaments. In July 2014, the team disbanded after a series of disappointing results and did not return to CS:GO until 2016. The organization fielded multiple Finnish lineups for the next two years but did not have a stable roster until April 2018, when the organization signed Aleksi "allu" Jalli, Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen, Jani "Aerial" Jussila, Jere "sergej" Salo, and Sami "xseveN" Laasanen. The roster of young talent went on an unexpected Cinderella run at IEM Katowice Major 2019 before finally losing in the finals to Astralis. During the Major the team's unlikely success made them a fan favorite among neutrals and in Finland. The Verkkars, a Finnish musical duo, released a song called "EZ4ENCE", titled after the team's chant; it references players, coaches, and team memes. "EZ4ENCE" went viral in Finland during the tournament, eventually becoming the fourth-most-popular song in a Finnish top 50 published by Spotify. The song would later be added into the game by Valve. ENCE remained one of the top CS:GO teams in 2019, winning BLAST Pro Series Madrid and finishing second at DreamHack Masters Dallas and IEM Chicago.IEM Katowice 2019 remains ENCE's best performance at a CS:GO Major, although they reached the playoff round of StarLadder Major: Berlin 2019 and the semifinals of PGL Major Antwerp 2022.
The team's results worsened at the start of 2020 and ENCE gradually replaced all of the players from the IEM Katowice run with an international roster. In February 2022, with the release of Joonas "doto" Forss, ENCE's roster was completely non-Finnish for the first time in the organization's history. The team instead set up a Finnish academy team. Shortly after, ENCE partnered with ESL, receiving a guaranteed spot in the ESL Pro League. The new roster has reached the top-5 of HLTV's world rankings.
ENCE won their first trophy in over four years after beating MOUZ in the grand finals of IEM Dallas 2023, where Alvaro "SunPayus" García would claim his first MVP title. The team would continue their strong form with grand final appearances in their following two tournaments, IEM Cologne 2023 and Gamers8 2023.
ENCE also attended ESL Pro League Season 18, where they placed 3-4th after being eliminated in the semi-finals by MOUZ.
''Counter-Strike 2''
On 26 November 2023, ENCE announced the departures of coach Eetu "sAw" Saha and in-game leader Marco "Snappi" Pfeiffer, who were replaced by Jakub "kuben" Gurczynski and Lukas "gla1ve" Rossander respectively. Later, on 16 December 2023, the team announced the departures of Alvaro "SunPayus" Garcia and Pavle "Maden" Bošković, who were signed by Saudi Arabian organization Team Falcons, along with Snappi the day prior. Heroic announced the signing of Guy "NertZ" Iluz on 17 December 2023, reducing ENCE's roster to only gla1ve and Paweł "dycha" Dycha.The same day, ENCE announced the signing of the Polish roster 9INE's core, consisting of Krzysztof "Goofy" Górski, Kacper "Kylar" Walukiewicz, and previous ENCE player Olek "hades" Miskiewicz.