Running a licensed MLBB tournament: the integrity rules that come with it

Not every Mobile Legends: Bang Bang tournament is run by Moonton Games, the game's publisher. Outside companies and communities stage events of their own, and the publisher runs a licensing system that lets the larger ones present themselves as official. Since June 2026 that system carries a second layer: an organizer that wants Moonton's license must also bring its event under the rules of the Esports Integrity Commission, the not-for-profit body known as ESIC.

That changes what a license means for everyone involved. For the organizer, it means new wording in its rulebook and a promise to act on decisions it did not take. For teams, players, coaches and managers, it means accepting ESIC's codes as a condition of taking part. This guide explains how Moonton's competition is organized, what its community license offers, which integrity obligations come with it, what the ESIC codes forbid, who decides when something goes wrong, and what the published texts leave open.

Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, often shortened to MLBB, is a mobile game in which two teams of five fight over one map. The June 2026 announcement describes it as installed more than 1.5 billion times, with 110 million monthly active users, and available in 139 countries.

Joint announcement by ESIC and Moonton Games, June 11, 2026; ESIC's portal for Moonton license applicants; ESIC Code of Conduct, Article 1.2.

Four ways to play official Mobile Legends

Moonton's competition is not one single pyramid. Read together, the published sources show at least four arrangements, and the integrity conditions of June 2026 concern only one of them.

At the top sit the MPL leagues, the publisher's own professional leagues, each named after its country. Esports Insider reported on February 24, 2026 that MPL Philippines and MPL Indonesia are fully franchised: their teams paid a buy-in fee, a price for a place in the league. MPL Malaysia took another route this year. Moonton had said in April 2025 that it intended to franchise that league and confirmed it in September 2025, then selected eight teams for what it calls a Partnership Programme, with Season 17 due to begin in March 2026. The publisher has not detailed how the partnership differs from a franchise.

Below and beside those leagues, Moonton also works with established tournament companies. In January 2026, The Esports Advocate reported that Moonton Games and PGL, a tournament organizer, were launching PGL MLBB Challengers, a second-tier competition in Europe. The outlet did not describe it as a licensed event, and the financial terms were not disclosed.

The fourth arrangement is the one this guide is about: events run by outside organizers, which Moonton and ESIC call third-party tournament organizers, under a license granted through the publisher's official process.

What the community license offers

The license predates the integrity rules by two years. On April 23, 2024, Moonton announced support for third-party competition built in partnership with three tournament platforms, Battlefy, Challonge and Toornament, and split it into two levels.

The first level is a free-standing tool. The MLBB Tournament Tool, hosted on the publisher's third-party tournament website, is meant for small-scale events. It gives an organizer one-click access to a tournament lobby, the private game room in which a match is played, and lets players join by scanning a QR code or typing a tournament ID. Before it, an organizer had to collect every participant's user ID, add each one as a friend in the game and place them in the lobby by hand. The three platforms plug into the tool, so an organizer can run an event without managing matches and communications by hand.

The second level is a license. Moonton's announcement said that organizers of large-scale esports events can apply for enhanced support through a Major Community Tournament License application. Once the application is processed, the publisher said, three resources are unlocked: a server with all heroes and emblems unlocked, official certification to use the MLBB logo, and marketing support on the game's official channels.

Heroes are the characters players control in a match; emblems are what a player equips before it. The logo certification is what allows an event to use the game's official mark.

Moonton's licensing website presents the license, its technical support and its promotion policies, and ESIC's portal points applicants to that page to read the terms and apply. The 2024 announcement did not define where small-scale ends and large-scale begins, and did not mention any fee.

The three obligations added in June 2026

On June 11, 2026, ESIC and Moonton Games announced that prospective third-party organizers applying through the official licensing process must adopt and put into practice key components of the ESIC Integrity Program, the commission's set of rules. The announcement turns that requirement into three obligations, which follow the life of a tournament.

The first obligation concerns paper. ESIC's integrity provisions and model clauses go into the tournament rules, the participation agreements, the general terms and conditions and the other competition documents.

The second concerns people. The announcement names teams, players, coaches, managers and other relevant stakeholders as those who must acknowledge and comply with ESIC's codes, the Code of Conduct and the related integrity policies included.

The third concerns consequences. Licensed organizers must recognize and enforce ESIC sanctions, suspensions and disciplinary outcomes linked to relevant conduct. Ray Ng, Moonton's head of esports ecosystem, gave the publisher's reason in the announcement: "Trust is fundamental to long-term success of any esports ecosystem."

Writing the codes into the rulebook

ESIC opened a section of its website for these applicants, which it calls the Moonton IP Portal. Its overview states that prospective organizers must agree to comply with ESIC's codes, and that the game's terms require them to incorporate those codes by reference into their tournament terms. The portal cites the source of that requirement: rule 4.2(n) of the General Rules of Mobile Legends: Bang Bang.

Incorporation by reference is a drafting technique. The organizer does not copy ESIC's codes into its own rulebook. It writes a sentence stating that the codes apply, so the event follows the current version of ESIC's texts without the organizer rewriting anything when the commission amends them.

The portal supplies two clauses for that purpose.

• A clause for the tournament rules. It places the tournament under the ESIC Integrity Program as amended from time to time, makes participation conditional on complying with the Code of Conduct, states that participants may be investigated and sanctioned by ESIC, and allows the organizer to take the action reasonably necessary to give effect to ESIC's outcomes.
• A clause for the team or player agreement. The player, the team or the participant agrees to be bound by the program and to cooperate with ESIC's processes, and accepts that the organizer may recognize and enforce ESIC sanctions for the purposes of the tournament. The signing party's name goes in a bracketed placeholder, and the portal asks drafters to keep defined terms consistent.

An organizer can then send its proposed tournament rules and team or player agreements to ESIC for review, through a form that asks for the applicant's name, its organization, a contact email and a description of the request. Other enquiries go to a dedicated address, reports of a suspected breach included.

The portal also explains who pays for this work. ESIC describes itself as a non-profit funded by its affiliates, says it gives priority to requests from affiliates, and says it may invite prospective organizers to become affiliates. Its membership page lists eight categories of member, among them tournament organizers, publishers, national federations and government bodies. The Esports Advocate reported that Moonton was the first publisher to join ESIC's membership, after a partnership between the two that began in 2024.

Who the codes bind

Once the clauses are in place, the reach of the codes is set by ESIC's own definitions, not by the organizer's.

The Code of Conduct, in force since May 1, 2016, binds every participant automatically. Under Article 1.2, the obligations last until a participant has gone 12 months without playing in a match or being involved in an event, and ESIC keeps jurisdiction over earlier conduct after that.

The Anti-Corruption Code, in force from the same date, casts a wider net in Article 1.4. It covers players, meaning the registered users of a game published by an ESIC member who play or try to play in a match. It covers support personnel: coaches, managers, team owners, officials, medical staff and agents linked to a team or a player, including anyone affiliated with one in the preceding 24 months. And it covers any team or organization taking part in an esports event or activity.

This is why the model clauses reach the participation agreement as well as the rulebook. A team owner who does not play is still a participant under the Anti-Corruption Code, and so are a team's coach and manager.

What the codes forbid

The two codes divide the ground between them. The Code of Conduct deals with behavior and fair play; the Anti-Corruption Code deals with corruption and betting. The Code of Conduct says so itself: conduct that is corrupt or linked to betting is handled under the Anti-Corruption Code.

The Code of Conduct sorts offenses into four levels. Level 1 covers acts such as abusing or changing event equipment without approval, or excessive swearing. Level 2 includes deliberate physical contact and, under Article 2.2.8, manipulating a match for inappropriate strategic or tactical reasons. Level 3 includes intimidation and cheating. Level 4 includes physical assault and violence in the event environment, accommodation included. Cheating sits at Level 3 or Level 4 depending on its seriousness. The code's examples include map hacks, aim bots and ghosting, which it defines as getting extra information about the game, usually about the opponent, from third-party sources.

The Anti-Corruption Code sets four groups of offenses and a range of sanctions for each in Article 6.2. Ineligibility, the term the code uses, means being barred from taking part.

The reporting duties are the part a participant most easily breaks without meaning to. Article 2.4.4 requires a participant to disclose to ESIC, without unnecessary delay, full details of any approach or invitation to engage in corrupt conduct. Article 2.4.5 extends that to anything that comes to their attention and may show corrupt conduct by another participant. The code adds that the report goes directly to ESIC, and that waiting until after the match or event concerned is always an unnecessary delay. Gifts or benefits worth US$500 or more must also be disclosed under Article 2.4.3, subject to listed exceptions.

Who decides when something goes wrong

The codes split the work between officials at the event and the commission.

Under Article 3.2.1 of the Code of Conduct, Level 1 and Level 2 offenses are reported to the Match Referee, and Level 3 and Level 4 offenses to the Integrity Commissioner, ESIC's officer in charge of investigations. The Match Referee can issue a Notice of Charge and impose a sanction within the range the code sets. Any suspected breach can be referred to the Integrity Commissioner under Article 6.4.1, and members must cooperate with investigations.

For a first offense, Article 7.3 sets the ranges: a warning or a reprimand and, or instead, a fine of up to 25% of match or event prize money at Level 1; a fine of up to 50% and up to two suspension points at Level 2; a fine of up to 100% and up to four suspension points at Level 3; and a suspension of between one month and a lifetime at Level 4. Under Article 7.4, points add up over a rolling 24 months, and a participant who reaches eight is suspended automatically until after the next member event of comparable status.

Corruption cases follow a heavier procedure. Under Article 4.3 of the Anti-Corruption Code, ESIC may send a written demand for answers, an interview or records, and the participant must cooperate fully. Article 4.2 states that the privilege against self-incrimination is not a valid reason to refuse. Under Article 4.7, the Integrity Commissioner may provisionally suspend a participant when charging them, or in other exceptional circumstances where integrity could otherwise be seriously undermined. If no full hearing has taken place within three months, the participant may apply to have the suspension lifted.

What recognizing a sanction means in practice

The third license obligation rests on a clause both codes share. Article 9.1 of the Code of Conduct says ESIC's decisions are recognized and respected by all members of ESIC, by participants and by anyone with responsibility under the code, automatically upon receipt of notice and without further formality. Article 9.1 of the Anti-Corruption Code asks members to take all necessary and reasonable steps to recognize and enforce its decisions, provisional suspensions and sanctions, without further formality.

This covers interim measures as well as final ones. A provisional suspension under Article 4.7 bars a participant from playing, coaching or taking part in sanctioned activity, and the license obligation names suspensions alongside sanctions and disciplinary outcomes.

An appeal does not pause any of this. Appeals go to the International Games and Esports Tribunal, known as IGET, with notice filed within 14 calendar days under Article 7.4 of the Anti-Corruption Code, and a decision under appeal stays in effect until the appeal is resolved. The Code of Conduct allows no appeal from a first Level 1 offense.

Anti-doping, at the publisher's discretion

The three obligations do not mention doping. The Esports Advocate reported on June 16 that the framework includes ESIC's anti-doping standards, which it described as among the few of their kind in active use in esports.

Stephen Hanna, ESIC's chief executive, told the outlet that any practical deployment of those standards, testing included, would follow Moonton's requirements and be at its discretion. He spoke of making a practical and credible framework available to support implementation, in a way that is proportionate, consistent and aligned with recognized integrity standards. "The objective is not simply to have policies on paper," he said. No testing plan has been announced for any Mobile Legends event.

Hanna also explained why the arrangement is not offered as one model for every publisher: publishers differ in their ecosystems and their structures. ESIC's role, as he described it, is to make its standards, expertise and infrastructure available for each publisher to rely on to the extent it considers appropriate.

What the published texts leave open

Several questions are not answered in public. The June 2026 announcement gives no tiers, no fees, no size threshold and no date from which the conditions apply, and it names no licensed organizer and no number of events. The 2024 announcement, for its part, does not say where a small-scale event ends and a large-scale one begins. The terms an applicant accepts are those Moonton sets on its application page, and the answer for any given event depends on that application.

The reach of the framework beyond third-party events is not set out either. Mobile Legends has featured in all four esports competitions held at the Southeast Asian Games and makes its debut at the Asian Games this year, The Esports Advocate notes, and it is on the program of the first Esports Nations Cup, scheduled for late in the year. Asked about multi-sport events sanctioned by Olympic bodies, Hanna said the application of the framework would depend on the event's structure, its governing arrangements and the approach of the rights holder and the organizer. At this year's Esports World Cup, the game's Mid Season Cup carries US$3 million in prize money and counts as an official stop of its international circuit.

The .esports registry publishes Esports Observer, so the whole scene can read its news for free.