New name but same dominance.

Falcons AP.Bren and Liquid ECHO, the last two winners of the M-series World Championship crowns, flaunted their pedigree and sent their respective foes crashing down to the lower bracket to forge an upper bracket finals collision in the MPL Philippines Season 13 playoffs on Thursday, May 23.

The defending champions FCAP gave play-in survivor Blacklist International a harsh reality check with a dominant 3-0 sweep in their best-of-five affair while TLPH also did the same fashion against RSG Philippines, 3-0, in their own matchup.

One between Falcons AP.Bren and Liquid ECHO can formally clinch a spot to the MPL PH S13 Grand Finals and punch the first ticket to the MLBB Mid-Season Cup during the Esports World Cup in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

A rousing series opener set the tone for Falcons AP.Bren’s rout of Blacklist International as Rowgien “Owgwen” Unigo anchored the defending champions' superb display of map control behind his roaming Chip pick.

Thanks to the map mobility provided by the teleporting abilities of Chip, Falcon AP.Bren was relentless in finding pickoffs across the map to seize control of Game 1. All of the Beehive’s heroes snowballed and essayed a dominant 13-2 kill scores to draw first blood.

The Codebreakers did show the same resilience that allowed them to survive nine grueling games against Minana EVOS and Fnatic Onic Philippines in the opening day of the playoffs but the M5 world titlists proved to be a nut too tough to crack in the end.

Falcons AP.Bren shrugged off the tough stand from Blacklist and went on to win the next two games to close out the series.

Meanwhile, Liquid ECHO lived up to the lofty billing of its new name and dominated RSG.

Alston “Sanji” Pabico showed the way in the opener as he struck down key players of RSG from the distance using his midlane Novaria pick – highlighted by a double kill at the eighth minute mark which gave TLPH the chance to seize the lead.

Jungler Karl “Karltzy” Nepomuceno and Benedict “BennyQT” Gonzales then followed suit and led the charge in the next two games to give TLPH a dominant sweep.