In season one of HBO's Silicon Valley, the entrepreneurs at fictional start-up Pied Piper make an appearance at TechCrunch Disrupt. The event's "start-up battlefield" — a real event that's legendary among new start-ups in the real Silicon Valley — launched Pied Piper into start-up success. 

HBO did their best to keep things as close to the real semi-annual tech conference as possible — it even used the same banner printing company that TechCrunch uses. So how does the show's version of the startup battlefield stack up to the real world?

"It's mostly the same," says TechCrunch Disrupt Battlefield emcee Anthony Ha. "In terms of the format and the feeling, it's very accurate."

The competition ended Wednesday and the San Francisco 2016 winner was Mobalytics, a coach for competitive gamers. The company brings visual analytics to gamers so they can find their weaknesses.

Here's how the competition works:

First, hundreds of new start-ups, most that haven't launched yet, apply to participate. The TechCrunch staff goes through the applications and chooses about 20-30 of them to do live demonstrations on stage in front of a panel of judges over the course of the first two days of the conference.

The companies each have six minutes to present and "demo" their products and six minutes for a Q&A session with the judges. The judges then narrow down the field to 5-6 finalists who present again on the last day. Then, judges choose a winner, which gets $50,000 and the "Disrupt Cup."

For an unknown start-up, a win can be a game-changer — with the immediate spotlight of attention from the media and investors. Past Disrupt champions include Dropbox and Mint. 

"On the one hand, it's just a company launch," Ha said. "But when you're up there on the stage it does feel like the most insane dramatic thing in the world."

For Silicon Valley fans, co-creator Mike Judge gave us a hint at what is coming next season: "You might see one of the stupidest apps ever invented."

And for show fans who can't wait, Erlich Bachman's Aviato car is available for rent through car-rental app, Turo. Disrupt attendees can get a photo with it this week. 

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Natalie DiBlasio is a digital editor for Paste BN who writes the column #Launched about tech and culture in San Francisco. Follow along with #Launched and on social media to explore the technology explosion and the culture collision that make up daily life in the Bay Area.