So I know I wrote a post about video games and eSports before…
…but ho-lee shit guys did anyone watch the Overwatch World Cup Finals yesterday?
Before I delve a little deeper into the world of eSports for all you guys (or at least this instance of it), let me explain what all this Overwatch nonsense is all about. Overwatch is a multiplayer first-person shooter game released by Blizzard Entertainment in May of 2016. The game features 28 (soon to be 29!) heroes available to play, each with their own unique abilities. Players compete in teams of six across multiple different game modes, some taken more seriously than others. Though pretty rich in lore, the game itself doesn’t have any form of story-mode. Overwatch is altogether colorful, creative, even a little odd. Honestly, I’ve heard it described as the gay version of Team Fortress 2.
In the two years since its release, the game has grown massively, coming to include eight more heroes and fourteen more maps. We have also seen the establishment of the Overwatch League and, the focus of this post, the Overwatch World Cup.
Now that you have a basis of what the game is, let’s talk about the eSport side of it. There are two main global Overwatch competitions, the World Cup and the Overwatch League. The Overwatch League (OWL) is the first major global eSports league with city-based teams. OWL’s first preseason kicked off on December 6, 2017, and the regular season ran through July 28, 2018, with the grand final. This League included teams like Boston Uprising, London Spitfire, Seoul Dynasty, Shanghai Dragons, and more. The first World Cup, on the other hand, happened in 2016 with the quarterfinals, semifinals, and finals happening November 4th and 5th at BlizzCon 2016. The World Cup is exactly as it sounds: teams from around the globe compete to see who is “the strongest nation in the world”, or at least the strongest in Overwatch.
This past weekend wrapped the 2018 Overwatch World Cup, with the final happening between China and South Korea on Saturday, November 3rd. And oh boy what a final it was.
I don’t think anyone found it surprising that South Korea made it to finals (they have, after all, won the last two World Cups) what with their 3-0 sweep against Australia in the quarterfinals and the 2-0 sweep against the UK in the semifinals. However, China was a surprise powerhouse, especially considering that no one on the team had ever played in a global competition like OWL before. Overwatch and the Overwatch League’s twitters were going wild in preparation for and even during this crazy showdown between China and South Korea, and for good reason.
I was on the edge of my seat for the whole match. At one point I even got my roommate just as entranced as I was as we watched the virtual head-to-head of the year and, wow, we were not disappointed. China put up a good fight (especially that close tiebreaker on the Watchpoint: Gibraltar map), but South Korea dominated for the third year in a row, with Bang “JJoNak” Sung-Hyun being the first non-tank player to win World Cup MVP.
Listen, I know I probably should’ve been rooting for the USA to win, but all my favorite players were on South Korea’s team. Plus, the UK knocked the US out in the quarterfinals (another crazy upset of this World Cup, but such is life). Catch me loving JJoNak and Fleta until I die.
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Sources
https://playoverwatch.com/en-us/game/overview
https://overwatchleague.com/en-us/about
http://www.espn.com/esports/story/_/page/blizzcon8/china-surges-overwatch-world-cup
the treachery of text [this is not a blog] 
I’m a huge fan of the competitive scene when it comes to gaming and I will be rooting for the US despite knowing that they probably won’t win. I’ve been seeing a lot of news around Overwatch recently specially with the new hero being released, Ashe and the apparent need to fully install the game again for the update. Regardless I’m excited to see the results from the Cup.
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