Esports

A Dedicated Fan Is Making A Game About The Overwatch League

As sports video games have shown us, sports are just games with off-the-court metagame layers attached. Also pageantry and juicy, juicy drama. Overwatch League follows this formula, making it ripe for a game in the most thrilling sports-adjacent genre of all: dating simulator. Wait, I mean management. OWL 2K18 is a work-in-progress fan game by…

Overwatch Team Whose ‘FU’ Jersey Was Banned Is Back With More FUs

Back in May, Philadelphia Fusion’s Overwatch Contenders team, Fusion University, ran into some wardrobe difficulties when their team jersey—emblazoned with a giant, devil-may-care “FU”—got banned from the season one finals. Now, though, they’re back with a new jersey that tells “FU” haters to F off Later today, Fusion University will be playing in the Contenders…

Trash-Talking League of Legends Star Seeks His Fifth Title This Weekend

One of League of Legends’ biggest stars will have a chance to earn his fifth championship title at this weekend’s North American summer finals—and possibly cement his legacy as the continent’s best player of all time. Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng has been a central fixture of League of Legends in North America going back to 2011.…

Eight New Teams Are Coming To The Overwatch League

Blizzard has confirmed eight new Overwatch teams for the Overwatch League’s second season. The teams will represent Vancouver, Toronto, Paris, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, and three Chinese cities: Hangzhou, Chengdu and Guangzhou. An official start date for the second season has not been announced. These eight new teams will join OWL’s twelve preexisting teams, making a…

Overwatch League Fans Are Mourning The First Off-Season Roster Shakeups

Even in a league full of streamers and burgeoning personalities, teams are only as good as their players. Now that Overwatch League’s first season is over, some players have got to go. OWL is now in off-season, and that means team owners and players are weighing their options and preparing for the upcoming signing window…

After An Unlikely Tie, Fortnite Summer Skirmish Grand Finalist Got Determined By Coin Flip

Yesterday, two Fortnite players tied for the 33rd qualifying spot in today’s Summer Skirmish grand finals: The_Real_Cryohme and SSG Colton. The 33rd slot wins a minimum of $5,000 and the potential to win far more; today’s first prize winner will take home $225,000. Only 33 players could advance to the final stage, though. Epic Games…

Popular PUBG Streamers Face Off This Weekend In The Broadcaster Royale Finals

The three-day finals for Broadcaster Royale, a PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds tournament featuring 80 duo teams of streamers from around the world, unfolds this weekend at PAX West’s Paramount Theater. The matches start today at 2 pm ET, streaming on the Broadcaster Royale Twitch channel and also on each competitor’s individual Twitch channel. Several well-known PUBG players…

Players Finally Let Loose At Overwatch League’s All-Star Weekend

This past weekend, during one of the Overwatch League All-Star games, NYXL DPS Jong-ryeol “Saebyeolbe” Park—a master of split-second timing and precision—rolled right off a ledge into the infernal fires beneath King’s Row. When asked what happened, he quipped, “That’s my plan. It’s fan service.” The whole weekend felt like fan service, a victory lap…

After Jacksonville Shooting, Gaming Event Organizers Pledge Better Security

Citing a need to review security plans, Electronic Arts is canceling the three remaining qualifying events for its Madden NFL 19 tournament after two players were killed at one in Jacksonville, Florida on Sunday. Other esports organizations are also talking more about security for their events. “We will work with our partners and our internal…

Tournament Underdogs Won This Year’s Dota 2 International

Tournament underdogs OG won this year’s Dota 2 International after a tense five game series against higher ranked rivals LGD. Victory must have felt especially sweet for the team’s skipper, Johan “N0tail” Sundstein, the only player who has been on the team since its original formation three years ago. OG has had diehard fans ever…

Almost Nobody Predicted This Weekend’s Wild Dota 2 Tournament

The International 2018 ends tomorrow. By day’s end, over $25 million will be divided up among 18 teams from around the world with the lion’s share, $11.1 million, going to first place. Whoever that turns out to be at this point, though, will be a team almost nobody saw coming. The tournament for Valve’s action…

Overwatch World Cup Match Grinds To A Halt When Game Crashes

The primary ingredients for a great Overwatch moment are a) a hotly contested match and b) a cheeky strategy the other team doesn’t see coming. During the fourth game of last night’s Overwatch World Cup match between South Korea and Finland, both these things happened. Then the game crashed. This year’s Overwatch World Cup—in which…

The Weekend In Esports: Call Of Duty World Championship And More

Stay inside, turn on the air conditioning and watch gamers pwn one another to your heart’s content over the weekend, because there are a crap ton of high profile esports tournaments going on. Call of Duty: WWII Call of Duty’s annual championship takes places this weekend in Columbus, Ohio at the Nationwide Arena. For those tired…

The Moment I Got Hooked On Dota 2‘s Biggest Tournament

Just before midnight on August 10, 2016, I jumped up from my seat screaming at the top of my lungs about Dota 2. I wasn’t even playing the game myself, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to understand it on the level of the players I watched that night. In a Dota 2…

Faker’s Grandma Knows A Lot About League of Legends

It’s one thing for a gaming pro’s parents to know about the game their offspring play, but quite another thing for granny to also be well versed. As Twitter user Mixen614 pointed out, in a documentary about Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok, the LoL pro’s grandma showed how closely she follows her grandson and esports. She totally…

The Weekend In Esports: Smash Never Stops

It’s a muggy, sleepy summer here in video game land, but esports does not rest. This weekend brings us a packed lineup of Smash, League, Heroes, and Fortnite, as well as multiple PUBG and Rocket League tournaments. Super Smash Brothers While most other fighting game pros are still catching up on sleep after Evo 2018…

The Keemstar vs Fortnite saga continues. Today Keem protested Epic’s Fortnite Summer Skirmish with a campaign to get Minecraft more Twitch viewers. Keem said that it might be a “big fail,” and it kinda was. While Keem’s chat yelled at him for playing wrong, Minecraft peaked at over 20,000. Fortnite had 230,000. It was an…

Hammond Debuts In Overwatch Pro Scene, With Mixed Results

Despite his penchant for crashing into the thick of things and leaving craters in his wake, Wrecking Ball has yet to make a huge impact on Overwatch’s meta. Then again, he only just got added to the game. Last night, though, the hamster hero showed squeaky inklings of his potential in two Overwatch Contenders playoff…

Popular Overwatch Pro Leaves The League To Return To His Twitch Empire [Correction]

Today, beloved Overwatch League star Brandon “Seagull” Larned announced his retirement from professional Overwatch after just one season. Larned, who played off-tank and DPS for the Dallas Fuel, will return to streaming on Twitch, where he built a streaming empire of 760,000 followers. In a statement, Mike Rufail, the owner and CEO of Envy Gaming,…

Smash Pro Plans To Donate Some Of His Evo Winnings To Lesser-Paid Players

Yesterday, William “Leffen” Hjelte won Super Smash Bros Melee gold at Evo, fighting games’ biggest stage, but now he’s cementing himself as one of the greats. Leffen announced that he will donate a portion of his prize money to lower-placing players, who took home pennies by comparison. Leffen explained his rationale on Twitter. “I will…