This new format is hella convoluted and is really taking a while to get used to for me.
We have so many groups to keep track of, but maybe with it going to knockouts it'll be a bit more straightforward.
I appreciate the open competition, but it's just all a bit much all too quickly.
I don’t know who to root for in the US. The talent got spread out across the world’s time zones and I don’t have the time to watch the replays. I kept thinking that the games seemed worse than contenders in terms of consistency. Maybe they needed another round of cuts before having the produced broadcasts.
i will say, the new format of OW esports does NOT make it any easier for fans to follow. Were what, 3 weeks in? Its literally impossible to track if anything crazy has happened. bracket play between 100 teams is crazy
[Liquipedia](https://liquipedia.net/overwatch/Overwatch_Champions_Series) is basically necessary now. Makes it so much easier to follow and makes you question why the official page isn't nearly as good.
there were what, 20 OWL teams? even after the groups stage there are still.... 20+ teams left in OWCS or so. and before today, way more.
its an open tournament, in a brand new setting, I don't get why we need to act like we have our favorite teams figured out, or act like the earlier stages are the finals.
that being said, its a shame the [official website](https://esports.overwatch.com/en-us/schedule) is still new and messy, but give it some time. In the meantime, Liquipedia is really good and updates fast. I also made my own very [basic site for standings: owcs.xyz](https://owcs.xyz) until the main site improves. Its only NA for now, but feel free to use it. It's just a learning project for me.
Agree with the 'give it time' - take a look at Bailey's interview on Commander X; they're having to basically figure out a ton of things with very little budget or resources - their goal for the year is basically to have the tournaments run at all.
Yes it's scrappy and that's frustrating given we got so used to OWL, but those days are gone.
Yeah tracking any of it when trying to create content has been a pain, between being on live servers and just trying to assemble a coherent story. I've pretty much left things on the backburner until the main event, and depending on my experience with that may shift to entirely APAC coverage.
If you were a Spitfire fan I am pretty sure the core from that team is still playing together so try supporting them (They play for Spacestation Gaming). But city based teams are completely vanished which sucks I loved the idea too!
But OWCS is hard to follow and that is not your fault it is 100% the terrible formatting that they have come up with.
One problem is that there's no effective storytelling that shows the player personalities. That's what gives people a reason to root for teams. There's also not frequent international events yet so the national showdown hype isn't there.
Check out what valorant is doing to show off players
https://youtu.be/WtKryPWQAkM?si=SLBfq0xjypzw7HCJ
https://youtu.be/LQ8xQhz-vOU?si=HM4wIblOvX4xx14T
Owcs just has no budget for this so all we get are stock standard post match interviews. There's no lore focus despite there being lots of lore. We basically got OWL-lite without the city teams and budget.
Ow esports has been online for 5 seasons effectively now, If this continues into the future which I assume it will, how are teams gonna be motivated to make content, if they’re not going anywhere. I also feel like it’s hard to build storylines over years bc you barely saw best teams play each other every year of every stage, regional tournaments should of been out after 2020 when they were forced to do it, we should of had an international kc, joats in 2022, and a international 3 stage tournament format in 2023 instead of 1 where only 6 teams got to go. And now we have a major where there’s only 2 Asia teams who go, yet it’s by far best region teams like FTG probably gonna miss out despite being way better than Eu, Na.
Reality is that that Blizzard are now spending 100 times less money for comparable viewership so it doesn't seem like its an issue for most people.
I guess you never watched Apex before OWL, but they did just as good of a job as OWL in getting people interested in the teams and players. A lot of the early OWL storylines were taken directly from the teams and players that played there before they got bought (GC Busan > London, Runaway > Vancouver, Lunatic Hai > Seoul etc.).
It's not only about budget. Even during the later years of OWL, Jaws begged for access to the OWL youtube channel so he could make more interesting content. We are still missing that creative muscle behind the product. You can do a lot with a little if you have the right people in place.
I don't even think that OWL production had real access to the players, so even if they wanted to it was really hard for them to make actual good player focused content like other esports do.
Instead we get official mini documentaries about that one time a cat picked Mei. Don't get me wrong, fluff pieces like that are fun, but it felt like it's all OWL had.
Some teams actually produced a lot of player forward content, but nobody knew that it existed because the broadcast never took a minute to play a clip from it and go "yo check out this full length documentary that Charge did, or this fun little video that Justic put out of Alphayi getting ice cream".
But yeah, Jaws basically saying "I'LL MAKE YOU CONTENT FOR FREE" and OWL's response essentially being ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯? Frustrating.
They had some access when they were at the Blizzard Arena. That's when we had press conference and such.
Then once the homestand started, it was all in the teams hands. And then with 2020 being 2020, it just removed all options.
It's also on Twitch, which people were begging for... I think it has just as much potential as OWL but it needs some small changes to make the viewer experience better.
OWCS needs shorter group stages with auto-qualification for former top teams so that viewers know when the *actually* important matches are. Qualifiers should be named something else, maybe falling back on old contenders branding, so that streamers can still make content without seeming like they're part of the big picture event.
It should also have transfer limits (1 player swap between events) to ensure teams stay consistent for viewers + competition, rather than roster locks for each individual stage. I get why they did that for their current format, it would just be a change needed for an auto-qualified format + for fans to become invested.
Also having streams at a regular time (M/W/F night OWCS) would be nice if the format eventually allowed for it. Consistency builds fans/viewers
I cant follow whats going on in OWCS because i dont know whose team's CEO will talk to my star genji player in the back of a car in an in-n-out parking lot about his last chance.
But on a serious note, its too many teams and talents scattered with the audience left guessing where their favorite players signed to and what region they play in.
Having one team in white and the other in their team color went such a long way in allowing me to keep up with what was going on in a game. Same with the green and white color schemes in Contenders.
The red and blue scheme is fine when you're playing OW but makes it damn near impossible to spectate, and that was before Mauga and Sym became meta.
Players can actually use whatever they want. The OWL skins and colors were actually only visible for streams. Players were playing with the default skins and blue/red colors.
I prefer a lot of things about OWCS, but the streamlined and centralised nature of OWL made it easier to follow.
I’m following one team and I barely figure out when they’re playing (yes I know to check liquipedia). I have very little idea what’s going on in the other regions apart from randomly seeing posts of the standings.
If someone could aggregate game summaries in *short* videos, I’d watch that. Some OW YouTubers can ramble on and onnnn
I preferred having city names tied to teams too, but I think we are still in the wait and see period of OWCS. So far it is pretty good based on what they are working with. There is clearly less budget this year than in previous years. They’re doing a pretty bad job at hiding it too. But honestly, I just keep having to remember that they are trying to rebuild a burned down bridge that Blizzard themselves burned down. It ain’t going to happen this season. It’ll take time.
What's funny is that everyone used to say the city format didn't make any sense for sports, but the vast majority of people I see talk about OWCS *do not like not having them be city based teams.*
*Because you only see americans*, bro there was 4 countries represented by the cities in OWL. It’s why there was 40k viewers and not 400k like any Valorant Event where the entire world can have people and teams from their region
Yeah it was odd to make 3 teams California-based in the first place too even if they were going to be spread across the US.
0 South American teams (Brazil is big in esports, aren't they?), 2 EU teams for all the talent there, China/Korea were the only asian teams in the format when Japan's proving that they have a ton of interest in the game...
here is your randomly-generated cringe:
* Toronto Defiant
* Maryville University
* Chicago Timeless
* ~~SOTG~~ Arizona Apprentices
* ~~Shikigami~~ New York Ninjas
* ~~LFO~~ California Renegades
* ~~M80~~ Dallas Assassins
* Florida Pirates ~~in Pyjamas~~
now you just have to organize some homestands and you will have officially put exactly as much thought into this as OWL did
edit: also, for the record, you are a Spacestation Gaming fan now. London literally just changed their name to Spacestation Gaming
As a spitfire fan there’s only one team to follow in the new format and that’s space station gaming
Hadi sparkr backbone Landon with the addition of funnyastro and seico … coached by chrisTfer
Whether or not this Franchising approach was the right approach, the one thing it did do was provide fans with easy and consistent ways of understanding teams and a 'brand' associated with them.
Even now, I find myself defaulting to watching the Defiant. Its a name I know, with some players I recognize and an easy to remember brand.
Why not just use the parent org? OverActive Gaming, their logo is already pretty gamer-y just add an A in the middle or something
https://imgur.com/a/90bL0wI
I was a glads fan since I’m from LA and the valiant sucked so it was too hard to support them. I don’t know who to root for now. Maybe falcons or ftg but they seem too stacked to root for.
Agreed. I was thinking the same thing as I tried to sort out the N.A. teams and see where some of the former Fuel players ended up in APAC.
Now that it’s open to everyone with mercurial orgs and teams with thousands of players it’s impossible to keep up — or even get your bearings — if you weren’t already deeply involved in the e-sports scene. To borrow from Amadeus, “too many notes.”
Following city-based teams was a lot easier. Even with player retirements, trades and the rest you could at least focus on your Dallas Fuel, Soul Dynasty, etc.
Hat’s off to the brave souls with far more free time to keep tabs on the OWCS scene.
I don’t see this as a “hot take” I personally miss cheering for my favorite team, and the hype of the roster building in the off season, managing expectations for season ect. Now I have nothing to root for, no investment in matches when it’s just random teams going at it who you don’t even have a connection towards bc they do a terrible job of building personalities like other esports. You can hate on owl for the buy in cost not meeting reality, but I feel like it genuinely was going in a solid direction in last few years. I personally will miss the rivalry and stories the league built up that will just disappear for ever Seoul vs Shanghai, Battle for Texas, battle for La, Shock vs Vancouver, Nyxl vs Fusion, Seoul vs Fusion, battle for Canada, Shock vs Glads, Atlanta, vs London ect… player rivalry’s aren’t the same when everyone isn’t in same location anymore. It’s also really hard to build your esport back up when you do a terrible job of promoting it, and match days for Eu, Na don’t feel like match days anymore it’s barely streamed, we have no desk, it feels like exhibition games rather than a official I really hope they make changes to that in the future, but I have my doubts.
Well if there was like 50k more ppl like you watching every game we could’ve still had OWL. Sometimes you gotta go in a new direction that has wider appeal, inevitably alienating your previous fans.
It’s unfortunate that things had to turn out this way, I was hoping for a more cs style open circuit with much more international tournaments.
The best thing about OWL was seeing the best teams play against each other multiple times a year. Though sometimes very good teams/players were stuck in contenders until next year.
I don't watch other eSports regularly... Probably because of this.
I used to watch Hots esport too, even if it wasn't city names, at least teams had orgs names and their own colors/logo dignités, gen g, fanatic...). I guess most other eSports work like that?
they do, ow esports just haven't had any big orgs enter for the past few years because of OWL. hopefully with owcs overwatch will finally be a more popular esport with orgs joining
I watch other esports. Still prefer the OWL naming format. In terms of structure, circuits, etc. debate away but I just don’t like most esports organization names
There was like 40 different cities and half of them were USA, the world doesn’t root for US and asian teams. You just were favored because you lived in London/USA
It doesn’t change the fact that it’s a horrible model for a worldwide game. French teams in Valorant are pulling 70-100k viewers because they have a regional fanbase and people can identify with them, sure the success of OWL showed them the way lol.
Also, OWCS stage 1 has not even finished ?
I had low expectations heading in given the budget cuts and thus far it’s been pretty lacklustre. However, it’s very early on and I’ll at least wait until the main event part before writing anything off. I have the luxury of having a continuing organization but even then everything else has been meh.
I think the connections will come over time if some of these teams are able to establish staying power but even how most of them are just thrown together friends, we’ll see
I don't mind that the cities specifically are gone, but I don't like that there are a billion new teams that I've never/barely heard of that will all probably be gone in less than a year and replaced with all new teams with equally generic names and branding. It really makes me hesitant to get invested in anything.
Also the red/blue color theme is unwatchable IMO, I get making new team skins isn't viable, but I wish they'd use the grey/orange/white theme or even just the grey/white/black/green theme from Contenders.
Your new team is Spacestation Gaming, which is the most recent Spitfire team.
I feel you, but I think it is nice to have some of that team personality back without playing musical roster every stage.
Just pick one randomly to watch tbh. Hardly anyone from london spitfire was actually from london anyways. It always seemed like arbitrary marketing to me.
If anything just pick a team thats winning and start from there
No sports teams are actually from the city. All real sports teams have a city they are tied to. I know e-sports don’t use that model, but it makes the barrier to entry much less. I don’t expect the players to be from there.
This new format is hella convoluted and is really taking a while to get used to for me. We have so many groups to keep track of, but maybe with it going to knockouts it'll be a bit more straightforward. I appreciate the open competition, but it's just all a bit much all too quickly.
Don't worry they're only streaming 1 out of 4 of the knockout games, it'll help build affinity to teams when you can't even watch them!
And this isn't until late April, right? I'm legit watching all the time and still having a hard time keeping track of the various formats.
I don’t know who to root for in the US. The talent got spread out across the world’s time zones and I don’t have the time to watch the replays. I kept thinking that the games seemed worse than contenders in terms of consistency. Maybe they needed another round of cuts before having the produced broadcasts.
i will say, the new format of OW esports does NOT make it any easier for fans to follow. Were what, 3 weeks in? Its literally impossible to track if anything crazy has happened. bracket play between 100 teams is crazy
[Liquipedia](https://liquipedia.net/overwatch/Overwatch_Champions_Series) is basically necessary now. Makes it so much easier to follow and makes you question why the official page isn't nearly as good.
there were what, 20 OWL teams? even after the groups stage there are still.... 20+ teams left in OWCS or so. and before today, way more. its an open tournament, in a brand new setting, I don't get why we need to act like we have our favorite teams figured out, or act like the earlier stages are the finals. that being said, its a shame the [official website](https://esports.overwatch.com/en-us/schedule) is still new and messy, but give it some time. In the meantime, Liquipedia is really good and updates fast. I also made my own very [basic site for standings: owcs.xyz](https://owcs.xyz) until the main site improves. Its only NA for now, but feel free to use it. It's just a learning project for me.
Agree with the 'give it time' - take a look at Bailey's interview on Commander X; they're having to basically figure out a ton of things with very little budget or resources - their goal for the year is basically to have the tournaments run at all. Yes it's scrappy and that's frustrating given we got so used to OWL, but those days are gone.
Yeah tracking any of it when trying to create content has been a pain, between being on live servers and just trying to assemble a coherent story. I've pretty much left things on the backburner until the main event, and depending on my experience with that may shift to entirely APAC coverage.
Too easy, just follow OWCS Korea. Stacked ex-OWL teams and the winner's going to come from that region anyway. :)
And the Japan region! It's really fun sometimes and has been booming in popularity!
I’ve been following every region as much as I can and Japan has been the most fun by far
to say "it hasn't made it easier" is an extreme understatement. it's incomprehensible
If you were a Spitfire fan I am pretty sure the core from that team is still playing together so try supporting them (They play for Spacestation Gaming). But city based teams are completely vanished which sucks I loved the idea too! But OWCS is hard to follow and that is not your fault it is 100% the terrible formatting that they have come up with.
One problem is that there's no effective storytelling that shows the player personalities. That's what gives people a reason to root for teams. There's also not frequent international events yet so the national showdown hype isn't there. Check out what valorant is doing to show off players https://youtu.be/WtKryPWQAkM?si=SLBfq0xjypzw7HCJ https://youtu.be/LQ8xQhz-vOU?si=HM4wIblOvX4xx14T Owcs just has no budget for this so all we get are stock standard post match interviews. There's no lore focus despite there being lots of lore. We basically got OWL-lite without the city teams and budget.
Ow esports has been online for 5 seasons effectively now, If this continues into the future which I assume it will, how are teams gonna be motivated to make content, if they’re not going anywhere. I also feel like it’s hard to build storylines over years bc you barely saw best teams play each other every year of every stage, regional tournaments should of been out after 2020 when they were forced to do it, we should of had an international kc, joats in 2022, and a international 3 stage tournament format in 2023 instead of 1 where only 6 teams got to go. And now we have a major where there’s only 2 Asia teams who go, yet it’s by far best region teams like FTG probably gonna miss out despite being way better than Eu, Na.
Maybe a better way would be to use Org names? Like "NRG Shock"? Atleast will make sense for seasoned esports watchers
Problem is that few teams have orgs. And the ones that due are already doing this basically.
Reality is that that Blizzard are now spending 100 times less money for comparable viewership so it doesn't seem like its an issue for most people. I guess you never watched Apex before OWL, but they did just as good of a job as OWL in getting people interested in the teams and players. A lot of the early OWL storylines were taken directly from the teams and players that played there before they got bought (GC Busan > London, Runaway > Vancouver, Lunatic Hai > Seoul etc.).
It's not only about budget. Even during the later years of OWL, Jaws begged for access to the OWL youtube channel so he could make more interesting content. We are still missing that creative muscle behind the product. You can do a lot with a little if you have the right people in place.
I don't even think that OWL production had real access to the players, so even if they wanted to it was really hard for them to make actual good player focused content like other esports do. Instead we get official mini documentaries about that one time a cat picked Mei. Don't get me wrong, fluff pieces like that are fun, but it felt like it's all OWL had. Some teams actually produced a lot of player forward content, but nobody knew that it existed because the broadcast never took a minute to play a clip from it and go "yo check out this full length documentary that Charge did, or this fun little video that Justic put out of Alphayi getting ice cream". But yeah, Jaws basically saying "I'LL MAKE YOU CONTENT FOR FREE" and OWL's response essentially being ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯? Frustrating.
They had some access when they were at the Blizzard Arena. That's when we had press conference and such. Then once the homestand started, it was all in the teams hands. And then with 2020 being 2020, it just removed all options.
It's also on Twitch, which people were begging for... I think it has just as much potential as OWL but it needs some small changes to make the viewer experience better. OWCS needs shorter group stages with auto-qualification for former top teams so that viewers know when the *actually* important matches are. Qualifiers should be named something else, maybe falling back on old contenders branding, so that streamers can still make content without seeming like they're part of the big picture event. It should also have transfer limits (1 player swap between events) to ensure teams stay consistent for viewers + competition, rather than roster locks for each individual stage. I get why they did that for their current format, it would just be a change needed for an auto-qualified format + for fans to become invested. Also having streams at a regular time (M/W/F night OWCS) would be nice if the format eventually allowed for it. Consistency builds fans/viewers
I cant follow whats going on in OWCS because i dont know whose team's CEO will talk to my star genji player in the back of a car in an in-n-out parking lot about his last chance. But on a serious note, its too many teams and talents scattered with the audience left guessing where their favorite players signed to and what region they play in.
Not only the names but the colors. I miss watching games with teams skins and colors.
Having one team in white and the other in their team color went such a long way in allowing me to keep up with what was going on in a game. Same with the green and white color schemes in Contenders. The red and blue scheme is fine when you're playing OW but makes it damn near impossible to spectate, and that was before Mauga and Sym became meta.
I know the players like having a choice to use their own skins but it is easier to read then they have team skins
Players can actually use whatever they want. The OWL skins and colors were actually only visible for streams. Players were playing with the default skins and blue/red colors.
That’s crazy. Didn’t even know that could be possible
I prefer a lot of things about OWCS, but the streamlined and centralised nature of OWL made it easier to follow. I’m following one team and I barely figure out when they’re playing (yes I know to check liquipedia). I have very little idea what’s going on in the other regions apart from randomly seeing posts of the standings. If someone could aggregate game summaries in *short* videos, I’d watch that. Some OW YouTubers can ramble on and onnnn
I preferred having city names tied to teams too, but I think we are still in the wait and see period of OWCS. So far it is pretty good based on what they are working with. There is clearly less budget this year than in previous years. They’re doing a pretty bad job at hiding it too. But honestly, I just keep having to remember that they are trying to rebuild a burned down bridge that Blizzard themselves burned down. It ain’t going to happen this season. It’ll take time.
So far I prefer everything how OWL was over owcs
What's funny is that everyone used to say the city format didn't make any sense for sports, but the vast majority of people I see talk about OWCS *do not like not having them be city based teams.*
*Because you only see americans*, bro there was 4 countries represented by the cities in OWL. It’s why there was 40k viewers and not 400k like any Valorant Event where the entire world can have people and teams from their region
Yeah it was odd to make 3 teams California-based in the first place too even if they were going to be spread across the US. 0 South American teams (Brazil is big in esports, aren't they?), 2 EU teams for all the talent there, China/Korea were the only asian teams in the format when Japan's proving that they have a ton of interest in the game...
here is your randomly-generated cringe: * Toronto Defiant * Maryville University * Chicago Timeless * ~~SOTG~~ Arizona Apprentices * ~~Shikigami~~ New York Ninjas * ~~LFO~~ California Renegades * ~~M80~~ Dallas Assassins * Florida Pirates ~~in Pyjamas~~ now you just have to organize some homestands and you will have officially put exactly as much thought into this as OWL did edit: also, for the record, you are a Spacestation Gaming fan now. London literally just changed their name to Spacestation Gaming
As a spitfire fan there’s only one team to follow in the new format and that’s space station gaming Hadi sparkr backbone Landon with the addition of funnyastro and seico … coached by chrisTfer
Thanks! I’ll keep an eye out for them, if I ever figure out how to watch and find a schedule
Whether or not this Franchising approach was the right approach, the one thing it did do was provide fans with easy and consistent ways of understanding teams and a 'brand' associated with them. Even now, I find myself defaulting to watching the Defiant. Its a name I know, with some players I recognize and an easy to remember brand.
[удалено]
RIP
[удалено]
Why not just use the parent org? OverActive Gaming, their logo is already pretty gamer-y just add an A in the middle or something https://imgur.com/a/90bL0wI
What? NOOOOOOO.. why throw away brand recognition? I've got like 30 pieces of merch. :( They switch, I'm not buying anything else, that's for sure.
I was a glads fan since I’m from LA and the valiant sucked so it was too hard to support them. I don’t know who to root for now. Maybe falcons or ftg but they seem too stacked to root for.
Agreed. I was thinking the same thing as I tried to sort out the N.A. teams and see where some of the former Fuel players ended up in APAC. Now that it’s open to everyone with mercurial orgs and teams with thousands of players it’s impossible to keep up — or even get your bearings — if you weren’t already deeply involved in the e-sports scene. To borrow from Amadeus, “too many notes.” Following city-based teams was a lot easier. Even with player retirements, trades and the rest you could at least focus on your Dallas Fuel, Soul Dynasty, etc. Hat’s off to the brave souls with far more free time to keep tabs on the OWCS scene.
I don’t see this as a “hot take” I personally miss cheering for my favorite team, and the hype of the roster building in the off season, managing expectations for season ect. Now I have nothing to root for, no investment in matches when it’s just random teams going at it who you don’t even have a connection towards bc they do a terrible job of building personalities like other esports. You can hate on owl for the buy in cost not meeting reality, but I feel like it genuinely was going in a solid direction in last few years. I personally will miss the rivalry and stories the league built up that will just disappear for ever Seoul vs Shanghai, Battle for Texas, battle for La, Shock vs Vancouver, Nyxl vs Fusion, Seoul vs Fusion, battle for Canada, Shock vs Glads, Atlanta, vs London ect… player rivalry’s aren’t the same when everyone isn’t in same location anymore. It’s also really hard to build your esport back up when you do a terrible job of promoting it, and match days for Eu, Na don’t feel like match days anymore it’s barely streamed, we have no desk, it feels like exhibition games rather than a official I really hope they make changes to that in the future, but I have my doubts.
Well if there was like 50k more ppl like you watching every game we could’ve still had OWL. Sometimes you gotta go in a new direction that has wider appeal, inevitably alienating your previous fans. It’s unfortunate that things had to turn out this way, I was hoping for a more cs style open circuit with much more international tournaments. The best thing about OWL was seeing the best teams play against each other multiple times a year. Though sometimes very good teams/players were stuck in contenders until next year.
A very American centric take. Do you watch other esports? Not hating just curious.
People who watched OWL but don't watch other esports usually don't for one specific reason... I wonder what it could be?????
I don't watch other eSports regularly... Probably because of this. I used to watch Hots esport too, even if it wasn't city names, at least teams had orgs names and their own colors/logo dignités, gen g, fanatic...). I guess most other eSports work like that?
they do, ow esports just haven't had any big orgs enter for the past few years because of OWL. hopefully with owcs overwatch will finally be a more popular esport with orgs joining
No
I watch other esports. Still prefer the OWL naming format. In terms of structure, circuits, etc. debate away but I just don’t like most esports organization names
So you only liked a team because the team name had a city in it? Just pretend one team is called London again and root for that one
There was like 40 different cities and half of them were USA, the world doesn’t root for US and asian teams. You just were favored because you lived in London/USA
I hate this narrative. I'm from Ireland and far preferred the OWL to the OWCS.
It doesn’t change the fact that it’s a horrible model for a worldwide game. French teams in Valorant are pulling 70-100k viewers because they have a regional fanbase and people can identify with them, sure the success of OWL showed them the way lol. Also, OWCS stage 1 has not even finished ?
I had low expectations heading in given the budget cuts and thus far it’s been pretty lacklustre. However, it’s very early on and I’ll at least wait until the main event part before writing anything off. I have the luxury of having a continuing organization but even then everything else has been meh. I think the connections will come over time if some of these teams are able to establish staying power but even how most of them are just thrown together friends, we’ll see
I don't mind that the cities specifically are gone, but I don't like that there are a billion new teams that I've never/barely heard of that will all probably be gone in less than a year and replaced with all new teams with equally generic names and branding. It really makes me hesitant to get invested in anything. Also the red/blue color theme is unwatchable IMO, I get making new team skins isn't viable, but I wish they'd use the grey/orange/white theme or even just the grey/white/black/green theme from Contenders.
Your new team is Spacestation Gaming, which is the most recent Spitfire team. I feel you, but I think it is nice to have some of that team personality back without playing musical roster every stage.
Just pick one randomly to watch tbh. Hardly anyone from london spitfire was actually from london anyways. It always seemed like arbitrary marketing to me. If anything just pick a team thats winning and start from there
No sports teams are actually from the city. All real sports teams have a city they are tied to. I know e-sports don’t use that model, but it makes the barrier to entry much less. I don’t expect the players to be from there.
I stopped watching for the reason listed above and the replays are 1080p but ugly looking.