Image courtesy of: Bump @ Turner Studios
The Overwatch Open is about to go live and the best teams from North America and Europe will be battling in the ELEAGUE studios for $300,000, with the finals broadcast on live television. Amazing production quality from Turner, the introduction of premier casting talent like Anders and Semmler, some of the best Overwatch games in months - all the pieces are set for an incredible show.
And yet I’m still frustrated because it could have been more.
Despite all of these positives, the format of the tournament has left us without the spectacle it could have been. In order to jump on the hype train of televised esports, somebody at the decision table (whether at Blizzard, Turner, or elsewhere at the Overwatch Open) has ruled that the final must contain the forced narrative of Europe vs. North America in order to provide entertainment to a TV audience.
We are not going to see matches between the best teams in the West with fiercely competitive games that can’t be held online, nor are we going to be able to see how the two continents stack up against each other in any comparable way. Instead we are watching two separate tournaments: a European LAN and a North American LAN. There is no interaction between them other than a single match - this is not an intercontinental LAN, it’s a qualifier for a televised showmatch.
The Overwatch Open would have been only the second major LAN that allowed teams from multiple continents to compete on even footing. These events are vitally important as they showcase the best games possible, keep competition fresh and interesting, and allow us to rank competition across the globe. LANs such as this also allow for a far superior viewing experience, both due to the added production quality and the personal interactions with the players.
The format of the Overwatch Open has the eight teams from North America split into two groups of four. Both groups then play a GSL-style double-elimination bracket, with the top two teams from each group progressing to the playoff stage. The remaining four North American teams play a single-elimination bracket to determine the best team in North America. The same procedure is mirrored for the European teams to find their gladiator and the final two teams (1 NA & 1 EU) do battle in the coliseum of cable TV.
Essentially ELEAGUE has created two region-locked gamescom tournaments with a grand final between the two winners. In one way it almost seems like getting more bang for your buck - in one event they have combined two domestic LANs with a showmatch final to appease the casual viewer that this really is a battle between the best teams in the West.
The loss of the fierce competition and fresh new matchups is what they’re giving up though. There’s no legitimacy to the final standings - no way of knowing if two European teams would have taken first and second again or if Fnatic could have beaten REUNITED had they not been already countered by NiP. These scenarios cannot happen because we have been pigeon-holed into the dreary trope of “NA vs EU finals” no matter the reality of the competition.
The original format for the tournament was going to be straight single-elimination tournaments for the two regions, until Morte (on behalf of the 16 teams) sent the league commissioner a letter complaining about three major points. They argued for GSL groups, travel aid for coaches, and integration of the regions before the grand final. The Overwatch Open now has the first two but would not relent on the third issue.
Morte said in the letter, ”I believe that separating regions massively takes away from an international event.” His writing continued, ”GamesCom perfectly showcased how entertaining matches between the different regions are. Matches within a region are not nearly as exciting as clashes between different regions, simply because matches within regions happen so often.”
The lack of movement on this key issue highlights how fiercely ELEAGUE wants to hang onto its NA vs EU storyline no matter how forced. It gives the impression that they don’t believe the tournament can succeed on its own merits, or at least they believe the final can’t hold a TV audience without the intercontinental gimmick. Overwatch is a new game with its own range of challenges for spectating, but it already has some developing team and player storylines from months of play. It is the responsibility of these early major tournaments to provide a platform for original storylines to develop; this is not the place to shoehorn in hackneyed plots for easy watching.
As a ridiculous final note, it seems highly unlikely that the Europe vs. North America final will be a reality. Two of the best teams in North America, EnVyUs and Fnatic, are made up of mostly European players and one of the top European sides is half American (and identifies as NA) in FaZe. Of all the likely outcomes, only a fraction of them end with a real intercontinental final.
The rules for region-locking make little sense and are not properly codified between tournaments. This doesn’t matter as much if it is for the qualifiers only or in online tournaments where ping acts as a natural regulator, but to structure the biggest LAN in Overwatch around these shabby rules makes no sense.
The Overwatch Open will still be an incredible LAN. It has an enormous prizepool that will produce incredible competition; its production quality will be outstanding; the experience of its casting and analytical talent stands head and shoulders above any other tournament; and it features the best teams in the world. It’s just a pity they won’t be able to play against each other.
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