[Overwatch] lol Boston

I'm ready go tonight. There's a party, alright. We don't need the raisin for joy, oh yeah. Tick down to midnight.
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[Overwatch] lol Boston

Post by Delthazar » Wed Jan 10, 2018 4:49 pm

Overwatch League is starting its inaugural season so I'm watching that 'cause I guess this is my life now

https://overwatchleague.com/en-us/

(reppin' San Francisco)

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Wed Jan 10, 2018 4:55 pm

Kind of interested to see if this city-based team stuff will catch on for e-sports.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Wed Jan 10, 2018 5:04 pm

I really hope it does. It's a very familiar and approachable sports thing that everyone on the planet knows vs. whatever the fuck older esports usually do with loose-ass corporate teams. Way easier to be a homer for a team with a home.

Overwatch World Cup, same deal, I don't think :can made it too far though

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Wed Jan 10, 2018 5:13 pm

How do I put a bounty on the head of the guy who brought the pepe sign to the arena

OWL is like an hour old and they've already found their "shitty ICP sign at WWE shows" equivalent

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Wed Jan 10, 2018 5:20 pm

Honestly, they need to use augmented reality tech to have a 3D hologram of the entire map and everyone on it. That would make this sort of thing 500% more viable and open to casual watchers.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Wed Jan 10, 2018 5:29 pm

or like a thing for VR headsets that lets you spectate anywhere on the map while still getting the audio commentary. I think NHL or NBA does this to some extent using either a VR connection to the the broadcast cams or a specific 360 VR camera.

But VR/AR isn't where it needs to be yet to help spur any kind of casual anything. Maybe in two-five years if the Earth hasn't turned into a smoking cinder ball.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Wed Jan 10, 2018 5:39 pm

I'd take a mini-map overlay, to be honest. But they're doing a decent job with the camera in general.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Wed Jan 10, 2018 5:54 pm

Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if that top-down tactical map they switch to sometimes becomes a permanent minimap fixture. Using the third-person cameras more often might also help.

maybe what they really need is a Second Screen Experience™

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Wed Jan 10, 2018 5:59 pm

The Bella Twins need something to do, I guess.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Wed Jan 10, 2018 8:58 pm

OWL

"Make a prediction!"
"Nooo, I can't!"

It's early days, but don't go fucking rah-rah WWE cheerleaders on this. Eventually you'll have to concede some teams are likely to win or are playing better than others.

Also, good job getting as many women fans as possible to try and balance out the fact that there isn't a single woman player in the league.

Also, I don't know that much about Overwatch so a little more primer stuff would be nice, either on stream or on the league website.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Thu Jan 11, 2018 9:25 am

John Layfield wrote:OWL
Well, they all predicted the San Fran would get rolled and then they got rolled, so it's not quite full-on "anything can happen in the WWE!" just yet, Maggle!

(San Francisco Shock more like San Francisco Shook amirite)

(if this LA team is anything like the Kings they'll just choke in the playoffs anyway)

And yeah, considering that Overwatch has a pretty strong female following it would be nice if there was any kind of gender balance at all on the teams themselves, but I have a feeling that's a much larger problem with esports in general. It's rail-thin pale dudes for days in esports.

But Blizzard fronts diversity pretty strong with Overwatch's design so they maybe had a chance here to be the tip of the spear. Pfft. Something to consider for Season 2, something to maybe talk to the franchise owners about, since we've got multiple layers of ownership and oversight in this league.

Totally agreed about a general Overwatch primer for casual or uninitiated viewers; to some extent just existing as a team-based shooter already makes Overwatch somewhat more accessible than whatever the fuck LOL and DOTA are supposed to be, but there's a lot of complexity under the surface with heroes and playstyles, so the more infodumps about that stuff the better. The commentary team could probably be doing more between games to cover the fundamentals.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Thu Jan 11, 2018 2:19 pm

One neat thing about OWL is they made new skins for all the characters to act sorta like in-game team jerseys, and even recoloured UI elements and ability effects to match, which helps spectators tell shit apart when things get hairy.

...then again, Florida Mayhem have this super unfortunate red-yellow team colours combination that makes me wonder if they're bankrolled by McDonalds, and San Fran's shade of orange makes everyone look like they're working roadside construction.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Thu Jan 11, 2018 2:25 pm

I'm glad they have names and numbers on their shirts, so they're easily identifiable by the referee across a field.

I'm in favour of the client they use for OWL being very different from the normal game, in terms of skins, layout, etc, to help spectators.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Thu Jan 11, 2018 2:29 pm

Also try not to say "London Spitfire, made up of the two best Korean teams" and based in the US.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Thu Jan 11, 2018 2:50 pm

HEY JEFF NEXT HERO ANNOUNCEMENT WHEN

JEFF

HEY JEFF

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Thu Jan 11, 2018 3:02 pm

Also neat that subs are a thing in OWL. I wonder how long it'll take a team to use one and how that'll effect stuff like team chemistry and morale. (San Fran probably should've subbed-in someone for whoever was playing Mercy for them yesterday.)

It's nice to see a fairly wide range of heroes in use, too. I wouldn't have expected too many Junkrats, Roadhogs, Moiras, or Zaryas, but all four are in play at the moment.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Sat Jan 13, 2018 3:48 pm

"despite the deluge of damage"

OWL commentators just gotta sneak in as much alliteration as possible.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by John Layfield » Sat Jan 13, 2018 3:56 pm

I wonder what breaks ties in league standings. You've got to imagine, even by season end, there's a good chance of some teams having identical records.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Sat Jan 13, 2018 4:06 pm

Good question, I don't see quite that much detail on the OWL site. Maybe in the case of tied standings they'll start breaking down each team's individual map records.

Like, there's gonna be a lot of 4-0 or 3-1 victories, but in some cases one of those four maps will have itself ended at like 8-5, like last night's opener, so that's gonna give you a broader statistical base to play with.

Maybe that's also why they always do the full four maps even after a team wins the first three.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Tue Jan 16, 2018 6:21 pm

John Layfield wrote:Also, I don't know that much about Overwatch so a little more primer stuff would be nice, either on stream or on the league website.
Not really a primer exactly, but they've started doing weekly recap videos which are pretty good at breaking down some of the squad tactics and stuff.

Squad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVI_IY-pBAE

Squad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsaDMpjGua0

Squad.

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Re: [Gaming News] + Upcoming Games + General Games Chat

Post by Delthazar » Wed Jan 17, 2018 5:08 pm

I just noticed they have home/away colour variants for all the teams. The Shock's colours are way better with white as the primary and orange the secondary.

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Re: [Overwatch] Del & John vs. OWL

Post by Delthazar » Thu Jan 18, 2018 2:48 pm

Fun storylines forming after just over a week of play

- Shanghai is terrible. Poor guys look like an aimless Quick Play team with no mics.

- Florida is also pretty damn bad, but probably not as bad as Shanghai. These two squads play each other this week and I'm looking forward to seeing who's the redshirts and who's the stormtroopers.

- Dallas is somehow looking like the worse of the two Texan teams despite coming in with the most hype and support. Houston is just dismantling them right now, and so quickly they might leave the commentary desk with nothing to do for a while. 2 map wins in less than 40 minutes.

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Re: [Overwatch] Del & John vs. OWL

Post by John Layfield » Thu Jan 18, 2018 2:58 pm

Shanghai are now my team, because sadsack lost causes are my thing.

Some people seem concerned that the amount of 4-0 victories may end up hurting the league. I think it's a legit concern, even if the core audience doesn't care. I don't know how they're going to rebalance teams post-season. A draft? But coaches seem so big on the whole "this team has been playing Overwatch for 15 YEARS TOGETHER, we can't break continuity". Just kick out everyone on Shanghai and sign a new e-sports team to wear the shirts instead?

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Re: [Overwatch] Del & John vs. OWL

Post by Delthazar » Thu Jan 18, 2018 3:17 pm

I imagine the map scores will stabilize eventually and we'll see fewer 4-0 sweeps as some of these teams improve their chemistry and get more used to playing on stage. I think part of the raisin why London (or New York?) and Seoul are doing so well is 'cause they were formed from previous World Cup teams.

Some folks were blaming Shanghai's seemingly overzealous training regimen for exhausting their players, which Shanghai's management has denied.

There is apparently a transfer window for player trades. Not sure about a draft, but I guess they gotta find something to do in the offseason.

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Re: [Overwatch] Del & John vs. OWL

Post by Delthazar » Thu Jan 18, 2018 3:26 pm

I also wonder if OWL will end up changing the general game meta, like if some team finally finds consistent ways to shutdown common tactics.

The "pirate ship" payload strategy in particular - riding the payload with an Orisa and her shield at the front (the "sail) and a turret-mode Bastion in behind (the "cannon") - can be super difficult to deal with sometimes. I wouldn't be surprised if it takes a pro team to kill strats like that assuming some patch doesn't get there first.