Blizzard's newest IP, Overwatch, looks to mark its territory on the ever-expanding landscape of esports. Since its first closed beta back in October 2015, teams have risen and fallen, with both European and North American teams competing in independent third-party tournaments to mark the history pages of what's hopefully the next big esport.
Andrew "ZP" Rush, and Robert "hexagrams" Kirkbride, the premier commentators of Overwatch, sat down with ESPN to give valuable insight into the state of the game, the formation of a competitive meta, and its future in esports.
Meet the broadcast team
"I did a lot of heavy streaming for Heroes of the Storm, and experience taught me that going down the caster or streamer path was the way to go," ZP recounts. "I had a long history with FPS games, including winning the only [North American] LAN Tribes: Ascend ever had in NA back in 2012."
"Unlike ZP, I didn't have much of a casting or streaming background," hexagrams says. "I loved Team Fortress 2 and dabbled in [competitive] for a little bit, but when Overwatch was announced, I knew it was a game I was going to love. When we announced our Overwatch section, I told all the higher-ups at [GosuGamers] that whatever we did with Overwatch, I wanted to be a part of it."
ZP and hexagrams were asked to do a 'test cast' together and it went well right from the start. The two have great synergy together as co-casters and their love for the game made it easy for them to amass an encyclopedia on competitive Overwatch. Aided by talking to high-level players and pros, both were able to watch the game evolve before their eyes.
The sound barrier of the meta
As the spiritual successor to Team Fortress 2, Overwatch has 21 different heroes to use compared to the nine classes in TF2. Players are allowed to change their heroes any number of times during a match, so long as they're within the spawn room. After all, flexibility demands versatility.
"In Beta 1, teams were happy to run a core of Reinhardt/Mercy/Lucio at all times regardless of the map and situation," ZP explains.
Lucio and Reinhardt are still the constant cores of many team compositions but now, teams are more comfortable with maps than they were in Beta 1, picking and counter-picking specific compositions. "One of the most notable examples would be Watchpoint: Gibraltor, where teams often switch into a very map-specific defense (sometimes dubbed as the Crossfire Defense) that's involved a lot of heavy-ranged stacking. For example, two Soldiers, one Widowmaker, or even three Soldiers at points," ZP says.
Unless something drastic changes, spectators should get used to seeing both Lucio and Reinhart on the big screen.
Hexagrams describes Lucio as extremely vital because his only major weakness is his lack of damage, which matters less due to his support role. "His self-sustain, shields, and positioning ability -- who doesn't love a good boop -- makes him a great addition to nearly any composition, and a must-have for King of the Hill matches at the very least. I would not be surprised to see changes to his ultimate, Sound Barrier, come at some point in the future," hexagrams says.
Additionally, Reinhardt is good against almost everything. "He can make a team feel safe from a sniper, he can initiate fights, and win games with Earthshatter, which is one of the most impactful ultimate abilities in the game. His primary attack does massive damage, and he can harass and poke with Fire Strike," hexagram elaborates. "Like Lucio, his biggest weakness -- being vulnerable to flanks -- is negated at the highest level play by teams with great awareness and game-sense."
The formations of war
The competitive landscape may have only lasted less than six months in closed beta. But for a game fresh out the gates, the meta can change several times.
According to hexagrams, the meta shifts every few weeks as we've gone from the Double Orb comp (two Zenyatta, two DPS -- usually Genji and Tracer -- a pre-nerfed Symmetra, and any preference as the sixth hero) to a wider variety of heroes introduced, back to a somewhat standard payload composition.
Even though the Double Orb comp hasn't stuck around, other team compositions such as Double Winston and 2-2-2 -- where you run two duplicates of three different heroes -- have arisen and are often deployed in the current metasphere. "Double Winston is a unique brand of tank play that can take the spot of a Reinhardt on payload maps," ZP says. Winston's portable shields and ability to jump long and high distances allows him get the jump on stray DPS trying for a flank or to take out a lone Widowmaker, as he's proficient in close combat situations.
"Unless something drastic changes, spectators should get used to seeing both Lucio and Reinhart on the big screen."
Newer players are likely to ponder the question: where does Bastion fit into competitive compositions? The turret-tank transforming robot is the scourge for all new players as it takes 'no skill' to sit in place and shoot in one direction. Bastion's biggest issue in higher level play is that competent players know how to abuse his lack of mobility. He otherwise takes an inane amount of babysitting to have an impact on the match but should a team choose to deploy Bastion, they can use a team comp that ZP and hexagrams have dubbed 'protect the president' or otherwise called 'El Presidente!'
In the recent Overkill best of nine finals between C9 and REUNITED, C9 was able to take the series against REUNITED by using Bastion on maps like Dorado. "[I've] seen teams try to run a Bastion and have it absolutely cost them the map," hexagrams says. "Even if they try to run El Presidente on the first ledge of 'Watchpoint: Gibraltor' with a Mercy and a Reinhardt, it can get blown up very quickly by a coordinated team."
Optimistic horizons for esports
One of the biggest factors to consider when making an esport last for a long time is to make sure the game doesn't turn stale for both the casual and the competitive audiences. Given that the average game time is significantly shorter than, say, a League of Legends game, spectators may get tired of seeing the same team comps win over and over again.
Fortunately, all the creativity of the competitive environment may propel Overwatch to greater heights. In one of ZP and hexgrams' casts, it was mentioned that a lot of the older World of Warcraft Arena players contributed a lot to the creativity that led to solutions that were needed to fix certain maps and comps. "I wouldn't limit creativity to merely the WoW players. We've seen a lot of creativity from players coming from all sorts of different games. But therein lies the rub: you get a lot of perspectives blending together in one big melting pot for competitive Overwatch," ZP explains.
"Many top teams have a mix of mechanical FPS gods from more traditional shooters, while also integrating MOBA players and WoW arena players. If you look at a team like Cloud9, which does have a very varied background for its overall roster, there's no way that the level of experience depth they have across games doesn't help them out tremendously," says ZP.
Words of praise were also shared by hexagrams, "Cloud9 has been nothing short of dominant in recent tournaments, and seem to have a really creative style, and extremely strong individual players."
With the variety of experience or lack thereof that have all led to some sort of success during the competitive duration of the beta, both ZP and hexagrams were both reluctant to choose any team to remain a powerhouse, with the exception of REUNITED from Europe.
"Five players of REUNITED's main roster have been together since 2012, and they've been consistently top two in EU throughout all of Beta 2. I would be surprised if they weren't a force at least throughout most of 2016," ZP explains.
It would be difficult to pinpoint what team to pay attention to due to the lack of longevity from the rosters outside of C9's and REUNITED's. Both casters emphasize that too many teams have risen and fallen to make a long-term prediction.
"The former IDDQD roster won 55 straight sets and then the roster fell apart. If that kind of success can't keep a team together, what can?" Hexagrams points out.
There is a lot up in the air regarding Overwatch's future as an esport. But if the closed and open beta are any decent indicator, it's pointing to the fact that a lot of brands are itching to jump into this new scene. And likely, spectators are going to be interested to see how Blizzard's new IP ends up making waves in the competitive sphere of esports.