TITLE
The Bittersweet Saga of an Aspiring Esport’s Huge Ambition and Brief Life
AUTHOR
Ben Lindbergh
PUBLICATION
The Ringer
YEAR
2018
ARTICLE TYPE
Article
FROM THE ARTICLE
On Friday, July 27, a near-capacity crowd of 11,000 packed the Barclays Center in Brooklyn for the first day of the Overwatch League Grand Finals. The two-day event, which pitted the eventually victorious London Spitfire against the Philadelphia Fusion, concluded the inaugural season of the pioneering, international league formed by Blizzard Entertainment, the revered video game developer that released Overwatch—a six-on-six, objective-based, first-person shooter—in 2016. From the floor, where the Philly fans’ thundersticks crashed, the esports display was an audiovisual spectacle akin to the concerts that often fill the same space: Bright lights and loud commentary banished shadows and silence, and massive video screens loomed over the crowd, magnifying the young competitors who sat on the stage, almost hidden behind their computers. The OWL’s big finish showcased the fledgling league’s vision of a game that could cross over into mainstream culture: DJ Khaled performed, Jon Bon Jovi and multiple Brooklyn Nets attended, and Spitfire supporter (and former OWL endorser) Serena Williams watched from afar, along with more than 860,000 other people worldwide who streamed the action online or tuned in to ESPN, which made the OWL’s Grand Finals the first live competitive gaming event ever to air on the network in prime time.Just as the Overwatch League was enjoying its moment of triumph, an analogous game that once had hoped to be a breakthrough success was saying goodbye. On a much quieter corner of Twitch, devoted fans, accomplished players, and longtime streamers assembled to send off Gigantic, an online shooter that had lost its war with Overwatch and every other competitor in an increasingly crowded multiplayer market. Gigantic was announced before Overwatch, but by the time it was ready for a full release, Overwatch was already almost 14 months old. In January, Gigantic’s publisher, Perfect World Entertainment, which had already laid off most of its developer Motiga’s staff the previous November, announced that the game was about to be over: Its servers would be going offline for good on July 31, giving it six months before doomsday. Gigantic’s official Twitch channel went dark soon after that January notice, but it flickered back into being on the 27th for one last celebration of life, days before the plug would be pulled. “We won’t be able to play the game come Tuesday, but everybody in the community is still going to be here,” quavery-voiced community manager Jared Browar, who officially interfaced with the fans first for Motiga and later for Perfect World, said in the last seconds of the stream. The video has only 1,200 viewers to date.
COMPANIES MENTIONED
Motiga
GAMES MENTIONED
Gigantic
Overwatch
PEOPLE MENTIONED
Jared Browar
Chris Chung
Mike Futter
Rick Lambright
Carter McBee
James Phinney
Joseph Pikop
Vinod Rams
ALTERNATE LINK
Archived Copy @ Internet Archive