Overwatch League Inaugural Season Begins Jan 10th
On January 10, the Overwatch League will begin its inaugural season at the brand new Blizzard Arena Los Angeles! The season is split into four stages of five weeks each, with a week’s break between each one.
Each team will play 40 normal matches during the season: 20 against teams in their division and 20 from outside their division.
To view the full match schedule, visit the official Overwatch League site https://overwatchleague.com/en-us/schedule.
Fiesta Bowl Overwatch Collegiate National Championship
Tespa is partnering with the Fiesta Bowl organization to host the Fiesta Bowl Overwatch Collegiate National Championship. The finals will take place at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona, on February 17.
Battling through a season-long collegiate competition featuring 318 schools, four teams have advanced. Defending champions University of California, Berkeley; last year’s runner-up, University of Toronto; University of California, Irvine; and University of California, San Diego will compete for the championship and the six scholarships (one for each player) going to the winning team.
In addition to the championship matches, the event will feature a rivalry show match between the University of Arizona and Arizona State University.
For more information, visit https://tespa.org/news/21353258/tespa-partners-with-fiesta-bowl-for-overwatch-collegiate-championship-finals.
SMITE Season 5 Changes Announced; New God Cerberus Revealed
The new Conquest Map features upgraded art and new, highly requested gameplay changes to the premier 5v5 game mode. Players will be able to jump in and try the new map for themselves on January 17th on SMITE’s public test server.
Along with the updated map, Hi-Rez Studios revealed their 93rd playable character, Cerberus, the three-headed guardian of the underworld. Later this year, they will also introduce gods from two new pantheons, Slavic and Voodoo.
New Gamemode Coming to Paladins
A new Battle Royale gamemode is coming to the team-based shooter Paladins, Hi-Rez Studios announced Thursday during a keynote address opening its annual Hi-Rez Expo. Paladins: Battlegrounds is the first-ever hero-shooter battle royale. This genre mashup combines ability-driven combat with survival gameplay and a fantasy setting to create something brand new.
“Riding on a mount through this massive fantasy-themed map, looking for gear and cooperating with your team, Paladins: Battlegrounds delivers some of the feel of open-world MMO PvP but all within a 20-minute match,” said Todd Harris, Executive Producer of Paladins.
Players must work together to survive in Paladins: Battlegrounds. Supports will work to keep their Front Liners alive, while Damage Champions let the bullets fly and Flanks look for any possible assassination opportunities.
Players spawn into a massive map — over 300 times the square footage of a typical Paladins’ Siege map. Then they hop onto their mounts and begin exploring, looting their way through more than four dozen outposts and tracking zeppelins that drop legendary gear.
As the fog contracts, the stakes are raised. The last team standing wins. And that’s not easy with 100 players all fighting to win.
Paladins is free-to-play, and the Battlegrounds mode will be free for all Paladins players upon release. An early alpha version is playable at Hi-Rez Expo, and a full release of the Battlegrounds gamemode will be added to Paladins in 2018.
