Just before 3 p.m. on Sunday, the Overwatch League experienced what it waited over two years for to finally come to fruition.
It was the opening weekend for season three of Activation Blizzard’s 20-team, city-based esports league. Each team has a full year of home and away matches for the very first time, giving home fans a whole new experience in addition to worldwide broadcasts on Twitch and YouTube.
The sensation of a true, regional rivalry was fully realized at the sold out Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City when Boston Uprising was met with a chorus of boos from the 1,600 fans in attendance before their loss to New York Excelsior (NYXL).
The five teams in the Atlantic Conference’s Northern Division, NYXL, Boston, London Spitfire, Paris Eternal and Toronto Defiant, played in New York while Pacific Conference teams played in Dallas at Esports Stadium Arlington. It was the first of a 26-week regular season that will be held at team sites, a culmination of a two-year buildup and process for Overwatch League to have live local matches in the U.S., Canada, England, France, China and South Korea.
Jon Spector, the vice president of Overwatch esports, sat with pride on a side balcony while watching the Paris-London series that kicked off Sunday’s NYC doubleheader. Activation Blizzard has been talking about a full season of homestands since OWL launched in 2018, carefully planning for it since then.