On May 2, after the first batch of regular season matches concludes, two teams in the West Region will qualify for the first international tournament of the Overwatch League’s 2021 season. Whether it be the San Francisco Shock or the London Spitfire, two Overwatch League teams will need to prepare for a long flight to Hawaii.
“We’ll only be working with a couple of finalists,” Overwatch League commissioner Jon Spector told Upcomer. He spoke on how only four teams will compete in each of the season’s four tournaments. “Once they qualify on Sunday, we’ll move quickly. We’ll have info on the flights we can book and hotels they can stay in ready.”
Western teams will need players and staff to receive negative COVID-19 tests before entering Hawaii. Once there, they won’t have to compete until May 6. Spector has spoken with the general managers of each Overwatch League team to confirm that there is time to deal with jet lag and prepare to play.
“I don’t think jet lag will be a problem,” Los Angeles Gladiators support Grant “Moth” Espe said. “I think I’m good at adjusting my sleep schedule now.”
The two qualifying squads will play in a facility at the University of Hawaii where Overwatch League officials have been able to directly route the internet service providers of computers at the school to a server in Tokyo. Teams in both South Korea and China can connect to the same ping levels that are less than 90 ms. The connection helps teams compete from across the Pacific with little impact from lag.
A partnership with the University of Hawaii
Hawaii will be a lifeline for the Overwatch League in 2021. The move to the island state is part of the league’s effort to limit the impact that latency has on the game. It also provides a way for international teams to play against each other more often. It’s a way to make sure all teams can play against each other more regularly.
“The single way to improve the structure we used in 2020 was to add that global competition,” Spector said. “In the May Melee tournament the Shanghai Dragons won in Asia, the SF Shock won in North America. The question was who was better between the two. We couldn’t answer that question last year.”
Last year, the Countdown Cup, Summer Showdown and May Melee tournaments were held separately in Asia and North America. This means that teams rarely played against internationally-based opponents. That changes with all five of 2021’s tournaments, the playoffs and grand finals included.
Spector doesn’t know if something will change before this May tournament, despite the league kicking off on April 16.
“One of the biggest lessons we learned from 2020, in the middle of a pandemic, was that setting any plans in stone is not the wisest course of action,” Spector said. “We’re trying to preserve our ability to be able to change during a pandemic.”
Project Aloha
“Project Aloha is Plan A,” Spector added. Here, he references the league’s name for their Hawaii-based tournaments. Spector stated that the league has several backup plans in case Hawaii experiences another COVID-19 outbreak. They are ready for circumstances of travel restrictions.
“If necessary, maybe this happens for one of the tournaments; regional tournaments are the default fallback,” he said. “But before that, maybe there are scheduling solves, maybe there is a travel somewhere else solution.”
Discussions about how to make the Overwatch League’s shift to online play more digestible began last March. This is when the pandemic first hit. Spector put the idea of a minimum latency feature, which sets a target latency between two teams that levels the playing field, on the radar of the development team. Then, Activision Blizzard’s legal team started surveying a number of islands across the Pacific. They were looking for a location to serve as a bridge between North America and Asia.
“We knew Hawaii was the best option once we completed the server tests,” he said.
The 2021 grand finals for Overwatch League aren’t ‘set in stone’
Spector and his team explored a number of possibilities, including a return to in-person play in South Korea. Last season, both the Philadelphia Fusion and San Francisco Shock flew to Seoul. They quarantined for two weeks in government housing and then practiced on laptops before the grand finals.
“We found that sending teams from North America to South Korea works,” Spector said. “But it also adds three weeks of downtime to the season because of the quarantine requirements.”
While Spector hopes that the league can host some live events in 2021, he notes that this isn’t necessary in order to be successful.
“The fact that we don’t have to compete in person is unique to esports,” he said. “The NFL and MLB can’t do that. We don’t need to take unnecessary risks, the same way March Madness finals don’t exist unless you can get both teams to the same gym.”
