Blizzard has announced the details of the upcoming Overwatch League. At the BlizzCon event in Anaheim, California, the game developer revealed that it is kicking off with its first season in January.
There will be pre-season exhibition matches on Dec. 6 to 9, but the inaugural season does not officially start until Jan. 10. Twelve teams will be divided into two divisions — Atlantic and Pacific. Most teams are coming from the United States, but there are a select few coming from overseas. The London Spitfire from United Kingdom belongs to the Atlantic division, while the Seoul Dynasty from South Korea and the Shanghai Dragons from China are playing at the Pacific division.
For the elimination round, 12 teams will compete in 40 matches, half of it within the same division and the other half against teams from the other division.
According to VentureBeat, each team will play twice a week across four game days — Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday — with three matches played each day. "We mixed up the start times each day so we could reach as many of you around the world as possible," said Overwatch League commissioner Nate Nanzer.
The league will be divided into four stages of five-week plays across eight different maps. A title match for each stage will decide which team will move on and receive the performance bonus of $100,000.
Playoffs will begin on July 11. Here, six teams will battle it out for 11 days to find out which two will face off for the grand finals on July 26 to 28.
Apart from the stage bonuses, a huge reward awaits the grand champion — $1 million to be exact. Blizzard is expected to give away a total of $3.5 million throughout the event.
Games will be held at the Blizzard Arena in Los Angeles, but fans all over the world can watch the matches on the Overwatch League website. Blizzard promises to make streaming worthwhile with instant replays and a third-person camera that will offer a better view of the action. A top-down map will also show each player standing within the league.
