2018 has already seen a landmark development in the world of e-sports. For the first time ever, 12 teams representing cities from all over the world will come together to compete in the Overwatch League, the first e-sport competitive scene to be linked to geographic locations in the same vein as traditional sports. The Seoul Dynasty, Shanghai Dragons, London Spitfire, L.A. Gladiators, and a host of others will compete during the regular season before vying for the championship in the postseason. Teams consist of players that were selected from the top 500 of two recent competitive seasons. These players live together and train together during the season, and are paid a base $ 50 000 salary complete with health coverage and a retirement plan, with additional earnings based on their performance.
There are 113 players currently signed to teams in the Overwatch League’s inaugural season. All of them are men. And that is a problem.
I grew up playing video games. I started with Pokemon: Yellow when I was eight, and from there played different games on a slew of different consoles. I gravitated towards RPGs and fantasy games, or anything with fast-paced third-person action. Games like Banjo Tooie, Prince of Persia, and Skies of Arcadia: Legends all came naturally to me. But while a lot of people who I knew eventually got into first-person shooters like Call of Duty, that particular genre never really appealed to me. I wasn’t very good at them either, which became a feedback loop of disinterest. After all, why should I invest time and energy into getting good at a game that I didn’t enjoy to begin with? Which is why I was unprepared for the almost instantaneous appeal of Overwatch.
Overwatch, for anyone who has been under a rock for the last two years, is an objective-based team shooter created by Blizzard Entertainment. Players choose one of twenty-six different characters (with more being added to the roster regularly), and work together to fight the enemy team and accomplish their mission: capturing and holding a particular point on the map, escorting a payload to its destination, or a mix of both. If that sounds like a pretty simple game, it’s because it is. And yet at the same time, a lot of complexity exists for anyone who is looking for it.
While individual contributions do matter, a far more important aspect to any team composition is the way those individuals synergize and work together. While you can choose to focus on getting the most kills or doing the most damage in a game, you will find it hard to make much progress if you don’t have the support of your teammates. And if you don’t focus on accomplishing your objective then it doesn’t matter how many kills you have. A sharpshooter playing Widowmaker might be able to wipe out a team for a moment, but all of those players will respawn and be right back at it only a few seconds later, and they will have the opportunity to switch to a different hero who counters you.
The roster is one of the game’s biggest draws. The work that went into designing each hero is readily apparent. While each hero is based on a broad archetype, they have been developed just enough as characters to stand out. Every one of them has a unique silhouette and colour palette that stands out while also feeling like it still fits into the game’s world. From a mechanics standpoint each one is also totally unique. Every hero has a primary weapon that they attack with, from a basic assault rifle, to an electricity-spewing tesla cannon, to a handgun that shoots music. They also come with a set of abilities that, while there may be some overlap, gives them a kit that only they have. They are sorted into four broad categories: offence, defense, tank, and support. But within those categories no two heroes can fulfill their role the same way.
Do you like raining death down from above and relying on explosions to keep your enemies pinned down? Try the Egyptian Special Forces member Pharah or the Australian amputee and criminal Junkrat. Do you enjoy fast-paced movement and controlling a battle by staying in your opponent’s blindspot while supporting your team? Cyborg ninja Genji, British time-manipulating pilot Tracer, or Brazilian DJ and freedom fighter Lucio could be a good fit for you. Maybe you have trouble with aiming in first-person shooters but still want to be in the thick of a fight? The super intelligent gorilla Winston or the Russian weightlifter-turned soldier Zarya could be perfect for you.
You may have realized by now, but Overwatch’s roster is one of the most diverse in video games, and that is absolutely by design. Blizzard’s team has made it clear both when accepting feedback from the community and when dealing with intolerant bigotry that they want their game to have someone for everyone. Even the supplementary material, from animated shorts with quality rivaling Pixar films to comic books that explicitly confirm that one character is gay and that another is on the autism spectrum, they have and continue to put the effort in. And its shows in their demographics.
According to QuanticFoundry, women make up approximately 4% of the player base for most tactical shooters. For Overwatch they make up 16 %. While that may not seem like very much, 16 % amounts to around five million players, some of whom absolutely did qualify for League selection. But despite that, and some infamously good women who have played in past competitions, none of them were signed to one of the League’s teams. During the Overwatch League’s media day some explanations were offered to the press for why this was. These included poor team synergy, no co-ed living situations, language barriers.
Most of these explanations are bullshit.
Requiring a co-ed living situation is a flimsy excuse at best. A language barrier could be more understandable, but is still not insurmountable. Other teams intended to recruit players who already had experience working together as opposed to talented individuals who do not, but this is also easily overcome through practice. Most players who have made it to the top 500 in a competitive season are capable of adapting on the fly to new team compositions, even without the time to practice that these teams have.
Some players and team owners have voiced sympathy towards these women. The Houston Outlaws general manager Matt Rodriguez stated “you have to go through all these hurdles, like if you pick up a player, is the press gonna call it a PR stunt, or is it because she was the best?” Which, in a way is correct. The first women to be signed in the Overwatch League is going to face constant scrutiny from an online community of man-babies who are ready to completely tear her apart (and people wonder why more women don’t try to compete).
But this plays into the same narrative that women face everywhere. To be allowed to have the same opportunities that men are afforded by default they need to be the best. They need to fight an uphill battle where they constantly must prove that they deserve just to participate. There’s nothing new about that, except for the fact that the Overwatch League is a brand new organization that came built-in with a glass ceiling that needs to be broken. Despite all of Blizzard’s attempts to promote inclusivity in their game, despite one of the most diverse casts of characters and player bases in first-person shooters these same problems persist. At any given time half of the characters being played in a match are women, but women still aren’t allowed to play unless they are so good that people accuse them of cheating, and even then they still won’t be signed to a major team. It’s patently absurd.
And the worst part is that this isn’t a problem that can be solved by Blizzard stepping in and mandating change, because Rodriguez is right about something. The first woman to be signed to a League team will be under constant scrutiny and will likely face hazing from the most sexist elements of online gamers. Affirmative action could be detrimental to those women personally as well as to the League as a whole. So what is the solution?
Well, one choice is for the teams themselves to ensure that more than one woman is signed in the future. Multiple players could bear the burden more effectively, and if the teams stood together as a united front and supported them it would send a clear message to those sexist dissenters. Another possibility is to host livestreamed tryouts. This would allow League hopefuls an opportunity to show what they are capable of to an online audience, and could help apply social pressures to have crowd favourites make the cut. It would also make the selection process more transparent.
Regardless of what happens in the future, if the sexist reputation that is associated with gamers is going to be shed then it seems appropriate that it begins with gaming’s most inclusive competitive game. It’s promising that members of the Overwatch League, from players to coaches to owners, acknowledge the double standard that exists. Now it’s on them to make changes to help dismantle it.