Interview with Nate Nanzer

About the Chinese OW scene:
**Q1**: Not all teams have the financial capabilities to join OWL, such as top Chinese OW team MY, who turned to other games due to financial issues. Where do you think the problem is? Are there any solutions?

**Nate**: MY was one of the best showing teams in the summer season, being forced to switch games is indeed a pity. These kinds of remarkable teams transferring to other games, we'll never know the reason behind them. But noticeably, there are many other companies currently looking into the Chinese market, attracting some teams to play their games is indeed understandable. For us, our goals are clear: Overwatch League is a long-term event, for our investors and team owners it will be a hefty investment. For those teams who are dabbling in Overwatch just to make a quick buck, testing the waters for a few months and leaving if it isn't profitable, those are the types of partners we do not wish to deal with in the long term. We are open to negotiations, but both sides need to have to have the same vision for Overwatch eSports for long-term partnerships to sustain. The message we would like to bring across is: In 2018, our goal and focal point is to stabilize the OW eSports ecosystem in China. Through Blizzard and the Overwatch League, we are trying to pursue a more active role, to help teams achieve financial stability. At the same time, we encourage teams to make more money, enabling them to train and grow their players.

Many established teams in the West have joined OWL, such as C9 and Misfits. At the same time, some orgs are willing to join OWL, but have no experience in fielding teams. We can try to match orgs with available teams, if they aren't able to join OWL on their own accord.

**Q2**: Next question: You've mentioned teams backing out of Overwatch because they do not have any long term plans on the game, but many teams have left Overwatch recently. Are there any other reasons?

**Nate**: We would like to emphasize, we would like to see teams become profitable, and do not wish to see teams leaving or otherwise because of financial problems. We have the following to help teams:

- More competitions in the year, such as the Open Division, Contenders, other third-party events etc.
- Focusing on the well-being of the players themselves, hoping to provide more opportunities, both online and offline, for the players
- The uniqueness of the Chinese market would have a difference in strategy (not too sure what this is suppose to mean)
- We have not decided whether to continue the World Cup in 2018, but we do believe it is a worthwhile competition. Even though there were some mishaps in 2017 (e.g. the controversy about the organizing committee), the World Cup still has broad appeal, and we will put it effort to make it better.

**Q3**: Other than financial reasons, are there any? You've mentioned players lacking tournaments, is that why many teams are disbanding?

**Nate**: To be honest I don't know, I hope you media outlets would get some answers as well. The focal point of 2018 is for teams to be profitable, players to get more tournaments. We would be encouraging teams to stay in the business, helping them out with finances as much as we can. Honestly, I don't feel this is a very productive topic to be on, if you want to know why teams are disbanding, it's better to ask the teams themselves.

**Q4**: Can you detail how you would promote the formation of teams?

**Nate**: Firstly, we wish we could establish long-term relationships with teams and build up a pro-OW ecosystem. In the market, there are a lot of companies just paying money to invite teams to play their games, this is not a healthy model. We wish to have a symbiotic relationship with the teams, supporting them where we can, and providing financial support, for them to build themselves as a brand, and attract fans. We are still working out the details of our plan internally, so far there isn't anything we can reveal to the public just yet. We will slowly be phasing in these support, even splitting the revenues from our sponsors, hopefully forming a better ecosystem and supporting our teams.

We appreciate feedback from the teams, hoping to know where they need help at. We are discussing details with some teams, hopefully reaching out to more in the future. We wish this to be a cooperative effort, instead of being a unidirectional "I pay you to play my game today, then you'll back out next year" kind of situation. We hope that as an Overwatch fan, after 5-10 years, your favourite team is still here, and has a steady number of fans. To us, this system is very important.

**Q5**: How significant is Larry's departure to the Chinese OW scene? Do you have a successor? What will be his/her job focus next year?

**Nate**: Larry leaving will not be very significant currently, there is an outstanding team in Blizzard China, putting work into Chinese Overwatch scene. We have talented people doing work behind-the-scenes, not Larry one-man carrying the entire thing. We won't share many details into his successor, but the long-term goal is to give support to our teams. Not only am I in China, but my colleagues as well, who have a wealth of experience with the OW scene. Taking the perspective of HQ, we will still support local Chinese teams, even though we are miles away. We still care for the Chinese scene, and are willing to support it even from so far away.
(Nate has a favourite roasted duck store in Shanghai, and is a frequent patron whenever he is in town. I don't know why this was added, but here it is I guess.)

**Q6**: Has Larry ever communicated with you about his departure? Has he told you the reasons why?
**Nate**: Prefer not to answer.

On the Overwatch League:

**Q1**: Let us discuss the future. I see a lot of perks in owning an OWL team. What is one Overwatch is the most focused on? The one most benefitting the teams?

**Nate**: All OWL teams have a cut in the revenue generated by the League, e.g. viewership, sponsorships, merchandising, ticketing etc. On the other hand, the teams should look into their local markets (e.g. Spitfire in the UK, Dynasty in Korea), by having local sponsors, ticketing etc. and grow the local scene. Even though the inaugural season in  held entirely in LA, with no home/away system yet, subsequent seasons would feature teams competing in their respective cities. For example, the Shanghai Dragons would return to Shanghai for competitions. All teams would have 20 home team matches, so they should take advantage of this and open up business in the local scene, such as the various Shanghai sports teams (I don't know them enough, not from Shanghai or care about sports).

**Q2**: Is there an estimate on the revenues each team would receive in a season?

**Nate**: Yes, but we cannot reveal it publicly. Under the framework mentioned earlier, teams and players have numerous revenue earning sources, the specifics are to be kept secret. The teams are very clear on their revenue pathways, and we've revealed our global partners, Intel and HP, a good partnership opportunity. We have achieved progress in media deals, hopefully we can announce them soon. Recently, we have begun merchandising sales. These are outlets of revenue for our teams, and we believe the teams will become profitable quick. Right now, OWL teams stand to gain much. As more teams enter in the future, the market will continue to expand, and more players will join. The financial situation of the entire League is very clear. But going back, we want to see the competitive scenes in the Contenders and Open Division regions to be healthy, and that is our priority. We wish, through these competitions, that the ecosystems are healthy for teams and players, as that is our utmost priority.

Q3: Is the entrance fee into OWL $20 million? How did you come to this price?

Nate: We won't respond to myths like these. We won't go into the entrance fees for Season 1 or 2. What we will share is, expansions of teams will begin next year.

Q4: According to the OWL schedule, at least until next July, there will not be any new teams joining. Are there any more specifics in the timeline to share? Especially concerning China.

Nate: Next spring and summer, we will begin work on expanding the league. If it is successful, we will share the news late summer / early autumn. New teams will join in 2019.

Q5: The preseason was only broadcast on the official website and on MLG.tv. What kind of considerations led to this? The Chinese audience have their own viewing habits, and don't generally look on the website, and typically aren't well-informed.

Nate: The preseason is for us to test the waters. The matches themselves aren't too important to us, but it is a time for us to practice and test the stage and stadium, so that everything is flawless once the actual season rolls around. We believe once the season starts, many people would still use the official website, so we want to ensure there are no hiccups there.

Also, the regular season will be broadcast on many more platforms than the preseason, we are still working out details with our media partners. We can't share them just yet, but rest ensured that there will be more broadcast channels than the ones from the preseason.

Even though the preseason is meant for us them, we've still gotten great feedback about it, so we've done our job.

Q6: The new spectating system first showcased in the World Cup has gotten decent feedback. However, there are still some problems, such as Moira's abilities being indistinguishable between both teams. How would the spectating system be improved?

Nate: We've been improving ever since the preseason. The World Cup was the first ever time it had been used, not only for us but for other teams as well. Since this, we've been improving it by listening to feedback from experts, casters, pros, and many others. People have brought up the issue about the hero frame at the top (the one that shows ult charge), we are looking into that. Not only has production team been improving, the dev team are also working to improve the viewing experience. We've added more features into the game, and we are continuing to add more content and listen to public feedback, in order to make a better viewing experience.

Q7: China has a large market, not only will fans support the Dragons, but other teams as well. Currently, Chinese players and fans are unable to buy team merch. How would this be solved in the future?

Nate: It's important for us to allow Chinese fans to support our teams. So far partnerships are close to being settled, hopefully it will be complete once the regular season comes about. So far there is no specific timeline we can reveal, but we can say it is soon.
Also we have t h e b e s t m e r c h.

Q8: Would the League credits (the things that allows you to buy team skins) support minor league teams? (I'm assuming Contenders/ Open Div. teams)

Nate: The revenues from the League credits would partially be shared with the teams, we've done a lot in game and provided team skins for each of the 12 teams and for each of the 26 heroes, that's like 300 skins (quik mafs) and an unprecedented amount, so that players can support their favourite teams.
The revenues from the League credits will not go towards the prize pool for Contenders / Open Division. The League teams and us are focused on the development of competitive scenes all over the world, as they are vital for the survival of the League. (Not too sure what it means here, I've translated as far as I can.)

About eSports:

Q1: Over the past two days, I've spoken to two people involved in the Chinese eSports scene (one in LoL, the other in what I presume to be Vainglory). I've discussed with them the same question: eSports and traditional sports are alike, not only must there be a high standard of play, but they must be able to attract a large fanbase to participate. Contenders and Open Division may not be enough. Others've put in place a larger system including collegiates and internet bars etc to support the lower tiers. Do you agree? If so, what measures will be taken in the future to support lower tiers?

Nate: Firstly, the bar for success is different between games. How do we know Overwatch as an eSport is successful? If it is to have a large viewership, then what else are they using the viewers for? For garnering more appraisal? For selling more merchandise? For getting viewers to buy more team skins for their heroes? For different companies, their goals for success in eSports are different. This isn't a one-for-one comparison, for some companies they persue eSports for marketing purposes. They attract more people to play their games, they aren't focused on eSports themselves.

We would like to share our viewpoints on Overwatch eSports. Overwatch is a unique product, and we can earn profits and establish it as a sport in the long term, just like in traditional sports. We may do things differently from other eSports titles.

Establishing a foundation is very important, that's why it's our priority. We've established the Open Division- Contenders- OWL Path to Pro. Of course we will look into LAN events and collegiate eSports. We wish to take it one step at a time, not do it all in a fell swoop, since that will hurt quality. We hope competitive players can participate and form their own competitions, for these to be on their path to pro. I am a basketball enthusiast, and enjoy competing with friends, since that is the experience of socializing with them. It is a great experience organizing competitions with friends. Currently Open Division requires players to be ranked Masters and above, in the future we are considering lowering the standards (you have), allowing more players to compete in tournament settings.

To go back to the question, the focus of 2018 is for the Chinese Overwatch scene to stabilize, not to do too much too quickly.

Q2: In contrast with traditional sports, eSports is still very reliant on its relevance. Even LoL, who has Tencent (some popular Chinese publishing company) as part of its operations team, or Dota 2's ever increasing prize pool, they are slowly losing players. You've mentioned about long term development, what do you have to say about this?

Nate: The notion that video games will just live out its lifespan and die, is not something we agree with. Games like Counter-Strike or StarCraft 1 have stayed relevant for decades, even having premier tournaments. The earliest MOBAs were just a map from Warcraft 3 (I presume), so they've been around for a long time. We believe that game genres will perfect themselves over time, and continuously improve. In the end games can stick around for very long. Overwatch is Blizzard's first new IP in 17 years, the first product in the first iteration of this IP, it will have a very long future to come. Not only is the game, but also animations, comics, Leagues, are part of this IP. We hope to attract more fans to join Overwatch, hope us progress to the next iteration.

Q3: A lot of players believe restricting prize money will affect the popularity of the game greatly. (Referring to how tournaments cannot give out more than $20k or something without Blizzard cooperation) We want to know why Blizzard made this decision. What was it supposed to achieve?

Nate: What's new is community competition policy. Community competitions are very important, and we wish to improve them. We, however, wish to differentiate community competitions from third-party competitions. Community competition applications are pretty simple, if you want to create a school-based competition, fill up a form online and you're good to go. But for third party competitions, we seek quality from their competitions. Hopefully they can use Overwatch to make a profit, but at the same time we hope they meet our standards of quality, not to neglect the quality of the competition and compromise the brand of Overwatch. We've worked with zhanqi.tv to create a well-polished competition in the form of the OTS (Overwatch Team Story). Going into 2018, we hope to have more community competitions in China, as well as more third-party competitions. We have a very distinct difference between the two. We take quality and our brand very seriously. We have many important global partners such as Intel and HP. We hope that once we get to the Overwatch League, we can see very high quality competitions.

Q4: When choosing partnerships with third-parties, what are some of the criteria?

Nate: Not that we judge our third parties, but we do focus on our own projects, such as OWL having a home/away system. As for third-parties, we care less for numbers but instead for quality. We hope each and every tournament is as high quality as we envision them to be.