The inaugral season of Blizzard Entertainment’s self-founded eSport, Overwatch League is in full swing. Rivalries have quickly developed, Blizzard’s in-person arena is selling out seats and fans are buying their favorite team’s skins to show their support. The league’s first week blew everyone’s expectations out of the water by pulling in over ten million viewers in it’s first week of play.
But underneath all of the fun and excitement there’s an issue that not enough people are talking about: there are no women among any of these teams’ all-star lineups. Despite the fact that we’ve seen a woman compete in the Overwatch World Cup, there’s top internationally recognized players like Barcode and 177 and yet not a single one of them were recruited by any of 12 franchise teams that make up Overwatch League.
The lack of representation has become a hot button debate within the Overwatch community, along with the ongoing issues with harassment that also plagues gaming as a whole. We see women competing at a top level in Overwatch, working the broadcast team at Overwatch League and filling the arena, so why aren’t they playing?
Well that may finally be changing. Yesterday afternoon female gamer and top level Overwatch player Geguri posted the following video on her Twitch account.
The video’s in Korean, but don’t worry I have the translation ready for you. Geguri had the following to say:
“Regarding teams.. just know that I’m going to a foreign team. I got many offers.”
For those of you who may not be familiar with Geguri let me give you a little background. She’s an 18 year old from South Korea that plays Overwatch professionally, is recognized as being one of the best players in the world and is said to be the best female player out there today. Geguri’s a former member of EHOME Spear and has most recently played with ROX Orcas.
Where will Geguri end up if she is indeed coming to Overwatch League? It’s hard to say. Currently she’s following every single one of the 12 teams on Twitter and hasn’t dropped any hints for us. But if you take a closer look at her Twitter account you’ll see that there’s one team in particular that sticks out above the rest.
New York Excelsior’s head of players personnel, head analyst and two players are following Geguri. It’s also worth noting that New York was the first team she chose to follow and it it can be argued that New York has a clear need for another off tank. Who’s Geguri’s best hero? Zarya.
Regardless of where Geguri ends up, I just hope she makes it to Overwatch League. There’s a lot of women playing Overwatch and a good number of them are just talented as the men who’re playing this game professionally. It’s about time we see them represented equally.
We’ll be following this story closely so be sure to check back with us for more news on this story as it develops.
UPDATE – ESPN.com reports Geguri to sign with Shanghai Dragons.
This article originally stated Geguri was 17; it has since been updated with her correct age. Also, it originally stated several women competed in the Overwatch World Cup; it has since been updated to say that only one competed.
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