ESPN is hours away from launching the “most ambitious eSports crossover in history.” Eight pro teams from seven famous game titles will battle it out on the Valorant setting.
Riot Games continue to shake the video game community with its highly-anticipated Valorant release. The all-new multiplayer FPS game is still on its closed beta phase, but it’s now on to its second third-party tournament.
Just recently, ESPN announced an invitational tournament to pro players from Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Fortnite, League of Legends, PUBG, Rainbow Six Siege, Apex Legends, and Overwatch.
All seven teams have been named, and the eighth team will probably a team of Valorant developers. ESPN previously noted on its tweet that aside from the pro players from the seven famous titles, the developers from the Valorant team will also compete.
The competing teams
The teams are grouped into their respective game origins.
Per ESPN, The teams’ composition will follow the basic Valorant-setup, so it is composed of as Cypher or Sova, Sage, Brimstone, Breach/Phoenix, Raze.
This gives a team vision, healing, several other supportive abilities to break onto a site like flashbangs and smoke bombs, and dueling power. Other considerations include gun economy and meta. This overview will be agent-focused, but gun economy is also an important part of VALORANT meta, especially during specific rounds.
Here are the following teams and their captains:
Team Rift (League of Legends)
- Shiphtur (Captain)
- Doublerift
- Xmithie
- Imaqtpie
- Dyrus
Team Canyon (Apex Legends)
- Kellar
- Syncdez
- Aceu
- Dizzy
- Mendo
Team Heroes (Overwatch)
- Gale (Captain)
- XQC
- Emongg
- Seagull
- Kephrii
Team Six (Rainbow Six Siege)
- Canadian (Captain)
- Rampy
- Thinkingnade
- nvK
- Necrox
Team Llama (Fortnite)
- Psalm
- Joseph
- THWIFO
- Highsky
- XXIF
Team Mirage (CS:GO)
- Hiko
- Skadoodle
- AZK
- Brax
- N0thing
THE CHAMPS ARE BACK!
They've already proven their @playVALORANT prowess in MULTIPLE invitationals, will they be able to claim the ???? this time?
Welcome Team Mirage, @Ska, @AZKcs_, @brax1wnl, @n0thing and @Hiko.
April 20-22 3 P.M. ET | 12 P.M. PT | https://t.co/tkRMYxQlY0 pic.twitter.com/Tg6Zi6WXPf
— ESPN Esports (@ESPN_Esports) April 19, 2020
Team Battlegrounds (PUBG)
- Vegas
- Venerated
- Valliate
- Yaboidre
- Sharky
ESPN stream event details
The ESPN eSports ‘Valorant’ invitational is a 3-day event, starting April 20-22, at 3:30 p.m. ET/12:30 p.m. PT. It will be streamed exclusively on Twitch.
It should be noted, as players might wonder, that the “show blood” option will be disabled so that it’ll be more suitable for all audiences during the broadcast.
Now, based on the winning probability, Team Mirage and Valorant developers’ team has the upper hand.
Meanwhile, it is important to note that Hiko’s team has won the previous Valorant closed beta tournaments.
However, considering that Valorant is a MOBA game and not an FPS, Team Rift coming from the League of Legends pro league, might just surprise everyone.
Make sure to witness an eSport history in the making!
Featured image courtesy of ESPN Esports/Twitter