Overwatch League Gets New Teams, Kicks Off Later This Year

We've heard about the professional Overwatch League that'll be kicking off in just a few months, with players competing for millions of dollars across a number of match-ups in Blizzard's hit multiplayer opus. But this week, some new details emerged, including when we'll be able to see the first match-up for the league.

First off, it appears that the teams have grown in count to 12, as Philadelphia will be getting its own team owned by Comcast Spectator, who also owns the Philadelphia Flyers NHL team; while Houston is also getting a team, backed by OpTic Gaming and featuring support from different investors, including Texas Rangers co-owner Neil Leibman, according to ESPN.

That, combined with the other cities that have teams (including New York City, Boston, San Frnacisco, Miami-Orlando, Shanghai, Seoul, and two Los Angeles based teams), should make for some interesting match-ups down the road.

But when will those match-ups start? Sooner than you think. The pre-season for the Overwatch League is set to begin on December 6th, with the first match taking place at the Blizzard Arena in Los Angeles, featuring a number of exhibition match-ups that will get people used to the structure.

After that, the general season will begin early next year, starting on January 10th, 2018. A schedule will be put in place with the teams facing off against one another. Eventually, they'll play through enough matches to get to the playoffs and finals, which will take place starting in July 2018.

More details, including league format and ticketing, are set to be announced by Blizzard over the next few weeks. But the publisher has high hopes that we'll be seeing some major stuff out of the Overwatch League, and there are plenty of big names attached to it. We'll see how the matches go over the next few months, and how heated the competition really gets.

In the meantime, you can get hands-on with Overwatch yourself and see just how well you fare, as it's available now for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC. It never hurts to get warmed up to see where you fit in with the League in 2018, now does it?