The Overwatch Open’s first season, presented in partnership by the competitive gaming platform FaceIt and the eSports organization ELeague, will soon be reaching the epic finale, where winners will get a piece of a $300,000 prize pool. Both the North American and European regional finals are set to take place next week starting on September 25, with the Grand Finals broadcast live on TBS from the ELeague arena at Turner Studios in Atlanta, Georgia on September 30.

The event, which is the largest eSports competition for the game to date, is sponsored by Asus Republic of Gamers (ROG)—a leading brand of high-end PC gaming hardware. As the official sponsor, Asus will provide powerful PCs and gaming monitors for next week’s competitions.

“The Overwatch Open is a great way to showcase the full capabilities of ROG gaming technology with class leading products,” said Vivian Lien, chief marketing officer at Asus North America in a press release.

vasos-roberts
Vasos Roberts, FaceIT vice president of sales

FaceIt vice president of sales, Vasos Roberts, spoke to [a]listdaily about the significance of having Asus sponsor the Overwatch Open and how it began.

“Republic of Gamers have been a close supporter of ours for a long time, and were very excited when we came to them with the Overwatch Open project,” said Roberts. “ROG is one of the first gaming brands to support the community in this way, and since 2006, they have been a provider of epic gaming PCs and monitors, and have a great love of community-focused gaming titles. Because of this, ROG was a natural choice as a supporter of the thrilling action that Overwatch delivers to fans of eSports.”

Roberts also explained how ROG was the perfect fit for the Overwatch Open because the brand has high-performance products that are tailored for high-end gaming needs such as eSports. “Overwatch itself is new, bright, demanding and fast, so the gear players use needs to be able to deal with this level of high graphical demand, high frame rates and for long periods of time. Paired with the top-of-the-line ROG gaming monitors, our teams will be in safe hands.”

According to Roberts, Asus was attracted to the Overwatch Open because “Republic of Gamers understands the benefit and importance of promoting and supporting new, exciting projects such as the Overwatch Open. They have a close connection with the gaming community, running weekly cups on the FaceIt platform, and were very positive about being able to help a new burgeoning game such as Overwatch.”

Additionally, Asus already had a strong interest in Overwatch, and it was an easy decision for ROG to sponsor the tournament. “ROG has always had a good feel for which new games are going to be making the biggest splash,” said Roberts. “Overwatch is a sponsor’s dream in that respect, with bold, fun characters, killer gameplay and a gigantic established community.”

The hardware that will be showcased during the tournament includes the ROG G11CD desktop computer using Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 video cards for the matches themselves, the GL502VS gaming laptop, and the supercharged G752VS OC Edition gaming laptop.

When asked how the ROG equipment would be promoted, Roberts replied that “eSports is now mainstream, and we promote it in a similar way to any terrestrial television production. The Overwatch Open Grand Finals will be aired live on TBS on September 30, as well as on our Twitch channel during the group stages.”

In addition to integrating ROG’s products into the tournament, Roberts further explained that “we are also delivering a non-intrusive, impactful advertising program that features a number of interactive segments. For example, Republic of Gamers Play of the Game will use a custom high-quality overlay and bumpers, supplementing standard commercials during breaks in the game.

“Streaming through sites like Twitch also allows unique opportunities to interact directly with viewers. We run highly effective ‘in chat’ messages that can be clicked, as well as small fun competitions with our viewers. Because the Overwatch Open team has a strong connection with the community, we also provide high visibility through social media promotion with huge reach through Twitter and Reddit.”