The future was looking bright for Endemic Esports in the Heroes of the Storm scene. Once the 2018 Heroes Global Championship circuit ended after BlizzCon in November, Endemic worked to put together their official roster for the 2019 season. It was settled. Josh “bkid” Choi, Sammuel “bigempct” Hua, Dane “Daneski” Coleman, Vi “ViN” Nguyen and Liam “Liam” O’Malley would be the squad that Endemic would rock and try to contend in the North American region with. Then, Activision Blizzard put an end to that dream with one swift press release on December 13, ending their support of the professional Heroes of the Storm scene. The community was shaken, organizations that had invested money into the 2019 season, furious, and players whose gaming careers relied on the income, lost. This past week, Endemic Esports, led by Chief Executive Officer, Michael Reilly, released a statement that they had partnered with ULT, an apparel company, to support the players who never got the chance to represent their org in the new year.
If you’re a fan of high-level Heroes of the Storm play, the past seven days have been kind to you. Not Heroes Global Championship (HGC)-level of kindness, but solid enough to give their pallets a small taste of what they may have been missing since Blizzard dropped the hammer on the competitive scene a couple months ago. Over the weekend, Heroes Lounge held a qualifier for their upcoming Division S tournament which is the first competitive event featuring former professional players since the HGC came to an end. Naturally, teams comprised of top-tier participants faired the best and qualified for the official event beginning in the near future.
The Heroes of the Storm team ended 2018 by announcing that Activision Blizzard would no longer be supporting the competitive circuit and moving developers off the title and onto other projects within the company. 2019 is not off to a much better start. Late Thursday night, Kevin Michael Johnson, also known as “Cloaken” within the gaming industry, announced that he will be transition off the Heroes of the Storm team and onto other projects.
As 2019 rolls around, the Heroes of the Storm creative team has a large task ahead of them: giving heroes who haven't received new skins over the past 18+ months, new toys to play with. Currently, that number is 22 or a little more than 25% of the current roster. While at face value that may seem like a lot of heroes that need love, and it is, Blizzard has one of the most talented creative teams in the gaming industry and, arguably, the world. Where should they start? Great question. How about some of the heroes that haven't been touched since their release, 2016 or 2015? Below is a deep-dive into a handful of heroes that the art team can flex their muscles on.
Nearly two weeks ago, one of the most popular, beloved and talented former professional players in the history of Heroes of the Storm esports, Thomas “Ménè” Cailleux, had enough. While streaming the game on Twitch, he began talking to his chat about his love for the title, regardless of the tough times it has been through lately, and, visibly frustrated, he began pleading for Blizzard to work with him, other former professional players and content creators to help improve the game. His rant, which was immediately clipped and put on the Heroes of the Storm subReddit, has garnered nearly 12,000 viewers and was one of the top posts for that week. His message though is one that has circulated throughout the pro scene for years: “Why hasn’t Blizzard worked with those who play the game at the highest level and have a deeper understanding of hero’s kits, battleground mechanics and what the game needs better than the vast majority of the player base? What is there to lose?”
Once Activision Blizzard announced that they would no longer be supporting the competitive Heroes of the Storm scene, Ian “workhorse” Anderson, the founder of HeroesHearth went to work. His goal, aside from growing his platform dedicated to entertaining and educating the community close to his heart, was to help establish a way for the competitive scene to not completely die due to the game developer’s decision.
Today it was revealed by Dot Esports' reporter Nicole Carpenter that five former professional Heroes of the Storm players for Team Naventic have filed a lawsuit against former owner, James Ross Elliot II, for more than $50,000 in unpaid earnings. According to the report and information provided to InvenGlobal, the players had tried to serve court documents to the owner 14 times. But, due to Elliot's unknown location, they had been unable to complete the process. The Dot Esports report claims that Christopher “zuna” Buechter, Ken “Kenma” Buechter, Sammuel “bigempct” Hua, Thomas “Tomster” Maguire, and Josh “bkid” Choi state that they are owed $55,125 in unpaid wages and prize money, not including interest.
Less than a week after Heroes Lounge opened sign-ups for their crowd-funded competitive tournament, Division S, 20 former professional Heroes of the Storm players have formed teams. Thomas “Mene” Cailleux, Dennis "HasuObs" Schneider, Jérôme "JayPL" Trinh, Filip "SmX" Liljeström and Aleksandar "ethernal" Milanov will make up one team from Europe. The former Leftovers squad from EU consisting of Maksym "Mopsio" Szczypa, Mark "Linked" Šepec, Arkadiusz “Bl3kitny” Czarnecki and Mikołaj "PotiBoss" Potera have teamed up together to assert their dominance.
Less than a month after Activision Blizzard announced they will no longer be supporting the competitive Heroes of the Storm scene, the first replacement professional league will begin signups starting tomorrow. Heroes Lounge, one of the largest Heroes of the Storm amateur sites in the world, has announced that their pro league, Division S, has crowd-funded over $13,700 within the last few weeks in an attempt to create an appealing enough format where former professional players and up-and-comers can showcase their play for cash prizes. Signing up to join the league is a fairly simple process, according to Heroes Lounge.
Once the Heroes of the Storm World Championship concluded at BlizzCon in November, Mandon “Dittri0” Florent went to work creating his own tournament to supersede the Nexus Games event that weren’t returning in 2019. The appeal of the Nexus Games in the past was that it took place during the competitive offseason and pitted amateur teams within the same region against one another for pride and a cash prize. He took to Twitter to seek help from the general population as creating a tournament of this size is not a task he wanted to take on alone and, to his surprise, help arrived. One of those individuals, Arnaud "Ouille" Pontonnier, contributed half of the $2,000 initial prize pool and has worked with Dittri0 to acquire additional funding, a sponsor and has helped overall to organize the event. Currently, the event, which begins tomorrow, has accrued a prize pool over $2500 and has secured a partnership with Razer headsets to be given away to the winners.
Leader of the Angiris Council and Aspect of Valor, Imperius has valiantly led the armies of the High Heavens to innumerous victories over the demons of the Burning Hells. While his methods are exact and severe, there is no greater defender of righteousness in the entirety of creation.
In the middle of the night, a Portuguese Heroes of the Storm Twitter account leaked the newest hero set to join the nexus next week. The often requested and short-tempered Archangel of Valor, Imperius, is slated to go live on the Public Test Realm (PTR) starting on Wednesday, according to the tweet. While his role in the nexus is currently unknown, his backstory and attitude are all too familiar to fans of the Diablo franchise. For everyone else who isn’t aware of Imperius’ storyline, here’s a little information to catch you up to speed.
Activision Blizzard announced last week that they are no longer supporting the competitive Heroes of the Storm scene but the community hasn’t. Since the press release that effectively ended the Heroes Global Championship (HGC) and Heroes of the Dorm circuits released last Thursday, numerous organizations, fans, and community members have voiced their interest in making a new tournament structure or league viable. The hashtag “#saveHotS” began appearing on different social platforms and is now acting as a rallying cry for those who do not want to see the competitive scene of one of their beloved games die altogether.
It’s been five days since Activision-Blizzard made the announcement that the Heroes of the Storm Global Championship (HGC) circuit would be discontinued and developers from the title moved to other, unannounced projects. Although “announcement” is too generous a word. Maybe “slap-in-the-face” is more appropriate considering the disingenuous manner the message was delivered, via an unfeeling press release. The content of the statement itself felt more corporate than personable. To many, it was insulting.
When Activision Blizzard announced on Thursday that they would no longer support competitive Heroes of the Storm at the amateur, collegiate or professional level going forward, a can of worms was opened. A decision based solely in the name of saving money and dedicating resources to more profitable ventures within the company, the backlash from the Blizzard community has been harsh, a feeling of betrayal and worry over the future of the title.
On Thursday afternoon, Blizzard Entertainment's new President, J. Allen Brack, made his first big move since the recent resignation of the long-time figurehead, Mike Morhaime. In an official statement, Brack announced that the company would no longer support the competitive Heroes of the Storm scene at the professional, collegiate or amateur level going forward.
Last Tuesday, the “best Heroes of the Storm player in North America” abruptly announced his retirement from the competitive scene after spending the last four years making a name for himself. Fan “Fan” Yang, a member of the first Heroes of the Storm World Championship team for Cloud9 issued a statement through his current team, Tempo Storm, regarding his decision to step down. His full statement can be found here. When Fan was approached by InvenGlobal to talk about his decision to move on from competing in the Heroes Global Championship (HGC) in 2019, he opened up a bit more.
As Christmas approaches, those who work in and follow the competitive Heroes of the Storm professional circuit called the Heroes Global Championship (HGC) are hoping Santa comes early with some much-needed information. With the 2019 professional circuit yet to be announced, amid reports that Blizzard is experiencing budget cuts, imaginations are running wild that the game many call home will be without a competitive scene come the new year. Blizzard has yet to issue a public statement regarding the future of the HGC as well as notify players behind closed doors as to whether they will have a job in the upcoming months, according to sources. Prior to this past week, the majority of the players and talent have sat back and remained patient for an update. Over the weekend, something changed.
Jake “SolidJake” Kulinski’s involvement in the Heroes of the Storm scene pre-dates the release of the full game being available to the general public. Between masterminding what is arguably the most popular Heroes’ podcast, TownHall Heroes, to casting the amateur Open Division scene and launching a community funded tournament with a $10,000 prize pool, Bloodlust, SolidJake has seen and done it all. While the list of accolades continues further in Blizzard games and the fighting game community (FGC), SolidJake has accomplished all that he has despite failing to look out for ‘numero uno’...himself. As long as his wife and her family’s business is taken care of, as long as the Blizzard community is taken care of, as long as the players and talent around him are taken care of, Jake is fine operating at a loss and putting himself at risk. The consummate ‘fall guy’ as it were. That’s not to say he hasn’t had opportunities to put himself first and selfishly look to further his career in the entertainment business; it has to be on his terms after everyone else around him is first taken care of.
The abomination hero, Stitches, has been a frontline pest since the earlier Heroes of the Storm days back in 2014. Hooking opponents, spreading putrid bile and consuming opponents has been his signature tricks and when the development team felt his kit needed to be reworked, they opted not to remove what made him...him. When the dust settled after being tweaked, the new Stitches will be more than a "hook bot" who, in-between his Hook's cooldown, will have more to do on the battlefield.
