Senior Joshua Condit playing Super Smash Bros Ultimate against Keiser University on Oct. 17.
McKenna Howenstine|Marlin Chronicle
Thanks to the support of a new sponsor, CompleteU, VWU’s Esports team will be receiving a much-needed hardware upgrade for the upcoming Collision on the Coast event, an annual Esports tournament held at VWU, and the upcoming spring season.
After experiencing a drop in system performance last year, the Director of Esports Brandon Kwon made it imperative to upgrade the team’s equipment as soon as he could. “It’s usually a five-year turnaround when you need new computers,” Kwon said.
Competing at the highest levels of Rocket League since the birth of the Esports program in 2019, Kwon was nervously excited about the timely upgrade to the team’s long-time PCs.
“We were stressed going into the year about new systems, if we want to run this (Collision on the Coast) again we’re going to need improvement,” Kwon said. With big schools like UCF, ODU and JMU coming to compete at last year’s event, and similar schools expected to be at this upcoming “Collision,” undesirable performance was not an option.
This complete system overhaul does not come cheap. However, with long-time sponsor Kellam Mechanical, and the acquisition of a new sponsor, CompleteU, the team was able to make the enhancements needed to continue competing at the highest level.
“They stepped in with a ‘sure let’s run it’ attitude,” Kwon said.
The program has been fitted with Lenovo Legion T5s, a cutting-edge engine allowing for high-performance systems. “We jumped two generations from 2070’s to 4070’s,” Kwon said; this jump allows for smoother frame rates and with Windows 11, an “Ultra high FPS,” according to Lenovo’s website. Senior Andrew Zamor, who plays Overwatch, and is known in game as Drzammy3, is especially excited about the performance improvements. “Better performance will make life easier, make us more comfortable, allow us to react faster, especially in a game like Overwatch,” Zamor said.
With fast-paced games such as Overwatch, Valorant, Fortnite and Rocket League offering major benefits for using a high-performance system, the majority of Esports games will be boosted by the upgraded PCs.
Although the system upgrades are substantial, the team’s abilities have never been in question. “While the new hardware is impressive, and will be a big help, our experience and progress is what got us this far and will continue to make us great,” sophomore Ahmik Allen, known as TMOApollo in game, said.
The team is currently, “on track to make the playoffs,” according to Zamor. “I think we can do a lot this year, make some noise,” Zamor said.
Collision on the Coast 3 is coming up next semester on March 29 and 30.
“Esports is one of the most interesting and competitive sports,” Allen said, “If you don’t know if it’s for you, all of our matches are streamed on Twitch through VWU Esports.”
Tune into their upcoming matches as they take on the likes of ODU, JMU and other big-time schools at TowneBank Arena.
By: Matthew Smith
mjsmith3@vwu.edu
