Marvel Rivals flying, Office Showdown is a go, RL + Valorant Academy Teams, building our leagues, metrics and more...

Hi there,

We faced a mix run during February, call it a month of reflection across our events programme but there was one particular project that took our attention - building Office Showdown, Ireland is the pilot and we closed February with seven teams confirmed (yes we’ll share who they are soon!).

In that time we took a trip to see the new gaming hub at St Mary’s University (London), undertook a review of the Collegiate Series events, said farewell to Rí-Rá (not for too long we hope), launched our 3rd Annual Student Esports Survey and our Schools Series pilot took another step forward.

We’re back with our short reads, long reads, successes, challenges…well you know the rest 👇🏼

INDUSTRY NEWS

🗞️ In Focus – The emergence of Marvel Rivals, what learnings can we take from it?

Marvel Rivals has entered the competitive shooter space with the power of one of the world’s most iconic franchises. This 6v6 hero shooter featuring Marvel characters has sparked immediate interest from gamers and esports teams alike. But does the game have staying power?

Competing with titles like Overwatch 2 and Valorant, Marvel Rivals leans on its dual appeal to gamers and comic book fans. While this crossover is compelling, the challenge is turning early interest into long-term competitive engagement.

While Marvel Rivals shows promise, its esports future depends on building a stable player base and credible competitive ecosystem. Early gameplay has impressed with its team-based strategies and character synergies, but concerns around balance and matchmaking persist. Esports organisations are monitoring growth, but without a clear competitive roadmap, commitment from the pro scene remains tentative. Without sustained developer backing, it risks fading like other IP-driven games.

Encouragingly, one major reason players are gravitating toward it over competitors like Overwatch 2 is that its developers are actively listening to community feedback and making timely adjustments. If that responsiveness continues, we think Marvel Rivals could secure a meaningful place in the esports landscape.

SUCCESSES

🚀 Office Showdown - the Ireland Esports Company Series, confirmed seven teams from three brands, we’ve got another eight brands (and growing) determining interest internally, we’re definitely onto something here!

🚀 Nativz Academy - Rocket League team announced and the new Valorant roster completed their first outing too. Next step is to formalise our coach development programme which looks exciting as it will start filling a big void in esports.

🚀 Collegiate Series - Spring tournament commenced on Mon 10 Feb, trial of new addition Overwatch 2 was well received and a YOY increase for Spring teams and individuals of 45% in large part due to adding two new game titles.

CHALLENGES

One of the biggest challenges we’ve faced has been to create an ecosystem that engages gamers’ from when they first start playing.

We’re validating the Company Series: Office Showdown concept with a Spring Pilot. Our early Schools Series conversations are extremely encouraging as we build steadily towards the 2025/26 academic year. Along with our successful Collegiate Series in the middle we’ll have a complete journey across these leagues.

In reflecting on this structure we recognised a number of opportunities that will enhance the impact of what we’re building.

🕹️ Educator relationships - we’re building good connections with senior educators, to enhance this we’re now creating a Collegiate Advisory Committee to amplify our impact.

🕹️ Physical infrastructure - our network has two gaming hubs, SETU and Queens University Belfast. We popup at Dogpatch Labs and have tested this on campus at TU Dublin. With this in mind, we’re now reviewing our event programme across our leagues.

🕹️ National esports communities - each of the leading esports games we offer in our leagues have national communities (i.e. Rocket League Ireland is to Esports with the FAI is to Sport), we’re now looking at how we can help support their growth.

From this exercise two key strategic questions emerged for our business;

👉🏼 Can we consolidate our leagues into a single brand solution?

👉🏼 Can we take this ‘local ecosystem’ model and replicate it efficiently?

More to follow on both of those questions!

NEEDS

👀 Office Showdown continues to be our priority at this moment in time as we build for the Spring Tournament. Here’s a reminder on how you can help us:

1️⃣ Follow Office Showdown on LinkedIn here and boost the following.

2️⃣ Repost LinkedIn content and better still, comment on a repost! Maybe this one?

3️⃣ Please share this article with your Irish business contacts.

Our LinkedIn content has built further, workplace wellbeing, the prevalence of tech professionals in esports and recently we looked at the game titles available 📰

METRICS

The following metrics are for the period of 1-28 February 2025:

COMING UP (& UNDERWAY)

Take a look at what we've got coming up:

📅 Underway - Nativz Rocket League and LoL Academy teams in competition

📅 11-13 April - Collegiate Series Spring Finals Weekend (Online Only)

📅 w/c 21 April - Ireland Esports Company Series, Office Showdown commences

Thanks for reading, now’s the important part - PLEASE share with your friends and family.

Regards,

Kurt & the Nativz Gaming Team

OFFICIAL PARTNERS OF NATIVZ GAMING