Why I played at UON Esports Varsity

Varsity at UON

Last year for the 2023/24 academic year, I took part in the Esports Varsity events on behalf of the University of Northampton. When I came to the university, I had no idea how I would be able to find teammates for Esports Varsity events. Luckily, the university has an Esports and Gaming society which was a nice, comforting environment to be able to find people. I was able to find my teammates and create the first ‘Rocket League’ game team for the university called AfrobeatsRL. Taking part in Varsity means that you are one of the best sports teams at your university.

Practice makes perfect!

Maintaining a good starting place in Rocket League requires a lot of practice. My personal experience of this is practicing the game 3-5 times a week sometimes even more! You should also go over the replays of the games to ensure that you understand any mistakes that may have made and rectify them for future games. In my experience, our team would practice against other industry team or even other teams inside of the University or from another university.

Strong competitors

Last year there was fierce competition to reach the top spots in the competition, with the top 2 successful teams going to an in-person grand final in Birmingham. From my experience, the teams we competed against were only getting better and better as we worked our way up the divisions all the way to the National league – which consisted of the top 32 teams in the whole of the UK. During this event, we were up against multiple of the top 10 teams in the country and sometimes you even played against the number 1 team in the country.

It’s a matter of if you are having a bad week, you pick yourself up and work on the flaws in the gameplay.

The competition

The competitions you can compete in are UKEL, NSE, and so many more. The best bit about competing in a university Varsity Esports team is that no matter what year you are going into, you are almost never going to have the same teammates. You will never play with the same people – which makes it that much more fun!

Having to learn and progress with new players and new playstyles is so fun and it teaches you a new side of the games you are competing in that you may never have seen before.

Also, the varying types of ability from yourself and your teammates can enable you to have a balanced team where you are all the same skill level. Alternatively, you could have one or two teammates that are a little bit lower than you who you can help work them up and teaching them new things.

Accomplishment

It’s about working together to achieve greatness and help teammates and other players with the flaws they may have in their gameplay. It also feels very rewarding when you beat a team that is a higher seed then you in the table.

It is also a great way to diversify your friend group with people outside of your cohort.

Learn about Varsity on UON’s Student Union website.

Find out more about Esports at UON

George Hayward

A second year Esports BSc student at UON.