The 2020 Season of Blizzard Entertainment's Overwatch League is set to launch on February 8. However, the esports event centered around their team-based first-person shooter will not be holding matches previously scheduled in China during the months of February and March due to recent health concerns surrounding the coronavirus outbreak.

According to a Tweet put out by the official Overwatch League account Monday, the matches in China are being canceled to "protect the health and safety" of players, fans, and staff members. However, they will still be hosted at an undetermined future time, and the post specifies that "we remain incredibly excited to play Overwatch League matches in China later this season."

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Earlier today, the World Health Organization declared coronavirus a "public health emergency of international concern" after more than 8,100 cases of the viral outbreak were confirmed in mainland China (with dozens more discovered globally), leaving at least 170 people dead according to CNN. Other esports events like the Chinese League of Legends league have also been delayed due to health concerns.

In a post uploaded to the Overwatch League website in November 2019, organizers described how the 2020 Season's 20 teams will be split into two conferences and each play 28 matches, "with teams playing matches in their home cities." Based on these divisions, four teams in the Eastern Pacific Conference come from China: The Chengdu Hunters, Guangzhou Charge, Hangzhou Spark, and Shanghai Dragons.

It's worth noting that Guangzhou is specifically a city in Hong Kong. Blizzard was recently in hot water over banning Hearthstone player Blitzchung for speaking out in favor of ongoing pro-democracy protests against the Chinese government.

Backlash against the developers' decision even erupted at BlizzCon 2019 when interest in Blizzard's properties like Overwatch were at an all-time high thanks to the announcement of Overwatch 2. The controversy has also resulted in Blizzard losing sponsors, such as the Taiwanese branch of Japanese auto company Mitsubishi last October.

The 2020 Overwatch League will be streaming exclusively through YouTube Gaming after Activision, Blizzard's parent company, struck a deal with Google that was announced earlier this month. It joins other esports events like the Call of Duty and Hearthstone leagues as exclusives for the streaming platform.

The Overwatch League is a very popular event regardless of the controversies surrounding its creator, even garnering a reference from the Adult Swim animated sketch show Robot Chicken. Whether concerns regarding the coronavirus will continue to affect the competition's world-traveling Overwatch players is yet to be seen, but it's worth watching how more companies will adapt going forward.

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Source: CNN