British Esports Championships competitors raise over £1,000 for GameBlast 2021! (with exclusive interview with Sillver!)

Bryony-Hope

6 min read | 2 Mar 2021

British Esports Championships team Coventry Crosshairs hosted an Overwatch ‘Arcade Festival’ last Friday, in aid of SpecialEffect’s Game Blast 2021.

The event consisted of five different arcade modes (Mystery Heroes, Hero Gauntlet, GOATS, Widow Headshot, and Tiny Overwatch) and four teams battled it out for the top spot.

The stream was done as a part of GameBlast 2021 – a fundraising event put on by Special Effect to raise money for the work they do with disabled gamers.

In total the Crosshairs raised a whopping £1013 throughout their entire stream – beating their initial target in the last matches of the tournament. As well as this, the Coventry Crosshairs reached affiliate status on their Twitch.

The Crosshairs put together the event with the help of Vulpine Esports, and invited fellow Championships competitors QMSamurai and GCSOwls to take part – along with a team of volunteer admins from the British Esports Association.

In between the chaos of GOATS gameplay, and the nonsense that is tiny Overwatch, the Crosshairs made sure that everyone had fun, and showcased the amazing work that Special Effect does.

After several hours of fun, QMSamurai came out on top – being led to victory by their captain NuttyNanza. Post-victory, stream presenters Lizzie Squires and Shoubs Naika-Taylor spoke to Nutty and got his thoughts on the event as a whole.

He said: “It was a lot of fun really, it was a charity event so it’s not like we were trying to be too tryhard, but it’s been good fun. So I guess we will keep grinding and go for the two-time next year.”

This event had been in the works since September 2020, and plans for the tournament were put into action after the Winter Qualifiers of the British Esports Championships.

Greg Naika-Taylor, head coach of the Coventry Crosshairs, said: “Hitting our donation target of £1000 has to be considered the overall highlight, and really sent us off on a massive high.”

He added: “My personal highlight however was when Sillver (Athxna’s younger brother) stepped in for BEA during tiny Overwatch. Not only seeing this young player terrorise teams made up of people almost twice his age, but also seeing the hype and support he was getting in chat made me feel proud of the event we had created.”

Furthermore, we caught up with the young player Sillver after the event to get his thoughts subbing in for the BEA Admin team.  Here’s what he said (we kept his exact responses for authenticity):

What characters did you play in the tournament?
Reaper, torb, gengo , ashe & tracer also sombra.

Who was your favourite character to play and why?
Reaper because I had lots of fun and I did lots of damage.

Did you enjoy playing in place of Athxna ?
Yes because I am a dps god

What was the best part of the whole match?
Tiny characters like in ‘kill to grow’

What team do you think should have won overall?
BEA admin

Do you know what the stream was raising money for?
Yes Special Effect that helps disabled people and makes equipment for them.

Would you like to play in an ow tournament again against really good teams?
Maybe, but there really REALLY good players

What made you smile the most throughout the whole tournament?
Me playing against other people and was more challenging

If you did play in another overwatch tournament, what mode would you like to play the most?
Sleep n yeet

Have you played in any other tournaments before?
Yes I won a rocket league tournament last week so proud

If you had to pick between Overwatch with Athxna or Fortnite with Palator , what would you choose and why?
Athxna because dad is bad at fortnite but I’m a god.