Final of season 2 apex had over 80k viewers with 40k-50k viewers on the global stream and 30k-40k on korean. I dont want to sounde negative but people who were not happy with what blizzard has been doing seem to have been right because this seasons final has had around 33k korean viewers (simillar to last year) but only around 20k global viewers (less then half of what was last year) and peaked at around 24k (only near the end) peak around 64k overall (16k lower then last years)
Last I checked it was 45k OGN and 25k OGN_Global but I don't know what the actual peaks were. Still though, that would be 10k less than last season's Finals.
Also, do you have numbers for any of the other broadcast methods? This reddit thread mentions three plus TV but I don't know how to corroborate this numbers listed in there:
I'd be interested in seeing if this season's numbers are lower across all platforms or just twitch. It would be unfortunate for such a huge tournament to be on the decline if what you mentioned is both accurate and replicated throughout all the services.
http://i.imgur.com/gu7vYEW.png here last season (overral twitch peak is i think for korean and global stream)
reminder: OGN is a tv station and the Korean language broadcast was also on Afreeca which is similar in popularity to twitch over there. Twitch is only a portion of the total viewership although i would still expect it to be somewhat down on last season viewership. RunAway was a one of a kind story.
As a Western viewer who loves watching OW but does not follow any Korean teams particularly closely, the seemingly never-ending karaoke bit after the first match certainly put a strain on my patience. It felt like a serious momentum killer to me, though I'm sure it was a lot more amusing for those more familiar with the scene. Of course it didn't help that I was completely exhausted after spending the entire night in the ER (helping a friend, I wasn't injured) either.
May have been bad for the NA fellas but for us Europeans it was at like 10 am, maybe 11 CET on a Saturday morning so it should've had a ton of European watchers but it had 20k when I was watching and this is the biggest LAN event we've ever had (iirc) for OW with 2 of the best teams on the planet so it is sad indeed but at the same time it's Korea and I'm sure quite a lot of people only watch NA/EU so it's hard to judge.
#17 listed a few reasons as to why NA viewership could have been lower. I doubt you actually the know reason yourself so I'll fix your last comment for you:
"still korean viewers were simillar to last years, I think its whats been happening to western scene (what blizzard been or rather havent been doing) that could have caused this".
I'm personally very invested in watching APEX, even getting up at an ungodly hour just to do it. But I can't tell if other western viewers may have lost interest because the last APEX tournament with western teams didn't have one (again), or because of the long production (again) or if they're just looking towards western events or if, as you said, Blizz has pissed them off and getting up was no longer worth it.
For the most part the whole event isn't geared towards western viewers so I don't think comparing those particular numbers is that impactful. Maybe if we saw a dip in overall Korean viewership (I don't have the numbers so I don't know) then I think it would be a bigger cause for concern.
More than anything I want to ask, do you want Overwatch to succeed? What do you think should be done to make that happen? Pointing out flaws in a system is part of constructive criticism, another part is to bring forth ideas an possible solutions. In your original post in this thread you said you didn't want to sound negative, but without suggestions you can only sound negative, instead of constructive/critical.
Good news! We should soon get some more viewership numbers to more easily compare Season 2 vs Season 3:
https://twitter.com/KuroiRyuuGaming/status/892731859586691073
From the same source as the image you have previously posted. As always the grain of salt quote applies.
https://esc.watch/tournaments/ow/ogn-overwatch-apex-season-3 - APEX season 3
detailed stats (ignore english stream numbers and twitch peak is korean and english streams combined)
just reminder, this was season 2 - https://esc.watch/tournaments/ow/ogn-overwatch-apex-season-2
edit: i just noticed that i estimated peak at around 64k and it was 69k but still preaty close :P (also why downvotes for this? im just posting statistics i seriously dont get it)
im currently keeping track of katowice viewers and numbers are really impressive (first day might already have higher peak then other qualifiers)
4th season might drop even lower because of total lack of western teams and im not sure krean viewers will make up for western (but thats only twitch streams)
Yeah I mean APEX S4 is a different beast imo because the Western viewers will not be as interested overall - though many will still be I think, especially for playoffs.
But the comparison between 2 and 3 is very valid and the comparison of Korean/Chinese viewers throughout is also valid through to S4 and beyond.
Yeah that's a definite dip, 34k fewer viewers (w/o Chinese numbers) is a big one. We'll have to see if Western interest just shifted away from this particular tournament or if it just diminished as a whole.
As for Season 4 the comparisons will no longer be as relevant since because of the lack of Western representation. At that point looking mostly at Asian numbers might make for a better comparison.
Discord