OSU Institute of Technology is celebrating its new, state-of-the-art eSports Arena with a grand opening reception on November 29th, from 1-3 pm. The space features more than a dozen gaming PCs and consoles, allowing students to play a wide variety of new games, host streaming watch parties and more. This unique experience is offered only to OSUIT students and is funded by Student Life through student activity fees.

College eSports have been on the rise for years, and since the soft launch last Spring, that’s no exception at OSUIT. Students have been keeping the space full and active by playing some of the most popular games in the world, including Fortnite, Apex Legends, Valorant, Brawlhalla, The Forrest, League of Legends, Rocket League, Team Fortress 2, CS: GO, and Minecraft.

OSUIT employs ggLeap, one of the leading eSports venue management software companies, to supply games and moderation tools. The service offers the arena a library of over 2,000 games to add to OSUIT’s server. Arena staff work with student feedback to determine which games to add to the list of more than 300 already available.

The arena has 12 Alienware Aurora R12 Gaming PCs with 25” monitors and matching Alienware accessories. Students are also free to use the Xbox and PS4 gaming consoles, a Nintendo Switch dock and PC controllers. Currently, enrolled students can sign into one of the computers with their OKEY credentials and pick up where they left off each session. Work-study employees are available in the arena for anyone who needs assistance.

Student Life offers eSports tournaments throughout each semester. They range from team matches to 1v1 matches and everything in between. Students using the arena, and engaged on our Discord channel, choose which game titles to play in each of our hosted tournaments. They are also planning to host watch parties of professional competitive matches soon.

A new student club has also emerged after the soft launch of the eSports Arena. The Gaming and Entertainment Organization aims to promote academics, inclusivity, and positivity in the eSports and Gaming Entertainment space by providing opportunities to connect, bring about social awareness for diversity and compete under OSUIT as a club.

The arena is not open to the public, and students may use it Monday through Friday from 10 am to 11 pm.