In a welcome blast from esports’ past, Team Envy is making a comeback with former team owner Mike “Hastr0” Rufail at the helm. And he’s bringing its Call of Duty and Overwatch brands back, too.
Hastr0 announced the move on Twitter/X today, confirming that he has re-acquired the Envy brand Envy Gaming, which includes Team Envy, the Dallas Fuel formerly of the Overwatch League, and Dallas Empire formerly of the Call of Duty League.
As part of the announcement, Hastr0 revealed that Envy’s first foray back in esports is with an Apex Legends team formerly known as Loan Sharks, featuring Dropped, Knoqd, and YanYa. He didn’t have to go looking too far for the team—Dropped and Knoqd were both members of OpTic’s Apex squad while the org was still in the scene.
Envy, along with OpTic and FaZe, was one of the early esports franchises based in CoD when it got its start in 2007. Hastr0 competed under the Envy banner (then known as Team EnVyUs) before becoming owner. Envy owned the Dallas Empire squad that won the CDL’s first-ever championship in 2020.
Envy fielded rosters in multiple games including Overwatch, such as one of the Blizzard hero shooter’s most exciting rosters that won OGN’s Overwatch APEX season one back in 2016. It eventually joined the OWL as the Dallas Fuel, where it won the 2022 OWL Championship and cemented itself as one of the most popular brands within the league during its active years.
In November 2021, though, Envy Gaming and OpTic Gaming merged together in a joint brand that became known as OpTic Texas in the 2022 CDL season. The Envy branding was replaced with OpTic’s name and colors everywhere else it competed, too, and Envy and its blue color scheme slowly fell by the wayside up until today’s announcement.
As for what this means for the future of Team Envy, the Fuel, and the Empire, that remains to be seen. Throughout the years, Envy also had squads compete in Counter-Strike, Gears of War, Halo, League of Legends, Rocket League, SMITE, and VALORANT in the past.
Dot Esports has reached out to both Envy and OpTic for comment on the news.
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