Esports in Olympic fold: Pros and Cons

The idea of esports 🎮 joining the Olympic fold programme ⛷️ has been discussed on all levels of the Olympic industry during the recent years. But if some see it as a recognition of the cybersport in the world, others just don’t get the point. So what are pros and cons of Olympic esports tournament?

It’s been almost a year since the IOC recognized esports as a sporting activity and Asian Games in Hangzhou (2022) already have a complete esports tournament on the agenda. Partly esports are becoming a “part of the game” due to a lack of young audience watching Olympics nowadays. So in case esports will become the part of the Olympic fold, game fans, most probably, will also look into other disciplines.

But not everybody sees Olympic inclusion as a generally good thing to happen for the esports. And the reason is simple: there are too many top esports competitions (e.g. Counter Strike’s ELeague Premier and Dota 2’s The International), which are taking place in summer, so it’s either esports athletes will choose to go to Olympics over the main world’s championships (which is hardly believable), or Olympics will become just another 2nd level championship, which can’t really compete with the prizes an attention of esports activities.

In addition, it’s very unlikely that the older demographic of Olympic viewers will be drawn to esports. The median age of the last summer Olympics viewers was 53. So it looks like esports doesn’t need the Olympics as much as the Olympics needs esports.

Is it possible that there is a young gamer who hasn’t heard of esports tournaments? Most likely not. So it’s either Olympic committee has to create a whole different idea of why Olympic esports matters, or, frankly, it’s not worth it. Esports is the fastest-growing sports group in the world, and they know it.

🤖 More posts are coming. Follow Esgs to stay connected and know what esports will be presented at the biggest esports summit. Berlin, April 2019.