The Growth of E-sports — How video games are bigger than most know
Gone are the days when playing video games was considered a time waste. E-sports has arrived and the world needs to notice. No matter how many arguments claim that it is not a sport, how can you watch people play on your computer or how is this even famous, competitive video gaming or E-sports has been blowing off charts for quite a while now. E-sports is now becoming a global entity where players play competitively on stages around the globe. Similar to events in traditional sports such as football, cricket, basketball and hockey, E-sports involve a flurry of competitions across multiple games, spread across genres. Electronic-sports has converted online gaming into a thrilling spectator sport, creating a similar experience as to watching other sports.
Simply put, E-sports is not a single sport but multiple games combined to form a single unit. The industry does not only contain well-known names such as FIFA, NBA2K, and WWE but also holds prominent games such as League of Legends, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2 and Hearthstone. Against the popular notion of video games being only for nerds living in their basement, E-sports has over 380 million viewers worldwide, including both online and in person. To put things into perspective, 31 million people viewed the NBA Finals Game 7 in 2016 while 43 million people watched the 2016 world finals of League of Legends. With soaring numbers and prominent platforms trying to cash in on the sector, the E-sports ecosystem promises a massive amount of monetization prospects.
The Playing Field
E-Sports competitions are held online as well as offline, including some well-known locations.With a seating capacity of almost 17,000, the KeyArena in Seattle hosted The Dota 2 International 2017, and the Agganis Arena, Boston, with a seating capacity of over 7,000 hosted the 2018 CS: GO, ELEAGUE Major. Apart from offline events, millions tune in on different websites to catch their favourite players and teams in actions. Some highflying names are also trying to purchase streaming rights to these events to tap the potential market. Below are some of the websites that stream E-sports.
- Twitch
Probably the biggest name you will hear in E-sports, Twitch.tv has become the nucleus of E-sport streaming in the past few years. Owned by a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Twitch is a live-video-streaming platform launched in 2011. Twitch currently has over 100 million monthly unique viewers, with numbers witnessing a significant increase every day. Twitch is not just limited to E-sports but also has added support for music and cosplays among other things. According to the data of the past 365 days from the time of writing this article, Twitch saw a total view time of 768,302 years and 310 days across different streams.The numbers are soaring and breaking records every day.
2. YouTube
YouTube decided to challenge Amazon’s Twitch and jumped into the E-sports arena in 2015 by launching YouTube-Gaming after it failed to acquire Twitch. Much like Twitch, YouTube-Gaming lets users stream and share E-sports content. YouTube has collected quite an audience in a short lifespan and the numbers are increasing each moment. YouTube has won the streaming rights of multiple tournaments from the top view accumulators such as League of Legends, Dota 2 and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. Gamers can enjoy their favourite tournaments on the video sharing platform which already was a source of learning for many. There are almost 20 million gaming learning videos on YouTube.
3. Facebook
The website with the highest number of users finally decided it was time to tap into the E-sports market. Towards the end of 2017, Facebook had over 2 billion monthly active users. A lucrative number which attracted ESL, a name behind some the prevalent Electronic sporting events. In January 2018 Facebook and ESL came to an agreement to stream ESL’s Counter-Strike and Dota competitions. Although ESL received a lot of flak from the community on the decision, it is considered an impeccable one by analysts, as it will tap a new market of viewers who spend most of their time on the social networking site. While initial stages show low numbers, they are expected to climb up soon enough.
Show me the Money
What is the use of millions of eyeballs when it doesn’t generate capital? That is not the case with E-sports, as the industry is rising in terms of capital every year. According to multiple reports, the revenue of the E-sports industry is a soaring bird and it is reaching new heights every day. The industry revenue was expected to reach over $1400 million in 2020, but it broke the barriers and surpassed $1500 million in 2017 only. The new prediction places E-sports at a $2.2 billion valuation in 2022.
E-sport tournaments have also seen a drastic rise in prize money in the past few years. The prize money development saw an increase from $5.2 million in 2010 to over $100 million in 2017. The most prominent prize pool came from Dota, which accounted for $37.1 million in prizes in 2017. As sponsors are pouring in and small and medium tournaments are rising, the prize pools are expected to double soon enough.
Controversies
Similar to other sports, E-sports is no stranger to controversies. Be it match-fixing, doping or gambling, E-sports has witnessed it all. Below is the list of few controversies that hit the E-sport industry hard.
- Gambling
Perhaps the biggest and the most persistent problem E-sports has to deal with is gambling. Even though most gambling websites use in-game items which hold no monetary value in the real world, item exchange for real money is as easy as buying a carton of milk. An unregulated industry of more than a billion dollars in illegal money haunts the E-sports ecosystem like no other. These websites now boast of real money transactions and even cryptocurrency availability, adding to the woes of E-sports organizations who try to regulate it. The rise of gambling websites has severely affected the spirit of the games as they lead to scams, addictions and worse, match-fixing.
- Match Fixing
In 2010, when E-sports war nothing but a fancy term in the west, it had deep roots in Asian countries, most prominently in Korea. A match-fixing scandal in Korea shook the E-sports world upside down. Eleven players were banned and some even faced criminal charges under the local law. It is still considered one of the biggest scandals in E-sports history and even after eight years of that event, such cases are still uncommon.
In 2015, seven players received a ban which stopped them from competing in official Counter-Strike: Global Offensive matches due to their role in a match-fixing incident. The players bet in-game items on their opponents to profit from a deliberate loss. Gambling and betting websites were offering 1:5 odds and the players decided to cash in from losing a game, which they were highly expected to win. Quite recently, a player-manager and coach of a team competing in the APEX Overwatch League received a charge for trying to fix a match.
- Doping
Even though there haven’t been any proven cases of drug abuse in E-sports, there have been rumours going around for quite some time. In 2015, a professional player in CS: GO stated in an interview that he and his teammates used a psychostimulant named Adderall before they played their matches. Even though it was ignored as a joke, doping in E-sports is still considered real issue.Organizers have decided to promote drug tests during tournaments to mitigate the drug problem if any.
Whether you like it or hate it, whether you are an avid watcher or an amateur fan, E-sports is something which cannot and should not be ignored right now. With gigantic strides in terms of viewership and revenue in the past few years, E-sports has already made a statement and is ready to make some more. It may not be recognized as a ‘real sport’ anytime soon, but E-sport has cemented its place in terms of a sport with its thrilling encounters and astounding events, all around the globe.
