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Social recognition of eSports as a form of legitimate sports


The emergence of eSports is a 21st-century phenomena, which inevitably has its impacts on the perception of traditional sports. On the ground that eSports and traditional sports take part in an entirely different medium, many people question the legitimacy of sports.

ESports, usually among professional gamers, refers to an umbrella term for organized competitive computer gaming, which has been in existence since the 1970s. During the past 40 years, eSports has evolved tremendously and grown to an international scale. In 2014, there were 205 million viewers dedicated to eSports; the 2013 League of Legends world championship had as many as 32 million online viewers, doubling the numbers of that of baseball's World Series and even NBA finals. Other than online viewership, the 2014 League of Legends world champion attracted nearly 40,000 fans to attend the event in person in Sangam Stadium in Seoul, which was the same arena for soccer World Cup semi-final in 2002.

While South Korea is considered as the leader of the development of eSports, other places, such as those in Europe and North America, are catching up. In August 2017, The International 2017 was held in Seattle at the KeyArena, awarding highest prize pool in eSport history of nearly US$25 million dollars, with the winners of the tournament taking home more than 10 million.

As esports has been attracting attentions all over the world, the academia has also shown interests in the brand new phenomena.

The International Council for Health, Physical Education, Recreation, Sport and Dance (ICHPEP-SD)’s Journal of Research published an article focused on the consumption motives of eSports and Traditional Sports. To be specific, the article explored 15 motivational factors affecting the amount of time spent on eSports gaming through a survey sample of 515 college students and traditional sports event viewers. The result of the survey shows that the competitive nature of eSports gaming is significant in determining one’s time spent on gaming while peer pressure is another marginal factor. Subsequent analysis in the article suggests that marketers of eSports may find focusing on creating competitions among players and higher rewards for winning beneficial in expanding their industry. In addition, as peer pressure is another motivational factor, the article suggests that more emphasis shall be put on the interactive nature of games.

ESports teams invest plenty of time focusing on strategic game-play, which would ultimately decide who the victor and loser is. Games, such as League of Legends and Starcraft, put huge emphasis on strategy.


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