<aside> đź‘‹ Please feel free to subscribe to my newsletter or follow me at @blakeir

</aside>

Initially published on Medium — July 22, 2015


For my 12th birthday, I received Xbox Live and Call Of Duty 2 for the Xbox 360. My friends and I played online together daily. We quickly became exposed to the competitive scene, and started to play “clan” matches regularly. My dream, at the time, was to become a professional gamer. To this day, I still feel more upset about not “clutching” up in certain Call of Duty matches than I do about missing game-winning shots in intramural basketball games. My dreams of becoming a professional gamer halted when I went to college; however, that has not stopped me from attempting to fund the future of eSports.

What is esports?

Competitive gaming is not a new concept. If you have ever been to an arcade, you have likely seen strangers and friends competing on games like Street Fighter, Dance Dance Revolution, etc. Over the past 20 years there has been unprecedented growth in the industry of eSports.

There are several key innovations and milestones that contributed to this explosive growth. The invention of personal computers and gaming consoles resulted in Local Area Network (LAN) parties, where people could play and compete locally. Furthermore, the introduction of the internet enabled people to compete with individuals and teams globally. Naturally, this has led to countless opportunities for tournaments, both online and offline. The ability to live-stream and upload your gameplay allows hundreds of thousands to tune in regularly to watch matches and scrimmages.

As tournaments started to become more popular, it became increasingly clear that more formal business organizations needed to exist to organize these matches and tournament. These organizations range from: Major League Gaming/Gamebattles, ESEA, FaceIt, Gfinity, etc. Each of these organizations has helped propel and power eSports.

I highly recommend watching this short documentary by PBS, if you are interested in learning more about the world of eSports. To summarize, within eSports there are several genres that competitive gaming can be sorted into:

Shooters and MOBA’s are heavily focused on teamwork and team coordination. In contrast, real-time strategy and fighting games are typically individuals competing against one another. Each of these genres of eSports is incredibly large; however, MOBA’s and Shooters are really leading the charge currently. Specifically, Counter Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, and League of Legends.

Why is eSports so compelling?