A Powerful Movement Imagine a crowd of over 18,000 people all packed inside a venue, waiting for their favorite teams to step on stage and battle for a trophy (Blum). However, in this scenario the teams are not battling with your average basketball or hockey puck; they are battling with keyboards and mice. This dream became a reality when a popular esports game, League of Legends, sold out Madison Square Garden in New York City for the North American championship game. Nonetheless, success should not be defined by only one big time event. The next few years for esports are crucial and could make or break the entire industry if done wrong. There are a lot of successful people who have invested in the esports way of life, but that does not excuse
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Most professional gamers are on the internet all the time, leading to the fans always being able to reach out to them. From my own experiences, I know that having a connection with someone and truly being able to relate to them has made me more interested in understanding their lives. It is the player to fan connection that can generate long-term fans for the industry as a whole. Esports needs supporters who are going to be with them in the long run if they ever want to be successful. Luckily, the age demographic for esports is quite young; sixty-seven percent of the esports population is under age thirty-four (Bacon, 23). The percentage of young people interested in esports is staggering. The vast majority of these young people grew up with the connectivity of the internet, a privilege that no other major entertainment industry has had the opportunity of rising up with. This gives esports the edge because they are taking away the younger demographic that the traditional entertainment industry has been so accustomed …show more content…
Esports viewers have steadily increased by an average of twenty-one percent each year since 2012; in 2012 the viewer count was at a little above fifty-five million people, but by 2014 there were a staggering eighty-nine million people tuning in for the live events (Casselman). With more people watching esports events every year, the amount of hours watched also increases. Advertisers love the increasing amount of fans and hours watched, resulting in their product branching out to more people. 3.7 billion hours of esports were watched in 2014 and that number is increasing astronomically every year. The viewers of the gaming industry 's biggest event, League of Legends World Championship Series, is second only to the Super Bowl’s viewer count of 112.2 million people (Casselman). The entire market itself is predicted to grow forty-three percent in the next three years (Bacon). This opens up new deals to be made for organizations, investors, sponsors, advertisers, and players. The biggest deal of all had to be when Amazon bought out Twich.tv for 970 million dollars. Twitch.tv is a way for gamers to connect with fans through streaming gaming content and interacting with them in a chat room. The site boasts a viewer count of over 155 million active users per month; in addition, there are on average 100 million users who are introduced to the streaming platform each
Most professional gamers are on the internet all the time, leading to the fans always being able to reach out to them. From my own experiences, I know that having a connection with someone and truly being able to relate to them has made me more interested in understanding their lives. It is the player to fan connection that can generate long-term fans for the industry as a whole. Esports needs supporters who are going to be with them in the long run if they ever want to be successful. Luckily, the age demographic for esports is quite young; sixty-seven percent of the esports population is under age thirty-four (Bacon, 23). The percentage of young people interested in esports is staggering. The vast majority of these young people grew up with the connectivity of the internet, a privilege that no other major entertainment industry has had the opportunity of rising up with. This gives esports the edge because they are taking away the younger demographic that the traditional entertainment industry has been so accustomed …show more content…
Esports viewers have steadily increased by an average of twenty-one percent each year since 2012; in 2012 the viewer count was at a little above fifty-five million people, but by 2014 there were a staggering eighty-nine million people tuning in for the live events (Casselman). With more people watching esports events every year, the amount of hours watched also increases. Advertisers love the increasing amount of fans and hours watched, resulting in their product branching out to more people. 3.7 billion hours of esports were watched in 2014 and that number is increasing astronomically every year. The viewers of the gaming industry 's biggest event, League of Legends World Championship Series, is second only to the Super Bowl’s viewer count of 112.2 million people (Casselman). The entire market itself is predicted to grow forty-three percent in the next three years (Bacon). This opens up new deals to be made for organizations, investors, sponsors, advertisers, and players. The biggest deal of all had to be when Amazon bought out Twich.tv for 970 million dollars. Twitch.tv is a way for gamers to connect with fans through streaming gaming content and interacting with them in a chat room. The site boasts a viewer count of over 155 million active users per month; in addition, there are on average 100 million users who are introduced to the streaming platform each