Tencent leading China’s charge
While many people still regard League of Legends and King of Glory merely as video games for children and nerds, a group of dedicated gamers, entrepreneurs and scholars treat them as a sport that deserves to be granted Olympic status. Although that debate still rages, the fact that e-sports is undergoing remarkable growth cannot be denied.
As e-sports gains more kudos with not only the gaming community but also in the corporate world, more and more competitions and promotions are springing up around the world. And now even academics are dissecting and debating the merits of e-sports. It even had a conference all to itself recently — the China-US Exchange Forum On E-sports, which took place in September in the game lab of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the United States.
Discussing the topic of “positive values of e-sports”, the forum was attended by industry leader Tencent Interactive Entertainment, the finest minds of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and other industry professionals, including ESPN. As players, tournament organizers, community numbers, broadcasters, commentators and publishers, they aimed to communicate the ways of supporting social values in e-sports.
“In fact, as a sport, e-sports has all the spirit that other sports contain,” said Sage Huang, general manager of the League of Legends product department. “Such as: mutual understanding, longstanding friendship and solidarity, and that participation itself is more important than results. Never give up, never give in and never lose hope.
“E-sports has developed extremely quickly and it will be developing even quicker in the future. It will affect more and more people and also should take on more social responsibilities. We hope to work together with all e-sports practitioners to introduce more valuable and meaningful aspects to the e-sports community, so as to make it a warmer one.”
The same idea that e-sports, like any other sport, has its own creative and positive values was also embraced by scholars.
“I want to speak today about the power of playing, and competing, together,” said TL Taylor, professor of Comparative Media Studies at MIT. “The value of participation, social connection and competition together have been present since the earliest days of e-sports. Indeed they are some of what drove the creation of this entirely new sporting arena we now have.
“Our challenge, as e-sports grows and becomes a mainstream media product, is to not lose sight of its creative, positive potential; to make sure to not only retain the value of competition but expand it to include even more people; to foster inclusion and diversity in our spaces; to build systems that grow healthy competitive communities; to leverage the positive power of participation in this new are- na of culture.
“I myself know of some games that advocated positive values, in which the players could not only have fun but also experience competition and learn collaboration,” said Lu Jingchao, dean of announcing & hosting art at Communication University of China. “Pierre De Coubertin’s ideal — ‘For each individual, sport is a possible source for inner improvement’ — encouraged him to found the modern Olympic Games. Today’s e-sports will also greatly promote the educational functions through entertainment.”
Despite e-sports’ progress, there are still many who refuse to accept that it can be categorized as a sport, let alone acknowledging any role it may have as a vehicle of positivity.
E-sports promoters believe that education is the most effective way to fight this perception.
Mars Hou, the general manager of the self-developed marketing department and integrated marketing department of IEG, said education will be key to promoting the positive values of the e-sports community.
“As the leading brand in the industry, we are willing to help those e-sports-training institutions, colleges and universities which have strength and vision, sharing with them our 10-plus years of operational business skills, helping them gradually form an e-sports talent cultivation system to maximize players’ potential and give e-sports a long-term development,” Hou said.
“E-sports’ socially positive values cannot form overnight. That will require every trade partner’s persistence and efforts,” he added. “But as the Chinese saying goes, ‘Lofty towers are all built up from the ground’. With the people’s power, the e-sports business will see a rapid development.”
The State General Administration of Sport of China (GASC) recognized electronic gaming as the country’s 99th sport in 2003, and has since organized a number of national e-sports competitions and exhibitions, while the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) announced in April that it will include e-sports as an official medal event at the 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province.
The OCA said the decision reflects “the rapid development and popularity of this new form of sports participation among the youth.” It was considered the boldest step yet toward mainstream recognition of competitive gaming.
“E-sports has been included in the Asian Games in 2022 and is expected to become an official sport of the Olympic Games in the near future,” said Hou. “As can be seen, as part of sport, e-sports is more and more integrated into mainstream society. I also know that in the United States, NBA Union has established its own e-sports league.”
China is at the forefront of the global e-sports revolution, with Tencent leading the boom’s corporate pack. The Chinese technology giant has become one of the most influential and profitable e-sports companies in the world since making its first explorative steps into the business in 2006.
Tencent believes China is capable of becoming the world center of e-sports. According to Tencent, the live broadcasts of LPL (League of Legends Pro League) were viewed five billion times by 43 million spectators. In 2017, the live broadcasts of KPL (King of Glory Pro League) were viewed 2.68 billion times in the spring season.
“Tencent e-sports contains about six brand games, such as MOBA (multiplayer online battle arena games), FPS (first-person shooter), and the other seven core occupation games such as LPL, KPL and CFPL. These form a sound basis for the e-sports tournament, with over 170 million users in total among them,” said Mars Hou, general manager of the self-developed marketing department and integrated marketing department of IEG.
“Take LPL (the top-flight professional league for League of Legends) in China, for example. Its 2016 viewership was more than five billion, the total timescale reached 840 million hours, and the independent viewers of the finals numbered over 43 million.”
Gaming competitions have existed for amateurs since the ’70s. Arguably the first e-sports event took place in Stanford University in 1972, when students battled each other in the game Spacewar for a grand prize of
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a year’s subscription to Rolling Stone magazine.
However, it’s a radically different scenario now, with the global market for e-sports totalling an estimated $750 million in 2015, nearly half of that from Asia, led by China and South Korea. Some analysts are boldly predicting e-sports will generate nearly $2 billion by 2018.
According to John Lasker, vice-president of digital media programming at ESPN, offering e-sports content across ESPN platforms shines a light on a formerly niche culture, but one that has been growing exponentially in recent years.
It also brings a new-found appreciation for the gamers and their skills, he added, including the physical and mental training they go through, and the dedication necessary to reach the professional level.
“I believe we can see that in recent years the global e-sports industry is developing very fast,” said Sage Huang, general manager of the League of Legends product department. “No sport has ever been able to achieve such growth, thanks to the internet and the rapid development of science and technology.”
Mars Hou,