Is It a Sport or Not?: A Glimpse Into the World of Competitive Video Gaming

Kay TurnerNov 27, 2016

To many people, the idea that video games could be sports rather than mere games, is a difficult idea to swallow. The problem could be that video games often appear too easy, and they seem to come with none of the trappings of real sports. For instance, is there any actual training that goes on, the way it does for football or tennis, skeptics ask. They look around and find that there appears to be no legitimate Olympics for video games, and they feel that they’ve confirmed their suspicions. Yet, each one of these suspicions is provably wrong.

Mind games

Many of the shortcomings that video games are criticized for could apply to activities such as chess as well. As with chess, video games belong to a new sporting category — mind games. It includes activities such as bridge, poker, draughts and Risk, among others, all sports that are demonstrably real . Those who devote themselves to these games of skill have access to coaches, for instance. They can hope to become superstars, and win fanatic fan followings. Any way that you may look at e-sports, they have a legitimate claim to being real.

There are packed stadiums

Madison Square Garden, the world center for prestigious sports such as heavyweight boxing, now hosts major video game events with thousands of screaming fans attending. It’s the same in developed gaming markets such as South Korea. FIFA World Cup stadiums in that country host regular, full-blown e-sporting matches. Even a decade ago, the sport attracted crowds no larger than a dozen or so. Everything’s changed today. It isn’t even just hardcore gamers who show an interest. Just as nonathletic people love watching sports on TV, non-gamers often buy a large-screen TV for gaming matches.

There are big-ticket sponsorships

Legitimate e-sports stars earn $2 million sponsorship deals from well-known brands such as Credit Karma, Arby’s and Buffalo Wild Wings. There are revenue-sharing contracts for team members, and attorneys who specialize in e-sports.

They even have their own regulatory body and doping scandals

If you aren’t sure how one would dope for a mind game, you do it with a drug like Adderall that focuses the mind to unnatural levels. E-sporting events are overseen by their own regulatory body — the WESA. It standardizes matches and dope-tests participants before major tournaments.

If you still scoff at how e-sports aren’t physical

The Olympics aren’t the only worldwide competition of record for physical sports. If you haven’t heard of it, there’s something called the ESPN X Games — the Olympiad for extreme physical sports. It features sports such as super pipe skiing, rally cross riding and aggressive in-line skating. There is such daredevilry involved, the fans of these games scoff at the tameness of the original Olympics. They don’t seem physical enough. It’s always easy to question the legitimacy of something that’s new.

By every yardstick, e-sports do measure up as real. Ironically, they now feature on the X Games. The 100m sprint, on the other hand, doesn’t.

Cameron Parkinson is a huge fan of E-Sports and has a dream of giving up his computer store job and becoming a full-time streamer. He writes about gaming and technology in his informative articles.