Who would have believed, just five or 10 years ago, that people would earn more than $1 billion per year playing video games in front of stadium crowds and huge television audiences? Paid to play video games - some would say esports champions are living the dream.

In 2016, esports had an estimated audience of 293 million, and in 2019, the number climbed to an amazing 453 million. And while COVID-19 may have disrupted almost every industry worldwide, the global esports community has continued to thrive.

Real sports tournaments across the world are currently on hold, so many people have turned to esports, and by 2022, the global net-worth of this rapidly-growing giant is expected to be around $1.8 billion.

Origins


Esports hasn’t just popped up out of nowhere: Way back in 1972, Stanford University was the proud host of the very first esports tournament, although not under that name. Spacewar was the name of the game and, in those wholesome times, the grand prize was an annual subscription to Rolling Stone magazine.

While we’re on the interstellar theme, the first Space Invaders video game championship was held in 1980. Ten thousand participants gathered together to stop pixelated monsters from invading Earth, garnering widespread media attention in the process.

Eager to get in on the growing action in the 80s, several companies started recording video game high scores. One of these companies was Twin Galaxies, which promoted video games and published high scores and game records.

The 90s saw the rise of the World Wide Web, and as it does everyone else, the internet brought together gamers from all around the world. This set the stage for competitive online gaming, but it also gave PC games more space to grow their popularity. Soon enough, companies such as Nintendo and Blockbuster began sponsoring world gaming championships.

The first high-profile esports competition was the Red Annihilation Tournament in 1997, where almost two thousand competitors battled in Quake’s virtual arenas to win a 1987 Ferrari 328 GTS.

But the title that forever changed the gaming landscape was Starcraft. It came out in 1998 and, along with its Brood War expansion, stood far apart from the crowd. To win in Starcraft, you had to engage in real-time strategy gameplay, relying on your brains much more than your reflexes and muscle-memory. The 2010 sequel, Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty, continues to live up to the standard, offering even more strategic possibilities. As a result, the Starcraft II World Championship Series is one of the most prestigious esports competitions, with over 50 million views and over 300,000 followers on Twitch TV.

2020


Social distancing has become the new norm, and with it, alternative sources of entertainment to fill out everyone’s newfound free time have experienced something of a boom. Esports is no different: This increase in its popularity has filled the current social void by connecting viewers and players in real-time. According to a survey of 2000 people, more than two-thirds of 35 year-olds in the UK were either playing games or watching streams during the lockdown. What’s more, over 50% were open to watching gaming or esports instead of traditional sports.

Unlike it did practically everything else, COVID-19 didn’t slow down esports product launches. According to Seventy-Six Capital, a sports and tech investment company, more than 150 startups dealing with esports, sports tech, and esport-betting appeared during the pandemic.

Even traditional sports are setting sail into the sea of esports. Or at least trying to. Organizations such as NASCAR and the Premier League have started holding virtual events in sports video games, where professional athletes compete in the virtual world. The ePremier League garnered a meager 52,000 viewers, but the eNASCAR iRacing Series was followed by 1.3 million viewers. Still, such events are no match for original esports games - Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Overwatch, Dota 2, and League of Legends all count their followers in the tens of millions.

The Negative Effects of COVID-19 on Esports Events


Although the lockdown produced a significant increase in esports viewership, there were some setbacks during the pandemic. Esports may be played digitally, however, live events are a crucial part of the esports experience. These meetups commonly include music shows, merchandise and activity booths, and most importantly, a live audience to generate palpable energy and excitement.

Although many esports events have been moved online, others have been canceled, as online hosting lacks the sales opportunities and extra content live events provided before the pandemic. This, unfortunately, has led to millions of dollars of lost revenue. It may not be a huge hit for the esports industry, seeing as how it’s worth billions, but it does present an obstacle for the growth of esports in the coming months, or perhaps years.

Furthermore, the pandemic has created challenges and setbacks for individual esports teams, as many of them had to rework their training routines. This change in scheduling and in-person training can cause lapses in performance, as teams have to get used to working together remotely. Still, this usually depends on the individual team and its training methods, and many players were happy to report that the transition to remote training had no detrimental effect on their performance.

How Far Has Esports Evolved?


The success of esports tournaments in the 2000s attracted sponsors, who in turn, bolstered the prize pools by a significant amount; the infrastructure around competitive gaming had no choice but to follow.

From 2010 until now, the esports industry has evolved in all sorts of ways, of which perhaps the most important is the introduction of MOBAs or Multiplayer Online Battle Arena games: a big hit in the industry, they incorporate strategy-based combat with RPG elements.

The most popular MOBA games are League of Legends and Dota 2: each amassed a veritable throng of followers, with League of Legends boasting a staggering 115 million players.

League of Legends


League of Legends is a multiplayer online battle arena game, where two teams compete against each other on a three-laned map. Every team consists of five out of 152 selectable champions, which all fill one of the five available roles: Toplane, Midlane, ADC, Support, and Jungler. Each character has four different abilities and is required to use variable tactics to contribute to their team’s victory. The players of each role compete against the same roles from the opposing team. The goal of the game is to beat the other team by destroying their lane buildings, penetrating the other team’s base, and obliterating the opposing Nexus.

As an esports game, League of Legends employs 7,130 professional players and is ranked number two on the list of the most popular esports games.

Dota 2


Dota 2 was released by Valve in 2013 and is a MOBA game with 3,873 professional players. The game follows the MOBA five-on-five player principle, featuring outstanding graphics and offering tactical gameplay opportunities. Players can choose from 110 different heroes, along with five different playable roles.

Although Dota 2 held a relatively small number of tournaments, its annual championships offered the biggest prize money in the industry.

Overwatch


In 2016, Blizzard Entertainment created Overwatch, and the game was a successful symbiosis between first-person shooters and MOBA games. The game is played from a first-person perspective, but you can choose from many heroes with different skill sets suited to specific roles, all carrying various weapons. The game has 3,942 professional players and is among the five most popular esports games.

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive


Another game with an enormous following is Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. The matches are played with two teams of five players competing as either terrorists or counter-terrorists. Unlike in other shooter games, a player that falls during battle can’t re-enter the game instantly. Instead, they can get back to their team in the next round of the match.

Compared to other first-person shooter games, CS:GO has a pretty demanding training phase. Due to the large number of tactical positions on different maps, as well as guns and grenades that all have a different rate of fire, CS:GO is extremely demanding even for experienced players. The game has over 13,029 professional players and is currently one of the most popular esports games, if not the most popular.

Summary

What was once a small industry held up by volunteers and unpaid amateur players, today is a professional sports giant employing thousands of players on full-time salaries, with high-profile sponsors and widespread media coverage.

No one expected the heights esports would reach in just a few decades. Even during the pandemic, esports continues its rise and so we must ask ourselves: what is the next step in the evolution of esports?

*Article submitted by Daniel Korolija