My script

Not too much to say while writing the script but any comments that need to be made I will highlight other than that I am segmenting it into different sections which mirrors the videos progression.

Speech in normal font

[visuals in square brackets]

{input by me}

Intro:

[visual pans of Esports stadiums filled, crowds of people]

Esports…… a term when mentioned to people can elicit multiple different reactions.

To the fans, excitement at the prospect of someone else who enjoys their hobby

[crowd cheering in excitement]

For others it could be confusion as they don’t understand the term

[swap back to more random Esports scenes doesn't need to be too complex]

Maybe even some judgment as they view it in a negative light.

Today I want to explain to you not only what this word represents but also take you on a journey from the beginning

[showcase early videos of tournaments]

to the present

[show a recent popular Esports event]

to the highs and the lows and even tell you some of my own story mixed within.

So, sit back and enjoy as I take you through...

The Rise Of Esports

[Title card appears with the words The Rise of Esports: A video Essay By Rory Tracey]

[lo-fi music in the background]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First segment (understanding):

[intro card with 'understanding' on it, music change from the first section still lo-fi]

Esports is described by The British Esports Association as 'a term used to describe competitive video gaming'

[show the article and zoom in on the quote and highlight it]

The BEA also state that where this tends to differ from normally playing video games is it's usually competitively played PvP (which stands for player vs player)

[a shot from a tournament with two teams next to each-other]

and usually has spectator aspects like traditional sports.

[show a full crown of people in a Esports stadium possible side by side with an actual sports stadium]

The article also mentions that 'Esports tournaments usually consist of amateur or professional gamers competing against one another for a cash prize'

[same as when i showcased the previous quote, zoom in and highlight it]

{This is lifted from my secondary research post with words changed to match the flow of the script}

There are many great examples from new to old of games that have an Esports scene that all have different genres, (if i feel as though terms need explaining there will be a box at the top right which will go more in depth than i might in the video)

There are games like Overwatch, paladins and Team fortress 2 which are FPS/Hero shooters which basis is focused on different abilities that can be synergized along with the core shooter mechanics

Arcade shooters like Call of Duty which is less hardcore and punishing, easy to pick-up and fast paced

Tactical shooters like Valorant, CS:GO and Rainbow six siege which may be more punishing with a higher skill curve for many different reasons

[showcase a small snippets from the trailer with a box top right with definitions of key terms] ,

League of Legends and Dota which are MOBA's, battle style arena games with abilities, similar to hero shooters in terms of having abilities

[same as the previous section, snippets and definition]

Strategy games like StarCraft which might require more managing of resources and well strategy

fighter games like Streetfighter, Tekken

Card games like Hearthstone and Magic the gathering

even games like Mario kart and Tetris have a competitive following through organized tournaments

[continue with the same process of visuals for each section]

So you know about the games but how do tournaments work?

Well typically, tournaments are held by a company or sponsor which holds a prize at the end, this can be anything of value like Money or even a car. Typically it will usually be the games company/publisher that will organize tournaments but independent league organizers are also used often. Depending on the popularity this could lead to it eventually becoming a consistent league (for example the game Overwatch has it own independent league, so does Call of Duty)

A lot of the time these leagues split and are segmented into skill levels, For instance how football is split into different league tables and some games even hold world championships. (keep in mind not all games work like this and typically it can often be up to the organization in control)

Typically it would be Country wide tournaments then into regions (North America, Europe, APAC and LATAM) and then World championships/ Best teams against the best

Examples of key organizations that hold tournaments can be: The Overwatch League, MLG (now considered an old organization), LCS (league of Legends) and ESL (considered a parent company that oversees a bunch of games)

Ok you get my point, Esports isn't just a one dimensional industry it's diverse and offers many options within itself just like how sports does but where did this all begin, well let me take you back to showcase where it all began

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

New section: The history

[new title card: The history]

For me, my love for Esports started 4 years ago, I had been playing video games for a while so this was pretty late considering they had been a key point on my life for so long.

However for it's origins we have to look much further back then that, the argument for what's considered to be the first Esports tournament is heavily contested and most consider one of the first to be a quake tournament in may 1997

[showcase some gameplay of Quake]

Quake an fps campaign shooter that influenced many fps games to this date, had a branch into multiplayer with PvP mechanics that used item drops and movement within set maps. Players would then face off against other to get the most kills either through Free for all (every player against each other) or Team death match (teams fighting other teams)

Thanks to the internet this 1997 tournament could be held online allowing 2000 participants to face one on one against one another...... this was until eventually 16 remained

These 16 were then flown down to Atlanta, Georgia to compete in an event that was watched by not only spectators but online watchers as well.

The fated competitor that won was Dennis "Thresh" Fong

[show pictures of Thresh and him wining, accompany the story with images from the tournament (if they can be found)]

and the grand prize for the someone who just beat 2000 people in a game that was considered by many the precursor of todays FPS games

A Ferrari 328 GTS previously owned by Quake programmer John D. Carmack,

[Show photos of Thresh with the car]

Quite a fine prize which highlighted the rewards that could be earned from Esports and truly showed that for some people it could be more than just a hobby

[cut to current teams lifting a huge trophy on stage then fade to black]

Well i think this is a great story and it deserves the fame it gets

To me the one that hits harder goes much further back

[Show gameplay of Spacewar]

Spacewar, this is the first game to ever have a video game tournament made around it and it's no surprise.

The gameplay included two monochrome spaceships called "the needle" and "the wedge", each controlled by a player, attempting to shoot one another while maneuvering on a two-dimensional playing field which acted as the gravity well of a star.

This is all set against the backdrop of a starfield.

Both ships can fire torpedoes that aren't affected by the pull of this star (the aim of the game being to destroy the enemy ship while not being destroyed by the enemy or the star in the middle), to balance both ships have a limited number of torpedoes along with fuel which is used up by the thrusters when they are in use.

So you now know the game but what about the tournament, how did it come about?

[Show a picture of young Stewart Brand if one could be found]

Well in 1972, Stewart brand a sports reporter for the rolling stones was writing a story focused on 'the tremendous potential of computers to unleash creativity and change society. And as far as Brand was concerned, nothing seemed to embody that potential more than video games'

[highlight the section quoted on the article]

To do this he reached out to Stanford, who at the time were one of the few schools with Spacewar, along with having one of the only machines advanced enough to run it.

[show photo of Nolan Bushnell, pong, and Atari computers]

(small history segment, the original group that developed it were originally at MIT but decided to split and go to different schools thus Spacewar ended up at Stanford with it's original concept creator Steve Russel. By pure coincidence, showed at another school an engineering student named Nolan Bushnell saw spacewar at his university and became interested. Bushnell went on to create the first coin-operated computer arcade game and start Atari Computers)

Ok history segment over

So Stewart decided after viewing them playing Spacewar to hold a tournament which took place with five students on the date October 19th 1972, so you may ask yourself what was the grandiose prize that they were competing for

"well since Rolling Stone had a key role they awarded the winning player a Years subscription to the magazine and an opportunity to be in the very article that Stewart Brand was writing however even all that according to Rolling Stone wasn't as great as the star prize, bragging rights that came with being titled 'the Intergalactic Spacewar Champion of 1972'"

{lifted from my secondary research}

So there's the prize now what about our Intergalactic Spacewar champion, Bruce Baumgart a grad student who was at Stanford AI Lab for what Rolling Stone described as 'basically, eyesight for mobile robots'.

[highlight the quote in the article]

first encountered Spacewar in the late 1960's when he studied applied mathematics at Harvard (another institute that the original group had split off too).

[show more spacewar gameplay in the background]

According to the article what most drew Bruce in was the impressive visuals. Even back then according to Rolling stone 'The backdrop looks like arbitrary dots, but it’s actually an accurate depiction of every star in the night sky above a certain magnitude of brightness,' even Bruce said that “The starfield was the real star of that game.”

As soon as he got to Stanford Bruce apparently according to the article 'adopted a

Morlock lifestyle so he’d have easier access. “I would sleep during the day, roll in at night, and work for 12 hours,”. Pretty soon Bruce was one of the best players and even 'began handicapping himself to make matches more of a challenge. Like Inigo Montoya, he would play with the controller in his non-dominant hand to give less experienced opponents a sporting chance. He even mastered steering two ships simultaneously, with a controller in each fist {lifted from secondary research post}

For me, this story brings out inner nerd it really highlights a lot of the typical practices that a lot of people do when they play video games for instance the article I'm referencing showcases the idea that many people practice easily which is not looking at the buttons while you play the article says that Baumgart became one of the best Spacewar players at Stanford. “Pretty soon, you don’t think about the buttons,” he says. “It’s like speed typing – you just look at ships on the screen and make them move where you need them to go.”

I mean this guy pioneered techniques that people have been using for generations along with staying up all night to practice and sleeping all day this guy was practically a precursor of what was to come and for me that is what highlights this stories awesomeness, not only does this showcase what Esports could become with even a crowd there to watch them the article says that Baumgart never had a match played out in front of spectators like this. “You had a gallery watching,” he said. “There was laughter, cheering, applause.” but also it was a peak into what gaming would become and that is what for me cements this story from the rest

[show a digital scan of the original newspaper]

If you are interested in reading the article I reference here or fancy reading a digital copy of the original article I will have links showcased in the description along with any sources i have used so far or will go onto use

So you now know the history lets go a little bit ahead and look at Esports popularity and growth

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Section: The growth

[New title card: The growth]

See this section is where things get difficult to pinpoint, everyone can generally point to vague reasons for Esports growth but as an industry there hasn't really been one single event or action that can easily showcase its huge popularity

Even trying to get numbers on it's growth is difficult with no concrete way of recording it's specific popularity, especially when we take into consideration we aren't talking about one single game but instead a whole group and hobby. A good comparison is the idea of trying to track the popularity and growth of sports, well sure this might be a simple comparison it works in the same way. Just like how you'd find it easier to look at football specifically and see it's growth

In recent years however it's growth can be tracked and most likely attributed to the platform Twitch

[showcase the logo]

Twitch is a streaming service that focuses on video game streaming live, including broadcasts of Esports competitions, in addition to offering music broadcasts, creative content, and "in real life" streams {lifted from Wiki}

In October 2013, the website had 45 million unique viewers, and by February 2014, it was considered the fourth-largest source of peak Internet traffic in the United States. At the same time, Justin.tv's parent company was re-branded as Twitch Interactive to represent the shift in focus – Justin.tv was shut down in August 2014. That month, the service was acquired by Amazon for US$970 million, which later led to the introduction of synergies with the company's subscription service Amazon Prime. {lifted from Wiki}

As of February 2020, it had 3 million broadcasters monthly and 15 million daily active users, with 1.4 million average concurrent users {lifted from Wiki}

In terms Esports there has been a lot of synergy between the platform and the hobby, with ESL tournaments launching on Twitch's predecessor company Justin.TV since 2009. Obviously their partnership carried over since it's change to twitch in 2011 and recently in 2020 they signed another 3 year contract. There has been tons of crossover between the two industries and because of this they end up propelling each other further into popularity. It is undeniable (in my personal opinion) that Esports growth wouldn't be nearly as huge if not for Twitch as a platform

In recent years the Covid pandemic could be a key factor when considering it's growth, with a lot of people at home and bored, having an industry that could be played mainly online with minimal consequences meant that while other sports were trying to make a recovery, Esports could continue to grow unhindered.

Now this isn't to say that there wasn't a struggle, there were many teams that suffered because of team members catching Covid. A lot of teams play internationally so being able to travel to different countries to play in tournaments has been a difficulty, with some teams instead of playing LAN (Everyone on the same network, in person) they would have to play online which made organizing difficult as often the PC's that are used in tournaments are provided by the organizers (for convenience and to prevent cheaters) so hat means players would be using their personal computers even after that playing online can result in internet issues as someone's connection might be bad mid match or they might not be able to join at all

Because of this while viewership might be larger than previous years, revenue is likely to be less than previous years

Even despite this, Esports is only growing and theirs data to prove this

-------------------------------------------------------------New section: The numbers-------------------------------------------------------------

Newzoo a quoted source for games market insights and analytics. help entertainment, technology, and media companies to target their audience, track competitors, spot opportunities, and make strategic and financial decisions.

In 2021 they released a market report on the global E-sports and streaming market which showcase interesting figures about Esports within recent years and also just have interesting knowledge that i think is cool to shar

An example of this is how 'non-gaming-related category Just Chatting was the most-watched category on Twitch in 2020, coming in at nearly 1.9 billion live hours watched, while second-place League of Legends generated roughly 1.5 billion hours watched'

To me this is crazy league has been a staple of twitch since early on and it being topped by a category mainly used for streamers to have a simple conversation with stream or even do content out in the real world is crazy

This is only the tip of the iceberg of information that this report has but I'll keep the explanation brief as some of it isn't as useful, Newzoo talked about revenue streams within the industry referencing how 'Sponsorship revenues are the foundation on which the esports market was built, so it’s no surprise that it continues to be the highest-grossing revenue stream, generating $641.0 million in 2021, or 59% of the entire market. However, this share will decrease slightly in the coming years as ticket revenues recover from COVID-19 restrictions and esports organizers and teams continue to diversify' they believe that this, along with previous points mentioned in the report is 'another sign of a healthy market'

They even kindly provided a visual representation of the revenue streams within the time they were working (mid point within 2021)

[showcase the graph given by them]

I mean look how much is gained through sponsorship money alone, it is a huge amount that showcases how much big brands have caused the industry to grow

Even considering that the other numbers alone aren't anything to laugh at with the next two factors putting in over 100 Million and over, keep in mind Newzoo themselves say these numbers don't include 'prize pools and player salaries' as they believe that while they are earnings it ends up being more towards a cost item at an industry level

They also mention how their 'The revenue numbers also exclude fan contributions to prize pools, as they would be pass-throughs to a cost center. We also exclude revenues from online gambling and betting related to esports (e.g., via BWIN, Unikrn). We do not include capital investments in esports organizations, as we think it is important to distinguish between revenues and investments. To clarify, capital investment is the activity of investing funds in a firm or enterprise to further its business objectives. The term brand investment refers to deals made by companies around brand sponsorships, marketing activations, and content licensing deals'

[Highlight the text piece within the document]

it should betaken in to consideration that there is more revenue and it has not been included here and therefore proves the point that Esports is only continuing to grow. this is even considering the fact that in 2020 the revenue streams were lower than in 2019, 2020 ended with around 947.1 Million in revenue growth. Lower than 2019 which boasted a 10.4 million extra, bringing it to 957.5

In regards to this year and last year, With lockdown many new viewers of E-sports were made with a large portion coming from the live streaming market, this is referenced in the report 'lockdown measures led to many new viewers last year—and will continue to do so into 2021.' However with this also comes with the fact that other factors took the forefront in different areas, the report states that 'audience numbers were most affected by growth markets across the Middle East and Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America, whose ongoing infrastructure developments are empowering resident'

• Many other factors are mentioned along the ones mentioned previously including 'the strong audience growth is mobile, which has entered the upper echelon of esports and is driving demand in markets like India and Brazil.' it also could be related to the idea that according to NewZoo 'Esports is also getting more visible on live-streaming platforms in the East and West alike, increasing discoverability' another obvious point is the idea of 'The interruption of physical sports last year, as well as continued strong cross-promotion between games and esports, also catalyzed demand'

{this I lifted straight from report and my research post about the report}

[Add this to the video]

It's unprecedented that these numbers showcase it's insane growth and even from a global market we get really interesting numbers, however this is not it, we can look further to specific countries.

An article by the BEA titled 'New reports explore the size of UK E-sports' references two sources of research, one of those mentioned was from a survey group called YouGov that had it's own sports division which according to the BEA found that 'The report states that four million people in Britain have watched Esports, though awareness of competitive gaming is low compared to other territories.' and also referenced that 'of those four million (7% of British adults) 57% are keen to do so again.' {Taken from my research post}

Now that' was a lot of information so I'm sure that some of it went over your head, therefore if you need to look over the information yourself please check the links below for all my sources. After looking at global market growth I think it's important to look further and look at the audience

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

New section: The audience

When looking at the E-sports audience I want to feature a second market report made by Nielsen holdings an American, information, data and market measurement firm. Using surveys and analyzing the data they had gathered in the U.S, Germany, U.K and France as to maximize the investments by understanding the fans.

The report states that their 'new research narrows in on the 13 to 40 year old E-sports audience, who have proven to be reliably knowledgeable about and engaged in the E-sports sector – and in turn, provide the most valuable insight into this passionate fan base.'

The report states that 7 out of 10 E-sports fans are male and that males have a tendency to Live stream E-sports content more frequently than their female counterparts. However the report states that characterizing all E-sports fans as millennial males is too simple as nearly 1 in 4 female fans still stream at least weekly

I find these figures interesting as it showcases how E-sports has become more than just something to be enjoyed by young male nerds that don't play sport. Instead a good percentage enjoy sport and not only that it features a broad age range and not only males but instead females as well. This shows the audience growth within the industry even throughout its small time span.

Looking way smaller I did my own research just through a small questionnaire among friends and found interesting results, even among people who play video games the enjoyment of E-sports seems to still be a niche

If you want to see each question that i asked to my friends and the answers i got feel free to check out my research post i made around the topic on my EPQ Blog linked below as i will just be referring to the interesting data i got from it

• Out of the 11 people I asked only 1 said that they didn't play video games

• I asked what gender the person answering the form was to fine a Gender split, the gender split was majority male with 72% (Eight) Male, 18.2% (Two) Female and 9.1% (one)That preferred not to to say

• The one who doesn't play video games was a male - I feel like that goes against our statistics but obviously my small friend group and sample size isn't representative so take that with a grain of salt (more like a pile than a single grain)

• Did the same as gender but with Age and I had a good age range split going from 54.5% (Six) being 17-21, 9.1% (One) Being 22-30, 9.1% (One) 36+ and 27.3% (Three) being 11-16

• this is where it gets interesting after asking 'how often do you play video games on a typical day' with a good wide split that can really only be fully understood with the image in front of you as we see no real majority with each section having one or two answers (the max being 3 at 4+ hours)

• While it was surprising initially that only one male doesn't play video games the trends start to become more apparent when we look at the fact that here Males play much more often with both females and the prefer not to say playing

1. Female - 1-2 Hours

2. Female - less than 1 hour

3. prefer not to say - 1-2 Hours

• Where as males consistently hit numbers above that with 3 males playing 4+ hours

• The next question I asked was about the system you play on, unsurprising all but one of the people who play video games use a console with overlap with Pc and laptops and really small overlap with Mobile Phone gaming (The one prefer not to say played only on a pc)

• I next asked how often they watched E-sports 27.3% (3) never, 36.4% (4) Rarely, 18.2% (2) Sometimes, 9.1% (1) occasionally, 9.1% (1) Often

• Then i asked that if they answered that they do watch E-sports what platform, i got 8 responses with 50/50 split of Twitch and YouTube obviously because of overlap with people using both platforms

• Next I asked how far they agreed with the statement 'E-sports competitions are real sports' despite what this pie chart says there was only one strongly disagree (someone answered wrong, I can tell because in the next question where I ask them to explain why they gave an answer that is meant to agree with the statement) with 3 neutrals, and 7 positives split among strongly agree and agree, it is a 3-3 split without the person who answered wrong

• My last question was about their reasoning and why they chose the options they did, here are my favorite responses:

• Agree: Sport to me, isn't necessarily always physical. It can mental too. Like pool or snooker for an example, its not exactly physically demanding but it does require precision and somewhat of a strategy. I think that goes for E-sports as well. Depending on the game, it may depend precision, but most of the time it requires strategy and communication especially if its a team game.

• Strongly agree: E-sports is just as valid as any sport. Professional gamers often have a shorter life span in terms of their careers. 2-3 years as things like Arthritis and carpal tunnel are all real injuries they risk just like a professional football player risks injury although some don’t recognize E-sports as a real sport that notion is quickly changing

• Strongly disagree: I would argue that sport should involve some sort of taxing physical activity - for example motor-sports are not sports in my opinion

I find all of this data interesting as even though almost everyone in the list plays video games (averaging mostly an hour plus an average day minimum) that E-sports is still polarizing, and highly contested as whether it's a sport or not. Now in my opinion whi8ch is featured on this survey is that rather than letting it sit itself under an existing idea we should be looking at the possibility that it holds it's own as something independent.

Why should we limit it to just being considered a sport when looking at the figures and data it would much rather be suited to it's own term with it's own separate parts (much like sports)

And that's where the difficulty lies, where do we draw the line between it's just a comparison between two industries and the idea that one goes under the other - Now i could go over this topic forever and I'm sure you could find plenty of opinions and videos with data by a simple google search so i will leave that topic there.

So where do we look next? well how about we look through the lens of the teams and the players as what's a game without people competing

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The teams and players ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

E-sports is unique in it's variety of players and teams, much different to sports it's rare to find geo-location based tournaments (teams based on locations rather than an organization) well there are major examples (mainly the Call of Duty league and the Overwatch league both mentioned previously) compared to a lot of other big league they are a small minority which is overshadowed by the focus on E-sports Orgs (organizations).

These groups are huge brands that usually start of with an initial roster from their origin country and then branch of by gaining players from different regions.

They are huge marketable companies that mainly can be known worldwide, by having unique names and logos it makes them easy to sell merch. Having a non-geo located org means that you can often gain fans from regions that don't live there and instead represent and love your org for the teams and players rather than just because they support a country

The most famous example by far in the western world being Faze clan - Noticeable by even just their name alone they are an org that has been into E-sports since MGL days and got their come up from one game specifically Call of duty.

While many orgs may have the same name recognition that Faze have not so many have undergone the change that faze have truly using social media and YouTube to their advantage they focused on Content Creation along with E-sports easily able to boost their following through that and now they are a staple name...... hell even DC (yes I'm referring to Batman Dc) did a collaboration with them, initially as a sponsor and partner putting the batman logo on some of their jerseys and merch but now it has evolved into them featuring in a comic which even to me is crazy.

Now the quality of that comic is to be debated as many might cringe a bit reading some of the page

[possibly showcase a page and read it]

Even better faze are still around and doing e-sports even after finding huge success focused mainly on content, for instance last year in R6 E-sports (my main area of expertise) they won a Major (huge tournament with the top teams of all four regions that year) and that was from not winning a major competition at all before then

Less specifically Orgs also have the advantage of having multiple teams in multiple games, and it allows them to not be locked in to a single location or region, for instance Faze an NA based org have a Latin America E-sports game.

Now when referring to orgs I recommend doing your own research as each game is different (like in sports) and often there's so much information that I could never cover it properly in one single video but I can speak broadly and talk about a game or Orgs that I know about. That is why i refer to R6 a lot as it falls under what I know the majority about

If we look deeper we can look at the players, many players can work for an Org that represent a different country and often depending on performance can be swapped around a lot (much like transfer windows). A lot of the time this will be down to a coach and analyst but there has been times when the more corporate side have stepped in and removed a team.

An example of this recently is Team Empire (A Russian org that almost won the highest achievement within R6 E-sports) recently dropped 4 players straight from their team and moved themselves out of the Qualifiers this season. This was a huge hock to the community and honestly a rare event that nobody saw coming (if you are interested in this please go check out a video made by a creator called CaliberJacob who focuses on R6 E-sports news and is a current games analyst, the link will be in the description)

So what do typical teams look like? Well the mainline teams usually have a team of players that's the main roster (number is dependent on the game) typically they all play different roles and specialties which depending on the team can have a leader in game making choices as to what to do. This can be followed by a coach and an analyst who work hand in hand to teach and improve the teams, sometimes you can have Substitute players (only one or two never a whole team usually) and that can be rare as sometimes a coach will step in to play instead

Now like most things this can be dependent on the game and all things will be decided by the people who make the game they all play, because unlike most sports, E-sports are the mercy of the developers, they decided when to change the game and what changes to make and his often can damage or help a team. This is prevalent in a lot of newer E-sports that are Hero shooters as most of the time there's a lot of balancing (a change made to make something less strong or more strong depending on the circumstance) and sometimes developers add completely new content that a team needs to learn. like I stated previously they are all at the mercy of the game developers, now obviously pro-players hold a lot of weight due to them being the best of the best and usually they have a following which gives social media attention but sometimes it isn't enough

This is ultimately the issue with E-sports at the moment, there is no protection or union for these players, mostly they are young (some 16 and younger) gamers looking for a chance to make it big, there is no support if they sign a contract they didn't read or get dropped randomly from their organization. If they play bad then their job is at risk and it can be a lot and sadly that's the nature of E-sports there is no party to be un-biased because overall nobody can be because outside forces don't hold any power.

Looking past the team are the players, mostly young with a lot of players entering the scene 18-19 as it's where the legality of age for certain games are. (Buhgha a Pro Fortnite player, was 17 when he won $3,000,000 in Prize Money during the Fortnite world cup) they mainly retire during their late 30's however many older pros have continued into their 40's.

While they do earn a fair bit and high end players definitely don't struggle for finance a lot of the profit can come from social media and content creation rather than just prize money.

After they retire there is still plenty of options for E-sports players, content creation through Twitch and YouTube has been the most popular but there are also avenues like going into Casting/commentating or maybe working as a coach for your team instead of a player

Certainly you gain fame, many players often depending on skill level will form a fanbase just based on them which can be crazy, this can be almost certain with the best E-sports players. It is hard to pin down the best E-sports player as it's like finding the best sports player, but one name does come to mind when considering one of the most famous games of all time LoL (League of Legends) and that would be 'Faker' sometimes referred to as "The Unkillable Demon King" by Korean fans Faker has won 3 World Championships (2013, 2015, 2016) and 2 Mid-Season Invitationals (2016, 2017), and has 10 combined LCK and Champions Korea titles which is almost unheard of and is definitely the most popular within his region of South Korea

Now I've been going a long time so lets speed this along a bit, zooming out from all this after looking this deep. We should have a look at the effect of E-sports on the world currently

~~~~~~~~~~~~~E-sports and the world~~~~~~~~~~~~~

it is undoubtable that E-sports has had an effect on the worldwide game industry with many game publishers deciding that E-sports is something they should focus on more, with games like Valorant made to be competitive as it's designed to be a hybrid of Hero and tactical shooter reminiscing CSGO and Overwatch combined. This showcases that E-sports has had an effect on the industry of video games but not only that now it's having an effect on the outside world, for instance recently the common wealth games has added an E-sports section near the end of the games it is holding three categories and is the first of it's kind featuring no medals as it seems to be a trial period testing the response of younger audiences. Looking into more serious consequences China's recent limitations on young people online could be viewed as a direct consequence of the growth of E-sports within the Asian market, Asia makes up 50% of viewership within E-sports and china has a huge part to play. Because of this the increasing worry is that their children may form an addiction to being online (that claim can hold as much merit as you choose to believe) and so they choose to restrict their online consumption through restrictions limiting them only allowed to play between 8pm and 9pm on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and public holidays.

This showcases how much E-sports is ready to effect the world and from here it can only get more interesting. So next time you hear the word E-sports try and learn as much as you can from the situation and open up to the idea of giving it a shot........

thanks for coming on this journey with me and this has been The story of E-sports