eSports: a new industry

Abstract

Research background: At the beginning of this century, the eSports industry was not yet a major player although it already existed as a niche of video and computer games. The importance and interest only began to increase with the rise of the internet and its infrastructure. Especially among the younger generation, eSports, today, has a significant meaning. Worldwide, professional players duel each other in countless tournaments online and offline and are enthusiastically celebrated by their millions of fans. Purpose of the article: The purpose of this paper is to analyze how eSports has developed in recent years since its first boom phase as well as to analyze its growth factors and how it has benefited from the COVID-19 pandemic compared to traditional competitive sports. Methods: The global eSports revenues and prize money values are analyzed. The first step is defining the eSports term. The second is looking at the development of eSports financials since its first boom and onward. The COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts are then looked at. Finally, growth factors for the increasing numbers are analyzed. Findings & Value added: The findings show that eSports has gained significant importance in recent years. In particular, the strong increase in global eSports revenue and the associated increase in players’ prize money clearly show that eSports will continue to gain importance and economic strength in the future.

Professional Gaming and Pro-Gamers: What Do We Know So Far? A Systematic Review

“…A key trend to note is that academic interest in pro-gaming piqued in the last 10 years, and it is only since 2020 that most studies surfaced (see Supplementary material, Appendix C for year-wise article distribution). Rising research in esports is due to the pandemic that disrupted traditional sporting events creating fertile grounds for esports, the digital nature of which acted as a tremendous competitive outlet during the crisis (Block & Hack, 2021). Several sports organizations and their sponsors ventured into esports to avoid loss and maintain their brand value during the lockdown (Ke & Wagner, 2022).…”

Risk Issues in Esports Events: A Proposal for a Research Framework

“…Defining Esports and its Significance: According to Wagner (2006), and Block and Haack (2021), a specific esports definition does not exist. However, Block and Haack (2021, p.2) did mention that "the German esports association "export-Bund Deutschland e.V."…”

“…Esports events started to gain popularity around the world and it can already be introduced as one of the sporting events in which players can play on any platform whether online or offline, professional or nonprofessional, individual or teams. The industry and a few researchers describe esports events as a fastgrowing industry (Block and Haack, 2021;Yusoff and Basri, 2021;Lim et al, 2022;Willingham, 2018;Yun, 2018;Chikish et al, 2019;Holden et al, 2017). Even though the study on esports events is unpopular and still under-researched, many countries have acknowledged esports and are benefiting from the industry (Parshakov and Zavertiaeva, 2016).…”

Constructing Authentic Spectatorship at an Esports Bar

“…With esports able to be played and produced over the internet without the involved personnel needing to be co-located, many esports leagues and tournaments have continued during the pandemic where their traditional sports counterparts have not. This attribute has been referred to by numerous writers, both in news media (Newman et al 2020) and academic outlets (Fakazli 2020; Block and Haack 2021), as the main reason why esports continues to stay profitable despite restrictions on public gatherings. However, these accounts often overlook the many other canceled esports events that were unable to make the transition.…”