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Competitive Gaming Hits the Mainstream
thegamebiz writes "Amped eSports has a recap of the 60 minutes segment profiling gaming icon Jonathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel, while also providing commentary on the effect it could have on the business as a whole. From the article: 'As millions of Americans sat with eyes affixed to their televisions during the second week of the NFL playoffs, a different type of sport was being birthed into the public spotlight merely a channel away ... It's time to wake up, America. eSports has hit the spotlight and with it comes the realization of a dream that has existed in the mind of every child since Fred Savage took his brother to California for a Nintendo tournament in The Wizard. Professional Gamer is now a valid career path.'"
'As millions of Americans sat with eyes affixed to their televisions during the second week of the NFL playoffs, a different type of sport was being birthed into the public spotlight merely a channel away...'
How does millions of people watching another program on at the same time help the cause?
It just seems stupid to me. Gaming is very much about the gamer and his/her experience. Making it be about the audience seems like it'd turn gaming into nothing more than a puppet show. Machinima already does that.
Hexy - a strategy game for iPhone/iPod Touch
Gaming has been bumbling along as an occasional novelty in the mainstream media since the CS explosion and the massive LAN events of the early noughties. The real point at which gaming can call itself mainstream is when the goofy gaming shows obviously hosted by non-gamers are replaced by serious coverage of tournament events, when CS and QT are presented like poker - serious coverage that the tournament entrants would appreciate, competent commentary by people gamers actually respect and just the occasional explanatory note to naive viewers. When the network execs begin to understand that their thirteen-year-old PS2 owner is a totally different kind of gamer to the WOW-playing, LAN-gaming faithful and realise that gamers aren't one demographic but a broad spectrum with widely diverging tastes and interests. For the moment, gaming is an odd novelty that the mainstream still don't quite get.
Yeah, it's as viable a career path as "Being Bono" or "Becoming Tom Cruise" is. How many people have made professional gaming an actual career? I don't mean 2 years of income. I mean at least 10 years of steady income.
No I don't see the appeal either but then I don't watch "regular" sports anyway so perhaps I am just weird.
Just as there is a "market" for chess matches or curdling or downhill skiing or soccer there will be a market for "gaming".
If it will ever be big I have no idea. Why did soccer get big but not field hockey? Why do americans watch football and europeans soccer.
F1 is a big sport. Perhaps it is only watched because you want to see lethal crashes but if that is not the case then why should people not also watch a F1 race with virtual cars?
It would not be my cup of tea and it may not be yours but we hardly matter now do we? Computer "sports" would allow events that could never be held in real live, why hold a chess match when you can televise a battle between armies? The BBC already had a program like this.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Seems like media hype to me and 60 minutes trying to be on 'the edge' of something new. Sure, pro gaming might be getting bigger but there are millions of gamers but only a handful of people who can make an actual living off it. Plus on 60 minutes they touted "Fatal1ty" as the best, which seemed kind of lame.
I can't wait until we have a televised first person shooter match and someone has a fit of rage by smashing a keyboard into the table with keyboard buttons flying everywhere. Should score a high rating with the "video games causes violence" crowd.
Click here to read the article and watch the streaming video. It was posted on Digg earlier.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Professional Gamer is now a valid career path.
I can already hear the cost of Big Macs going up because all the McDonald's employees have now come the realization that they're better than these other professional gaming chumps and are going to dedicate their lives to it. Sure, it might be a "valid" career path, but for how many people exactly? We're not talking about something like the fast food industry where there's always an open job for a warm body. You're talking about quite a niche market. While there may be tens of thousands of gamers out there, how many of them actually have the disposable income to support the companies who're using this to advertise to what they believe is worthwhile demographic? Look at Abit. Heaven knows how much they've sunk into the "Fatal1ty" brand and it doesn't appear to have helped with news of them potentially being bought out because of how poorly they're doing. Sure, it's a pipe dream to be a professional gamer, but as is often said "Don't quit your day job!"
If big boobed women work at Hooters do one legged women work at IHOP?
...and they want their "next big thing" back.
While we're at it, we'll take "Linux on the Desktop" back as well.
This could be both good and bad.
Games which are heavily endorsed will receive much more attention, of course. CounterStrike, for example, had a huge following of dedicated gamers well before it was ever picked up officially by Valve. Day of Defeat had a decent sized following before it got picked up as well. With this "revelation" however, people will be attracted to the games in which they think could potentially earn them money or make them famous (silly isn't it?) rather than playing games in which they simply enjoy. It'll be difficult to put the game in gaming if this goes full-scale.
I already know teams who compete in tournaments like CAL and CPL for a shot at winning some money and popularity...a lot of them don't even enjoy the games they play, it's like they're working rather than playing.
If more games had a shot at being put on the big screen, so as to diversify the content, this wouldn't be so bad. It would also give pr0 gamers more variety in their goals, rather than just playing CS, Painkiller, or Unreal.
What else can happen when an unstoppable force collides with an immovable object?
Professional Gamer is now a valid career path.
And just like Pro-Footballer or Pro-Soccer player, it's not all the dream it's sold as.
As in any other business, thousands of young people enter that career path every year, and most of them never make it past "it pays the rent". In fact, I would be surprised if a considerable percentage came even that far.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
The main issue with gaming becoming mainstream is that it's such a fast-paced industry that can change at the drop of the hat. If you take more established competitive sports, like football or soccer, the basic rules have remained very similar for the past hundred years, with the odd tweak here or there. In contrast, watch what happens when a patch is released for a particular game (once every year or so?). The rules change, balance changes, some things become more powerful, others weaker and it can change the game dynamics greatly.
This also completely ignores technology advances which generally means the latest and greatest games will become more popular.
Frankly, there isn't much in it for the spectators.
First, it can't be live. There's no way to intelligently comment on a live video game, and essentially commentary is why people are watching. In most sports you can see displays of athletic prowess. Other sports (just using it as a term, don't want to debate what's a sport), like poker, you need interesting commentary. Poker is slow enough and widespread enough that there are a lot of people that are well-versed in it that can keep up with the game compellingly on live TV. Not so with video games. People aren't going to sit there watching someone else playing video games unless they're very dedicated, and downloaded replays are much more interactive.
So what do you do? Save the replay. Let both sides walk you through the game afterward and explain the problems they had at key steps, and how they lost the game. Explain their strategies for gamers that are interested in the specific game. This isn't going to be terribly compelling except in small chunks, but then again, it has almost no production cost.
Secondly, get someone that has some authenticity. People that obviously don't know what they're talking about discussing games just makes me angry. And I know a lot of my friends that feel the same way. MTV-style gaming shows don't really appeal to anyone, because gamers who aren't hardcore don't really want to watch gaming television, and people who are hardcore just despise it.
Third, fuck the cheat codes. No one, no one, no one watches TV to get cheat codes. I don't even buy strategy guides anymore unless they're very well made. Cheat Code TV is a shitty, shitty idea.
Fourth, as for content, how about interviews with industry leaders? People showing clips from upcoming games. Even spotlights on independent games, or mods. Or documentaries on the game-making process. Hell, I'm nerdy enough that I'd watch gaming news: suchandsuch a clan opened up dungeon X in WoW, patch Z was released for MMO_flavor_of_the_week with suchandsuch changes, soandso art designer quit company Q.
Finally, there could even be room for a debate-style show. Get industry "pundits" *shudder* together to discuss stuff that will at least inspire interesting flame wars. Are video games art? Is storyline important? Which console is shaping up to be the best? Do graphics matter? What's the best fighting game? Did Blizzard ruin balance in WoW with the latest patch? Is Jack Thompson a lunatic? Hell, bring Jack Thompson on to defend himself! Shit like that.
Gaming is very big in S-Korea, and has been at least since Starcraft came out. There is a huge industry with idols, fans, groupies, big sponsors, big money, regular TV shows, heck, even their own TV channel. THAT's what I call Mainstream. No problem with TFA, but don't give the impression that the US went there first.
The grass is always greener on the other side of the light cone.
When did Jonathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel become an icon?
As per subject.
I've been involved with running large LAN gaming events for the last six years in Australia and never have I ever met someone so arrogant and up himself as this guy. He came over to win "only four thousand dollars worth". Australian dollars, so it's not THAT much - but the cheek!
While he would be considered a celebrity in gaming circles, I'd hardly consider him the be-all and end-all of competitive professional gaming.
The commentator has an advantage that the players don't have in the match: he can see everything.
"MacKenzie is dropping back from the blue team pack, twisting in behind an oil drum. Jason from the Red team is sneaking up on them from behind, but he has no idea who lies in wait for him."
"Mayatama is trying a box style defense on the Zerg, but it doesn't seem to be holding. Will Jerrelly's Protos style seems unbeatable at this point. You know, Bill, Will played with Mayatama's Okinawa team for his last two years in college, but this is the first time these two men have ever met in person."
Most sports banter is just that, banter. Background on the players, the event, putting things into perspective. It's also a lot of obvious filler. "Unitas goes back to pass. Ohhh! And they've sacked him at the 15 yard line. That's got to hurt. They're going to need to make up some yardage to get a first down... Ok, I've got nothing. Over to you, Bill."
Sports commentator on videogames could be good, but they've got to improve significantly before they're up to the entertaining-but-empty level of professional sports commentators. Even tennis has commentators, and look at how much explainable strategy is in that game.
The ______ Agenda
Before gaming can hit the big time on TV there is one key feature games need. Television production support. The TV crew needs the ability to place, move and control multiple cameras, in game, so that they can shoot the game as if the game was real. Give the producer a few dozen cameras, fixed and mobile, the ability to have the camera crews manipulate the cameras (move, pan, tilt, zoom, focus) and you've got a system that they can work with. Sport stadiums are designed with TV cameras in mind, video games producers will have to coordinate with the TV producers starting at the design stage of the game so the TV producers will have the tools they need.
"Grab them by the pussy" -- President of the United States of America
Competitive gaming is still very very much a cult activity in Korea. 99% of Koreans talk shit about the .2% of the population involved in competitive gaming. It's bigger than the US but it's not at all mainstream.
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I don't recall ever seeing a curdling match. Is it more common in dairy country, like cow-tipping?
We are the 198 proof..