Competitive Gaming The New Sport
Professional gaming’s popularity is increasing immensely; gaming is now starting to become a job for many professional gamers. Gaming at a professional level is extremely difficult and requires a lot of skill. Joining the ranks of poker and chess, competitive gaming should now be considered a professional sport.
Did you know the LCS is now officially recognized as a sport league just like the NBA, NFL and NHL? The first reason why competitive gaming should be considered a sport is because playing at a competitive level requires a ton of practice, skill and experience. Chae “Piglet” Gwan-jin and Kim “Fenix” Jae-hun are teammates, that play on the same League of Legends team, they practice between 12-14 hours a day and they only get about four hours of sleep a night.
Professional teams are now getting their players to come to America with athlete visas, these visas are for people who are extraordinary ability in their field; this shows that professional gaming is now becoming a recognized sport. For instance, Danny "Shiphtur" Le, of Edmonton has an athletes visa and now lives in America playing for his team, the competitive “Team Dignitas”. Gaming teams and players also have their own branches of apparel and sponsorships with companies.
With prize pools up to one million dollars, competitive gaming has a large market for viewers, ESL One Cologne 2015 was the most viewed Counter Strike Global Offensive tournament in the world with 27 million viewers. Millions of people will watch these tournaments and support their favorite E-sports teams. Fans, not to mention media and big business, are taking E-sports just as seriously as traditional sports such as football and basketball.
Professional gaming is now considered a sport as it should be. Competitive gaming will continue to grow and gain tons of new viewers and players. Professional players are now able to financially support themselves and consider it an actual job and sport.
