Sky Sports WTF
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Apparently gaming is now worthy of screening on live television, Sky Sports 2 to be exact.
Nothing on the box, so was channel surfing, as you do.
Came across NZGC: Call of Duty LIVE.
I can only assume NZGC stands for NZ Gaming Championship?They even have commentators, and hosts sitting in a studio setting, much the same as footy coverage.
I would understand if the was the US of A, they put anything on tv, but here, in NZ?
Do people actually watch it?
Can understand why sky fees keep going up now, I mean the broadcast deal must be in the billions for an event like this.
Unfuckingbelievable!
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Gaming can absolutely be entertaining - a different type of competing but competition nonetheless.
Worldwide there are several games that have hundreds of thousands of active players and decent numbers of pro-teams. The numbers are split across games etc but the biggest games at the moment would have more players than some smaller but well established sports.
I watch heaps of gaming online and it's a growing scene - not that fussed about it being on tv as COD isn't my cup of tea, but I would stop to watch other content. The production quality on the online and live events is pretty good - there are big events in South Korea (some on mainstream tv too) and across the US and Europe.
Kind of funny that platforms like YouTube are becoming a bit more like TV while TV is picking up more online native content.
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Gaming as an esport is becoming massive. In the same way that, if you play rugby yourself, watching the pros play it to a ridiculously high standard is entertaining, so it goes with gaming. Activision’s CEO said “Professional gamers will eventually be as celebrated, honoured and recognized as professional athletes.”
This WSJ article is a good write up
http://www.wsj.com/articles/e-sports-a-league-of-its-own-1477265860
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@Gunner said in Sky Sports WTF:
I would understand if the was the US of A, they put anything on tv, but here, in NZ?
Unfuckingbelievable!Always worth waiting for the USA spelling bee on the world sports leader ESPN. It's brilliant - although some of the reffing is dodgy and it lacks a little physicality. Personally I think they should allow shoulder charges.
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There was a thing on tv the other night and yep, gaming is HUGE.
The gaming market is bigger than the movie market and the 'esport' market is growing rapidly.
Some young girl making money from it, a decent portion from people just giving her money to continue playing, think she was from Christchurch ..not sponsors, but fans (helped she was tidy)
The term 'esport' is daft given they aren't always sports related games....
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@reprobate said in Sky Sports WTF:
the term 'esport' just makes me fucking despair.
Similar to 'motorsport'. Neither are sports in the purest form but both require an incredible amount of skill to compete at the top level.
Get used to seeing this more and more, gaming is a multi billion dollar industry and with the advances in technology there will be more and more international competitions, that generate more and more interest.
20 odd years ago I used to play Quake 1 online in NZ competitions and it was heaps of fun, and the finals I played in generated a lot of interest from the Quake 1 community. It's just back then there was no way for others to watch live. Hardly surprising that competitions for games that are played by millions of people around the world generate a lot of interest, and in turn $$$.
I don't have a problem with it at all. If a kid is talented (and you do need natural ability to compete) then why wouldn't he pursue a career as a professional gamer? Just because that option didn't exist 20 years ago doesn't invalidate it as a career choice. The world is changing at an ever increasing rate, best to keep up rather then lag behind complaining about missing "the good old days".
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I watch Twitch from time to time, and it's actually pretty interesting watching gaming. It's certainly perfect for TV with the way graphics are these days.
It dwarfs Hollywood in terms of a revenue these days. It's actually pretty smart of them to put it on, thanks for the heads up!
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Gaming is only going to grow - it can appeal to an international market easily which is attractive for global companies - big ones like Redbull are already in the scene and you've got a host of gaming gear companies putting a lot of money in. Plus the game makers themselves like Blizzard and RIOT.
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@Snowy said in Sky Sports WTF:
@Gunner said in Sky Sports WTF:
I would understand if the was the US of A, they put anything on tv, but here, in NZ?
Unfuckingbelievable!Always worth waiting for the USA spelling bee on the world sports leader ESPN. It's brilliant - although some of the reffing is dodgy and it lacks a little physicality. Personally I think they should allow shoulder charges.
I remember after a hard night drinking and spending a day on the couch I switched on tv and that was on sky sports, woulda been over 10 years ago. Even in my drunken stage I still believe I could have beaten half the snot nosed Asian kids with glasses who were competing.
(Frantically checks for any spelling or grammatical errors before posting )
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Yeah I read an interesting piece earlier in the year about the huge growth in gaming across the developed world. Something like half the population of industrialised countries identify as 'gamers'. Countries like China and Brazil their teens spend more than 10% of their leisure time gaming.
The budgets that go into game development and marketing are huge and rival movies, so TV was naturally going to be the next phase in this phenomenon.
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I've been a competitive gamer and the thought of it being on TV with commentators makes me laugh. "sport".
That being said, you can become a millionaire playing Dota2.
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Well, I have certainly learnt something today.
I must live a very sheltered life, coz I genuinely had no idea that competition gaming was so popular and it being televised/live streamed or what ever is nothing new.Watching gaming is pretty low down on my things to do in life, so don't think I'll be tuning in any time soon.
And it's highly debatable whether it can be called a sport.
