WCG and Cyber Sports
As I had looked around the class, the majority held disbelief in their faces, while the rest hid under either smug grins or complete distaste. What am I talking about? The notion of gaming as a competitive platform mentioned by Kevin.
Let me give a small tidbit of background information.
Korea was devastated by the end of WWII, having been completely invaded by the Japanese and almost had their way of life annihilated. Though the Jap eventually succeeded control back to the Koreans, life didn't get much better due to the 1948 split into North and South Korea's. The economy was shattered, the land was shattered, the culture was shattered.
South Koreans picked themselves back up by labour-intensive manufactured exports, which eventually to lead to such things as the Hyundai brand. Things trotted along nicely, and with the induction of technology of computers and the WWW South Korea banked on its (at the time) unlimited promises and cashed in, backed by both government and private sectors. This continued well into the late 20th Century with producing computer products and parts, as well as an extremely healthy gaming population along with it.
This has been decisively evident since the turn of the century, having invested numerous amounts of money into their booming IT industry, becoming one of the key major IT super powers in Asia. Obviously, tied into the IT industry is the gaming industry, which helped quite literally rebuild South Korea's economy, and stabilizing it in the 21st Century. That's the background.
The advent of video gaming has thus produced a growing phenomenon, started by South Korea,into an international affair that spreads throughout the majority of Asia, as well as a plethora of European countries with Germany foremost. In South Korea, there are several television channels dedicated to broadcasting video games on TV as spectator sport. Players get contracts not unlike major league sports stars from various corporations and companies. The fan base, resembling those of some major sports, is large enough to fill grand stadiums for the grand finals of tournaments.
As it stands approximately 70% (and above) of the population have high speed internet (gigabit connections), and their net traffic is counted as one of the highest in the world. This fascination with the internet has meant MMO's are one of the most favored past-times in South Korea, especially StarCraft, which as Kevin mentioned has become their national sport, Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos/Frozen Throne, Counter Strike, Maple Story, Lineage ... et cetra.
Now, interesting thing comes along - they've decided they like it so much they quite literally pattern the gaming world into a sports league, and having it inducted as an official "sport" recognized world-wide, with the main focus on RTS (real-time strategy) and FPS (first-person shooter) games. This has led to a series of gaming conventions and international tournaments speaheaded by the World Cyber Games, which just recently has been officially recognized and sponsored by Microsoft. Other tournaments include the Electronic Sports World Cup held in France, and the World e-Sports Games (website under construction).
This notion of e-Sport has continued into the formation of the Cyberathlete Professional League, focused on the elite of professional gaming. These elites are all backed by brands and companies, with one of the most famous being Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel, who is backed by Creative Industries. Also, prize money won at tournaments will actually enable the competitors to live off of their winnings, with certain tournaments having had massive amounts of prize money. A record of $1 million USD last year in a competition hosted by FUN Technologies was made previously.
So, who wants to play competitively for a extra bit of moolah?
Let me give a small tidbit of background information.
Korea was devastated by the end of WWII, having been completely invaded by the Japanese and almost had their way of life annihilated. Though the Jap eventually succeeded control back to the Koreans, life didn't get much better due to the 1948 split into North and South Korea's. The economy was shattered, the land was shattered, the culture was shattered.
South Koreans picked themselves back up by labour-intensive manufactured exports, which eventually to lead to such things as the Hyundai brand. Things trotted along nicely, and with the induction of technology of computers and the WWW South Korea banked on its (at the time) unlimited promises and cashed in, backed by both government and private sectors. This continued well into the late 20th Century with producing computer products and parts, as well as an extremely healthy gaming population along with it.
This has been decisively evident since the turn of the century, having invested numerous amounts of money into their booming IT industry, becoming one of the key major IT super powers in Asia. Obviously, tied into the IT industry is the gaming industry, which helped quite literally rebuild South Korea's economy, and stabilizing it in the 21st Century. That's the background.
The advent of video gaming has thus produced a growing phenomenon, started by South Korea,into an international affair that spreads throughout the majority of Asia, as well as a plethora of European countries with Germany foremost. In South Korea, there are several television channels dedicated to broadcasting video games on TV as spectator sport. Players get contracts not unlike major league sports stars from various corporations and companies. The fan base, resembling those of some major sports, is large enough to fill grand stadiums for the grand finals of tournaments.
As it stands approximately 70% (and above) of the population have high speed internet (gigabit connections), and their net traffic is counted as one of the highest in the world. This fascination with the internet has meant MMO's are one of the most favored past-times in South Korea, especially StarCraft, which as Kevin mentioned has become their national sport, Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos/Frozen Throne, Counter Strike, Maple Story, Lineage ... et cetra.
Now, interesting thing comes along - they've decided they like it so much they quite literally pattern the gaming world into a sports league, and having it inducted as an official "sport" recognized world-wide, with the main focus on RTS (real-time strategy) and FPS (first-person shooter) games. This has led to a series of gaming conventions and international tournaments speaheaded by the World Cyber Games, which just recently has been officially recognized and sponsored by Microsoft. Other tournaments include the Electronic Sports World Cup held in France, and the World e-Sports Games (website under construction).
This notion of e-Sport has continued into the formation of the Cyberathlete Professional League, focused on the elite of professional gaming. These elites are all backed by brands and companies, with one of the most famous being Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel, who is backed by Creative Industries. Also, prize money won at tournaments will actually enable the competitors to live off of their winnings, with certain tournaments having had massive amounts of prize money. A record of $1 million USD last year in a competition hosted by FUN Technologies was made previously.
So, who wants to play competitively for a extra bit of moolah?
posted by Unknown at 12:53 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home