Are e-Sports A Big Thing Now?

Blogs, YouTubers, streamers, Michael Jordan—everyone is talking about eSports these days. Even sports sites now allow you to watch eSports tournaments. If you constantly watch eSports competitions and also love gaming, you have a new sport. Sure, not all tournaments are supported, but eSports gaming is growing fast. Below is how eSports gaming works and what to expect on eSports sites.

Supported Games

Although there are hundreds of video games out there, gaming sites mainly support the most popular games. These are First shooters, multiplayer battle arenas and strategy games. Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is the most popular first shooter game amongst professionals. In this game, competitors battle it out against terrorist groups while you predict which side wins.

League of Legends is the most popular MOBA game in the eSports world. From Twitch to YouTube, LA to Melbourne, professional gamers love LOL. The only other MOBA that comes close to nearing LOL’s popularity is Call of Duty.

If you love strategy games, StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty is the game to watch on gaming platforms. Unlike most games, this strategy game offers multiple ways to win. You can predict who wins while watching.

eSports Sites

At least five of the top 20 biggest game sites support eSports. Some don’t support players in your country, but others will accept you. Supported eSports games include LOL, CS: GO, Dota 2 and Heroes of the Storm.

Many new online casinos also support eSports gaming now that it’s fast taking off as a recognized sport across the world. To attract players, the new platforms offer big tournaments and great value to supported games.

Integrity in eSports Gaming

As a new sport, eSports has been doing great to maintain integrity during eSports tournaments. Since the first major tournament was hosted in 2006, there has been almost no complaint about rigging or match-fixing.

Thanks to this, gambling sites have never had a reason not to accept the new sport. Anyone that wants to bet can do so confidently because there is no fear rigging may cost them their bets. Of course, this does not mean all eSports competitions are professionally managed. But if you stick to betting on the top betting sites, you always get wagers from top tournaments.

How big is eSports?

In the US, eSports is already a billion-dollar industry. Surprisingly, only $24 million was spent on the industry in 2015. That means gaming in video game competitions skyrocketed at a rate of more than 500% in the past four years.

Globally, eSports could be as huge as $13 billion. While the US has one of the largest eSports audiences in the world it doesn’t come close to nearing the numbers recorded across Asia. There are plans to make the sport a legal competition in the 2022 Asia games and this will only enhance its popularity further.

In Europe and Australia, eSports is also gaining popularity. In fact, most of the winners in recent E-tournaments were Europe based. Considering that eSports gaming is also legal in most of Europe, expect the sport to continue growing.

Potential Gaming Challenges

While eSports gaming continues to grow, there is one problem that keeps on affecting players. There is limited data about past games. With traditional sports, there is a wide swath of data that goes back 10 or more years ago.

Sports data helps gamers predict future matches more confidently. In eSports, you will be lucky to find sites that offers a decent amount of data to help you. On the flipside, sites are addressing the problem by constantly ranking data that can aid players to gain confidence in eSports.

Another major problem relates to data. With limited data to help compare competitors accurately, the chances of winning tend to vary widely. Sometimes it’s not a data problem. Talent pools in the video gaming scene are also limited, which makes some competitions too predictable.

To Conclude

While eSports has been around for a while, the sport is relatively a new thing. Almost no major sites supported the sport in 2010. However, there is no denying that video game eSports is a legitimate niche worth billions of dollars.

Most of the top eSports sites announce whenever there is a popular tournament. You can watch a wide category of games even on your mobile device. So, if you watch eSports regularly, consider giving eSports gaming a try.