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Jason Lake put his family’s financial security on the line, spent 400,000 dollars out of his own pocket, and spent at least five hours a day engrossed in a single game. Jason Lake loved Counter Strike.
I just finished reading Game Boys by Michael Kane and it was an absolutely astounding book. It showed the story of gamers trying to be taken seriously on a broader scale along with the trials and speed bumps laid before them at almost every turn. To these players Counter Strike was not only a true sport but lifestyle.
Esports has been on the rise in America and I for one couldn’t be happier. For far too long the simple concept of people competing in a video game was a niche within the video game niche that even some of the most diehard gamers wouldn’t entertain. Now it’s everywhere, with some of the biggest gaming websites unable to ignore it.
Esports speaks to me on two very fundamental levels; I love sports and I love video games. It is as simple as that. I watch the Chargers play every Sunday (yeah I know, I never said it was easy), I catch as many Lakers games as I can, and I sit in front of my computer watching StarCraft every night.
There is no difference between them in my opinion. All three show how amazing it is to watch the best players within a system of rules and guidelines compete against each other.
Any sports fan will tell you that more than the amazing athleticism or the pride one takes in their team it is the Romantic elements within a game that truly make sports matter. Most of us will never throw a sixty yard Hail Marry or a sink a 3-point buzzer beater, but we will be there, we will be a part of it.
Sports speak to us a much deeper level than we usually think about. They speak to the believers and dreamers in us all. We become part of somehting much bigger when we invest in our teams or a game.
Games like StarCraft and Marvel vs. Capcom work in the same way. Watching Justin Wong fight back from loser bracket and take first place at SoCal regional’s with an Iron Fist team was incredible. So was the Evo2011 match between PR Balrog and Viscant when Tron hit that level three grab on Dark Phoenix.
Now you may have no idea what that last paragraph meant but I challenge you to ask a non sports fan about the Immaculate Reception or the Music City Miracle. I’m guessing you got a blank stare, but that doesn’t mean that those moments weren’t special. We all share these collective memories about our favorite sports moments and Esports provides that same feeling of a shared experience.
We all love video game and I would venture a guess that at some point we relished beating our friends at one. Whether it is Counter Strike, Tekken, Forza, or Street Fighter, the games allowed us the opportunity to for one moment be the best. We should chase that feeling as far as we can.
There was a time when Esports being taken seriously was out of the question, in America at least. Korea and some Eastern European counties like Sweden were way ahead, but the time has come.
Part of the reason Esports has exploded in popularity is because of a single game, if we are to be fair we need to give Starcraft 2 a lot of credit, but another reason is our ability to give the product to as many people as possible. For Lake and the Counter Strike community Television seemed like the only way for mainstream validation, that’s no longer the case, we have the internet.
Over 900,000 people watched the League of Legends stream from Dreamhack this last year. MLG pulls in thousands of live attendants to events and tens of thousands more watch online. We don’t need TV anymore because the people who want is can find it.
More important that numbers and results competitive gaming gives anybody a chance to follow their dreams, which brings us back to Jason Lake. He started Complexity Gaming back when there was only one sponsored team for three years he paid his team out of his own pocket. He nearly went bankrupt. He was 400,000$ in the hole with his excursion into competitive gaming, but the man had a dream. You can just look at Team Complexities website to find out how it went.
Esports is here to stay and you should give it a shot. Almost every game has a community built around it that is willing to help new people understand. We love games and we love this industry so we should support our fellow gamers who want to make something of their passion. We can’t all be Jason Lake but we all have dreams, and the beautiful thing about video games is that as we evolve those dreams can come true.
The most interesting aspect of any sport is rarely that action on the field but the humanity behind the players. These players happen to be our fellow gamers and we owe it to them to lend our support.
