Esports is walking the planet: from marginal fun to the dream of millions

While the world was not obsessed with bitcoins, esports was progressing at the fastest pace. Seven years ago, guys who disappeared for days in computer clubs looked more like marginals than athletes. My parents hoped that it would pass soon, and they came to the tournaments more to have fun than to win some money. Today, top players have an army of fans and earn millions of dollars. And this is not an exaggeration. And the best accessories for esports can be found here, come and make sure.

The revolution that brought esports out of the underground happened in the summer of 2011. Valve, the developer of such hits as Counter-Strike and Half-Life, has announced a tournament in the new DOTA 2 discipline with a grand prize pool. The champions were promised no less than a million dollars. The winners later admitted that they believed in the reality of what was happening only after the money came to the account.

The tournament itself, called The International, however, turned out to be somewhat crumpled. There were so many viewers on the online broadcast of the matches that they worked worse than pizza delivery on New Year's Eve. But Valve still achieved their goal. DOTA 2 instantly established itself as one of the main esports disciplines.

Such an impressive event naturally caused a chain reaction. Soon, tournaments comparable in generosity appeared in other games — for example, Counter-Strike and League of Legends. And in general, competitions of all stripes began to breed like mushrooms after the rain. There was a lot of money. Having seen what kind of audience the streams gather, how many people come to the halls, the sponsors readily began to plow the marketing virgin land.

Esports has gained such popularity that in the spring of this year in Russia it was recognized as an official sports discipline. This means that you can theoretically become a master of sports in Mortal Kombat. Moreover, there is a real possibility that esports will be included in the Olympiad program already in 2024. The International Olympic Committee is seriously considering this issue.

It would be strange if the youth industry with an annual income of more than half a billion dollars would be ignored by the media. Almost all major sports portals have long opened a separate section where news and reviews of esports events are published. Status tournaments are even shown on TV. In particular, Match TV covered The International 2017 in full. By the way, this time the winning team, consisting of five people, has already earned more than ten million dollars.

In parallel, esports is adopting television formats. Just a few days ago, the first season of the reality show "Citilink Esports Academy", organized by the network electronic discounter "Citilink", ended. 20 ordinary DOTA 2 players from all over Russia lived for a month and a half under the supervision of cameras in order to finally fight for a million rubles and, more importantly, show themselves to the breeders of professional organizations.

More than 400 teams showed up for the qualifying stage. Four of the best came to Moscow directly for the shooting. Each of them was taken under the wing of an honored person from the world of "Dota". The guys lived and trained in a cozy loft, and the mentors had the task of soldering them into a well-coordinated team, where one for all and all for one. Without synchronicity and a clear distribution of roles in this game, you will not succeed.

As befits a reality show, cameras were watching everything that was happening. The videos were edited into weekly issues, which were published on a YouTube channel popular among gamers.

The culmination of the project was the final match in Yota Space. The place, I must say, is solid. The richness of the interior is more like a club where people go to dance, rather than a club where they play computer games. Only instead of a dance floor, there is a full-fledged game stage with a big screen and other attributes that are mandatory for these times.

200 people came to cheer for the guys offhand, another 20 thousand watched on the Internet. The game itself turned out to be hot, with ups and downs. And the quality was not too different from those performances that professionals give out. Interestingly, the team that was considered an outsider won.

Apparently, the second season is not far off. And then, you see, they will come up with some more fresh formats. Esports has come seriously and for a long time, so we can expect a stormy continuation of the banquet.