While gaming initially seemed childish entertainment, nowadays, esports is a multi-billion-dollar industry popular worldwide. The market is gradually expanding, and it’s predicted that it will grow twice by 2025. Gaming fans enjoy watching tournaments, which practically puts esports in line with football, basketball, and boxing.
Evolution of Esports
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Playing games has been common during the last decades, but who could ever think it would become so popular? It all began in the 1980s when many companies began investing in developing games and consoles to involve the public in such a pastime. During the 1990s, a significant boom was witnessed in this sphere, and gamers could enjoy impressive tournaments in Quake or Warcraft. At that time, professional leagues began to appear, which made this entertainment very popular.
Nowadays, live streams of events attract millions of viewers, and those desiring to make profits prefer betting on eSports at an NZD online casino or a bookmaker platform. Game development and streaming quality have reached a totally new level, becoming an advantage for both players and audiences.
Trends in Esports in 2022
Technologies significantly improve daily, which directly affects the gaming industry. The 2020 and the beginning of pandemics have shown us that the digitalized world is the future that is beginning right now. While footballers and tennis players were left aside due to quarantine restrictions, esports gained a new twist of popularity. This gave rise to the following tendencies in the market.
Businesses in Esports
Live streams are a perfect space for advertisements, and multiple companies already use this thick. It’s a great way to get a solvent and loyal audience, so many brands worldwide utilize gaming as one of their marketing tools. Since millennials are the main fans of e-gaming who spend lots of time online, the advertisements are primarily oriented toward them. There are numerous ways to collaborate:
- Placing advertisements during match streams
- Integrations with esports celebrities
- Sponsoring events or holding game festivals
Since tournaments attract millions of people, such ads are usually effective. On the other hand, it often costs brands very expensive, but the result is worth it.
Domination of Mobile Games over Products for PC
Software developers consider the needs of players and the demand for their games, which is the main reason why most companies are now concentrating on releasing products for mobile devices. We used to the tendency that the best games are usually provided for personal computers, and those for smartphones lack quality and features. However, this trend seems to be changing: more games, such as PUBG Mobile and Call of Duty, have overcome their counterparts for PC.
Influence of eSports on Traditional Sport Disciplines
Although traditional sports will never lose popularity, they are forced to adapt to the new reality. The world is becoming more digitalized: for instance, the National Football League collaborated with FOX News to broadcast games. We hope to see more similar partnerships in the future so that esports will be in line with other traditional disciplines.
Implementation of NFT Games & Metaverses
The influence of blockchain technologies on the world is evident, and numerous people already use cryptocurrencies daily. One more invention is NFT, which quickly gained popularity among users. Metaverses such as Decentralend are already popular with millions of users, and this trend seems to get more and more attention every day. So, we’ll see what will come of it and how the emergence of such technologies will affect esports in the future.
