When the first human throw the first stone, the second tried to throw further and thereby gain the attention of females, respect of the tribe and a better place near the fire. Since then and up to the competition of hairdressers, every human activity is a subject that its participants are trying to improve and make it more significant so that a victory brings more - fame, money, bloody mammoth meat or roller. Video Games are basically just a new medium for old types of competition in reflexes, skills or intelligence, and it is quite natural to serve as an arena for battles. In this blog you'll learn how much that competition has the character of "professionalism", ie can the competitive playing of video games anywhere in the world be called a job.

Professional gamer
Can video games be a professional sport?

Emphasizing that it is "pro" by itself turns light for warning because, when you need to highlight that something you're doing is professional, is already a sign that the professionalism in that activity isn't included by itself. A combination of "progaming" is even stranger because it connects the label of professionalism, something you're doing as a profession, ie a job, with the word "gaming" that stands for something that is done for fun. Or, in short, games are by their nature activity's for fun and rarely someone will pay someone else to have fun. Sports like football, tennis, basketball, and others have the advantage that many viewers are enjoying while they watch and are ready to pay for it. But watching someone play video games is not particularly attractive - or at least not enough for a large number of spectators, which would showing video games make more profitable. What does remain? Of course, advertising, as one of the main drivers of the majority of media products in the world. In short, gaming is professional as long as it serves for advertisers.

How much money is that? Awards may sound big, but there are problems with payments and the money will receive only the first three places, which is not easy to win

Pay me to play

We should not ignore the fact that a large number of "real" sports would not survive without advertisers, so that video games are not special by that characteristic. However, tracking the players of video games and competitions in them are only in the begins. And that makes video games as a professional activity highly dependent on the marketing plans of companies that want to connect their products to this activity. Such are, for example, manufacturers of computer hardware, or telecommunications companies. On the other hand, players are mostly youngboys from 15 to 20 years, who love playing video games even if they are not payed, but a chance to make some money on there hobby would certainly not be rejected. Power of players is measured in APM (actions per minute) and that is why in this work you are going in the retirement very early. As we getting older, our APM fall down and we barely have a APM of 180 if not lower, while the champions, for example, in Starcraft have an APM of 460, about four and half hits per second. These three elements: the dependence on the good will of advertisers, a large number of players who are ready and wants to play for small money and lack of audience that would rate the quality of what is and what they like to watch - those are the key elements for observation of the professional sphere of competition in video games. Organizations that deal with the preparation of competition in video games are spending most of their time on attracting advertisers, because they know that there will always be gamers - and they are ready to play for relatively small money. There are a lot such organizations - especially in the U.S.. Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) and Major League Gaming (MLG) are companies that currently are organizing the most popular league and bringing together individual players and clans on the tournament, whose maintenance and rewards are mostly payed by sponsors - advertisers.

Two is Two No, even pro gamer does not need two pairs of headphones, but any opportunity to show the product of sponsor is always good

You need to know how to earn

One of the few examples of western pro gamers who managed to turn his love for video games (and skill in them) into a profitable business is Johnathan Wendel, better known as Fatal1ty. With victories in tournaments, which were mostly organized by CPL, he earned more than $500,000.00 in cash and other prizes, managed to make sponsorship agreements with various hardware manufactures and now under his own name, he is selling specially designed PC hardware. Good management of its name and character led him to the pages of many magazines and brought him appearance in various TV shows - and Fatal1ty know how to cash it by the sponsors. While some admire his skills in FPS, the other murmur against him, saying that he went in the commercional waters, forgetting that playing at the professional level means exactly - playing for money.

Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel According to many commercially the most successful player in the world, he plays good as well as he finds sponsors with whose products he binds his name

Korean Big Brother

Even further competition in video games has gone in South Korea, where digital conflicts are transferred on specialized TV channels and watched by over thousands of fans. However, even there it all depends on the money for advertise so the best players aim to join clans which are sponsored by the largest telecommunication companies which are making from that something like a "Big Brother". Those clans then are accommodated in houses equipped with computers on which they constantly play and prepare for the tournament, while their faces and the successes (along with sponsors logos) are pumped to fans from which one half are teenage girl that are easy to impress, and the other half are teenage boys who themselves want be "pro-gamers". But such glory is fleeting, and it's possible to count on fingers those who for their path in a demanding and highly competitive environment earn substantial sums of money. However, only a few such "heroes" is enough that many young boys (and some girls) conceive reverie that they can earn for life by holding the mouse or controller in there hand.

Is there discrimination? Although there is no reason that girls are worse gamers than men, usually the competition are divided by gender

Evolution of professionalism

But even football players didn't always earned millions. Korean StarCraft-heroes are one example of the possibilities of profit on video games, while in Europe and U.S. we have Quakers and Counter-Strikers. Neither one nor the other nor the third have many pro gamers, but every year there is more. However, there are not many large tournaments so that hundredths of players could live from the reward fund, and companies that are organizing them are notorious for delay of payment or even complete non-payment. But most large companies such as Intel, Samsung, or nVidia have teams or individuals that are sponsored by them to compete. And not only that they give them a computer, equipment and nice uniform, but they also (more or less) regularly pay them for gaming. The second half of the puzzle are competitions that are organized by software manufacturers themself such as Electronic Arts, Konami, or Blizzard. Competition in the games like FIFA, Pro Evolution Soccer, or Warcraft, which are organized by the publishers, often does not carry great financial rewards, but for the sponsors of teams and individuals, there are an excellent opportunity for promotion. All this is, however, is short-lived because the sponsorship contracts for players and teams are rarely made for a period longer than one year, so you can hardly say about competitive gaming as a profession. Only few players manage to penetrate to the place where with they hobby can earn a little, and even less of those who succeed to earn big money. There are estimates that throughout the world from competitive playing of video games currently live (ie earning for life) only somewhat more than 1000 games. And again - it is much more than a few years ago. Or, more graphical, about ten years ago to earn enough money for a car playing video games was equal to get the biggest prize on the lotto, but now this is about as you hit 10 doubles in the bookmaker. After ten years, perhaps playing video games get possible earnings similar to popular sports today - in which, remember, only a small number of participants earn, while stars, same as in any activity, are extremely rare.

Rare among the rare Women are not common in the pro-gamer circles, although in fact, there is no reason why in games they would be worse than men's

When it all boils down...

Now would be the turn to respond to the question which every gamer asked themself: "Can I earn enough by winning other people in this in what I am so good?". Because when we defeat artificial intelligence, we all tend to think for ourself that we are the best in the world. And the answer is: harder than some other activity. Penetrate to a position where someone will sponsor you and pay monthly to play, requires time and energy and has a small chance for success, and going to tournaments without sponsors is expensive so you would have to win a lot to manage to live from that money. Of course, if you happen to win in WorldWideWeb Games, then you won one million dollars in one turn from which you sure can live. But such reward, so far, is paid only once. So evaluate your chances. But before I end this attractive theme, we should look into the future - does video game have a chance to become an electronic sports and by paying of players stand side by side with "real" sports? I do not have a crystal ball, but considering that more and more people play video games and concern for them, the interest is bigger, so it is not impossible that - just as in Korea on TV where they transmit StarCraft matches or in Germany Counter-Strike and Call of Duty - that soon everywhere we are going to see competition in digital football or fight of virtual boxer or a race where a car collision only result with bunch of scattered pixels. And those who will manage the digital football players, fighters and cars will be that, now rare in the future maybe wide scattered type - Pro Gamers.

Anel Zukic
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in the hope for better times...