Our popular blog writer Jim Wang is also a royal fan of eSports. He disagrees with many people’s idea that eSports are not real sports and explains his reasons in the following blog post.
–Editor Amber
–by Jim Wang
eSports means competitive tournaments of video games, especially games among professional gamers. But are these eSports real sports? Most people may say no because they think that there are not any physical aspects like those found in football or basketball in video games. However, in my opinion, I totally agree with people that categorize eSports as real sports. Here are my reasons.
Firstly, eSport competitions are similar with those of traditional sports. Like conventional sports, eSports consist of many different games such as Starcraft, DotA, 
Counter-Strike, etc. So, let’s take, for example, League of Legends, a popular multi-player game. People who are really good at League of Legends must have inhuman reaction speed, excellent team awareness, and great minds–just like in any other sport. Moreover, these players have to practice for more than ten hours a day in order to improve their personal and team-working skills. You may think that playing ten hours of a video game is easy, but if you try to play just one competitive hour of any eSport game you will know that it’s not easy at all.
Secondly, eSports are generating enormous business all over the world. According to newzoo.org, which conducts market research for the computer games industry, in 2014 there were 205 million viewers of online games. The 2013 League of Legends 
world championship attracted 32 million online viewers, which was more than double the amount of the online viewership of the Baseball World Series and seven times the amount of the NBA finals online. The 2015 Counter-Strike Grand Final drew 36.95 million viewers online–a 295% jump in viewership from last year. The 2014 League of Legends world championship attracted 40,000 fans at Seoul Sangam Stadium, which hosted a football World Cup semi-final in 2002. And, in July 2014, 11,000 fans watched an eSports event in a Seattle basketball arena. It offered the highest eSports prize pool so far–$10.9 million, which is higher than the prize for golf’s USPGA Championship, and this event was streamed by US broadcasting giant ESPN.
Finally, the reason eSports is a true sport is that the top players earn an estimated 1 million dollars a year by winning the world championship or through sponsorship and subscriptions to live broadcasts like that on Twitch.tv. People don’t have to worry about their livelihood if they are masters at video games.
Now, more and more people are realizing the potential of eSports, and I hope that one day eSports can be accepted as real sport.
Gaven I like your arguments and all the socio-economic similarities you point out between the two.
Actually the ONLY difference seems to be the difference in the vastly different degrees of physical exertion.
There are a lot of meanings in using the English word, sport. Here are ONLY two:
THE MODERN DEFINTION:
An activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others: team sports such as baseball and soccer
ANOTHER DEFINITION ( Maybe considered old-fashioned):
Entertainment, fun as in games and amusements and play
So it’s actually accurate to say esports when talking about ways to entertain your self by playing electronic games. People who limit the word to mean competitive athletics have a limited vocabulary.
My name is “Jim.” Thank you. 🙂