Is professional league+city competition the future of e-sports?

When it comes to e-sports, I'm afraid most people think of those tall spotlights and venues comparable to traditional sports. As for another important member city competition in the field of e-sports, people's understanding is probably still at the stage of Internet cafe competition.

In fact, compared with professional sports events that have experienced "resurgence", the development of city leagues has actually withstood the changes of the times and environment. In 2003, the State Sports General Administration officially listed e-sports as a formal sport, but the joy is not over yet. The State Administration of Radio, Film and Television gave a heavy blow to the high-spirited e-sports players with the Notice on Banning Broadcasting Computer Network Games in the Second Year. In that era when the network was not yet mature, Ban left TV as the mainstream media channel, which was tantamount to choking the industry.

Although the emergence of SKY and the enthusiasm of players make the e-sports league seem to be in full swing even without the support of communication channels, with the long-term stocking of War3 and StarCraft by Blizzard, the version has been delayed, the popularity of CS in China has declined, and the appreciation of professional competitions has gone from bad to worse. Coupled with the outbreak of the domestic online game market in 2007, e-sports games are no longer the favorite of players. At the same time, SKY's dream of three consecutive championships seems to imply something.

In 2008, the financial crisis swept the world, and many giant clubs at home and abroad laid off employees or even dissolved. The club can't pay wages and the game can't be held. In addition to many small-scale events, some large-scale events, such as PGL and IEST, which are familiar to China players, have also gone to the fate of suspension. During this period, e-sports ushered in two major changes that have affected the present: online games became the main carrier of e-sports projects, and city events took over the banner of e-sports competitions.

TGA is an essential name in many documentaries about the debut of e-sports gods. The launch of TGA brand started from the lowest valley of e-sports in China. In 2009, Tencent held the first "Crossing the Fireline" 100-city League. At that time, LOL had not been brought into China, CF was recognized as the first online game in Internet cafes, and the 100-city league tournament with Internet cafes as its match point also attracted 1.5 million teams and 1.5 million participants because of its low threshold and large-scale characteristics. With this experience as the foundation, Tencent also discovered the potential of popular online games in the field of e-sports. After integrating all its competitive games into the TGA platform, the TGA Grand Prix was founded based on the city competition. Since then, the low threshold of domestic e-sports events and the wide spread of cities have basically taken shape.

In the period when e-sports broke out from the trough, the role of city competition was more like a popular communicator. On the other hand, professional events are still in the short-term cup stage, lacking new ideas and imperfect club integration. It was not until 20 12 that CFPL, the first professional league in China, was established that this phenomenon gradually improved. It is worth mentioning that it is also a CF mobile game that proposes "starting the first shot of mobile e-sports". Crossing the Fire Line has been criticized as a game product, but as an e-sports event, CF has made some pioneering achievements in the field of e-sports in China.

The significance of the emergence of e-sports league is obvious, because it is the direct basis of being on an equal footing with traditional sports from 20 12, which proves that gamified e-sports competition is absolutely sustainable, and according to the development in recent years, the realization potential of e-sports events is probably no less than that of traditional mass sports such as football and basketball. In addition, in terms of players, e-sports players no longer have a stable salary income, their lives can be guaranteed to a certain extent, and professional players have achieved real regularization. Similarly, from a competitive point of view, due to the long cycle, the league will greatly improve the competitive strength of domestic players. Generally speaking, taking LPL as an example, it can also play a role in promoting ethnic exchanges.

Now the sports leagues of various events have a basic framework, and their scale is becoming more and more mature, and their influence is self-evident. On the other hand, while maintaining its own rhythm, the city competition represented by TGA is also increasing its fit with the professional league. The city competition has also expanded from a platform for national players to a "draft competition" for professional players. And if the professional league is to let more and more people know and recognize e-sports, then the city competition is to let more and more people participate in e-sports events.

In the period when e-sports is at a low point and the league is in a bottleneck, the city games have played a role in inheriting incense. Using Internet cafes to prove the feasibility of e-sports has not provided a large number of talents for the future development of e-sports. After the outbreak of e-sports, the city competition did not decline. On the contrary, with the rapid increase of e-sports audience and the lowering of the threshold, it gradually expanded its influence and even extended to colleges and universities.

On this basis, many projects are in short supply or in a hurry to develop, and city competitions are held outside the league. Make use of the linkage between professional leagues and urban events to expand the layout of events. In addition to the more historic LPL and urban hero competition in League of Legends, CFPL and Hundred Cities Alliance in Crossing the Line of Fire. Following the professional league OWPS, Watch Pioneer also started the national strength competition this year. However, it is worth mentioning that holding professional league matches and city matches at the same time is not the only indicator to measure an event, such as Hearthstone and DOTA2. The former only has city matches, while the latter does not even have city matches and professional leagues.

Not only that, the combination of city games and leagues has also achieved initial results in mobile e-sports. Both the glory of the king, which is very popular now, and the ball game as a new way of leisure e-sports started from the professional league and the city league at the same time. Moreover, compared with the end tour, the city competition of mobile e-sports is more convenient and has a wider coverage. Perhaps, the heat and scale of the city competition will largely show the upper limit of mobile e-sports.