The ideas these people come up, as the UK Guardian lets Devarshi Lodhia run rampant with snowflake droppings
Forget dancing horses, surfing and BMX – the Olympic Games need eSports
And the subhead is just as fun
eSports can be the spark for the International Olympic Committee to update the Olympic Games and reach a larger, more diverse audience
Away we go
If we have learned anything from the previous few Olympics, it is that the Games are going through an identity crisis. Rocked by a doping scandal and with an older audience than ever, the International Olympic Committee is attempting to rehabilitate its image by appealing to a disinterested youth.
Here’s an idea for appealing to all those tuning out: show the blackenty blank sports live. Minimize all the human interest and drama segments, let the sports be the drama. I pretty sure I’ve gone apoplectic on this subject in the archives. You flip from channel to channel to channel, and instead of watching someone, say, ski down a mountain live, you see a segment on them when they were 10 years old and …. don’t get me going.
With sports such as BMX freestyle and baseball taking their place alongside archaic remnants from the age of imperialism, like modern pentathlon and dressage, it is difficult to know what or who the Olympics represent anymore. If the IOC is serious about joining the brave new world that seems to have passed it by and more importantly if it wants to keep its sponsors happy, it needs to make serious changes – starting with introducing eSports.
If you’re thinking, that sounds like people playing sporting games via video games, you’d be utterly correct. Seriously, how exciting can it be to watch someone sitting in a comfy chair beat on a game pad? Well, maybe watching fat jiggle can be hypnotizing, but, this is one of those uber-snowflake ideas taken to the heights of snowflake.
You’d be surprised at the level of interest being found for e-sports. Were you folks aware that STADIUMS sell out for these events? E-sports are turning out to be the next level in sporting complete with training, scouts, sign-on bonuses, teams, and did I mention stadiums? Oh – AND endorsements. E-sports also go worldwide. For instance, it’s a big deal to topple the South Korean teams in anything e-sports. There’s big money starting to be made in e-sports. Just look at one of these games such as Call of Duty. It’s released and WHAM! It makes HALF A BILLION DOLLARS in less than one week! That’s incredible.
I know this sounds crazy to some of you and I’m not even entirely sure where I stand on it myself but I play some video games and cover them a lot as well. So I am seeing this all the time. Very interesting.
And quite frankly, real sports have become nothing more than thugs on drugs sometimes playing fixed events. So there’s really no ‘merit’ or discipline or good behavior-examples being offered by real sport the way they used to be.