DALLAS "We're following White Fox as he makes his way around the corner," comes the play-by-play commentary

in the hushed-but-tense voice of sportscaster Tim 'Gunslinger' Lakin. "They really haven't had the need to go into the water-access area yet, the front door entrance is working fine." The play is quick, the players' reflexes even quicker as they adjust strategies in millisecond calculations. They may not break a sweat, but the competitors here at the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL) Tournament say they are the athletes of the new millennium. And like 18-year-old Kyle "Ksharp" Miller, they may not eat anything special for breakfast, but they train all year with the intensity of a Tiger Woods. His Team 3D is just one of the 100 fiveman teams from more than 30 countries who gathered - in person - to play multiplayer online games. An audience of some 3,000 fellow players and fans watched on big screens, as on-air shoutcasts (Internet radio) provided play-by-play and color commentary. The purse? $200,000 cash (and all the Papa John's pizza you can eat on-site). Unless you're a member of the joystick generation, you've probably never heard of the CPL games. But event organizers and sponsors are convinced that, like the X-Games before them, these are the games of the new generation. And as this group grows up, the games will grow with them. Next summer's games are already scheduled for a venue twice as large to hold an audience that more than doubles with each event. "We're riding the crest of our culture," says CPL founder, Angel Munoz. "Right now, we're under most people's radar," says the former investment banker who organized the first games in 1997. But, says the New York transplant, league-style interactive games are like smoke on the horizon, "a sign of a huge change that's already under way." Online games may not bring smiles to the faces of many American parents, already concerned about overweight kids who consume too much media violence. But Mr. Munoz says the games encourage social interaction with far-flung team members. "Our gamers are in touch with people all over the globe," he says, pointing out that most teams are comprised of individuals from every part of the country. "The CPL games," he adds, "are not limited by borders." While some may question whether online, global game play makes these competitors athletes, Munoz is unapologetic about the moniker. "Athlete," he says, "is a Greek word for competitor. We're not football players, but we're serious competitors." CPL commissioner Frank Nuccio says, "This is a viable, play-by-play sport that is in its infancy." Like it or not, he adds, technology is the dominant mode of social interaction for the next generation. The CPL games are part of that leading edge. Paid to play

It turned out mothers everywhere were wrong: You can make a living playing video games. Mr. Miller, a college sophomore from Washington, says he trains online with his team (dubbed 3D for desire, discipline, dedication), going over the maps and strategies used in the game. During the school year, the 3D's compete in two leagues, one amateur, one pro. Thanks to the team's cosponsors, CompUSA and NVIDIA, players receive a regular salary - enough to support an 18year-old while he's in school studying business (Miller declines to give a figure).

Electronic sports, abbreviated e-sports is used as a general term to describe the play of video games competitively. Other terms include competitive gaming, professional gaming, cybersports and v-sports. One of the founding fathers of electronic sports leagues is Angel Munoz, founder of the Cyberathlete Professional League).[1] Games that are played as electronic sports normally belong to the real-time strategy (RTS), fighting, first-person shooter (FPS), massively-multiplayer online (MMOG), and racing genres. They are played competitively at amateur, semi-professional and professional levels including in leagues and tournaments.

Contents
[hide]

1 Over the Internet 2 Over a local area network 3 Electronic Sports History o 3.1 Arcade era o 3.2 Unix era 3.2.1 Netrek o 3.3 Early PC Era 3.3.1 Doom 3.3.2 Doom II 3.3.3 Quake o 3.4 Global Tournaments Era 3.4.1 Cyberathlete Professional League 3.4.2 World Cyber Games 3.4.3 Electronic Sports World Cup 3.4.4 Major League Gaming 3.4.5 World eSports Games 3.4.6 World Series of Video Games 4 Player Contracts & Professional Electronic Sports Titles 5 Major electronic sports games o 5.1 StarCraft o 5.2 Counter-Strike o 5.3 Warcraft III o 5.4 FIFA o 5.5 Halo o 5.6 Quake 4 o 5.7 Fighting games o 5.8 Starcraft 2 o 5.9 TrackMania Nations o 5.10 Dota games 6 Other competitions 7 Media coverage 8 Professional Leagues

9 See also 10 Associations and Governing Bodies 11 References 12 External links

[edit] Over the Internet

The easiest way to play an electronic sports match is over the Internet. General online play is subject to the lessened ability to detect cheating and the more unpredictable network latency not being the ideal environment for high level competition; however, due to its convenience, even players who are used to LAN games use Internet games for fun and exhibition games. Usually teams (or "clans" as they are sometimes called) contact each other prior to matches. Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is very popular for doing this, due to the ability of each clan, league, or other gaming-related organisation to set up its own chat channel on the network, making them easy to find. (IRC has become so popular among gamers that the largest IRC network is QuakeNet, a network originally created for players of the first-person shooter Quake and now used by players of many different games.) The matches are then carried out on the server according to the rules of the leagues the teams are familiar with. Popular online leagues include the Canada-based Pro Gaming League, along with Cyberathlete Amateur League, Cyber Evolution (CEVO), FraggedNation, eCompete-Online (ECO), Major League Gaming, ClanBase, and the Electronic Sports League. Video game competitions have referees or officials to monitor for cheating.[clarification needed][2] These video gaming tournaments also bring in fans, that either show up at the tournament or view it online[3] Video gaming has sponsorship; for example, the CPL is sponsored by Sierra Entertainment, Razer, Cyber Shots Energy Drink, and Gamerail,[4] and some teams even have sponsorship from big companies such as Intel, Western Digital or even Steelseries. The largest online gaming network on the PC is Battle.net, used to play Warcraft, Diablo and StarCraft online. These networks have over 12 million active users with an average of 1,000,000 online at any given moment with peaks up to 1,500,000[citation needed]. This service provided by Blizzard Entertainment is especially important for Warcraft III for which it features integrated ladders. The best on the one-one ladders compete in seasons stretching over a period of months, after which the top finishers gather at offline events to compete for a seasonal championship and tens of thousands of dollars in prize money. Even though the PlayStation Network currently has the most individual profiles(sitting in around 28 million), it's chief competitor Xbox Live is currently the most popular and the most subscribed to console online gaming service, with over 17 million subscribers.

[edit] Over a local area network

Playing over a Local area network (LAN) has a number of advantages: the network has less lag and higher quality, and the competitors can be directly scrutinized for cheating. At professional events administrators will normally be present to ensure fair play. Because there is still a possibility of gamers using Modding to alter their hardware to unfairly modify certain aspects of the game or controller inputs to their advantage, some competitions prevent this by supplying all competitors with identical hardware for the event. LAN events also create a more social atmosphere as a result of all competitors being physically present. Due to the advantages of LAN many gamers organize LAN parties or visit LAN centres and most major tournaments are conducted over LANs.

[edit] Electronic Sports History

[edit] Arcade era
Video games have been played competitively since their inception. Twin Galaxies is known for keeping track of high scores on many classic arcade games, and they created the U.S. National Video Game Team in 1983. The team ran a number of competitions, including the 1987 Video Game Masters Tournament for Guinness World Records. Nintendo held their World Championships in 1990, touring across the United States, with the finals at Universal Studios Hollywood in California. There were 90 finalists, and the champions were Jeff Hanson (11 & under), Thor Aackerlund (1217), and Paul White (18 & over). The Nintendo championships are notable for the gold cartridges distributed to all of the finalists, which now fetch high prices on eBay.[5] Nintendo held a 2nd World Championships in 1994 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) called the Nintendo PowerFest '94. There were 132 finalists that played in the finals in San Diego, CA. Mike Iarossi took home 1st prize. Blockbuster Video ran their own World Game Championships in the early 1990s, co-hosted by GamePro magazine. Citizens from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Chile were eligible to compete. Games from the 1994 championships included NBA Jam and Virtua Racing.[6] The first ever televised eSports event has been noted as the Australian gameshow A*mazing, which would show two children competing in various Nintendo games in order to win points.

[edit] Unix era

[edit] Netrek Developed as a successor to 1986's Xtrek, Netrek was first played in 1988. It is an Internet game for up to 16 players, written almost entirely in cross-platform open source software. It combines features of multi-directional shooters and team-based real-time strategy games. Players attempt to disable or destroy their opponents' ships in real-time combat, while taking over enemy planets

by bombing them and dropping off armies they pick up on friendly planets. The goal of the game is to capture all the opposing team's planets. Netrek was the third Internet game, the first Internet team game,[7] the first Internet game to use metaservers to locate open game servers, and the first to have persistent user information. In 1993 it was credited by Wired Magazine as "the first online sports game".[8] As of 2010 it is the oldest Internet game still actively played.

[edit] Early PC Era

[edit] Doom The release of Doom on December 10, 1993 introduced multi-player death match games. Doom spawned newsgroups, chat rooms and among the first known users of IRC for gaming. Players connected to each other modem-to-modem and online competitive gaming was born. A handful of Doom fan sites report the favored maps of the time being e1m4 and e1m5. Doom was swept aside by the release of its successor Doom II on October 10, 1994. Shortly thereafter the DWANGO (Dial up Wide Area Network Gaming Operations) firm launched their services. DWANGO, charged users the cost of a local telephone call to connect to their dial-up bulletin board services. With 20+ servers scattered throughout urban locations in North America DWANGO became the early hub of competitive gaming. Initially, online gaming was available only to those with superior internet connections. These included ISP employees, university/college students and large businesses. Early client side software includes iDoom, Kali and iFrag. [edit] Doom II To accompany the launch of Doom II, Microsoft held the first offline tournament for PC players, Deathmatch '95. Deathmatch '95 (aka Judgment Day Deathmatch 95 & Dwangos Deathmatch 95) was aimed to be a competitive offline gaming tournament featuring the most popular title of the year, Doom II. This format, with gamers attending a single location and using standardized hardware, has defined eSports competitions since. The tournament took place in Richmond, Virginia in October and a handful of national qualifiers witnessed players from Europe flying to play in the tournament. Prior to these events many players had competed online. Early favorites for the competition included Dennis Fong and Merlin. Dennis Fong later recalled the tournament as follows: By virtue of having already played most of the top players around the country and beaten them, I was considered one of the favorites to win the tournament. Another player who went by the handle "Merlock" was considered the other favorite. Due to a random draw, we ended up facing

each other in the semi-finals. I ended up beating him something like 10-5. Merlock got so upset he slammed the keyboard and threw his chair off-stage. It was quite the scene, particularly since LAN tournaments weren't all that common back then. Although I didn't practice the game much, it was pretty evident that most players really favored the Cleric class as it was the easiest to learn and had a homing-type weapon that seemed more powerful than anything else in the game. Since everyone expected the finals to be played Cleric vs. Cleric, I decided to go against the grain and learn the Mage class. Anyway, to make a long story short, I found a way to counter the Cleric super-weapon and ended up shutting out my opponent in the finals, beating him 8-0.[9] [edit] Quake Formal events have grown dramatically since the release of Quake in 1996. At the earliest offline Quake tournament, "Red Annihilation" in May '97 of that year, Quake co-creator John Carmack promised his own red Ferrari 328 GTS convertible to the winner, Dennis Fong aka "Thresh".

[edit] Global Tournaments Era

[edit] Cyberathlete Professional League In June 1997 Angel Munoz launched a league for computer video gamers, known as the Cyberathlete Professional League or CPL. Since then, the attendance and size of the venues for these events has grown and thousands of spectators typically connect over the internet to watch the final matches.[10] In 2005 the CPL moved to a World Tour format. The 2005 CPL World Tour focused on the oneon-one deathmatch game Painkiller and had a total prize purse of $1,000,000. The winner of the CPL Grand Finals event, Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel, went home with the grand prize of $150,000, while Sander "Vo0" Kaasjager took home the MVP trophy for having the most tournament wins. The Cyberathlete Amateur League (CAL) is the "minor league" of the CPL. It is based mainly on online game play. It hosts more than 600,000 online gamers.[11] A 2003 competition hosted by CAL was played in a Hyatt Regency Ballroom. Several tables were placed together where 10 computers were set up for the professional gamers. The game was Half-Life: Counterstrike.[3] The CPL closed its doors in 2008 and in planning on re-opening May 2010. Controversy currently surrounds the league after a leaked report that the league faked its closing.[citation needed] [edit] World Cyber Games In the year 2000, the first World Cyber Games event was held in Seoul, Korea. There were competitions for Quake III Arena, StarCraft, FIFA 2000, and Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings. The competition initially had 174 competitors from 17 different countries with a total prize purse of $20,000. In 2006, the prize purse had risen to $462,000, and the event had grown to 9 different competitions and 700 qualified participants from 70 different countries.

[edit] Electronic Sports World Cup Electronic Sports World Cup is an international championship held annually in France. Representatives must win their respective national qualifier to represent their country in the tournament.[12] The first Electronic Sports World Cup event was held in 2000, with a total of 358 participants from 37 countries, and a prize purse of 150.000. By 2006, the event had grown to 547 qualified participants from 53 countries and a prize purse of $400,000. The event also featured the first competition with a game specifically made for it; TrackMania Nations. [edit] Major League Gaming 2002 saw the launch of Major League Gaming, a North American professional videogame league, the largest organized professional gaming league. Competitors from 28 different countries have participated in their tournaments, while over one million participants have competed online.[13] In 2006, Major League Gaming was the first televised console gaming league in the United States, with their Halo 2 Pro Series being broadcast by USA Network.[14] Now Major League Gaming has put Halo 3, Halo: Reach, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare,League of Legends, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Starcraft II, and World of Warcraft into their circuit.[15] Events are now broadcast on their homepage. [edit] World eSports Games The first time the World e-Sports Games took place, was January 30 through March 20, 2005 and featured Counter-Strike and Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos as main titles. Players resided in Seoul, South Korea throughout most of the tournament and matches were broadcast on Korean television. The finals took place in Beijing, China. Attendees were all invited based on past performances and included the likes of Jang "Moon" Jae Ho, Team NoA and Li "Sky" Xiaofeng. [edit] World Series of Video Games 2006 saw the first season of the World Series of Video Games event, a spin off of the CPL World Tour format. The WSVG held world championships for Counter-Strike, Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, and Quake 4. The WSVG also held American championships for Halo 2, Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter, and Project Gotham Racing 3.

[edit] Player Contracts & Professional Electronic Sports Titles

There are a number of titles that have a professional gaming scene. The top players can make a living playing the games on the marketing value they gain as a result. Hundreds, thousands and even millions of dollars in prize money are turned out each year for competitors in these titles. The most popular tournaments are those run by the World Cyber Games, the World e-Sports Games, and the Electronic Sports World Cup. The prize money for these events is mostly provided by the large technology corporations who sponsor the events; these companies also

tend to sponsor eSports teams. A team sponsorship usually includes travel expenses and sometimes free hardware specific to that company. Although sponsorships have evolved over the years, and oftentimes only sponsoring one gamer at a timethe first all inclusive team sponsorship was given to Team Abuse in June of 2000. Team Abuse was a well-respected Quake II team led by Doug 'Citizen' Suttles and a gamut of talented players [Toxic, Method, Lord Vader]. Upon their hosting of a grass roots event called Lansanity in Portland, OR Team Abuse was offered a complete sponsorship, setting precedence for many gamers to come. The Speakeasy sponsorship included a fully leased gaming studio in Lake Oswego, OR with a Speakeasy.net T1 connection. Additionally Team Abuse was sent to many CPL events, Quake Invitational League events, hosted Lansanity 2, and also found itself sending Marc 'pureluck' Naujock to the XSI Invitational in London as part of the Top 10 USA players vs the Top 10 European players tournament. Speakeasy paved the way for fully immersive corporate marketing sponsorship for professional gaming by applying merchandising, PR, grass root events, and a serious interest in the gaming community.

[edit] Major electronic sports games

[edit] StarCraft
Main article: StarCraft professional competition

StarCraft: Brood War Real Time Strategy (1vs1, PC)

This game has found a home in South Korea, where many play it professionally or as a spectator sport. It is the most popular professionally played game due to its immense popularity in South Korea, where the best pro-gamers are seen as celebrities. In Korea, Starcraft has leagues such as Ongamenet Starleague, MBC Starleague, and Proleague. Finals for these league attract tens of thousands of fans and are viewed on cable TV with great popularity. StarCraft is the very first game to have been accepted into the World Cyber Games tournament and has a tournament at their events since inception. It also enjoys significant competitive popularity in the west as well.

[edit] Counter-Strike

Counter-Strike Tactical Team FPS (5vs5, PC)

Played all around the world with hot spots in North America and Europe, there are a few dozen professional teams that gather at just as many tournaments all around the world every year. Without a uniting body in competitive gaming many of these claim to be the game's "World Championship" tournament.

While none of them stand out enough to justify this claim, six tournament finals are generally identified as being the "biggest". The six "Major tournaments" are listed below and are led by WCG (World Cyber Games) and the CPL (Cyberathlete Professional League). Teams can be observed playing professionally in leagues such as, CEVO, ESEA League, ESL, and others. The defunct league Championship Gaming Series franchised teams with contracted players who played Counter-Strike: Source

[edit] Warcraft III

Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne Real Time Strategy (1vs1, PC)

Played professionally all around the world with hot spots in South Korea, China , France and Germany, there are a few dozen "professional" teams. The game lacks a uniting body and has no definable world championship. Some of the biggest Warcraft III tournaments include the six "Major tournaments" listed below as well as events organised by Blizzard Entertainment, televised Korean leagues and several large tournaments held in China. Warcraft III is seen as the competitive RTS-game with the second biggest playerbase, with the number players online at Battle.net ranging between 70,000 and 100,000 at any given moment. It must also be noted that the Chinese scene, which has over three million players, uses their own clients for online competition due to a poor connection to the outside world. In Korea, Warcraft III has significantly less popularity than Starcraft, which is the most popular. Wiki articles about Warcraft III competitions include a historical overview of "world championships" as well as a ranking based on them and a number of player biographies such as: Xiaofeng "Sky" Li, Dae Hui "FoV" Cho, Jang "Moon" Jae Ho, Fredrik "MaDFroG" Johansson and Manuel "Grubby" Schenkhuizen.

[edit] FIFA

FIFA Football Sports (PC)

FIFA Football is a part of the World Cyber Games since its beginning in 2000 and also at every regional WCG Tourney like the SEC or the Pan-American WCG. In 2003 a FIFA tournament was also held at the CPL Europe and is therefore the only sports game that has ever been part of a Cyberathlete Professional League competition.

World League eSport Bundesliga Kick-Off Event Germany has the biggest FIFA Football community with two professional leagues (Electronic Sports League EPS and the World League eSport Bundesliga which is aired on the national TVbroadcaster Deutsches Sportfernsehen). Besides Germany, South Korea is a strong FIFA Football nation with 3 World Cyber Games titles. There are also leagues in South Korea like the Ongamenet FifaLeague that are televised. In 2006 prizes with a value of over a quarter million US-Dollar were handed out to professional FIFA gamers.

[edit] Halo

Halo Tactical Team FPS (Xbox)

The Halo series has a large impact on the national professional scene in the United States of America. See Major League Gaming for more information. This has also been picked up in Europe, with the European Gaming League hosting their first event at the end of July 2010 in Liverpool attracting 30 of Europe's biggest teams. Australia have also started their own leagues with the Australian Cyber League hosting their Pro Circuit with tournaments in several major cities in Australia.

[edit] Quake 4

Quake 4 DeathMatch FPS (1vs1, PC)

Played professionally in western society, there are a dozen professional players signed to a few professional teams and a number of players marketing themselves through other means. As of 2008, Quake 4 has fallen out of favor in competition for the previous game in the series Quake III Arena. Four "world championships" took place using Quake 4 in the 2006 season. Most notable are those of the Electronic Sports World Cup and the World Series of Video Games as the game had a top tier status with these organizations, the game had the smallest status of all games played at the World Cyber Games and KODE5. So far only the Electronic Sports World Cup has announced that they will be using Quake 4 again. It is generally expected that the World series of Video Games will do the same and it is also seen as a potential candidate for a top status game at the World Cyber Games.

[edit] Fighting games

Street Fighter Fighting (1vs1, Arcade, PS2)

Street Fighter series, The King of Fighters series, Mortal Kombat series, Marvel vs. Capcom series (also known as crossover or versus series), and Tekken series are amongst those fighting games played at a professional level. Popular tournaments have taken place in the whole world, primarily the Evolution Championship Series in the USA, TOOHON in South Korea, Tougeki Super Battle Opera in Japan.

[edit] Starcraft 2

Starcraft 2 Real time strategy (PC)

Crowd watching starcraft 2 at MLG Columbus Following the success of Starcraft as an e-sport, especially in South Korea, Starcraft 2 has become the most popular e-sports in the world. GSL, a monthly tournament from GOM-TV, boasts having the most prize money of any e-sport to date. As of July 2011, StarCraft 2 has paid out over 1.4 million US in cash prize tournaments. Some of these leagues have received the honor of being recognized worldwide as a provider of e-sports content.[16] The MLG Pro Circuit and the North American Star League (NASL) are some examples of leagues.

[edit] TrackMania Nations

TrackMania Nations Forever Racing (1vs1vs1vs1, PC)

TrackMania Nations ESWC released in January 2006, and was the first game to be conceived for a competition (Electronic Sports World Cup). The game permits players to create their own tracks. Except ESWC, the Electronic Sports League, Electronic Tournaments and the FuturTech Gaming League organize competitions on this game. In April 2008, a new version of the game, called TrackMania Nations Forever, released and added new features to the original game. The ESWC committee decided to use this new version for ESWC 2008. This game is downloadable free of charge and counts around 8,000 players at least on any moment. On esports, the game is most popular in Europe, especially in France, where the game was created.

[edit] Dota games

Defense of the Ancients - Dota (5v5, PC, Mac) Dota 2 - Dota (5v5 PC, Mac) Heroes of Newerth - Dota (5v5, PC, Mac, Linux) League of Legends - Dota (5v5, PC)

Defense of the Ancients, League of Legends (LoL) and Heroes of Newerth (HoN), are played professionally. All 3 games have been played at Dreamhack.[17][18][19] The League of Legends Grand Finals was broadcasted live over the Internet where the winning team received $50,000.[20] LoL has been added to the Intel Extreme Masters lineup for the 2011 Electronic Sports League season.[21] Both LoL and DotA have been included in the World Cyber Games and DotA will also be included in ESWC.[22] It was recently announced that HoN will be included in the second season of the North American Star League as a promotional title.[23]

[edit] Other competitions

In September 2006 FUN Technologies held the first WorldWide Web Games for a $1 million prize. The competition had 71 contestants and featured the casual games Bejeweled 2, Solitaire, and Zuma. The champion was 21-year-old Kavitha Yalavarthi of Odessa, Texas.[24] Some online games can be played using a variety of peripheral input devices that require physical activity. These include game cycles, bicycles both upright and recumbent, steppers like the Gamercize peripheral and treadmills. In March 2009 a new sort of computer video game (exergaming) peripheral was launched, the FootPOWR peripheral. Until this time the majority of electronic game competitions consisted of players using the mouse and select keyboard input for game play. The FootPOWR peripheral is quite versatile since each of the nine area of the item can be mapped to specific keys or mouse functions.[25] Like other online game competitions it is difficult for those using activity-driven (exergaming) input devices to be certain they are playing in a similar fashion as others who may be using conventional mouse or keyboard input.[26]

[edit] Media coverage

StarCraft match televised on MBCGame in Seoul, South Korea The main medium for electronic sports coverage is the Internet. Electronic sports websites generally focus on professional tournaments and the top level amateur games, leaving the other

games to be covered by the leagues themselves or smaller game-specific community websites if at all. Mainstream coverage in North America and Europe has increased, and more mainstream news websites are starting to regularly provide some coverage of the major events with occasional television coverage. One of the biggest contributors to the video game media coverage are professional video gamers such as Lil Poison and Fatal1ty. In South Korea, electronic sports and events are regularly televised by dedicated 24-hour cable TV game channels Ongamenet and MBCGame. The most frequent games in South Korean electronic sports are the real-time strategy games StarCraft and Warcraft III. The South Korean scene is often cited as an example of popularised electronic sports by those who would like to see a similar level of popularity in the west.[27] In Germany, GIGA Television's majority of shows are covering e-sports. ESL TV was transformed into GIGA II in June 2006 but the concept failed and ESL TV was reintroduced in autumn 2007. ESL TV features e-sports only. In the UK, XLEAGUE.TV broadcasts on SKY channel 208, showing both features on eSports and broadcasting matches from its online leagues and tournaments, which for the purpose of television shows, are shot from its studio rather than played online. This channel has ceased broadcasting as of 1 March 2009. In France, Game One propose some e-sport matches in a show called "Arena Online" and is a partner of the Xfire Trophy, an invitational tournament. They broadcasted matches on games like Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike: Source, Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars, and recently Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. In the United States, gaming is seen on a variety of channels. ESPN has a show called Madden Nation, which shows gamers playing the Madden NFL game for Xbox 360. These players are competing for a cash prize.[28] DirecTV shows live video game matches for the Championship Gaming Series.[27] CBS aired footage of the 2007 World Series of Video Games tournament that was held in Louisville, Kentucky.[29] G4 (TV channel) is dedicated to keeping viewers up to date on video games.[30]

[edit] Professional Leagues

League name Ongamenet Starleague (OSL) MBCgame Starleague (MSL) Proleague SIXAXIS Gaming Game Starcraft Starcraft Starcraft COD4, Gran Turismo 5, FIFA '11, NBA 2K11, Killzone 3 Korea Korea Korea Country Since 2000 2003 2005

Australia/New Zealand 2008

Left 4 Dead 2, Call of Duty, CounterStrike: Source, StarCraft 2 Halo 3, Halo: Reach, Tekken 6, StarCraft Major League II, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, World of Gaming WarCraft, Call of Duty: Black Ops Pro Gaming League Halo 3, Halo: Reach, NHL 11 ESL Extreme Multiple. Changes occasionally. Masters Multiple and not included in the "Extreme ESL Major Series Masters" ESL Pro Series Multiple. Changes occasionally. European Team Fortress 2 League Team Fortress 2 (ETF2L) NGL One Warcraft 3 and StarCraft 2 Pozna Game Arena ClanBase EuroCup UKeSA Dell XPS Premiership National Professional Cybersport League Evolution Multiple. Changes per year Championship Series Athens Gaming CS:Source, CS 1.6, Call of Duty 4, PES, League DotA Allstars World Cyber Games Multiple. Changes per year E-Sports Entertainment League Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike: Source, Cyber Evolution Call of Duty, Team Fortress 2, Left 4 Dead Tougeki Super Multiple. Changes per year Battle Opera Xtreme Professional CS 1.6, CS:Source, COD4, America's League Army, and more CS 1.6, Quake Live, WarCraft 3, Electronic Sports Trackmania, NFS Shift, DotA, CS Female, World Cup Super Street Fighter IV, Guitar Hero 5 World e-Sports Games Total Gaming League CyberGamer

Australia/NZ, North America North America North America International European European European European European European United Kingdom Russia North America Greece International International International Japan International International International International

2007 2003

2007 2007 2002 2004

2004 2000

2003

2000

2003 2003 2000

GOMTV Global Starcraft II League StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty (GSL) North American Star StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty League (NASL) iRacing.com World iRacing.com Championship Halo: Reach, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Australian Cyber FIFA 11, Marvel vs Capcom 3, League (ACL) Streetfighter IV, Super Smash Bros: Brawl, Super Smash Bros. Melee

Korea/International

2010

North 2011 America/International International 2009

Australia/New Zealand 2009

Players
Nationality Belarus Sweden Russia Saudi Arabia Germany France Germany Germany Player Alexey Yanushevsky Andreas Thorstensson Anton Singov Badr Hakeem Benjamin Reichert Bertrand Grospellier Christian Hck Christoph Semke 24 26 30 Age 21 32 25 26 28 30 Cooller ArabianJoker Kane ElkY GitzZz Mondragon FoV Templars of Twilight SK Gaming StarCraft, Warcraft III Unreal Tournament series StarCraft Quake III, Quake 4 Pro Evolution Soccer series Pseudonym Cypher Team Game(s) Quake series

South Korea Dae Hui Cho Japan United States United States Daigo Umehara Daniel Stemkoski Dennis Fong

Warcraft III Street Fighter The Beast, Daigo, Team (series), Marvel Vs. Ume MadCatz Capcom 3 StarCraft, StarCraft Artosis Sixjax Gaming II Thresh Quake series

Sweden Emil Christensen 27 South Korea Eunjong Byun 28 Fredrik Sweden 26 Johansson Russia Ivan Demidov 24 30

HeatoN JJu MaDFroG

Counter-Strike StarCraft II, Warcraft III StarCraft, Warcraft III Warcraft III, Starcraft II Quake III, Quake 4 Quake 4 Warsow Team Liquid StarCraft II

South Korea Jang Jae Ho United States Sweden United States Sweden South Korea People's Republic of China Johnathan Wendel Johan Quick Jonathan Rodriguez Jonathan Walsh Lee Young-Ho Li Xiaofeng

Moon Fatal1ty Toxjq

27 19 26 31 20 25

kyuubi Jinro By.FlaSh Sky SlayerS_`BoxeR` SlayerS av3k Grubby Kinetic Serious Gaming

Warcraft III Starcraft, Starcraft II Quake series Warcraft III Project Gotham Racing 3 Halo series SK Gaming Counter-Strike StarCraft, Starcraft II Quake III Counter-Strike Halo 2 Painkiller, Quake III, Quake 4 Quake III, Quake

South Korea Lim Yo-Hwan Maciej Krzykowski Manuel Netherlands Schenkhuizen Poland Ireland United States Germany Norway Mark Kenny Michael Cavanaugh Musa Celik Ola Moum

23 31 31 24

StrongSide Schroet Kommando elemeNt July czm Darth Saiyan Vo0 Rapha SK Gaming

South Korea Park Sung-Joon

StarTale

United Paul Nelson 27 States Netherlands Pieter Bas Kwak 28 United Ryan Danford 25 States Netherlands Sander Kaasjager 26 United Shane 22

States United States United Kingdom Germany United States United States France

Hendrixson Stevie Case Sujoy Roy Tim Reichert Tom Ryan Vanessa Arteaga Yoan Merlo 26 ToD FreedoM Mousesports Samsung KHAN 31 25 Burke Ogre 2 SK Gaming 35 KillCreek

Live

Quake

Halo 3 Dead or Alive 4 Warcraft III StarCraft, Warcraft

South Korea Youngsuk Chang 23

In 2002, EA purchased the license to NASCAR for six years, ending competition from Papyrus and Infogrames. On December 13, 2004, EA Sports signed an exclusive deal with the National Football League (NFL) and its Players' Union for five years. On February 12, 2008, EA Sports announced the extension of its exclusive deal until the 2012 NFL season. Less than a month after the NFL Exclusive deal, EA Sports signed a four-year exclusive deal with the Arena Football League (AFL). On April 11, 2005, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and EA Sports signed a deal to grant EA Sports the sole rights to produce college football games for six years. EA lost the rights for Major League Baseball (MLB) games to 2K Sports in 2005, ending EA's MVP series; however, EA made NCAA Baseball games in 2006 and 2007 after losing the MLB license. In January 2008, EA Sports decided not to renew their NCAA College Baseball license while they evaluate the status of their MVP game engine.[5] In 2005, EA Sports and ESPN signed a massive 15-year deal for ESPN to be integrated into EA Sports video games. EA's use of the ESPN license has steadily increased over the early life of the deal. EA's early usage of the ESPN license began with ESPN Radio and a sports ticker in titles like Madden NFL, NBA Live, Tiger Woods PGA Tour, and NCAA Baseball and Football. The ESPN integration now includes streaming podcasts, text articles (including content only available previously to ESPN Insider subscribers), and ESPN Motion video (including such programs as Pardon the Interruption).