Three hundred people packed into the Paragon Sports Bar in Sydney last Saturday to watch the biggest sports match of that night on widescreen TVs. Streamed live over the Internet, the match tonight was Starcraft II, a real-time strategy game, where players build & take control of an army to defeat their opponent's army.



The enthusiasm & atmosphere is very similar to footy finals day at the local RSL. People yelling, laughing and cheering with mates, drinks in hand, all sharing the same interest – professional Starcraft 2. Almost anyone can play this game, compete, and if dedicated enough win at Starcraft 2. It was only last month at the largest professional video gaming league in the world; Major League Gaming, (MLG) put up a prize pool of $120,000 USD, attracting the world's best Starcraft 2 players. A South Korean player with the alias; Leenock beat 16 of his peers to take out the first prize of $50,000 USD. Leenock is sixteen years old.

Watching people play and compete professionally against each other, in any activity, is human instinct. There are already a few gaming commentating services in Australia. These "shoutcasters" commentate various games and provide enjoyable viewing for the people who choose to tune in live or download the show later. Watching a highly anticipated match excellently "shoutcasted" on multiple large screens with hundreds of similar-minded individuals is definitely a sight to behold. "I always find watching an eSports game with some friends an awesome time" Sydney Gamers Leagues' founder and avid gamer Jackson Gray stated, "Gamers, beer and games... what better environment?"


Whenever there's a team, there are spectators cheering on their favourite side, e-sports is no different. During the broadcast of MLG, over 3.6 million viewers tuned it over the course of the championship itself. CEO of Major League Gaming, Sundance DiGiovanni told TechCrunch:

"Our viewership numbers this year have been staggering and MLG now pulls in larger audiences than several traditional television cable network,"

Think about that for a second. A broadcast of people playing games drawing a bigger audience than scripted television shows – talk about reality TV. I mentioned in my EB Games Expo coverage a few months ago, that the gaming industry generates more income than Hollywood makes in box office movies and events like MLG only exemplifies this notion.



It's no wonder that a concept like Barcraft works in the real life. Barcraft is essentially people watching a professional game of Starcraft in a bar atmosphere sharing the common love of Starcraft 2. Barcraft is the next logical step of multiplayer gaming, having evolved from a room of people playing in an Internet Café till wee hours in the morning, or carrying your complete PC to a LAN party event to play with hundreds of other gamers in a room for the weekend, to playing online with gamers across the country and the world in the comfort of your seat thanks to the magic of the Internet.

More on my new blog here


Matthew can be found rambling about competitive PC gaming, PC hardware, photography and the random stuff he masticates on his Twitter page.

Edited once, 20/12/11 - 4:21pm by Arseynimz.

:D

Good Read.

Front Page someone??

If you enjoyed the read, feel free to share it on your social media sites, or other forums. I'd really appreciate it

If someone can post this on TL and sc2sea = <3 long time.


P.S. If you haven't seen me, it's because I'm on the COD/Hardware side of CyberGamer

I should mention, I showed Ska last night, he didn't read the whole thing in 30seconds lol.

******* Tim, always getting a sneak peek.

Front Page'd.

the only bar guarentee'd everyone goes home alone!

and for some reason, every other bar that you go to

y no invite grumpz....

2 beers, 9 crossed arms, no one yelling at the screen and everyone making the pool table unplayable. I think we need ti give those guys some lessons in bar etiquette.

cause ur fat n ugly n gey

Kenji gives hugz tho

hes also gey

hahaha, the only chick at the whole bar is on her phone, typical

cool stuf