Cover story
Words by Ren Alcantara
I
doubt there’s anyone who will argue against that point. Whether alone or in groups, games are played to kill some time and keep ourselves occupied, no matter how trivial the game is. But there’s another side of gaming as entertainment that has seen quite the boom over the course of the pandemic, and that’s gaming streams. Whether it’s watching a large, organized esports event, or just joining a random someone’s play-along-with-me feed, gaming streams have gotten bigger and bigger as people continue to look for more sources of entertainment, and as connectivity, gaming titles, and available time all increase. Some of the largest viewerships happen in esports tournaments. The recently concluded Valorant Champions Tour Masters in Berlin averaged at just shy of 390,000 viewers and peaked at a whopping 811,000
October 2021
sets of eyeballs glued to their devices watching the action. This peak was hit on Day 6 of the tournament, as two huge teams, the Sentinels and G2 Esports faced off. The Overwatch League (OWL), on the other hand, has seen a resurgence in viewership, despite stiff competition from Valorant, a title for which some Overwatch Pro players left OWL. In May, the average number of viewers watching every minute was at 113,000, a massive 79 percent increase from the previous year’s numbers. The subsequent Countdown Cup saw an average of 102,000 average views a minute, representing 91 percent growth from the previous year. However way you look at it, people are interested in watching these pro-FPS players do their thing in what’s essentially a traditional broadcast format.
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