ESPORTSA brief history of professional gaming

Giovanni Darkik Viviani

What are esports?

Are video games really becoming relevant?

1981 -Stanford University

21st Century !

Rise of global tournaments

During 2000 South Korea recognises Esports as an official sporting event

"Esports Tournament Prize Amounts 1998ẃ–‚„2014" by Aron Ambrosiani - Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Esports_Tournament_Prize_Amounts_1998%E2%80%932014.png#mediaviewer/File:Esports_Tournament_Prize_Amounts_1998%E2%80%932014.png

Free to play

Jönköping - Sweden - 2011 100.000$

Los Angeles - United States - 2012 2.000.000$

Los Angeles - United States - 2013 2.050.000$

Busan - South Korea - 2014 2.130.000$

DOTA 2 - The International 2014 !

~11.000.000$

Professional StarCraft 2 player from South Korea Kim "ViOLet" Dong Hwan recently became the first person from the eSport to obtain a P-1A visa from the American government, his

representatives at Cyber Solutions Agency announced.

Hwan is not the first professional video game player to receive a P-1A visa. Canadian-based League of Legends player Danny "Shiptur" Le was approved for the visa earlier this year.

http://www.polygon.com/2013/12/15/5212798/starcraft-2-player-receives-the-sports-first-us-athlete-visa