I WAS a college sophomore when Starcraft became such a hit and hundreds of students spent time and money--which they didn’t have--to play the hit game. I played it for a while, but since strategy games have always been my weakness, I never really got hooked to the multi-player version, opting to do the campaigns.
Some were naturally gifted, though, and there were even times when a group of guys from one cafe would go play against another group of guys in another cafe for a tournament of sorts. There would be pot money involved, of course.
Why write about Starcraft in a sports column? Well, because a couple of weeks ago, the Olympic Council of Asia announced that Starcraft II will be one of six events for eSports in the Asian Games. Yep, this year’s Asian Games. The other five are League of Legends, Pro Evolution Soccer 2018, Arena of Valor, Heartstone and Clash Royale.
When I saw our tentative list of delegates for the Asian Games per sport, I immediately checked if we had entries for eSports. It’s too bad that we don’t. Or perhaps, we will have.
I’m not aware of a national association for eSports in the country and I hope we have one.
According to the story from the Olympic Council of Asia, to join the Asian Games eSports events, each country must nominate one player for each event before May 31, and the players will be made to join the regional qualifiers in Asia--East, South, Central, West and Southeast--between June 10 and 20 with the winners advancing to the Asian Games proper in August in Indonesia.
If we don’t have a group, I hope one gets formed soon, and if possible, with the guidance of both the Philippine Olympic Committee and the Philippine Sports Commission. Esports, I believe, will have a bigger base of players than all other sports except basketball. If it’s in this year’s Asian Games, I don’t see why it won’t be included in future editions.
Besides, there is already a push to include it in the Summer Olympics, starting in Paris 2024 as a demo sport. I hope the eSports community can get organized in the country, so we won’t have to play catch-up. Sure, some will scoff at this as something that isn’t really sports but please, let’s not go there.
The future is already happening; we either scoff and stay behind or get on with the program.