Esports is growing at an incredible rate as a new independent industry. It provides the perfect opportunity to capitalize on Millennials and digital native’s favorite activities: watching game content and actually playing the games. The industry that covers competitive video gaming as a spectator sport is set to reach almost $2 billion by the end of 2018, and manufacturers, brands, and participants have a unique opportunity to exploit the space where there is still territory to seize.
Last year, some 36 million people streamed the world finals of the League of Legends. Fantasy sports is a massive market in the U.S., with reports claiming that around 57 million people over 12 years of age are playing, so why shouldn’t esports continue to soar?
Why esports is developing exponentially
Firstly, let’s look at why esports is growing so swiftly:
- Technology – the development of technology and constant improvement of network infrastructure make it possible for bigger, more complex games.
- Commerce – esports attracts the masses. Besides advertising opportunities, esports is a dream platform for game manufacturers to raise brand popularity and awareness.
- Esports – esports itself has no restriction when it comes to time and place, which means that there is greater flexibility for players.
The idea that people are keen to watch others play competitive video games for big prizes is no longer surprising. Today, large esports events attract more than 40,000 people watching live as well as tens of millions of spectators on the web. It’s bigger than a basketball game!
Esports and revenue
The coming year is set to see the esports economy soar with a year-on-year growth of over 40%. Let’s take a look at the average breakdowns:
- $155 million is set to be spent on advertising
- $266 million to be spent on sponsorship
- $95 million to be spend on media rights
Furthermore, it is expected that consumer spending on tickets and merchandise will amount to $64 million. That leaves an estimated $116 million total investment from game publishers.
Who is enjoying esports?
If you’re wondering which countries are enjoying esports the most, and therefore which languages you should be localizing your software in, take a look at the figures:
- The global audience will reach 385.5 million this year
- Emerging regions like the Middle East, Africa, and Southeast Asia are seeing increased viewership
- The top 10 countries where eSports is mounting are: USA, South Korea, Sweden, China, Canada, Germany, Denmark, France, Ukraine, and Russia
Considering languages
Since the esport market is a multilingual environment, there is a growing need for localization and multilingual translations.
For most companies involved in the gaming world, the challenge is to grow as quickly as the industry, both globally and sustainably. Your brand needs to reach fans from the Far East to the West Coast, which means you need to be considering the main players and their languages. If you are not localizing your content to meet the needs of non-English speaking countries, you are missing out on exponential growth.
