Popularity of Pro Gaming

[KIAENETOgamergear]

Do you think that pro gaming will become increasingly more popular in the years to come? Or do you feel that as a "spectator sport" it has about reached its maximum level of popularity?

[paecmaker]

I feel that where I come from e-sports will be more popular. A few years ago no one had even seen a tournament here, and now in a few months the first big tournament will start.

I think E-sports will be more popular, at least in some places.

[LiNuX]

When I was younger, I wanted to be a pro gamer, but as I got older, I realized that the market for that isn't really that big, you'd have to be super awesome to get anywhere (or be extremely lucky). I'm neither at most games.

So growing up, I haven't seen pro gaming as something "huge" - so I don't think it'll get bigger, but I could be wrong.

[Saph]

Pro gaming could potentially be a pretty decent occupation, but as Linux said, you'd have to be pretty badass and stand out from the rest in order to be one! The title of being a true "Pro" is not an easy title to come by, since there're millions, perhaps billions of gamers, and each one strive, wether they know it or not, for perfection, and there might only be a hand ful of positions in for example Bethesda Softworks, Rockstar Games etc. to test their games.

I think the job of a pro gamer is to test the entire game, complete or puzzles, tutorials, challenges, and difficulty levels, and then report on HOW difficult each part was. Like wether they should increase or decrease the difficulty, or simply leave it as is. I think thats what a pro gamer is?

A game TESTER however? Whole different ball game! A Game Tester plays the games in a fashion that the average gamer would. He sits down with a game assigned to him and plays it in slightly greater detail than most, keeping a keen eye out for missing parts(for example you might need an iron pipe to complete a puzzle, but the pipe isnt anywhere to be found!), texture misshaps, glitches, and various kinds of bugs that could cripple the game experience. They then finish the game, and write a report on what they discovered where, and what needs to be fixed.

A game tester is a whole lot easier to get. I think Gamestop hires game testers all the time to test the game that people bring in to make sure they still work properly, since age can cause glitches.

[Echo]

I've always played for fun.
But seeing people playing Black Ops free for all 30-0 makes me think that maybe pro gaming would branch out further than what it is.

[KIAENETOgamergear]

Yeah, I agree that the likelihood of becoming a pro gamer is incredibly slim. As industry of pro gaming concerning viewership and overall popularity I guess I could see things going either way. It could be near its peak, or it could blow up even more and be on network TV. You never know :) Thanks for your thoughts!