ESL One Birmingham: Hundreds of followers head to West Midlands to look at skilled video players

Apr 28, 2024 at 8:17 PM

The manufacturing is slick, the pundits are sharp and the gamers are gods.

This isn’t any conventional match although. This is skilled gaming. Fans are watching the very best gamers on this planet taking part in their favorite sport, in an area, for a money prize.

Around 15,000 followers from internationally are in Birmingham watching professionals go head-to-head (nearly) all through the week, with many 1000’s extra watching the competitors on-line.

The match, ESL One Birmingham, is being held on the Resorts World Arena close to the town’s airport.

While many individuals may have heard of a few of the video games which can be performed at massive esports occasions like this, akin to Fifa, the sport being performed this week in Birmingham shall be much less broadly identified.

Dota 2 is described to me by one gaming analyst as being ‘sort of like chess’ however with flashing lights and novelty characters.

There are two groups of 5 gamers and, earlier than play can start, a substantial period of time is spent by the professionals selecting their very own characters and making an attempt to cease the opposite workforce from selecting characters which is likely to be overly advantageous throughout the sport.

Then, frankly, the foundations of the sport are misplaced on me however I’m advised it entails a king, queens and making an attempt to destroy the enemy’s (the opposite workforce’s) base.

The followers inform me a part of the attraction of Dota is how tough the sport is, however finally the enjoyment of being a spectator is similar as for sports activities lovers.

“It’s about the professional aspect of it, similar with football. You can go and play football but it’s nice to see people playing it at a level you could never play at,” says fan Ryan Freeman.

I’m right here to look at the competitors’s semi-final between the UK workforce, Tundra, and a Saudi Arabian workforce, Falcons. There aren’t really any UK gamers in Tundra and Falcons are an equally worldwide bunch.

Much like in skilled athletic sports activities, esports groups are shopping for and promoting the very best gamers on this planet. The professionals in Tundra and Falcons are a few of the finest paid within the trade.

One professional tells me at this degree, gamers could make $10,000 (£8,000) a month, plus match winnings and sponsorship offers. The prize pot at this competitors is $1m (£800,000) though that’s shared between the groups, with the profitable workforce taking $300,000 (£240,000).

“I think many people think of the esports team as just five guys who like playing the game at home,” says Alvaro Sanchez Velasco, Product Manager at ESL One Birmingham.

“But the [team] organisations have boot camps, they have schedules that include training regimens, psychological visits. They usually have a team manager and team psychologist, that’s very common these days, as well as a coach and assistant coach.”

Jonas Volek is a Czech skilled gamer and though he isn’t collaborating on this match in Birmingham, he is right here to commentate and analyse the video games. While I’m interviewing him I see a line of followers creating, they’re clearly ready for him to complete talking.

When he does, all of them ask for selfies.

Mr Volek, 23, performed chess as a toddler, then switched to video video games and by 12 years previous he was hooked on Dota 2, turning into an expert participant by his late teenagers. Now he competes in tournaments internationally.

“It’s not really a job, it’s more of a lifestyle because it takes so much of my time,” says Mr Volek.

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“When I’m really training, it takes 12 hours a day, and I’m always travelling. There’s no time for anything else.”

I did not see any feminine gamers on stage in Birmingham, and the viewers is dominated by males.

“I do hope one day I’ll see more women up there playing the game in the best teams,” says fan Charlotte Keane.

But there is not the charged, typically risky ambiance that you just may discover at many sporting occasions, significantly males’s soccer.

There is a few comedian ‘smack discuss’ between gamers from opposing groups, egged on by the hosts for the viewers’s enjoyment. But after one participant criticises the opposite participant’s hair in mock-serious vogue, one of many hosts decides that is sufficient play combating.

Of course, for the followers, there is not the identical territorial spirit that comes with supporting a selected soccer workforce as an illustration. Mostly that is about respect for the person gamers, who cannot hear any of the cheers or chants from the group throughout the sport as they put on noise cancelling headphones to allow them to give attention to profitable.

After about an hour of play, Falcons are victorious, and the followers make their means out of the auditorium to purchase scorching canine and fish and chips.

This occasion feels distinctly much less boozy than any sporting competitors I’ve ever been to. But, even for an fanatic, Dota 2 doesn’t look like the sort of sport it could be straightforward to comply with after a couple of pints.