Many things have changed since the technological revolution and the advancement of the computer age. The advancement of the computer age has changed many things even the way we play games. For many years now E-sports have been growing in popularity. To play games Counter-Strike and Quake were among the first E-sports holding tournaments and leagues online.
E-sports is so competitive and popular that very skilled and dedicated players can earning a very comfortable lifestyle online just playing games. So with millions of players, and by far being the most popular online game of all time, it was merely a matter of time before World of Warcraft embraced the E-sport method of play.
Combat has always been an integral part of the Warcraft series of free games. However, Blizzard took this part of the WoW gameplay a step further when it introduces Arena PvP (player versus player) play to world of warcraft with its Burning Crusade expansion.
In the Arena a group of WoW players could fight as a team of either two players, three players or five players. With its exciting fast-paced gameplay, entertaining and rewarding player versus player combat interactions and its complex form of rating teams the Arenas became very popular very fast.
Thousands of teams were created and battles between teams raged for days on end as they fought to gain a top 10 ranking in the online leagues.
It didn't take long for Blizzard to launch a tournament (for 5 player teams) where they offered a spot to the top 3 teams from each bracket to compete for a $10,000 top prize. This started a frenzy of activity in the Arenas and soon thousands of teams were battling for the top spots.
For years prior to this World of Warcraft PvP expansion there were E-sport sponsors of other online games and it was no surprise that Warcraft caught their attention.
As Blizzard were already hosting 5 player team tournaments the company World Series of Video Games (WSVG) negotiated with them to host 3 player team tournaments. Again this tournament carried a $10,000 prize and attracted a great deal of competition among world of warcraft teams.
These three player team tournaments are very exciting to watch and seem to be the most popular of all tournaments. CBS signed a deal with Blizzard to televise Wow tournaments. The CBS deal also lead to a deal with CGS to show the two player team tournaments.
World of Warcraft has passed its "Midas touch" and popularity onto its online arenas. With such large monetary prizes on offer a huge amount of E-sport players are jumping on the Warcraft bandwagon and abandoning their traditional games like rats off a sinking ship!
