Cybersport has already ceased to be entertainment for a very narrow audience. Today, Adidas and Puma sew uniforms for e-sport tournament participants, super popular artists perform in half-time competitions, and the audience of Dota 2 and Counter-Strike championships is in the millions, as are the prize pools.

But what is especially interesting for us is the potential advertising audience and its portrait. Last year, the number of eSports fans grew to 450 million people. These are people who join the competition, watch the progress of the game, cheer for their favorite team…

The main difference between the audiences in regular sports and eSports is age. So boxing and football fans are predominantly men aged 30 to 65, while 75% of eSports fans are young people aged 12 to 39.

The proportion of men is, of course, higher in both profiles, with a slight margin in favor of traditional sports. But the share of average income and the habit of buying online are higher among cyber fans: 43% versus 30% and 64% versus 50%, respectively.

What games are esports or can you play everything?

Games in which teams are initially on an equal footing. There are many such games in general, but the most popular now are Dota2, LoL, CS:GO, Apex, PUBG, Fortnite, etc. You can do everything at once, but only a few disciplines, for example, have special popularity. The rest do not attract our players so much yet.

Play in a team or alone?

This is individual, someone starts playing solo, someone in a team of like-minded people. Just like in music, there are performers, and there are groups - so in eSports. At the start of my career, I would choose a team game, as for me, it is more fun, and if you make a mistake somewhere, then there are people who will cover you. And in solo, everything depends only on the player himself, and the audience for such games is noticeably smaller.

Summarizing

In its trends for 2022, the game is moving from an activity to a destination. We are already starting to see the merging of gaming with social media, which will lead to the creation of a concept known as the Metaverse: an online world where people come not only to play games but also to meet and connect with their friends.

In conclusion, I would like to note that esports is already a multi-million dollar industry with its own rules and, most importantly, a super-loyal audience. Moreover, with the pandemic and digitalization in general, this is not a passing trend, but a phenomenon that will be with us for a long time, so you should already look towards placing ads in games and deeper integration into gameplay.